If you don’t debunk alternative archaeology then what’s the… umm… alternative?

Ancient Sumerians. Photo by Santa Rosa

I had a slight worry a few weeks back. I found a book that tackled a large swathe of alternative archaeology telling the truth about it. The subtitle was The Disinformation Guide to Ancient Civilizations, Astonishing Archaeology and Hidden History. It was a surprise because I keep kicking around an idea of writing my own disinformation guide. I flipped it open the contents page and found that it’s probably an uncritical trip through alternative archaeologies greatest hits. So it’s not quite what I want to do. What I’d like to write is a guide on how to write alternative archaeology. There’s a wide range. Some is simply ideas that aren’t accepted by academic archaeologists. Some other books on the other hand seem attempts to cash in on Erich von Daniken’s work. A lot of alternative archaeology is formulaic. If I can crack the formula then there’s the possibility for anyone to make their own alternative past. This could annoy some people. There’s the tale (urban myth?) of the criminal who wrote a guide to home security which was effectively a criminal’s handbook. His defence was that the criminals knew these tricks anyway, so there wasn’t a huge problem in printing these methods. Similarly I think there could be a lot to be gained by examining best-selling alternative archaeology in a light-hearted way. By demonstrating how the formula works it might show why these people aren’t taken seriously.

The main reason for me that it’s of use isn’t that the results are threatening, I’m used to being dead wrong about things. It’s that the process is so lax that the conclusions are down to however you feel on the day. Jack Cohen has a story of telepathic dog in one of his books which demonstrates this. He was shown a dog that could read his owner’s mind. The owner would think of a newspaper and the dog would walk to the newsagent’s and get it. Cohen’s response wasn’t don’t be so daft telepathic dogs don’t exist, it was more sophisticated. He asked was the dog telepathic? Could it not be the newsagent who was receiving the message? Perhaps the man was precognitive and supernaturally predicting which paper the dog would bring. Perhaps the dog was controlling the man with CIA-developed mind-ray. The problem wasn’t that the explanation didn’t work, but that when you make the supernatural an option then you open up so many explanations that there’s no way to logically choose any explanation over the other.

I thought that a similar approach might work with alternative archaeology. For instance what could possibly explain the Mayan crystal skulls? These are realistic looking glass skulls and they’re the product of high technology. According to orthodox archaeology the Mayans were not capable of such work. In terms of technology and style it’s the sort of art you’d expect to find in 19th century Germany instead. How can you explain that. Archaeologists can’t and they’re probably jealous that they were found by an amateur. They were found by Mitchell-Hedges in the city of Lubaantun shortly after he’d bought some 19th German crystal skulls at Sotheby’s.

There’s a lot of stuff like this, William R. Corliss has compiled to good sourcebooks with this kind of information. A compilation of mysterious objects with a guide to why archaeologists aren’t convinced by them, and counter-arguments to weasel out of them could be entertaining and more effective than simply foot-stamping. The London Hammer might not be an ancient artefact, but the natural process of concretion around an object is pretty weird. It also helps show why the context of an artefact is so important. In the case of the London Hammer it wasn’t found in a secure geological context.

It’s not just about the artefacts. There’s a logic to be explored too. I think it’s Sitchin who argued that aliens crossed millions of miles of inhospitable space in their eldritch vehicles to reach Earth. Unfortunately while they had invented space-flight, they hadn’t got round to inventing the tow-bar. It meant they had to enslave people to mine gold for their nefarious alien purposes. Thus alternative archaeology tells us that when we make contact with aliens they probably won’t want to talk about caravans. What it doesn’t do is tell us anything useful about the past. If you’re going to invoke aliens, who’s to say the aliens enslaved the humans? Perhaps the ancient Egyptians snared UFOs with techno-nets and forced the aliens to build the pyramids. It’s plausibility depends on whether or not the audience for an alternative history book are willing to believe in the existence of high technology which has been lost in the mists of time.

Both Cornelius Holtorf and Brian Fagan (who are at opposite ends of the archaeological spectrum) have said in their recent books that it’s the process that’s the important factor rather than the conclusion. I think that if historians and archaeologists are going to be able to justify their positions, then it’s this process that they have to defend, not their conclusions. If I had a sound method for finding Atlantis, then I would have my own research chair at a prestigious university. Perhaps by illuminating the modus operandi of the less scrupulous authors then you can demonstrate it’s the argument that matters rather than the person saying it.

All this relies on being able to show that the alternative archaeology best-sellers are derivative. Is there a common thread that links von Daniken’s Chariots of the Gods, Hancock’s Fingerprints of the Gods, Appleby’s Hall of the Gods and Childress’s Technology of the Gods?

If all you need to make your own alternative past is a little inspiration, I’ve moved the alternative archaeology generator to the new template. It’s been a while since I’ve looked at it. There’s a few KLF references, but I’m not sure where I got “If truth is a weapon then say hello to the AK-47” from. I did a search on Google and found results on Google Scholar. Obviously I’m not the only only person who’s seen too many Lethal Weapon films.

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