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Stephen Oppenheimer
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Eden in the East: The Drowned Continent of Southeast Asia Paperback – July 1, 1999

by Stephen Oppenheimer (Author)
4.5 4.5 out of 5 stars 38 ratings
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This book completetly changes the established and conventional view of prehistory by relocating the Lost Eden—the world's first civilisation—to Southeast Asia. At the end of the Ice Age, Southeast Asia formed a continent twice the size of India, which included Indochina, Malaysia, Indonesia, and Borneo. In Eden in the East, Stephen Oppenheimer puts forward the astonishing argument that here in southeast Asia—rather than in Mesopotamia where it is usually placed—was the lost civilization that fertilized the Great cultures of the Middle East 6,000 years ago. He produces evidence from ethnography, archaeology, oceanography, creation stories, myths, linguistics, and DNA analysis to argue that this founding civilization was destroyed by a catastrophic flood, caused by a rapid rise in the sea level at the end of the last ice age.
Previous page
  1. Print length
    575 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    Orion Publishing
  4. Publication date
    July 1, 1999
  5. Dimensions
    5 x 1.5 x 7.7 inches
  6. ISBN-10
    0753806797
  7. ISBN-13
    978-0753806791
  8. See all details
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Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Orion Publishing (July 1, 1999)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Paperback ‏ : ‎ 575 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0753806797
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0753806791
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.08 pounds
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5 x 1.5 x 7.7 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.5 4.5 out of 5 stars 38 ratings

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Stephen Oppenheimer

Stephen Oppenheimer

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Customer reviews

4.5 out of 5 stars
4.5 out of 5
38 global ratings

Top reviews from the United States

Hexagram of the Heavens
5.0 out of 5 stars Detailed and informative if occasionally tedious. Good read for Lost Civ thread.
Reviewed in the United States on December 14, 2018
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The drowned Asian continent of Sundaland and the diaspora of its peoples around 6K years ago has been a well-worked thread in recent years by the "Lost Civilization" crowd, Graham Hancock, Robert Schoch, et alia. This book was written before their books (except Fingerprints of the Gods, which was a couple of years earlier), and it does not address questions of megalithic or lost advanced technologies, and deals only with the genetic and linguistic evidence, which it does in great detail. Note also that Bucky Fuller also suggested this theme of a Southeast Asian human homeland in Critical Path, many years ago.

The book offers good detail on the timeline of the gradual drowning of Sundaland and other coastal regions, and does not attribute the whole process to one cataclysm 12K years ago. He even says that the sea level was rather higher than today at one point, accounting for the several-meter silt layer in Mesopotamia with ruins above and below. This was news to me.

This and Oppenheimer's later book Out of Eden, dealing with the larger framework of dispersal out of Africa, form an interesting counterpoint to Cavalli-Sforza's Genes Peoples and Languages, on the same larger theme. Oppenheimer criticizes Cavalli-Sforza's use of the statistical method of Principle Components, about which he has his own ideas and interpretations, a good second opinion on this stuff although I don't think that the conclusions are radically different.

I say it's tedious at times because the technical detail on the Y-chromosome and mt-DNA diffusion tracks is at times more than I can take in; perhaps there might have been another way to organize this material. But all in all, this really is a must-read for the Lost Civilization thread.
4 people found this helpful
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H J Duff
5.0 out of 5 stars Recommended to anyone interested in a take on a different ...
Reviewed in the United States on June 15, 2016
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Well written, interesting book,
writing is clear with a truthful ring to it.
Recommended to anyone interested in a take on a different prehistoric past from what is commonly believed.
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Roland A. Boucher
4.0 out of 5 stars numbers
Reviewed in the United States on September 2, 2010
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I enjoyed reading this book and feel that the author made a good case for his premise if not a compelling one.

I was troubled by the use of references which are obviously false for example:

Page 247 (17) "Noah, who altogether reigned for 1565 years or 86400 weeks"
I cannot believe that anyone lived this long there has to be an error in the translation of this myth.
The number 86,400 is the number of seconds in a day ( the sumerians divided the solar day into 24 hours, 60 minutes, and 60 seconds)
while this number is well known to those who compute the trajectories of deep space probes It is not a commonly use number
and there is no reason I can think of the relate this number to years or weeks.

Page 250 paragraph 3 "the ten kings ruled for 432,000 years (that is 86,400X 5, five years being 60 months)

There is more of this nonsense with numbers which should have been examined. for example sumerian time periods also contained fractions of years which would have essentially reduced the total by a factor of ten...950 year would have become 95

It is possible that scribes could have misread ancient texts which used numbering systems that were no longer in use.

THESE NUMBER DON'T MAKE SENSE

Roland Boucher
10 people found this helpful
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R_Crusoe
5.0 out of 5 stars Ground-breaking book
Reviewed in the United States on January 9, 2007
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Stephen Oppenheimer is the first author to treat this subject in an extensive manner using both scientific evidence and comparative mythology. He brings together a wide range of complimentary fields to support his theory on the rise of Southeast Asian during the Neolithic and Bronze Age periods. A must read for those interested in new historical perspectives.
11 people found this helpful
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Michael Bulger
3.0 out of 5 stars Intriguing and worthwhile, but too little editing.
Reviewed in the United States on May 1, 2000
The central theme of "Eden in the East" is derived from the fact that island southeast Asia, or more correctly the now mostly submerged Sunda shelf, was actually an extensive subcontinent, comparable in size to India, during the last Ice Age. Oppenheimer summarizes one current understanding of how the Ice Age ended--that is, not slowly, but in three quite dramatic and rapid melts that resulted in severe flooding and perhaps even substantial seismic activity and tsunamis. Thus, the Sunda subcontinent was subjected to a series of horrendous cataclysms, the last one occurring circa 8000-7000 B.C. After this introduction to the climatic facts of the case, the first half of the book is devoted to an examination of genetic and linguistic evidence, or rather to Oppenheimer's own re-examination of this evidence, with the conclusion that Ice Age Sundaland harbored a thriving neolithic culture that dispersed throughout the Pacific and into most of Eurasia subsequent to its flooding, and thus that much of Western civilization can be expected to be derived, or at least influenced, by this antediluvian culture. The second half of the book is entirely concerned with a comparative analysis of several myths that exist in recognizable forms throughout most of the world, including Noah's flood, creation myths, Cain and Abel, and the dying god who is resurrected. Again, Oppenheimer argues that the evidence indicates an origin for each of these basic myths in neolithic southeast Asia.
I am not really qualified to argue with Oppenheimer's analyses; then again, the author is himself a pediatrician with no apparent formal training in linguistics, genetics, or anthropology. Be that as it may, I found his ideas highly intriguing, and a reading of this book reveals him to be completely unlike most of the recent spate of speculative (and very silly) pseudoarchaeologists, concerned as they are with finding Atlantis or some other vision of a long-lost but highly advanced ancient civilization. Unlike the "work" of Rand Flem-Ath or Graham Hancock, what is presented here at least seems reasonable and worthy of intelligent debate. Not the least of the reasons for this is the fact that Oppenheimer is arguing for the existence of an influential neolithic culture, not an enlightened antediluvian civilization. Much of what he argues could still be wrong, and probably is, but at least something interesting might come of the discussion.
The drawbacks of this book are mostly editorial: Oppenheimer is not a gifted writer, and the prose is sometimes tortured enough to give pause. Additionally, the book as a whole, especially the second half dealing with comparative mythology, is entirely too long. I found myself nearly nodding off during the recitations of various "dying-and-rising-tree-god" myths from around the islands of southeast Asia. Beyond this, little attention seems to be paid to the provenance of the many myths recounted in this book; one wonders if the "warring brothers" (Cain and Abel) or Adam and Eve stories in southeast Asia could not have been introduced by Christian missionaries, despite Oppenheimer's protestations. Overall, though, this is a book worth reading, or at least skimming.
41 people found this helpful
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Gary R Noble
5.0 out of 5 stars Love the challenging new ideas.
Reviewed in the United States on August 24, 2013
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The detail and erudition of the research and the exposition of findings are outstanding. The future of continuing research will add to our understanding of our origins.
One person found this helpful
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thuong
5.0 out of 5 stars excellent book
Reviewed in the United States on May 6, 2015
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excellent book
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Top reviews from other countries

Ms. C. B. Mclaglen
5.0 out of 5 stars Eden in the East By Stephen Oppenheimer
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on February 10, 2014
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A facinating and essential addition to the story og humans' story in Africa and after leaving Africa 83.000 years ago. After studying desease carrying DNA in people in the islands of Indonesia and surrounding areas, he became interested in the myths of the various areas and other stories which seemed to tie up sometimes and be related. He was also interested in the ancient geological history overthe past 200,000 years as this was important to the influence on humans as they travelled. The amazing thing is that like Graham Hancock, this scientist found that there was a strong link beween climate changes and oceans and the myths and historys in impotant cultural songs and writings still sung today and written on clay tablet in cuneform 3,000 to 4000 years ago about a time before that when there were terrrible floods. this is well worth reading and make one feel as though one had travelled back in time. Cynthia Allen McLaglen
One person found this helpful
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J. Friedmann
5.0 out of 5 stars Extraordinary book about how ice ages and global floods impact on world populations
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on January 11, 2022
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Spectacular book using anthropology, genetics, archeology, history to show how populations are displaced and the earth has changed how and where we live. Fairly academic but with great themes.
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Ratchada
4.0 out of 5 stars Interesting hypothesis from Oppenheimer, plenty of depth which leans ...
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on June 12, 2018
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Interesting hypothesis from Oppenheimer, plenty of depth which leans towards the academic. Reading the book altered my opinions on how various belief systems developed and the nature of migrations. The subject area is huge in it's scope and it is clear the neglected pre-history of South East Asia had potentially a massive impact on ho modern human cultures and civlisations developed.

High reccomended
One person found this helpful
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H. G. G. Nevill
5.0 out of 5 stars Book re'd in good condition
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on April 23, 2020
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Have not yet read the book but it appears to promise an interesting read.
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3,
5.0 out of 5 stars Long time no sea (or rather explanation of flood myths)
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on December 31, 2012
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I would recommend this book to everyone who is interested in the history of languages, ancient history in general and scientific explanations of myths and the facts behind them.
One person found this helpful
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