Grafton Elliot Smith: Map of Hyperdiffusionism from Egypt, 1929
Hyperdiffusionism is a pseudoarchaeological hypothesis[1] that postulates that certain historical technologies or ideas were developed by a single people or civilization and then spread to other cultures. Thus, all great civilizations to engage in what appear to be similar cultural practices, such as the construction of pyramids, derived them from a single common progenitor.[2] According to proponents of hyperdiffusion, examples of hyperdiffusion can be found in religious practices, cultural technologies, megalithic monuments, and lost ancient civilizations.
The idea of hyperdiffusionism differs from trans-cultural diffusion in several ways. One is the fact that hyperdiffusionism is usually not testable due to its pseudo-scientific nature.[3]:255–56 Also, unlike trans-cultural diffusion, hyperdiffusionism does not use trading and cultural networks to explain the expansion of a society within a single culture; instead, hyperdiffusionists claim that all major cultural innovations and societies derive from one (usually lost) ancient civilization.[3]:224–32 Ergo, the Tucson artifacts derive from ancient Rome, carried by the "Romans who came across the Atlantic and then overland to Arizona;" this is believed because the artifacts resembled known ancient Roman artifacts.[3]:246 One common hyperdiffusionist hypothesis states that the similarities among disparate civilizations were inherited from the civilization of a lost continent, such as Atlantis or Lemuria, which has since sunk into the sea. Egypt is also commonly featured in hyperdiffusionist narratives, either as an intermediate civilization that inherited its culture from such a lost continent and in turn passed it on to other civilizations or as a source of hyperdiffused elements itself.
Francis Joseph Collin (born November 3, 1944) is an American former political activist and Midwest coordinator with the American Nazi Party, later known as the National Socialist White People's Party. After being ousted for being partly Jewish (which he denied), in 1970, Collin founded the National Socialist Party of America. (N.S.P.A.)[4] In the late 1970s, his planned march in the predominantly Jewish suburb of Skokie, Illinois was challenged; however, the American Civil Liberties Union defended Collin's group's freedom of speech and assembly in a case that reached the United States Supreme Court to correct procedural deficiencies. Specifically, the necessity of immediate appellate review of orders restraining the exercise of First Amendment rights was strongly emphasized in National Socialist Party v. Village of Skokie, 432 U.S. 43 (1977). Afterward, the Illinois Supreme Court held that the party had a right to march and to display swastikas, despite local opposition, based on the First Amendment to the United States Constitution. Collin then offered a compromise, offering to march in Chicago's Marquette Park (where Martin Luther King had been attacked in 1966) instead of Skokie.[5][6] After Collin was convicted and sentenced in 1979 for child molestation, he lost his position in the party.[7][8]
Grafton Elliot Smith
The so-called Heliolithic Culture hypothesized by Grafton Elliot Smith includes a wide range of hyperdiffused cultural practices such as megaliths and sun worship (the name was coined by Smith himself from helios, "sun", and lith, "stone") and the similar designs and methods of the construction of such pieces are described as having a linear geographical distribution.[9] These heliolithic cultures can refer to religious customs that share distinctive practices, such as the worship of a Solar Deity. As this trope is seen in numerous belief systems, Smith believes that it is diffused from one ancient civilization.[9]:132
According to G. Elliot Smith, Egypt was the source of civilization for Asia, India, China, and the Pacific, and eventually, it was the source of civilization for America.[9]:45 Smith sees Mummification as a prime example of how religious customs prove the diffusion of a single ancient culture.[9]:21 He believes that only an advanced civilization, such as Egypt, could create such a peculiar belief, and that it then spread by way of ancient mariners.[9]:133–34
Early Man Distribution refers to Smith's belief that Modern Man is derived from "six well-defined types of mankind," which comprise the sources of Earth's population.[10] The six types of mankind are the Aboriginal Australians, Negroes, Mongols, and the Mediterranean, Alpine, and Nordic races.[10]:15
Carl Whiting Bishop
Carl Whiting Bishop in the 1930s and the 1940s produced a series of articles arguing hyperdiffusionism in explaining the expansion of technology into China. Among the scholars influenced by Bishop were Owen Lattimore, who was intrigued by Bishop's emphasis on geography as a shaping factor in Chinese civilization and his emphasis on field work rather than library research.[11]
Charles Hapgood
In Charles Hapgood's book Maps of the Ancient Sea Kings, he concludes that ancient land formations gave way to hyperdiffusionism and the diffusion "of a true culture."[12] This culture could have been more advanced than that of Egypt or Greece because it was the foundation of a worldwide culture. Hapgood also suggests that the Three-age system of archeology is irrelevant due to primitive cultures co-existing with modern societies.[12]:193–94
According to Hapgood, the pyramids in South America and Mexico may be indicative of cultural practices which the builders of them shared with ancient Egyptian civilization.[12]:200 He theorized that the ancient Maya were strongly influenced by the diffusion of ancient Egyptian social and political cultures,[13] and that they became a civilized culture due to the migration of citizens from Atlantis after that island sank.[14] For example, he says "How did the Mayans achieve such precise results...the knowledge may have, of course, been derived by the Babylonians or the Egyptians".[12]:198 It is also said that Mayan artifacts resemble those of a classical culture, possibly Greece.[2]:147 This plays into Plato's Account of the ancient battle for Atlantis, which led to the downfall of the civilization.
Hapgood finds evidence of ancient Egyptian "expression" in the writings of Hinduism and Buddhism. He notes that in these writings there appear deities that are similar to those worshiped throughout the world. Furthermore, there are myths and creation stories that are said to have a common origin in Egypt.[12]:204–5
Barry Fell
Mystery Hill, or America's Stonehenge, is the site which Barry Fell refers to as the primary basis of his hypothesis that ancient Celts once populated New England.[15] Mystery Hill, Fell believes, was a place of worship for the Celts and Phoenician mariners.[15]:91 These ancient mariners, called the Druids, are said to have populated Europe at the same time. He hypothesizes that they were the ancient settlers of North America. Also, he believes that what he describes as inscriptions on stone and tablet artifacts from this site are in an ancient language derived from common sources of the Goidelic languages.[15]:92
These authors describe hyperdiffusionism as the driving force behind the apparent cultural similarities and population distribution among all civilizations. Hapgood's hypothesis states that one specific civilization is responsible for similar cultural practices in all other civilizations. Smith says that religions are proof of hyperdiffusionism, as similar worship ceremonies and symbols recur in geographically separated societies. Also, Smith believes that the Earth's population is made up of six types of humans, who diffused across the Earth's continents by virtue of their skin color.[10]:47–48 Finally, Fell asserts that ancient mariners, such as Druids and Phoenicians, traveled from Europe and comprised the early population of ancient America.
Critiques
Alexander Goldenweiser
Alexander Goldenweiser in Culture: The Diffusion Controversy stated that there are reasons for believing that culture may arise independently rather than being transmitted. In addition, Goldenweiser insists that behavior is primitive and that cultural similarities may arise simply because they are reflections of adaptive traits that all human beings have evolved. Goldenweiser disagrees with the theory of hyperdiffusionism, stating that "culture is not contagious"[16]:104 and that the data fails to support the theory.[16]:100–106
Stephen Williams
Stephen Williams uses the phrase "Fantastic Archaeology" to describe the archeological theories and discoveries which he defines as "fanciful archaeological interpretations".[3]:12 These interpretations usually lack artifacts, data, and testable theories to back up the claims made.
In his chapter "Across The Sea They Came," Williams introduces a few hyperdiffusionists, their discoveries, and how they "tested" artifacts, beginning with Harold S. Gladwin who made his "fantastic" discoveries at an Arizona Pueblo site, Gila Pueblo Archaeological Foundation. Gladwin favored the diffusion theories which later influenced his methodologies for dating the artifacts at the site. This belief led him to ignore the data that was found at the Folsom site in his chronology as it made his "Man descended from Asia into the New World" theory impossible.[3]:230 The section continues with Cyclone Covey and Thomas W. Bent, specifically their publications on the Tucson Artifacts and their theory that ancient Romans traveled to Arizona. Williams pokes fun at this theory in his book Fantastic Archaeology, and criticizes the authors for failing to explain exactly how and why these artifacts were found in Arizona, and focusing their attention instead only on the artifacts themselves and their similarities to Roman artifacts.[3]:240 Concluding, Williams points out in the chapter how hyperdiffusionists fail to recognize solid archaeological research methods and/or ignore conflicting data and contextual evidence. They are "tailoring their finds with any similar chronology or in-depth linguistic analysis that fits into their scenarios".[3]:255–56
Alice Kehoe
Alice Beck Kehoe says that diffusionism is a "grossly racist ideology".[17]:144 Although she agrees that diffusion of culture can occur through contact and trading, she disagrees with the theory that all civilization came from one superior ancient society.[17]:148
Kehoe explores the "independent invention" of works and techniques using the example of boats. Ancient peoples could have used their boat technology to make contact with new civilizations and exchange ideas. Moreover, the use of boats is a testable theory, which can be evaluated by recreating voyages in certain kinds of vessels, unlike hyperdiffusionism.[17]:158 Kehoe concludes with the theory of transoceanic contact and makes clear that she is not asserting a specific theory of how and when cultures diffused and blended, but is instead offering a plausible, and testable, example of how civilizational similarities may have arisen without hyperdiffusionism, namely by independent invention and maritime contact.[17]:169
↑ Steiger, Brad; Steiger, Sherry (2012). Conspiracies and Secret Societies: The Complete Dossier (2nded.). Detroit, Michigan: Visible Ink Press. p.18. ISBN978-1578593682. In 1979 Collin's ambition to lead a new Nazi America was thwarted when he was arrested, convicted, and sent to prison on child molestation charges.
1 2 3 4 5 Smith, G. Elliot (1929). The Migrations of Early Culture. Manchester: Manchester University Press. OCLC1868131.
1 2 3 Smith, G. Elliot (1931). The Evolution of Man. London: Ernest Benn Limited. pp.13–47. OCLC637203360.
1 2 3 4 5 Hapgood, Charles H. (1966). Maps of the Ancient Sea Kings. Philadelphia: Chilton Company. pp.193–206.
↑ Webster, David (2006). "The Mystique of the Ancient Maya". In Fagan, Garrett G. (ed.). Archaeological Fantasies. Oxford: Routledge. pp.129–154. 978-0-415-30593-8.
↑ Hale, Christopher (2006). "The Atlantean Box". In Fagan, Garrett G. (ed.). Archaeological Fantasies. Oxford: Routledge. pp.235–59. ISBN978-0-415-30593-8.
1 2 3 4 Kehoe, Alice Beck (2008). Controversies in Archaeology. Walnut Creek, CA: Left Coast Press. pp.140–172. ISBN978-1-59874-062-2.
Related Research Articles
Afrocentrism is a worldview that is centered on the history of people of African descent or a biased view that favors it over non-African civilizations. It is in some respects a response to Eurocentric attitudes about African people and their historical contributions. It seeks to counter what it sees as mistakes and ideas perpetuated by the racist philosophical underpinnings of Western academic disciplines as they developed during and since Europe's Early Renaissance as justifying rationales for the enslavement of other peoples, in order to enable more accurate accounts of not only African but all people's contributions to world history. Afrocentricity deals primarily with self-determination and African agency and is a pan-African point of view for the study of culture, philosophy, and history.
Pseudoarchaeology—also known as alternative archaeology, fringe archaeology, fantastic archaeology, cult archaeology, and spooky archaeology—is the interpretation of the past by people who are not professional archaeologists and who reject or ignore the accepted data gathering and analytical methods of the discipline. These pseudoscientific interpretations involve the use of artifacts, sites or materials to construct scientifically insubstantial theories to strengthen the pseudoarchaeologists' claims. Methods include exaggeration of evidence, dramatic or romanticized conclusions, use of fallacious arguments, and fabrication of evidence.
Ancient astronauts refer to a pseudoscientific set of beliefs that hold that intelligent extraterrestrial beings visited Earth and made contact with humans in antiquity and prehistoric times. Proponents suggest that this contact influenced the development of modern cultures, technologies, religions, and human biology. A common position is that deities from most, if not all, religions are extraterrestrial in origin, and that advanced technologies brought to Earth by ancient astronauts were interpreted as evidence of divine status by early humans.
Sir Edward Burnett Tylor was an English anthropologist, and professor of anthropology.
Graham Bruce Hancock is a British writer who promotes pseudoscientific theories involving ancient civilizations and hypothetical lost lands. Hancock speculates that an advanced ice age civilization was destroyed in a cataclysm, but that its survivors passed on their knowledge to hunter-gatherers, giving rise to the earliest known civilizations of ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia, and Mesoamerica.
Sir Grafton Elliot Smith was an Australian-British anatomist, Egyptologist and a proponent of the hyperdiffusionist view of prehistory. He believed in the idea that cultural innovations occur only once and that they spread geographically. Based on this, he traced the origins of many cultural and traditional practices across the world, including the New World, to ideas that he believed came from Egypt and in some instances from Asia. An expert on brain anatomy, he was one of the first to study Egyptian mummies using radiological techniques. He took an interest in extinct humanoids and was embroiled in controversy over the authenticity of the Piltdown Man.
Francis Joseph Collin is an American former political activist and Midwest coordinator with the American Nazi Party, later known as the National Socialist White People's Party. After being ousted for being partly Jewish, in 1970, Collin founded the National Socialist Party of America. (N.S.P.A.) In the late 1970s, his planned march in the predominantly Jewish suburb of Skokie, Illinois was challenged; however, the American Civil Liberties Union defended Collin's group's freedom of speech and assembly in a case that reached the United States Supreme Court to correct procedural deficiencies. Specifically, the necessity of immediate appellate review of orders restraining the exercise of First Amendment rights was strongly emphasized in National Socialist Party v. Village of Skokie, 432 U.S. 43 (1977). Afterward, the Illinois Supreme Court held that the party had a right to march and to display swastikas, despite local opposition, based on the First Amendment to the United States Constitution. Collin then offered a compromise, offering to march in Chicago's Marquette Park instead of Skokie. After Collin was convicted and sentenced in 1979 for child molestation, he lost his position in the party.
In cultural anthropology and cultural geography, cultural diffusion, as conceptualized by Leo Frobenius in his 1897/98 publication Der westafrikanische Kulturkreis, is the spread of cultural items—such as ideas, styles, religions, technologies, languages—between individuals, whether within a single culture or from one culture to another. It is distinct from the diffusion of innovations within a specific culture. Examples of diffusion include the spread of the war chariot and iron smelting in ancient times, and the use of automobiles and Western business suits in the 20th century.
Many pre-Columbian cultures in North America were collectively termed "Mound Builders", but the term has no formal meaning. It does not refer to specific people or archaeological culture but refers to the characteristic mound earthworks that indigenous peoples erected for an extended period of more than 5,000 years. The "Mound Builder" cultures span the period of roughly 3500 BCE to the 16th century CE, including the Archaic period, Woodland period, and Mississippian period. Geographically, the cultures were present in the region of the Great Lakes, the Ohio River Valley, Florida, and the Mississippi River Valley and its tributary waters.
Atlantis: The Antediluvian World is a pseudoarchaeological book published in 1882 by Minnesota populist politician Ignatius L. Donnelly. Donnelly considered Plato's account of Atlantis as largely factual and suggested that all known ancient civilizations were descended from this lost land through a process of hyperdiffusionism.
Augustus Henry Julian Le Plongeon was a British-American archeologist and photographer who studied the pre-Columbian ruins of America, particularly those of the Maya civilization on the northern Yucatán Peninsula. While his writings contain many notions that were not well received by his contemporaries and were later disproven, Le Plongeon left a lasting legacy in his photographs documenting the ancient ruins. He was one of the earliest proponents of Mayanism.
Mesoamerican pyramids form a prominent part of ancient Mesoamerican architecture. Although similar in some ways to Egyptian pyramids, these New World structures have flat tops and stairs ascending their faces, more similar to ancient Mesopotamian Ziggurats. The largest pyramid in the world by volume is the Great Pyramid of Cholula, in the east-central Mexican state of Puebla. The builders of certain classic Mesoamerican pyramids have decorated them copiously with stories about the Hero Twins, the feathered serpent Quetzalcoatl, Mesoamerican creation myths, ritualistic sacrifice, etc. written in the form of Maya script on the rises of the steps of the pyramids, on the walls, and on the sculptures contained within.
Fingerprints of the Gods: The Evidence of Earth's Lost Civilization is a 1995 pseudoarcheology book by British writer Graham Hancock, which contends that an advanced civilization existed in prehistory, one which served as the common progenitor civilization to all subsequent known ancient historical ones. The author proposes that sometime around the end of the last ice age this civilization ended in cataclysm, but passed on to its inheritors profound knowledge of such things as astronomy, architecture and mathematics.
Ivan Gladstone Van Sertima was a Guyanese-born British associate professor of Africana Studies at Rutgers University in the United States.
Olmec alternative origin speculations are non-mainstream pseudohistorical theories that have been suggested for the formation of Olmec civilization which contradict generally accepted scholarly consensus. These origin theories typically involve contact with Old World societies. Although these speculations have become somewhat well-known within popular culture, particularly the idea of an African connection to the Olmec, they are not regarded as credible by mainstream researchers of Mesoamerica and are considered fringe theories.
The dynastic race theory was the earliest thesis to attempt to explain how predynastic Egypt developed into the sophisticated monarchy of Dynastic Egypt. The theory holds that the earliest roots of the ancient Egyptian dynastic civilisation were imported by invaders from Mesopotamia who then founded the First Dynasty and brought culture to the indigenous population. This theory had strong supporters in the Egyptological community in the first half of the 20th century, but has since lost mainstream support.
Panbabylonism was the school of thought that considered the cultures and religions of the Middle East and civilization in general to be ultimately derived from Babylonian myths which in turn they viewed as being based on Babylonian astronomy, often in hidden ways.
George Francis Carter was an American professor of geography who taught at Johns Hopkins University and later Texas A&M University. Carter had a background in anthropology and conducted archaeological excavations in Southern California. He is best known for supporting the theories of trans-cultural diffusion and early human settlement of the Americas.
Burrows Cave is the name given to an alleged cave site in Southern Illinois reputedly discovered by Russell E. Burrows in 1982. Burrows says it contained a number of ancient artifacts. Through the many inconsistencies of Russell E. Burrows' story, discovery and findings, the cave is considered a hoax by archaeologists and anthropologists.
Cyril Daryll Forde FRAI was a British anthropologist and Africanist.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
