We all know now that Columbus was not the first European to travel to N. America-the Viking ruins in newfoundland prove that the scandinavians were here ca. 1000 AD. Were there others, even earlier? A few years back I recall reading a book by the late Barry fell (Ph.D./Harvard) -the book was called AMERICA BC. In the book he makes the claim that other europeans (Phoenicians, Irish, etc.) may have come and left traces of their visits as well. My question: of all the civilizations of the ancient world, why would Rome not be a candidate for this? They had reasonably good seafaring skills, and were certainly aggressive about expanding their empire. They did conquer Britain twice (first around 35 BC, then later under Claudius, around 65 AD), and they certainly knew of Ireland. So, could a Roman galley cross the Atalntic from ireland? Some linguists claim that traces of latin exist in the Algonquian languages of the NE Indians-is it possible that the Romans came here?
“Show me the evidence!”
Certainly there are suppositions that everyone from the Sumerians to the Lapps popped over for a tour of the States before Chris C. conned Ferdinand and Isabella into giving him a West Indies cruise for his birthday. But there’s been no or inadequate evidence to prove any of them. The ones I’m familiar with:
[li]people from Atlantis ('nuff said right there)[/li][li]sun worshippers spreading civilization just before history – this has some minor archaeological support but is still pretty farfetched[/li][li]various groups of quasi-Biblical characters – Mormon doctrine; perhaps a LDS person could go into detail on this and what evidence exists[/li][li]Early Irish visits, resulting in the various legends of Tir nA nog, Emhain, etc.[/li][li]St. Brendan the Navigator[/li][li]Prince Madog of Gwynedd[/li][li]Chinese explorations of the California coast[/li][li]Norse incursions beyond Vinland[/li][li]Whatever was supposed to happen underlying "The Vinland Map and the Tatar Relation – a pre-Columbian map showing North America fairly accurately, but also a more-or-less accurate coast of Antarctica ice-free.[/li]
None of these have enough evidence supporting them to call them even partially proven. Some of them are off the deep end, others almost definite.
Your OP asks a lot of “could they?” questions. Could the Romans have visited N. America? Sure. Did they? I’d bet against it.
Roman shipping was much better built for tooling about the Med, which stays a lot more flat than some of the vertical water you get in the North Atlantic. The Viking ships were built to flex, and the Norse had a lot more experience with nasty water than the Romans. Ditto the Phoenecians, and the curragh that St. Brendan is expected to have used (if that trip really happened) was basically a leather bag over a flexible basket - a rough ride, but certainly doable.
But a Roman Trireme, for example? Don’t think so. Too heavy, too low at the gun’ls, and too many holes to start with.
**egkelly wrote:
My question: of all the civilizations of the ancient world, why would Rome not be a candidate for this? They had reasonably good seafaring skills, and were certainly aggressive about expanding their empire.**
I think it’s better to ask “why should they sail west to North America” rather than “could they sail west to North America”?
I’m fairly certain that mariners of the Antique period knew the world was round and had the skills to sail across the Atlantic, but why should they? They had no idea what was out there and no real reason to go exploring. For all they knew, there were no new lands to explore and after a while, their supplies would run out and they’d die of starvation. Maybe there were new lands out there, but would they be willing to bet their lives on it? Apparently not.
Actually, I would take issue with
.
During the period of the Roman Empire, people around the Mediterranean made several interesting improvements to ship design. This included the artemon which was a forward mounted sail that very likely helped the ships tack upwind (although it was inefficient and there are those who feel that no Roman ship could accomplish that) and the manufacture of very large grain ships which were not matched in size by anything built between the fourth century and the Great Eastern of 1858.
However these developments were not accompanied by any general improvement in shipbuilding or navigation. (When the Romans were forced to fight on the sea against Carthage, they had no hope of defeating the swift Punic ships in battle, so they ordered large ships based on Greek design, capable of carrying large numbers of soldiers/marines, and then invented the corvus (“crow”) that was basically a hinged boarding ramp with a spike at the end that they dropped into the deck of their opponents, whom they then overwhelmed by sending their soldiers across the ramp to kill the crew.)
The artemon and the large grain ships appeared during the Roman era, but there is no evidence as to where they were invented or developed. Even if we ascribe both developments to the Romans, themselves, it must be noted that the basic accomplishment was to improve the transport of goods (especially grain) to Rome across known routes. Neither those developments nor any other changes to shipbuilding during the period produced a design that was suitable for exploration.
I’m holding out for the Hanna-Barberra-esque cartoon of the evil Pontius Pilate and his buffoon henchmen chasing Jesus around the Indian Territories. “I’ll get you next time Jesus! Next Time!!”
Well, there is the American Stonhenge in New Hampshire, which has various Celtic runes carved in it.
Joel, I was under the impression that at least the runes, and probably the whole site, had been debunked as a 19th century forgery. I think it was in Skeptical Inquirer a while ago.
Besides which, there are only so many ways in which straight lines can be carven into wood or stone…it would be safer to say “celtic-looking runes” (and we won’t get into the broad use we’re making of the term “rune” here.)
Apropos of this, there is the interesting fact that the ronga ronga boards of Easter Island, the only native Polynesian “written language” relics, appear to be using a similar alphabet to that used by the Indus Valley Civilization. Neither has been deciphered. And of course there’s the small matter of half a world’s distance and about 3000 years between the two cultures, but we won’t let that throw us.
Question for the T.M. and Freyr in particular: Aside from L’Anse aux Meadows, are there any sites in North or South America predating Columbus which are definitely not of Native American construction? I haven’t encountered reports of any that that sort of certitude can be placed on.
I have visited the “mystery Hill” site-it is in North salem, NH. It is indeed impressive, but because it has never been systematically studied (by professional archaeologists), its origins are open to considerable doubt.One thing that Dr. Fell looked at was the strange stone buildings, which are scattered around new England and the midwest. These resemble partially buried stone-walled chambers, covered by flat roof slabs. they do (in some cases) resemble similar stone structures found in Ireland (these are of early Bronze-Age origin). I have seen some of these myself, and they are striking in that many are located on hillsides, or in deep woods, far from any settlemnts. A few years back, a Harvard archaeologist dismissed any talk of these being of pre-columbian origin-he claimed they were colonial-era root cellars!This explanation makes no sense whatsoever, because most were never anywhere near any colonial towns.
OK, but don’t try to explain that to the locals around Salem, NH.
But what about the cartoon? I bet there’d be a huge market in Utah. Sort of a George of the Jungle for the new millenium. He could get cruxified at the start of every episode…
Jesus, Jesus,
Jesus of the Indians,
Should be dead as you can see.
ELOI, LAMA SABACHTHANI?!!
They hung him from a tree…
Jesus, Jesus,
Jesus of the Indians,
Is alive though you can see.
(Ahhhhhhhh)
Watch out for that tree!
When he gets in a scrape,
he doesn’t try to escape
cause he gets cruxified,
for our sake
Then to Pilate’s chagrin
From the tomb he’s in
He comes back alive and vaquished sin…
(of course, the real money will be in merchandizing)
Rather than Roman explorers, it would be much more likely that there were Carthaginians in the New World. If they were Puno-Celto-Iberians, it would explain most of the “inscriptions” assuming that at least some of them are real. However, Barry Fell is very unreputable. I would no sooner believe a Barry Fell story than I would dismiss a story that the Skeptical Enquirer debunked. Both have agendas that interfere with a search for the truth.
Mind you- it is actually LIKELY that some poor lost sailors ended up over in the Americas prior to ol Christopher C. BUT- they did not get back & report, they left precious little evidence- and no impact that can be proven.
Since the Vikings actually got back & reported in- they can legit lay claim to the first “discoverors” of America- but barely.
And i have to agree that SI does a poor job in “debunking” this sort of thing- they extensively debunked the kensington stone- but based on analysis of the writings- which is VERY inexact when you have that little writing to go on. Since several scholars bet their professional standing on the fact that the KS HAD to be a fraud- before others found the viking landing site, and thus proved the Vikings got here- i would say there is a reasonable chance that the KS is legit. I would list it as 'doubtful" as opposed to the SI saying it was 'a clear forgery".
If we find some evidence that some Carthaginian (or roman) ship shipwrecked somewhere in America i would not be shocked. But round trips? Very, very unlikely.
What about those Asians that came over 12-16,000 years ago and became the ‘Native Americans’? True, they didn’t have to cross MUCH water…but they probably didn’t walk over like the earlier waves of humans, some of which might have made it over as much as 100,000 years ago.
I think the Chinese may have made it over more recently than that, though, and actually had a lasting influence - some Central and South American sculpture is very reminiscent of ancient Chinese stuff.
**Polycarp wrote:
Question for the T.M. and Freyr in particular: Aside from L’Anse aux Meadows, are there any sites in North or South America predating Columbus which are definitely not of Native American construction? I haven’t encountered reports of any that that sort of certitude can be placed on.**
Neither have I. One question about the Kensington stone/American Stonehenge: celtic runes??? The runes are Norse, not Celtic. So, what are these celtic runes? Also, as from what I’ve read, the Celtics didn’t build the famous meagliths like Stonehenge, etc. Those were built by an earlier culture, the Megalith Builders (of which we know very little, except they liked astronomy).
**Badtz Maru wrote:
What about those Asians that came over 12-16,000 years ago and became the ‘Native Americans’? True, they didn’t have to cross MUCH water…but they probably didn’t walk over like the earlier waves of humans, some of which might have made it over as much as 100,000 years ago.**
They walked over, since at the time of their crossing, the seas levels were low enough to expose the land between Asia and North America. This happened around 9000 BC.
There’s evidence of earlier inhabitation, like 17000 BC, in areas like Meadowcroft rock shelter in PA, but some people doubt the dating, saying there was contamination of the radiocarbon tests.
There’s also Kenniwick Man, but the idea he’s European is based solely on the reconstruction of his features. There’s no other cultural evidence to support it.
I’ve heard of evidence of earlier finds in North and South America, but the dating of those artifacts has never been firmly established.
Freyr:
Best evidence we have is that Stonehenge III – the Sarcen Circle and such that everybody thinks of as “Stonehenge” – was built by the Beaker People, on whom there’s a fair amount of archaeological data. Were they Celts? Probably – they were in the right area at the right time to be the ancestors of the Classic-history continental and Brythonic Celtic tribes. No proof, though. (My wife did some research on this for an advanced-level anthro. course. Of course, it’s all theoretical at this point – something she’d be quick to point out.) Stonehenge I and II, the predecessor constructions at that site, are evident only in holes and a few isolated stones, but C-14 says they predate the Beaker Folk by 900 years and more.
Celtic runes: I understood him to mean Ogham markings, which are often referred to as “runes” in a broader usage than the Futhark (Isn’t there another term for this in Old Norse? All I can remember is the Anglo-Saxon.) And it’s quite questionable whether the “American Stonehenge” markings, fraudulent or not, are in any writing system known today. I’ve gathered from less-than-reputable reports that they do bear some resemblance to Ogham, and was willing to let “runes” pass as a broad-usage descriptor; after all, Tolkien had a set of (written) characters used by his (fictional) characters that he called “runes” – and he certainly knew the true meaning of the term.
The Berber Project postulates extensive contact and even trade between North America and Europe/North Africa from 3000 BCE.
How plausible is this, historically?
BTW, with The Berber Project, it’ll be less confusing if you start with chapter two for the historical stuff–the site is in the context of the Kingdom of Talossa, a self-proclaimed microstate appatently somewhere in the USA.
jmullaney wrote:
Damn you, jmullaney!
Now I have an image in my head of Jesus holding up a glowing club and shouting, “MIIIIGH-TORRRR!”
At least I don’t envision him wearing Space-Ghost-esque power bands. Yet.
From the end of the first chapter of the Berber Project:
The rest is pretty amusing and I think the author is having a good time, but I think that the few “facts” I saw presented were pretty much along the lines of contributing to their “real or imagined culture.”
Roman vessels were not limited to triremes and such, but would have borrowed things like latter-day xebecs and whatnot. Such boats could make a trans-Atlantic trip no harder than, say Polynesians going Samoa-to-Hawaii (I don’t buy into the construction aspects). And I wouldn’t call the Med “flat” or Mid-Atlantic necessarily stormy, having crossed both many, many times. Been in incredibly ugly storms in the Med, and several completely flat crossings of the Atlantic. Sailing technology and prevailing winds would easily allow for a shot from Gib to the southern West Indies, so it seems certainly plausible.
But “why would they” seems the better explanation, as depleted resources had never gotten that bad in the Med, or [example] Roman political organization would not likely have seen to the outfitting of a small mercantile fleet with lateen rigging, but rather military type convoys that couldn’t handle that type of trip… As opposed to, say, Polynesians, who depleted an island of game and had to get somewhere else, badly and quick.