Title: In Quest of Lost Worlds
Description: Our intrepid archeologist hardly stops to draw a breath as he tells the stories of five of his expeditions: his discovery of Tin Hinan's tomb in the Hoggar Mountains of the Sahara (1925-26), his excavation of the temple of Jupiter Ammon in Libya (1926-28), a short trip into Tripolitania, Libya (1931), his search for the stone-age Lacandon Indians in Chiapas, Mexico (1932-33), and his quest for King Solomon's mines in Ethiopia (1933-34). Tin Hanan was the queen of an ancient "white" race in north Africa. Prorok and a handful of companions penetrate deep into hostile territory, find the tomb, scoop up the queen's body and a museum's-worth of artifacts, and make their getaway moments before certain death at the hands of the local Taureg warriors. The Tuaregs were fond of burying their enemies up to their necks in the sand and cutting off their eyelids, then applying ants.But Prorok finds the Tuaregs charming, as well. After a feast which includes stuffed locusts and the tails of snakes and lizards, he is presented to the current queen and her ladies-in-waiting. "Here were the real masters of the land! I was astonished to discover the matriarchate still potent in the world; more potent here, even, than it is in the United States, which, until that moment, more closely approached absolute domination by women than any country I had seen." As a mark of courtesy, the Sultan had bestowed three young women upon Prorok, who took him to a party that evening:"My three ladies of honour escorted me thither. It was the night of the full moon...The music was plaintive and melancholy at the beginning, but slowly the girls began more ardently to court the men, with little subtlety and considerable charm. I was somewhat troubled by the warmth of the advances made by my three companions, who expected much from the leader of an expedition."Ah, the hardships of the desert trail.Prorok was known as great believer in Atlantis. He saw hints of the Atlantean culture spread out across Africa, westward along the tropic of Cancer, over the Atlantic to the Yucatan in Mexico, where he takes us next.This is Villahermosa, Mexico, in the throes of the 1933 revolution. Brigands rule. The governor leads a mob that burns a church and hunts down priests. The Prorok party is hauled along: "It was a spectacle unbelievable in its intensity: as though we had landed right in the heart of the French Revolution. Naturally, our camera-man was not too disturbed by the excitement. He was a cinematographer, and he turned steadily away, getting his shots home." This was not a Cook's Tour. Eventually, the party escapes to the jungle, where they find the mysterious stone-age Lacandon Indians, several lost Mayan cities, and a little gold.But there is more gold back in Ethiopia, where de Prorok journeys next, in search of King Solomon's mines. This is a different version of the story in Prorok's later book Dead Men Do Tell Tales. The facts are different, but not conflicting, and the account is less expurgated.They do find the gold, but it belongs to the Mad Sultan Ghogoli, who has hundreds of slaves working the placer deposits in a riverbed.The expedition later races ahead of a grass fire, falls into the clutches of the Mad Sultan (and into his harem), and then bluffs its way to freedom.And this is all -- as far as we know -- completely true, as are Prorok's other books: Digging for Lost African Gods (1926), Mysterious Sahara (1929), and Dead Men Do Tell Tales (1942). All are available from The Narrative Press.
Subjects: Antiquarian, History, Nonfiction, Travel, Archaeology, Description and travel, Antiquities