(More about the Piri-reis map)

 Old World narratives of the Americas.

The 'Atl'-as Mountains - The Andes in South America were called the 'Atl-Andes' by locals when they were first discovered. In America, the word 'Atl' comes from the Nahuatl tongue, and means 'Water', and we know that a city of Atlan, 'Near the Water', still existed on the Atlantic side of the Isthmus of Panama at the time of conquest. (2) The mountains that run through Morocco on the other side of the Atlantic ocean were also called the 'Atlas' mountains, a tradition can be traced back at least as far as the Greeks. (In Greek mythology Atlas supported the world on his shoulder).

• Plutarch makes mention of the 'Cronian' or 'Saturnian' continent beyond the Atlantic. (2)

• Diodorus says 'Over against Africa lies a very great island in the vast ocean, many days sail from Libya westward' (Book V, Chap ii). The Phonecians, he said, having built Gades, sailed along the Atlantic coast of Africa when a ship was 'On a sudden, driven by a furious storm far into the main ocean; and that after they had lain under this tempest for many days, they at length arrived at this island'. (2)

• There is a similar statement to that above in a work attributed to Aristotle (de Mirab. Auscult.), in which the discovery is ascribed to the Carthaginians. (2)

• Aelian, in his 'Varia Historia' (Book iii, Chap.xviii), tells us that Theopompus related the particulars of an interview between Midas, King of Phrygia, and Silenus, in which Silenus reported the existence of a great continent beyond the Atlantic 'larger than Asia, Europe, and Libya together'. He stated that a race of men, called Meropes were persuaded that their country was a continent. Out of curiosity, some of them crossed the ocean and visited the Hyperboreans. (2)

• It is now a historical fact that the Norse, sailing from Iceland, not only discovered America in the tenth century, but also established colonies on the coast of New England, and they preserved communication with these colonies for over two centuries. (2)

• The Abbe de Boubourg says in his introduction to the Popol-Vuh, 'It has been known to scholars nearly a century that the Chinese were aqcquainted with the American continent in the fifth century of our era. Their ships visited it. They called it Fu-Sang, and said it was situates at the disatance of 20,000 li from Ta-Han'. M.Leon de Rosny has ascertained that Fusang is the topic of 'a curious notice in the Wa-kan-san-tan-dzon-ye (which is the name of the great Japanese encyclopedia). In that work Fusang is said to be situated east of Japan, beyond the ocean, at the distance of about 20,000 li (7,000 miles or more) from Ta-nan-kouek. (2)

• Baldwin in 1869 cites a note from the Abbe Brasseur's translation of the 'Popol-Vuh' in which he said 'There is an abundance off legends and traditions concerning the passage of the Irish into America, and their habitual communication with that continent many centuries before the time of Columbus...An Irish saint, named Vigile, who lived in the eighth century, was accused to Pope Zachary of having taught heresies on the subject of the antipodes. At first he wrote to the pope in reply to the charges, but afterwards he went to Rome in person to justify himself, and there he proved to the pope that the Irish had been in communication with a trans-Atlantic world'. This fact seems to have been preserved in the records of the Vatican. (2)

• The Basques, being adventurous fishermen, and extensively engaged in the whale fishery, were accustomed to visit the northeast coast of America long before the time of Columbus, and probably "from time immemorial". (See Michael's "Le Pays Basques," and De Bourbourgs introduction). (2)

• The Welsh annals tell us that the prince Madog, about the year 1170 AD, 'sailed away westward, going south of Ireland', to find refuge from the civil war among his countrymen. We are told that he found the land he sought. Having made preparations for a settlement, he returned to Wales, secured a large company that 'filled ten ships', and then sailed away again, and 'never returned'. In 1660, the Rev. Morgan Jones, a Welsh clergymen, seeking to go by land from South Carolina to Roanoke, was captured by the Tuscarora Indians. He declared that his life was spared because he spoke Welsh, which some of the Indians understood; that he was able to converse with them in Welsh, though with some difficulty; and that he remained with them four months' (2).

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There have been several previous attempts to prove a 'fusion' of African and Pre-Columbian American races. The Evidence ranges from Linguistics, Plant Geography, Skeletons, Terracotta figures and even North African 'Tifinag' inscriptions on the Virgin Islands (3). However, nowhere is the evidence for this argument stronger than at La-Venta, where several large stone heads have been discovered that clearly display Negroid (and Asian), features.

The huge proportions of the heads suggests that they were important people, and their association with the Olmec culture at around (800-600 BC) places them long before the Maya, Inca or Columbus's arrival in America.

The first rumours of large stone-heads in Tres Zapotes came from as early as 1858, but it was in 1938 that Dr. Stirling uncovered the first head, which was made from a single piece of basalt rock resting on a prepared foundation of unworked slabs of stone. He said of it that it was:

 '...unique amongst aboriginal American sculptures, it is remarkable for its realistic treatment. The features are bold and it is amazingly negroid in character'. (3)

 

The head was found 10 miles from the source of the stone and a long slab of stone which was found at the same site yielded a precise date of Nov 4th. 291 BC. As digging increased in south America other larger heads and earlier heads were found at sites such as La Venta, which began to reveal a chapter of history in the pre-Columbian Gulf of Mexico that was almost lost to us. The La Venta heads showed several similarities to the Tres Zapotes heads, and it emerged that they dominated the ceremonial plaza, a feature which suggests that they were in some way 'revered'. Four heads were found at La Venta, all of them faced the Atlantic, and the largest at 9ft high had its domed top flattened so that it could function as an altar. A speaking tube was found going in at the ear and out at the mouth; a possible oracle or talking god. Radio carbon dates from the site were published in 1957 and they give an average reading of 814 BC +/- 134 yrs.  These figures were among the oldest at the La Venta site.

La Venta was not alone in its depiction of Negroid faces in stone. Apart from the four found there, two were excavated in Tres Zapotes and a further five at San Lorenzo in Vera Cruz, one of which, the largest known, is nine feet, four inches high, and is estimated to weigh around 40 tons. (3)

(More about La Venta and the African stone-heads)