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| | Animal symbolism in Africa as a road to universal science |
 | | Alternatively, under conditions of state formation, the emergence of organised religion, and literacy, the substratum underwent specific transformations in ancient Egypt (from where a decisive influence was exerted on Greek religion and mythology) and, in a radically different direction, in ancient Mesopotamia. |
 | | While animal symbolism remained a part of both transformative clusters, animals lost their earlier central roles as vehicles of meaning and of thought (as in the Upper Palaeolithic), and gave way to anthropomorphic symbols or to symbols derived from other natural phenomena than animals, especially meteorological and celestial phenomena. |
 | | It confirms Levi-Strauss’ that animals have been bien a penser, ‘good for thinking’, in the most literal sense: as props for forms of untamed thought from which, ultimately, along an itinerary whose outline we are beginning to discern, contemporary scientific knowledge was to come forth. |
| www.shikanda.net /ancient_models/animal.htm (621 words) |
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