Who Discovered America? : The Untold History of the Peopling of the Americas (9780062236777)
Page 10
THE STONES AT LA VENTA
Even before focusing on cultural mores, DNA evidence, or physical appearance, it seems quite clear to me that there is one bit of evidence that would favor Chinese presence in the New World before Columbus. In 1995, Professor Mike Xu, a Chinese-born scholar at Texas Christian University, analyzed engraved writings on excavated stones found at La Venta and compared them with characters prevalent during the Shang era in China, about 1500 B.C.1 His study offers clear examples of Shang characters–inscribed on Olmec architecture and artifacts. Among the most persuasive evidence is a diagram known as “Offering No. 4” at an Olmec site at La Venta, close to the border of the Mexican states of Veracruz and Tabasco. “16 male stone figurines accompanied by six stones, known as ‘celts’ on which writing was found2 (all with noticeably slanted eyes).” The discovery, combined with Professor Xu’s knowledge of Shang characters, is for me a veritable Rosetta stone.
The stones are reported as serpentine jade and sandstone, and stand in a semicircle at the burial site. The correlation between Shang writing and the images on the La Venta stones appeared to be exact.
The translation reads: “Let us practice divination at the stone temple over the burial mound and make sacrificial offerings to hear from the spirit of the ancestors.”3
Research of this kind sometimes involves scholarly politics and even the power of persuasion. Professor Xu sought help from academic specialists on the Olmec and on their counterparts in China on the Shang period.
Han Ping Chen is perhaps the foremost authority on the Shang in China. He was commissioned as editor of a Shang language dictionary, the first such update in two thousand years. In 1996, he traveled to the United States to view the inscription on Offering No. 4, which was on display at the time at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C.
Chen reported that although some of the writing was impossible to decipher because of aging of the material, what he could read was in fact written in Shang Chinese. He compared the characters he saw with his own dictionaries to confirm the concordance between the writing and the Shang.
However, other Olmec scholars scoffed, saying that Chen’s search for Chinese characters on the Olmec celts is “insulting to the indigenous people of Mexico.” U.S. News & World Report stated, “There are only about a dozen experts worldwide in the Shang script, which is largely unrecognizable to readers of modern Chinese. Of the Americans, Profs William Boltz of the University of Washington and Robert Bagley of Princeton recently looked at a drawing of the celts but dismissed as ‘rubbish’ the notion that the characters could be Chinese.”
After looking at the celts, Robert Bagley was quoted by U.S. News & World Report as saying, “it no doubt gratifies their ethnic pride to discover the Mesoamerican civilization springs from China!”
So who is right—Chinese professors Xu and Han Ping Chen, or the American professors Boltz and Bagley?
In 1995, Professor Mike Xu analyzed engraved writings on excavated stones found at La Venta and compared them with characters prevalent during the Shang era in China, about 1500 B.C. His study offers clear examples of Shang characters that are inscribed on Olmec architecture and artifacts.
It seems to me one method of analysis is to compare Chinese art of the Shang dynasty with Olmec art. Over the years I have found countless similarities between Oriental and Mesoamerican art. In the first color section of this book, we have placed several pieces of Chinese art next to similar pieces of Olmec and Mayan art of the same era. Although they are not all included in these color photos, over the years I have found similarities exist in:
Head of the Lord of Las Limas and the goddess of Niuheliang, a Chinese site
Jade bear and jade jaguar
Pottery funerary objects—human bodies and animal heads
Terra-cotta soldiers
Jade death masks of King Pacal (Palenque) and Prince Liu Sheng
Jugglers and wrestlers
Sculptures of human heads with bulbous noses
Axe shapes used for money
Lions
Olmec pottery using Shang lettering
Orange ceramics
Pottery bowls
Stone necklaces
Tripod cooking vessels
Earrings
Felines
Pottery animals
Mirrors
These paired photographs are remarkable. It is frequently difficult to discern which is Olmec and which is Shang Chinese—they are so similar.
A civilization that received the same art, architecture, and writing customs from another civilization is likely to have received the same methods of medicine and curing illnesses.
In 1999, Hernán Garcia, Antonio Sierra, and Gilberto Balám published Wind in the Blood: Mayan Healing and Chinese Medicine. This book is a collective endeavor whose principal protagonists are the curanderos (native healers) of Campeche and the Yucatán with whom the authors worked for several years. Several of the curanderos—shamans, herbalists, masseuses, bone setters, and midwives—worked collectively on it. The authors acknowledge the generosity of these indigenous Indian people in Chiapas and Guatemala who helped them.
The book, which is heavily annotated and includes a lengthy bibliography, focuses on an array of identical or very close methods of medical treatments of the Maya compared with the Chinese. The chance of these being all coincidence is infinitesimal.
I have selected nine examples to give a flavor of their book, which I recommend highly.4
THE BODY
The Mayan view was that the human body is based on a duality of hot and cold, and that this duality exists in equilibrium. The balance between the extremes can be lost because of both internal and external factors. For the Maya, therefore, this is the basic and most frequent cause of illness.
The similarities are of course striking when compared with the Chinese concept of yin and yang. Chinese philosophy focuses on the Neijing Suwen—“heaven and earth.” The chi and the blood both reflect the interplay of yin and yang. Cold and hot are equally primary forces, water representing coldness and fire representing heat. Yin and yang are commingled and interdependent, reflecting all things in the universe, and cannot be separated. As with the Maya, health is based on a balance of forces. Disruption of yin and yang is akin to a year with spring without winter or winter without summer.
TUCH AND TIPTE AMONG THE MAYA AND THE DAN TIAN OF THE CHINESE
To the Maya, the tuch or navel is considered a highly erotic zone. The umbilical region radiates energy, beating with life, and is fundamental to the health of the body. Similarly, Chinese ancient texts refer to the area just below the navel as being “the gate of life”—the Dan Tian. The primordial chi is stored in the Dan Tian, and this is the fundamental material of life. Strong energy in the Dan Tian feeds health and well-being to the organs of the body.
THE RIGHT-HAND SIDE OF THE BODY
The dichotomy between the left and right sides of the body is essential; for the Maya, the right-hand side is associated with health and success, while the left carries the stigma of illness and failure. In China, the right side is yin and the left is yang.
OOL [MAYA] AND CHI [CHINESE]
Mayan and Chinese cultures both refer to the life force of breathing. The ool for the Maya is “wind of life,” inhalation. The ool passes through the lungs to the heart, its home. For the heart, the vital energy force of the ool is distributed through the bloodstream. For the Chinese the breath of life is chi; the inhaling breath is the body’s vital force.
POINTS AND MERIDIANS IN TRADITIONAL CHINESE MEDICINE AND POINTS AND WIND CHANNELS IN MAYAN MEDICINE
The Chinese view the blood and chi as traveling along the system of meridians, or pathways of life. These pathways connect a series of points both inside and outside the human body. Mayan medicine men—curanderos—manipulated the wind through bleeding and with the application of needles. Each point of entry coincides with a Chinese point—on the left leg, for example, Yinshi and Liangoiu; on
the left arm Binao and Zhouliao; on the head Yianding and Shenting.
Points in the head and face used by Mayan curanderos and masseuses.
Meridians and points in the head and face used in traditional Chinese medicine.
Points in the feet used in Mayan traditional medicine.
Points in the feet used in Chinese traditional medicine.
HERBOLOGY
Along with our description of the vast array of rain forest plants used in Mayan herbology, the authors of Wind in the Blood have identified two hundred and fifty species that are used medicinally to this day. Plants used by the Maya are classified into two groups—cold plants and hot plants. The Chinese book, the materia medica, is called Ben Cao. It contains medicinal plants and their uses and a whole lot more. By the year 1082, the Chinese pharmacopoeia included more than 1,558 medicinal products.
The primary Chinese classification divides the plants into those with yin and yang effects.
Plants of a cold or fresh nature have a yin character, while those of a warm or hot nature are considered yang.
MAYAN MASSAGE [TALLADAS] AND CHINESE MASSAGE [TUI NA]
Talladas (rubbings) are massages applied with the whole palm, the thumbs parallel to each other and horizontal, spreading the hands across the body with firm pressure—a method used to diagnose and treat muscle problems. When one is performing this massage, various lines are followed, such as the muscles on either side of the spine. Similarly, Chinese massage stimulates the circulation of blood in the capillaries, bringing blood to muscle tissue and joints; it relaxes tense muscles, which also releases emotional stagnation.
MAYAN ACUPUNCTURE: TOK AND JUP
As may be seen in the diagrams, Mayan acupuncture has forty-nine points, with each one the same as the Chinese counterpart—an identical but smaller map of points. Mayan curanderos use spines and thorns of various bushes, spines from the tails of manta rays (xtoon), and porcupine quills. Jup involves pricking the skin at the selected point, either puncturing the skin or using a less sharp spine (such as the spur of a wild pheasant), in which skin is not punctured but merely bruised.
Chinese acupuncture is much more sophisticated and formalized than the Mayan. It has been continually improved by Chinese doctors for centuries. Until the Tang dynasty there was no general agreement on the names and functions of the points. Then the famous doctor Zhenquan ordered a codification of the system, which had been handed down ad hoc from father to son. In 1026, in the Song dynasty, another revision was undertaken to establish the exact function and location of each of the points, which were then displayed on a life-sized bronze model.
Acupuncture is considered a science in China, one with complex and varied techniques. In effect, Mayan acupuncture stagnated with the Spanish conquest and never approached the advanced state of modern Chinese practice.
PLASTERS AND POULTICES
In Mayan medicine, poultices and plasters were commonly used in the form of burning charcoal to warm and stimulate the body. Poultices could be made out of animal, vegetable, or mineral products, such as from herbs, fat, or clay.
“Moxibustion” developed alongside acupuncture in China. Heat is applied to the skin by burning mugwort, called Zhen Jiu (needle and fire). In Mexico, estafiate, a dry leaf, takes the place of Zhen Jiu.
For Mayan medicine, especially acupuncture, to have followed Chinese so precisely, the Mayans, I believe, must have copied Chinese drawings. It is not possible to pass forty-nine separate points for acupuncture by word of mouth. This means the Maya must have copied Chinese drawings during or after the Song dynasty, when they were first codified in China. Given this and the close similarity of the Maya and Chinese of the Shang, Qin, and Han dynasties, as described earlier, repeated voyages must have been made after those of the Shang dynasty, when the first “Chinese style” pyramids were built. The issue of repeated voyages will be explored further in later chapters. Genetics and advances in DNA science tell part of the story. So do the colossal structures left behind—thousands upon thousands of pyramids of the New World with characteristics that link their designs firmly to China.
CHAPTER 9
Pyramids in Mexico and Central America
Pyramids with artwork buried in them tell us a great deal. Olmec pyramids have Shang inscriptions and are aligned to the same star, Kochab, that the Chinese use. Town planning is the same for Olmec, Maya, and Han dynasty pyramids, with the same areas set aside for ceremonial and public use. Monte Albán is a half-scale copy of Emperor Qin’s mausoleum, with similar satellite tombs and ceremonial tombs. The shapes and sizes are the same—Emperor Qin’s and Cholula. Chinese and Mayan pyramids are set in the same location in relation to mountains and rivers. Tombs at Teotihuacán and Chichen Itza were found to contain Mongolian skeletons. Chinese jade is found at Tikal and the shroud at Jucutacato shows Asian merchants arriving in multi-masted ships.
Pyramids were built by every great ancient civilization. The construction and purpose usually were quite similar. There were three main functions: burial of a chief; the establishment of a religious center with rooms for priests and their ceremonies; and finally, a capacity for predicting celestial events—essential in all societies in order to establish the times for sowing and harvesting crops. Each society had its own emphasis. The principal use for the Egyptians, of course, was a monument over a burial chamber, and study of the heavens was secondary. On some Mayan pyramids, on the other hand, very elaborate astronomical observations were made, and these had first priority.
There are more than ten thousand pyramids in Mexico, more than any other country. Mexico also has the world’s largest pyramid—the base of the Great Pyramid of Cholula is 1,300 feet on each side, almost twice the size of the Great Pyramid of Giza.
The oldest Mexican pyramid was built in the marshes around La Venta in about 1400 B.C.; the most recent is near Uxmal and was built around 1100 A.D., a spread of 2,500 years. We focus here on the description of one pyramid from each era: La Venta of 1400 B.C., the politically important site at Teotihuacán, north of Mexico City, built about 200 B.C., where the magnificent pyramids of the sun and moon awe visitors; Cholula, south of Mexico City, the world’s largest, also started c. 200 B.C. but added to later; Tikal, built between about 200 and 400 A.D.; Palenque, started two centuries after Tikal but completed in the same era; and, finally, Chichen Itza and the Puuc group on the Yucatán Peninsula. This chronological selection also covers the principal phases of the developments of civilizations in Central America—first Olmec (La Venta), then relatively independent Teotihuacán; Monte Albán, a transitional site between Olmec and early Maya; Tikal—partly transitional, partly Mayan; Palenque, classic Mayan; and Chichen Itza, which is classic Mayan and Toltec.
LA VENTA
In 1862 a colossal stone Olmec head was found in the Mexican state of Veracruz. Sixty years later, after further substantial discoveries, specialists began to recognize a unique style of art and architecture, which they called Olmec, meaning “inhabitants of the rubber region.”
This Olmec culture was the first to establish large urban centers and exclusive trade networks that covered a vast area from Central Mexico to what is now Honduras, as evidenced by ceramics, stonework, and beautifully carved jade. The Olmec were renowned for their majestic pyramids and for being the first people in the Americas to develop writing and a system of numbers based on dots and dashes. Their importance lies in their culture, which later peoples of Central America, notably the Zapotec and Maya, adopted and adapted.
At La Venta, then an island in the river, now part of a swampy area, the Olmec built their first capital in about 1400 B.C. The site was near the confluence of the Tonalá River and its tributary, the Chicozapote. Together the rivers and sea provided an abundance of fish and game, crustaceans, and wild birds. The Olmec were good engineers and developed an irrigation system in the surrounding countryside.
They planted the classic trio of maize, beans, and squash and developed a method of using lime to release th
e vitamins in corn, which they ate, as well as deer, crocodiles, turtles, and all manner of sea and freshwater fish.
Thousands of tons of stone were used to construct the buildings of the city of La Venta, overlaid on rammed-earth foundations. The main pyramid faced a ceremonial rectangular area, on each side of which were ceremonial buildings for the priests. The common people lived outside the main complex.
Some very fine art has been found at the site, which is described in greater detail later.
The Olmec were the founding civilization of the Americas.
MONTE ALBÁN
Monte Albán, located in Oaxaca, capital of the Mexican state by the same name, is about three hundred miles southwest of La Venta. This for me was a very enjoyable part of the trip to Mexico. We stayed at a hotel above colonial Oaxaca, and from there we could see the adjacent mountains on which Monte Albán was built. We dined on a balcony overlooking a splendid Victorian garden, richly planted in the style of the rain forest—a wonderful prelude to our expedition to Monte Albán itself.
The site is dominated by a great pyramid that overlooks a grand plaza, flanked by satellite pyramids containing burial tombs and the remains of palaces—the whole set against distant mountains. The air was like champagne. Monte Albán is a transitional site between Olmec and Maya, revealing both Olmec writing and figurines. Monte Albán was also a link between the north and south, where goods were traded from Teotihuacán in the north and from Honduras in the south.
Monte Albán boasts some very fine art—notably a wonderful pottery jaguar in the Olmec style, and paintings of a series of male figurines performing ritual dances. The figures of the dancers have round heads on short necks, slanting eyes, and broad foreheads. There were also Olmec inscriptions that are said to have the same characteristics of the Maya. The site is dated to 500 B.C. The view looking south over the complex to the southern pyramid is one of the greatest in the world.