There's a pamphlet, recently published in France, that deserves to be read twice. The first time to understand what it says. The second time to understand. including he says it, and it is in that second reading that, in my opinion, the most interesting question lies.
The title tells us everything: The imposture of « modern matriarchal research ». Signed by Anne Augereau, Christophe Darmangeat, Jean-Loïc Le Quellec and Marilou Nordez, four authoritative voices in French archaeology, and the declared target are the theses of Heide Göttner-Abendroth, the German scholar who has been working on the concept of matriarchal societies for decades.
I'm not writing to defend Göttner-Abendroth, nor to establish whether his research stands up to the test of facts; that's the task of scientific debate. I'm writing because, reading those pages, I saw something happen that's worth recounting: a text written to criticize a theory that, line after line, ends up criticizing a person.
For those of us who, like us, Prehistory in Italy, has been observing the debate surrounding unconventional interpretations of prehistory for years, this mechanism is not new. We have already seen it emerge on other occasions. And it is precisely this recurrence, even more than the specific case, that has pushed me to stop and ask myself whether it isn't worth reflecting not only on the ideas being criticized, but also on the way in which that criticism is constructed.
A title that judges before arguing
Let's start with a fact: imposture, in French as in Italian, is not synonymous with "error" or "weak hypothesis." It's a weighty word, evoking deception, simulation, the staging of a legitimacy that doesn't exist. It's a verdict, not a question.
Those who open that book aren't invited to evaluate arguments, but are informed, right from the cover, that what they'll find is a fraud that needs to be exposed. And the cover, for someone like me who's been working in visual communication for forty years, isn't just an aesthetic detail: it's the first line of the article, even before the first line. In this case, it's a Minoan seal, one of the most cited symbols in studies of matriarchal societies in the prehistoric Aegean, paired with the word impostureThe effect is precise, and I don't think it's accidental: before even reading a single page, an entire search field is placed under the same sign of suspicion.
I'm not attributing intentions to whoever chose that title and image; intentions can't be proven, and that's not the terrain I want to explore. I'm observing an effect. And it's an effect that, I fear, conditions the reading of everything that follows.
From theory to person: two examples that speak for themselves
Within the text, the same dynamic repeats itself with a regularity that cannot be coincidental.
First example. The authors correctly acknowledge that being an independent researcher is not in itself a demerit. But a few lines later, they note that Göttner-Abendroth's publications in peer-reviewed journals are scant, calling this a "red flag" that, a few pages later, becomes a "true alarm bell." Reinforcing this suspicion, they invoke the HAGIA Academy, which she founded, and the spiritual activities conducted there.
The problem here isn't the accuracy of the reported facts, which I have no reason to doubt. The problem is the function those facts serve in the text: they don't serve to discuss a fact, a method, a source, but to construct a profile, that of a figure on the fringes of academia, close to spiritual practices, and therefore implicitly less credible. It's no longer a theory that's being weighed. It's a person.
A second example, perhaps even more telling, is this: the authors cite several passages in which Göttner-Abendroth describes his work as pioneering, then comment that, in the scientific field, such a display of self-satisfaction rarely bodes well. Here too, the focus shifts; the focus is no longer on the content of a statement, but on the tone in which it was uttered. It's an attitude that's being judged, not an argument.
Taken individually, each of these passages might seem like a marginal note. Arranged in a row, they outline a method; the theory is accompanied, almost silently, by a portrait of its proponent. And that portrait—an isolated, self-satisfied researcher, close to an unorthodox spiritual environment—needs no explanation to work. It's enough to simply approach it.
Why this research, and not others?
Here I come to the point that really interests me, and which goes beyond the single pamphlet.
Göttner-Abendroth's theories, like those of Marija Gimbutas before her, don't simply propose an alternative reading of a few finds. They question a framework constructed, for a century and a half, almost exclusively by men: an archaeology that has examined power, war, hierarchies, and territorial control, considering that perspective not as one option among many, but as the only possible one.
I call this approach androcentrism, and I say this without any intention of attacking individuals, but rather describing a paradigm that has ended up treating as universal a point of view that was not universal. When someone attempts to shift attention to care, relationships, symbolism, or the female figures that populate so many prehistoric contexts, they're not just proposing another research topic. They're questioning where we look from, not just what we look at.
And it is precisely when a paradigm feels undermined at this point, at its very foundation, not in a single detail, that the debate risks ceasing to be scientific and becoming defensive. It is no coincidence, I believe, that the harshest criticisms do not concern only Göttner-Abendroth's data or method, but also focus on his academic position, his language, and his activities outside of research strictly speaking. It is easier to dismantle a person than a paradigm.
The point that remains
I'm not debating whether Göttner-Abendroth's conclusions are well-founded; they can be confirmed, corrected, or rejected, like any scientific hypothesis. I'm questioning the way the critics, in this case, have chosen to proceed: a title that condemns before arguing, a cover that arouses suspicion, a method that combines data analysis with the construction of an unflattering portrait of the person interpreting those data.
Researchers have the right, indeed the duty, to be severe and stern when a theory doesn't hold up. But being severe about content is one thing. Discrediting a person is another, and when the two become confused, the reader is no longer evaluating a hypothesis, but evaluating a reputation already established by others.
This, I believe, is the real crux. It's not just about Göttner-Abendroth, nor just about studies on matriarchies. It's about how a worldview, one that for centuries has considered the male point of view to be universal, continues to shape not only the questions science asks, but also the language with which it welcomes or rejects those who attempt to ask different ones. And perhaps this, more than any data or any contested source, is the reason why certain research continues to provoke such disproportionate reactions.
Some final considerations
Genealogy “by association” with Herman Wirth.
The authors devote over a page to reconstructing how Marie König (Göttner-Abendroth's primary source on Paleolithic writing) fits into a tradition that dates back to Herman Wirth, who is specified in great detail as a member of the Nazi Party and the SS, and who directed a section of Himmler's Ahnenerbe. The conclusion they draw is that König's theses "are not without precedent," as Göttner-Abendroth claims, but belong to a tradition völkisch, (The school of thought born in Germany and Austria between the end of the nineteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth century which praised a common ancestral origin). All this concerns the story of an idea, Not its truthWhether symbolic writing actually existed in the Paleolithic is a question answered with archaeological finds, dating, and comparisons, not by reconstructing who else, before them, and for what (questionable) reasons, had a similar idea. In logic, this is called a genetic argument: a claim is evaluated based on its origins or its historical supporters, rather than on the evidence supporting it today.
The ending, which explicitly psychologizes the intentions.
In their conclusions, the authors do not limit themselves to judging the theses: they attribute to Göttner-Abendroth real deliberate rhetorical strategies, a "smokehouse" (smokescreen), calculated science, the choice to present herself as the victim of a patriarchal conspiracy to avoid answering the merits, a scientific-religious "doublespeak" purposely constructed to broaden the readership. These are all assertions about the author's psychological intentions, not about the validity of her theses, and by their very nature, they are unfalsifiable.
The ironic-mocking register used as an argument.
More than one passage does not refute but ridicules: the comparison with a biologist who mistakes peanuts for camels, the play on words between “modern” and “modest”, the final reference to “pseudo-scientific couleuvres" (taking bitter pills) in closing, the comparison between his entire work and the manuals of creationist theology. The authors write that Göttner-Abendroth's arguments as a whole "have no more value than those theological manuals" that refute evolution, a comparison that disqualifies on the basis of categorical comparison, rather than on specific merit.
Details on the prices of the HAGIA Academy.
In addition to the aforementioned "alarm siren," the text adds that the academy's co-director leads "spiritual healing circles" at €210 per module. This detail has no bearing on the validity of the historical theses; it simply serves to complete the portrait.
To conclude
If a theory is really so inconsistent, why did it require the joint work of four authoritative academics to be demolished by the method of discrediting the person?
