Hyperdiffusion

Published January 14, 2016

Hyperdiffusion is defined by Wikipedia⁽ⁿ⁾as “a pseudoarchaeological hypothesis suggesting that certain historical technologies or ideas originated with a single people or civilization before their adoption by other cultures. Thus, all great civilizations that share similar cultural practices, such as construction of pyramids, derived them from a single common progenitor. According to its proponents, examples of hyperdiffusion can be found in religious practices, cultural technologies, megalithic monuments, and lost ancient civilizations.”

Hyperdiffusion with Atlantis at its centre was argued at great length by Ignatius Donnelly when he proposed Atlantis as the mother culture, located in the Atlantic. Through colonisation and migration, their civilisation was brought to the Americas and the Mediterranean, particularly Egypt. The idea received widespread support at the time>>from people such as the Rev. Joseph Cook<<and has persisted until today^(a), with Graham Hancock being currently the best-known proponent of hyperdiffusion. In 2022, Marco Vigato also advocated Atlantis as a hyperdiffusionist hub.

A similar hyperdiffusionist proposal was made by James Churchward regarding his Pacific island of Mu.

Angelo Mazzoldi expressed support for a form of regional hyperdiffusion that had his Italian Atlantis as the mother culture which seeded all the great civilisations of the eastern Mediterranean region.

However, even earlier, in the seventeenth century, Olof Rudbeck “purported to prove that Sweden was Atlantis, the cradle of civilization, and Swedish the original language of Adam from which Latin and Hebrew had evolved.”⁽ⁱ⁾

Since Atlantis in the Atlantic is considered by many to be highly improbable and Mu only existed in Churchward’s imagination, a more likely explanation is that diverse ideas emerged independently in different locations, possibly around the same time. These developments then diffused through trade and migration in various directions, sometimes returning in an improved format. The result is that today we are finding that most ancient civilisations show evidence of cultural influences from more than one source.

Lawrence Freeman is the American author of Beyond The Pillars: a search for Antediluvian civilizations^(l) in which he reviews almost every civilisation and prehistoric mystery that you ever heard of. He refers to Atlantis throughout the book, but in rather sceptical tones, with the nearest to a conclusion being that – “Atlantis may well have never existed, but if it did exist, then it was likely only as part of a worldwide antediluvian civilization that is now coming to light.”

Richard Cassaro and Jim Allen have both published online large collections of images^(b)(c)(d) that clearly demonstrate widespread diffusion. This is particularly so in the case of South America where influences from both east and west are clearly evident. While it is regularly claimed that Egypt influenced South American civilisations it is obvious that Asian inspiration was equally, if not solely, at work. The existence of pyramids in both Egypt and Mesoamerica is put forward as evidence of contact between them. However, the problem is that the American pyramids were constructed hundreds if not thousands of years later than the Egyptian ones. However, in spite of this separation by time and distance, the Egyptians and the Aztecs also shared feathered-serpent deities^(g)! What appears to be overlooked is the fact that the Chinese pyramids are more like Mesoamerican examples and are dated to the second half of the first millennium BC, again closer to the development of pyramids in Mesoamerica.

Christian O’Brien contended that global cultural hyperdiffusion was centred in Southern Lebanon (the Garden of Eden) and was spread from there by ‘The Shining Ones’ leading to the establishment of some of the great civilisations of our ancient past!^(m)

An even more unusual hyperdiffusionist opinion was expressed by the Argentine palaeontologist, Florintino Ameghino (1854-1911), who thought that mankind originated in South America^(h) and spread globally from there!

In 2020, Anthony Woods ^[1775] attempted to prove that Atlantis was Ireland and also the source of the mother culture for the entire world. As an Irishman, when reading this, I did not know whether to laugh or cry.

In March 2021, Hugh Newman published a paper drawing attention to the similarity of megalithic building techniques, using polygonal stones, found in America, Asia, Europe and Africa. He goes further, noting that “Peruvian relief carvings match those at Göbekli Tepe.” How much of this might be the result of coincidence or hyperdiffusion is a matter of opinion.^(k)

Carl Feagans offers a paper that is highly critical of hyperdiffusion and its promoters, denouncing them as “willfully ignorant and grossly racist. Though they don’t say it directly, the message is still the same: “white people did it, not savages.”^(j)

A 1986 paper^(f) by Ben Urish entitled Cultural Diffusion^[⁰⁹⁶⁹^] should be read in this connection.

^(a) https://www.africaspeaks.com/reasoning/index.php?topic=5106.0

^(b) https://web.archive.org/web/20200629021253/http://www.atlantisbolivia.org/artefacts.htm

^(c) https://www.richardcassaro.com/suppressed-by-scholars-twin-ancient-cultures-on-opposite-sides-of-the-pacific

^(d) https://www.richardcassaro.com/pagan-god-self-icon-found-worldwide-rewrites-history-reveals-lost-golden-age-religion

^(e)https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_pyramids

^(f) Wayback Machine (archive.org) *

^(g) See: Archive 2827

^(h)See: https://web.archive.org/web/20180329154212/https://webs.advance.com.ar/lae_tor/teorias.htm

⁽ⁱ⁾ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olaus_Rudbeck

^(j) https://ahotcupofjoe.net/2016/12/hyper-diffusion-archaeology/

^(k) https://www.ancient-origins.net/ancient-places/megalithic-origins-g-bekli-tepe-and-ancient-peru-same-architects-008402