There are striking graphis and photos but ths collection of short pieces, some paleontological, some Archaeological has little interest to modern readers in this field ( )

Book is based on a series of articles entitled The Epic of Man which appeared in LIFE from 1955 to 1957.

I think this book was my first exposure to the development of human cilvilization and it had a massive effect on me. Not so much the text, which is dense and was quite beyond my 10 year old ken, but the glorious full colour illustrations. These pictures informed much of my initial knowledge of ancient history and to this day I can still recall them vividly. The Stone Age hunters shooting geese with blunt-headed arrows, naked Sumerian priests in procession to the ziggurat through a crowded street, slave girls waiting to be auctioned on a Phoenician waterfront, Cretan athletes effortlessly vaulting over the horns of bulls, Chinese prisoners lined up near a tomb waiting to be executed to accompany their master into death, it was all vivid beyond belief. The book would be hopelessly out of date now, knowledge of human development has advanced by light years since it was publishd a tick over half a century ago, but thos glorious illustrations will never date. Highly recommended for any school or any parent who wants to theri children to be captivated by the pageant of human progress ( )