'The First Fossil Hunters'—4/5

Adrienne Mayor's The First Fossil Hunters may seem a pinch on the dry side at times, but an intriguing thesis supported by credible arguments make this an enjoyable, brisk read with a unique interpretation. Mayor's thesis is a rather simple, but thought-provoking one: essentially, ancient nomads, Greeks, Romans, Egyptians, and others found massive fossils that today would be classified as coming from extinct species such as dinosaurs and tried to make sense of them. These efforts led to at least some of the creatures that color their unique mythologies.

Take griffons, for instance, which are the focus of the book's first chapter: Mayor takes us through her initial interest in them. As she looks through ancient representations of creatures, she notes that the griffon stands out against more fantastical creatures like Pegasus: it has a more biological, scientific portrayal. What would cause this?

Pulling on this thread, she comes to the conclusion that the myth of the griffon came from nomadic tribes in Central Asia spotting bones during their travels. As a result, griffons were played up to be fearsome guardians of gold; the reasoning behind this gets more specious, as it could be due to the fossils being found atop clutches of eggs or it could be a self-perpetuating myth begun by tribespeople who spread the myth to keep people away from gold, a sort of urban legend that took on a life of its own.

Similarly, in the Mediterranean, we see stories of giants and cyclopes. Separate from more chimeric conceptions, such as the Minotaur, which fall into the more fantastic mold, there appears to be more ostensible evidence of creatures founded in nature. Sure enough, in Greece and these areas, the bones of mammoths, elephants, and similarly oversized beasts are seen as signs of these massive human ancestors.

A quadrupedal mammoth skeleton

This was encouraged by the similarity between particular bones, most notably the femur, which is almost identical and could have encouraged the ancients to reconstruct fossils in a bipedal, human-like image as opposed to the quadrupedal, beast-like stance and gait we would associate with an elephant or mammoth.

For an easier visual of the difference between the bipedal/quadrupedal skeletons: imagine the mammoth above rearranged to follow the bipedal structure of this cave bear—quite a different animal comes to mind, doesn't it? This is the difference between how we attempt, today, to piece together fossils and how the Greeks got their ideas about giants and previous generations being larger and with more bestial qualities, arguably reflected in Hesiod's Five Ages myth

These stories also feed into the ancient Greek myths of the Titanomachy, or war between the Titans and the Gods, as well as local mythology, such as Typhon or the stories from Samos of the Neades: creatures whose screams were so loud the earth opened and swallowed them, an explanation for earthquakes that still struck the area and caused devastation (as well as the haunting image of their "bones trapped underground").

Particularly as the fossils presented as those of the Neades do not conjure up anything short of nightmare fuel; credit to Wikipedia

In Egypt, the desert aids in this transition of fossils into myths: Mayor teases us with the knowledge of creatures in Egyptian myths that often come from and return to the sands of the desert. Is it so hard to imagine this as a reflection of the hostile desert winds, covering and uncovering bones?

Imagine yourself there, several thousand years ago: it's twilight, sand is blowing, visibility isn't great and you're wiped after a long day under those blistering sun rays. Something odd is poking out of the sand and catches your attention. You keep a distance to be safe, but are intrigued enough to grab a buddy to take a second look at the thing, trying to explain what you saw to him the whole way along—only to get back and find that the thing is gone. Good thing you didn't get closer, right? It must have been alive, after all. And you've already built up this creature in your imagination as you're recounting it to your friend; the air isn't being let out of that fantasy like it would be if you came back to find the fossil. That fossil is buried in the desert sands even as it's blossoming in the fertile soil of your mind.

Overall, The First Fossil Hunters is a great book despite the thesis bordering on the threshold of being impossible to prove. I wouldn't quite call it a beach read, as it is on the more academic side, but many of the more academic aspects of the book aren't essential to understanding and enjoying the colorful thesis. While these fossils might help to explain some of the mythology and fantastic creatures of ancient peoples, ultimately the same impulse inspired Mayor to write this book as inspired these ancient people to create the myths in the first place: it helps to give some logic to the world and it's just fun.