“Prehistoric eyes” by Guy Davenport is an essay on the most primitive people, the Dogon, who have survived into our age. Davenport takes a closer eye on the building designs, patterns, and meanings of the Dogon people of Upper Volta and Mali.

 The most compelling passages to me were the first four paragraphs. The passages illustrate the building designs and patterns of the most primitive people to have survived to today’s century. Generally, today’s architecture results from ancient buildings, and to understand the present, we must first look into the past. The passages reveal the meanings of the building patterns and designs of the most primitive Dogon people.  The patterns and designs emerged from the symmetry, sense of infinity, and love of intricate decoration. The designs, according to them, were rhythmic ways of pleasing the eyes and filling space (Davenport pp. 61-62). According to the archeologist, they are memories of past centuries when clay pots were an emulation of woven baskets. To the Dogon people, their painting of a column of dotted lozenges on the right door represents the descent heavenly ark from space.

Guy Davenport’s main idea is that art has not evolved but instead has always been itself. Consequently, Modern artists have learned more from obsolete findings in the current century than from the immediate century. According to him, history is the ring of extension in trees and is tragic but not linear. He prefers the historical sciences as it does not necessarily stave off death (Davenport p. 67). To him, looking at a man’s past and finding him not inarticulate but a soul of sensitivity is a shield against all forces that starve off life. He provides an illustration on the Dogon people. The Dogon people, although most primitive, can point to the stars which the modern man discovered recently with the aid of a telescope. After the discovery, the modern man has cataloged the facts and published the facts in books.  The primary meaning of such books, according to him, is not what has grown from men living together but rather what has been lost.