Jaredite Steel?

[John Williams]

Yes the Atalantic Article I earlier referenced. You should really read the Article, rather than dismiss it "out of hand" becuase it may have a reference or two to Atlantis.

Mayan Fired Bricks

Heres another source that speak of the fired bricks at Comalcalco temple...

http://www.delange.org/Comalcalco/Comalcalco.htm

So the earlier argument that Mayans didn't have "Special Fired Bricks" to be able to make Kilns capable of making Steel is a red herring.

I reread the article, and it was Fell, not Kelley, making the claims about Comalcalco. Either way, Comalcalco dates from the Classic Mayan period, some 2,000-4,000 years after the time of the Jaredites. The OP is about the Jaredites, not the Maya, who presumably line up with the Nephites/Lamanites.

So, it's still anachronistic. How's that for a knee-jerk response?

[Zakuska]

I reread the article, and it was Fell, not Kelley, making the claims about Comalcalco. Either way, Comalcalco dates from the Classic Mayan period, some 2,000-4,000 years after the time of the Jaredites. The OP is about the Jaredites, not the Maya, who presumably line up with the Nephites/Lamanites.

So, it's still anachronistic. How's that for a knee-jerk response?

Ah but you are forgetting.... very often... Mayans built ontop of older "OLMEC" ruins.

Preclassic

While the Maya area was initially inhabited around the 10th millennium BC, the first clearly “Maya” settlements were established in approximately 1800 BC in Soconusco region of the Pacific Coast. This point in time, known as the Early Preclassic, [2] was characterized by sedentary communities and the introduction of pottery and fired clay figurines.[3]

Archaeological evidence suggests the construction of ceremonial architecture in Maya area by approximately 1000 BC. The earliest configurations of such architecture consist of simple burial mounds, which would be the precursors to the stepped pyramids subsequently erected in the Late Preclassic. Prominent Middle and Late Preclassic settlement zones are located in the southern Maya lowlands, specifically in the Mirador and Pet

[John Williams]

Ah but you are forgetting.... very often... Mayans built ontop of older "OLMEC" ruins.

So you're claiming that the fired bricks that show late classic architectural and cultural features are actually remnants from an earlier Olmec civilization?

Dude, whatever you're smoking, I want some.

[Zakuska]

So you're claiming that the fired bricks that show late classic architectural and cultural features are actually remnants from an earlier Olmec civilization?

Dude, whatever you're smoking, I want some.

Im not making any claim. Unlike you who is letting his bias Jade his criticial thinking. I'm looking at it with an Open Mind that just maybe... Joseph Smith didn't make it up. Since you've already made up your mind that he did...

These arnt the "Only" fired brick structures there are in the region.

[John Williams]

Im not making any claim. Unlike you who is letting his bias Jade his criticial thinking.

You throw out a cryptic statement about how Comalcalco was built on top of Olmec ruins as if that has any bearing on the issue at hand: steel smelting (and by your extension brickmaking kilns) at least 2,000 years before the construction of the temple at Comalcalco. I'm at a loss as to how this applies at all to the discussion, unless you're claiming that the brickmaking technology predates the temple construction. If that's not what you're saying, I apologize for not understanding you. But if that's not what you meant, what did you mean?

Here's some actual information about the temple at Comalcalco:

During the reign of K'inich Kan Bahlam II (AD 684-702), Palencano temple structures underwent their most significant formal architectural addition. All the temple structures attributed to his reign contain an inner vaulted sanctuary in the rear primary axis room. Hieroglyphic evidence has shown that these sanctuaries functioned as symbolic ritual sweatbaths. While the monumental, as well as more "private," symbolic sweatbaths seem to have continued in use following K'inich Kan Bahlam's reign, no other monumental inner sanctuaries were constructed at Palenque after AD 702.

At the westernmost Maya site of Comalcalco, Tabasco, the identification of similar "inner sanctuaries" has often been cited as indicative of Palenque's political dominance at that Late Classic site. Other architectural and sculptural 'parallels,' such as similar sloping upper facades, are also seen as evidence of Palencano influence at Comalcalco.

---

ome form of contact existed between the two sites and that Comalcalco architecture was heavily influenced by architectural styles from Palenque. In fact, the centers (and Tortuguero) have the same emblem glyph, which has led to speculation of familial ties between the dynastic lineages of both sites. The presence of nine sculpted stucco figures in the tomb underlying Comalcalco Temple IX and K'inich Janab Pakal I's tomb in the Temple of the Inscriptions at Palenque has seemed to confirm interaction between the two centers. (Damien Marken and Kirk Straight, "Conclusion: Reconceptualizing the Palenque Polity" in Palenque: Recent Investigations at the Classic Maya Center, ed. Damien Marken, pp. 292-293).

I haven't "made up my mind," Zak. At this point, Joseph Smith's account seems highly unlikely. If you have evidence of fired bricks and/or metallurgy in Jaredite times, I'd like to see it. I might even change my mind. You never know.

[Zakuska]

I'm at a loss as to how this applies at all to the discussion, unless you're claiming that the brickmaking technology predates the temple construction. If that's not what you're saying, I apologize for not understanding you. But if that's not what you meant, what did you mean?

Im suggesting that as a possibility... how would we know?

We Know that Planque and Comalcalco are two of the sites favored by the Mormon Comunity. As particular places spoken of in the BOM. However we Know the Mayan came After the BOM ended. So what is underneith it? Until we dig... The silence is defening.

[Scott Lloyd]

As for the carelessness, I hope you took my response as lighthearted as it was meant.

Come on! You caught me in a gaping gaffe. Relish it while you have the chance.

[John Williams]

Im suggesting that as a possibility... how would we know?

We Know that Planque and Comalcalco are two of the sites favored by the Mormon Comunity. As particular places spoken of in the BOM. However we Know the Mayan came After the BOM ended. So what is underneith it? Until we dig... The silence is defening.

This is just another way of saying "the discovery hasn't all been done." On that we can agree. But hopefully we can also agree that, based on current knowledge, the use of smelting and/or kiln-fired bricks at the time of the Jaredites is anachronistic.

Come on! You caught me in a gaping gaffe. Relish it while you have the chance.

I'll just wait for the next one, Scott. Then I'll relish. LOL

[Zakuska]

Fair enough... however... how do we date these bricks?

[maupayman]

Fair enough... however... how do we date these bricks?

why don't you google it?

[Zakuska]

Intresting...

http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Academy/8919/biling.htm

9 of the 360 Pyramids have been excavated. Something tells me he have a lot to learn!

[John Williams]

Intresting...

http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Academy/8919/biling.htm

9 of the 360 Pyramids have been excavated. Something tells me he have a lot to learn!

No offense, Zak, but you do realize that this Clyde Winters you've been quoting is an "Afrocentrist" who believes that every culture from the Olmecs to China has its origins in Africa. In other words, he's a bit of a crackpot. Some books and articles from Mr. Winters:

Atlantis in Mexico

Teaching Ancient Afrocentric History

The Black Greeks

Ancient African Kings of India

The Ancient Chinese were Li Min: Black People

African Origin of Mayan Writing

African Origin of Olmec Skeletons Good Scholarship

Are you seeing a pattern here? Are you sure you want to use this guy as a source? So far today, you've given us Barry Fell; a carving of a "horse" whose only source is Milton Hunter, LDS General Authority; and this stuff from Clyde Winters.

[maupayman]

No offense, Zak, but you do realize that this Clyde Winters you've been quoting is an "Afrocentrist" who believes that every culture from the Olmecs to China has its origins in Africa. In other words, he's a bit of a crackpot. Some books and articles from Mr. Winters:

Atlantis in Mexico

Teaching Ancient Afrocentric History

The Black Greeks

Ancient African Kings of India

The Ancient Chinese were Li Min: Black People

African Origin of Mayan Writing

African Origin of Olmec Skeletons Good Scholarship

Are you seeing a pattern here? Are you sure you want to use this guy as a source? So far today, you've given us Barry Fell; a carving of a "horse" whose only source is Milton Hunter, LDS General Authority; and this stuff from Clyde Winters.

Interesting thread John, your's usually seem to be that way. I am surprised that we have not had a Kevin Christensen, SolarPowered, Lifeonaplate etc. sighting on this thread. They usually have tonnes of apologetic articles to hurl at you. This is one of the supposed anachronisms that I had not really looked into before.

[John Williams]

Interesting thread John, your's usually seem to be that way. I am surprised that we have not had a Kevin Christensen, SolarPowered, Lifeonaplate etc. sighting on this thread. They usually have tonnes of apologetic articles to hurl at you. This is one of the supposed anachronisms that I had not really looked into before.

As I said, I knew about Nephi's alleged use of smelting to make steel, but somehow I missed the Jaredite equivalent, which to my mind is much harder to reconcile than Nephi's.

I'm surprised there isn't more of a response too. Oh, well. Maybe no one has taken notice of the thread.

[Zakuska]

Did I say I believed every word clyde or anyone of these other people said?

Heck I wouldn't even claim that I beleive every thing Milton Hunter says.

My only reason in posting the link was to show that we've only excavated 9 of the 360 fired brick pyramids in the complex. It took a lot longer to build that complex than the ~10 years or so that King Chalam Balam [sic] built his complex in 626AD.

Nothing More nothing less.

PS. its not just Milton Hunter who claims its a horse... The Non-LDS tour Guides who Jerald Lund sites in his book that Im in the process of posting up also call it a horse.

People have been snikering at the size of the horse compared to the headless man... Horses come in all sizes ya know. Even if all it was was a Shetlan Pony its still a horse. Why do people automatically think that the Nephite horses pulling big and Burley Nephite Stripling Warriors... In their Egyptian Stlye Steele Chariots (Something the text really never claims) had to bet Budweiser Clydes Dales?

PSS. Im in the process of fixing the typos but heres Chapter 15 of Jerald Lunds book.

What have we learned... that many in the Mainstream Academic Community (ie Kelley) beleive the Vikings set up trade routes and made it at least to Ontario WAY prior to Columbus.

So much for those European SPanish and their discovery of the New world.

[John Williams]

Did I say I believed every word clyde or anyone of these other people said?

Heck I wouldn't even claim that I beleive every thing Milton Hunter says.

My only reason in posting the link was to show that we've only excavated 9 of the 360 fired brick pyramids in the complex. It took a lot longer to build that complex than the ~10 years or so that King Chalam Balam [sic] built his complex in 626AD.

Nothing More nothing less.

PS. its not just Milton Hunter who claims its a horse... The Non-LDS tour Guides who Jerald Lund sites in his book that Im in the process of posting up also call it a horse.

People have been snikering at the size of the horse compared to the headless man... Horses come in all sizes ya know. Even if all it was was a Shetlan Pony its still a horse. Why do people automatically think that the Nephite horses pulling big and Burley Nephite Stripling Warriors... In their Egyptian Stlye Steele Chariots (Something the text really never claims) had to bet Budweiser Clydes Dales?

PSS. Im in the process of fixing the typos but heres Chapter 15 of Jerald Lunds book.

What have we learned... that many in the Mainstream Academic Community (ie Kelley) beleive the Vikings set up trade routes and made it at least to Ontario WAY prior to Columbus.

So much for those European SPanish and their discovery of the New world.

Zak, my issue with the stuff you've been posting is that it's all pseudoscience, none of it peer reviewed and all of it with an agenda behind it, whether it's Winters' Afrocentrism or Hunter's and Lund's Mormonism. I read somewhere that the "horse" figure Hunter showed was actually a damaged portion of a Jaguar-Serpent figure. I'll have to dig up where I found that, but I remain unconvinced by a single reference from a hardly disinterested Mormon. Frankly, throwing all this junk out there smacks of desperation to me.

Clyde Winters' stuff is illustrative of some of the stuff I've seen coming out of Mormon apologetics. Winters sees African cultural influence everywhere, from China to India to Mesoamerica; he finds parallels that make sense to those who share his beliefs, but they aren't convincing to anyone else. In the same way, some apologists find Mesoamerica in the Book of Mormon and vice versa, but the parallels are only convincing to those who already share a belief in Mormonism.

[Zakuska]

So now your telling me that...

The influential archaeologist David Kelley, of the University of Calgary, has his own concerns about Barry Fell's methods -- and yet, unlike Williams and Brian Fagan, in the end he is unable simply to dismiss Fell's work. Kelley is a Harvard-trained scholar of catholic interests, which range from ancient calendrics and archaeo-astronomy to the prehistory of the Celts to the decipherment of Mayan glyphs. In conversation he seems to guide by indirection, answering questions with questions or with references to the writings of his peers. His wispy eyebrows sit above eyes undimmed by more than forty years of serious scholarship; a tight-lipped smile suggests that there are many things he will not say about himself or his accomplishments. Indeed, he is almost painfully reticent about what most scholars now consider to be a monumental achievement in the field: his having broken a century-old logjam in Mayan epigraphy. Prevailing amid a hail of academic and personal attacks, Kelley made a persuasive argument for a phonetic, as opposed to an ideographic, method of interpretation. Drawing on the work of the Russian linguist Yuri Knorosov, Kelley's work offered a way to unlock the sounds and meanings of glyphs that had stood mute for centuries -- inaugurating a new age of decipherment that is transforming Mayan studies.

Kelley, who is a contributing editor to The Review of Archaeology, complained in a 1990 essay 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." Among the embarrassments that Kelley and other critics often use against Fell are a series of Celtic ogham inscriptions that were sent to Fell from McKee, Kentucky, in 1988. He dutifully translated the scripts, which later proved to be forgeries. Although Fell was the one to spot that they were fake, the damage was done.

Nevertheless, Kelley and others do credit Fell with raising the possibility of Celtic, Iberian, and North African connections to certain unexplained American inscriptions. The Grave Creek Stone, from West Virginia, is a typical example. Mainstream archaeologists, puzzled by the carvings on it, have long dismissed it as a forgery; but Fell suggested that its symbols derive from an ancient Punic, or Phoenician, alphabet used on the Iberian Peninsula during the first millennium B.C. -- a script unknown, and thus presumably unforgeable, at the time of the stone's discovery, in 1838. Kelley disagrees with Fell's theory that the Grave Creek symbols represent some sort of astronomical text. But the similarity of those symbols to obscure but undisputed Phoenician letters, he believes, is much more than coincidence -- and, at the least, Fell deserves credit for emphasizing the comparison.

It is unusual to detect even this much tolerance for Barry Fell in a member of the academic mainstream. But Kelley can be more enthusiastic yet. With regard to a celebrated (or notorious) hypothesis of Fell's that the stick-figure letters carved into stones at sites ranging from Vermont to Oklahoma are Celtic in origin, Kelley wrote in his Review of Archaeology essay, "I have no personal doubts that some of the inscriptions which have been reported are genuine Celtic ogham." These are the very markings that most orthodox scholars dismiss as plough marks or forgeries or the figments of febrile New Age imaginations. In addition, Kelley resists joining the many of his peers who take potshots at Fell's Druids of New England. He continued,

Despite my occasional harsh criticism of Fell's treatment of individual inscriptions, it should be recognized that without Fell's work there would be no [North American] ogham problem to perplex us. We need to ask not only what Fell has done wrong in his epigraphy, but also where we have gone wrong as archaeologists in not recognizing such an extensive European presence in the New World.

The way Kelley is described by his friend Michael Coe in Breaking the Maya Code (1992) suggests that he might secretly revel in his controversial, if guarded, support for Fell. Coe wrote,

[Dave is] a lively mixture of Irish puckishness and New England Yankee sobriety [whose] large frame, bald head, and leprechaun smile are familiar features at [academic] meetings, where he can always be expected to present a paper that may be unusual and even outrageous, according to one's lights, but is usually grounded in the most impeccable scholarship.

In one such paper, titled "Writing in the Americas," published in October of 1998 in a special edition of the Journal of the West, Kelley focused on a "decipherment" that detractors consider to be one of Fell's most outrageous: the Peterborough Stone, in Ontario. This is a flat table rock measuring hundreds of square feet, upon which a riot of curious incised graffiti are interlaced, seemingly at random. To Fell, who made the stone the focus of his Bronze Age America, the layout consisted of meaningful groups of symbols and letters, carved primarily to document the visit and the commercial enterprise of a Bronze Age Nordic king whom Fell identified as Woden-lithi. "Woden-lithi, of Ringerike the great king, instructed that runes be engraved," reads one section of Fell's ambitious translation of this curious saga in stone. "A ship he took. In-honor-of-Gungnir was its name .... For ingot-copper of excellent quality came the king by way of trial."

Fell believed that Scandinavian visitors circa 1700 B.C. incised the Peterborough Stone with words and symbols that have distinctly Scandinavian pronunciations and meanings. However, the letters themselves are not depicted with recognized medieval Norse runes. In Fell's, and now Kelley's, view, a pre-runic alphabet was used -- a little-known script called Tifinagh, preserved by a Saharan Berber people known as the Tuareg. It is as if Woden-lithi's scribe used symbols from the Classical Greek alphabet to put together English-sounding words.

In The Review of Archaeology, Kelley supported Fell's identification (if not his exact translation) of proto-Tifinagh at Peterborough, and he amplified this position in his Journal of the West article. After comparing figures at Peterborough with inscriptions found in the Bohusl

[John Williams]

So now your telling me that...

The renound David Kelly from Calgary who broke the Mayan cypher log jamb and rarley does anything in un peer reviewed manner is a psuedo scientist?

OK, for the third time, Kelley is being quoted in a non-academic article, and if you read what he says, he's very cautious about Fell's claims. There's no resounding support, just a cautious admission that some of Fell's work might be worth investigating, but this puts Kelley in the distinct minority. Fell's work is the pseudoscience, and the best you can come up with is one scientist who thinks maybe we should look into some of it further.

Either way, you've thrown out an avalanche of stuff in this thread, and by my count, none of it is related to the OP: steel smelting circa 3000 BC in the Americas.

[Zakuska]

OK, for the third time, Kelley is being quoted in a non-academic article, and if you read what he says, he's very cautious about Fell's claims. There's no resounding support, just a cautious admission that some of Fell's work might be worth investigating, but this puts Kelley in the distinct minority. Fell's work is the pseudoscience, and the best you can come up with is one scientist who thinks maybe we should look into some of it further.

Either way, you've thrown out an avalanche of stuff in this thread, and by my count, none of it is related to the OP: steel smelting circa 3000 BC in the Americas.

Yes he is being quoted in a non academic article but the statements as referenced in the article are coming from several academic peer reviewed sources.

eg.

Breaking the Maya Code (1992)

Review of Archaeology essay

PS. Some one said they would have needed "special fired brick" to smelt the steele. Here we have special fired brick. How long where bricks being fired to build 360 Pyramids of which, we've only excavated 9?

[John Williams]

Yes he is being quoted in a non academic article but the statements as referenced in the article are coming from several academic peer reviewed sources.

eg.

Breaking the Maya Code (1992)

Review of Archaeology essay

PS. Some one said they would have needed "special fired brick" to smelt the steele. Here we have special fired brick.

Late classic Mayans knew how to fire bricks and pottery, though their methods were quite crude: they dug pits, put the clay items in, covered them with brush and wood, and set it aflame. The bricks at Comalcalco are not the kind of bricks you would need for a smelter but simply reflected the scarcity of stone in that part of the Mayan world.

In short, you're making a connection where there isn't one:

bricks -> advanced pyrotechnology -> smelting/metallurgy -> steel

It doesn't work because the bricks are not the product of advance pyrotechnology, and there is no evidence of smelting of any kind until roughly 1000 AD.

[Zakuska]

Late classic Mayans knew how to fire bricks and pottery, though their methods were quite crude: they dug pits, put the clay items in, covered them with brush and wood, and set it aflame. The bricks at Comalcalco are not the kind of bricks you would need for a smelter but simply reflected the scarcity of stone in that part of the Mayan world.

In short, you're making a connection where there isn't one:

bricks -> advanced pyrotechnology -> smelting/metallurgy -> steel

It doesn't work because the bricks are not the product of advance pyrotechnology, and there is no evidence of smelting of any kind until roughly 1000 AD.

Fired Brick is fired Brick, and you keep thinking that the type of "Steele" we are speaking about is 21st Century titanium alloy. We've already determined that these "crude brick ovens" produce enough heet for smelting.

Lets look at it from lingusitics point of view...

The Olmec civilization was developed along the coast of the Gulf of Mexico in the states of Tabasco and Veracruz (Pouligny 1988:34).The Pacific area was early colonized by Olmec people in middle Preclassic times (Morley, Brainerd & Sharer 1984).

The Maya were not the first to occupy the Yucatan and Gulf regions of Mexico. It is evident from Maya traditions and the artifacts recovered from many ancient Mexican sites that a different race lived in Mayaland before the Mayan speakers settled this region.

The linguistic evidence suggest that around 1200 B.C., a new linguistic group arrived in the Gulf region of Mexico.M. Swadesh (1953) has presented evidence that at least 3200 years ago a non- Maya speaking group wedged itself between the Huastecs and the Maya. Soustelle (1984: 29) tells us that "We cannot help but think that the people that shattered the unity of the Proto-Mayas was also the people that brought Olmec civilization to the region".

Weiner (1922) believe that some of these foreign people may have come from West Africa. Dr. Wiercinski (1972) claims that some of the Olmecs were of African origin.

Dr. Wiercinski supports this claim with skeletal evidence from several Olmec sites where he found skeletons that were analogous to the West African type . Wiercinski discovered that 13.5 percent of the skeletons from Tlatilco and 4.5 percent of the skeletons from Cerro de las Mesas were Africoid (Wiercinski & Jairazbhoy 1975).

http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Academy/8919/decip1.html

Is it possible that the Linguistics wild card these scientists are looking for is right before our eyes?

You do remember that Hebrews where expert Brick Makers for Pharoah, and Africanese Skeletons in America... Doesn't sound like Psuedo Science to me.

[John Williams]

Fired Brick is fired Brick, and you keep thinking that the type of "Steele" we are speaking about is 21st Century titanium alloy. We've already determined that these "crude brick ovens" produce enough heet for smelting.

Lets look at it from lingusitics point of view...

http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Academy/8919/decip1.html

Is it possible that the Linguistics wild card these scientists are looking for is right before our eyes?

You're still almost 4,000 years off; what does late Maya technology have to do with the Jaredites? It would be like saying that since we have satellite technology in the 21st century, people 2000 years before Christ could have had similar technology.

And fired brick is not fired brick. The stuff that would have been produced by the Maya was of low quality and would not have been of use in building smelters and kilns.

And I'm not talking about 21st century titanium alloy (talk about a straw man). Joseph Smith knew the difference between steel and copper and distinguished between them in the Book of Mormon. The idea that "steel" means something else is an excuse for an anachronism.

Edit: For the last time, I do not accept Clyde Winters' non-peer-reviewed work to be acceptable scholarship.

[Zakuska]

Again who says this is "Late Classic" We are talking about a complex of 360 pyramids. It just didnt spring up over night.

Edit: For the last time, I do not accept Clyde Winters' non-peer-reviewed work to be acceptable scholarship.

Clyde isnt the Primary source.

Dr. Wiercinski supports this claim with skeletal evidence from several Olmec sites where he found skeletons that were analogous to the West African type . Wiercinski discovered that 13.5 percent of the skeletons from Tlatilco and 4.5 percent of the skeletons from Cerro de las Mesas were Africoid (Wiercinski & Jairazbhoy 1975).

You also remember that the Lingusitics evidence of which David Kelly is expert is what we are talking about here. Some one... at around 1200bc (Just about right for Jaredites) introduced brick building technology into the region, we see that from the language, as well as the Africoid skeletal remains.

[John Williams]

Again who says this is "Late Classic" We are talking about a complex of 360 pyramids. It just didnt spring up over night.

Clyde isnt the Primary source.

You also remember that the Lingusitics of which David Kelly is expert is what we are talking about here.

I shouldn't have to say this, but Wiercinski is also considered a crackpot. Here's a pithy quote from the Journal of Latin American Antiquity: "As long ago as 1962, Wiercinski's methodology was described as grossly obsolete."

And given that Comalcalco lies at the western edge of Maya expansion and has an architecture derivative of Palenque, there's no question that it's a late classic polity.

[Zakuska]

Ah yes... lets just go name all the people we don't agree with... "Crack pots" that will do the trick.

Got any Skeletal DNA evidence to refute his claims?

PS. Beastie on Mormon Discussions Site was making fun of Dr. Petersen and Farms claim of acididc soil destroying horse bones...

Weren't Caananites described as "Giants" in the Old Testament? The Skulls they found where Giant.

The Skeletal evidence at first seemed a problematic propostion since the corrosive humidity of the soil destroyed the bones in the humid capitals of the Olmec. but in the drier centers-- Tlatilco, Cerro de las Mesas, and Monte Alban-- the Polish craniologist, Andrez Wiercinski, found ample and indisputable evidence of an Africoid presence.

Wiercinski, in 1972, assessed the presence of a negroid pattern of traits on the basis of multivariate distance analysis of a large set of skull traits which differentiate between africoid, Mongloid and Casucasoid varietes. The traits analyzed included "degree of Prog-nathism, prominence of nasal bones, height of nasal roof, width of nasal root, shape of nasal aperture, position of nasal spine, shape of orbit, depth of canina fossa, and depth of maxillary incisure. 35 Wiercinski sees the collossal heads representing individuals with "negroid" traits predominating but with admixture of other racial traits. That is what I have said.

http://books.google.com/books?id=FXFsUySZg...xgQY6NASKkQLka4

Here again Mormons are agreeing with the Scientists and critics are labeling them all "Crack Pots". However I do beleive the Collosal heads he is refering too are the giant stone heads that look polynesian.