The Oldest Enigma of Humanity: The Key to the Mystery of the Paleolithic Cave Paintings Hardcover – April 1, 2014

The principal author, who is an illustrator, was skeptical of earlier explanations for the quality and consistency of cave paintings--especially that somehow a "school" of art and artists had persisted for tens of thousands of years--and had the insight that shadows cast by figurines illuminated by an oil lamp (examples of which have been found in caves) onto rough cave walls could explain consistency of form across time and geography. I had read a brief, dismissive newspaper article on his work and almost decided against buying the book. Fortunately, positive reviews persuaded me to read it to supplement other books on the subject that are heavy on illustration and description but light on explanation. My thanks to those reviewers.The author's diligent, ingenious, methodical, intellectually honest testing of his theory is a pleasure to follow, quite aside from its results. Like a good scientist, he raised and answered many questions to test his theory from every angle he could think of, and then sought out professional critics to test it further before publicizing it. A truly impressive project with a wonderful payoff.As an earlier, grumpy, and off-target review notes, this small book has few illustrations, only enough to substantiate the author's arguments. Look elsewhere for richly illustrated books, or search online for brilliant images of the drawings. This impressive and enjoyable book provides a convincing explanation of how the images were created and plausible speculation on why.

I love the ideas presented in this book. There is no real evidence for his theory, but his arguments are compelling and make sense. It does make me look at the paintings in a new way. I actually, having seen many of the painting (or facsimiles), think that his theory makes a lot of sense. The only warning I give is that it takes away some of the 'magic' of the ancient work.

I have long been aware of the beautiful paleolithic cave paintings, I never thought much about them and so did not realize all the questions surrounding their existence. The author has done a fantastic job of researching his ideas and presenting them in this book. I applaud his efforts and appreciate his work. I think he hit the nail on the head and hope the rest of the scientific community agrees.

I've been to the caves. Have sat through lectures by the experts. They said it was magic or some other explainable non-sense that normal people couldn't begin to understand. I'm an artist myself. I've taught art to high school students. This is an honest interpretation that I found refreshing and it takes nothing away from the Cave artists. I've used shadow projection to make stage backgrounds. This guy deepened my appreciation and respect for the Cave Paintings and the clever humans who made them. Also...no "Alien" non-sense.

I purchased this book expecting many pictures of cave art to look at.Of a 138 pages, there are two pages containing 8 pictures. The rest of the book is filled with the author’s speculations on how and why the art was made. Long on Academic and personal family anecdotes short on coherent logical thought. The author is simply on the wrong speculative track. Useful as a leisurely hourly read to fill some empty time .

This excellent book takes a different look at the mystery of the cave paintings by explaining a very plausible technique for how they were made. It is mostly about an art technique and is extremely good a finding a plausible methodology, It still leaves open many questions about why the images were made for thousands of years and then abandoned for thousands more.

This book is 5" x 8."

Anyone interested in cave drawings of the Paleolithic peoples will find this book very interesting. Who made these images in the darkest part of caves? How come the images look the same? Written in an interesting way to keep you glued to the book.

A+