Customer Reviews

The Mummies of Urumchi

5 star:		(18)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Ms. Barber has given me exactly what I hoped for with this incredible book: a plausible suggestion for the origins of these fascinating people. My first contact with the mummies of the Tarim Basin was through an article published by Discover magazine, which I have kept. After reading that piece, my imagination took off, and I found myself hauling out atlases and everything I own on the pre-history of humans. It was not until reading this excellent book that I found support for some of my inexperienced suspicions of the mummies' origins. I have learned so much from this book, from the dispersion of Indo-European languages to the role of textiles in our human development. I love Ms. Barber's writing style; she doesn't go over the head of the layperson. She uses humor and a friendly tone, as if you were at her elbow, studying the clothing of the Cherchen man. Her manner of explaining new pieces of information was very clear. It was easy to understand a previously unknown textile term, for instance, through her simple illustrations and analogies. I highly recommend this book. I eagerly await more news from the continuing excavations, and more publications from Elizabeth!

This was an impressive text. I am not personally knowledgeable about textiles, although my mother an artist who is a consumate spinner and weaver is, and so I have come to have an appreciation for the weaver's art through my association with her. I was especially impressed by the authors' thorough knowledge of the craft and of the archaeological implications of the textiles preserved with the famous Urumchi mummies of the Tarim Basin of the Taklimakan Desert. These naturally preserved bodies, like the freeze dried mummies of the Andean mountains and the Early Bronze age body found frozen in an Alpine glacier, provide archaeologists with direct information about the health, genetic relationships, and cultural affinities of the people in these regions. In particular the Urumchi mummies are unique in that the population appears to have been caucasian rather than oriental, suggesting early settlement of the area from the West. Prior to the discovery of these bodies, it had always been assumed that the cultures of the East and the West had developed in relative isolation with respect to one another. Now it is clearer that the human populations of both areas were in far greater contact and that there was significant potential for both genetic and cultural exchange, with ultimate implications for the later civilizations that developed in each. With their intensive evaluation of the fiber crafted cultural remains entered with the bodies, the Barbers' add fine points of detail to what is known about the people of the area and of their likely origins. The book clearly illustrates the value of textiles in the approach to archaeological problems.

A rather good look at a very interesting mystery of pre-historic European migrations. Central to this has been the discovery of mummies some three to four-thousand years old who posses what is termed a "Caucasian" appearance, both biologically and culturally. Elizabeth Barber is an expert on ancient textiles and the first part of this book, involved in a description of mummies' textiles (from observations made on a visit there) is in her element and makes what could have been a dreadfully tedious description quite lively. It ends up being the best discussion in the book. In fact I give this book an additional star over other scholarly books of this sort - rather bland usually - for causing me to read with deep interest page after page about what is really an analysis of textile stitching. After describing the better-preserved mummies and analyzing their goods and textile weaves and patterns, she then approaches the whole question of their origins and especially in whether one can link this culture to the theoretical proto Indo-European language-speakers. At this point there is an interesting but rather plainly-written collection of a good deal of information provided by explorers into the region, and comparisons to other cultures such as the Celts, and some linguistic analysis. Although it kept my interest, the jumping between time, place and peoples could sometimes be confusing. And I kept having to search through the maps to remember where we were in relation to where, as these parts of Asia are not very familiar to us. It lacks at the end a good tie-up of loose ends or a summary, that seems required after such a lengthy heaping of theories.

When most people think of mummies, they think of ancient Egypt, or maybe South America. In truth, mummification can occur whenever the conditions are right, and the arid Tarim River basin in Western China has revealed a large number of mummified bodies, thousands of years old.

What sets these mummies out from others is their probable ethinicity. The author displays with great lucidity the thesis that these people were not Asian at all, but rather were closely related to the Celts.

She does this by covering a wide range of available evidence, such as funeral practices, cloth, and language, as well as looking at the geography of the region and exptraploating as to how it may have affected the patterns of settlement three thousand years ago or more. At the end, I was convinced by her arguments, and in the process gained a better appreciation of the Celts, whom I had assumed I understood reasonably well. This is only possible because of the author's breadth of knowledge and research, well presented in a sparsely worded style.

This book is a great combination of popular science and academic sholarship. I like it the more as the author has the intellectual honesty to admit the points on which her thesis may be lacking in evidence. This does much to inspire confidence in the work as a whole.

Having just finished reading Tournament of Shadows, I prefer this book for its coverage of the Tarim River basin by far.

Barber has written a wonderful, entertaining, and compelling book. One of its strengths lies in the fact that it is a perfect blend of many disciplines. Whether discussing archaeology, anthropology, linguistics, history, or her own specialty, textiles and clothing, Barber presents clear and concise points and explanations of theories. This book is exceptionally easy reading for a laymen, because she gives necessary summaries and background information of major theories and events in the sciences. It is also sufficiently detailed and exploratory enough to rivet expert attention, as this case has again aroused a lot of interest on all fronts in the Proto-Indo-European debate.

An excellent read!

I have a longstanding amateur interest in archaeology, but knew nothing of textiles. I found the instruction in the archaeology of textiles to be one of the best thiungs about the book. I also, in contrast to the grumpy first reviewer, very much enjoyed the, admittedly speculative, parts about the migrations of various groups in asian prehistory. It is fascinating to realize that the modern national and ethnic boundaries are merely the latest configuration

This nicely written book by Barber starts by analysing the fabrics associated with mummies found in the Tarim basin of western China. In providing the context of her research, she gives one of the clearest outlines of the prehistory of the western Asia and eastern Europe over the last ten thousand years. Very enjoyable reading and thinking. It reminds me of those books from the 50's on the history of the world through maps, only better.

Stitches in Time by Roger Hainsworth. Urumchi stands on the southern wing of the fabled Silk Road which traversed Asia from China to the Middle East from at least the second century BC. It is the capital of the Uyghur Autonomous province in the far west of the Chinese Republic. Set on the edge of the largely desert Tarim Basin, it houses a museum containing remarkable exhibits: a number of mummified bodies of great antiquity. One of the oldest is the so-called Beauty of Loulan. She was interred about the time of Abraham, or rather earlier than the construction of the more elaborate phase of Stonehenge, that is, about 4,000 years ago. Another, popularly know as Cherchen Man, dates from about 3,000 years ago. We are accustomed to mummies from Ancient Egypt but these are far better preserved than are the bodies of the pharoahs and their courtiers. Moreover, their disconcerting appearance of having recently walked the earth is reinforced by their clothing which the dry conditions have preserved as effectively as they have preserved their wearers and is often still richly coloured. Interestingly these representatives of a very ancient people, although their precise race is still debated, appear Caucasian with no Mongoloid features, fair-haired and, it is believed, were probably blue-eyed. They were also very tall. Cherchen Man, who was buried with three other women, one of them as well preserved as himself, is six feet six inches tall. Some of the women were at least six feet tall. The mummies were not buried with rich grave goods although the clothing interred with them would have been among the most valuable possessions of a people who wandered the steppe with their flocks and herds. It was this clothing which attracted Dr. Barber to these remote exhibits. A lecturer at Occidental College, California, she is the author of Prehistoric Textiles a study of Neolithic and Bronze Age cloth found in the Aegean and a more popular study Women's Work: the First 20,000 Years. She examined as closely as she could through the plexiglass covers of the cases the remarkably skilled techniques of these early weavers and stitchers. She was also allowed to examine some clothing recovered from tombs where the corpses had perished or which had simply been interred as grave goods. Her analysis of the techniques involved would be of considerable value to anyone interested in the history of clothing or fashion. Unfortunately here the archaeology is disappointing because although Dr. Barber could examine in detail clothing excavated from the mummies' graves she was not permitted to penetrate the storerooms in which they were kept to make her own selections. Moreover so far as the mummies were concerned she was usually only allowed to see what any visitor would see. There is considerable frustration in Dr. Barber's analysis of the clothing at times because she could not see what happened to the weave as it passed out of sight beneath the body, what form the underclothing took, and how the seams were sown from within. For the detailed archaeological examination of both corpses, clothing and accessaries we must look elsewhere. This is simultaneously a fascinating and a disappointing book. The archaeology disappoints because no archaeology in the usual sense is directly experienced. Indeed the most significant portions of the book - the analysis of the techniques of weaving, sewing and design of clothing - could probably have been contained in a well illustrated article in the National Geographic. To turn these slender resources into a book has required a great deal of padding and so while we came for mummies we are detained by chapter after chapter which begins cogently but soon wanders off into a discussion about human origins, and much highly speculative discussion about the origins of the Urumchi mummies and the identity of their more recent descendants. If we can believe Dr. Barber, and I doubt that we can, these may include the inhabitants of Celtic Ireland. Thus we are given repetitive discourses about the peoples of central Asia, the successive advances and retreats of the Steppe peoples toward Europe and China, even the wanderings of Alexander the Great, some interesting accounts of such explorers as Sven Hedin and Sir Aurel Stein. These are all interspersed with maps and diagrams illustrating such diverse topics as Central Asia's peculiar drainage system, the vagaries of the position of the Lop Nor "lake" over the centuries, and the slowly developing vocal tracts of humanoids and their simian ancestors. These diversions are often interesting and stimulating but we are not always persuaded of their relevance. Moreover they crop up among several chapters rather than being collected into one coherent whole. The structure is difficult to discern. Dr Barber has been ill-served by her publisher's editor. Infelicitous slang disfigures the text. There are signs of hurried production - for example the error of having the numbering of the plates in the text differ from the numbering of the plates themselves. Happily the book contains scattered nuggets of information, some of which are illuminating, some of which could persuade us to pursue further enquiries in her enticing bibliography. Others are delightfully unexpected. For instance, those who assumed the "Silk Road" was an English translation of some ancient name from Latin or perhaps Chinese will discover that it is simply a translation of "Seidenstrasse", a term coined by the nineteenth century explorer, Ferdinand Baron von Richthofen, a kinsman of Snoopy's old opponent, the "Red Baron".

Excelent book shedding light about early Indo-European migrations when representatives of two principal expansion waves met in East Turkestan: the remants of the first wave that came from the north, probably after being decimated by mongolians, that spoke the conservative "Celtic-like" Tocharian language; and wanderers of the earliest Indo-Iranian branch that arrived coincidentally in Tarim, probably after inventing the spoked wheel just east of the Ural, expanding to West Turkestan and from there choosing direction between Iran, India or Tarim.

It is a praise song to cultural exchange, finally giving equal share to the peoples of the Middle East, China and the "Northern Eurasian barbarians" in their contributions made to the rise of human civilization. Early Indo Europeans wheren't just a language family: they were a race and bearers of culture: not only important in spreading tecnology and languages from west to east and back again, but also creative in inventing their ways.

Now with this book we can recognize in our ancestors more than ever their human face.

I bought this book because I heard an interview with charming Elizabeth Barber about mummies in China. By the time the book was finished she had covered -- almost effortlessly -- a world where weather, textiles, religion, migration, agriculture, geography, mysticism, and so many other fields somehow come together.

These events happen in exotic, unfamiliar and inaccessible places but they are surprisingly relevant to our own lives. So many of the side lessons -- like a bad weather year in east Asia could cause a wave of invasions as far as Moscow, and did for millenia -- have helped to make the conflict-prone post-9/11 days a bit more understandable, sadly.

It's hard to believe that her short lessons about things like dendrochronology (tree-ring dating) and paleolinguistics (word origins and the people who used them) could turn into almost every day concepts, but it's true! Imagine -- we can what the weather was in the Swedish summer of 863 B.C.E. because of tree trunks from around the world! It's a mark of mastery to take a subject so large and present it clearly, and Ms. Barber has done so.