The Ancestral Landscape

"This is a work of extraordinary maturity—a well-considered incisive careful yet bold and highly original summation of insights gained over many decades of research….Keightley here presents in compelling and…understandable form some insights of general historical and intellectual interest that are derived from this rare body of original materials and he integrates them with a dazzling array of data from other fields of scholarship—including metereology botany zoology astronomy sociology and archaeology. The resulting lively and multifaceted picture of Shang realities is extremely impressive [...] The brilliant synthesis of the Shang social configuration of the cosmos that is presented here is unprecedented in its scope and startling in its clarity. It greatly exceeds all previous piecemeal work on the issue by Chinese Japanese and Western experts. Specialists as well as general readers will...feel deeply moved and inspired by this work...This is historical writings at its best"—Lothar von Falkenhausen

"Those who have a professional interest in Early China studies will find this book not only informative in its own right but also a good portal through which to enter more deeply into the material....But this is also a fine (and all too unusual) example of a scholarly book that is worth reading for pure pleasure quite apart from its value as a source of particular information and analysis. Keightley's lucid prose and magisterial interpretive stance together with the richness of the subject itself make this book a rare treat. Even the footnotes are interesting. The Ancestral Landscape deserves to find a readership far beyond the confines of its scholarly field."—John S. Major China Review International 9 no. 2 (Fall 2002): 460-464

“David Keightley is one of a handful of American scholars who have worked methodically to introduce the complexities of [oracle bone] scholarship to Western readers. Unlike many other scholars his approach is to let the bones speak for themselves and he only rarely introduces evidence from the later transmitted textual tradition. […] The Ancestral Landscape is an excellent tool for students to learn how historians can decipher the often-cryptic bone inscriptions for vital social historical and cultural information. —Constance A. Cook Lehigh University Journal of Chinese Religions 29 no. 1 (2001): 311–313