Description
Book SynopsisThe Hunter, the Stag, and the Mother of Animals offers an in-depth exploration of the changing traditions of belief in pre-Bronze and Bronze Age North Asia. Esther Jacobson-Tepfer centers her argument on a female deity and her evolution up until the early Iron Age, across a 2,000 year period. Through the art historical and archaeological evidence of the symbolic systems left behind, she traces the progression of the deity from an originating animal mother through her incarnation as the mother of animals, her late embodiment as the guardian of the road to the land of the dead, the transformation of her essential liminality into the structures of predation and, in the form of a predated stag, her subsequent destruction. In detailed commentaries on rock art structures and monuments, Jacobson-Tepfer reconstructs and explores how the deity''s power was embedded in the Janus-faced concept of life/death: how, in all her forms, the deity occupied the threshold between the worlds of humans and
Trade ReviewProfessor Jacobson-Tepfer offers to readers her outstanding first-hand knowledge and deep understanding of unique Eurasian civilizations: the societies of ancient hunters, nomadic mounted pastoralists, and their animal symbolism. Archaeology, art history, and the history of religions, including shamanism, are synthesized by using careful scientific theoretical approaches. * Henri-Paul Francfort, Director of the French Archaeological Mission in Central Asia. *
The Hunter, the Stag, and the Mother of Animals is an important book not only in terms of its value as a scientific treatise nonpareil but also as an elegant exploration of the prehistoric human mind with implications far beyond the geographical and temporal focus of Jacobson-Tepfer's study. Her lucid, informative and entertaining writing is complemented by superb illustrations, including world-class photographs contributed by her husband, world-renowned photographer, Gary Tepfer. * John W. Olsen, University of Arizona *
this assessment of long-muted societies is an inspired triumph of dedicated scholarship and an inspirational work of art in its own right. It may well remain the most revealing interpretation of ancient rock art in South Siberia until the stones themselves begin to speak with human voices. * E. J. Vajda, CHOICE *
This lavishly illustrated book is highly recommended to anyone interested in rock art, standing stones, the material manifestation of myth, the archaeology of North Asia, sacred landscapes and the archaeology of belief. * Paul Taçon, Time & Mind *
Table of ContentsList of Illustrations: Maps, Figures ; Preface ; Chapter One: The Transformation of Image, Object and Belief in Prehistoric North Asia ; Chapter Two: The Appearance of the Animal Mother ; Chapter Three: The Persistence of Liminal Beings ; Chapter Four: The Mother of Animals ; Chapter Five: The Emergence of Pictorial Narrative ; Chapter Six: Intimations of Death and Transformation ; Chapter Seven: The End of Naturalism in Nomadic Art ; Chapter Eight: The Pivot Between Life and Death ; Chapter Nine: Traces of Ancient Beliefs ; Chapter Ten: The Archaeology of Belief ; Appendix: The Dating of Rock Art ; List of Abbreviations ; Bibliography ; Index
