Customer Reviews

Gods of Eden: Egypt's Lost Legacy and the Genesis of Civilisation

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4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(1)
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1 star:		(1)

 

 

After his sensational "debut" with "From The Ashes To Angels", Andrew Collins gets one step further with this well-structured, well-planned and well-presented study on the apparent existence of a "lost and advanced civilization." Walking on the similar paths with Graham Hancock, Robert Bauval and John Anthony West, Collins traces the footprints of the ancient knowledge and proposes an "antediluvian" civilization which could well be the roots of the now-lost wisdom, Ancient Egyptians once had.

The books starts with some basic facts and "anomalies" of the most enigmatic monuments of the ancient world: Great Sphinx, Valley Temple and the enormous pyramids of Giza plateu. Quoting the pioneer Egyptologists' accounts on the subject (such as W. Flinders Petrie) he underlines the perfect craftsmanship of these monuments without apparent existence of essential tools to form the hard and large stone blocks which weighted hundreds of tones.

Then he presents an alternative explanation for this excellent masonry: Probable usage of now-lost "sound technology" to levitate the giant stone blocks. He goes on with convincing arguments, supported with some "enigmatic" verses from the Old Testament. His conclusion is an ancient (probably "antediluvian") technology which was preserved by some cults in Ancient Egypt (in Heliopolis and Thebes) then somehow obtained by Biblical Moses, who was supposedly raised by Egyptians. During the course of his work, Collins also suggests his dating of Biblical Exodus.

Though I personally disagree on a number points with Collins (including the existence of Moses as a real personality and the dating of Exodus), and I found his "sound technology" theory just an interesting "fantasy", I must admit that "Gods of Eden" is definitely a very impressive book which deserves a careful reading. Furthermore, it includes a well-written, detailed panorama of Ancient Egyptian sacred cults which is somehow unique among contemporary works on the subject. If you are somehow interested with the Ancient Egyptian culture, this book should be on your bookshelf.

I accidentally came upon Andrew Collins when researching material on Atlantis, and read his excellent GATEWAY TO ATLANTIS. I had to go to Amazon.uk to find his previous works. Good thing they are now readily availble in the USA.

GODS OF EDEN is one of those books that one needs to pick up periodically to mull over. It's nearly impossible to take in all of Collins' theories in one go. But he makes impressive arguments that the Egyptian culture is much older than traditional archeologists will admit. While kicking a bit of dust at the stodgy, old Egyptologists at the British Museum, Collins also deftly avoids the smoke and mirrors of "pyramidiots" old and new.

I admit he loses me a bit when he travels too far afield of Egypt, but I attribute the fault with myself and not with him. The book is copiously footnoted (they make good reading in themselves) and well researched.

I would give this book 5 stars for a good research done. But there are some very strange arguments.

Notably, the author actually relies on revelations by psychics. Well, this seems too much for me.

Very irritating is the author's manner of attaching words like "unquestionably" to what should be properly regarded as wild suppositions.

Many statements of facts raise doubts, especially when skilled artisan work and agriculture are assigned to 8000-9000 BCE.

The author attempts to make a point that ancient Egyptians had technology, unavailable even now. That's because we can't build pyramids like they did. So, what technology is that? Believe it or not, the author spends much effort to prove they possessed... saws. You got it right, the incredible technology was the brass saw, perhaps with sapphires on the edge. Of course, this is more than what is normally allowed for that time, but come on, you can't say someone built the pyramids with brass saws and then claim they had higher technology than we do.

Another proof is equally strange, although in its own way. It is commonly thought that Egyptians employed drills under pressure of 1 to 2 tons. This equipment is no rocket science, you see. But the author prefers to conjecture they used ultrasonic drills. Excuse me, but ultrasonic drill should work like a hammer, it won't leave spiral traces, like those found.

Other traces of this antedeluvian culture are equally unimpressive. There are no factories or spacecraft, just a few stones and artefacts, worked up better than we expect of this era. But doesn't it make sense to question their dating, then?

Authors' hypothesis on using sound to lift stones, right or wrong, is pure fantasy.

In order to find similarities between different cultures, the author discusses only those religious ceremonies and gods, which are alike. Not even exact, just somewhat alike. But if we look for dissimilarities, there is much more of them.

The author's point is unclear, but he seems to imply that these highly developed people of the previous civilization, who built pyramids, were in fact bird-worshipping shamans. And fish-worshipping, too. And star-worshipping. In effect, they were just shamans. Would you believe these people left us highly advanced knowledge, hidden below the pyramids?

Andrew Collins is great for coming up with original mysteries of history. Unlike many alternative authors who jump on the Jesus and the grail bandwagon collins comes up with cool topics. This book is one of the only books I have found that deal with sound technology and its ability to levitate objects. I have allways been interested in old tales of large stones being moved with sound. Collins does a good job with the very small amount of information availible to him. And I loved the story of the 19th century inventore John Keely. This man was a genious who like many eccentric people keep his cards close to him. Then all his knowledge was lost after his death. Maybe he was a man ahead of his time like Tesla.

This is an excellent read. The opening chapter is largely a reworking of Hancock's "Fingerprints of the Gods" but after that the author breaks new ground. The greater part of the book is concerned with ancient Egypt and the mechanics of how the pyramids and other structures were actually built. The premise is that the large stone blocks were moved by use of high frequency sound waves which resonated to the extent that the stones were rendered weightless. Although this might sound absurd on first reading, the author offers a thorough analysis and a huge amount of compelling evidence as to why this option should be taken seriously. What is lacking from this book, however, is any mention of Ed Leedskalanin's Coral Castle in Florida, where stones up to 30 tons were moved by a single 100 lb man during the 1950s. Leedskalinin claimed to have cracked the secret of the Pyramid Builders. To date, how the Coral Castle was built remains a mystery.

The notion that there was a high tech civilization on earth before the Great Flood is hardly original, but Mr. Collins does provide extra corroborative evidence that is not found elsewhere, so if this is your interest, it is a book worth buying.

This book gets into how ancient mythology from Sumarians, Egyption, ancient Mexico and many more ancient cultures talk about elder gods or civilization that were around before humans. The book gets into all ancient mythology talk about the same thing with all these cultures not having contact with each other. All these mythologies talk about ancient technology like for example; moving stones with just sound, astronomy. Very interesting book worh a read.

I had hopes for this, but lost interest halfway through. I recommend Bramley's book with the same title - much better and had more relevant facts and information. This one is a huge waste of time, and 372 pages.

The Book arrived very quickly in good condition. Andrew Collins offers a provocative and fascinating perspective on early civilization. He has delivered a well researched theory which I plan to explore further.

This book has a lot of indepth information about Eqyptology. The author has added another concept for the building of the pyrimids and moving of the great stones. It was very intersting and gave food for thought. We modern humans obviously don't know everything!

I like the connections this guy makes between divergent sources in early history. Explains why we think the way we do today.