Теории доколумбовых трансокеанских контактов

О преобладающих моделях, описывающих географическое происхождение и ранние миграции людей в Америке, см. « Население Америки» . Для получения дополнительной информации о генетическом наследии коренных американцев см. Генетическую историю коренных народов Америки . О доказательствах доколумбовой связи через Берингов пролив см. в разделе « Доколумбовые контакты через Берингов пролив» .

Реконструкция высадки викингов в Л'Анс-о-Медоуз.

Доколумбовые теории трансокеанских контактов — это спекулятивные теории, которые предполагают, что посещения Америки , взаимодействие с коренными народами Америки или и то, и другое были совершены людьми из других мест до Христофора Колумба в первого путешествия Карибское море в 1492 году. Исследования, проведенные в период с 2004 по 2009 год, предполагают возможность того, что самые ранние миграции людей в Америку могли совершаться на лодках из Берингии и путешествовать вдоль побережья Тихого океана, одновременно с сухопутными миграциями через Берингийский сухопутный мост , а возможно, и до них. которые в ледниковый период соединили территории, которые сегодня являются Сибирью и Аляской . Активно обсуждается вопрос о том, происходили ли в этот исторический период трансокеанские путешествия, приведшие к доколумбовым контактам между оседлыми американскими народами и путешественниками с других континентов.

Only a few cases of pre-Columbian contact are widely accepted by mainstream scientists and scholars. Yup'ik and Aleut peoples residing on both sides of the Bering Strait had frequent contact with each other, and Eurasian trade goods have been discovered in archaeological sites in Alaska. Maritime explorations by Norse peoples from Scandinavia during the late 10th century led to the Norse colonization of Greenland and a base camp L'Anse aux Meadows in Newfoundland, which preceded Columbus's arrival in the Americas by some 500 years. Recent genetic studies have also suggested that some eastern Polynesian populations have admixture from coastal western South American peoples, with an estimated date of contact around 1200 CE.

Scientific and scholarly responses to other claims of post-prehistory, pre-Columbian transoceanic contact have varied. Some of these claims are examined in reputable peer-reviewed sources. Many others are based only on circumstantial or ambiguous interpretations of archaeological evidence, the discovery of alleged out-of-place artifacts, superficial cultural comparisons, comments in historical documents, or narrative accounts. These have been dismissed as fringe science, pseudoarchaeology, or pseudohistory.

Claims of Austronesian contact

Human genetics

Between 2007 and 2009, geneticist Erik Thorsby and colleagues published two studies in Tissue Antigens that offer evidence of an Amerindian genetic contribution to human populations on Easter Island, determining that it was probably introduced before European discovery of the island. In 2014, geneticist Anna-Sapfo Malaspinas of the Center for GeoGenetics at the University of Copenhagen published a study in Current Biology that found human genetic evidence of contact between the populations of Easter Island and South America, dating to approximately 600 years ago (i.e. 1400 CE ± 100 years). In 2017, a comprehensive genomes study found "no Native American admixture in pre- and post-European-contact individuals".

Two skulls suggested to belong "Botocudo" people (a term used to refer to Native Americans who live in the interior of Brazil that speak Macro-Jê languages), were found in research published in 2013 to have been members of mtDNA haplogroup B4a1a1, which is normally found only among Polynesians and other subgroups of Austronesians. This was based on an analysis of 14 skulls. Two belonged to B4a1a1, while twelve belonged to subclades of mtDNA haplogroup C1 (common among Native Americans). The research team examined various scenarios, none of which they could say for certain were correct. They dismissed a scenario of direct contact in prehistory between Polynesia and Brazil as "too unlikely to be seriously entertained." While B4a1a1 is also found among the Malagasy people of Madagascar (which experienced significant Austronesian settlement in prehistory), the authors described as "fanciful" suggestions that B4a1a1 among the Botocudo resulted from the African slave trade (which included Madagascar). A later review paper of Polynesian history suggested that it was "more likely that these are the skulls of two people who died in Polynesia sometime early in the period of European voyaging, and whose graves were robbed by later visitors, and then mistakenly grouped in collections with the remains of Native Americans."

In 2020, a study in Nature found that populations in the Mangareva, Marquesas, and Palliser islands and Easter Island had genetic admixture from indigenous populations of South America, with the DNA of contemporary populations of Zenú people from the Pacific coast of Colombia being the closest match. The authors suggest that the genetic signatures were probably the result of a single ancient contact. They proposed that an initial admixture event between indigenous South Americans and Polynesians occurred in eastern Polynesia between 1150 and 1230 CE, with later admixture in Easter Island around 1380 CE, but suggested other possible contact scenarios—for example, Polynesian voyages to South America followed by Polynesian people's returning to Polynesia with South American people, or carrying South American genetic heritage. Several scholars uninvolved in the study suggested that a contact event in South America was more likely.

Plant genetics

The genetics of several plant species has also been used to support pre-Columbian contact via the Pacific. For example, there is a genetically distinct sub-population of coconuts on the western coast of South America. This has been suggested to be evidence of introduction by Austronesian seafarers.

Sweet potato

See also: Sweet potato cultivation in Polynesia

The spread of sweet potatoes. The red lines indicate the likely spread carried out by the Polynesians.

The sweet potato, a food crop native to the Americas, was widespread in Polynesia by the time European explorers first reached the Pacific. Sweet potato has been radiocarbon-dated to 1000 CE in the Cook Islands. Current thinking is that it was brought to central Polynesia c. 700 CE and spread across Polynesia from there. It has been suggested that it was brought by Polynesians who had traveled across the Pacific to South America and back, or that South Americans brought it to Polynesia. It is also possible that the plant floated across the ocean after being discarded from the cargo of a boat. According to the "tripartite hypothesis", phylogenetic analysis supports at least two separate introductions of sweet potatoes from South America into Polynesia, including one before and one after European contact. However other scholars assert that the sweet potato arrived in Polynesia some 100,000 years ago, long before humans ventured to this part of the world.

Sweet potatoes for sale, Thames, New Zealand. The word "kumara" has entered English from Māori and is widely used, especially in Polynesia.

Dutch linguists and specialists in Amerindian languages Willem Adelaar and Pieter Muysken have suggested that the word for sweet potato is shared by Polynesian languages and languages of South America. Proto-Polynesian *kumala (compare Easter Island kumara, Hawaiian ʻuala, Māori kūmara; even though a proto-form is reconstructed above, apparent cognates outside Eastern Polynesian are either definitely borrowed from Eastern Polynesian languages or irregular, calling Proto-Polynesian status and age into question) may be connected with dialectal Quechua and Aymara k'umar ~ k'umara; most Quechua dialects actually use apichu instead, but comal was attested at extinct Cañari language on the coast of what is now Ecuador in 1582.

Adelaar and Muysken assert that the similarity in the word for sweet potato "constitutes near proof of incidental contact between inhabitants of the Andean region and the South Pacific." The authors argue that the presence of the word for sweet potato suggests sporadic contact between Polynesia and South America, but not necessarily migrations.

Ageratum conyzoides

Ageratum conyzoides, also known as billygoat-weed, chick weed, goatweed, or whiteweed, is native to the tropical Americas, and was found in Hawaii by William Hillebrand in 1888 who considered it to have grown there before Captain Cook's arrival in 1778. A legitimate native name (meie parari or mei rore) and established native medicinal usage and use as a scent and in leis have been offered as support for the pre-Cookian age.

Turmeric

Turmeric (Curcuma longa) originated in Asia, and there is linguistic and circumstantial evidence of the spread and use of turmeric by the Austronesian peoples into Oceania and Madagascar. Günter Tessmann in 1930 (300 years after European contact) reported that a species of Curcuma was grown by the Amahuaca tribe to the east of the Upper Ucayali River in Peru and was a dye-plant used for the painting of the body, with the nearby Witoto people using it as face paint in their ceremonial dances. David Sopher noted in 1950 that "the evidence for a pre-European, transpacific introduction of the plant by man seems very strong indeed".

Physical anthropology

Mocha Island off the coast of the Arauco Peninsula, Chile

In December 2007, several human skulls were found in a museum in Concepción, Chile. These skulls originated on Mocha Island, an island which is located just off the coast of Chile on the Pacific Ocean, formerly inhabited by the Mapuche. Craniometric analysis of the skulls, according to Lisa Matisoo-Smith of the University of Otago and José Miguel Ramírez Aliaga of the Universidad de Valparaíso, suggests that the skulls have "Polynesian features" – such as a pentagonal shape when they are viewed from behind, and rocker jaws.

Rocker jaws have also been found at an excavation led José Miguel Ramírez in the coastal locality of Tunquén, Central Chile. The site of excavation corresponds to an area with pre-Hispanic tombs and shell middens (Spanish: conchal). A global review of rocker jaws among different populations show that while rocker jaws are not unique to Polynesians "[t]he rarity of rocker jaw in South American natives supports" the view of "Polynesian voyagers who ventured to the west coast of South America".

Disputed evidence

Araucanian chickens

In 2007, evidence emerged which suggested the possibility of pre-Columbian contact between the Mapuche people (Araucanians) of south-central Chile and Polynesians. Bones of Araucana chickens found at El Arenal site in the Arauco Peninsula, an area inhabited by Mapuche, support a pre-Columbian introduction of landraces from the South Pacific islands to South America. The bones found in Chile were radiocarbon-dated to between 1304 and 1424, before the arrival of the Spanish. Chicken DNA sequences were matched to those of chickens in American Samoa and Tonga, and found to be dissimilar to those of European chickens.

However, this finding was challenged by a 2008 study which questioned its methodology and concluded that its conclusion is flawed, although the theory it posits may still be possible. Another study in 2014 reinforced that dismissal, and posited the crucial flaw in the initial research: "The analysis of ancient and modern specimens reveals a unique Polynesian genetic signature" and that "a previously reported connection between pre-European South America and Polynesian chickens most likely resulted from contamination with modern DNA, and that this issue is likely to confound ancient DNA studies involving haplogroup E chicken sequences."

However, in a 2013 study, the original authors extended and elaborated their findings, concluding:

This comprehensive approach demonstrates that the examination of modern chicken DNA sequences does not contribute to our understanding of the origins of Chile's earliest chickens. Interpretations based on poorly sourced and documented modern chicken populations, divorced from the archeological and historical evidence, do not withstand scrutiny. Instead, this expanded account will confirm the pre-Columbian age of the El Arenal remains and lend support to our original hypothesis that their appearance in South America is most likely due to Polynesian contact with the Americas in prehistory.

A 2019 study of South American chickens "revealed an unknown genetic component that is mostly present in the Easter Island population that is also present in local chicken populations from the South American Pacific fringe". The Easter Island chicken's "genetic proximity with the SA continental gamefowl can be explained by the fact that both populations were not crossed with cosmopolitan breeds and therefore remain closer to the ancestral population that originated them. " The genetic proximity might also "be indicative of a common origin of these two populations".

California canoes

'Elye'wun, a reconstructed Chumash tomol

Researchers including Kathryn Klar and Terry Jones have proposed a theory of contact between Hawaiians and the Chumash people of Southern California between 400 and 800 CE. The sewn-plank canoes crafted by the Chumash and neighboring Tongva are unique among the indigenous peoples of North America, but similar in design to larger canoes used by Polynesians and Melanesians for deep-sea voyages. Tomolo'o, the Chumash word for such a craft, may derive from tumulaʻau/kumulaʻau, the Hawaiian term for the logs from which shipwrights carve planks to be sewn into canoes. The analogous Tongva term, tii'at, is unrelated. If it occurred, this contact left no genetic legacy in California or Hawaii. This theory has attracted limited media attention within California, but most archaeologists of the Tongva and Chumash cultures reject it on the grounds that the independent development of the sewn-plank canoe over several centuries is well-represented in the material record.

Clava hand-club and words for axes

Archaeological artefacts known as clava hand-clubs found in Araucanía and nearby areas of Argentina have a strong resemblance to the mere okewa found in New Zealand. The clava hand-clubs are also mentioned in the Spanish chronicles dating to the Conquest of Chile. According to Grete Mostny, clava hand-clubs "appear to have arrived to the west coast of South America from the Pacific". Polynesian clubs from Chatham Islands are reportedly the most similar to those of Chile. The clava hand-club is one of various Polynesian-like Mapuche artifacts known.

Possible linguistic evidence for Austronesian-American contact is found in words for axes. On Easter Island, the word for a stone axe is toki; among the New Zealand Maori, the word toki denotes an adze. Similar words are found in the Americas: In the Mapuche language of Chile and Argentina, the word for a stone axe is toki; and further afield in Colombia, the Yurumanguí word for an axe is totoki.

Stone adzes often had ceremonial value and were worn by Maori chiefs. The Mapuche word toki may also mean "chief" and thus may be related to the Quechua word toqe ("militia chief") and the Aymara word toqueni ("person of great judgement"). In the view of Moulian et al. (2015) the possible South American links complicate matters regarding the meaning of the word toki because they are suggestive of Polynesian contact.

Population Y

A 2015 study found some Indigenous American groups, particularly those in the Amazon, carry a small admixture (around 1-2% of the genome) related to groups in Southeast Asia and Australasia like Andamanese peoples, Indigenous Australians, Papuans and the Mamanwa people of the Philippines. This ancestry component has been dubbed "Population Y". Some authors have suggested that this reflects a trans-Pacific migration, but scholars have suggested that this more likely reflects genetic heterogeneity in the initial founding population of Native Americans present in Beringia, only some of which carried the "Population Y" ancestry. It has also been noted that a 40,000 year old individual from Tianyuan Cave in northern China also carries this ancestry, making it more likely that this ancestry was the result of contact in Eurasia, prior to the arrival of the ancestors of Native Americans in Beringia.

Claims of East Asian contact

Claims of contact with Ecuador

A 2013 genetic study suggested the possibility of contact between Ecuador and East Asia, that would have happened no earlier than 6,000 years ago (4000 BC) via either a trans-oceanic or a late-stage coastal migration that did not leave genetic imprints in North America. Further research did not support this but was rather "a case of a rare founding lineage that has been lost elsewhere by drift."

Claims of Chinese contact

A jade Olmec mask from Central America. Gordon Ekholm, an archaeologist and curator at the American Museum of Natural History, suggested that the Olmec art style might have originated in Bronze Age China.

Some researchers have argued that the Olmec civilization came into existence with the help of Chinese refugees, particularly at the end of the Shang dynasty. In 1975, Betty Meggers of the Smithsonian Institution argued that the Olmec civilization originated around 1200 BCE due to Shang Chinese influences. In a 1996 book, Mike Xu, with the aid of Chen Hanping, claimed that celts from La Venta bear Chinese characters. These claims are unsupported by mainstream Mesoamerican researchers.

Other claims of early Chinese contact with North America have been made. In 1882, approximately 30 brass coins, perhaps strung together, were reportedly found in the area of the Cassiar Gold Rush, apparently near Dease Creek, an area which was dominated by Chinese gold miners. A contemporary account states:

In the summer of 1882 a miner found on De Foe (Deorse?) creek, Cassiar district, Br. Columbia, thirty Chinese coins in the auriferous sand, twenty-five feet below the surface. They appeared to have been strung, but on taking them up the miner let them drop apart. The earth above and around them was as compact as any in the neighborhood. One of these coins I examined at the store of Chu Chong in Victoria. Neither in metal nor markings did it resemble the modern coins, but in its figures looked more like an Aztec calendar. So far as I can make out the markings, this is a Chinese chronological cycle of sixty years, invented by Emperor Huungti, 2637 BCE, and circulated in this form to make his people remember it.

Grant Keddie, Curator of Archeology at the Royal B.C. Museum identified these as good luck temple tokens which were minted in the 19th century. He believed that claims that these were very old made them notorious and he wrote that "The temple coins were shown to many people and different versions of stories pertaining to their discovery and age spread around the province to be put into print and changed frequently by many authors in the last 100 years."

A group of Chinese Buddhist missionaries led by Hui Shen before 500 CE claimed to have visited a location called Fusang. Although Chinese mapmakers placed this territory on the Asian coast, others have suggested as early as the 1800s that Fusang might have been in North America, due to perceived similarities between portions of the California coast and Fusang as depicted by Asian sources.

In his book 1421: The Year China Discovered the World, British author Gavin Menzies claimed that the treasure fleets of Ming admiral Zheng He arrived in America in 1421. Professional historians contend that Zheng He reached the eastern coast of Africa, and dismiss Menzies's hypothesis as entirely without proof.

In 1973 and 1975, doughnut-shaped stones that resembled stone anchors which were used by Chinese fishermen were discovered off the coast of California. These stones (sometimes called the Palos Verdes stones) were initially thought to be up to 1,500 years old and therefore, they were thought to be proof of pre-Columbian contact by Chinese sailors. Later geological investigations showed that they were made of a local rock which is known as Monterey shale, and it is currently believed that they were used by Chinese settlers who fished off the coast during the 19th century.

Claims of Japanese contact

Otokichi, a Japanese castaway in America in 1834, depicted here in 1849

Archaeologist Emilio Estrada and co-workers wrote that pottery which was associated with the Valdivia culture of coastal Ecuador and dated to 3000–1500 BCE exhibited similarities to pottery which was produced during the Jōmon period in Japan, arguing that contact between the two cultures might explain the similarities. Chronological and other problems have led most archaeologists to dismiss this idea as implausible. The suggestion has been made that the resemblances (which are not complete) are simply due to the limited number of designs possible when incising clay.

Alaskan anthropologist Nancy Yaw Davis claims that the Zuni people of New Mexico exhibit linguistic and cultural similarities to the Japanese. The Zuni language is a linguistic isolate, and Davis contends that the culture appears to differ from that of the surrounding natives in terms of blood type, endemic disease, and religion. Davis speculates that Buddhist priests or restless peasants from Japan may have crossed the Pacific in the 13th century, traveled to the American Southwest, and influenced Zuni society.

In the 1890s, lawyer and politician James Wickersham argued that pre-Columbian contact between Japanese sailors and Native Americans was highly probable, given that from the early 17th century to the mid-19th century several dozen Japanese ships are known to have been carried from Asia to North America along the powerful Kuroshio Currents. Japanese ships landed at places between the Aleutian Islands in the north and Mexico in the south, carrying a total of 293 people in the 23 cases where head-counts were given in historical records. In most cases, the Japanese sailors gradually made their way home on merchant vessels. In 1834, a dismasted, rudderless Japanese ship was wrecked near Cape Flattery in the Pacific Northwest. Three survivors of the ship were enslaved by Makahs for a period before being rescued by members of the Hudson's Bay Company. Another Japanese ship went ashore in about 1850 near the mouth of the Columbia River, Wickersham writes, and the sailors were assimilated into the local Native American population. While admitting there is no definitive proof of pre-Columbian contact between Japanese and North Americans, Wickersham thought it implausible that such contacts as outlined above would have started only after Europeans arrived in North America and began documenting them.

Claims of Indian contact

The Somnathpur figures at the sides hold maize-like objects in their left hands

In 1879, Alexander Cunningham wrote a description of the carvings on the Stupa of Bharhut in central India, dating from c. 200 BCE, among which he noted what appeared to be a depiction of a custard-apple (Annona squamosa). Cunningham was not initially aware that this plant, indigenous to the New World tropics, was introduced to India after Vasco da Gama's discovery of the sea route in 1498, and the problem was pointed out to him. A 2009 study claimed to have found carbonized remains that date to 2000 BCE and appear to be those of custard-apple seeds.

Copán stela B was claimed by Smith as representing elephants

Grafton Elliot Smith claimed that certain motifs present in the carvings on the Mayan stelae at Copán represented the Asian elephant, and wrote a book on the topic entitled Elephants and Ethnologists in 1924. Contemporary archaeologists suggested that the depictions were almost certainly based on the (indigenous) tapir, with the result that Smith's suggestions have generally been dismissed by subsequent research.

Some objects depicted in carvings from Karnataka, dating from the 12th century, that resemble ears of maize (Zea mays—a crop native to the New World), were interpreted by Carl Johannessen in 1989 as evidence of pre-Columbian contact. These suggestions were dismissed by multiple Indian researchers based on several lines of evidence. The object has been claimed by some to instead represent a "Muktaphala", an imaginary fruit bedecked with pearls.

Claims of African and West Asian contact

Claims of African contact

See also: Olmec alternative origin speculations

Several Olmec colossal heads have features that some diffusionists link to African contact

Proposed claims for an African presence in Mesoamerica stem from attributes of the Olmec culture, the claimed transfer of African plants to the Americas, and interpretations of European and Arabic historical accounts.

The Olmec culture existed in what is now southern Mexico from roughly 1200 BCE to 400 BCE. The idea that the Olmecs are related to Africans was first suggested by José Melgar, who discovered the first colossal head at Hueyapan (now Tres Zapotes) in 1862. More recently, Ivan Van Sertima speculated an African influence on Mesoamerican culture in his book They Came Before Columbus (1976). His claims included the attribution of Mesoamerican pyramids, calendar technology, mummification, and mythology to the arrival of Africans by boat on currents running from Western Africa to the Americas. Heavily inspired by Leo Wiener (see below), Van Sertima suggested that the Aztec god Quetzalcoatl represented an African visitor. His conclusions have been severely criticized by mainstream academics and considered pseudoarchaeology.

Leo Wiener's Africa and the Discovery of America suggests similarities between the Mandinka people of West Africa and native Mesoamerican religious symbols such as the winged serpent and the sun disk, or Quetzalcoatl, and words that have Mandé roots and share similar meanings across both cultures, such as "kore", "gadwal", and "qubila" (in Arabic) or "kofila" (in Mandinka).

Malian sources describe what some consider to be visits to the New World by a fleet from the Mali Empire in 1311, led by Abu Bakr II. According to the only known primary-source-based copy of Christopher Columbus's journal (transcribed by Bartolomé de las Casas), the purpose of Columbus's third voyage was to test both (1) the claims of King John II of Portugal that "canoes had been found which set out from the coast of Guinea [West Africa] and sailed to the west with merchandise" and (2) the claims of the native inhabitants of the Caribbean island of Hispaniola that "there had come to Española from the south and south-east, a black people who have the tops of their spears made of a metal which they call guanin, of which he had sent samples to the Sovereigns to have them assayed, when it was found that of 32 parts, 18 were of gold, 6 of silver and 8 of copper".

Brazilian researcher Niede Guidon, who led the excavations of the Pedra Furada sites, "said she believed that humans...might have come not overland from Asia but by boat from Africa", with the journey taking place 100,000 years ago, well before the accepted dates for the earliest human migrations that led to the prehistoric settlement of the Americas. Michael R. Waters, a geoarchaeologist at Texas A&M University, noted the absence of genetic evidence in modern populations to support Guidon's claim.

Claims of Arab contact

Early Chinese accounts of Muslim expeditions state that Muslim sailors reached a region called Mulan Pi ("magnolia skin") (Chinese: 木蘭皮; pinyin: Mùlán Pí; Wade–Giles: Mu-lan-p'i). Mulan Pi is mentioned in Lingwai Daida (1178) by Zhou Qufei and Zhufan Zhi (1225) by Chao Jukua, together referred to as the "Sung Document". Mulan Pi is normally identified as Spain and Morocco of the Almoravid dynasty (Al-Murabitun), though some fringe theories hold that it is instead some part of the Americas.

One supporter of the interpretation of Mulan Pi as part of the Americas was historian Hui-lin Li in 1961, and while Joseph Needham was also open to the possibility, he doubted that Arab ships at the time would have been able to withstand a return journey over such a long distance across the Atlantic Ocean, pointing out that a return journey would have been impossible without knowledge of prevailing winds and currents.

Al-Mas'udi's atlas of the world includes a continent west (or south) of the Old World

According to Muslim historian Abu al-Hasan Ali al-Mas'udi (871–957), Khashkhash Ibn Saeed Ibn Aswad sailed over the Atlantic Ocean and discovered a previously unknown land (Arḍ Majhūlah, Arabic: أرض مجهولة) in 889 and returned with a shipload of valuable treasures. The passage has been alternatively interpreted to imply that Ali al-Masudi regarded the story of Khashkhash to be a fanciful tale.

Claims of ancient Phoenician contact

Main article: Theory of Phoenician discovery of the Americas

In 1996, Mark McMenamin proposed that Phoenician sailors discovered the New World c. 350 BC. The Phoenician state of Carthage minted gold staters in 350 BC bearing a pattern in the reverse exergue of the coins, which McMenamin initially interpreted as a map of the Mediterranean with the Americas shown to the west across the Atlantic. McMenamin later demonstrated that these coins found in America were modern forgeries.

Claims of ancient Judaic contact

The Bat Creek inscription

The Bat Creek inscription and Los Lunas Decalogue Stone have led some to suggest the possibility that Jewish seafarers may have traveled to America after they fled from the Roman Empire at the time of the Jewish–Roman Wars in the 1st and 2nd centuries CE.

However, American archaeologists Robert C. Mainfort Jr. and Mary L. Kwas argued in American Antiquity (2004) that the Bat Creek inscription was copied from an illustration in an 1870 Masonic reference book and introduced by the Smithsonian field assistant who found it during excavation activities.

As for the Decalogue Stone, there are mistakes which suggest that it was carved by one or more novices who either overlooked or misunderstood some details on a source Decalogue from which they copied it. Since there is no other evidence or archaeological context in the vicinity, it is most likely that the legend at the nearby university is true—that the stone was carved by two anthropology students whose signatures can be seen inscribed in the rock below the Decalogue, "Eva and Hobe 3-13-30."

Scholar Cyrus H. Gordon believed that Phoenicians and other Semitic-speaking groups had crossed the Atlantic in antiquity, ultimately arriving in both North and South America. This opinion was based on his own work on the Bat Creek inscription. Similar ideas were also held by John Philip Cohane; Cohane even claimed that many geographical placenames in the United States have a Semitic origin.

Claims of European contact

Solutrean hypothesis

Main article: Solutrean hypothesis

Examples of Clovis and other Paleoindian point forms, markers of archaeological cultures in northeastern North America

The Solutrean hypothesis argues that Europeans migrated to the New World during the Paleolithic era, circa 16,000 to 13,000 BCE. This hypothesis proposes contact partly on the basis of perceived similarities between the flint tools of the Solutrean culture in modern-day France, Spain and Portugal (which thrived circa 20,000 to 15,000 BCE), and the Clovis culture of North America, which developed circa 9000 BCE.The Solutrean hypothesis was proposed in the mid-1990s. It has little support amongst the scientific community, and genetic markers are inconsistent with the idea.

Claims of ancient Roman contact

Evidence of contacts with the civilizations of Classical Antiquity—primarily with the Roman Empire, but sometimes also with other contemporaneous cultures—have been based on isolated archaeological finds in American sites that originated in the Old World. For example, the Bay of Jars in Brazil has been yielding ancient clay storage jars that resemble Roman amphorae for over 150 years. It has been proposed that the origin of these jars is a Roman shipwreck, although it has also been suggested that they could be 15th- or 16th-century Spanish olive oil jars.

Archaeologist Romeo Hristov argues that a Roman ship, or the drifting of such a shipwreck to American shores, is a possible explanation for the alleged discovery of artifacts that are apparently ancient Roman in origin (such as the Tecaxic-Calixtlahuaca bearded head) in America. Hristov claims that the possibility of such an event has been made more likely by the discovery of evidence of travels by Romans to Tenerife and Lanzarote in the Canary Islands, and of a Roman settlement (from the 1st century BCE to the 4th century CE) on Lanzarote.

Floor mosaic depicting a fruit which looks like a pineapple. Opus vermiculatum, Roman artwork of the end of the 1st century BCE/beginning of the 1st century CE.

In 1950, an Italian botanist, Domenico Casella, suggested that a depiction of a pineapple (a fruit native to the New World tropics) was represented among wall paintings of Mediterranean fruits at Pompeii. According to Wilhelmina Feemster Jashemski, this interpretation has been challenged by other botanists, who identify it as a pine cone from the umbrella pine tree, which is native to the Mediterranean area. The leaves shown in the depiction (as with stone carvings from Nineveh) make the pine cone identification problematic.

Roman and other European coins have been found in the United States. Jeremiah Epstein, an American anthropologist, rejected the suggestion that these coins can be cited as evidence of Pre-Columbian contact between Europe and the Americas pointing out the lack of any pre-Columbian archaeological contexts relating to these finds, the lack of detail concerning the discoveries, and the possiblity of forgery (at least two were clearly forgeries).

Tecaxic-Calixtlahuaca head

Main article: Tecaxic-Calixtlahuaca head

A small terracotta sculpture of a head, with a beard and European-like features, was found in 1933 in the Toluca Valley, 72 kilometres (45 mi) southwest of Mexico City, in a burial offering under three intact floors of a pre-colonial building dated to between 1476 and 1510. The artifact has been studied by Roman art authority Bernard Andreae, director emeritus of the German Institute of Archaeology in Rome, Italy, and Austrian anthropologist Robert von Heine-Geldern, both of whom stated that the style of the artifact was compatible with small Roman sculptures of the 2nd century. If genuine and if not placed there after 1492 (the pottery found with it dates to between 1476 and 1510), the find provides evidence for at least a one-time contact between the Old and New Worlds.

According to Arizona State University's Michael E. Smith, a leading Mesoamerican scholar named John Paddock used to tell his classes in the years before he died that the artifact was planted as a joke by Hugo Moedano, a student who originally worked on the site. Despite speaking with individuals who knew the original discoverer (García Payón), and Moedano, Smith says he has been unable to confirm or reject this claim. Though he remains skeptical, Smith concedes he cannot rule out the possibility that the head was a genuinely buried post-Classic offering at Calixtlahuaca.

14th- and 15th-century European contact

Further information: Priory of Sion and Westford Knight

Henry I Sinclair, Earl of Orkney and feudal baron of Roslin (c. 1345 – c. 1400), was a Scottish nobleman who is best known today from a modern legend which claims that he took part in explorations of Greenland and North America almost 100 years before Christopher Columbus's voyages to the Americas. In 1784, he was identified by Johann Reinhold Forster as possibly being the Prince Zichmni who is described in letters which were allegedly written around 1400 by the Zeno brothers of Venice, in which they describe a voyage which they made throughout the North Atlantic under the command of Zichmni. According to The Dictionary of Canadian Biography Online, "the Zeno affair remains one of the most preposterous and at the same time one of the most successful fabrications in the history of exploration."

Henry was the grandfather of William Sinclair, 1st Earl of Caithness, the builder of Rosslyn Chapel near Edinburgh, Scotland. The authors Robert Lomas and Christopher Knight believe some carvings in the chapel were intended to represent ears of New World corn or maize, a crop unknown in Europe at the time of the chapel's construction. Knight and Lomas view these carvings as evidence supporting the idea that Henry Sinclair traveled to the Americas well before Columbus. In their book they discuss meeting with the wife of the botanist Adrian Dyer and explain that Dyer's wife told them that Dyer agreed that the image thought to be maize was accurate. In fact Dyer found only one identifiable plant among the botanical carvings and instead suggested that the "maize" and "aloe" were stylized wooden patterns, only coincidentally looking like real plants. Specialists in medieval architecture have variously interpreted the carvings as stylised depictions of wheat, strawberries, or lilies.

Henry Yule Oldham suggested that the Bianco world map depicted part of the coast of Brazil before 1448. This was immediately opposed by members of the Royal Geographical Society but later repeated by American and European historians. This was later refuted by Abel Fontoura da Costa, who proved that it actually depicted Santiago, the largest island of the Cape Verde archipelago.

A 1547 edition of Oviedo's La historia general de las Indias

Some have conjectured that Columbus was able to persuade the Catholic Monarchs of Castile and Aragon to support his planned voyage only because they were aware of some recent earlier voyage across the Atlantic. Some suggest that Columbus himself visited Canada or Greenland before 1492, because according to Bartolomé de las Casas he wrote he had sailed 100 leagues past an island he called Thule in 1477. Whether Columbus actually did this and what island he visited, if any, is uncertain. Columbus is thought to have visited Bristol in 1476. Bristol was also the port from which John Cabot sailed in 1497, crewed mostly by Bristol sailors. In a letter of late 1497 or early 1498, the English merchant John Day wrote to Columbus about Cabot's discoveries, saying that land found by Cabot was "discovered in the past by the men from Bristol who found 'Brasil' as your lordship knows". There may be records of expeditions from Bristol to find the "isle of Brazil" in 1480 and 1481. Trade between Bristol and Iceland is well documented from the mid-15th century.

Gonzalo Fernández de Oviedo y Valdés records several such legends in his Historia general de las Indias of 1526, which includes biographical information on Columbus. He discusses the then-current story of a Spanish caravel that was swept off its course while on its way to England, and wound up in a foreign land populated by naked tribesmen. The crew gathered supplies and made its way back to Europe, but the trip took several months and the captain and most of the men died before reaching land. The caravel's ship pilot, a man called Alonso Sánchez, and a few others made it to Portugal, but all were very ill. Columbus was a good friend of the pilot, and took him to be treated in his own house, and the pilot described the land they had seen and marked it on a map before dying. People in Oviedo's time knew this story in several versions, though Oviedo himself regarded it as a myth.

In 1925, Soren Larsen wrote a book claiming that a joint Danish-Portuguese expedition landed in Newfoundland or Labrador in 1473 and again in 1476. Larsen claimed that Didrik Pining and Hans Pothorst served as captains, while João Vaz Corte-Real and the possibly mythical John Scolvus served as navigators, accompanied by Álvaro Martins. Nothing beyond circumstantial evidence has been found to support Larsen's claims.

The historical record shows that Basque fishermen were present in Newfoundland and Labrador from at least 1517 onward (therefore predating all recorded European settlements in the region except those of the Norse). The Basques' fishing expeditions led to significant trade and cultural exchanges with Native Americans. A fringe theory suggests that Basque sailors first arrived in North America prior to Columbus' voyages to the New World (some sources suggest the late 14th century as a tentative date) but kept the destination a secret in order to avoid competition over the fishing resources of the North American coasts. There is no historical or archaeological evidence to support this claim.

Irish and Welsh legends

Saint Brendan and the whale, from a 15th-century manuscript

See also: Great Ireland

The legend of Saint Brendan, an Irish monk from what is now County Kerry, involves a fantastical journey into the Atlantic Ocean in search of Paradise in the 6th century. Since the discovery of the New World, various authors have tried to link the Brendan legend with an early discovery of America. In 1977, the voyage was successfully recreated by Tim Severin using a replica of an ancient Irish currach.

According to a British myth, Madoc was a prince from Wales who explored the Americas as early as 1170. While most scholars consider this legend to be untrue, it was used to bolster British claims in the Americas vis-à-vis those of Spain.The "Madoc story" remained popular in later centuries, and a later development asserted that Madoc's voyagers had intermarried with local Native Americans, and that their Welsh-speaking descendants still live somewhere in the United States. These "Welsh Indians" were credited with the construction of a number of landmarks throughout the Midwestern United States, and a number of white travelers were inspired to go look for them. The "Madoc story" has been the subject of much speculation in the context of possible pre-Columbian trans-oceanic contact. No conclusive archaeological proof of such a man or his voyages has been found in the New or Old World; however, speculation abounds connecting him with certain sites, such as Devil's Backbone, located on the Ohio River at Fourteen Mile Creek near Louisville, Kentucky.

At Fort Mountain State Park in Georgia, a plaque formerly mentioned a 19th-century interpretation of the ancient stone wall that gives the site its name. The plaque repeated a claim by Tennessee governor John Sevier that Cherokees believed "a people called Welsh" had built a fort on the mountain long ago to repel Indian attacks. The plaque has been changed, leaving no reference to Madoc or the Welsh.

Биолог и спорный эпиграф-любитель Барри Фелл утверждает, что ирландское письмо огама было найдено вырезанным на камнях в Вирджинии. Linguist David H. Kelley has criticized some of Fell's work but nonetheless argued that genuine Celtic Ogham inscriptions have in fact been discovered in America. Однако другие выразили серьезные сомнения по поводу этих утверждений.

Заявления о трансокеанских путешествиях, происходящих из Нового Света

Претензии в отношении египетской коки и табака

Мумия ​ Рамсеса II

Следы коки и никотина , обнаруженные в некоторых египетских мумиях, привели к предположению, что древние египтяне, возможно, имели контакт с Новым Светом. Первоначальное открытие сделала немецкий токсиколог Светлана Балабанова после исследования мумии жрицы по имени Хенут Тауи . Последующие тесты на стержне волоса, которые проводились с целью исключить возможность заражения, показали те же результаты.

В телешоу сообщалось, что исследования многочисленных суданских мумий, которые также проводила Балабанова, отражают то, что было обнаружено в мумии Хенут Тауи. Балабанова предположила, что табак можно объяснить, поскольку он также мог быть известен в Китае и Европе, о чем свидетельствуют анализы человеческих останков из этих регионов. Балабанова предположила, что такие растения, произрастающие в этой местности, могли развиваться независимо, но с тех пор вымерли. Другие объяснения включают мошенничество, хотя куратор Египетского музея в Мюнхене Альфред Гримм это оспаривает. Скептически относясь к выводам Балабановой, Розали Дэвид, хранитель отдела египтологии Манчестерского музея , провела аналогичные тесты на образцах, взятых из коллекции мумий Манчестера, и сообщила, что два образца тканей и один образец волос дали положительный результат на присутствие никотина. .

Однако ведущие ученые по-прежнему настроены скептически и не считают результаты этих тестов доказательством древних контактов между Африкой и Америкой, особенно потому, что в Старом Свете могут существовать возможные источники кокаина и никотина. Две попытки повторить выводы Балабановой о кокаине не увенчались успехом, что позволяет предположить, что «либо Балабанова и ее коллеги неверно истолковывают свои результаты, либо образцы протестированных ими мумий загадочным образом подверглись воздействию кокаина».

Повторное исследование мумии Рамсеса II в 1970-х годах выявило наличие в ее брюшной полости фрагментов табачных листьев. Эта находка стала популярной темой в периферийной литературе и средствах массовой информации и рассматривалась как доказательство контакта между Древним Египтом и Новым Светом. Исследователь Морис Бюкай отмечал, что, когда мумию развернули в 1886 году, брюшная полость осталась открытой и «нельзя уже было придавать никакого значения наличию внутри брюшной полости какого бы то ни было найденного там материала, так как этот материал мог происходить из окружающую среду». После возобновления дискуссии о табаке, вызванной исследованием Балабановой, и упоминания о табаке в публикации Розали Дэвид в 2000 году, исследование в журнале Antiquity предположило, что сообщения о табаке и кокаине в мумиях «игнорировали их истории после раскопок», и указало, что мумию Рамсеса II перемещали пять раз в период с 1883 по 1975 год.

Заявления о путешествиях во времена Римской империи

Помпоний Мела пишет: и скопирован Плинием Старшим , что Квинт Цецилий Метелл Целер (умер в 59 г. до н.э.), проконсул в Галлии , принял «несколько индейцев» ( Indi ), которых штормом пригнал к берегам Германии, в качестве подарка от германского короля :

Он добавляет Метелла Целера и упоминает, что он сообщил следующее: Когда он правил Галлией, король [свевов] подарил ему некоторых индейцев; откуда они пришли на поиски этих земель и узнали, что силой бури они были взяты с индийских кораблей, и, купив то, что они разрушили, наконец отправились на берега Германии. Итак, остается море; но остальная часть его сохранилась из-за постоянных морозов и поэтому пуста.

Метелл Целер вспоминает следующее: когда он был проконсулом в Галлии , ему дал людей из Индии царь свевов ; на вопрос, почему они оказались на этой земле, он узнал, что они попали в шторм вдали от Индии, потерпели кораблекрушение и, наконец, высадились на побережье Германии. Таким образом, они сопротивлялись морю, но всю оставшуюся часть пути страдали от холода, и именно по этой причине они ушли.

Фредерик Дж. Пол предположил, что эти потерпевшие кораблекрушение, возможно, были американскими индейцами . Эта версия вызывает сомнения, поскольку Метелл Целер умер сразу после своего консульства, еще до того, как добрался до Галлии.

Находка ДНК в Исландии

В 2010 году Сигридур Сунна Эбенесерсдоттир опубликовал генетическое исследование, показывающее, что более 350 ныне живущих исландцев являются носителями митохондриальной ДНК нового типа, C1e, принадлежащей кладе C1, которая до этого была известна только у коренных американцев и восточноазиатских популяций. Используя генетическую базу данных deCODE , Сигридур Сунна определил, что ДНК попала в исландское население не позднее 1700 года, а, вероятно, на несколько столетий раньше. Однако Сигридур Сунна также утверждает, что «хотя индейское происхождение кажется наиболее вероятным для [этой новой гаплогруппы], нельзя исключать азиатское или европейское происхождение».

В 2014 году исследование обнаружило новый субклад мтДНК C1f в останках трех человек, найденных на северо-западе России и датированных 7500 лет назад. В современных популяциях он не обнаружен. В исследовании была выдвинута гипотеза о том, что сестринские субклады C1e и C1f рано отделились от самого недавнего общего предка клады C1 и развивались независимо, и что субклад C1e имел североевропейское происхождение. Исландия была заселена викингами в 9 веке, и они совершили массовые набеги на западную Россию, где, как теперь известно, проживал родственный субклад C1f. Они предположили, что оба субклада были завезены в Исландию через викингов, и что C1e вымер на материковой части Северной Европы из-за смены населения и его небольшой представленности, а субклад C1f вымер полностью.

Скандинавские легенды и саги

Статуя Торфинна Карлсефни

Легенды сообщают, что в 1009 году норвежский исследователь Торфинн Карлсефни похитил двоих детей из Маркланда , области на материковой части Северной Америки, которую норвежские исследователи посетили, но не поселились. Затем двоих детей отвезли в Гренландию, где их крестили и научили говорить по-скандинавски.

В 1420 году датский географ Клавдий Клавус Сварт писал, что лично видел « пигмеев » из Гренландии, пойманных скандинавами в небольшой кожаной лодке. Их лодка была вывешена в соборе Нидарос в Тронхейме вместе с другой, более длинной лодкой, также отнятой у «пигмеев». Описание Клавуса Сварта соответствует инуитам и двум их типам лодок — каяку и умиаку . Точно так же шведский священнослужитель Олаус Магнус писал в 1505 году, что видел в соборе Осло две кожаные лодки, взятые десятилетиями ранее. По словам Олауса, лодки были захвачены у гренландских пиратов одним из Хоконов , что относит событие к 14 веку.

В Фердинандом Колумбом биографии своего отца Христофора, написанной , он говорит, что в 1477 году его отец увидел в Голуэе , Ирландия, два трупа, которые выбросило на берег в их лодке. Тела и лодка имели экзотический вид, и предполагалось, что это были инуиты , сбившиеся с курса.

Заявления инуитов о путешествии в Старый Свет

Было высказано предположение, что в последующие столетия норвежцы увозили в Европу в качестве рабов другие коренные народы, поскольку известно, что они брали шотландских и ирландских рабов.

Есть также свидетельства того, что инуиты пришли в Европу самостоятельно или в качестве пленников после 1492 года. В Шотландии они были известны как финны-мужчины . Значительная часть фольклора гренландских инуитов, впервые собранная в 19 веке, рассказывает о путешествиях на лодке в Акилинек , изображаемый как богатая страна за океаном.

Утверждения о путешествии инков в Океанию

Перуанский историк Хосе Антонио дель Бусто Дутурбуру популяризировал теорию о том, что инков правитель Топа Инка Юпанки, возможно, совершил морское исследовательское путешествие через Тихий океан около 1465 года, в конечном итоге достигнув Французской Полинезии и Рапа-Нуи (острова Пасхи). Различные испанские летописцы XVI века пересказывают истории, рассказанные им народами инков, в которых Юпанки отправился в морское путешествие и в конечном итоге достиг двух островов, называемых Нина Чумпи («пояс огня») и Хава Чумпи («внешний пояс», также пишется Авачумпи, Хауа чумпи ). По рассказам, Юпанки вернулся из экспедиции, привезя с собой чернокожих людей, золото, медный стул и шкуру лошади или животного, похожего на лошадь. Дель Бусто предположил, что «чернокожие люди» могли быть меланезийцами , а шкура животного могла принадлежать полинезийскому дикому кабану , который был ошибочно идентифицирован. Критики отмечают, что экспедиция Юпанки - если она когда-либо состоялась - могла достичь Галапагосских островов или какой-либо другой части Америки, а не Океании.

Претензии, основанные на религиозных традициях или символах

Утверждения о доколумбовых контактах с христианскими путешественниками

В период испанской колонизации Америки несколько мифов и произведений искусства коренных народов побудили ряд испанских летописцев и авторов предположить, что христианские проповедники, возможно, посещали Мезоамерику задолго до эпохи Великих географических открытий . Берналь Диас дель Кастильо , например, был заинтригован наличием символов креста в иероглифах майя, что, по его мнению, предполагало, что другие христиане, возможно, прибыли в древнюю Мексику до испанских конкистадоров . Фрай Диего Дуран , со своей стороны, связал легенду о доколумбовом боге Кецалькоатле (которого он описывает как целомудренного, кающегося и чудотворца) с библейскими рассказами о христианских апостолах. Бартоломе де лас Касас описывает Кетцалькоатля как человека со светлой кожей, высоким ростом и бородой (что предполагает происхождение из Старого Света), а Фрай Хуан де Торквемада приписывает ему распространение сельского хозяйства в Америке. Современные ученые поставили под серьезные сомнения некоторые из этих утверждений, поскольку сельское хозяйство практиковалось в Америке задолго до появления христианства в Старом Свете, и было обнаружено, что кресты майя имеют совершенно иную символику, чем та, которая присутствует в христианских религиозных традициях.

Согласно доколумбовому мифу, Кетцалькоатль покинул Мексику в древние времена, отправившись на восток через океан, пообещав вернуться. Некоторые ученые утверждают, что ацтекский император Моктесума Ксокойоцин считал испанского конкистадора Эрнана Кортеса (прибывшего на территорию современной Мексики с востока) Кетцалькоатлем, а его прибытие - исполнением пророчества мифа, хотя другие оспаривали это утверждение. Некоторые теории предполагают, что Кетцалькоатль, возможно, был христианским проповедником из Старого Света, который жил среди коренных народов древней Мексики и в конечном итоге попытался вернуться домой, отплыв на восток. Карлос де Сигуэнса-и-Гонгора , например, предположил, что миф о Кетцалькоатле мог возникнуть в результате посещения Америки Апостолом Фомой в I веке нашей эры. Позже Фрай Сервандо Тереза ​​де Миер утверждал, что плащ с изображением Девы Гваделупской , который, как утверждает католическая церковь, носил Хуан Диего , вместо этого был привезен в Америку гораздо раньше Томасом, который использовал его в качестве инструмента для евангелизация .

Мексиканский историк Мануэль Ороско-и-Берра предположил, что и крестные иероглифы, и миф о Кецалькоатле могли возникнуть во время визита в Мезоамерику норвежского католического миссионера в средневековые времена. Однако нет никаких археологических или исторических свидетельств, позволяющих предположить, что норвежские исследования когда-либо доходили до древней Мексики или Центральной Америки. Другие предполагаемые личности Кетцалькоатля (приписываемые их сторонникам, преследующим религиозные цели) включают Святого Брендана или даже Иисуса Христа .

Популярная версия теории заговора, берущая начало в «Святой крови», «Святом Граале», гласит, что тамплиеры использовали флот из 18 кораблей в Ла-Рошели, чтобы избежать ареста во Франции. Флот якобы ушел, нагруженный рыцарями и сокровищами, незадолго до выдачи ордера на арест Ордена в октябре 1307 года. Это, в свою очередь, было основано на одном показании служащего брата Жана де Шалона, который говорит, что «слышал, как люди говорили, что [Жерар де Вилье] вышел в море на 18 галерах, а брат Хьюг де Шалон бежал с всю сокровищницу брата Гуго де Пейро». Однако, помимо того, что стенограмма является единственным источником этого заявления, в стенограмме указывается, что это слухи, и этот служащий брат, похоже, склонен делать некоторые из самых диких и наиболее изобличающих заявлений об Ордене, что заставило некоторых усомниться в его достоверность. Неизвестно, какого пункта назначения достиг этот флот, если таковой вообще был. Другая теория предполагает, что флот, возможно, направился в Америку, где тамплиеры взаимодействовали с коренным населением. Хелен Николсон из Кардиффского университета поставила под сомнение существование этого путешествия, утверждая, что у тамплиеров не было кораблей, способных плавать по Атлантическому океану.

Утверждения о древней еврейской миграции в Америку

Основная статья: Десять затерянных племен

С первых веков европейской колонизации Америки и вплоть до XIX века некоторые европейские интеллектуалы и богословы пытались объяснить присутствие американских индейских аборигенов, связывая их с Десятью потерянными коленами Израиля, которые, согласно библейской традиции, были депортированы после завоевания Израильского царства Неоассирийской империей . Как в прошлом, так и в настоящем, эти усилия использовались и продолжают использоваться для продвижения интересов религиозных групп, как еврейских, так и христианских, а также они используются для оправдания европейского заселения Америки.

Одним из первых, кто заявил, что коренные народы Америки являются потомками затерянных племен, был португальский раввин и писатель Менассия Бен Исраэль , который в своей книге «Надежда Израиля» утверждал, что обнаружение предполагаемых давно потерянных евреев ознаменовало скорое пришествие библейского Мессии . В 1650 году норфолкский проповедник Томас Торовгуд опубликовал книгу «Евреи в Америке, или Вероятности того, что американцы принадлежат к этой расе» . для миссионерского общества Новой Англии. Тюдор Парфитт пишет:

Общество активно пыталось обратить индейцев в свою веру, но подозревало, что они могут быть евреями, и понимало, что им лучше подготовиться к трудной задаче. В трактате Торогуда утверждается, что коренное население Северной Америки было потомками Десяти потерянных племен.

В 1652 году сэр Хамон Л'Эстрейндж , английский автор, пишущий по истории и теологии, опубликовал «Американцы не евреи» или «Невероятности того, что американцы принадлежат к этой расе» в ответ на трактат Торогуда . В ответ на L'Estrange Торовуд опубликовал второе издание своей книги в 1660 году с измененным названием и включил предисловие, написанное Джоном Элиотом , пуританским миссионером, переведшим Библию на индийский язык.

Учение движения Святых последних дней

Исапа Стела 5

Основные статьи: Археология и Книга Мормона , Генетика и Книга Мормона , Коренные американцы и мормонизм

В Книге Мормона , священном тексте движения Святых последних дней , говорится, что некоторые древние жители Нового Света являются потомками семитских народов, приплывших из Старого Света. Мормонские группы, такие как Фонд древних исследований и мормонских исследований, пытаются изучать и расширять эти идеи.

В письме 1998 года в Институт религиозных исследований Национальное географическое общество заявило, что «археологи и другие ученые уже давно исследуют прошлое полушария, и обществу пока не известно ни о чем найденном, что подтверждало бы Книгу Мормона».

Некоторые ученые СПД придерживаются мнения, что археологические исследования утверждений Книги Мормона не предназначены для подтверждения литературного повествования. Например, Террил Гивенс , профессор английского языка в Ричмондском университете , указывает на недостаток исторической точности в Книге Мормона по отношению к современным археологическим знаниям.

В 1950-х годах профессор М. Уэллс Джейкман популяризировал веру в то, что Стела Исапа 5 пророков Легия и Нефия из Книги Мормона представляет собой видение древа жизни и является подтверждением историчности утверждений о доколумбовых поселениях в Америке. Его интерпретации резьбы и ее связь с доколумбовыми контактами оспариваются. С тех пор исследования Книги Мормона сосредоточились на культурных параллелях, а не на «неопровержимых» источниках.

См. также

• Древняя морская история
• Антиллия – остров-призрак 15 века.
• Экспедиция Атлантиды - 1984 г., аргентинское путешествие на плоту через Атлантический океан.
• Пещера Берроуз – предполагаемое место пещеры.
• Колумбийская биржа
• Таблички Давенпорта - три грифельные таблицы с надписями, найденные в Соединенных Штатах в 1870-х годах.
• Диффузия (антропология)
• Генетическая история коренных народов Америки
• Гвеннан Горн – Корабль предполагаемого валлийского мореплавателя
• Гипердиффузионизм
• Гипердиффузионизм в археологии
• Институт изучения американских культур
• Жан Кузен (штурман)
• Еврейская индийская теория
• Кенсингтонский рунный камень - поддельный «скандинавский» рунный камень.
• Экспедиция Кон-Тики - путешествие на плоту 1947 года из Южной Америки в Полинезию.
• Пенни штата Мэн – норвежская серебряная монета.
• Башня Ньюпорт (Род-Айленд) – остатки ветряной мельницы 17 века.
• Происхождение палеоиндейцев
• Доколумбовые плоты
• Карта Винланда - поддельная «скандинавская» карта Северной Америки.
• Вестфорд Найт – Узор на скале в США.
• Магна Боул