Crown Publishers, Inc., New York. Archaic and Woodland cultural materials were also recovered from the pre-mound deposits and were also present in the adjacent occupation areas. Pre-Mississippian artifacts dating to the Archaic and Woodland periods were also found. Antiquity 58(223):137-138. 7), as shown below, but inverted to Gordon's proposed Hebrew orientation. the word that follows. ancient times, were clearly engraved in Coelbren letters, In Macoy's illustration, this is clearly meant to be a qoph, [5], Today, the probable source used by the forger to create the inscription has been identified, yet the question of who made the tablet and why remains unanswered. W-like shin of the Biblical QDSh (Qedosh) is entirely There has been a systematic denigrating on the part of the 'intellectuals' in the Smithsonian Museum of evidence of pre-Columbian migration from the Old World to the western hemisphere. ), Handbook of American Indians North of Mexico, p. 610. Murray was the first to completly make sense (properly translate) of all inscriptions on this stone (with simplicity in its simple form). "The engraved stone lay partially under the back part of the skull" (Thomas 1894:393). a little like the second letter (Q) on Bat Creek, but in [8] The Adena and Hopewell peoples constructed significant earthworks and mounds, a "widespread practice throughout the American southeast, Midwest, and northern plains". Silverberg, Robert any competent student of antiquities. "The Bat Creek Stone: Judeans in Tennessee?". This belief was influential and "adopted by many Americans in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries". The BatCreek Stone McCulloch, J. Huston, "John Emmert, Demon Rum, and The McCulloch (1988) identifies sign ii as "waw" based partially on a fourth century B.C. 30. The That Thomas identified the metal as copper is hardly surprising, considering that substantial numbers of native copper artifacts had been recovered from mounds throughout the eastern United States. In 1988, the stone was the subject of a Tennessee Anthropologist article by J. Huston McCulloch, professor of Economics at Ohio State University, amateur paleographer, and practioner of cult archaeology. Per Timothy E. Baumann, Curator of Archaeology, McClung Museum. and continued in use until the end of the eighteenth century (Craddock 1978; Hamilton 1967:342; Shaw and Craddock 1984). the tell-tale string -YHW again, in the name of Yehucal's father, 12/29/05. illustration. This is especially exciting when considered in the context of the DNA evidence, Joseph Smiths statements, and all the other archaeological evidence for highly advanced civilizations in the heartland of America during the Book of Mormon epic.4, Your email address will not be published. [5] McCarter concluded, "It seems probable that we are dealing here not with a coincidental similarity but with a fraud". The shorter first words of the Bat Creek and Masonic Scratched through the patinated exterior on one surface are a minimum of 8, and possibly as many as 9 (excluding a small mark identified by some writers as a word divider), signs that resemble alphabetic characters (Figure 1). Publications of the Museum, Michigan State University, Anthropological Series 1(4):269-418. In McCulloch (1988) I note that Appleton and Co., New York. R. Stieglitz and Marshall McKusick, in the Any errors of interpretation or omission are the sole responsibility of the authors. Bat Creek Stone - Wikipedia Above the vault, an intrusive Historic burial containing 2 brass (probably silver plated) trade brooches, a metal button, and fragments of preserved buckskin were encountered. Emmert was employed as both a temporary and regular field assistant by the Smithsonian Institution for several years between 1883 and 1889, and personally directed a truly amazing number of excavations at sites in eastern Tennessee and adjacent areas. Although Gordon's Paleo-Hebrew reading of From the epigraphic standpoint, there is no clear cut reason to conclude that the Bat Creek Stone is a fraud or that it proves an Israelite origin for the . However, the most telling difference between the Bat "Canaanites in America: A New Scripture in Stone?". in which case it might be a numeral indicating Year 1 or dictionary chart of Jewish War it was exacavated. excavated and whose context been carbon-dated to [1] According to Emmert, the site consisted of one large mound (Mound1) on the east bank of the creek and two smaller mounds (Mound2 and Mound3) on the west bank. Refugees Escape to Tennessee?" Bat Creek empties into the southwest bank of the Little Tennessee 12 miles (19km) upstream from the mouth of the river. While McCulloch seems to imply that professional archaeologists would be horrified by such a prospect, the anomalous nature of some of Emmert's reported findings has long been recognized. 1930 The Mound Builders. Since the above was written, Wilson et al. We demonstrate here that the inscribed signs do not represent legitimate Paleo-Hebrew and present evidence suggesting that the stone was recognized as a forgery by Cyrus Thomas and other contemporary researchers. Why Should Latter-day Saints Beware Fraudulent Artifacts? In: Handbook of American Indians North of Mexico, edited by Frederick W. Hodge, pp. Peet, Stephen D. Macoy's illustrator, who was 5-18. Two of the most hotly contested issues in American archaeology during the nineteenth century were the existence of an American Paleolithic of comparable age to sites in Europe and hypothetical pre-Columbian contacts with the Old World (Willey and Sabloff 1974). Ignoring our own interpretations and relying solely on Gordon, the occurrence of 3 signs that are unquestionably not Paleo-Hebrew (to say nothing of the admitted difficulties with several others) is sufficient grounds to rule out the Bat Creek inscription as genuine Paleo-Hebrew. New York: Basic Books. In early 1889, Emmert resumed his excavations under Thomas' direction; by February 15 he had "found" the Bat Creek stone (Emmert to Thomas, 15 February 1889).