Ancient Books - Page 4

The Mayan Code: Time Acceleration and Awakening the World Mind

Barbara Hand Clow

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Total reviews: 40 Average rating: 3.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

Bestselling author Barbara Hand Clow shows how the Mayan Calendar is a bridge to galactic wisdom that fosters personal growth and human evolution

• Unearths the meaning behind the calendar, its message for modern civilization, and what will happen when the calendar ends

• Reveals how time acceleration is a manifestation of the acceleration of consciousness

• By the author of The Pleiadian Agenda

Many researchers have investigated the science of time cycles by using the Mayan Calendar, which tracks the 5,125-year Long Count ending in the year 2012. History shows that civilizations suddenly appeared around 3115 B.C. in Egypt, India, and Sumer that used calendars based on systems similar to the Mayan Calendar, reflecting what was once a universal and sacred understanding of time. In The Mayan Code, Barbara Hand Clow draws on the work of biologist Carl Johan Calleman and many other New Paradigm researchers to unearth the deeper meaning behind the calendar and its message for modern civilization, especially during its final five years.

As we approach the end of the Mayan Calendar, time and consciousness are accelerating. Working with Calleman’s time-acceleration theory, Barbara Hand Clow shows how the cycles of time marked by the calendar match important periods in the evolutionary data banks of Earth and the Milky Way Galaxy and that the calendar describes the evolutionary stage to come. She explores how our own personal healing is the most important factor as we prepare to make this critical leap in human evolution--now referred to as the awakening of the World Mind.

Europe Between the Oceans: 9000 BC-AD 1000

Barry Cunliffe

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Total reviews: 2 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

Europe is, in world terms, a relatively minor peninsula attached to the Eurasian land mass. Yet it became one of the most innovative regions on the planet, generating restless adventurers who traversed the globe to trade, to explore, and often to settle. By the fifteenth century Europe was a driving world force, but the origins of its success have until now remained obscured in prehistory.

 

In this magnificent book, distinguished archaeologist Barry Cunliffe views Europe not in terms of states and shifting political land boundaries but as a geographical niche particularly favored in facing many seas. These seas, and Europe’s great transpeninsular rivers, ensured a rich diversity of natural resources while also encouraging the dynamic interaction of peoples across networks of communication and exchange. The development of these early Europeans is rooted in complex interplays, shifting balances, and geographic and demographic fluidity.

 

Weaving together titanic concepts while remaining sensitive to specifics, Cunliffe has produced an interdisciplinary tour de force. His is a bold book of exceptional scholarship, erudite and engaging, and it heralds an entirely new understanding of Old Europe.

(20080808)

The Gifts of the Jews: How a Tribe of Desert Nomads Changed the Way Everyone Thinks and Feels (Hinges of History)

Thomas Cahill

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Total reviews: 141 Average rating: 3.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

The author of the runaway bestseller How the Irish Saved Civilization has done it again. In The Gifts of the Jews Thomas Cahill takes us on another enchanting journey into history, once again recreating a time when the actions of a small band of people had repercussions that are still felt today.



The Gifts of the Jews reveals the critical change that made western civilization possible. Within the matrix of ancient religions and philosophies, life was seen as part of an endless cycle of birth and death; time was like a wheel, spinning ceaselessly. Yet somehow, the ancient Jews began to see time differently. For them, time had a beginning and an end; it was a narrative, whose triumphant conclusion would come in the future. From this insight came a new conception of men and women as individuals with unique destinies--a conception that would inform the Declaration of Independence--and our hopeful belief in progress and the sense that tomorrow can be better than today. As Thomas Cahill narrates this momentous shift, he also explains the real significance of such Biblical figures as Abraham and Sarah, Moses and the Pharaoh, Joshua, Isaiah, and Jeremiah.



Full of compelling stories, insights and humor, The Gifts of the Jews is an irresistible exploration of history as fascinating and fun as How the Irish Saved Civilization.

The Works of Josephus: Complete and Unabridged, New Updated Edition

Flavius Josephus

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Total reviews: 30 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

an amazing reference 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

want to know how Christianity was working when the apostles were still the ones calling the shots? here is a first/second century historians perspective on what was going on in that time

Editorial Review:

This renowned reference book has served scholars, pastors, students, and those interested in the background of the New Testament for years. The insight given into the Essene community, the destruction of Jerusalem and the interpretations and traditions of the Old Testament in first century Judaism is invaluable. The outlook of Josephus, a late first century Pharisee and historian, on Jesus and the New Testament documents is enlightening and provocative. As an original reference, The Works of Josephus is essential to a full understanding of the first century, the time of Christ and the New Testament.

Complete and unabridged, this is the best one-volume edition of the classic translation of JosephusÂ’ works. The entire text has been reset in modern, easy-to-read type; numbering corresponding to that used in the Loeb edition has been added to the text; and citations and cross-references have been updated from Roman numerals to Arabic numbers.

The Fall of the Roman Empire: A New History of Rome and the Barbarians

Peter Heather

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Editorial Review:

The death of the Roman Empire is one of the perennial mysteries of world history. Now, in this groundbreaking book, Peter Heather proposes a stunning new solution: Centuries of imperialism turned the neighbors Rome called barbarians into an enemy capable of dismantling an Empire that had dominated their lives for so long.
A leading authority on the late Roman Empire and on the barbarians, Heather relates the extraordinary story of how Europe's barbarians, transformed by centuries of contact with Rome on every possible level, eventually pulled the empire apart. He shows first how the Huns overturned the existing strategic balance of power on Rome's European frontiers, to force the Goths and others to seek refuge inside the Empire. This prompted two generations of struggle, during which new barbarian coalitions, formed in response to Roman hostility, brought the Roman west to its knees. The Goths first destroyed a Roman army at the battle of Hadrianople in 378, and went on to sack Rome in 410. The Vandals spread devastation in Gaul and Spain, before conquering North Africa, the breadbasket of the Western Empire, in 439. We then meet Attila the Hun, whose reign of terror swept from Constantinople to Paris, but whose death in 453 ironically precipitated a final desperate phase of Roman collapse, culminating in the Vandals' defeat of the massive Byzantine Armada: the west's last chance for survival.
Peter Heather convincingly argues that the Roman Empire was not on the brink of social or moral collapse. What brought it to an end were the barbarians.

Nefertiti (Unabridged)

Michelle Moran

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Total reviews: 115 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

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Nefertiti and her younger sister, Mutnodjmet, have been raised in a powerful family that has provided wives to the rulers of Egypt for centuries. Ambitious, charismatic, and beautiful, Nefertiti is destined to marry Amunhotep, an unstable young pharaoh. It is hoped by all that her strong personality will temper the young Amunhotep’s heretical desire to forsake Egypt’s ancient gods, overthrow the priests of Amun, and introduce a new sun god for all to worship.

From the moment of her arrival in Thebes, Nefertiti is beloved by the people. Her charisma is matched only by her husband’s perceived generosity: Amunhotep showers his subjects with lofty promises. The love of the commoners will not be enough, however, if the royal couple is not able to conceive an heir, and as Nefertiti turns her attention to producing a son, she fails to see that the powerful priests, along with the military, are plotting against her husband’s rule. The only person wise enough to recognize the shift in political winds—and brave enough to tell the queen—is her younger sister, Mutnodjmet.

Observant and contemplative, Mutnodjmet has never shared her sister’s desire for power. She yearns for a quiet existence away from family duty and the intrigues of court. Her greatest hope is to share her life with the general who has won her heart. But as Nefertiti learns of the precariousness of her reign, she declares that her sister must remain at court and marry for political gain, not love. To achieve her independence, Mutnodjmet must defy her sister, the most powerful woman in Egypt—while also remaining loyal to the needs of her family.

Love, betrayal, political unrest, plague, and religious conflict—Nefertiti brings ancient Egypt to life in vivid detail. Fast-paced and historically accurate, it is the dramatic story of two unforgettable women living through a remarkable period in history.

The Machu Picchu Guidebook: A Self-Guided Tour

Ruth M. Wright, Alfredo Valencia Zegarra

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Total reviews: 29 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

A great way to prepare your eyes for Machu Picchu 5 out of 5 stars.
2 of 2 people found this review helpful.

This book is fairly scholarly and serious, but I read it on a cross-country flight, using the detailed map insert to locate key items as I read. It made my enjoyment of the site itself many many times greater. Most local guides you hire at the site will only show you "Machu Picchu's greatest hits", and with the book's knowledge you can really appreciate what they are taking you to and can explore the rest effectively on your own. I was glad to have read and studied the book and its many illustrations ahead, however, as the weather was wet and using it as an on-the-spot guide wouldn't have worked so well.

Very Useful for Self-Guided Tour 5 out of 5 stars.
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I spent 8 hrs visiting Machu Picchu following the guide. It was very detailed in describing each sector and the information given was enough to get a good understanding of the place. We walked to see the "Inca Bridge" and it described exactly what to expect and when to stop walking. I will recommend this book to anyone that is going to visit Machu Picchu. Great guide!!!

Editorial Review:

This revised edition includes newly discovered sites. New photos and maps with full-color illustrations of real life scences from National Geographic Magazine.

Maximum City: Bombay Lost and Found

Suketu Mehta

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Total reviews: 75 Average rating: 3.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

A brilliantly illuminating portrait of Bombay and its people–a book as vast, diverse, and rich in experience, incident, and sensation as the city itself–from an award-winning Indian-American fiction writer and journalist.

A native of Bombay, Suketu Mehta gives us a true insider’s view of this stunning city, bringing to his account a rare level of insight, detail, and intimacy. He approaches the city from unexpected angles–taking us into the criminal underworld of rival Muslim and Hindu gangs who wrest control of the city’s byzantine political and commercial systems . . . following the life of a bar dancer who chose the only life available to her after a childhood of poverty and abuse . . . opening the doors onto the fantastic, hierarchical inner sanctums of Bollywood . . . delving into the stories of the countless people who come from the villages in search of a better life and end up living on the sidewalks–the essential saga of a great city endlessly played out.

Through it all–as each individual story unfolds–we hear Mehta’s own story: of the mixture of love, frustration, fascination, and intense identification he feels for and with Bombay, as he tries to find home again after twenty-one years abroad. And he makes clear that Bombay–the world’s largest city–is a harbinger of the vast megalopolises that will redefine the very idea of “the city” in the near future.

Candid, impassioned, funny, and heartrending, Maximum City is a revelation of an ancient and ever-changing world.

The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Vol. 3

Edward Gibbon

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Total reviews: 68 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

The Book 5 out of 5 stars.
4 of 5 people found this review helpful.

First one thing: do not, on any account, get the abridged version. If I could take one book to a desert island, it would be this one. That's because it is extremely long, and every word of it is worth it.

Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire remains as relevant as ever. And this is in spite of its hugely ambitious scope, treating of the history of the Roman and Byzantine empires (both considered Roman by Gibbon) from the end of the 1st century AD to the 15th. Gibbon is a modern historian. He is shrewdly selective of his sources, judiciously reserved, and coldly analytical. He differentiates between proximate and ultimate causes. He has a humanistic but impartial point of view. At the same time, he is an 18th century Englishman. While this is reflected in some of his opinions, such as that the extinction of republican freedom was what determined Rome's decline, it makes them no less valid and often the more interesting; it is hard to imagine anyone today being able to treat the early Christian controversies with the same tact and humour, for example.

And Edward Gibbon wrote like an enchanter. I read somewhere that his style was an inspiration to Churchill. No wonder. Every line of this tome of perhaps a million words is a delight to read. You will laugh out loud. His thought is clear and convincing. And there are simply magical moments, such as when he produces that mythical animal that appeared in the Roman circus, an animal no one in Europe has seen since then... a giraffe. Or the dissertation on whether Europe remains at threat of invasion from the Mongols.

The Decline and Fall is full of telling anecdotes, and yet it always holds to a general picture. It is filled with detail and colour but never loses the reader. It is packed with events, and it offers discussion of longer trends - notably those that participated in Rome's decline and led to its eventual fall - political, religious, military, economic. And it is even more impressive when one thinks of the modern tools its author did not have at his disposal, in particular archaeological and numismatic. Approximately half of the book is dedicated to the Roman Empire proper, up to the late 5th century. This is where Gibbon is at his strongest, his research the most thorough. The rest deals with Byzantium, touching heavily on European history up to the fall of Constantinople, and has a broader sweep. His work ends with a description of Rome as it looks today (i.e. in the late 18th century).

I finished reading my copy (after several happy months) in Rome itself, in a little place with a view of the Pantheon. If you have the luck of being able to do that, you will never forget it.

Editorial Review:

This is an abridged edition of Gibbon's classic. Concentrating on the centuries from the age of the Antonines to the fall of the empire in the West, this volume chronicles "the triumph of barbarism and religion" in the disruption of the unified empire, the rise of Christianity, the progress of the Huns from China and the revolt of the Goths.

2012: The Year of the Mayan Prophecy

Daniel Pinchbeck

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Total reviews: 114 Average rating: 3.5 of 5

2012 4 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

I found this book very interesting and very well written. The interesting with Pinchbeck is his backgrund in the intellectual art milieu of New York combined with a later interest in the occult, new spirituality and mysticism. 2012: The Return of Quetzalcoatl is sort of a spiritual and intellectual biography. We follow Daniel on his travels and thoughts, to Stonhenge to look for crop circles, to the amazonas to try hallucinogenic mushroooms and so on. Driven by a frustration over the shallowness and crudeness of "western" "materialism" he seeks new and/or alternative world views.
What I like is Pinchbecks openness towards "the other side". He actually tries it all: drugs, crop circles, meditation, 2012 "prophesies", mayan calendar stuff and so on, with an open but inteligent mind. Often his reasoning is interesting to follow, sometimes it gets a bit too longwinded. I also like that he does not give the reader a new philosophy or ontology or religion or system of beliefs. Rather, as I read him, it is an attempt to shake a little the ingrained view of reality we usually take for granted. Is the established conception of reality so obvious? Or is there something fundamental that we can't see? And if so, can alternative world views give us a hint? 2012 opens up windows to alternative and fascinating ideas, described by someone with a foot in mainstream acedemic discourse as well. Which I think is unusual.
New age-fans or seekers of a belief system will probably find 2012 too ambiguous. Rather I think this book is intended for sceptical readers with an open mind.