Re: Amerindian navigators

["Larry J. Elmore" <ljelmore@montana.campus.mci.net>]

Domingo Martinez <agdndmc@showme.missouri.edu> wrote in article
<5r2khh$1erq$1@news.missouri.edu>...

<SNIP>

> 2. Do you know the difference between a "reed boat", as used in the
Titicaca 
> Lake, and a "caballito de totora" ("reed pony" would be a nice
translation), 
> as used in the Lambayeque coast?. "You see, Yuri," the caballito de
totora is 
> mounted like a horse: it is no raft, or boat, or anything like that,
being its 
> use closer to that of a Hawaiian surfing board before it reached LA
("There 
> you have it: contact between Hawaii and the Redondo Beach and the
Andes!").  I 
> really doubt that Heyerdahl mentions "reed boats" in Lambayeque today,
really.

If you've been following the newsgroup, I think the answer's pretty
apparent. And of course Heyerdahl doesn't mention reed boats in that area
today, except to mention the very small ones you just brought up. But if
you read Heyerdahl, you'd know that already.

However, what does the fact that only small one-man reed boats are used
today have to do with anything? Does that say _anything_ about hundreds of
years ago? That'd be like claiming that since only small boats are made in
the modern world out of wood (while all large vessels are steel), that that
is evidence that large wooden vessels were never used. Of course, that's
nonsense. And please, before the too-literal-minded jump down my throat,
that is an example of analogy and sarcasm, not a statement of literal
truth. If it wasn't for the fact that similar such examples have been so
grossly misunderstood before, I wouldn't think such a warning necessary
(nor would it be on some other newsgroups).

> 3. Did the "amazing maritime Chincha civilization" (cf. one of Yuri's
dozens 
> of recent scholarly posts) use reed or balsa-wood rafts?  If they used
balsa 
> wood, wher did they get it? "You see, Yuri,"  there are no too many balsa

> trees in the Peruvian Coast, especially around Chincha, which sits in a 
> riverine oasis in one of the driest deserts of the world, and which also
is 
> the coastal region which is among the farthest away from any jungle. (The

> Chincha, by the way, were co-opted by the Inca to carry our trade in both
land 
> --cotton, camelid fiber, and so on-- and along the Coast, to get the very

> valuable Spondylus shells from what today is Ecuador. Maria Rostworowski 
> mentions, if my memory does not fail, around 6,000 traders.  They were 
> important, of course, so much so that during the Cajamarca tragedy, the 
> Spaniards could not very well tell who was more important: the Inca, or
the 
> Apu of Chincha.  Later, Atawallpa, a friend of tall tales, would tell the

> Spaniards that the Chincha had a float of 100,000 rafts!)

This is really obtuse, to say the least. I guess the Spaniards just
_imagined_ meeting balsa rafts at sea, making their way upwind sometimes.
And Pizarro just _imagined_ frequently using the damned things. Jeez, just
because you're ignorant of the facts, don't spout off as all-knowledgeable.
You guys demand proof and references, then instead of looking up the
references, claim we didn't provide enough. What do you want us to do,
infringe copyright protections and reproduce entire books for your pleasure
on the newsgroup??? Even that would be useless, I suspect. You'd just sneer
down your noses that that wasn't good enough, and demand more. Why don't
you just go read the references and satisfy your curiosity yourself?
Groundless sniping is a whole lot easier and doubtless more fun to boot,
though, so I doubt I'll ever see anything else.
 
> 4. What are the best hypotheses to explain the paucity of archaeological 
> indications of trade between Mesoamerica and the Andes, let alone between

> Polynesia and the Andes? (Question that arises from the purported
"evidence" 
> of large trade networks by "amazing maritime civilizations" around the 
> Pacific.) Trade most likely happened, but there does not seem evidence of
it 
> being an established fact.

No, the Cuna Indians of Panama just made it all up, and by an amazing
coincidence, their fairytales just happened to fit hand-in-glove with
reality.
 
> 5.  In the chronicles, there is only, I believe, one account (among
thousand 
> of pages and hundreds of chroniclers) of one Inca, Túpac Yupanqui, I
believe, 
> that mentions an expedition to the Western seas.  Heyerdahl was basically

> inspired by that account to carry out the Kon-Tiki expedition.

Wrong.

> Nobody doubts that the basic technology to attempt explorations existed, 
but 
> that does not automatically translate in those explorations taking place.
 The 
> Chinese case, in which explorations were stopped abruptly due to internal

> political causes, should be sufficient to make one more careful before 
> throwing assertions like "it could be done, then it was done", which was
the 
> case of the Kon-Tiki and Rah expeditions.  Heyerdahl understood, later,
that 
> some archaeology was also in order, but his intensive excavations in
Easter 
> Island and Túcume have yielded --for his hypotheses of exchanges between
those 
> areas--, so far, only some friezes of birdmen in Túcume (subject to 
> interpretation: they are not hard evidence of anything!, besides the
pictures 
> do NOT look similar!)  and birdmen in the Orongo site in Easter I.  They
are 
> stylistically different, very different.

So maybe the inspiration for the Easter Island stuff didn't come directly
from Tucume. Maybe they changed over a couple of hundred years, like such
stuff does everywhere else in the world. No one doubts diffusion when it
occurs by land with similar evidence, only when by sea. Why? Because we
_know_ they couldn't sail worth a damn until Europeans showed them how?

> The other piece of "evidence" is a paddle, *one* small wooden paddle 8 cm

> long.

Are you talking about Easter Island (in which case there are eyewitness
accounts anyway), or Tucume, in which case there was more than just one
small wooden paddle.

> I got some of this info in the Kon Tiki web site.  On Túcume and Easter 
> Island, read (basically reed boats and birdmen with lots of preaching 
> included):
> 
> http://www.media.uio.no/kon-tiki/tucume/modus_vivendi.html
> 
> where author Johansen, curiously, complains about how closed and
overzealous 
> some archaeologists are (in this case, he refers to Polynesian
archaeologists, 
> but it sounds mighty familiar in some newsgroups).
> 
> I strongly recommend everybody to read that article, as it may be a good 
> summation (including the language and the choice of words) of what takes
place 
> in these newsgropus regarding pre-Columbian post-Pleistocene
pre-Columbian 
> contacts, namely:
> 
> 1. conspiracy of statu-quo archaeologists who don not allow new points of
view

That's not quite what they say and you know it. Why not be accurate, oh you
stickler for accuracy from all others...

> 2. statues that purportedly provide "evidence"