Who We Are and How We Got Here
Who We Are and How We Got Here

Author: David Reich

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2018-03-29

Total Pages: 400

ISBN-13: 0192554387

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

The past few years have seen a revolution in our ability to map whole genome DNA from ancient humans. With the ancient DNA revolution, combined with rapid genome mapping of present human populations, has come remarkable insights into our past. This important new data has clarified and added to our knowledge from archaeology and anthropology, helped resolve long-existing controversies, challenged long-held views, and thrown up some remarkable surprises. The emerging picture is one of many waves of ancient human migrations, so that all populations existing today are mixes of ancient ones, as well as in many cases carrying a genetic component from Neanderthals, and, in some populations, Denisovans. David Reich, whose team has been at the forefront of these discoveries, explains what the genetics is telling us about ourselves and our complex and often surprising ancestry. Gone are old ideas of any kind of racial 'purity', or even deep and ancient divides between peoples. Instead, we are finding a rich variety of mixtures. Reich describes the cutting-edge findings from the past few years, and also considers the sensitivities involved in tracing ancestry, with science sometimes jostling with politics and tradition. He brings an important wider message: that we should celebrate our rich diversity, and recognize that every one of us is the result of a long history of migration and intermixing of ancient peoples, which we carry as ghosts in our DNA. What will we discover next?

The Native Conquistador
The Native Conquistador

Author: Amber Brian

Publisher: Penn State Press

Published: 2015-06-18

Total Pages: 127

ISBN-13: 0271072040

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

For many years, scholars of the conquest worked to shift focus away from the Spanish perspective and bring attention to the often-ignored voices and viewpoints of the Indians. But recent work that highlights the “Indian conquistadors” has forced scholars to reexamine the simple categories of conqueror and subject and to acknowledge the seemingly contradictory roles assumed by native peoples who chose to fight alongside the Spaniards against other native groups. The Native Conquistador—a translation of the “Thirteenth Relation,” written by don Fernando de Alva Ixtlilxochitl in the early seventeenth century—narrates the conquest of Mexico from Hernando Cortés’s arrival in 1519 through his expedition into Central America in 1524. The protagonist of the story, however, is not the Spanish conquistador but Alva Ixtlilxochitl’s great-great-grandfather, the native prince Ixtlilxochitl of Tetzcoco. This account reveals the complex political dynamics that motivated Ixtlilxochitl’s decisive alliance with Cortés. Moreover, the dynamic plotline, propelled by the feats of Prince Ixtlilxochitl, has made this a compelling story for centuries—and one that will captivate students and scholars today.

Ancestral House
Ancestral House

Author: Taylor & Francis Group

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2021-11-29

Total Pages: 634

ISBN-13: 9780367009489

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

An anthology of 70 short stories by writers of African descent. The authors are from Europe and the Americas (about half of them from the United States), and they include Alice Walker, Hal Bennett and John Edgar Wideman.

Explaining the Practice of Elevating an Ancestor for Veneration
Explaining the Practice of Elevating an Ancestor for Veneration

Author: George Shakwelele

Publisher: Wipf and Stock Publishers

Published: 2023-06-13

Total Pages: 204

ISBN-13: 1666714100

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

The Bisa people of Nabwalya, Zambia love their culture and gladly celebrate all their traditional festivals. This book presents exciting research into Kusefya pa ngena, rituals through which the Bisa elect ancestors for veneration. The Bisa speak freely of how their belief in ancestor veneration does not conflict with their worship of God. For them, the two work hand in hand. Traditional practices are considered vital to the community because they enhance life, reinforce cultural values, and explain life events. Those questioned said ancestor veneration should continue because it benefits current and future generations. For example, their most celebrated ancestor, Kabuswe Yombwe, when petitioned, provides rain and a good harvest for the community. People affirmed that rain fell each time they petitioned Kabuswe. One woman, who is married to an elder in a Pentecostal church, vowed not to give up ancestor veneration, to which she attributed the healing of her son and daughter. She pledged her allegiance to both Jesus Christ and to her family's ancestors. In another story, an ancestor appears in a dream to an expectant woman demanding that her child be given a feminine name. The mother obeys to avoid the child being born with a sickness . . .

Invaders as Ancestors
Invaders as Ancestors

Author: Peter Gose

Publisher: University of Toronto Press

Published: 2008-12-04

Total Pages: 401

ISBN-13: 1442693010

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Since pre-Incan times, native Andean people had worshipped their ancestors, and the custom continued even after the arrival of the Spaniards in the sixteenth century. Ancestor-worship however, did not exclude members of other cultures: in fact, the Andeans welcomed outsiders as ancestors. Invaders as Ancestors examines how this unique cultural practice first facilitated Spanish colonization and eventually undid the colonial project when the Spanish attacked ancestor worship as idolatry and Andeans adopted Spanish political and religious forms to challenge indigenous rulers. In this work, Peter Gose demonstrates the ways in which Andeans converted conquest confrontations into relations of kinship and obligation and then worshipped Christianized and racially "white" spirits after the Spaniards invaded, though the conquering Spaniards prevented actual kinship bonds with the Andeans by adhering to strict rules of racial separation. Invaders as Ancestors explores an alternative response to colonization beyond the predictable resistance narrative, presenting instead a creative form of transculturation under the agency of the Andeans. Invaders as Ancestors is a fascinating account of one of the most unusual transcultural encounters in the history of colonialism.

Invasion
Invasion

Author: Philippe Thirault

Publisher: Humanoids Inc

Published: 2015-11-20

Total Pages: 50

ISBN-13: 1594657319

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

A sweeping saga of two brothers locked in combat in colonial 1940s Burma, where an ancient magic will decide their fate, and that of the whole country.

Athens Burning
Athens Burning

Author: Robert Garland

Publisher: JHU Press

Published: 2017-01-26

Total Pages: 185

ISBN-13: 142142195X

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

"In this next offering for the Witness to Ancient History series, Robert Garland writes about the Persian invasion of Greece in the 5th century BC. After introducing the reader to the contextual background of the Greco-Persian Wars, including the famous Battle of Marathon, Garland describes the various stages of the invasion from both the Persian and Greek point of view. He focuses on the Greek evacuation of Attica (the peninsular region of Greece that includes Athens), the siege of the Acropolis, the eventual defeat of the Persians by Athenian and Spartan armies, and the return of the Greek people to their land. Coming off his 2014 PUP book on the experience of diaspora in ancient Greece, Garland is well placed to speak authoritatively on this important time in ancient history when the Greeks had to flee their homeland. Garland is an experienced and productive writer whose experience producing video lecture courses for The Great Courses company makes him an ideal author for this introductory volume"--Provided by publisher.

Athena Itonia: Geography and Meaning of an Ancient Greek War Goddess
Athena Itonia: Geography and Meaning of an Ancient Greek War Goddess

Author: Gerald Lalonde

Publisher: BRILL

Published: 2019-10-21

Total Pages: 351

ISBN-13: 9004416390

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

With Athena Itonia: Geography and Meaning of an Ancient Greek War Goddess Gerald V. Lalonde offers the first comprehensive history of the martial cult of Athena Itonia, from its origins in Greek prehistory to its demise in the Roman imperial age. The Itonian goddess appears first among the Thessalians and eventually as the patron deity of their famed cavalry. Archaic poets attest to "Athena, warrior goddess" and her festival games at the Itoneion near Boiotian Koroneia. The cult also came south to Athens, probably with the mounted Thessalian allies of Peisistratos. Hellenistic decrees from Amorgos tell of elaborate festival sacrifices to Athena Itonia, likely supplications for protection of the islanders and their maritime trade when piracy plagued the Cyclades after collapse of the Greek naval forces that policed the Aegean Sea. This will be an indispensable volume for all interested in the social, political, and military uses of ancient Greek religious cult and the geography, chronology, and circumstances of its propagation among Greek poleis and federations.

Ancestral Leaves
Ancestral Leaves

Author: Joseph W. Esherick

Publisher: Univ of California Press

Published: 2011-02-09

Total Pages: 393

ISBN-13: 0520947622

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Ancestral Leaves follows one family through six hundred years of Chinese history and brings to life the epic narrative of the nation, from the fourteenth century through the Cultural Revolution. The lives of the Ye family—"Ye" means "leaf" in Chinese—reveal the human side of the large-scale events that shaped modern China: the vast and destructive rebellions of the nineteenth century, the economic growth and social transformation of the republican era, the Japanese invasion during World War II, and the Cultural Revolution under the Chinese Communists. Joseph W. Esherick draws from rare manuscripts and archival and oral history sources to provide an uncommonly personal and intimate glimpse into Chinese family history, illuminating the changing patterns of everyday life during rebellion, war, and revolution.