Editing Cultural diffusion (section)

==Hyperdiffusionism==
{{Main|Hyperdiffusionism in Archaeology}}
Hyperdiffusionists deny that [[parallel evolution]] or independent invention took place to any great extent throughout history; they claim that all major inventions and all cultures can be traced back to a single culture.<ref>Legend and lore of the Americas before 1492: an encyclopedia of visitors, explorers, and immigrants, Ronald H. Fritze, 1993, p. 70</ref>

Early theories of hyperdiffusionism can be traced to ideas about South America being the origin of mankind. [[Antonio de León Pinelo]], a Spaniard who settled in [[Bolivia]], claimed in his book ''Paraíso en el Nuevo Mundo'' that the [[Garden of Eden]] and the creation of man had occurred in present-day Bolivia and that the rest of the world was populated by [[Human migration|migration]]s from there. Similar ideas were also held by Emeterio Villamil de Rada; in his book ''La Lengua de Adán'' he attempted to prove that [[Aymaran languages|Aymara]] was the original language of mankind and that humanity had originated in [[Sorata]] in the Bolivian [[Andes]]. The first scientific defence of humanity originating in South America came from the Argentine [[paleontologist]] [[Florentino Ameghino]] in 1880, who published his research in ''La antigüedad del hombre en el Plata''.<ref>Indians of the Andes: Aymaras and Quechuas, Harold Osborne, 2004, pp. 2–3</ref>

The work of [[Grafton Elliot Smith]] fomented a revival of hyperdiffusionism in 1911; he asserted that copper–producing knowledge spread from [[Egypt]] to the rest of the world along with [[megalithic]] culture.<ref>''The Routledge Dictionary of Anthropologists,'' Gérald Gaillard, 2004, p. 48</ref> Smith claimed that all major inventions had been made by the ancient [[Egyptians]] and were carried to the rest of the world by migrants and voyagers. His views became known as "Egyptocentric-Hyperdiffusionism".<ref>Megaliths, Myths and Men: An Introduction to Astro-Archaeology, Peter Lancaster Brown, 2000, p. 267</ref> [[W. J. Perry|William James Perry]] elaborated on Smith's hypothesis by using [[ethnographic]] data. Another hyperdiffusionist was [[FitzRoy Somerset, 4th Baron Raglan|Lord Raglan]]; in his book ''How Came Civilization'' (1939) he wrote that instead of Egypt all culture and civilization had come from [[Mesopotamia]].<ref>''Sociocultural Evolution: Calculation and Contingency,'' Bruce G. Trigger, 1998, p. 101</ref> Hyperdiffusionism after this did not entirely disappear, but it was generally abandoned by mainstream academia.