The Seventy Great Inventions of the Ancient World

Edited by:
  • Brian M. Fagan
Thames & Hudson: 2004. 304 pp. £24.95, $40
Quick on the draw? The age of paintings of horses at Chauvet cave in France is controversial. Credit: DRAC RHÔNE-ALPES, SERVICE REGIONAL DE L'ARCHEOLOGIE

The ‘Seventy Great’ book franchise, which first appeared a few years ago, has until now seemed rather lightweight, focusing as it has on ‘wonders’ and ‘mysteries’. The volumes were uniformly attractive and often well written, but they inevitably reminded one of those pointless ‘top 10’ and ‘100 best’ shows that help to pad out the British TV schedules. It is likely that no two archaeologists would ever reach a consensus on which topics to include in such compilations.

But this new addition to the list is a distinct improvement: as a survey of ancient technology, it is far less random and certainly covers the basics. Edited by Brian Fagan, an eminent popularizer of archaeology, it presents almost all the major inventions of humankind, from its origins up to an undefined cut-off point. The 70 topics, we are told, were chosen from a potential list of hundreds, but the basis on which the selections were made, or who made them, is not revealed. Nevertheless, I think archaeologists would agree that few important topics have been omitted, and the team of 42 authors certainly includes a number of outstanding specialists.

Overall, the volume is very up-to-date and includes recent finds such as Germany's Nebra sky disc. Some of the essays are extremely good, notably those on pottery, watercraft and fermented beverages. Others are weaker, but this is an inevitable problem in such works — nobody can really be an expert on every period, and it shows.

In particular, some essays, such as those on clothing or jewellery, display a distinct lack of knowledge of the Stone Age evidence, despite the earliest periods being the most crucial to the book as a whole, as this is when these and many other inventions actually arose. For example, astonishingly, the essay on clothing makes no mention of Italy's Neolithic Iceman, who has made a huge contribution to our knowledge of early everyday wear, as opposed to burial garments; and the great Neolithic wooden well of Kückhoven, Germany, is absent from the essay on water supplies. The piece on boomerangs ignores not only those found in Tutankhamen's tomb, but also the great ivory specimen from Oblazowa, Poland, dating to at least 18,000 years ago; it may have been a ceremonial object, but nevertheless, trials with a facsimile proved it to be an efficient and aerodynamic weapon.

Among the topics that are missing completely, but which could well be argued to have been far more important to human life than board games, ball games, or codes and cyphers (all of which are included), one might mention levers and pulleys, ladders and scaffolds, steps and staircases, cordage and knots — and language. Other topics that are mentioned only briefly, such as mirrors and dentistry, should surely have been accorded much greater significance.

The book is also strangely inconsistent in its attitude to evidence. Some highly controversial items are accepted without a murmur, such as early dates for France's Chauvet cave, a late date for people reaching the Americas, and the Neanderthal ‘flute’ of Divje Babe, Slovenia, which is almost certainly natural, made by carnivores. Yet the early proto-figurine of Berekhat Ram, Israel, is treated with great scepticism, despite having been the subject of two microscopic analyses.

But overall I can recommend this book as an entertaining pot-pourri. It presents a great deal of fascinating information in a highly readable and well illustrated way.