An Enquiring Mind

Studies in Honor of Alexander Marshack

Paul G. Bahn, P.G. (ed).

Hardcover. 352 p. Oxbow Books 2010 .Publishers' price € 24


Alexander Marshack single-handedly revolutionized the field of Paleolithic art research. His astounding photographs of portable art objects caused us to see them with fresh eyes, to ask new questions, and to understand their technology and production far more precisely; and his pioneering use of infrared and ultraviolet light in the caves revealed startling new facts about the paintings. In addition, he carried out important, provocative and challenging work on archaeoastronomy, calendar sticks, female imagery, and other topics. Alexander Marshack was able to do what nobody else ever had before, or perhaps ever will again - i.e. travel all over Europe, visiting not only many decorated caves but also all the portable art objects scattered throughout the continent, including Russia. This unique experience and knowledge, together with his unrivalled and amazing documentation of all this material, made him by far the USA's foremost specialist in Paleolithic imagery. To honor his memory, in this book, scholars from many parts of the world contribute papers about some of the many problems that interested him and to which he made such a massive contribution.

1. Introduction (Elaine Marshack)
2. Alexander Marshack and Harvard University’s Peabody Museum (C. C. Lamberg-Karlovsky)
3. Calendars, Cosmologies, and the Unwritten Record in Ancient Mesoamerica (Anthony Aveni)
4. First Things First: Abstract and Figurative Artistic Expressions in the Levant (Anna Belfer-Cohen and Ofer Bar-Yosef)
5. Seals from the Magdalenian site of Gonnersdorf (Rhineland, Germany) (Gerhard Bosinski and Hannelore Bosinski)
6. Support for a New Sky Hero from a Conquered Land (John Clegg)
7. Eye and Vision in Paleolithic Art (Brigitte and Gilles Delluc)
8. The Oldest Representation of Childbirth (Francesco d’Errico)
9. Hunting the European Sky Bears: A Diachronic Analysis of Santa Claus and His Helpers (Roslyn Frank)
10. After the Ice Age: How Calendar-Keeping Shaped Early Social Structuring (Michael Hudson)
11. The Crow, the Cup, and the Water Snake: Celestial Seasonality of Figs and Rain (E. C. Krupp)
12. Claw Marks and Ritual Traces in the Paleolithic Sanctuaries of the Quercy (Michel Lorblanchet)
13. Alexander Marshack: His Original Views and Thoughts. A Remarkable Contribution to the Evolution of Research: the Contribution of a Fascinating Session of Work at Gouy (Yves Martin)
14. The Venus of Macomer: A Little-Known Prehistoric Figurine from Sardinia (Margherita Mussi)
15. Chasing Thoughts Lost Thirty Millennia Ago (Elena Okladnikova)
16. Paleolithic Mosaics (Marcel Otte)
17. The Chauvet Conundrum: Are Claims for the “Birthplace of Art” Premature? (Paul Pettitt, Paul Bahn, and Christian Zuchner)
18. Communication with Symbols: Art and Writing (Denise Schmandt-Besserat)
19. Four Forms of Finger Flutings as Seen in Rouffignac Cave, France (Kevin Sharpe and Leslie Van Gelder)
20. Defining Modernity, Establishing Rubicons, Imagining the Other – and the Neanderthal Enigma (Olga Soffer)
21. Evolution and the Human Capacity (Ian Tattersall)
22. Jean Vertut (Alexander Marshack, with an introduction by Paul Bahn)