The Colonizer Votan -- Was He Jared Or Mulek?

[Uncle Dale]

In 1881 LDS Apostle Moses Thatcher published the following conclusion:

The extract, from Kingsborough, states that the manuscript of the primitive Indians refers to the Tower as the "Great Wall," which the lord of the "hollow piece of wood" saw, when it was being built, and beheld with his own eyes the confusion of the language of the people. Votan, it is stated, was a grandson of Noah, and came by express command of the Lord to the people of this land. The brother of Jared did the same; pleading with the Lord not to confound the language of Jared, or their friends and families. The seven families, being the same, doubtless, whom Votan led, maintained one language, being not confounded. They formed one company and traveled together many years (104), over rivers, mountains and arms of the sea. So did the colony led by Jared's brother, who was in the wilderness many years and built barges to cross many waters. If the records of the Indians, which survived the vandalism of the Roman Catholic clergy, who followed in the wake of the Spanish conquerors, are reliable, and form, when combined with the traditions of the primitive inhabitants of the land, a chain of facts like those produced even thus far in this series of articles, then who can consistently deny the divine origin of the Book of Mormon?

http://www.olivercowdery.com/smithhome/188...0s/1881_Con.htm

Here and elsewhere in his 1881 article, "Divine Origin of the Book of Mormon," Apostle Thatcher equates

the Central American folk hero "Votan" with the Book of Mormon's Jared -- indeed, Elder Thatcher said that

this identity of ancient colonizers in the Americas was such a slam-dunk that we moderns should no longer

"consistently deny the divine origin of the Book of Mormon."

However, a few years earlier, Elder George M. Ottinger argued that Votan was really Prince Mulek, of the

tribe of Judah -- and that, after Ottinger himself had considered the Jared option:

http://www.olivercowdery.com/smithhome/187...MO.htm#1876-014

I suppose that the counsel of a Mormon leader, ordained as a prophet, seer and revelator overrides that if

a mere high priest, and that we must dismiss Ottinger's Mulek claims.

Is that what modern LDS leaders have concluded? Or, have I missed reading some important FARMS article

which clears up the entire mystery?

Uncle Dale

.

[BCSpace]

The story does not seem consistent with Mulek. I'd go with Jared.

I suppose that the counsel of a Mormon leader, ordained as a prophet, seer and revelator overrides that if

a mere high priest, and that we must dismiss Ottinger's Mulek claims.

The Contributor does not seem to meet the standard for LDS doctrine, being published independently by Junius F. Wells. Therefore, we can dismiss both claims if we want to.

Is that what modern LDS leaders have concluded? Or, have I missed reading some important FARMS article

which clears up the entire mystery?

I am not aware of any statement in any official publication and an initial search on "Votan" turns up nothing. As for the opinion of some FARMS article, I have not searched for it.

[Uncle Dale]

...

The Contributor does not seem to meet the standard for LDS doctrine, being published independently

by Junius F. Wells. Therefore, we can dismiss both claims if we want to.

...

Then again, it was the organ of the Church's youth and became an official publication of the Church in

1897-98, when its name was changed to "Improvement Era" (precursor to the "New Era" and "The Ensign").

I'd suppose that most of what was published there was the typical Mormon viewpoint, if not perfect doctrine.

If Votan is such a good proof for the BoM, I'm surprised that he's not much mentioned by the LDS. I'm more

apt to find references to that sort of Meso-American legend in the RLDS publications.

Maybe somebody will come up with some more exact explanations.

???

UD

[skenderbeg]

Not to be trite, but what this publication "was" in no way affects of defines what it "became" - if 'the Church' decided at some later date to use it as a means of publishing the teachings of the Church, this in no way validates anything published before this.

Sorry, but this is a poor man's "Proof by Induction" - doesn't hold up.

Then again, it was the organ of the Church's youth and became an official publication of the Church in

1897-98, when its name was changed to "Improvement Era" (precursor to the "New Era" and "The Ensign").

I'd suppose that most of what was published there was the typical Mormon viewpoint, if not perfect doctrine.

If Votan is such a good proof for the BoM, I'm surprised that he's not much mentioned by the LDS. I'm more

apt to find references to that sort of Meso-American legend in the RLDS publications.

Maybe somebody will come up with some more exact explanations.

???

UD

[Brant Gardner]

In 1881 LDS Apostle Moses Thatcher published the following conclusion:

Here and elsewhere in his 1881 article, "Divine Origin of the Book of Mormon," Apostle Thatcher equates

the Central American folk hero "Votan" with the Book of Mormon's Jared -- indeed, Elder Thatcher said that

this identity of ancient colonizers in the Americas was such a slam-dunk that we moderns should no longer

"consistently deny the divine origin of the Book of Mormon."

However, a few years earlier, Elder George M. Ottinger argued that Votan was really Prince Mulek, of the

tribe of Judah -- and that, after Ottinger himself had considered the Jared option:

http://www.olivercowdery.com/smithhome/187...MO.htm#1876-014

I suppose that the counsel of a Mormon leader, ordained as a prophet, seer and revelator overrides that if

a mere high priest, and that we must dismiss Ottinger's Mulek claims.

Is that what modern LDS leaders have concluded?

I think your supposition that the excitement to correlate all kinds of legends with the Book of Mormon followed Kingsborough. Kingsborough was of a Christian diffusionist mindset and colored his report of Mesoamerican information through that lense. Clearly, that is what the English-reading early church picked up. They were predisposed to like what he said and elaborated on it for a Book of Mormon tint to the previous heavy coloration.

Modern leaders, in general, haven't "concluded." Ted Brewerton is from that school, but is subject to the same misleading interpretations.

I don't know of anyone doing a lot of work on the legend/oral material at the moment. What I have done is a few years in the past, but I am still trying to change the perceptions of how the material is used (and it is misused way more often than used correctly).

Votan has no connection to the Book of Mormon.

[Brant Gardner]

If Votan is such a good proof for the BoM, I'm surprised that he's not much mentioned by the LDS. I'm more

apt to find references to that sort of Meso-American legend in the RLDS publications.

I'm trying to get the word out!

By the way, did you include one of the Michigan artificts just to make me comment on it?

[USU78]

Votan has no connection to the Book of Mormon.

Too busy drinking at the Well of Wisdom in Finland/Kvensland, I guess.

[Uncle Dale]

...

By the way, did you include one of the Michigan artificts just to make me comment on it?

Not really -- that side-thought on my part was more along the lines of demonstrating that the RLDS tended

to get all hot and bothered over things like the "Michigan relics," mastodon image mounds and Kingsborough

than did the LDS (who, I suppose, were more inclined to "check with the bosses" before they went off on too

many wild tangents).

My main interest is how widespread the Votan lore was prior to 1828 -- and especially prior to the 1816 death

of Solomon Spalding (who had at least some limited plausible access, via Clavigero, Robertson, Southey and

von Humboldt). By looking at how the 19th century Latter Day Saint apologists made use of this stuff (especially

before Bancroft), I begin to get a handle on how widespread the source material was.

For example, Charles B. Thompson, way back in 1843, was familiar with the 1822 Del Rio published report on

Palenque -- and yet he made no use of the accompanying Votan lore. Again, in 1859-60, the Millennial Star

made use of Del Rio, but without citing the attached Cabrera paper on Votan, etc.

There seems to be no available reporting on the history of LDS apologetics, so I'm having to wade through a

lot of dross, just to uncover an occasional Mormon reliance upon these obscure sources.

Speaking of Votan -- do you happen to have ready access to Ottinger's 1879 paper on that subject, as

published in the Juvenile Instructor? My stacks of photocopies are in a useless jumble these days (sigh!)

UD

[Brant Gardner]

Not really -- that side-thought on my part was more along the lines of demonstrating that the RLDS tended

to get all hot and bothered over things like the "Michigan relics," mastodon image mounds and Kingsborough

than did the LDS (who, I suppose, were more inclined to "check with the bosses" before they went off on too

many wild tangents).

Not from what I've seen!

Speaking of Votan -- do you happen to have ready access to Ottinger's 1879 paper on that subject, as

published in the Juvenile Instructor? My stacks of photocopies are in a useless jumble these days (sigh!)

I'm sorry, but I am no help at all. I don't have anything from that time period. My historical interests typically go way older. However, I will really be interested to read what you come up with.

[Uncle Dale]

...

However, I will really be interested to read what you come up with.

I'll put the 1879 article here (if I ever locate my xeroxes):

http://www.olivercowdery.com/smithhome/187...MO.htm#1879-058

I'm also working on getting the Clavigero and Kingsborough texts on-line -- and am

about 1/3 of the way into transcribing the octavo English edition of von Humboldt's "Researches."

I finished up Southey and Del Rio months back -- have Adair on-line, but not yet formatted:

http://olivercowdery.com/texts/bookindx.htm

UD

[Cold Steel]

I suppose that the counsel of a Mormon leader, ordained as a prophet, seer and revelator overrides that if a mere high priest, and that we must dismiss Ottinger's Mulek claims.

Oh, come on. That's being a bit dogmatic. Who knows which one is right, or if either one is right? Neither was a historian or an archeologist. Now if either one claimed that they were visited by the angel Votan....

[Uncle Dale]

...

visited by the angel Votan....

oh oh!

UD

[BCSpace]

Then again, it was the organ of the Church's youth and became an official publication of the Church in

1897-98, when its name was changed to "Improvement Era" (precursor to the "New Era" and "The Ensign").

Which significantly postdates the time period in question.

If Votan is such a good proof for the BoM, I'm surprised that he's not much mentioned by the LDS.

Perhaps it's because it's not found in a doctrinal work.

I'm more apt to find references to that sort of Meso-American legend in the RLDS publications.

Of course I wouldn't mind seeing more. Here is another example from the Contributor......

"Many years ago, the precise date I do not recollect, a plain-looking countryman called upon me with a letter from Dr. Samuel L. Mitchell, requesting me to examine and give my opinion upon a certain paper, marked with various characters, which the doctor confessed he could not decipher, and which the bearer of the note was very anxious to have explained. A very brief examination convinced me that it was a mere hoax, and a very clumsy one, too. The characters were arranged in columns, like the Chinese mode of writing, and presented the most singular medley that I ever beheld. Greek, Hebrew, and all sorts of letters, more or less distorted, either through unskillfulness or from actual design, were intermingled with sundry delineations of half moons, stars and other natural objects, and the whole ended in a rude representation of the Mexican Zodiac."â??The Church Record, Vol. 1, No. 22.

The silence of Professor Anthon respecting the certificate he gave to Martin Harris and then afterwards destroyed, together with his reference to the characters presented to him as a "hoax," is easily accounted for from the fact that he became an avowed enemy to the Book of Mormon. But a perusal of the following taken from the "Divine Authenticity of the Book of Mormon," by Orson Pratt, footnote, pp. 296-7, will convince the reader that Professor Anthon unwittingly placed upon record a very strong proof that the characters presented to him by Martin Harris were genuine characters, such as were employed by the ancient Mexicans in their writings, and thus one who sought to destroy the work of God has been made to give a strong testimony in its favor:

Professor Anthon no doubt thought that this statement would militate against the Book of Mormon; but we consider it a great acquisition of evidence, confirmatory of the truth of that book when compared with the discoveries of the glyphs and characters among the ancient ruins of America. The celebrated antiquarian, Professor Rafinesque, in speaking of the glyphs discovered on the ruins of a stone city in Mexico, says: "The glyphs of Otolum are written from top to bottom, like the Chinese, or from side to side, indifferently, like the Egyptian, and the Domotic Libyan. Although the most common way of writing the groups is in rows, and each group separated, yet we find some formed, as it were, in oblong squares or tablets, like those of Egypt."â??Atlantic Journal for 1832, by Professor Rafinesque.

Two years after the Book of Mormon appeared in print, Professor Rafinesque, in his Atlantic Journal for 1832, gave the public a fac-simile of American glyphs, found in Mexico. They are arranged in columns being forty-six in number. These the learned professor denominates "the elements of the glyphs of Otolum," and he supposes that by the combination of these elements, words and sentences were formed, constituting the written language of the ancient nations of this vast continent. By an inspection of the fac-simile of these forty-six elementary glyphs, we find all the particulars which Professor ascribes to the characters, which he says "a plain-looking countryman" presented to him. The "Greek, Hebrew, and all sorts of letters," inverted and in different positions, "with sundry delineations of half-moons," planets, suns, "and other natural objects," are found among these forty-six elements. This "plain-looking countryman," according to Professor Anthon's testimony, got some three or four years the start of Professor Rafinesque, and presented him with the genuine elementary glyphs years before the Atlantic Journal made them public; and what is still more remarkable, "the characters," Professor Anthon says, "were arranged in columns, like the Chinese mode of writing," which exactly corresponds with what Professor Rafinesque testifies, as just quoted, in relation to the glyphs of Otolum. We see nothing in Professor Anthon's statement that proves the characters presented to him to be a "hoax," as he terms it; unless, indeed, he considers their exact resemblance to the glyphs of Otolum, and their being arranged in the right kind of columns, is a "hoax." But as Joseph Smith was an unlearned young man living in the country, where he had not access to the writings and discoveries of antiquarians, he would be entirely incapable of forging the true and genuine glyphs of ancient America; therefore we consider this testimony of Professor Anthon, coming as it does from an avowed enemy of the Book of Mormon to be a great collateral evidence in its favor.

-B. H. Roberts

(Source: Contributor, vol. 10 (November 1888-October 1889), Vol. X. December, 1888. No. 2. 48.)

[Uncle Dale]

...

Here is another example from the Contributor......

Yes -- I have that segment of Roberts' article on-line also.

However, at that stage of his writing, Roberts had yet to get into the Votan lore.

I'll have to go back through my sources, to see just when it was that Roberts began that

particular line of investigation/reporting.

When I get more gathered together on this topic, I'll post a summary, excerpts, and links, here:

http://solomonspalding.com/SRP/saga2/VotanLDS.htm

UD