LeBlanc's Book Explores Warfare Through the Ages

In his new book, Constant Battles: The Myth of the Peaceful Noble Savage, Peabody Museum Director of Collections Steven LeBlanc explores the connections between prehistoric warfare and modern military conflicts, which he says are often incorrectly overlooked.

Humans are genetically disposed towards aggressive behavior which can escalate to war, LeBlanc argues, and war has been central to life in both tribal and complex societies. LeBlanc, who also serves as a senior lecturer in the anthropology department, has been interested in prehistoric warfare for many years.

LeBlanc’s work has centered on the American southwest and Turkey. The image of prehistoric tribal groups in these areas as “peaceful noble savages” is widely accepted, LeBlanc says, yet his work has uncovered evidence of ancient wars in both places.

In the chapter “Enter Conflict,” LeBlanc describes the excavation sites of Mimbre villages in southwestern Mexico. The Mimbres, who flourished three thousand millennia ago, have traditionally been viewed as farmers. Yet the remains of Mimbre settlements have been found frequently on hilltops, which are inconvenient for farming and prone to lightning strikes.

LeBlanc concludes that the hilltop locations can only be explained in terms of their defensive and strategic value. His theory is supported by defensive walls which have been found near the Mimbre settlements. Unburied and improperly buried bodies at these sites suggest violent massacres, a theory corroborated by a large amount of evidence of scalpings.

Contrary to the myths surrounding them, LeBlanc writes, the Mimbres were not simply “peaceful Pueblo Indians.” Similar evidence in other places has been long ignored, overlooked due to what LeBlanc describes as the common belief that humans have lived peacefully before the advent of nation-states. Both anthropologists and the general public have romanticized prehistoric societies and contemporary tribal groups as peaceful, LeBlanc argues, when in fact populations have perished or flourished as a result of warfare.

It took LeBlanc himself many years to come to terms with this myth. The Mimbres were not the only early people who engaged in war; evidence for warfare has been found across the world.

“I began to think that if the Southwest was not peaceful,” LeBlanc writes, “then there was little reason to believe any other place on Earth was peaceful for long. The whole idea of a peaceful past came into question.”

LeBlanc cites groups as diverse as the Maoris of New Zealand and the Greek Mycenaeans to demonstrate that warfare was prevalent in both prehistoric and tribal societies.

One reason may be that humans are prone to aggressive behavior. LeBlanc cites the work of Professor of Biological Anthropology Richard Wrangham, who studied warfare among chimpanzees. LeBlanc observes that humans, like chimps, are not prone to warfare but to aggression, which leads to war. It is not true that some peoples are by nature more “peaceful” than others; all humans seem to be genetically programmed for aggression, he writes.

An even more common—but equally dangerous—myth proposes that tribal peoples lived in symbiotic relationships with the environment. LeBlanc attempts to debunk this myth as well.

While LeBlanc acknowledges that peoples such as the Plains Indians in North America were knowledgeable about and respectful of their natural surroundings, they were not conservationists—they, too, had problems balancing population growth with limited natural resources.

“The idea that Native Americans, as well as other early humans the world over, lived in ecological harmony, is pure fantasy,” he says.

Warfare, LeBlanc believes, “has ultimately been a constant battle over scarce resources throughout the ages.”

To better understand and prevent warfare today, humans must come to terms with the two myths.

They must acknowledge the centrality of warfare in human history and explore ways to share resources. They must also acknowledge the changing environment and need to capitalize on available resources, as well as examine the deeper meaning of ecological balance.

And while humans may be prone to aggressive behavior, this does not mean they are prone to war. In fact, LeBlanc writes, a smaller percentage of people today are likely to be killed by war than in the past—a hopeful prediction in today’s world.