Post by blackcrowheart on Sept 5, 2007 14:08:54 GMT -5
LENAPE HOAX BUILT TO SUPPORT THEORY
By Zinnia Faruque
Herald News
"On the earth, (was) an extended fog, and there the great Manito was.
He made the extended land and the sky/He made the sun, the moon, the
stars/He made them all to move evenly." - Excerpt from the Walam
Olum, translated by American historian Daniel Brinton in his 1885
book, "The Lenape and Their Legends"
Since it was published in 1836, the Walam Olum has long been
considered to be an ancient record handed down for generations by the
Lenni-Lenape Indians, the first American Indians to settle New Jersey
and other parts of the Northeast.
Compared to "The Iliad" and the Bible, it was an epic tale that
chronicled everything from the creation to the migration of the
Lenape to America and the coming of the white man. But could the
Walam Olum really just be a masterful hoax, created by a 19th-century
scholar yearning for fame and fortune?
"The Walam Olum is not the 'oldest native North American history,'
but one of the oldest hoaxes in North America," wrote ethnologist
David Oestreicher in a 1996 article that appeared in Natural History
magazine, published by the American Museum of Natural History.
Widely regarded as the Lenape Rosetta stone, the Walam Olum allegedly
surfaced in 1822, when Constantine Samuel Rafinesque said that he had
discovered the hieroglyphic document, painted on wooden tablets.
Rafinesque, who was at the time a botanist and natural historian at
the University of Transylvania in Lexington, Ky., claimed to have
deciphered the hieroglyphs after more than a decade of study, and he
published a manuscript of this translation in 1836.
In the decades that followed, the Walam Olum was repeatedly validated
by scholars, including a prolific team assembled in the 1930s by
pharmaceutical tycoon Eli Lilly. In 1954, after 20 years of work,
Lilly's team reported "all the confidence in the historical value of
the Walam Olum that (German archaeologist Heinrich) Schliemann had in
the accuracy of the Homeric epics."
The Walam Olum seemed to provide American Indian folklore that went
along with the science of the day - that migrations from Asia across
the Bering Strait land bridge accounted for the early peopling of the
New World.
Although some scholars expressed doubt over the document's
legitimacy, no solid refutation was ever published - that is, until
Oestreicher came along.
Based on a review of Rafinesque's papers, Oestreicher concluded that
Rafinesque had first translated the document from English into
Lenape, rather than from Lenape into English, meaning that the Lenape
document was a forgery.
Oestreicher said that Rafinesque wanted to prove his passionately
held conviction that the Indians came from Asia. But this was hard to
do because he had been widely discredited by his contemporaries
because of other outlandish claims.
"Frustrated and feeling unappreciated, Rafinesque apparently became
convinced that no one would ever accept his views unless he
manufactured some dramatic 'evidence,'" wrote Oestreicher.
In fact, the Walam Olum appeared around the same time as another set
of mysterious tablets, uncovered by Joseph Smith, founder of the
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. In 1830, six years
before the publication of the Walam Olum, Smith said he had found
golden tablets buried in upstate New York, written in the "language
of the Egyptians" and proving that the Indians were descendants of
ancient Jews.
"He believed that Joseph Smith's tablets were a hoax based upon an
incorrect theory, but they appear to have inspired him to create his
own 'long-lost tablets," said Oestreicher.
Other scholars, including Matt Tomaso, principal investigator for
Montclair State University's Center for Archeological Studies, have
corroborated Oestreicher's detailed investigation of the Walam Olum.
But today's younger generations of Lenape Indians may have suffered
the most from this hoax.
"Having suffered the loss of their language and earnestly seeking to
reclaim their past, some Lenape were deeply disappointed when I
presented my findings at a recent symposium in Oklahoma," wrote Oestreicher.
Contributed by
Peter "Smoking Waters Turtle" Luderer
[NOTE: Many groups of Lenape still look to the Walam Olum as
"Gospel" and refuse to examine fully Dr. Oestreicher's Doctorate
Thesis found in the Bulletin of the Archaeological Society of New
Jersey, Volume #49, 1994 "Unmasking the Walam Olum: A 19th Century
Hoax" and Volume #50, 1995 "Text Out of Context: The Arguments that
Created and Sustained the Walam Olum." I do not see how anyone can
read these articles with an open and inquiring mind and still
believe. Both articles are included on the "Lenape Studies Volume
Three CD, compiled by Wipunkwteme. - WT]
By Zinnia Faruque
Herald News
"On the earth, (was) an extended fog, and there the great Manito was.
He made the extended land and the sky/He made the sun, the moon, the
stars/He made them all to move evenly." - Excerpt from the Walam
Olum, translated by American historian Daniel Brinton in his 1885
book, "The Lenape and Their Legends"
Since it was published in 1836, the Walam Olum has long been
considered to be an ancient record handed down for generations by the
Lenni-Lenape Indians, the first American Indians to settle New Jersey
and other parts of the Northeast.
Compared to "The Iliad" and the Bible, it was an epic tale that
chronicled everything from the creation to the migration of the
Lenape to America and the coming of the white man. But could the
Walam Olum really just be a masterful hoax, created by a 19th-century
scholar yearning for fame and fortune?
"The Walam Olum is not the 'oldest native North American history,'
but one of the oldest hoaxes in North America," wrote ethnologist
David Oestreicher in a 1996 article that appeared in Natural History
magazine, published by the American Museum of Natural History.
Widely regarded as the Lenape Rosetta stone, the Walam Olum allegedly
surfaced in 1822, when Constantine Samuel Rafinesque said that he had
discovered the hieroglyphic document, painted on wooden tablets.
Rafinesque, who was at the time a botanist and natural historian at
the University of Transylvania in Lexington, Ky., claimed to have
deciphered the hieroglyphs after more than a decade of study, and he
published a manuscript of this translation in 1836.
In the decades that followed, the Walam Olum was repeatedly validated
by scholars, including a prolific team assembled in the 1930s by
pharmaceutical tycoon Eli Lilly. In 1954, after 20 years of work,
Lilly's team reported "all the confidence in the historical value of
the Walam Olum that (German archaeologist Heinrich) Schliemann had in
the accuracy of the Homeric epics."
The Walam Olum seemed to provide American Indian folklore that went
along with the science of the day - that migrations from Asia across
the Bering Strait land bridge accounted for the early peopling of the
New World.
Although some scholars expressed doubt over the document's
legitimacy, no solid refutation was ever published - that is, until
Oestreicher came along.
Based on a review of Rafinesque's papers, Oestreicher concluded that
Rafinesque had first translated the document from English into
Lenape, rather than from Lenape into English, meaning that the Lenape
document was a forgery.
Oestreicher said that Rafinesque wanted to prove his passionately
held conviction that the Indians came from Asia. But this was hard to
do because he had been widely discredited by his contemporaries
because of other outlandish claims.
"Frustrated and feeling unappreciated, Rafinesque apparently became
convinced that no one would ever accept his views unless he
manufactured some dramatic 'evidence,'" wrote Oestreicher.
In fact, the Walam Olum appeared around the same time as another set
of mysterious tablets, uncovered by Joseph Smith, founder of the
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. In 1830, six years
before the publication of the Walam Olum, Smith said he had found
golden tablets buried in upstate New York, written in the "language
of the Egyptians" and proving that the Indians were descendants of
ancient Jews.
"He believed that Joseph Smith's tablets were a hoax based upon an
incorrect theory, but they appear to have inspired him to create his
own 'long-lost tablets," said Oestreicher.
Other scholars, including Matt Tomaso, principal investigator for
Montclair State University's Center for Archeological Studies, have
corroborated Oestreicher's detailed investigation of the Walam Olum.
But today's younger generations of Lenape Indians may have suffered
the most from this hoax.
"Having suffered the loss of their language and earnestly seeking to
reclaim their past, some Lenape were deeply disappointed when I
presented my findings at a recent symposium in Oklahoma," wrote Oestreicher.
Contributed by
Peter "Smoking Waters Turtle" Luderer
[NOTE: Many groups of Lenape still look to the Walam Olum as
"Gospel" and refuse to examine fully Dr. Oestreicher's Doctorate
Thesis found in the Bulletin of the Archaeological Society of New
Jersey, Volume #49, 1994 "Unmasking the Walam Olum: A 19th Century
Hoax" and Volume #50, 1995 "Text Out of Context: The Arguments that
Created and Sustained the Walam Olum." I do not see how anyone can
read these articles with an open and inquiring mind and still
believe. Both articles are included on the "Lenape Studies Volume
Three CD, compiled by Wipunkwteme. - WT]