Prehistoric Giant Survivors - Reduced

As New Unmarked Hardcover with pristine Dustjacket. First Published 1995.
192 pages. Post €7
IN SEARCH OF PREHISTORIC SURVIVORS

Before Darwin it was believed that all living things were exactly the same today as they had always been immortal and immutable; thus the idea of the extinction and transformation of animal species was implacably opposed. Yet, even though the development of species via evolutionary change is nowadays a widely accepted scientific philosophy, the notion that prehistoric creatures could have survived into modern times remains a taboo subject for the majority of present-day zoologists. For some reason, the same unquestioning opposition that was once faced by the theory of evolution is now being applied in an equally illogical manner to the concept of prehistoric survival.

In this ground-breaking book, however, noted zoologist Dr Karl P.N. Shuker reveals how the annals of contemporary science contain many recently-discovered, living examples of ancient creatures - creatures hitherto believed to have vanished long ago from our planet. By extension, these 'living fossils' - such as New Zealand's tuatara (a lizard-like dinosaur contemporary) and that famously archaic lobe-finned fish, the coelacanth provide strong evidence for believing that all is not what it might seem in the world of orthodox zoology.

Naturally, there is no suggestion that a veritable 'Lost World' of prehistoric survivors is waiting to be uncovered by a true-life Professor Challenger. Nevertheless, there are so many reports of unexplained animals strongly resembling long-vanished creatures that it would be rash to dismiss entirely the likelihood that certain prehistoric lineages have elusive modern-day representatives still awaiting formal scientific discovery.

This book presents some startling and controversial possibilities - including the prospect of living dinosaurs amid the world's most impenetrable swamplands; winged beasts irresistibly reminiscent of pterodactyls and prehistoric giant vultures, long-necked plesiosaurian sea serpents, and a plethora of mammalian Methuselahs, ranging from surviving sabre-toothed tigers to living mammoths. Traversing the frontiers and backwaters of science, this major work of cryptozoology (the scientific study of mysterious, unexplained animals) will make us all take a new look at what might still be sharing our world.