I have come to realize

[strappinglad]

If one walks 5 miles per day, 3 days per week for 10 years , one could cross the entire US at least twice. Mind you, on flat smooth terrain , 5 miles might take as little as one and a half hours , while crossing rugged mountains and dense forests one might  cover less than  a mile per day. And contrary to rumored speculation, I like to think that Moroni, after such a long trek, wandered down to south west Florida and lived out the remainer of his days in a community of descendants of Hagoth in a nice beachfront property.

[Brant Gardner]

3 hours ago, notHagoth7 said:

On that note, if you don't mind me asking, as a historian, what's your take on the third-hand assertion (50+ years after Carthage and 30 years after the death of the reported *2nd*-hand source) that Moroni died at the hands of a small band of Lamanites? 

 

 

There certainly isn't much that helps firm that up as history. As speculation, it is pretty reasonable. It was either than or die of old age, so there is a chance that the tale is right whether it came from a good source or not.

[Brant Gardner]

3 hours ago, RevTestament said:

Well, third party witnesses in Zion's Camp put ancient Manti in Indiana/Missouri... which is my guess you reject, as do I.

I take third party accounts with a huge grain of salt.

Suffice it to say those maps were not in JS' handwriting. So thank you for helping to clear that up, but the map itself leads one to believe it was made by Joseph.

If there is any questions tho, the capital B, the "d"s and the "s" are definitely not Joseph's. Joseph's "d" virtually always had a closed loop or singular appearing line for the stem, and the loops on those "d"s are huge and open, etc

Whether Joseph was ever that specific or not, the presence of the maps tells us that people were willing to believe that Joseph could have made the maps. That places an expansive geography close to Joseph's time, and one that wasn't seen as distorting his memory. That is to say, they wouldn't have thought Joseph to have been as geographically restrictive as some paint him to have been.