Customer Reviews

Mysteries and Discoveries of Archaeoastronomy: From Giza to Easter Island

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Professor Giulio Magli's book Archaeoastronomy provides the reader with a realistic, science-based, review/survey of the major structures used in antiquity to look at the planets and stars and how the night sky often mixed into ancient civilzations global cultures. This book should be used in colleges and universities as a part of the study of Western Civilization inasmuch as his work provides insights to how the ancients viewed the world, the planets, and stars. The author treats the astronomically-based artifacts with the respect and dignity they deserve in human history. The book would also be a classic in the study of the history of astonomy and, to a lesser extent, astrology since astronomy and astology were one in more ancient times.

IF the reader is looking for the UFO alien life-to-ancient civilization nexus, this is NOT the book for such mind play. The professor treats each site examined around the world with careful and cautious analysis of how the facilities were actually used in ancient times (as best as he can in modernity). I perosnally enjoyed the book more because of my visits to many of the sites described in my years of travels.

Ironically, I read this book while in China (July 2009) and during a visit to Xi'an which made the contents more alive while looking at ancient artifacts of the Chinese history of hundreds of years ago while awaiting the Total Solar Eclipse view from the China mainland. Nonetheless, I am pleased to have added this book to my personal collection since it provides the first serious work I have read on Archaeoastronomy. Professor Magli's book is lenghy but worthy read because it treats the topic with serious academic respect and duty. I recommend it to those with a serious appetite for honesty, scientific analysis, and logical reasoning of ancient astronomical achievements.

The book is an English translation of an Italian book. It seems to be well-researched. I have begun to dig deeper into this field because of this book. It is a very easy read even for dummies like me. It helps to keep [...] handy just in case. This field tells us that many of the "Indian" mound complexes, pyramids, and others structures going back thousands of years dealt with ancient peoples' understanding of the heavenly bodies, and using that knowledge to time yearly events such as vernal equinox and other seasons, even though they did not possess the intricate instruments of today. For instance, the pyraminds at Giza were only one site of many, and not the oldest. I've gone on to read about Cahokia in Illinois and Poverty Point in Louisiana. I've visited Pinson Mounds near Jackson, TN and Mound Bottom on the Harpeth River west of Nashville, TN. It's awe-spiring to read about this history that took place a thousand years and farther in the past.

I found this book difficult to read. The writing style isn't the kind I like.

The book is set up in two parts. The first is a detailed explanation of the archeological sites in question and the second is an explanation of the meaning of what is found at the sites. The overall conclusion is that we bring our present day outlook to all these sites and the explanations of what we find there.

One cannot argue with the conclusions, but the conclusion could have been reached without a hundred pages of detail about what is found at each site.

This is not a book like Chariots of the Gods which looks to aliens or other worldly contact to explain the archeological sites, it is much more of a textbook with lots of pictures and details about what the ancients left behind for us to study. It is unfortunate that no real explanations of what we have found can be gleaned from the book. What is apparent is ancient humans existed for over 150,000 years without buildings of any real size and suddenly massive megalithic structures sprang up around the world. Why is simply beyond us and we cannot bring their world view forward to the present to help us understand what was going on. In addition, we should not impose upon the ancients our own world view. With this I totally agree.

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I can not believe that I paid for such a soap bubble!?!
The worst book about the subject I ever read. A perfect
material for making Whole Foods grocery bags!!
Not only he says nothing new, not only he is 100 years
behind, but "The Professor" has an attitude that, in my view
is incompatible with teaching.
My mistake to buy his book. Promise not to repeat it.

Dear Amazon, I am trying to post the review and I'm asked to rate it.
The rating is 0 (zero) stars! And because I refuse to give it even a star,
I can not post my review. Al right, one star for the binding!