2024/046: The First Fossil Hunters — Adrienne Mayor

Something real must have continued to confirm the most remarkable features about griffins: They had four legs but also a beak; they were found in deserts near gold. What kind of physical evidence might have verified their existence for so many people over so many centuries? [p. 34]

Adrienne Mayor, 'a historian of ancient science and a classical folklorist', uses her knowledge of classical literature and of paleontology to argue that the ancient Greeks interpreted fossils that weathered out of the ground as the bones of heroes, giants and monsters. She begins with the suggestion that the myth of the griffin -- a creature with four legs, but also a beak -- is derived from ancient discoveries of intact Protoceratops and Psittacosaurus skeletons, observed by nomads and miners in the steppes of Central Asia. She cites Pliny, Pausanius and Ctesias, all of whom wrote about griffins and described them as 'four-legged birds': there are even mentions of them laying eggs, and nests of eggs have been found in the region.

Her other main thesis is that bones discovered in the Mediterranean area (largely more recent, Pliocene megafauna such as mastodons, cave bears and rhinoceri) were identified either as the remains of giants from the Gigantomachy or as the bones of legendary heroes such as Theseus and Heracles. She notes dryly that 'this vigorous early traffic in celebrity relics helps explain how the term “heroes’ bones” came to mean any large prehistoric skeleton that came to light in later Roman times' [p. 113] and discusses the various bones that were described by classical authors as being displayed at temples, viewed at certain places (which turn out to be key sites for fossils) and revered as remains of a time when men and beasts were larger than their contemporary counterparts.

There are some intriguing references to ancient 'tombs' where gigantic fossil bones were found buried with Bronze Age weaponry or stone tools: perhaps an indication that humans in earlier times also revered the bones, and gave them ritual burial? And I was utterly delighted to discover the story of Tjanefer's sea urchin, a fossil with an inscription in hieroglyphics recording the name of the man who found it. Mayor's hypothesis that the Hesione vase shows a fossil skull weathering out of a cliff is so credible as to seem obvious.

The discussion of whether the Greeks understood, or accepted the possibility of, evolution is interesting, if occasionally dry; the footnotes, appendices and bibliography very thorough. I'd argue that the book's title is something of a misnomer: it's not so much about fossil hunters as fossil interpreters. But I found it fascinating, and I have no regrets about buying it at full, non-fiction-ebook, price.

Fulfils the ‘posture’ rubric of the Annual Non-Fiction Reading Challenge. Mayor discusses the postures in which Psittacosaurus skeletons are found, and how they can be interpreted as gold-guarding griffins.