In “Ishmael” there are a number of interesting claims: pg.180: “… a herding people being pushed into the desert by agriculturalists from the north.” pg.217: “But before the introduction of horses by the Spanish, the Plains Indians had been agriculturalists for centuries.” Can you give us some references where we can read more about those examples?

Neither of these strikes me as a “claim.” The first is offered as a reconstruction based on these undoubted facts: The Semites were a herding people living to the south of the Fertile Crescent, birthplace of the Taker agricultural revolution. The agriculturalists of the Fertile Crescent aggressively extended their revolution in every direction (and are still doing so today), and the Abel/Cain story in Genesis makes sense as a record of that aggression. Check an historical atlas—for example, “The Penguin Atlas of Ancient History”, by Colin McEvedy. For the agricultural past of the Plains Indians, check Peter Farb’s “Man’s Rise to Civilization as Shown by the Indians of North America from Primeval Times to the Coming of the Industrial State.”

DATE: 27 Mar 1998
UPDATE: 27 Mar 1998
ID: 179