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Summarized by Kent Larsen
Mainstream Archaeology vs. Book of Mormon Evidence
Atlantic Monthly Jan00 N6
by Marc K. Stengel
You've probably heard of those crackpot theories about ancient Phoenicians or Chinese in the New World. Maybe it's time to start
paying attention
An article in this month's Atlantic Monthly magazine examines the
'Diffusionist' movement among archaeologists - those that believe that
the Americas had extensive contact with the rest of the world before
1492. While the movement seems to be gaining some respect, it is still
a long way from gaining respectability among mainstream
archaeologists. And for believers in the Book of Mormon, it is still a
long way from the views of most diffusionists to evidence supporting
the Book of Mormon.
Diffusionists have long been viewed as crackpots by mainstream
archaeologists. Relying on artifacts like a Norse spatha type sword
discovered in Pennsylvania and a stone containing carved
Phoenician-era Iberian script found at Grave Creek, West Virginia,
they have raised the possibility of contact from the rest of the
world.
The Diffusionist cause has not only been hurt by the reactions of
mainstream archaeologists, however. Often the suggestions of
Diffusionists have been poorly thought out and poorly researched, or
ignore a wealth of evidence that doesn't support their claims. In
addition, those making the diffusionist claims often have no training
relevant to their claims.
The retired curator of the Peabody Museum at Harvard University,
Stephen Williams, calls the diffusionists "Cranks." His 1991 book,
"Fantastic Archaeology: The Wild Side of North American Prehistory" is
almost a catalog of diffusionist theories, which Williams attempts to
debunk in a heavily sarcastic tone. Another influential mainstream
professor, Brian Fagan of the University of California at Santa
Barbara, finds diffusionist theories exasperating, "Why do such
lunatic ravings persist?" he asks in "The Great Journey: The Peopling
of Ancient America" (1987). "To read the crank literature on the first
Americans is to enter a fantasy world of strange, often obsessed,
writers with a complex jargon of catchwords and 'scientific' data to
support their ideas."
But the mainstream theory has its problems also. That theory says that
the ancestors of the American Indian crossed the land bridge from Asia
before 10,000 years ago, slowly spreading south through the Americas,
before reaching the southern part of South America about 3,000 years
ago.
But archaeologist Tom Dillehay of the University of Kentucky at
Lexington has found evidence of human beings in southern Chile from
12,500 years ago and Brazilian scientists have found the remains of a
young woman that date to 11,500 years ago; and the woman's features
suggest Negroid origins instead of Mongoloid as predicted by the
theory.
More recent artifacts, such as the Grave Creek stone, also point to
the possibility of additional contact, in spite of the isolation
predicted by the theory. "It amazes me," says Mike Xu, a professor of
modern languages and literature at Texas Christian University, "that
while there are authorities who propose visits to North America by
boat some twenty-five thousand years ago, [most orthodox academics
insist that contact across the sea in the past 3,000 years is] "simply
unthinkable."
One of the most popular of the diffusionists was H. Barraclough
"Barry" Fell, a Harvard biologist who became an epigrapher, studying
the man-made markings of ancient peoples. In 1976 Fell published
"America B.C.," a discussion of the implications of epigraphy on
archaeology. The book excited many readers with its talk about "Druids
in Vermont?" and "Phoenicians in Iowa before the time of Julius
Caesar?"
While Fell had a good reputation among his biologist colleagues and
bearing academic credentials from one of the world's most imposing
Universities, Fell failed to use a scientists objective approach to
his study and expressed absolute certainty in his explanations of the
origin of American-found artifacts. In "America B.C." and his
subsequent books, "Saga America" and "Bronze Age America," Fell
claimed that Europeans, Africans and Asians made routine visits to the
Americas which are not remembered in history.
But mainstream archaeologists viewed Fell as a self-promoting
pseudo-scientist who threatened their careful work by approaching a
nonspecialist -- and therefore easily fooled -- audience. Critics
cited numerous errors in Fell's chronology and interpretations, and
pointed out that Fell's work hadn't been reviewed by his peers.
"Unable to trust some of his discoveries, mainstream academics have
generally elected not to trust any of them." says Stengel.
But not everyone threw out the baby with the bathwater. Archaeologist
David Kelley of the University of Calgary can't bring himself to
simply dismiss Fell's work, in spite of the many errors that he sees.
He writes that, "Fell's work [contains] major academic sins, the three
worst being distortion of data, inadequate acknowledgment of
predecessors, and lack of presentation of alternative views."
Kelley says his colleague's reaction to Fell isn't completely
justified, "When it is clear that a 'fantastic' interpretation has
many reasonable components if the data are valid, most professional
archaeologists regard that as .... adequate reason to assume that the
data are invalid." He says that Fell's work needs a different kind of
hearing for his work to be evaluated fairly, "The problem I see with
Barry Fell," he says, "is that the people who can evaluate him
accurately are the people who are least likely to be reading him. It
needs somebody with a professional understanding of linguistic
evidence and a willingness to look at some quite unlikely-seeming
material."
Meanwhile, Diffusionists have tried to become more careful in their
research and conclusions. Supporting the claims of diffusionists is
the work of BYU professor John Sorenson and the Harold B. Lee
Library's Martin Raish. Sorenson and Raish published a two-volume
work, "Pre-Columbian Contact with the Americas Across the Oceans"
detailing more than 5,100 books, articles, dissertations and
presentations, pro and con, on diffusionist theories. However,
because the work was produced by a group with strong Mormon beliefs,
establishment scholars have dismissed it.
Diffusionists also suffer because they often approach their research
from non-traditional perspectives. Most archaeologists look for
physical evidence of contact from outside the Americas, so called
"dirt archaeology." But much of the evidence isn't physical. Calgary's
Kelly says that the impact of visitors just wasn't physical, but
instead was 'ideological.' "The problem is in the fact that there are
influences, but they don't show up in 'dirt archaeology.' Basically,
they show up in ideological materials: mythology, astronomy,
calendrics. These are precisely the areas which are hardest to deal
with archaeologically. And so they don't get much attention from
traditional archaeologists."
But Native American activist Vine Deloria Jr. sees a more pervasive
reason for the mainstream archaeologist's refusal to even consider
diffusionist claims, "There's the Stephen Jay Gould attitude out there
that believes science can do whatever it wants unless it comforts
religion -- because religion is considered a mere superstition. But if
you look at it, most things that they're calling religious are not
really religious. They're oral traditions; they're ancient memory."
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