kennewick man

[Daniel Peterson]

Sorry, Just Curious. Most of China isn't considered "Central Asia," either. (Sinkiang Province, the Tarim Basin, but not much else.) China, particularly in its urban and historic core, is in "East Asia."

And I misremembered the name of Denis Sinor's book. It's Inner Asia, not Central Asia. Sorry. But that's significant, because "Inner Asia" is essentially a synonym for "Central Asia." (The course I took, many years ago, was entitled "Central Asian History.") Consider the title a clue.

There is another famous book about the subject, by Rene Grousset, entitled Empire of the Steppes. That title is another clue.

By "Central Asia," scholars essentially mean the steppes, the grasslands, the horse country, of the Mongols and various Turkic tribes (e.g., the Uighurs). They don't mean India, or settled urban China, or Indochina.

Here's another clue: The professor I studied with worked mostly in Mongolian, Turkish, and Russian.

[Scott Gordon]

I'm just thinking outloud here:

First we hear that DNA PROVES the "Book of Mormon people" really came over the land bridge from Siberia, Mongolia and other parts of Asia.

Then we hear that Mongolia and China had large horse based economies and we have people offering evidence of that.

Then we hear that there were NO HORSES in the Americas.

Hmmmm.....so of all of those horse riding people decided to leave their horses behind?

Scott

[DG#23]

I'm just thinking outloud here:

First we hear that DNA PROVES the "Book of Mormon people" really came over the land bridge from Siberia, Mongolia and other parts of Asia.

Then we hear that Mongolia and China had large horse based economies and we have people offering evidence of that.

Then we hear that there were NO HORSES in the Americas.

Hmmmm.....so of all of those horse riding people decided to leave their horses behind?

Scott

Brother Gordon,

If you were to move from California (where we know there are horses) to a small uninhabited Island in the Pacific, could future generations conclude that you didn't move there from California because you didn't bring your horses with you?

[Scott Gordon]

Brother Gordon,

If you were to move from California (where we know there are horses) to a small uninhabited Island in the Pacific, could future generations conclude that you didn't move there from California because you didn't bring your horses with you?

That analogy doesn't work because I would have to take a boat to the island. The argument is that people walked across the land bridge. It would be more accurate to talk about moving to Nevada.

If I had a horse, I would certainly have it carry my gear. Given the argument is that many people crossed the land bridge, one would think that several horses would have come as well.

What does this have to do with the Book of Mormon? Not much. But it does reflect the conflicting arguments against the Book of Mormon. People argue FOR the land bridge, but against horses.

I'm not planning on dying on my sword on this. I really don't care. It just struck me as funny that the two arguments are contradictory.

I personally believe in multiple groups coming into the Americas and muliple groups leaving the Americas and going to other places. I also have a hard time believing there weren't some horses here.

I know we have camels in California. We also have zebras. The camels were released in the southern Deseret area, and the zebras are around Hurst Castle (I have pictures.) I doubt that there will be any evidence of these animals 2000 years from today.

Scott

[emaughan]

If you were to move from California (where we know there are horses) to a small uninhabited Island in the Pacific, could future generations conclude that you didn't move there from California because you didn't bring your horses with you?

How many farmers do you think migrated west in the 1800s without their seed or plow?

The point I got from what Scott said was that a people with a culture that is heavily centered around horses would not undertake a migration and leave their "heart" behind. Your analogy is silly. You compare Scott moving to "Gilligan's Island" from California to a migration of a people over time from one part of the world to another. A better analogy would be if Scott were to move to an unihabited island to escape some of the inept arguments on the FAIR boards, would he purposely leave behind tools or equipment that he knew would be helpfull for him to start a new life?

If Scott was a lover of horses, and depended on them for his living, would he abondon them in California?

[cinepro]

So, no one has any guesses as to where the word "horse" came from in the first place?

[Guest Just Curious]

Dan instead of playing games why don't you just give me the list of current countries YOU would consider to be in central asia ok?

[Guest Just Curious]

I'm just thinking outloud here:

First we hear that DNA PROVES the "Book of Mormon people" really came over the land bridge from Siberia, Mongolia and other parts of Asia.

Then we hear that Mongolia and China had large horse based economies and we have people offering evidence of that.

Then we hear that there were NO HORSES in the Americas.

Hmmmm.....so of all of those horse riding people decided to leave their horses behind?

Scott 

Keep thinking....those people came over prior to the domestication of the horse in their homelands !!!!

[miked]

Keep thinking....those people came over prior to the domestication of the horse in their homelands !!!!

i have to agree. i'm not sure on the dates, but i believe that most people knowledgeable regarding the migrations across the land bridge in the bering strait happened around 13,000 to 10,000 bc (correct me if i'm wrong).

ok, here are some excerpts from the Encarta Encyclopedia:

"Horses were widespread across North America, Europe, Asia, and Africa during the ice ages. But as the climate warmed and open tundra gave way to forest around 15,000 years ago, the habitat for the horse began to vanish. In North America, where horses also suffered from being hunted by Paleo-Indians, they became extinct. Horses nearly became extinct in the rest of the world as well; by about 7,000 years ago the world

[Scott Gordon]

Keep thinking....those people came over prior to the domestication of the horse in their homelands !!!!

Ok, I can accept that.

It just seemed contradictory.

Scott

[Guest Just Curious]

Ok, I can accept that.

It just seemed contradictory.

Scott

No problem...it was a very valid question and one certainly that should be asked to learn...

[Daniel Peterson]

Dan instead of playing games why don't you just give me the list of current countries YOU would consider to be in central asia ok?

"A simple glance at any map of Eurasia will reveal that the main centers of civilization lie on its edges. From west to east -- Europe, the Semitic civilizations, Iran, India, Southeast Asia and China -- occupy the shores of this immense island; only the northern shore, inaccessible to man because of its climate, has not produced its own major civilzation. The land surrounded by this 'crust' of civilization is Central Eurasia, the subject of this course.

"The definition that can be given of Central Eurasia in space is negative. It is that part of the continent of Eurasia that lies beyond the borders of the great sedentary civilizations. This definition implies that this frontier is unstable. Although it varies from age to age, from area to area following the balance of pressure between the civilized and the uncivilized, it is easily traceable at any given moment in history . . ."

Denis Sinor, Inner Asia: A Syllabus, Indiana University Publications, Uralic and Altaic Series, Volume 96, 2d ed., rev. (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1971), 2.

[Daniel Peterson]

So, no one has any guesses as to where the word "horse" came from in the first place?

As the Peterson-Roper article I've cited suggests, the term horse -- that is, the Lehite equivalent of English horse -- most likely appeared on the plates themselves. And that would be true under either the tapir-hypothesis or the horse-survival hypothesis.

[Beowulf]

At BYU many years ago, I had a class from a (then-young) Prof. Montgomery (is he still there Dan?) called Asiatic Russian History. It was my favorite history course ever.

He defined this area as everywhere between Europe and China, and north of the Middle East. And the terminology was fluid over the centuries.

When people cite no horse bones, they mean this area. Not Turkey, not Persia, and not China. But this is where use of the horse in warfare first started, by all accounts.

There is a famous tale of the Chinese sending a military expedition around 100BC to Fergana (modern Uzbekistan) to bring back the fabled horses, by trade or by force, it did not matter which.

Curiously, nobody knows what breed of horses these were, because no specimens are alive today. All we have are enigmatic descriptions in Han dynasty texts.

BTW, my favorite Prof. Montgomery story is when he was showing slides of a sabbatical he had spent in Uzbekistan (circa 1970 or so), we students were speculating about which people were true Russians, and not Uzbeks, Kazakhs, or whatever. None came up for awhile, until a ravishingly beautiful blonde woman in a Russian fur hat appeared. "That's a Russian!" we all chortled. No, said Prof. Montgomery, "that's my wife!"

Beowulf

[Daniel Peterson]

David Montgomery, who studied with Denis Sinor, was my teacher for what may be an alternate version of the same class you took. It was one of my favorites, too. Unfortunately, due largely to family health problems, David took early retirement a year or two ago. I still see him occasionally, though.

[Beowulf]

Sorry to hear that.

A great teacher and a good friend he was.

I took that class circa 1978 or so.

[miked]

i took middle eastern history from prof. montgomery as a freshman, it was a great class and he was a great professor.

amusing story. i remember once he was talking about missions. he said that when he was younger mostly troublemakers and others in need of some growing up went on missions, and that it wasn't really seen as near-mandatory as it is today. can't remember if he said he went or not...

[Guest Just Curious]

I can't believe no one will take me up on my proposal on page 3. Come on all you Tapir=horse theorists...put your money where your theory is....I double dare ya!!

[Daniel Peterson]

I have a proposition....ok here it is -- Joseph was raised on a farm as we understand...now I propose we do this. We take a picture of a tapir, a picture of a Spanish Mustang (which according to Dan the peoples of meso america mistook for a tapir) and a picture of a pig.

That's not at all what I've said. I've suggested the possibility that the Lehites, being familiar with horses but not with tapirs, might have classified the tapirs they saw under the same category as the horses they knew. I've supplied (here and in my article with Matt Roper) several well documented historical examples of just such behavior when people encountered unfamiliar animals and classified them with familiar animals. I've noted the obvious and historically well documented fact that other cultures and languages, removed from ours in time and/or space, don't necessarily categorize things the same way we do -- e.g. Greek aetos meaning both "eagle" and "vulture," and Semitic mrkb referring to "chariots," "saddles," "boats," and "shoes" -- and I've pointed out that it's sheer uninformed cultural imperialism to expect everybody to think and to classify things precisely as we do.

Your "proposition" is irrelevant to the point I've made. If you think I'm mistaken in suggesting that someone might look at a tapir and think of a horse, you need to explain why the people I cite in my article -- who are not Latter-day Saints and have no known interest in the Book of Mormon -- looked at tapirs and thought of horses. And you need to explain why the indigenous Mesoamericans, seeing Spanish horses for the first time, called them tapirs. Or you need to demonstrate that I've simply invented the data. In fact, I have an alternative proposition to yours: I'll gladly transfer to you two months of my salary, and I'll resign from my professorship at BYU, if you can demonstrate that my sources don't exist.

I've said that I believe the word horse almost certainly appeared on the original plates, because it was almost certainly engraved on the plates by the authors of the Book of Mormon. Your ruminations on the translation process are irrelevant in that light. What part of this don't you understand?

[Benjamin McGuire]

Just curious wrote:

You simply cannot blame translational errors on Joseph and Oliver...any translational errors are Gods' fault unless of course Joseph and Oliver later came back and changed what was written down the first time...

I am curious to know really what you imagine the "translation" process was like?

Does God (as the translator) stick with a strictly literal translation? Or does he go for a translation of equivalent meanings, or does he provide us with the not necessarily present intent of the author?

Here is a hypothetical. Suppose there were Tapirs (I personally haven't accepted the notion, but I haven't dismissed it). What do you call them? The language of the Gold Plates seems to be pretty static (of course its hard to tell in translation, but the vocabulary of the Book of Mormon is tiny. Everything, for example, is a "river" - no streams, no brooks, no rills, etc.) If there were no horses, the question only applies early on, of course. Once the decision is made to represent the tapir as a horse, the term horse would quickly (long before the Book of Mosiah) become equivalent to tapir within the text. But, as Dr. Peterson points out, the term horse still appears in the gold plates.

So, how should it be translated? If Nephi wrote "horse" when he was referring to a tapir, his intent was still to write "horse". Should God have stayed true to the text and provided Joseph with "horse"? Should he have followed Nephi's intent, and given Joseph Smith "horse"? Perhaps he should have gone against both intent and actual wording, and gone after meaning and given Joseph "tapir"? Can this really be called translation?

At the same time, English is a language full of ambiguity. Is there such a thing as a perfect translation? Who would be the target audience? Joseph Smith? Meaning is not present in a text - it is a creation of the reader. The reader of a text is only capable of understanding the intent of the author as far as that reader resembles the ideal reader envisioned by the author. Since we are all different, who was the ideal reader envisioned by God? And doesn't that mean that the rest of us, who will differ from that ideal reader in myriad ways, will never realize completely the intent which God presents to us? This notion of translation without errors is nothing more than imaginary device which you want to use to beat up LDS with. It cannot be applied to any text - whether or not God participates in the translational process.

Perhaps you would be kind enough to explain just what sort of translation you would expect to see given the situation as you understand it - so at least we can all see how (un)reasonable your demands are.

Ben

[Guest Just Curious]

That's not at all what I've said. I've suggested the possibility that the Lehites, being familiar with horses but not with tapirs, might have classified the tapirs they saw under the same category as the horses they knew.

And what I am suggesting is that since they Lehites were also familiar with pigs that a tapir much more closely resembles a pig than a horse. If we put farm animals together such as horse, cow, ox, donkey and pig...the tapir would more closely resemble the pig first, donkey second and horse third, cow/oxen lastly. To say that they possibly mistook a tapir for a horse fairly well excludes the possibility that they thought a tapir was a pig or donkey as well (which are both in the BoM). Besides I keep bringing up the translation process and everyone keeps ignoring that fact. There was no error in translation.

Your "proposition" is irrelevant to the point I've made. If you think I'm mistaken in suggesting that someone might look at a tapir and think of a horse, you need to explain why the people I cite in my article -- who are not Latter-day Saints and have no known interest in the Book of Mormon -- looked at tapirs and thought of horses.

And what did they think of when they saw pigs?

And you need to explain why the indigenous Mesoamericans, seeing Spanish horses for the first time, called them tapirs.

And what did these people call pigs when they first saw them, what did they call donkeys?

Or you need to demonstrate that I've simply invented the data. In fact, I have an alternative proposition to yours: I'll gladly transfer to you two months of my salary, and I'll resign from my professorship at BYU, if you can demonstrate that my sources don't exist.

Did I ever dispute your sources or say they were phoney Dan?

I've said that I believe the word horse almost certainly appeared on the original plates, because it was almost certainly engraved on the plates by the authors of the Book of Mormon. Your ruminations on the translation process are irrelevant in that light. What part of this don't you understand?

OK I give up...God may have meant tapir but he put the word "HORSE" down on the peep stone so that He could have this huge controversy about it, instead of putting down tapir and showing how really correct/true the book is. Heck with an arguement like that I totally surrender...

[Guest The Headless Laban]

So, if the tapir theory is accepted, will we get a new book of mormon with the word horse replaced by tapir, or maybe put horse in quotes? Maybe have new Book of mormon art with tapirs instead of horses. Instead of the Freburg painting portraying Helaman leading the stripling warriors while mounted on

a mighty, white steed, Helaman will instead be on the back of a short, fat tapir. Or, since there is no mention of riding "horses" in the Book of Mormon, Helaman will ride in a chariot that is pulled by the fat, tapir. This could be a lot of fun.

[Daniel Peterson]

To say that they possibly mistook a tapir for a horse . . .

You haven't grasped the point. I haven't said that they "mistook" a tapir for a horse, any more than I've claimed that the ancient Greeks confused vultures and eagles. I've said -- on three or four different occasions now -- that different peoples in different places at different times speaking different languages might well classify things differently than we do. And I've given specific examples where that is certainly the case.

Besides I keep bringing up the translation process and everyone keeps ignoring that fact.  There was no error in translation.

I haven't claimed that there was an error in translation. I've specifically said that I don't believe there was, and see no need to assume one.

Did I ever dispute your sources or say they were phoney Dan?

You've acted as if they didn't exist.

OK I give up...God may have meant tapir but he put the word "HORSE" down on the peep stone so that He could have this huge controversy about it, instead of putting down tapir and showing how really correct/true the book is.  Heck with an arguement like that I totally surrender...

You really haven't ever gotten the argument. I haven't said that God "meant" tapir.

[Guest The Headless Laban]

That's not at all what I've said. I've suggested the possibility that the Lehites, being familiar with horses but not with tapirs, might have classified the tapirs they saw under the same category as the horses they knew.

And what I am suggesting is that since they Lehites were also familiar with pigs that a tapir much more closely resembles a pig than a horse.

This gets into a bigger issue. If the Lehites did such a poor job of identifying and naming things, what else did they screw up. Maybe the white guy they saw wasn't Jesus. Maybe it was satan, and they just assumed he was jesus so they wrote down the word "jesus".

[Daniel Peterson]

So, if the tapir theory is accepted, will we get a new book of mormon with the word horse replaced by tapir, or maybe put horse in quotes? Maybe have new Book of mormon art with tapirs instead of horses. Instead of the Freburg painting portraying Helaman leading the stripling warriors while mounted on

a mighty, white steed, Helaman will instead be on the back of a short, fat tapir. Or, since there is no mention of riding "horses" in the Book of Mormon, Helaman will ride in a chariot that is pulled by the fat, tapir. This could be a lot of fun.

Giggle, giggle.

I take it that neither ethnology nor linguistics is your strong suit?