Shamans Through Time: 500 Years on the Path to Knowledge

by Jeremy Narby (editor), Francis Huxley (Editor)

A collection of essays by priests, explorers, adventurers, natural historians and anthropoligists traces Western civilization's struggle to intrepret and understand the ancient knowledge of cultures that revere magic men and women, shamans capable of summoning spirits. 12,500 first printing.

Genres: History, Anthropology, Nonfiction, Spirituality, Religion, Philosophy, Psychology

321 pages, Hardcover

First published April 23, 2001

About the author

Jeremy Narby is an anthropologist and writer. Narby grew up in Canada and Switzerland, studied history at the University of Canterbury, and received a doctorate in anthropology from Stanford University. Narby spent several years living with the Ashaninca in the Peruvian Amazon cataloging indigenous uses of rainforest resources to help combat ecological destruction. Narby has written multiple books, as well as sponsored an expedition to the rainforest for biologists and other scientists to examine indigenous knowledge systems and the utility of Ayahuasca in gaining knowledge. Since 1989, Narby has been working as the Amazonian projects director for the Swiss NGO, Nouvelle Planète.- wiki

Reviews

[Dov · Rating 4 out of 5]

so much knowledge has been lost due to our own indifference to things we have not understood. This book was humbling in the sense that so much of my heritage has been part of the discrimination and destruction of such valuable teachings through the ages.

[Jack Barten · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an excellent book that one can either dip in and out of or go right through the history of how shamanic practices have been represented.

Narby is an anthropologist with extensive knowledge of Amazonian shamanism but the book takes a much broader view by going through hundreds of years of history and offering the reader clear snapshots from different people's perspectives.

These range from early missionary accounts, where the shaman is presented as doing diabolical things on behalf of the devil to up-to-date situations where scientists have been given the shamanic potion ayahuasca and as a result had breakthroughs in their research. Between these two extreme are an incredibly broad range of perspectives and this allows the reader to not only give insight into shamanism but also into how our societies have transformed and become more appreciative of 'traditional' approaches to healing and spirituality.

The book is a good sized and manages to get lots of eras and perspectives in but it is easy to read. Those interested in particular chapters can follow-up this reading by finding the original depictions on which the book hangs.

[Mack · Rating 2 out of 5]

There are tons of glowing 4- and 5-star reviews on this one, and I guess I'm the odd one out, because I (to my surprise) did not enjoy this much at all.

It's a collection of essays throughout the ages about shamanism – but all from outsiders' points of view. It was an especially hard read because it goes chronologically, and essays from the 1500s right up to about the 1950s or so all denigrate the topic and approach it with such disdain and cluelessness. It taught me nothing except how assholish and self-aggrandizing people can be.

We actually start to learn and gain some great insight once we see essays from people who actually respected the topic and/or participated in shamanic practices themselves. Unfortunately, we don't see any of that until nearly the end of the book.

This might be great for historians or academics, but if you're actually interested in insight into shamanic practices, there are better books out there.

[Tinquerbelle]

1) "Devil Worship: Consuming Tobacco to Receive Messages from Nature" (1535); de Oviedo, Gonzalo Fernandez
2) "Ministers of the Devil Who Learn about the Secrets of Nature" (1557); Thevet, Andre
3) "Evoking the Devil: Fasting with Tobacco to Learn How to Cure" (1664); Biet, Antoine
4) The Shaman: "A Villain Who Calls Demons" (1672); Petrovich, Avvakum
5) "The Savages Esteem Their Jugglers" (1724); Lafitau, Joseph Francois
6) "Shamans Deserve Perpetual Labor for Their Hocus-Pocus" (1751); Gmelin, Johann Gmelin
7) "Blinded by Superstition" (1755); Krasheninnikov, Stepan Petrovich
8) "Shamans are Impostors Who Claim They Consult the Devil--And Who Are Sometimes Close to the Mark" (1765); Diderot, Denis
9) Misled Impostors and the Power of Imagination (1785); Herder, Johann Gottfried
10) Animism Is the Belief in Spiritual Beings (1871); Tylor, Edward B.
11) A White Man Goes to a Peaiman (1883); Thurn, Everard F. Im
12) The Angakog Uses a Peculiar Language and Defines Taboos (1887); Boas, Franz
13) The-Man-Who-Fell-From-Heaven Shamanizes Despite Persecution (1896); Sieroshevski, Wenceslas
14) Shamanism is a Dangerously Vague Word (1903); Gennep, Arnold Van
15) "Doomed to Inspiration" (1904); Bogoras, Waldemar
16) Ventriloquist and Trickster Performances for Healing and Divination (1908); Johelson, Vladimir Ilich
17) "A Motley Class of Person" (1908); Dixon, Roland B.
18) Seeking Contact with Spirits Is Not Necessarily Shamanism (1910); Boas, Franz
19) "The Shaman Practices on the Verge of Insanity" (1914); Czaplicka, Marie Antoinette
20) Near-Death Experience (1929); Rasmussen, Ivalo and Knud Rasmussen
21) Seeking Knowledge in the Solitude of Nature (1930); Rasmussen, Igjugarjuk and Knud Rasmussen
22) Summoning the Spirits for the First Time (1932); Elk, Black and John G. Neihardt
23) The Shaman's Assistant (1935); Shirokogoroff, Sergei M.
24) Shamans Charm Game (1938); Park, Willard Z.
25) Climbing the Twisted Ladder to Initiation (1944); Metraux, Alfred
26) Aboriginal Doctors Are Outstanding People (1945); Elkin, Adolphus Peter
27) Shamans as Psychoanalysts (1949); Levi-Strauss, Claude
28) Using Invisible Substances for Good and Evil (1949); Metraux, Alfred
29) The Shamanin Performs a Public Service with Grace and Energy (1955); Elwin, Verrier
30) "The Shaman Is Mentally Deranged" (1956); Devereux, George
31) Clever Cords and Clever Men (1957); Rose, Ronald
32) Singing Multifaceted Songs (1958); Dioszegi, Vilmos
33) !Kung Medicine Dance (1962); Marshall, Lorna
34) Smoking Huge Cigars (1956); Huxley, Francis
35) "I Was a Disembodied Eye Poised in Space" (1957); Wasson, R. Gordon
36) Fear, Clarity, Knowledge, and Power (1968); Castaneda, Carlos
37) "I Found Myself Impaled on the Axis Mundi" (1974); Myerhoff, Barbara
38) A Shaman Loses Her Elevation by Interacting with Observers (1977); Sabina, Maria and Alvaro Estrada
39) "I Felt Like Socrates Accepting the Hemlock" (1980); Harner, Michael
40) Experiencing the Shaman's Symphony to Understand It (1987); Kalweit, Holger
41) A Washo Shaman's Helper (1967); Handelman, Don
42)Magic Darts, Bewitching Shamans, and Curing Shamans (1968); Harner, Michael
43) "Remarkably Good Theater" (1973); Hitchcock, John T.
44) Two Kinds of Japanese Shamans: The Medium and the Ascetic (1975); Blacker, Carmen
45) Music Alone Can Alter a Shaman's Consciousness, Which Itself Can Destroy Tape Recorders (1975); Olsen, Dale A.
46) Shamans are Intellectuals, Translators, and Shrewd Dealers (1975); Reichel-Dolmatoff, Gerardo
47) Shamans, Caves, and the Master of Animals (1979); Burkert, Walter
48) "Plant Teachers" (1984); Luna, Luis Eduardo
49) A Shaman Endures the Temptation of Sorcery (and Publishes a Book) (1990); Payaguaje, Fernando
50) Interview with a Killing Shaman (1992); Skafte, Ashok and Peter Skafte
51) Invisible Projectiles in Africa (1994); Some, Malidoma Patrice
52) Science and Magic, Two Roads to Knowledge (1962); Levi-Strauss, Claude
53) Shamans, "Spirits," and Mental Imagery (1987); Noll, Richard
54) Dark Side of the Shaman (1989); Brown, Michael F.
55) Shamans Explore the Human Mind (1990); Walsh, Roger
56) Training to See What the Natives See (1992); Turner, Edith
57) "Twisted Language," a Technique for Knowing (1993); Townsley, Graham
58) Magic Darts as Viruses (1993); Chaumeil, Jean-Pierre
59) Bubble, Bubble, Toil and Trouble: Tourists and Pseudo-Shamans (1994); de Rios, Marlene Dobkin
60) Shamans and Ethics in a Global World (1995); Ott, Eleanor
61) Shamans as Botanical Researchers (1995); Davis, Wade
62) Shamanism and the Rigged Marketplace (1995); Vitebsky, Piers
63) An Ethnobotanist Dreams of Scientists and Shamans Collaborating (1998); Shepard, Glenn H.
64) Shamans and Scientists (2000); Narby, Jeremy

[Ann · Rating 4 out of 5]

I had to read this book for my Anthropology class, and I found it quite interesting. It amazing how Shamans have been viewed. Some view them as "actors", others view them as true healers in their societies. This compilation of essays does a nice job of showing you the various views of anthropologists, adventurers and explorers. The early essays show how shamanism is viewed as hoaxes to devil worship; whereas, the later essays show how shamanism is viewed as a "remarkable system of spiritual knowledge and practice."

[Roger Green · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a nice edited collection of of the convoluted writings on "shamans," throughout history. One gets a good sense of the superior attitudes Europeans held for a long time which helps in gleaning the ways those attitudes continue to shape people's current attitudes even when they think they are favorably disposed toward indigenous peoples' practices around the world. The concept remains a problem.

[Isobel Atkins · Rating 4 out of 5]

A compilation of the literature about shamans and shamism beginning with authors from the 16th century up until the present day. At first I found the excerpts annoyingly short but as I continued to read an overall picture of the evolution western thought as it related to shamism and traditional societies was painted. So well written and organised that I feel like I have learnt a lot without any effort.

[Pippa · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was an excellent book, with many accounts of what shamans have said themselves. As it is written for our culture there are, of course, some parts which have a difficult and unhelpful energy for people with psychic/shamanic gifts to read, but on the whole this is one of the best books I've found. I do recommend it highly.

[Sheila · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting insight into how the Shamans were viewed in the olden days.

[Spencer · Rating 4 out of 5]

My 4th favorite book about shamans.

[Yelena · Rating 4 out of 5]

It’s a good reading. If you are interested in details and history, it’s your book. Written by two anthropologists, it covers a significant period of study of shamanism from as early as 1887 till 2000 year. Book has a lot of analysis of transcripts and descriptions of interactions with real shamans. It describes the shamanism as a new phenomenon and shows how it was handled in different parts of the world such as Amazon, Siberia, Africa, Australia, parts of Asia etc. It does not teach you any shamanic songs or rituals, so if you are into that, then probably it’s not your book. I enjoyed the reading and highly recommend it to readers who want to develop knowledge in the area with a scientific approach.

[Meg Miller · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this book and found the written content to be a rich source of inspiration as part of my research as an artist. Also it seemed to be quite a thorough compilation of writings from many different viewpoints on shamanism across the globe since the turn of the century. I'm ready to read it again!

[Andy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting collection of excerpts from various writers on the topic of "shamanism." Not really sure who it's for though. Academics in the field are probably more interested in complete texts and lay people are probably more interested in either more detailed descriptions or a discussion of the academic evolution. While it is interesting I'm not sure what purpose it serves.

[William Bookman III · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's ok. More like pieces of other's work based on their perception of Shamen. It is great to see the evolution of an anthropologist's perspective on witch doctors. It seems like we are heading in the right direction and hopefully we can indigenous knowledge alive.

[Anthony Meyer · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found this book a very Interesting read as it gave a great insight into the shaman world.

[Clivemichael · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great collection that scratches the surface very well.

[Riversue · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting compilation of essays on the topic of shamanism.