Wade Miller: Horses…

[Calm]

Thought some might be interested

https://meridian.allenpress.com/tjs/article/74/1/Article 5/487323/POST-PLEISTOCENE-HORSES-EQUUS-FROM-MEXICO

”For more than a century many paleontologists, biologists, paleoecologists, and archaeologists have contended that Equus species (American horse) became extinct on the North American continent by about 13,000 calibrated years BP – all part of the Late Pleistocene (Ice Age) extinction event. The paleontological project presented here that focuses on Equus from Rancho Carabanchel, San Luis Potosí, México became chronologically intriguing to us in having the horse consistently radiometrically dating into the Holocene, well beyond the presumed extinction event. Our approach to this observation was to conduct successive radiocarbon dates (n=19) tied as closely as possible to fossil remains and to stratigraphic units. The remains of the extant horse, Equus caballus, were recovered only in the upper-most Unit I while the extinct Equus cf. mexicanus, E. cf. conversidens, and E. cf. tau were recovered from the underlying Units II – VI of the late Holocene to approximately 45,000 calibrated years ago. We discuss how our data adds to the growing information which implies that horses may have persisted in this region of México well after the classical Late Pleistocene extinction event. Our conclusions may well illustrate that the extinction episode was actually a process lasting well into the Holocene and was not the event that many paleoecologists and archaeologist envision….”

[smac97]

2 hours ago, Calm said:

Thought some might be interested

https://meridian.allenpress.com/tjs/article/74/1/Article 5/487323/POST-PLEISTOCENE-HORSES-EQUUS-FROM-MEXICO

”For more than a century many paleontologists, biologists, paleoecologists, and archaeologists have contended that Equus species (American horse) became extinct on the North American continent by about 13,000 calibrated years BP – all part of the Late Pleistocene (Ice Age) extinction event. The paleontological project presented here that focuses on Equus from Rancho Carabanchel, San Luis Potosí, México became chronologically intriguing to us in having the horse consistently radiometrically dating into the Holocene, well beyond the presumed extinction event. Our approach to this observation was to conduct successive radiocarbon dates (n=19) tied as closely as possible to fossil remains and to stratigraphic units. The remains of the extant horse, Equus caballus, were recovered only in the upper-most Unit I while the extinct Equus cf. mexicanus, E. cf. conversidens, and E. cf. tau were recovered from the underlying Units II – VI of the late Holocene to approximately 45,000 calibrated years ago. We discuss how our data adds to the growing information which implies that horses may have persisted in this region of México well after the classical Late Pleistocene extinction event. Our conclusions may well illustrate that the extinction episode was actually a process lasting well into the Holocene and was not the event that many paleoecologists and archaeologist envision….”

Interesting stuff.  I'd like to better under stand this. 

Book of Mormon Central just posted an article on this yesterday: When Lehi’s Party Arrived in the Land, Did They Find Horses There?

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The Know

When Lehi and his family arrived in the promised land, according to Nephi’s account, they found “beasts in the forests of every kind, … the *** and the horse, … and all manner of wild animals” (1 Nephi 18:25). The inclusion of horses in the Book of Mormon is a subject that has long perplexed many readers since conventional thinking among scientists maintains that horses went extinct in the Americas around the end of the last Ice Age (ca. 10,000 BC). Some have used this apparent discrepancy to try to discredit the Book of Mormon. Others, however, have argued that various possibilities could account for it.1

Looks like it may be time to update Wikipedia:

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_the_Book_of_Mormon#Anachronisms (entry for or discussion of "horses" relative to the Book of Mormon)
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archaeology_and_the_Book_of_Mormon#Anachronisms_and_archaeological_findings (same)
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anachronisms_in_the_Book_of_Mormon#Horses (same)
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historicity_of_the_Book_of_Mormon#Archaeology (reference to horses as "unattested in pre-Columbian America")
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Book_of_Mormon#Views_on_historical_authenticity (same)
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_Mormon_sacred_texts#Historicity (same)
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_Mormon_sacred_texts#Archaeology (same)

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While these remain important possibilities to consider, a recent study published in the Texas Journal of Science indicates that horses may have been in the Americas during Book of Mormon times after all.6 An international team of scholars—including experts in geology, biology, paleontology, and archaeozoology—recovered specimens of horse and other megafauna from a stratified context at Rancho Carabanchel, near Cedral, San Luis Potosí, Mexico.

One of the researchers who authored the article, Wade Miller, retired from BYU's  Department of Geological Sciences in 2002.  

Another researcher, Jim I. Mead, was at the Department of Geology and the Quaternary Sciences Program at Northern Arizona University from 1985 to 2008, then at East Tennessee State University, then managing director of The Mammoth Site.  No apparent affiliation with BYU or the Church.

The other researchers listed, Gilberto Pérez-Roldán, Rosario Gómez-Núñez, Jorge Madrazo-Fanti and Isaí Ortiz-Pérez, also have no apparent connection to BYU or the Church.

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To establish the chronology of the site, several radiocarbon dates were obtained at each layer of strata from charcoal and other organic material recovered during excavations. Importantly, several horse specimens were recovered in close association with materials carbon dated to Book of Mormon times (see table).7

Post-Pleistocene, Pre-Columbian Dates Associated with Horse Remains at Rancho Carabanchel, San Luis Potosí, Mexico (see Miller et al. 2022, table 1)
Uncalibrated Radiocarbon Dates		Calibrated Radiocarbon Dates
Years BP*	Years in BC/AD	Years BP*	Years in BC/AD
3310±30	1390–1330 BC	3610–3458	1660–1508 BC
3220±30	1300–1240 BC	3494–3374	1544–1424 BC
2410±30	490–430 BC	2498–2350	548–400 BC
1870±30	50–110 AD	1877–1724	73–226 AD
1840±30	80–140 AD	1864–1708	86–242 AD
1647±57	247–360 AD	1697–1408	253–542 AD
930±30	990–1050 AD	925–785	1025–1165 AD
*BP = “before present,” with the “present” standardized to 1950.

The dates in the "Years in BC/AD" columns will, I think, be most illuminating for us neophytes, as they correspond to the times referenced in the Book of Mormon:

• Ether 9:19 (date uncertain, but per John E. Clark's estimate, around 1200 B.C.) ("And they also had horses, and asses...").
• 1 Nephi 18:25 (about 591–589 B.C.) ("And it came to pass that we did find upon the land of promise, as we journeyed in the wilderness, that there were beasts in the forests of every kind, both the cow and the ox, and the *** and the horse...").
• Enos 1:21 (about 420 B.C.) ("And it came to pass that the people of Nephi did till the land, and raise all manner of grain, and of fruit, and flocks of herds, and flocks of all manner of cattle of every kind, and goats, and wild goats, and also many horses.").
• Alma 18:9-12 (about 90 B.C.) (references to Ammon tending the king's horses).
• Alma 20:6 (about 90 B.C.) ("Now when Lamoni had heard this he caused that his servants should make ready his horses and his chariots.").
• 3 Nephi 3:22 (about 16-18 A.D.) ("And it came to pass in the seventeenth year, in the latter end of the year, the proclamation of Lachoneus had gone forth throughout all the face of the land, and they had taken their horses, and their chariots...").
• 3 Nephi 4:4 (about 19–22 A.D.) ("Therefore, there was no chance for the robbers to plunder and to obtain food, save it were to come up in open battle against the Nephites; and the Nephites being in one body, and having so great a number, and having reserved for themselves provisions, and horses and cattle...").
• 3 Nephi 6:1 (about 26-30 A.D.) ("And now it came to pass that the people of the Nephites did all return to their own lands in the twenty and sixth year, every man, with his family, his flocks and his herds, his horses and his cattle...").

Also footnote 7 above states: "Unfortunately, researchers were not able to obtain any carbon dates directly from the pre-Columbian horse bones themselves because insufficient collagen had survived. This is a common challenge when dealing with ancient animal remains. See Terry O’Connor, The Archaeology of Animal Bones (Thrupp, UK: Sutton Publishing, 2000), 23–24."  I wonder if we will see this point raised as a rejoinder to the paper's findings/conclusions.

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Based on the researchers’ analysis of the recovered horse specimens, all the samples from pre-Columbian, post-Pleistocene (Ice Age) contexts belong to either Equus mexicanus or Equus conversidens, both now extinct North American horse species. This rules out the possibility that these were actually Spanish horse bones that somehow contaminated the lower strata of the site.

Fig. 3 in Miller et al. 2022, showing the stratigraphy and location of horse bones and radiocarbon dated material at Rancho Carabanchel

The authors of the study concluded: “The remains of Equus that we recovered from RC [Rancho Carabanchel] from multiple stratigraphic layers all with associated radiocarbon dates, all in a fair stratigraphic continuum (Fig. 3), and showing no mixing between geological units imply that horses may have persisted in this region of México well after the classical late Pleistocene extinction time.”8

"This rules out the possibility that these were actually Spanish horse bones that somehow contaminated the lower strata of the site."

"'{N}o mixing between geological units imply that horses may have persisted in this region of México well after the classical late Pleistocene extinction time.'"

Wow.

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Although this is incongruous with the commonly assumed date for the extinction of the horse in America, it is consistent with the traditions of several Indigenous groups which insist that their people had horses before the Spanish arrived.9 

Footnote 9 references " Yvette Running Horse Collin, 'The Relationship Between the Indigenous Peoples of the Americas and the Horse: Deconstructing a Eurocentric Myth' (PhD diss., University of Alaska—Fairbanks, 2017), 73–101."  We previously discussed Ms. Running Horse Collin's assessment back in 2020. 

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It is also part of a growing body of evidence that suggests that at least some pockets of horses survived for several millennia after the end of the last Ice Age.10 

Footnote 10 cites to a number of useful resources: 

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Much of this evidence is summarized in Wade E. Miller, Science and the Book of Mormon: Cureloms, Cumoms, Horses & More (Laguna Niguel, California: KCT & Associates, 2010), 76–83; Daniel Johnson, “‘Hard’ Evidence of Ancient American Horses,” BYU Studies Quarterly 54 (2015): 149–179; Wade E. Miller and Matthew Roper, “Animals in the Book of Mormon: Challenges and Perspectives,” BYU Studies Quarterly 56, no. 4 (2017): 159–165. Although older and not entirely up-to-date, John L. Sorenson, “Animals in the Book of Mormon: An Annotated Bibliography,” FARMS Report (1992), is also still useful.

As noted above, "Wade E. Miller" referenced here is one of the authors of the just-published paper.

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In Mesoamerica, scholars have long been perplexed by horse bones found in conjunction with ceramics in northern Yucatan.13 Charcoal found in association with some of these horse specimens was radiocarbon dated to ca. 1840 BC, and additional horse remains were found in later pre-Columbian strata.14 In the past, scholars have raised questions about the stratigraphy of the site, but recently one pair of archaeologists concluded that the possibility that the horse “survived into the Late Archaic or even Early Preclassic” should be taken more seriously: “Since the horse also survived into post-Pleistocene times in the Old World, the possibility of its survival into Archaic times in the American tropics may also need to be considered.”15 The most recent findings reported from Mexico further reinforce that possibility.

"Further reinforce that possibility."

As interesting as this paper is, we still need to proceed cautiously.

Quote

The Why

Establishing the survival of horse populations in the Americas well beyond the last Ice Age has major implications that would reverberate across several disciplines engaged in the study of pre-Columbian American history, “creating a paradigm shift,” as the authors of this latest study have acknowledged.16 

I will be very curious as to whether this "paradigm shift" will happen, and if so how quickly.

Quote

Whether this latest evidence will bring about such a shift is yet to be seen, but the scientists who published it have urged others to treat the possibility “as a developing hypothesis, which is testable rather than just avoided.”17

"{T}estable rather than just avoided."  It seems that this happens more often than it should.

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Although the issue is not yet definitively settled, the potential implications of these latest findings on how we read and interpret references to horses and other animals in the Book of Mormon are very much worth considering. In this light, it is particularly interesting to compare these latest findings to the dating of various Book of Mormon references to horses.

Two of the radiocarbon dates found near horse remains came from the mid-second millennium BC, thereby supporting the reference to horses during Jaredite times in Ether 9:19.18 Another dates to the sixth or fifth century BC, which is chronologically close to Lehi’s arrival in the promised land, when Nephi said he saw horses there (1 Nephi 18:25), and to Enos’ time when the Nephites had “many horses” (Enos 1:21). The final mention of horses in the Book of Mormon comes during the Gadianton siege in the first century AD (3 Nephi 3:22; 4:4; 6:1), and two radiocarbon dates support the presence of horses around this time as well. Thus, if these findings are valid, they support the existence of horses in all periods the Book of Mormon mentions them in.19

The location of the horse remains was a quarry in Rancho Carabanchel, San Luis Potosí, México.  Here is the location of that state:

From the article: "Rancho Carabanchel is located near the municipality of Cedral, San Luis Potosí, Mexico at 23.8131° N, 100.7023° W on the regional plateau Altiplano Potosino, which measures on average about 2000 m above sea level."  Cedral is near the northernmost portion of the state, and about 1,200 miles north of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec.

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Additionally, it may be significant that two different types of Equus species were found in strata dating to Book of Mormon times since the Book of Mormon also mentions the *** (donkey), which is likewise a member of the so-called horse family (Equidae). Since the E. coversidens is a small- to medium-sized horse, perhaps it is what the Jaredites and Nephites referred to as an ***,20 while the larger E. mexicanus was their horse. The findings at Rancho Carabanchel may therefore help account for not one, but two animals mentioned in the Book of Mormon.

Very interesting!

Quote

As scientists and scholars continue to explore and debate this issue, students of the Book of Mormon should remain open to various explanations for references to horses and other Old World animals mentioned in Jaredite and Nephite records.

Yep.  Plenty of resources for that:

• FAIR: Horses in the Book of Mormon
• FAIR: Horses in the Book of Mormon (separate article)
• Book of Mormon Central: New Evidence for Horses in America (January 2018)
• Book of Mormon Central: Why Are Horses Mentioned in the Book of Mormon?
• Book of Mormon Central: Animals in the Book of Mormon: An Annotated Bibliography
• Jeff Lindsay: Plants and Animals in the Book of Mormon: Some Solutions to Apparent Problems
• BYU Studies: "Hard" Evidence of Ancient American Horses
• BYU Studies: Animals in the Book of Mormon: Challenges and Perspectives
• BYU Studies: Archaeological Trends and Book of Mormon Origins

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These recent findings once again illustrate why it is important to remain patient and open-minded as archaeology continues to unfold the past rather than jump to hasty conclusions based on a mere lack of evidence. The potential discovery of pre-Columbian horses during Book of Mormon times is but a single data point in a much larger trend toward confirming things once thought to be anachronous in the Book of Mormon.21

“In scholarship as in science,” Hugh Nibley once observed, “every paradox and anomaly is really a broad hint that new knowledge is awaiting us if we will only go after it.”22 Those who have had the patience to approach the Book of Mormon’s reference to horses as just such a broad hint are now enjoying new knowledge that may be on the verge of rewriting the history of the Americas.

Good stuff.

Thanks,

-Smac

[OGHoosier]

I'll be cautious for now, but the finding is certainly interesting. I hope Dr. Miller's prior work and BYU connections are not used to dismiss the research out of hand, though thankfully I doubt that will occur among serious interlocutors. 

If the bones from the Preclassic-Maya era times are really from different species then Spanish horses then that would rule out post-Columbian contamination of the site, but it still could be argued that bones from an earlier period were brought to the site by the site's inhabitants. Since the bones themselves can't be carbon-dated, that remains possible...but it seems question-beggy to me.

[SeekingUnderstanding]

5 minutes ago, OGHoosier said:

I'll be cautious for now, but the finding is certainly interesting. I hope Dr. Miller's prior work and BYU connections are not used to dismiss the research out of hand, though thankfully I doubt that will occur among serious interlocutors. 

If the bones from the Preclassic-Maya era times are really from different species then Spanish horses then that would rule out post-Columbian contamination of the site, but it still could be argued that bones from an earlier period were brought to the site by the site's inhabitants. Since the bones themselves can't be carbon-dated, that remains possible...but it seems question-beggy to me.

Does this mean I have to throw out my Tapir pin?

[Nofear]

11 minutes ago, SeekingUnderstanding said:

Does this mean I have to throw out my Tapir pin?

'For example, some have suggested that the use of the term “horse” is an instance of what scholars call “loanshifting” or “referential extension,” where a familiar word is applied to a foreign item or concept ... While these remain important possibilities to consider, a recent study published in the Texas Journal of Science indicates that horses...'

It still exists as a possibility. It just may not be absolutely necessary. No need to rush to conclusions...

[pogi]

3 hours ago, smac97 said:

The dates in the "Years in BC/AD" columns will, I think, be most illuminating for us neophytes, as they correspond to the times referenced in the Book of Mormon:

• Ether 9:19 (date uncertain, but per John E. Clark's estimate, around 1200 B.C.) ("And they also had horses, and asses...").
• 1 Nephi 18:25 (about 591–589 B.C.) ("And it came to pass that we did find upon the land of promise, as we journeyed in the wilderness, that there were beasts in the forests of every kind, both the cow and the ox, and the *** and the horse...").
• Enos 1:21 (about 420 B.C.) ("And it came to pass that the people of Nephi did till the land, and raise all manner of grain, and of fruit, and flocks of herds, and flocks of all manner of cattle of every kind, and goats, and wild goats, and also many horses.").
• Alma 18:9-12 (about 90 B.C.) (references to Ammon tending the king's horses).
• Alma 20:6 (about 90 B.C.) ("Now when Lamoni had heard this he caused that his servants should make ready his horses and his chariots.").
• 3 Nephi 3:22 (about 16-18 A.D.) ("And it came to pass in the seventeenth year, in the latter end of the year, the proclamation of Lachoneus had gone forth throughout all the face of the land, and they had taken their horses, and their chariots...").
• 3 Nephi 4:4 (about 19–22 A.D.) ("Therefore, there was no chance for the robbers to plunder and to obtain food, save it were to come up in open battle against the Nephites; and the Nephites being in one body, and having so great a number, and having reserved for themselves provisions, and horses and cattle...").
• 3 Nephi 6:1 (about 26-30 A.D.) ("And now it came to pass that the people of the Nephites did all return to their own lands in the twenty and sixth year, every man, with his family, his flocks and his herds, his horses and his cattle...").

I wouldn't be celebrating yet with this discovery.  The Book of Mormon lists 2 kinds of horses - the horse and the *** (which is a member of the Equidae, or horse, family).  As far as I am aware horses are native to the Americas but the donkey is not.  It is native to Africa.  We also need to find evidence that the horse was domesticated, ridden, bridled, and pulled chariots.   It also lists cows and cattle, which are not native to the Americas.   One thing I never really noticed before is that they found "goats, and wild goats" mentioned in a couple different locations.  Does this insinuate that they found domestic goats when they arrived?  

Edited October 18, 2022 by pogi

[Durangout]

 

[Ryan Dahle]

8 minutes ago, pogi said:

I wouldn't be celebrating yet with this discovery.  The Book of Mormon lists 2 kinds of horses - the horse and the *** (which is a member of the Equidae, or horse, family).  As far as I am aware horses are native to the Americas but the donkey is not.  It is native to Africa.  We also need to find evidence that the horse was domesticated, ridden, bridled, and pulled chariots.   It also lists cows and cattle, which are not native to the Americas.   One thing I never really noticed before is that they found "goats, and wild goats" mentioned in a couple different locations.  Does this insinuate that they found domestic goats when they arrived?

That is a legitimate concern. The BMC article notes that these new findings might help resolve that as well:

Quote

Additionally, it may be significant that two different types of Equus species were found in strata dating to Book of Mormon times since the Book of Mormon also mentions the a** (donkey), which is likewise a member of the so-called horse family (Equidae). Since the E. coversidens is a small- to medium-sized horse, perhaps it is what the Jaredites and Nephites referred to as an a**,20 while the larger E. mexicanus was their horse. The findings at Rancho Carabanchel may therefore help account for not one, but two animals mentioned in the Book of Mormon.

[smac97]

7 minutes ago, pogi said:

I wouldn't be celebrating yet with this discovery. 

Nor would I.  Hence my statement: "As interesting as this paper is, we still need to proceed cautiously."

7 minutes ago, pogi said:

The Book of Mormon lists 2 kinds of horses - the horse and the *** (which is a member of the Equidae, or horse, family).  As far as I am aware horses are native to the Americas but the donkey is not.  It is native to Africa. 

This is actually addressed in the BOMC article:

Quote

Additionally, it may be significant that two different types of Equus species were found in strata dating to Book of Mormon times since the Book of Mormon also mentions the A*s (donkey), which is likewise a member of the so-called horse family (Equidae). Since the E. co{n}versidens is a small- to medium-sized horse, perhaps it is what the Jaredites and Nephites referred to as an A*s,20 while the larger E. mexicanus was their horse. The findings at Rancho Carabanchel may therefore help account for not one, but two animals mentioned in the Book of Mormon.

A skeleton of E. conversidens 

A few illustrations of what E. conversidens may have looked like:

If we take loan-shifting into account, E. Conversidens seems as good a candidate for "A*s" as compared to deer/tapirs (perhaps better).

7 minutes ago, pogi said:

We also need to find evidence that the horse was domesticated, ridden, bridled, and pulled chariots.   

Domesticated?  Yes, I think such evidence would be helpful.  Tapirs already seem to fit that bill.  From FAIR:

Quote

7. Tapir.

In my opinion, a more likely candidate for the Nephite loan-shift “horse” would have been the Central American tapir. Tapirs are one of only a few odd-toed ungulates–a family that includes the horse, zebra, donkey, onager, and the rhinoceros. These large grazing animals have common traits, including an odd number of toes on each hoof, a large middle toe, and a relatively simple stomach (as compared to other grazing animals like cows who regurgitate their cud for digestion).
...

While some species of tapir are rather small and look like pigs, the Mesoamerican variety–Baird’s Tapir–can grow to be nearly six and a half feet in length and can weigh more than six hundred pounds. A modern government report indicates that

The tapir is docile toward man and hence management of the animal is relatively easy. An indigenous person describes the tapir as follows: “The animal is very sociable. Taken as a pup, one can easily tame it; it knows how to behave near the house; it goes to eat in the mountain and then returns to sleep near the house.”²⁷

Tapirs were frequently eaten and, because of their strength, they may have been used as beasts of burden on a small scale. Charles Darwin wrote that tapirs were kept tame in the Americas, though they did not tend to breed in captivity. This fact might explain the relatively infrequent mention of “horses” in the Book of Mormon.²⁸

“Many zoologists and anthropologists,” explains one researcher, “have compared the tapir’s features to those of a horse or a donkey.”

“Whenever I saw a tapir,” notes zoologist Hans Krieg, “it reminded me of an animal similar to a horse or a donkey. The movements as well as the shape of the animal, especially the high neck with the small brush mane, even the expression on the face, are much more like a horse’s than a pig’s…. When watching a tapir on the alert . . . as he picks himself up when recognizing danger, taking off in a gallop, almost nothing remains of the similarity to a pig.”²⁹

Non-LDS archaeologist, Michael Coe, in his book Breaking the Maya Code, claims that in the Mayan Yucatec language the term “tzimin” would classify either a “horse” or a “tapir.”³⁰ Tzimin originally meant “tapir” but was expanded to include the “horse” when the Yucatec speaking natives discovered a need to label the horse. Once again we could ask how the Book of Mormon can be rejected for suggesting the Nephites had done the exact thing we find in the history of Yucatec-speaking Mayans.

"Ridden" or pulling "chariots"?  Not sure about that, as these seem to be assumptions rather than required by the text.  Per BOMC:

Quote

Horses are mentioned only on a few occasions in the Book of Mormon (the last mention is around the time of Christ):

• Horses are mentioned once, in Moroni’s retelling of the record of Ether, as one of the animals that were “useful unto man” among Jaredites during the reign of Emer (Ether 9:19)
• Nephi mentions wild horses among animals found on arrival in the Promised Land (1 Nephi 18:25)
• Enos says that in his time, the Nephites raised “many horses” (Enos 1:21), but how and why they were used is not mentioned
• King Lamoni had horses which Ammon and other servants prepared for a royal procession (Alma 18:9–10,12; 20:6)
• Horses were included among the livestock and provisions the Nephites took when they left Zarahemla and withdrew for seven years into a more secure site as a defensive tactic against the Gadianton Robbers (3 Nephi 3:22; 4:4; 6:1)1

In this small handful of references, no text ever says that horses were ridden or used in battle. They are sometimes mentioned with chariots, but are never actually described as pulling them. It is hard to determine exactly what kind of role they played in the daily life of Book of Mormon peoples except to say that they were “useful.” 

In 3 Nephi 4:4, horses are mentioned as being among the provisions “reserved for themselves … that they might subsist for the space of seven years.” The word "subsist" may imply that horses in that desperate time were used for food. Fortunately, the Nephites were successful in their defensive strategy and were eventually able to return to their own lands, "every man, with his family, his flocks and herds, his horses and his cattle, and all things whatsoever did belong unto them" (3 Nephi 6.1). These limited details seem to allow Brant Gardner’s observation, “The Book of Mormon ‘horse’ never fulfills the functions we expect of a horse.”2

Nevertheless, we may already have evidence of "riding" "horses" in Mesoamerica.  From FAIR:

Quote

6. A man riding a deer in Siberia.

As already noted, some of the Aztecs called the Spanish horse “deer.” Likewise, in the Quiche languages of highland Guatemala we have expressions like keh, which means both deer and horse, and the cognitive keheh, which means mount or ride.²⁴ Early Native Americans had no problem expanding their definition of “deer” to include horses, so why couldn’t the Nephites expand their definition of “horse” to include deer if the American genus of deer–in some ways–acted like horses? An early pre-Spanish incense burner discovered in Guatemala shows a man riding on the back of a deer, and a stone monument dating to 700 A.D. shows a woman riding a deer. Until recently many people in Siberia rode on the backs of deer. In such cases the deer served as “horses.”²⁵
...

8. Mayan riding a peccary.

While we know that, in at least a few instances, deer were ridden, we do not have the same information concerning tapirs, other than accounts of children riding tapirs. The problem, once again, is of recontextualization. The Book of Mormon never says that Nephite “horses” were ridden. Book of Mormon horses are never used to hasten a journey and they are never used in a combat narrative.

Plenty of room for plausibility here, I think.

7 minutes ago, pogi said:

It also lists cows and cattle, which are not native to the Americas. 

From BOMC:

Quote

The ancient Israelites had a different way of categorizing animals than we do today. Genesis 1:24 divides “living creatures” into three categories: cattle, creeping things, and beasts of the earth. Rather than being redundant, these are all specific kinds of animals. “Cattle” is used more broadly than we usually use it in modern English. It is the translation of the Hebrew behemah and refers to all domesticated animals, not simply cows, including goats and sheep as well as cows. “Creeping things” include all the small animals, such as rodents, lizards, or amphibians that crawl on the earth. According to Leviticus 11:29–30, these animals convey a specific kind of ritual impurity. “Beasts of the earth” or “beasts of the field” are the rest of the wild animals. 

From FAIR:

Quote

John L. Sorenson:

As with many other animals in the Book of Mormon, it is likely that these Book of Mormon terms are the product of reassigning familiar labels to unfamiliar items...The Miami Indians, for example, were unfamiliar with the buffalo and simply called them “wild cows.” Likewise the “explorer DeSoto called the buffalo simply vaca, cow. The Delaware Indians named the cow after the deer, and the Miami tribe labeled sheep, when they first saw them, ‘looks-like-a-cow’”^[1]

And:

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Wade E. Miller and Matthew Roper: ^[2]

Bones of domesticated cattle (Bos taurus – see Figure 2) have been reported from different caves in the Yucatan Peninsula of Mexico.^[3] In one instance these bones were found with those of an extinct horse, Equus conversidens. It is especially interesting that along with these cow and horse remains, human artifacts were found in association with them! The indication is that domesticated cattle and the horse coexisted with humans in pre-Columbian time. ^[4]

And:

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The current consensus is that ancient Americans did not keep herds of large animals for use as food. However, Pietro Martire d'Anghiera noted the following in 1912:

In all these regions they visited, the Spaniards noticed herds of deer similar to our herds of cattle. These deer bring forth and nourish their young in the houses of the natives. During the daytime they wander freely through the woods in search of their food, and in the evening they come back to their little ones, who have been cared for, allowing themselves to be shut up in the courtyards and even to be milked, when they have suckled their fawns. The only milk the natives know is that of the does, from which they make cheese.^[5]

 

7 minutes ago, pogi said:

One thing I never really noticed before is that they found "goats, and wild goats" mentioned in a couple different locations.  Does this insinuate that they found domestic goats when they arrived?  

From FARMS:

Quote

Some time afterthedeathofhisfatherJacob,EnoswrotethattheNephitesraised“flocksofherds,andflocksofallmannerofcattleofeverykind,andgoats,andwildgoats”(Enos1:21).While contemporary archaeology thus far has not yielded evidence of pre-Columbian goats, anthropologist John L. Sorenson has suggested that Book of Mormon peoples, like the Spanish writers of a later time, may have considered some species of pre-Columbian deer to be a kind of goat.

This is a short but very interesting read.

See also this excerpt from Michael Ash:

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When the conquistadors arrived in the New World both the natives and the Spaniards had problems classifying new animals. The lowland Maya called the European goat a “short-horned deer” and some of the Amerindians referred to the newly introduced horse simply as “deer.”

One Aztec messenger reported to Montezuma, “Their deer carry them on their backs wherever they wish to go. These deer, our lord, are as tall as the roof of a house.” The Aztecs did not suddenly forget was a deer was; they, instead, expanded the meaning of the word to include this new animal. Dr. Eco also comments on the Aztec’s expansion of the word deer to include the horse.

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Oriented therefore by a system of previous knowledge but trying to coordinate it with what they were seeing, they must have soon worked out a perceptual judgment. An animal appeared before us that seems like a deer but isn’t. Likewise they must not have thought that each Spaniard was riding an animal of different species, even though the horse brought by the men of Cortes had diverse coats. T hey must therefore have got a certain idea of that animal, which at first they called macatl, which is the word they used not only for deer but for all quadrupeds in general.

If early Native Americans had no problem expanding their definition of “deer” to include horses, why could not the Nephites expand their definition of “horse” to include deer if the American genus of deer in some ways acted like horses? It is not only possible, but virtually mandatory that the same phenomenon would be found in the Book of Mormon if it really derived from an ancient culture that intermingled with another foreign culture.

Thanks,

-Smac

[mfbukowski]

Horses and Historicity proving or disproving theological paradigms of the best path for mankind.

The best path for mankind supposedly depends on horse Family History.

Does anyone see the absurdidty here?

[jkwilliams]

The interesting thing to me is that, outside of the high Andes, ancient Americans had no domesticated beasts of burden, horses or otherwise. So the idea of horses, asses, and chariots is quite anachronistic. This is why some apologists have said that “horses” and “asses” refer to miniature stone or wooden figures of “battle animals” meant to bring good fortune in war. Similarly, “chariot” means a wheel-less sledge or litter. 

I suppose it depends on one’s perspective whether the apologetic argument has any merit. 

[jkwilliams]

12 hours ago, smac97 said:

Nor would I.  Hence my statement: "As interesting as this paper is, we still need to proceed cautiously."

This is actually addressed in the BOMC article:

A skeleton of E. conversidens 

A few illustrations of what E. conversidens may have looked like:

If we take loan-shifting into account, E. Conversidens seems as good a candidate for "A*s" as compared to deer/tapirs (perhaps better).

Domesticated?  Yes, I think such evidence would be helpful.  Tapirs already seem to fit that bill.  From FAIR:

"Ridden" or pulling "chariots"?  Not sure about that, as these seem to be assumptions rather than required by the text.  Per BOMC:

Nevertheless, we may already have evidence of "riding" "horses" in Mesoamerica.  From FAIR:

Plenty of room for plausibility here, I think.

From BOMC:

From FAIR:

And:

And:

 

From FARMS:

This is a short but very interesting read.

See also this excerpt from Michael Ash:

Thanks,

-Smac

I’m trying to figure out what the loan-shifts are supposed to be for cattle, goats, horses, flocks, etc. Presumably Mike Ash knows the Mesoamericans kept only turkeys and muscovy ducks in domesticated flocks. Yes, they practiced wild herd management of deer, but that in no way suggests domesticity. So, when we get the story of the king’s servants watering the flocks, it doesn’t work with deer, as they would already have been scattered and would not have been amenable to being led or driven by what amounted to shepherds. Nor does it make sense to have deer being used in any way analogous to a horse. And the idea of driving forth a flock of turkeys to be watered is kind of hilarious. 

The funny thing about Book of Mormon apologetics is that a lot of the “hits” are comparisons to old world scripture and geography; once the Nephites get to the promised land, it gets kind of spotty, at best. It’s almost as if the author of the Book of Mormon had a basic familiarity with Judeo-Christian scripture and Near Eastern geography but knew next to nothing about ancient America. What are the odds of that?

ETA: I’m sorry if I sound snarky, but these kinds of apologetics are kind of insulting. They assume that the reader doesn’t know anything about the material culture of Mesoamerica. If you’re going to argue loan-shifts, you need something to shift it to. There just isn’t anything there. Mike Ash et al. either doesn’t know this or is being too cute by half. It’s annoying. 

Edited October 19, 2022 by jkwilliams

[Benjamin McGuire]

16 hours ago, Nofear said:

'For example, some have suggested that the use of the term “horse” is an instance of what scholars call “loanshifting” or “referential extension,” where a familiar word is applied to a foreign item or concept ... While these remain important possibilities to consider, a recent study published in the Texas Journal of Science indicates that horses...'

I am not a fan of the term loanshifting when referring to this specific case. I prefer 'semantic extension'. The reason for this is that the context is purely literary. Even if the Nephites used the written term translated in the Book of Mormon as "horse" for something other than a "horse", the term continues to mean "horse" in other contexts in the Book of Mormon - particularly when it quotes Old Testament passages that use the term to mean "horse". I have always liked the example of this in the use of the term "unicorn" in Marco Polo's Travels. Here is a discussion from Umberto Eco on the topic:

Quote

 

Often, when faced with an unknown phenomenon, we react by approximation: we seek that scrap of content, already present in our encyclopedia, which for better or worse seems to account for the new fact. A classic example of this process is to be found in Marco Polo, who saw what we now realize were rhinoceroses on Java. Although he had never seen such animals before, by analogy with other known animals he was able to distinguish the body, the four feet, and the horn. Since his culture provided him with the notion of a unicorn - a quadruped with a horn on its forehead, to be precise - he designated these animals as unicorns. Then, as he was an honest and meticulous chronicler, he hastened to tell us that these unicorns were rather strange - not very good examples of the species, we might say - given that they were not white and slender but had "the hair of the buffalo" and feet "like the feet of an elephant." He went on to give even more detail ("Kant, Pierce, and the Platypus", in Kant and the Platypus: Essays on Language and Cognition, translated by Alistair McEwan, 1999, pp. 57ff.):

Quote

 

It has one horn in the middle of the forehead very thick and large and black. And I tell you that it does no harm to men and beasts with its horn, but only with the tongue and knee, for on its tongue i has very long spines and sharp ...

It has the top of the head made like a wild boar ... It is a very ugly beast to see and unclean. And they are not so as we here say and describe, who say that it lets itself be caught in the lap by a virgin girl: but I tell you that it is quite the contrary of that which we believe that it was. (Polo, The Description of the World, ed. and trans. A. Moule and P. Pelliot, London: Routledge, 1938)

 

 

The problem that you have, is that you cannot translate Marco Polo's text into English and replace the term "unicorn" with the term rhinoceros - it would destroy a lot of the meaning in the text. We couldn't, for example, say as Polo did that the "rhinoceros was strange because it was not white and slender". This are perfectly acceptable notions when applied to the rhinoceros. So, if the Gold Plates referred at times to something other than a horse in using the term "horse," it did so by extending the semantic meaning of the word horse, and not through a process of loan shifting - at least it does this to the extent that we encounter it in the English translation in the Book of Mormon.

I tend to have a lot of skepticism over attempts to equate specific species references in the Book of Mormon to animal species in various geographic models for the text. I think that they text references are generally far more categorical. The passage in 1 Nephi 18 seems far more about "the use of man" and the relationship this has with Mosaic law than it does about actual species discovered. The terms 'goat' and 'wild goat' in the Book of Mormon are far more likely related to Deuteronomy than they are to any actual species of animals discovered by the Nephites. Translation becomes a problem (and not just potentially the English translation but also the translation required to create the gold plates). And the text isn't helpful in providing descriptions based on what these animals did or how they were used. I don't know that the text allows for a convincing case of which of these mentions should be attributed to translation, which ones refer to the Old Testament texts, and which ones are some kind of 'loan shift' or 'semantic extension' (at least I am not interested in trying to differentiate between them).

Because of all of this, I am not all that worried about arguments that attempt to make the term 'horse' mean something akin to our modern 'horse' by trying to push the dates of such animals into the Book of Mormon period. Nor am I concerned about arguments that the Book of Mormon references to 'horse' are anachronistic in some places. Both of these approaches are based on the assumption that "horse" in the Book of Mormon really only has one specific meaning.

[jkwilliams]

19 minutes ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

I am not a fan of the term loanshifting when referring to this specific case. I prefer 'semantic extension'. The reason for this is that the context is purely literary. Even if the Nephites used the written term translated in the Book of Mormon as "horse" for something other than a "horse", the term continues to mean "horse" in other contexts in the Book of Mormon - particularly when it quotes Old Testament passages that use the term to mean "horse". I have always liked the example of this in the use of the term "unicorn" in Marco Polo's Travels. Here is a discussion from Umberto Eco on the topic:

The problem that you have, is that you cannot translate Marco Polo's text into English and replace the term "unicorn" with the term rhinoceros - it would destroy a lot of the meaning in the text. We couldn't, for example, say as Polo did that the "rhinoceros was strange because it was not white and slender". This are perfectly acceptable notions when applied to the rhinoceros. So, if the Gold Plates referred at times to something other than a horse in using the term "horse," it did so by extending the semantic meaning of the word horse, and not through a process of loan shifting - at least it does this to the extent that we encounter it in the English translation in the Book of Mormon.

I tend to have a lot of skepticism over attempts to equate specific species references in the Book of Mormon to animal species in various geographic models for the text. I think that they text references are generally far more categorical. The passage in 1 Nephi 18 seems far more about "the use of man" and the relationship this has with Mosaic law than it does about actual species discovered. The terms 'goat' and 'wild goat' in the Book of Mormon are far more likely related to Deuteronomy than they are to any actual species of animals discovered by the Nephites. Translation becomes a problem (and not just potentially the English translation but also the translation required to create the gold plates). And the text isn't helpful in providing descriptions based on what these animals did or how they were used. I don't know that the text allows for a convincing case of which of these mentions should be attributed to translation, which ones refer to the Old Testament texts, and which ones are some kind of 'loan shift' or 'semantic extension' (at least I am not interested in trying to differentiate between them).

Because of all of this, I am not all that worried about arguments that attempt to make the term 'horse' mean something akin to our modern 'horse' by trying to push the dates of such animals into the Book of Mormon period. Nor am I concerned about arguments that the Book of Mormon references to 'horse' are anachronistic in some places. Both of these approaches are based on the assumption that "horse" in the Book of Mormon really only has one specific meaning.

I don't think the anachronism requires an assumption that "horse" means "horse.” As I noted, it's problematic that domesticated animals, either as food or beasts of burden or means of conveyance, are not present in Mesoamerica (except for a couple of species of fowl) but are asserted in the text. It certainly doesn't prove anything, but it suggests that attempts to place actual horses closer (relatively speaking) to Book of Mormon times are irrelevant.

Edited October 19, 2022 by jkwilliams

[nealr]

14 hours ago, jkwilliams said:

I’m trying to figure out what the loan-shifts are supposed to be for cattle, goats, horses, flocks, etc. Presumably Mike Ash knows the Mesoamericans kept only turkeys and muscovy ducks in domesticated flocks. Yes, they practiced wild herd management of deer, but that in no way suggests domesticity. So, when we get the story of the king’s servants watering the flocks, it doesn’t work with deer, as they would already have been scattered and would not have been amenable to being led or driven by what amounted to shepherds. Nor does it make sense to have deer being used in any way analogous to a horse. And the idea of driving forth a flock of turkeys to be watered is kind of hilarious. 

The funny thing about Book of Mormon apologetics is that a lot of the “hits” are comparisons to old world scripture and geography; once the Nephites get to the promised land, it gets kind of spotty, at best. It’s almost as if the author of the Book of Mormon had a basic familiarity with Judeo-Christian scripture and Near Eastern geography but knew next to nothing about ancient America. What are the odds of that?

ETA: I’m sorry if I sound snarky, but these kinds of apologetics are kind of insulting. They assume that the reader doesn’t know anything about the material culture of Mesoamerica. If you’re going to argue loan-shifts, you need something to shift it to. There just isn’t anything there. Mike Ash et al. either doesn’t know this or is being too cute by half. It’s annoying. 

Come on, John. I know you've been around a lot longer than I have, and so surely you know that books like John Sorenson's Ancient American Setting for the Book of Mormon, or articles like the one by Roper and Miller a few years ago in BYU Studies Quarterly (to name but two publications) discuss issues surrounding what animals were there in Mesoamerica, how ancient Mesoamericans used and exploited them, domesticity (and whether the Book of Mormon text even requires that), and what (based on all of that) could potentially function as the loanshifts for various animals. I am not saying all issues and questions on this are resolved, and if you don't find any of that persuasive, fine (and predictable), but its you pretending that sorta of thing doesn't exist (or being totally ignorant of it, after swimming in these waters for many, many years) that strikes me as "kind of insulting" and "too cute by half," and "annoying." 

[jkwilliams]

14 minutes ago, nealr said:

Come on, John. I know you've been around a lot longer than I have, and so surely you know that books like John Sorenson's Ancient American Setting for the Book of Mormon, or articles like the one by Roper and Miller a few years ago in BYU Studies Quarterly (to name but two publications) discuss issues surrounding what animals were there in Mesoamerica, how ancient Mesoamericans used and exploited them, domesticity (and whether the Book of Mormon text even requires that), and what (based on all of that) could potentially function as the loanshifts for various animals. I am not saying all issues and questions on this are resolved, and if you don't find any of that persuasive, fine (and predictable), but its you pretending that sorta of thing doesn't exist (or being totally ignorant of it, after swimming in these waters for many, many years) that strikes me as "kind of insulting" and "too cute by half," and "annoying." 

Yeah, I'm familiar with those references. It's been years since I cracked open Sorenson's book, but Miller and Roper don't actually argue for domesticated animals, just potential candidates for domestication. And sure, there are a lot of potentials (bison, peccaries, etc.) What I'm not seeing is any evidence that animals were domesticated. Miller and Roper argue that we can't know because bones decay rapidly in the damp, acidic soil of Mayan/Olmec lands. That might work if there were any material cultural artifacts that pointed to domesticated animals (again, other than domesticated fowls for food). For example, Mesoamerican cities and highways are designed for human pedestrian traffic, suggesting that no one was using tapir or deer as means of conveyance or as pack animals. 

Does the Book of Mormon "require" domestication of animals? The whole story of King Lamoni's flocks certainly does. How exactly does one drive "flocks" of animals to be watered if they are not domesticated? And Ether 10 tells us that the Jaredites “did make all manner of tools with which they did work their beasts.” According to Miller and Roper, "This suggests that the Jaredites were able to work some of their animals with plows or other such contrivances to grow crops." And of course, the association of horses and chariots links domesticated animals with transportation. Again, I don't see Miller and Roper arguing that animals were domesticated, just that there are potential candidates and that bone and tooth fragments have decayed such that there is no evidence of domesticated animals. 

If I've missed something, I'm happy to be corrected. Either way, your accusation that I'm deliberately ignoring legitimate evidence is certainly not warranted and is not appreciated. 

[bluebell]

15 hours ago, jkwilliams said:

I’m trying to figure out what the loan-shifts are supposed to be for cattle, goats, horses, flocks, etc. Presumably Mike Ash knows the Mesoamericans kept only turkeys and muscovy ducks in domesticated flocks. Yes, they practiced wild herd management of deer, but that in no way suggests domesticity. So, when we get the story of the king’s servants watering the flocks, it doesn’t work with deer, as they would already have been scattered and would not have been amenable to being led or driven by what amounted to shepherds. Nor does it make sense to have deer being used in any way analogous to a horse. And the idea of driving forth a flock of turkeys to be watered is kind of hilarious. 

The funny thing about Book of Mormon apologetics is that a lot of the “hits” are comparisons to old world scripture and geography; once the Nephites get to the promised land, it gets kind of spotty, at best. It’s almost as if the author of the Book of Mormon had a basic familiarity with Judeo-Christian scripture and Near Eastern geography but knew next to nothing about ancient America. What are the odds of that?

ETA: I’m sorry if I sound snarky, but these kinds of apologetics are kind of insulting. They assume that the reader doesn’t know anything about the material culture of Mesoamerica. If you’re going to argue loan-shifts, you need something to shift it to. There just isn’t anything there. Mike Ash et al. either doesn’t know this or is being too cute by half. It’s annoying. 

Just wanted to add that people herd flocks of turkeys all the time.  Just google it if you are interested.  Lots of youtube videos on different techniques etc.  Turkeys have to be shown where their water is and even have to have their beaks put into the water sometimes for them to figure it out (if the people on these websites know what they are talking about.  I've never herded turkeys myself).

[Bernard Gui]

7 minutes ago, bluebell said:

Just wanted to add that people herd flocks of turkeys all the time.  Just google it if you are interested.  Lots of youtube videos on different techniques etc.  Turkeys have to be shown where their water is and even have to have their beaks put into the water sometimes for them to figure it out (if the people on these websites know what they are talking about.  I've never herded turkeys myself).

I taught in public schools for 42 years. Does that count?

Edited October 19, 2022 by Bernard Gui

[jkwilliams]

53 minutes ago, Bernard Gui said:

I taught in public schools for 42 years. Does that count?

I’d add on the years you’ve been here. Plenty of us turkeys around. 

[jkwilliams]

1 hour ago, bluebell said:

Just wanted to add that people herd flocks of turkeys all the time.  Just google it if you are interested.  Lots of youtube videos on different techniques etc.  Turkeys have to be shown where their water is and even have to have their beaks put into the water sometimes for them to figure it out (if the people on these websites know what they are talking about.  I've never herded turkeys myself).

I stand corrected. 

[mfbukowski]

8 hours ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

I am not a fan of the term loanshifting when referring to this specific case. I prefer 'semantic extension'. The reason for this is that the context is purely literary. Even if the Nephites used the written term translated in the Book of Mormon as "horse" for something other than a "horse", the term continues to mean "horse" in other contexts in the Book of Mormon - particularly when it quotes Old Testament passages that use the term to mean "horse". I have always liked the example of this in the use of the term "unicorn" in Marco Polo's Travels. Here is a discussion from Umberto Eco on the topic:

The problem that you have, is that you cannot translate Marco Polo's text into English and replace the term "unicorn" with the term rhinoceros - it would destroy a lot of the meaning in the text. We couldn't, for example, say as Polo did that the "rhinoceros was strange because it was not white and slender". This are perfectly acceptable notions when applied to the rhinoceros. So, if the Gold Plates referred at times to something other than a horse in using the term "horse," it did so by extending the semantic meaning of the word horse, and not through a process of loan shifting - at least it does this to the extent that we encounter it in the English translation in the Book of Mormon.

I tend to have a lot of skepticism over attempts to equate specific species references in the Book of Mormon to animal species in various geographic models for the text. I think that they text references are generally far more categorical. The passage in 1 Nephi 18 seems far more about "the use of man" and the relationship this has with Mosaic law than it does about actual species discovered. The terms 'goat' and 'wild goat' in the Book of Mormon are far more likely related to Deuteronomy than they are to any actual species of animals discovered by the Nephites. Translation becomes a problem (and not just potentially the English translation but also the translation required to create the gold plates). And the text isn't helpful in providing descriptions based on what these animals did or how they were used. I don't know that the text allows for a convincing case of which of these mentions should be attributed to translation, which ones refer to the Old Testament texts, and which ones are some kind of 'loan shift' or 'semantic extension' (at least I am not interested in trying to differentiate between them).

Because of all of this, I am not all that worried about arguments that attempt to make the term 'horse' mean something akin to our modern 'horse' by trying to push the dates of such animals into the Book of Mormon period. Nor am I concerned about arguments that the Book of Mormon references to 'horse' are anachronistic in some places. Both of these approaches are based on the assumption that "horse" in the Book of Mormon really only has one specific meaning.

Great post, and I had not noticed the Davidson quote before- perfect!  :

Quote

... suppose, contrary to legend, that Oedipus, for some dark oedipal reason, was hurrying along the road intent on killing his father, and, finding a surly old man blocking his way, killed him so he could (as he thought) get on with the main job. Then not only did Oedipus want to kill his father, and actually kill him, but his desire caused him to kill his father. Yet we could not say that in killing the old man he intentionally killed his father, nor that his reason in killing the old man was to kill his father. (Davidson)

 

[Bernard Gui]

20 hours ago, jkwilliams said:

I’d add on the years you’ve been here. Plenty of us turkeys around. 

I claim my Fifth Amendment right.

[pogi]

Speaking of Mormons and wild/crazy horses - 

If nothing else, you have to check out the dance moves at...well, throughout the entire song, but especially at about 2:13.   Respect! 

 

Edited October 20, 2022 by pogi

[jkwilliams]

23 minutes ago, pogi said:

Speaking of Mormons and wild/crazy horses - 

If nothing else, you have to check out the dance moves at...well, throughout the entire song, but especially at about 2:13.   Respect! 

 

Yep, when this kind of stuff shows up, it's definitely time for a break. 

[pogi]

1 hour ago, jkwilliams said:

Yep, when this kind of stuff shows up, it's definitely time for a break. 

To each his own.  That video made my day.