The Buried Soul: How Humans Invented Death [Hardcover]

Timothy Taylor (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 15, 2004

A groundbreaking investigation of the human soul that encompasses vampirism, cannibalism, near-death experiences, and modern-day human sacrifice.

“I never would have thought that archaeology would be so interesting, so relevant to how we think today . . . and so disturbing. In The Buried Soul, Timothy Taylor tells a provocative and often grisly tale. This is a fascinating book, grippingly written, of considerable scope and ambition.” —Paul Bloom, professor of psychology, Yale University

Archaeologist Timothy Taylor has spent his life sifting through the relics of our ancestors’ encounters with death: early historical accounts of sacrifice, ancient rituals with echoes in the present, monumental sarcophagi, and bodies discovered in caves, in bogs, and on mountains.

In The Buried Soul, Taylor presents evidence of how the ancients saw their universe and asks how we came to have not only a sense of the afterlife but also an image of the soul. After we began to speak but before we could write, Taylor suggests that early humans, in an astonishing conceptual leap, separated the body from the spirit that animated it. Thus arose a series of rituals that attempted to placate, tempt, scapegoat, destroy, or contain this potentially malevolent spirit.

In the tradition of the best-selling Stiffed, The Buried Soul is a worldwide exploration of the rites and rituals of death. Taylor’s search spans all of human history and interweaves the author’s own experience of bewildering deaths. By combining cutting-edge science, personal insight, and scholarship, The Buried Soul is a radical voyage into sepulchral worlds.

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Taylor's entertaining, if grisly, interpretative history turns the raw gleanings of two centuries of archaeology on their head. Referencing his own experience, as well as others' documented discoveries, he expounds on the pervasiveness of such practices as funerary cannibalism, vampirism, and human sacrifice, and he poses the question, Which came first, the notion of the soul or the ceremonial burial of remains? His conclusions, as he acknowledges, may be somewhat unsettling. Caches of bones, pottery shards, and tools reveal only the most basic clues, and the majority of archaeologists, filtering those clues through their modern "visceral insulation" from things pertaining to death, are, by Taylor's lights, unable to acknowledge how prevalent cannibalism and ritual sacrifice were and are. Furthermore, while widespread popular thought maintains that humans acquired belief in the soul first and then developed ritual burial, Taylor considers the reverse to be more accurate: the immortal soul was invented as a result of the first burial ceremonies. Taylor demonstrates, albeit in highly scholarly style, the value of postulating well-developed, opposing points of view. Donna Chavez
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Review

'I never would have thought that archaeology would be so interesting, so relevant to how we think today . . . and so disturbing. In The Buried Soul, Timothy Taylor tells a provocative and often grisly tale. This is a fascinating book, grippingly written, of considerable scope and ambition.' -Paul Bloom, professor of psychology, Yale University

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 353 pages
• Publisher: Beacon Press (July 15, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0807046728
• ISBN-13: 978-0807046722
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6 x 1.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,941,245 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Insightful but slow reading, August 9, 2005

By 

Newton Ooi (Phoenix, Arizona United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Buried Soul: How Humans Invented Death (Hardcover)

This book deals with the concept of death in the human experience, specifically how the living think of death, try to control it, demystify it, and use it as a tool to control the behavior of individuals and societies. Medicine and the prevention of death is ignored; instead the book focuses on cultural and philosophical issues from prehistory days to modern times.

Topics covered in the book include cannibalism, burial practices, worshipping the dead, exorcism and getting rid of dead spirits, sacrificial killings, beliefs in the afterlife, and vampires. The author attempts to explore these topics for a variety of cultures and geographies, and does a good job of including examples from Islam, the West, Native Americans, Australian aborigines, and some other groups, but the book is in no way comprehensive. Several notable examples of man's obsession with death are excluded, such as Mexico's Day of the Dead, Halloween, and the raising of Lazarus by Jesus. Instead, the book tries to cover the topics we do not necessarily think about or are even aware of. These include the prevalence of ritualistic cannibalism throughout the world, the long history of sacrificial killings, and the one topic still alive today, the treatment of widows in certain non-Western cultures.

The book itself is written in first person. The author is a trained anthropologist working in this field. Each topic begins with his narration of a field dig; from there he goes on to give a lecture on what his finds tell us about culture and history; specifically death. For example, the chapter on cannibalism begins with his description of buried skeletons that show clear cut marks where stone tools were used to separate flesh from bone. This style of writing is engaging, though there were many times when too many words were spent relating the field dig, thereby distracting the reader.

Overall, an interesting book though the reading can be quite slow at times.

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Interesting, August 13, 2005

By 

James Schumann (Hayward, California USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Buried Soul: How Humans Invented Death (Hardcover)

I picked this up at the library, for the cover alone. The photo is outstanding. If you're into death, and the take on death through the ages, you'll like this book. There is a description of a viking burial that is fascinating for us N.Euros, with an excellent interpretation. I enjoy an educated writer and this guy is sharp, but there are no no great revalations here, the value here is in breadth. Does he do what he sets out to do? Pretty much, but he gets a little wordy and sometimes you'll wonder where he's going. If death, the soul, or burial interest you, I'd say you'd enjoy it and get something out of it. I presently don't own this, but it's on my list of titles to flesh out my library, and I will be referring back to this later. Check it out: 4 stars.

6 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars stimulating, April 30, 2005

By 

John E. Carlson "Johnny" (Everett, WA USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Buried Soul: How Humans Invented Death (Hardcover)

I found this book one of the most interesting I have read in a long time. Some of the information in the book was disturbing, but always intellectually engaging. I plan to re read it eventually. Taylor puts forth some ideas that, in his field, have no doubt been controversial, but that is what makes an interesting and thought provoking author and book. My short review and my opinion. Surely there will soon be more reviews from readers who love to write as if they know it all. Read it yourself. You may take exception to some of it, or find yourself in absolute agreement, but it is worth the process.