Annalee Newitz

In Four Lost Cities, acclaimed science journalist Annalee Newitz takes readers on an entertaining and mind-bending adventure into the deep history of urban life. Investigating across the centuries and around the world, Newitz explores the rise and fall of four ancient cities, each the center of a sophisticated civilization: the Neolithic site of Çatalhöyük in Central Turkey, the Roman vacation town of Pompeii on Italy's southern coast, the medieval megacity of Angkor in Cambodia, and the indigenous metropolis Cahokia, which stood beside the Mississippi River where East St. Louis is today. Newitz travels to all four sites and investigates the cutting-edge research in archaeology, revealing the mix of environmental changes and political turmoil that doomed these ancient settlements. Tracing the early development of urban planning, Newitz also introduces us to the often anonymous workers--slaves, women, immigrants, and manual laborers--who built these cities and created monuments that lasted millennia. Four Lost Cities is a journey into the forgotten past, but, foreseeing a future in which the majority of people on Earth will be living in cities, it may also reveal something of our own fate.

A Secret History of the Urban Age

Four Lost Cities

Fabio Mologni

I liked the overall idea and how the author challenged the concept of "lost cities". However, the more you read the book, the more the author does what in Italy is called "to talk well but act poorly". They criticize previous attitudes and paradigms in anthropology, rightfully, but just to substitute them with new paradigms, more in line with today's social expectations, but equally disputable based on the evidence they provide. 

This book is also moralizing. The author criticises so strongly eurocentric approaches to anthropology that seems only an excuse to attract a specific audience or to tap into the last trend, rather than objectively discuss them. 

The best example is their critic of Diamonds' Collapse. It is said it's based on anecdotal evidence, but this book draws general conclusions from evidence that is fragmentary, interpretations are mostly speculations, yet treated as conclusive. On top of that, Diamond's book was criticized for half a chapter, but the author didn't engage in academic debates previously in the book. Why do it now, especially considered that the author is not an academic. Finally, one critic to Diamond is that past cultures' collapse was always attributed to environmental reasons, and that is not true. I agree, however, climatic reasons are always among the primary reasons for the abandonment of the 4 examples discussed in the book: are the author contradicting themselves? All this considered that critics of Diamond's book have actually merit. 

Finally, one of the main takes from this book is that cities had all different histories, that cannot be investigated only from a eurocentric perspective. This is true. However, there are general trends that are not discussed. For instance, all 4 cities seem to have followed the same "evolution": first settlement, growth, peak, decline, abandonment. What more than that to support that humans are actually all the same, everywhere?

All in all, this book runs the same risk as Diamond's Collapse: to be criticised as soon as scientific knowledge advances and social expectations change.

Let me initially say two of the experts she interviews in this book were my university professors, who actually lectured on these findings before they made their way to print, and I come in from that perspective. 

very archaeologically based and challenges many erroneously assumed norms in the approach of historical study. Though it was somewhat shallow and not particularly insightful. There wasn’t much of a clear defined “point,” argument or thesis by the end and if it was just simply to explore these 4 cities it wasn’t too insightful. Though, I may be biased as I’ve already attended lectures from the ve to professionals in this book, so it may be valuable to others interested in history ! 

Ben Nathan

Absolutely fascinating. I loved all the details and learned SO much. I am totally going to write a trivia round around this one day. The way it was written/told was incredible and I was just a huge fan of this book. Also, suggested it to my dad almost right away.

Four Lost Cities A Secret History of the Urban Age

Reviews