Civics Essay

The archaeological evidence found on the islands of Malta and the paintings found in the Chauvet caves support the conclusions found by feminist scholars about the development of civilizations up to 5000 B.C. It is thought by some feminist scholars that before 5000 B.C most western civilizations were dominated by goddess worshiping religions, and that people prayed to an earth goddess rather than to a sky god.

The islands of Malta are a couple of small islands in the middle of the Mediterranean ocean, and are virtually isolated from the rest of the world. It is a mystery how people arrived at Malta, Aliens, but we do know that at some point the people of ancient Malta were able to trade with other civilizations on the main land.  From the physical evidence that was left behind by this ancient society we have determined that these people were peaceful, and prosperous according to the film goddess remembered. They worshiped an earth goddess, and they constructed elaborate temples and buildings, but never (to the best of our knowledge) had any sort of defensive structures. Instead of the sky god, male dominated religions that came after who’s defense strategy seemed to be “always have the bigger stick”, the people of Malta seemed to prefer the “make no enemies, only friends” defense tactic.  The Paintings done at the time showed men and women being equal, and showed an ideal society without major conflict or war. Many statues of goddesses were constructed and large temples were built in the name of their goddesses. The temples built by the people of Malta even look like the shape of a goddesses body when looked at from above, but if this was intentional or just a coincidence is impossible to tell with the information we can dig up currently. It is believed by the feminist scholars that this was not an isolated incident, and that until about 5000 B.C most religions and civilizations were like the ones found on Malta, and were goddess oriented. Several thousand sculptures and statues uncovered all over Europe were in the image of ancient goddesses. These sculptures were dated from before 5000 B.C, according to the film Goddess remembered.  However, from the same time period very few male statues and sculptures have been found, and the ones that were found tended to be cruder and less detailed than the goddess sculptures. These statues were mostly made of clay, bone, rock, gold, or other metals. The change between female and male dominated religions occurred about 5000B.C according to the Goddess remembered film. It would have been easy for warfarin male religions to convert or destroy goddess religions that had no military, defensive structures or prior experience to combat and war, “survival of the fittest”, as Darwin would put it.

In the south of France there is a cave called the Chauvet caves, covered with prehistoric drawings done by ancient peoples up 32 thousand years old, according to the Werner Herzog in his movie about the Chauvet Caves called the cave of forgotten dreams. This cave was accessed by people for thousands of years, until one day an earthquake blocked the caves. Only recently have they been re-discovered. At very back of this cave on a stalactite there is a drawing of what appears to be an animal embracing the sex of a woman, thought to be a goddess from one of the ancient religions. This goddess painting shows that the island of Malta was not the only goddess worshiping religion, and supports the theory of the feminist scholars that goddess religions were common in ancient Europe. If the same goddess figure was portrayed in France and in Malta, then the religion must have been fairs widely spread out. It In the Cave of forgotten dreams movie by Werner Herzog, he had suggested that this painting of the animal and the goddess shows a link between people who worshiped animal spirits and those who worshiped goddesses.

In conclusion, I believe that the archaeological evidence discovered on the islands of Malta and the painting of the goddess discovered in the Chauvet caves do support the theory made by the feminist scholars, that before about 5000 B.C, Europe was dominated by a goddess worshiping religion. I also think they support the theory that these religious societies were more peaceful and prosperous then the male dominated religion that took over.