Homo erectus in the Americas, some things I found on the Internet

I came across some short texts posted by Richard Thornton (his mini bio), in which he discusses a statue protraying an ape-like creature found in Mexico. Thornton suggests that it is the depiction of a captive Homo erectus.

In Homo Erectus in the coastal marshes of Tabasco State, Mexico? (October 25, 2024) he includes some pictures he took in the 1970s, including one that he describes as "...quite controversial after public exposure, since it does not portray a Homo Sapiens with typical Indigenous American features. However, mainstream archaeologists still refuse to admit the possibility that the millions of animals that crossed back and forth across the Bering Land Bridge over the past two million years were followed by primitive hominids."

A second post Homo Erectus in the Americas? (April 15, 2022) includes the following image:

Statue supposedly depicting an Homo erectus. Richard Thornton, 2022.

Thornton wrote: "It looked like a primitive hominid, such as Homo Erectus, not a New World Monkey. He is portrayed standing erect with his hands tied behind his neck. This is the typical way that Mesoamerican art portrays prisoners of war or people captured to be made into slaves. Monkeys were always portrayed with their arms and legs tied together, hanging from poles."

The final post is titled: Did Homo Erectus live in the Americas until fairly recently? (December 6, 2023) and includes this text "There are stories, both in the Lower Southeastern United States and in Southeast Asia of primitive humans with tails, who were capable of hurling rocks and sharpened sticks at Homo Sapiens humans. Those in what is now the United States disappeared soon after the arrival of Europeans. Apparently, they were extremely vulnerable to European diseases. During the Vietnam War, such creatures supposedly attacked both U.S. and Vietnamese soldiers, who ventured into an uninhabited mountain range in what was then South Vietnam."

Some comments

The spider and howler monkeys are common in the southern areas of Mexico. They represented good fortune, happiness, lust, pleasure in the Central American lore. They were sacred animals and were not used for sacrifices nor eaten (source). Below are some Mesoamerican depictions of monkeys (same source), they have a monkey appearance:

Thornton is right in his posts when he says the statue has been moved. It ended up in the Villahermosa museum and is known as "Monument 56", its name is "Monkey Looking at the Sky."

The sculpture although it is shaped as a column is believed to be a peg-like structure which was to be displayed horizontally. It shows a head and a torso of a simian (anthropomorphic) figure with its arms bent backwards, behind the neck. It has a round-shaped eye and a narrow bridged nose. The creature wears a hat or helmet, and the back of the hands have been lost. It has triangular ears. It is 1.36 m long (roughly 4.5 ft.) and 53 cm wide (21") and 48 cm thick (19"). It is made of a tough hornblende andesite.

"It is highly likely that this sculpture was originally embedded horizontally; that is, the section resembling the body is the tenon that secured it as part of a building's architectural structure." (Source, and also source of the following images):

Finally, the comments about Vietnam and sightings there during the war are new to me. I will look into it. The remark about them being vulnerable to European diseases makes sense. Illnesses like measles, human flu, and small pox would affect hominins but not monkeys.

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Patagonian Monsters - Cryptozoology, Myths & legends in Patagonia Copyright 2009-2026 by Austin Whittall © 

Fusang. The Chinese discovery of America c.450-490 AD

Fusang is an account written by a Chinese Buddhist monk named Hoei-schin which tells about a Chinese voyage which took place in the late fifth century AD, to a country called Fusang, located far to the east, 20,000 li (Chinese miles) from China, which some believe was America, and specifically, Mexico. The Fusang account also mentions a previous visit that took place earlier, in 458 AD, involving some Buddhist monks who took their religion with them to Fusang.

You can find the account digitalized online (Fusang : or, The discovery of America by Chinese Buddhist priests in the fifth century. Leland, Charles Godfrey and Neumann, Karl Friedrich, 1875.

The name Fusang is that of a Chinese plant, said to resemble one they found in the country they visited, which the notes and comments by Friedrich, translated from German to English by Leland, identify with the maguey.

The book is well balanced because it includes points of view that support the notion that Fusang was America, and others that say it is fiction. See this criticism as an example:

"'Hui-shen appears to have been a consummate humbug.' (Cf. 'The People of Central Asia,' by F. Hyacinth.) "I cannot, indeed, understand what ground we have for believing that Fusang is America..."

Earlier references about Fusang

There are older references on Fusang, as can be seen online here (1763), mentioning de Guignes, who is also mentioned here in 1761 (with a map showing Fusang), and earlier, in 1753.

There is also some disputed and controversial maps attributed to Marco Polo's travels to Asia that mention Fusang (See source) where it shows East Asia and Western North America, with "Focan = Fú Sāng (扶桑) [a mythical land to distant east of China and/or a mythical mulberry tree (桑) growing there]"

Fusang in the 18th-century cartography

A map published in 1776 by Zatta, A., Nuove scoperte de’Russi al Nord del Mare del Sud si nell’Asia, che nell America. Venice. Shows the Northern Pacific, on the coast at Cape Fortuna, you can see "Fou-Sang", this is NW USA, roughly 50° Lat. North and it reads "Colonia de Chinesi" (Chinese Colony). Next to it is the mythical strait of Anian, which was believed to be a link to the Northwest Passage (to the Atlantic Ocean), and also marked the boundary between Asia and America, like Bering Strait does nowadays. The location is roughly where Cape Flattery and Juan de Fuca Strait are located. It can also bee seen in another map from 1768 (online here) which reads "Four Sang according to yc. Chinese geogr." with Puerto Bravo and Cabo Fortunes along its coast, and the Juan de Fuca Strait on its southern side. It is probably Vancouver Island (map).

Juan de Fuca's voyage was published in Hakluytus Posthumus, vol. XIV, p. 415, in 1825, as told by Michael Lok, who in 1596 met de Fuca in Venice.

Zatta's map 1776, and detail showing Fou-Sang. Online, can be enlarged

Now, let's look at the text by Charles G. Leland, Karl F. Neumann, published in 1875.

The 1875 Text on Fusang

This is the literal translation of the original text:

"During the reign of the dynasty Tsi, in the first year of the year-naming, ' Everlasting Origin ' (a.d. 499), came a Buddhist priest from this kingdom, who bore the cloister-name of Hoei-schin, i.e., Universal Compassion, to the -present district of Hukuang, and those surrounding it, who narrated that Fusang is about twenty thousand Chinese miles in an easterly direction from Tahan, and east of the Middle Kingdom. Many Fusang trees grow there, whose leaves resemble the Dryanda cordifolia, the sprouts, on the contrary, resemble those of the bamboo-tree, and are eaten by the inhabitants of the land. The fruit is like a pear in form, but is red. From the bark they prepare a sort of linen which they use for clothing, and also a sort of ornamented stuff.
They have written characters in this land, and prepare paper from the bark of the Fusang. The people have no weapons, and make no wars ; but in the arrangements for the kingdom they have a northern and a southern prison. Trifling offenders were lodged in the southern prison, but those confined for greater offences in the northern ; so that those who were about to receive grace could be placed in the southern prison, and those who were not, in the northern. Those men and women who were imprisoned for life were allowed to marry. The boys resulting from these marriages were, at the age of eight years, sold as slaves ; the girls not until their ninth year. If a man of any note was found guilty of crimes, an assembly was held ; it must be in an excavated place." {Gruhe^ Grer. "a pit;" possibly within an embankment or circle of earth. — C. Gr. L.) " There they strewed ashes over him, and bade him farewell. If the offender was one of a lower class, he alone was punished ; but when of rank, the degradation was extended to his children and grandchildren. With those of the highest rank it attained to the seventh generation.
The name of the king is pronounced Ichi. The nobles of the first-class are termed Tuilu ; .of the second. Little Tuilu ; and of the third, Na-to-scha. "When the prince goes forth, he is accompanied by horns and trumpets. The colour of his clothes changes with the different years. In the two first of the ten-year cyclus they are blue ; in the two next, red ; in the two following, yellow ; in the two next, red ; and in the last two, black."

Oxen and Horses in Fusang (America?)

The text continues and mentions the locals have oxen, horses, and use the milk of deers. The notes mention that Humboldt had said there were two types of bovids in Mexico, and that some critics of the text had pointed out that there were no horses in America. The commentary argues the opposite: " "

" The horns of the oxen are so large that they hold ten bushels. They use them to contain all manner of things. Horses, oxen, and stags are harnessed to their waggons. Stags are used here as cattle are used in the Middle Kingdom, and from the milk of the hind they make butter. The red pears of the Fusang-tree keep good throughout the year. Moreover, they have apples and reeds. From the latter they prepare mats. No iron is found in this land ; but copper, gold, and silver are not prized, and do not serve as a medium of exchange in the market. "

The final part of the text is about marriage, and then it mentions a previous voyage of missionary Buddhist monks in 458 AD.

"Marriage is determined upon in the following manner : — The suitor builds himself a hut before the door of the house where the one longed for dwells, and waters and cleans the ground every morning and evening. When a year has passed by, if the maiden is not inclined to marry him, he departs ; should she be willing, it is completed; When the parents die, they fast seven days. For the death of the paternal or maternal grandfather they lament five days ; at the death of elder or younger sisters or brothers, uncles or aunts, three days. They then sit from morning to evening before an image of the ghost, absorbed in prayer, but wear no mourningclothes. When the king dies, the son who succeeds him does not busy himself for three years with State affairs.
In earlier times these people lived not according to the laws of Buddha. But it happened that in the second year-naming Great Light,' of Song (a.d. 458), five beggar-monks from the kingdom of Kipin went to this land, extended over it the religion of Buddha, and with it his holy writings and images. They instructed the people in the principles of monastic life, and so changed their manners."

The final part of the text mentions a tribe of Amazons! which is not translated in this work: "This land," he writes, "lies ahout a thousand Chinese miles in an easterly direction from Fusang, and is inhabited hy white people with very hairy bodies." The entire story is, however, intermixed with so. much fabulous matter, that it is not worth translating."

So if this has "fabulous" matter, why don't we consider other parts of the text as made up? It could all be false.

The domestic animals

On page 40, the book analyzes the deer, bovids, and horses:

"DOMESTIC ANIMALS.
The Aztecs had no beasts of draught or of burden. Horses were not found in the New World. The report of the Chinese missionary has, therefore, no connection with the later Mexican reigns. Two varieties of wild oxen with large horns ranged in herds on the plains of the Rio del Norte.³ These might have been tamed by the earlier inhabitants, and used as domestic animals. Stag's horns have been found in the ruins of Mexican buildings ; and Montezuma showed the Spaniards, as curiosities, immensely large horns of this description.

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³ Humboldt : Neuhispanien, ii. 138.
[My comment (A. Whittall). This quote is correct, Humboldt wrote: "The Mexicans had not yet attempted to domesticate the two species of wild oxen (Bos americanus and B. moschatus) that roam in herds on the plains along the River del Norte. These are the American bison and the muskox.]

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It is possible that the stags formerly ranged from New California, and other regions of North America, where they are still found in great numbers, to the interior of Mexico. To a native of China it must have seemed remarkable that the Mexicans should have prepared butter from hind's milk, since such a thing has seldom been done in China, either in ancient or modern times....
It is indeed possible that the Chinese have described an animal similar to the horse with the character Ma, or horse, for changes of this nature are of frequent occurrence.¹ In such a manner many names of animals in the Old World have been applied to others of an entirely different nature in the New. The eastern limits of the' Asiatic Continent are also the limits of the native land of the horse, and it appears that it was first taken in the third century of our era from Korea into Japan. But let the error in regard to the American horses have come from what source it will, the unprejudiced, circumspect inquirer will not be etermined on account of it to declare the entire story of Fusang-Mexico an idle tale. It appears to me that this description of the western coast of America is at least as authentic as the discovery of the eastern coast, as narrated in Icelandic sagas.

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¹It is usual for all ignorant or unscientific people to give to animals for which they have no name that of some other creature with which they are familiar. Thus the gipsies speak of a fox as a weshni jucTcal, or wood-dog ; of an elephant as a loro naJckescro gry, or great-nosed horse ; of a monkey as a ionibaros, and a lion as a horo iomlaros, or big monkey, from their connection in menageries. Professor Neumann was probably ignorant of the fact, to which I allude more fully in another place, that the fossil remains of many horses found in America are of so recent a period, according to Professor Leidy, that they were probably coeval with man. — C. G. L."

The oxen are taken up again on p. 153 with an interesting explanation that equates them with bison:

"We may, perhaps, even dispense with supposing that the oxen seen by Hoei-shin were bison, if we admit that domestic cattle may have existed in America, and been exterminated. Thus, in the "Relation de Choses de Yucatan de Diego de Landa," the author tells us that an Indian chief named Cocom showed him one day an ancient book containing the picture of a common European cow, and told him it had been prophesied that when such beasts should come into the country, the worship of the gods would cease — " Cessario el culto de los Dioses, y que se avia cumplido, porque los espanoles truxeron vacas grandes." It is true that this may have been a mere trick of the Indian to flatter the Spaniard.
D'Eichthal has vindicated Deguignes as regards the statement that hinds (biches) were domesticated in Fusang, and that cheese was made from their milk, by citing from the "Popol-Vuh" (Introduction, p. xl.)" Milk was known to the Mexicans, who were accustomed to milk bison-cows and tame hinds, and make cheese." The statement appears to have been taken from Castaneda."

My comment: Hind is a mature female deer. The word "biches" used by Deguinges is French for "hind".

Regarding the quote from Popol-Vuh, I disagree; there is no refrence in the Popol-Vuh about cheese-making by the ancient Mayas using deer milk. In fact, the quote mentioned above and cited as "Popol-Vuh, Introduction p. xl" is a circular reference, because going to D'Eichthal's work (see it here, p. 151) we see that the quote originated in the work of M. l’Abbé Brasseur de Bourbourg, in his introduction to the Popol-Vuh, but, where he quotes the Fusang book; the text on p. xl says [in Fusang] "They raise deer like oxen, and make a drink from milk."

The mention of father Diego de Landa (1524-1579) and his Relación de las Cosas de Yucatan (p.14) is correct, but excluded some relevant text. The original says: "Don Juan Cocom... le contó muchas antigúedades y le mostró un libro que fue de su abuelo, hijo de Cocom que mataron en Mayapán, y en él estaba pintado un venado; y que aquel su abuelo le había dicho que cuando en aquella tierra entrasen venados grandes, que así llamaban a las vacas, cesaría el culto de los Dioses; y que se había cumplido porque los españoles trajeron vacas grandes" which in English is: "Juan Cocom... told him many ancient stories and showed him a book that had belonged to his grandfather, the son of Cocom who was killed in Mayapán, and in it was painted a deer; and that his grandfather had told him that when large deer, which is what they called cows, entered that land, the worship of the gods would cease; and that it had come to pass because the Spaniards brought large cows."

So, were they cows or deer (venados)? or did the natives use the word "deer" and applied it to some local bovid, probably American bison?

I have posted several times in the past about American cows and horses (See two examples Native Pre-Hispanic Cattle in Patagonia?, and the survival of native horses in the Americas, so I am not surprised at them being mentioned in Mesoamerica.

It is very likely that Chinese ships crossed the North Pacific Ocean and took advantage of its natural resources (forestry, salmons, seals, Steller sea cows) and visited Alaska, and the west coast of Canada, the U.S., and Mexico.

My next posts will look into Eastern Asia (China and Japan) and their possible pre-Columbian contacts with America.

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Patagonian Monsters - Cryptozoology, Myths & legends in Patagonia Copyright 2009-2026 by Austin Whittall © 

Olmecs, not African, but Oriental? or were-jaguars?

Continuing with the Olmecs, I noticed, while researching for my post about the supposed African admixture into the Olmeca people in Pre-Hispanic America, that not all sculptures and statues depicted people with African features.

I was quite surprised to see that many Olmec artifacts depicted people with a very clear East Asian appearance. In this post we will explore their artwork with non-African features, and what some scholars have written about these oriental-looking depictions.

See my two previous posts on the Olmecs: Blacks in Pre-Columbian America and Africans reached America ca. 1310 C.E.?

Jaguar Men: the were-jaguar

Those who have studied the Olmec culture find that their artwork depicts people with feline features, and this has led to the concept of a jaguar-based symbolism used by the ruling class and the religious leaders and shamans. Of course, we cannot decipher their writing, and there are no Olmecs to tell us about their beliefs. These theories are just that, conjectures.

As an example of this notion, I will quote from the following essay: Slater, F., (2010). Were-jaguars and jaguar babies in Olmec religion, Essex Student Journal 3(2). doi: https://doi.org/10.5526/esj114.

"Digs at sites such as La Venta have yielded an abundance of finds, testament to the sophistication and artistic sensitivity of this ancient culture. Of these finds, one particular type has spurred the most debate and speculation. The delicately carved and gracefully composed anthropomorphic hybrid figures, known as Were-Jaguars and Jaguar-Babies respectively, have puzzled scholars for decades....
The Jaguar Motif appears in a variety of different guises. The essential elements of the Were-Jaguar or Jaguar-Baby are, the ‘V’ shaped cleft, clawed or paw like feet or hands and a feline head with, in some cases, a tail. With Jaguar-Babies the iconography is of a greater symbolic content and is based on facial features. These include; The ‘V’ shaped cleft, large almond shaped eyes, a snarling mouth with bifurcated fangs and full down-turned lips and a broad flat nose. Different levels of ‘jaguarness’ are visible in these images, with some being unmistakeably jaguar like. Others have a much more subtle pars pro toto style, which is typical of Olmec iconography...
Whilst we can never know for certain the significance of the jaguar to Olmec religious view we can be certain of their importance. Whilst it is always difficult to assert with any confidence about the mystical practices of cultures long dead, the frequency of this motif is an excellent starting point for investigation, leading no doubt to the wealth of literature dealing with the subject. In my opinion, the Jaguar was an important symbol of the power of the natural world, as the apex predator of the surrounding area it would be natural for the jaguar to be subsumed into the iconography of any burgeoning chiefdom, which might later become the “royal house” (if such a term can be used accurately). However, the jaguar would always first and foremost be the creature that most played on the popular imagination and, before any conflation with the trappings of state, would indubitably have become a major part of the religious complex. As for the possibility of human/jaguar copulation, it is extremely difficult to draw any meaningful conclusions as to the significance of the jaguar motif, especially when it comes to the possibility of sexual intercourse. Those Monuments where copulation can be inferred - transmit just that - an inference."

Were-Jaguar Olmec figurine, 900-300 BC. Source

Down Syndrome

An article by John M. Starbuck, (2011) (On the Antiquity of Trisomy 21: Moving Towards a Quantitative Diagnosis of Down Syndrome in Historic Material Culture. the Journal of Contemporary Anthropology Research, Vol. II-1) put forward the idea that these statues depict people with Down Syndrome who were worshiped because they resembled their idea of a person which blende human and jaguar features:

"Milton and Gonzalo (1974) argue that several Olmec figurines from Meso-America dated from 1500 B.C. – 300 A.D. may depict Down syndrome. Milton and Gonzalo report that these figurines have upslanted palpebral fissures, well-marked epicanthic folds, short noses, broad nasal bridges, brachycephalic head shapes, open mouth postures, and a lower lip that is drawn downward. Kunze and Nippert (1986) have also diagnosed an Olmec figurine with Down syndrome because of the presence of slanted palpebral fissures, ocular hypotelorism, short extremities, and obesity. In addition to asserting that these figurines depict Down syndrome, Milton and Gonzalo (1974) argue that the religious beliefs of the Olmec culture may have ascribed a high status to individuals with trisomy 21 because they were thought to be the offspring of a mating between humans and the jaguar, which was the most powerful Olmec totem."

Below is an image depicting a were-jaguar, it has clear feline features, with jaguar ears, and sharp teeth in a snarling mouth. It does not look oriental, it is a man-jaguar:

Down Syndrome? Olmec figurines. Starbuck J.

Olmec figurines depicting adults

The following artworks have a very strong oriental look to them. They are not babies, but men:

Olmec Jadeite face, 900-400 BC. The Met

Olmec contortionist, Middle pre-Classical period, 900-400 BCE. Acrobat made of steatite. Source

Some believe the "Wrestler" shown below, with his mustache and goatee is a fake, a forgery that was created to resemble Olmec art. Others say it is authentic. It is remarkable as it hints at motion, and has unique features that don't look like an Amerindian at all!

The Wrestler, basalt, Olmec statue. 1,400-400 BC. Source

Lord of Las Limas, Olmec, Veracruz, 1,200-400 BC. Serpentine with pyrite eyes.

Comments

The Olmecs are better known for their gigantic Afro-looking heads, like the one shown below. The delicate and finely crafted figures with oriental features when compared with these massive and coarsely hewen heads look as if they were the creation of different societies and civilizations. This is quite intriguing. One one hand, small detailed objects, on the other 40 ton, 3 meter tall (10 ft.) colossal heads. Were they produced at different times, during different cultural periods?

Notice how the gigantic head, despite its lips, and flat nose bridge has oriental eyes!

This goes to show that a culture can display many different styles of art, even if they use the same media (stone) and that the creative inspiration in humans is vast. We'd never infer that the Olmecs were were-jaguars just because they made these statues, so why do we wonder if they were Africans that sailed to America, if we see statues with African features?

I do believe that people depict their beliefs and also portray themselves. The oriental-looking figures are not gods, or were-jaguars, they are people, people with pronounced Asian-like epicanthic folds, the skin that covers the inner corner of the eye (canthus). Interestingly, they have high nose bridges, which is not so common among East Asians. So it isn't likely that they depicted visitors from China, Japan, or Korea that sailed across the Pacific Ocean 3500 years ago. They could easily represent a Native American, who share both features. And so do the Polynesians!).

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Patagonian Monsters - Cryptozoology, Myths & legends in Patagonia Copyright 2009-2025 by Austin Whittall © 

The mysterious lack of Olmec DNA papers

The Olmec culture flourished on the Gulf of Mexico coast (Campeche Bay) in the Tehuantepec, Veracruz, Chiapas, Tabasco region of Mexico between 1,500 BC and 100 BC. They are the earliest known major Mesoamerican civilisation, predating the Mayas and the Aztecs. (Short article on the Olmec people or this book with a section dedicated to their culture, both of them in English).

My previous posts (Blacks in Pre-Columbian America and Africans reached America ca. 1310 C.E.?) explored the weird and pseudoscientific theory that assumes as true that Black African people sailed across the Atlantic from Western Africa, reached Mesoamerica, and settled there, creating the Olmec civilization. For some examples of this theory, see: "Olmec and Mayas have distinct genetic origins", "The surprising connection between Olmecs and Africans", "African Origins of Olmec Civilization", etc.

I don't believe in conspiracy theories. Instead, I opt for believing in human ignorance, incompetence, and deliberate manipulation of information to forward certain causes and obscure legitimate ones. Nevertheless, as I sought information on the genetics (mtDNA, Y-chromosome and autosomal DNA) I quickly realized that there is little to be found. This seems to be a blank in the research of Amerindian genetics. Which, is quite surprising! (just google the terms "genetics Olmecs" and you will undertand what I mean).

The paltry papers on Olmec genetics

It is true, papers on Olmec genetics are really scarce! There are very few; I have only found the following, none of which analyzed nuclear DNA or Y-chromosome DNA, they only seem to have looked at the mtDNA, and it is unclear if the specimens analyzed were Olmec or not. Of course, none of these papers hint at an African origin, they state that the Olmecs are Amerindians, like all the other Native Americans. Below are these papers, with a brief comment on their main conclusions):

• Arnaiz-Villena A, et al., (2000). HLA genes in Mexican Mazatecans, the peopling of the Americas and the uniqueness of Amerindians. . Tissue Antigens. 2000 Nov;56(5):405-16. doi: 10.1034/j.1399-0039.2000.560503.x. PMID: 11144288.
  Old paper! "The HLA allele frequency distribution of the Mexican Mazatecan Indians (Olmec culture) has been studied and compared with those of other First American Natives and worldwide populations (a total of 12,100 chromosomes; 6,050 individuals from 59 different populations). The main conclusions are: 1) An indirect evidence of Olmec and Mayan relatedness is suggested, further supporting the notion that Olmecs may have been the precursors of Mayans..."
• Navarro-Romero MT, et al, (2021). Mitochondrial DNA Haplotypes in Pre-Hispanic Human Remains from Puyil Cave, Tabasco, Mexico, in María de Lourdes Muñoz-Moreno, and Michael H. Crawford (eds), Human Migration: Biocultural Perspectives (New York, 2021; online edn, Oxford Academic, 21 Oct. 2021), https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780190945961.003.0007.
  It tells that the archaic and pre-classic individuals had The mtDNA of haplogroups A, A2, C1, C1c, and D4, haplogroup B was absent. It does not specifically mention "Olmecs" only Maya and Zoque people. But the team's next paper mentions Olmecs, see it below.
• Navarro-Romero MT, et al, (2024). Bioanthropological analysis of human remains from the archaic and classic period discovered in Puyil cave, Mexico. Am J Biol Anthropol. 2024 Jun;184(2):e24903. doi: 10.1002/ajpa.24903. Epub 2024 Feb 2. PMID: 38308451.
  It investigated "ACD" and conducted mtDNA tests, finding: "artificial cranial deformation (ACD)... These pre-Hispanic remains exhibited five mtDNA lineages: A, A2, C1, C1c and D4. Network analysis revealed a close genetic affinity between pre-Hispanic Puyil Cave inhabitants and contemporary Maya subpopulations from Mexico and Guatemala, as well as individuals from Bolivia, Brazil, the Dominican Republic, and China. Conclusions: Our results elucidate the dispersal of pre-Hispanic Olmec and Maya ancestors and suggest that ACD practices are closely related to Olmec and Maya practices. Additionally, we conclude that ACD has likely been practiced in the region since the Middle-Archaic Period." More or less a re-hash of the 2021 paper, but, it does mention the Olmec culture.
• Enrique Villamar Becerril, (2018) Estudios de ADN y el origen de los olmecas, Arqueología Mexicana, núm. 150, pp. 40-41.
  "The pioneering mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) study conducted on Olmec individuals, one from San Lorenzo and the other from Loma del Zapote, resulted, in both cases, in the unequivocal presence of the distinctive mutations of the maternal lineage “A”. That is to say, the origin of the Olmecs is not in Africa but in the Americas, since they share the most abundant of the five mitochondrial haplogroups characteristic of the indigenous populations of our continent: A, B, C, D, and X." These individuals had haplogroup A.
• Cyphers, Ann, (2020) El ADNMT y la descendencia olmeca, Arqueología Mexicana, Edición especial, núm. 94, p. 23. Same conclusions. It is not based on new studies, only repetition of Villamar's paper (above), mtDNA is Amerindian and not African.

The Olmecs didn't vanish into thin air, their genes must be present in the current population of this region. According to Pye and Clarke (2005), the area where the Olmec and Mokaya lived, was peopled by the Proto-Mixe-Zoque people, who differed from their neighbors, the Maya and Zapotec. The Maya would have a large impact on them when their civilization bloomed and the Olmecs vanished.

The "Ghost" population

However, a study published in Science (Viridiana Villa-Islas et al., Demographic history and genetic structure in pre-Hispanic Central Mexico. Science 380, eadd6142 (2023). DOI:10.1126/science.add6142), though it does not mention the Olmecs and only goes back to the year 100 BC., does mention the Mixe people! and adds an intriguing fact, a "ghost population" admixed into the Mixe.

"Earlier studies report the contribution of “ghost” genetic ancestry from an unsampled group, designated as UpopA, among the present-day Mixe from Mexico. We tested the presence of this UpopA in the pre-Hispanic individuals using combinations of admixture graph models... we found that Sierra Tarahumara and Mixe share the same ghost genetic ancestry, UPopA ... Finally, we ... confirmed that ... Mixe share the contribution from UpopA1... A contribution from an unsampled population named UpopA was previously identified in present-day Mixe as well as in present-day northern and central Indigenous populations from Mexico. UpopA was estimated to have diverged ~24,700 years ago from Native Americans"

The "earlier studies" mentioned above by Villa-Islas et al. refer to a paper by J. I. Moreno-Mayar et al. (2018), Early human dispersals within the Americas (Science 362, eaav2621 (2018). DOI:10.1126/science.aav2621), which says "Modeling indicates that the Mixe most likely carry gene flow from an unsampled outgroup and form a clade with Lagoa Santa... Hereafter, we refer to that outgroup as unsampled population A (UPopA), which is neither AB, NNA, or SNA and which we infer split off from NAs ~24.7 ka ago, with an age range between 30 and 22 ka ago... Under a model with a pulselike gene flow, we inferred a probability of ~11% gene flow from UPopA into the Mixe ~8.7 ka ago (95% CI, 0.4 to 13.9 ka ago)... We infer that the Lagoa Santa population diverged from the Mixe shortly thereafter, ~13.9 ka ago (95% CI, 12.8 to 14.8 ka ago)"

A "Ghost" population is one that left genetic material (DNA, mtDNA, aDNA) in a current or ancient population, but has not been sampled or, it vanished, becoming extinct leaving no remains; a ghost.

Who were these people?

The fact that they appear among the Mixe (Olmec) and the peculiar Lagoa Santa people of Brazil, who carry rare haplogroups and also seem to be associated with Australasians, is surprising.

This is something that furhter genetic research could help clarify with deeper sampling, including ancient remains, if the ghost signal belongs to allelles found at very low frequencies, a larger sample will provide more data about them and help pinpoint the ghost population's origin.

Closing Comments

It is likely that the lack of publications on the Olmec DNA is due to a shortage of funds (Mexico may not provide funding for this kind of research), not enough academic interest in this culture, or, that the jungle habitat or the poorly preserved remains don't allow collection of adequate genetic material for DNA studies. I guess it is a combination of all factors. The Aztecs and the Mayas seem to be more popular as you can see in the following image which compares web searches for Olmecs (blue), Aztecs (yellow) and Mayas (red) between 2004 and now (Google Trends). Notice the Maya peak in 2012 (when many believed that the world was going to end according to a prophecy in the Maya calendar).

Link to this Google Trends result

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Patagonian Monsters - Cryptozoology, Myths & legends in Patagonia Copyright 2009-2025 by Austin Whittall © 

Chiquihuite Cave occupied 35,000 years ago? A very early date for human presence in America

This paper, published in Nature yesterday: Ardelean, C.F., Becerra-Valdivia, L., Pedersen, M.W. et al. Evidence of human occupation in Mexico around the Last Glacial Maximum. Nature (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-020-2509-0, found evidence that human beings lived in the Chiquihuite Cave for around 20,000 years, starting some 35 ky ago.

The cave is located in north central Mexico (see map) in a dry area, which at the time had forests that resembled those we now see in British Columbia or NW USA.

The authors unearthed stone tools in the cave but these are quite unusual: "The site yielded about 1,900 stone artefacts within a 3-m-deep stratified sequence, revealing a previously unknown lithic industry that underwent only minor changes over millennia.". That is, a technology that produced stone tools in the same manner over thousands of years and in a way that is different from other stone making tools!

People have been living here since before the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) which took place between 19 and 26,000 years ago. This is long before the purporte "Beringian" standstill, (theory which assumes that Asians on their way to America stood still in Beringia because the LGM didn't let them into America).

The stones! the authors state: "The flaked artefacts reflect a technological tradition that was previously unknown, and remains mostly unchanged over the sequence." and they are quite unique: "...However, the majority of these tools are unifacial with marginal retouch... Apart from incipient preforms, finished bifacial artefacts are scarce; their existence is inferred from the abundance of tertiary thinning flakes. Notches and stems are almost completely absent. The bases are rounded or convergent, and are rarely thinned... Overall, the assemblage represents a lithic industry with no evident similarities to any of the other cultural complexes of the Pleistocene or Early Holocene epochs known in the Americas".

The authors conclude: "The occupants of the cave were seemingly adapted to altitudes and mountain landscapes, showing a behavioural pattern that—to our knowledge—was previously unknown in the archaeological record of the Americas. Their lithic industry has no parallel in the continent and its qualitative traits suggest a mature technology, possibly brought in from elsewhere before the LGM."

Of course the unusual stone tools and the lack of bones, ashes or hearths which would indicate actual human presence has been used by some skeptics to doubt the validity of this find. I quote some of them from this article in National Geographic below:

• Loren Davis,Oregon State archaeologist: "The thing to remember is that humans don’t have a monopoly on the physics required to break rocks" (implying a natural origin for the unusual stone tools.
• Tom Dillehay -discoverer of the Monteverde Site in Chile- "It's very curious that the assemblage is so different from anything anyone has known before. How is it possible that it’s not related to anything previously found? Well, it’s possible."

These are some of the tools (from the article):

They look man-made to me. And the tools found inside the cave were from stones of a green or black color (90% of the total) wich is interpreted as an act of human choice. Furthermore these stones are found close to the cave but not in it. The cave's rocks are grey so there is no doubt that they didn't fall from the cave's walls or roof.

To my inexperienced and non-academic eyes they look rather coarse and similar to Mousterian tools made by Neanderthals.

There is much to learn yet! But if humans were using these caves 35 Ky ago, then they must have arrived even earlier. In a Spanish language article one of the paper's authors -Ardelean- tells us that they found the cave following the indications given to them by a local farmer. That it took him a lot of work and effort to secure funding to excavate the cave; that there are few discoveries like this due to lack of funding and that the scarce funding goes into the "pyramids" (Mayan and Aztec ones) because they can be exploited as tourist attractions.

Ardelean added that "humans came to the caves now and then, they didn't live there, instead it was a winter shelter, probably part of a migration route".

Let's look forward to more discoveries like this one.

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Patagonian Monsters - Cryptozoology, Myths & legends in Patagonia Copyright 2009-2020 by Austin Whittall © 

Dorenberg Skull, more information

My post on the Dorenberg Skull mentioned a skull discovered in Mexico in the late 1800s, and lost during allied WW II bombing raids over Leipzig that flattened the local Museum of Ethnology.

Below are two images with more information from the book The Forgotten Collector: Josef Anton Dorenberg (1846-1935) by Ron Van Meer:

The description of it as a "Tertiary" skull is indeed interesting, the skull was set in stone.

The skull, though destroyed during the war, was studied by several scholars which identified new species of diatoms from samples taken from the skull.

Diatoms are minute single-cell algae that live in water. Their cell walls are composed in part of a transparent silica glass (they are the only living creatures that use silica to build their bodies -sea shells are made of calcium carbonate).

Well, Reichelt identified a diatom species he named Navicula dorenbergi in 1901 which he dated to the Sangamonian (80-220 Ky BP) -source.

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Patagonian Monsters - Cryptozoology, Myths & legends in Patagonia Copyright 2009-2020 by Austin Whittall © <

More on the "erectus"(?) calvaria from Chapala Mexico

I recently posted about a very robust skullcap that was discovered in the region of Lake Chapala, Jalisco, Mexico by Mr. Federico A. Solórzano, today I will add some more information.

The skullcap (or a copy of it) -here we have two different versions! is on exhibition at the Museo de Paleontologia de Guadalajara (Guadalajara Museum of Paleontology), this city is the capital of Jalisco state and is located 28 miles (45 km) north of Lake Chapala.

Guadalajara's official tourism website tells us all about the museum and also mentions the calvaria:

"...Este arco superciliar humano tiene características muy antiguas y no se parece al de un hombre moderno (Homo sapiens y Homo robustus), sino que se asemeja al de un Neanderthal. De comprobarse esta hipótesis, se tendría que modificar la datación del poblamiento de América, ya que el hombre que cruzó por el estrecho de Bering era tipo Cromagnon."

In English: "... this human superciliary arch has very ancient features and does not resemble that of a modern man (Homo sapiens and Homo robustus), instead it is similar to that of a Neanderthal. If this hypothesis is proved true, the date of the peopling of America would have to be modified, because the humans that crossed Bering Strait were of the Cromagnon type.".

This blog, written by Roberto Diaz Sibaja has the following photograph, which he took; he says it is a replica:

'

Replica of Solorzano's skull, by Roberto Diaz Sibaja

But, where exactly was this skullcap found? In what setting? Well, according to an interview published in this blog, Solórzano said, regarding the calvaria: "The experts don't admit it for a reason: there is no context. Initially it comes from Chapala, but it was not found in any geological layer or in association with anyghing because I don't know if I found it or if it is one of those that I bought".

Solorzano (1922 - 2015) was an engineer who later specialized in pharmaceutical biology, he was an academic at Guadalajara University, and at the time of the interview by José Jesús Langarica Herrera in 2011, was 89 years old. No wonder he couldn't remember if he'd purchased it or found it himself.

Above (source) is another image of the skullcap (right), and an unidentified skull (left).

What if someone sold it to a young avid Solorzano, who wanted to collect as many bones as possible? Can we be sure it was an American skullcap? What if somebody sold him a Eurasian calvaria? Possible and probable.

Finally here is an article written in English (Mexico discovery fuels debate about man's origins), in Oct. 2004, which says: "... archaeologists have never found a trace of Homo erectus in the Americas. 'Most people sort of just shook their heads and have been baffled by it,' said Robson Bonnichsen, director of the Center for the Study of the First Americans at Texas A&M University."

Could Robson Bonnischsen be one of the Texas A&M osteologists mentioned in our last post, who in "an unpublished 1990 report... suggest the brow's thickness and robustness are comparable to those of (an) African Homo erectus"?

Bonnischsen was one of the anthropologists who took the United States government to court, fighting for the right to study the bones of Kennewick Man. And he won.

Chapala man is a mystery and will remain so until further evidence is found.

Lake Chapala is Mexico's largest freshwater lake (420 sq. mi - 1.100 km²) it is relatively shallow (34 ft. - 10 m). It drains into the Pacific Ocean. It is a lake formed by a tectonic rift valley, and has been around at least since the late Pliocene 2.5 Ma. It is set in a volcanic area.

Fossils of megafauna have been found near the lake: horses, mammoths and Gomphotheres, elephant-like animals, that lived there some 1.6 Ma.

You can hear Fernando Solórzano in a conference he gave in 2007 speaking about this calvaria here; listen after minute 20 of this 1:38 h. conference because he mentions the skull ("arcada" as he calls it), and an "English scientist" who sampled the skull.

He also says that "I found it" and that is a problem because he found it in Chapala, and it is out of place, so they suspect that he might have planted it there. And that (min. 41) "it was simply found among a large pile of bones that were collected over a long period of time on the shores of lake Chapala"

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Patagonian Monsters - Cryptozoology, Myths & legends in Patagonia Copyright 2009-2020 by Austin Whittall © 

Chapala "homo erectus" brow ridge revisited

A lmost nine years ago I posted about a superciliary arch unearthed in Mexico (See post), and a link to the paper itself:

Link: Irish, J. D., S.D. Davis, J.E. Lobdell, and F.A. Solórzano, (2000), Prehistoric Human Remains from Jalisco. Mexico, Current Research in the Pleistocene 17, 2000 pg. 95-96

Image (source):

The authors state that:

"One Chapala superciliary arch deserves specific mention due to its large size. Studies by Solórzano show the bone resembles that in archaic Homo sapiens at Arago, France. In an unpublished 1990 report, Texas A&M osteologists suggest the brow’s thickness and robustness are comparable to those of KNM-ER 3733 (African Homo erectus). Our measurements show the central torus thickness is 13.3, compared with 8.5 mm for KNM-ER 3733; the lateral torus thickness is 11.5 versus 9.0 mm (Rightmire 1998). Thus for the sake of comparison, the brow is more like that of Zhoukoudian Skull XI (Asian Homo erectus), with a central torus thickness of 13.2 +/- mm; lateral torus thickness was not measured (Rightmire 1998). Modern brows are too diminutive to allow these measurements. The brow also shows pneumatization (air pockets) along its length.
However, to reiterate the findings of the Texas A&M workers, these comparisons do not imply that pre-Homo sapiens were in the Americas. No phylogenetic or age implications are intended. Instead, the comparisons demonstrate the size relative to most New World specimens, although brows on the Lagoa Santa skull (Bryan 1978) and on recent Tierra del Fuego and Patagonia crania (Lahr 1995; C.L. Brace pers. comm. 1998) appear comparable. "

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Patagonian Monsters - Cryptozoology, Myths & legends in Patagonia Copyright 2009-2019 by Austin Whittall © 

Hueyatlaco the controversial Mexican site at lake Valsequillos

The Hueyatlaco site in Mexico (map with location) has been controversial since it was first studied because the excavations conducted there back in the early 1960s (1962, 1964 and 1966) by C. Irwin-Williams and on occasions also Juan Armenta Camacho, found stone artifacts -later lost by the Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia (INAH) located in Mexico City- that were set in extremely old soil layers.

These tools were dated to an age of several hundreds of thousands of years. Far too old to have been made by Homo sapiens.

A good detailed account of this site can be found here: Malde, Harold E., Steen-McIntyre, Virginia, Naeser, Charles W. and VanLandingham, Sam L. 2011. The stratigraphic debate at Hueyatlaco, Valsequillo, Mexico. Palaeontologia Electronica Vol. 14, Issue 3; 44A:26p; palaeo-electronica.org/2011_3/27_malde/index.html.

These early dates were unnaceptable because they contradicted orthodox findings. So they were rejected on the basis that Uranium had leached into the artifacts and altered their age as measured by the uranium series age technique.

An alternate measuring method was used (fission track dating), and the outcome was the same (Geologic Evidence for Age of Deposits at Hueyatlaco Archeological Site, Valsequillo, Mexico, Virginia Steen-McIntyre, Roald Fryxell and Harold E. Malde, DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/0033-5894(81)90124-1. Published online by Cambridge University Press: 20 January 2017, Quaternary Research, Volume 16, Issue 1July 1981 , pp. 1-17). Below is the Abstract of this paper:

"Abstract
Direct tracing of beds during excavation in May 1973, confirmed that the artifact-bearing layers at Hueyatlaco underlie 10 m of fine-grained, water-laid deposits that constitute part of the wide-spread Valsequillo gravels. Dissection of these deposits by the adjacent Río Atoyac has reached a depth of 50 m. The stratigraphic section at Hueyatlaco includes four distinctive tephra units. The oldest one occupies a small channel in a series of cut-and-fill stream deposits that have yielded bifacial tools. It lies more than a meter above flat-lying, fine-grained beds from which edge-retouched tools have been recovered. The three other tephra units occur higher in the section.
Fission-track ages on zircon phenocrysts from two of the younger tephra layers (370,000 ± 200,000 and 600,000 ± 340,000 yr, 2σ) agree with concordant uranium-series dates for a camel pelvis that was found associated with bifacial tools at Hueyatlaco (245,000 ± 40,000 yr by 230Th and > 180,000 yr by 231Pa). These dates are compatible with the depth of burial and subsequent dissection of the Hueyatlaco deposits, as well as with the degree of hydration of volcanic glass shards and with the extent of etching of heavy-mineral phenocrysts from within the tephra layers.
These findings suggest to us that further search for archaeological remains in deposits as old as those at Hueyatlaco would be warranted."

Silvia Gonzalez from the Liverpool John Moores University disputes these early dates, but has agreed to dates which are also older than those currently accepted by orthodox science: 40,000 years.

In The Late Pleistocene Human Occupation of Mexico Silvia Gonzalez and David Huddart (FUMDHAMentos VII pp 237-259) discuss the older ages proposed by Steen-McIntyre et al, but also mentions several sites in Mexico with ages of up to 40 kya. One of them is the Toluquilla footprint layer, which has both animal and human foot and paw prints in volcanic ash deposited at Lake Valsequilo. This ash erupted from the Tolquilla volcano roughly 40 Kya:

Gonzalez and Huddart write:

"The stratigraphic context and geochronological control for the Xalnene Ash is shown in Figs.11 and 12 and discussed in detail in Gonzalez et al. (2006a). The Toluquilla Footprint Layer has been dated to 38 ±8.57 Ka (sample number: TW04-10) using Optically Stimulated Luminescence dating of baked, silty xenoliths within the ash which were interpreted as being baked at the time of the eruption, which reset the time signal. The ash layer is older than the stratigraphically younger, fluvial sediments from the Valsequillo Gravels exposed in the Barranca Caulapan (Fig.12) where there are radiocarbon dates between 9.15 ±0.5 Ka (W1896) from the top of the sequence to 38.9 ±0.8 Ka (Oxa-14355) on a mollusc shell at its base, as well as an Electron Spin Resonance date on a mammoth molar and U-Series dates on bones. All of the dates obtained with different methods are in agreement."

See my post on these footprints

Footprints at Valsequillo from Gonzalez and Huddart.

The only work to be published at a date more or less close to the time of the discoveries was written by Juan Armenta Camacho Vestigios de labor humana en huesos de animales extintos de Valsequillo, with his paper presented at the XXXV Congreso Internacional de Americanistas, Puebla, 1978. On its page 111, it mentions the controversial -and other not so controversial dates- for the animal bones with evidence of human activities on them (cuts, crushing, torsion breakage, perforations and even inscriptions).

Dates from Armenta's book (notice the 280,000 year old date)

The question seems to remain open: we have the very ancient dates, but we also have a firm refusal to accept them. Mainstream science simply ignores these findings which otherwise would undermine the neat construction built on the assumption that America was first peopled not more than 15-20,000 years ago.

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Patagonian Monsters - Cryptozoology, Myths & legends in Patagonia Copyright 2009-2019 by Austin Whittall © 

Tarahumara Giants in Chihuahua

Reading an old magazine (Smithsonian of May 1998), I came across the following text in an article about the Mexican Tarahumara natives:

"In the 1890s, Carl Lumholtz was told a legend about a race of giants ("as big as pine-trees") that had occupied the canyon country when the Tarahumara arrived. The giants ate the Tarahumara children and ravished the women. At last, the people exterminated the giants by tricking them into eating a mixture of corn and a poisonous extract from the chilicote tree." [1]

These are interesting giants which despite being as tall as trees are sufficiently nimble to have intercourse with human women. So maybe they were giants in a metaphoric way, but size-wise they were like us.

Giants, from my perspective mean "different humans", such as Neanderthals or Homo erectus; they were the way that ancient cultures declared that a group of people were not Homo sapiens, they were men, but not like us, they were hominins. So I decided to find what Lumholtz had written about them, and below is what I found.

Giants and Tarahumara natives

Carl Lumholtz was a Norwegian explorer who travelled to Australia and Mexico. He spent many years in Mexico between 1890 and 1910, during which he spent a full year with the Tarahumara people. His book, Unknown Mexico is the source of the Giant's myth quoted below:

"GIANTS
On the heights once lived giants. They were as big as pine-trees and had heads as big as bowlders [sic]. They taught the Tarahumares how to plant corn, by cutting down trees and burning them, but they ate children.
A woman bore a giant in a cave, which was situated very high up on the side of a valley. She died, because the child was so large, and he was taken care of by his grandmother. Once when she was asleep, she turned over and crushed him.
From Wasivori (near Cusarare) came giants to Nararachic to ask alms. Tesvino [Note: a kind of beer made from corn] they liked very much. They worked very fast, and the Tarahumares put them to hoe and weed the corn, and gave them food and tesvino. But the giants were fierce, and ravished the women while the latter were under the influence of the Moon; therefore the Tarahumares got very angry and they mixed a decoction made from the chilicote-tree with the corn that they gave the giants to eat, and the giants died.[2]

The paragraph before the one quoted above mentions a "Deluge", which filled the world with water. It, like most Flood myths around the World (and also in the Americas) must surely reflect the deep impression caused by rising sea levels and glacial dam ruptures with the consequent flooding caused by climate change at the end of the last Glacial Period some 8 - 10 kya.

This suggests that Giants (Neanderthal) were alive at that time, in America.

These giants evidently caused problems to the human mothers bearing them, but I don't think that size was the issue (the baby's grandmother crushed the infant in bed while sleeping next to it... it wasn't a gigantic baby, it was probably a big headed child).

They were farmers but ate human children and raped their women. They lived in the mountains (perhaps in caves?), and their interactions with humans were not amicable. But, from the mythic point of vies, these creatures were not gods either, poison killed them (a tea made from the beans of Erythrina flabelliformis), they were "men".

Another source

More recently Guadalupe Holguín (2011) [3], mentions these giants as part of the "Collective memory" of the Tarahumara. They were known as "Ganokos" and were alive between 1,500 BCE and 300 CE. She mentions a giant which was known as a "uribi", which lived in Teguerichi, "with its wife and son in a cave located at Osérare. As time passed the Rarámuris [another name for Tarahumara] grew tired of him because each fertility period and crop time, this giant misbehaved and stole their food and women. So they decided to invite him to drink tesvino to get him drunk and then posion him with chilicote (a red colored bean that grows wild in the hills of Chihuahua).". [3]

Other creatures lived in the upper parts of the hills (Alta Tarahumara), like Bichiguare at Narárachi, set at an altitude of 2,290 m (7,500 ft). A very tall Tarahumara lived there, who had the same features of the "uribi" who also appeared during the crop period and also misbehaved. So he too was invited to a feast and they gave him chilicote. After that they burned him in his cave. [3]

The fact that they called him a "very tall Tarahumara" means that he was probably a giant-human (or should I say Neanderthal-human) hybrid.

Notice how all stories agree upon the "poisoning" part. These were giants that had to be exterminated. They probably competed with humans for the best crop land or for scarce natural resources during droughts. They were enemies.

Holguín says (adopting a more mainstream science approach) that thse giants are the memories of inter-ethnic strife between Tarahumara and Tubares, who were "characterized by being of a greater height than the other natives... some skeletons measure over 2 m tall" (6 ft. 7"). [3]

Lumhotz described the Tubares as enemies of the Tarahumara: "They are said to have been fierce and constantly fighting the Tarahumares..." [2], I did not find any reference to them being tall, however Holguín says that they were "very tall". [3]

Finally, Holguín adds that the Tarahumara were not alone in their beliefs about giants, the Acaxeess or Chichimecas, Chinipas, Pima and Guarojíos also believed in giants. Which she attributes to the fossil remains of prehistoric animals.

The following image [4] from the The John Lenk Collection, Tarahumara / Raramuri, Wooden Mask with White Fur Beard collected in Copper Canyon area in Chihuahua around 1965. It has a striking "hominin" appearance. The source of the image describes it as: "Copper Canyon, Chihuahua Mexico – Primitive male mask with applied fur for beard, mustache, brows, and sideburns. Roughly carved unfinished blonde wood with open mouth, peg teeth, and fearsome expression reminiscent of a Yeti or Bigfoot. Beard is white fur, possibly goat skin. Brown hair used in other areas is softer, possibly coyote or dog. Fur is still attached to tanned hide, and is delicate from age. Lots of character.". [4]

To close today's post, I include the following link Chihuahua mine ghost, which links to a blog post about a creature living in a mine in Chihuahua (the territory of the Tarahumara), which was reported in a newspaper back in 1892. The beast was described as: "resemble[s] a huge ape with hairy body and long, powerful arms. It is misshapen, and with deep sunken eyes...". There is even a drawing of it, representing it as a gorilla-like beast.

By the way, there are several myths (I googled them in Spanish under "fantasma mina Chihuahua" and came across several reports)on ghosts in mines in Chihuahua. Perhaps they reflect the ancient myths of primitive gigantic "cavemen" who succumbed to the encroaching Homo sapiens.

Sources

[1] David Roberts, In the land of the Long-distance runners, Mexico's copper canyon is home to the great athletes, the Tarahumara. Smithsonian, May 1998, V.29:2 - 43-52
[2] Carl Lumholtz, (1902). Unknown Mexico; a record of five years' exploration among the tribes of the western Sierra Madre. New York, C. Scribner's sons. pp. 299.
[3] Guadalupe Holguín, (2011). Asolan a rarámuris los “gigantes o ganokos”. El Observador. Chihuahua, Chih. 28 March 2011.
[4] The John Lenk Collection. Tarahumara / Raramuri Wooden Mask with White Fur Beard

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Patagonian Monsters - Cryptozoology, Myths & legends in Patagonia Copyright 2009-2014 by Austin Whittall © 

Dorenberg Skull: erectus in Mexico 80 to 220 ky ago

 

Reconstruction of how the owner of the Dorenberg skull could have looked, based on dimensions of known Homo erectus skulls,by Laura Lyons. From [1], by Laura Lyons

Joseph Dorenberg, the German Consul who lived at Puebla, Mexico in the 1890s, purchased an ancient skull which he took back home with him to Leipzig, Germany. After his death it was donated to the Museum für Volkerskunde in 1919 and put on display.

However during World War II, the museum and surrounding areas were leveled by a RAF bombing (Dec. 1943), and the skull was destroyed with most of the museum’s contents.

Date

Diatomaceous earth is a sedimentary rock that is made up of the fossilized remains of diatoms, a group of unicellular algae. The most remarkable feature of diatoms is that they are encased within a small “shell” or capsule made of silica, which when the cell dies, drops to the sea bead and accumulates. The different varieties of fossil diatoms found in Diatomaceous earth allow scientists to date them and remains that are found buried by it.

This came in handy as the “Dorenberg skull” was found buried in diatomaceous earth. Hugo Reichelt, of Leipzig took some samples of the diatomes and established the skull’s age. His study was published in an article [2] and the skull was pronounced as “antediluvian” (i.e. before the last Ice Age). [1]

He kept some samples of the diatomaceous earth which was reanalyzed recently using modern techniques [3] and found that these diatoms: “ indicate an age corresponding to the Sangamonian Interglacial sensu lato (80,000 to ca. 220,000yr BP).” [3]

This is long before the accepted date of modern human entry into America. Furthermore, the heavy and prominent brow ridges and the sloping forehead are very unlike Homo sapiens yet very similar to H. erectus. This is a clear proof of erectus in America some 80 - 220 kya.

It is a shame that the "solid" proof (the Dorenberg skull) has been lost.

Some orthodox scientists in an attempt to discredit the finding have insinuated that the whole Dorenberg skull story is a hoax: "In relation to the Dorenberg skull, the reviewer claimed that, "... (there is evidence that this was a hoax generated by Europeans...". [4]

Sources.

[1] Patrick Lyons. Pleistocene America. Online. Also see The mystery of the Dorenberg Skull. Pleistocene Coalition News. vol 1:2. Nov-Dec. 2009. pp.4.
[2] Reichelt Hugo, (1899). Diatomeen aus dem Kalktuffe aus der Gegend von Puebla in Mexiko. In: Felix, J. and Lenk, H., Eds., Beitraege zur Geologie und Palaeontologie der Republik.
[3] Sam VanLandingham, (2004). Corroboration of Sangamonian age of artifacts from the Valsequillo region, Puebla, Mexico by means of diatom biostratigraphy.
Micropaleontology; December 2004; v. 50; no. 4; p. 313-342; DOI: 10.2113/50.4.313
[4] Ibid; (2009). Extraordinary Examples of Deception in Peer Reviewing: Concoction of the Dorenberg Skull Hoax and Related Misconduct. Paper in 13^th World Multi-Conference? on Systemics, Cybernetics and Informatics: International Symposium on Peer Reviewing. Orlando, Florida.

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Patagonian Monsters - Cryptozoology, Myths & legends in Patagonia

2011 International Year of Forests Copyright 2009-2011 by Austin Whittall © 

Toluquilla Footprint; is it erectus?

 

Toluquilla footprint in Mexico. From [1]

Close to Lake Valsequillo, a site where ancient stone tools have been found (predating the appearance of modern humans in Africa), is Cerro Tolquilla, a volcano that erupted some forty thousand years ago.

In its ashes, a “human” footprint can be seen, which has been been dated to 38,000 +/- 8,570 years ago.[1]

However there is some controversy regarding the age of this “Xalnene” ash. Because Renne et al (2005) [2] published an article in the prestigious journal Nature where they “dated the Xalnene Ash but with startlingly different results” as they “document that this ash is much older at 1.3 Ma years based on single grain Ar-Ar dating and they suggest that the footprints cannot be human, because of the age but are the result of quarrying operation” [1]

In Renne’s words: [2]

Here we show by ⁴⁰Ar/³⁹Ar dating and corroborating palaeomagnetic data that the basaltic tuff on which the purported footprints are found is 1.30 +/- 0.03 million years old. We conclude that either hominid migration into the Americas occurred very much earlier than previously believed, or that the features in question were not made by humans on recently erupted ash. [2]

Assuming Renne’s team date is correct, then their first concluison is right, hominids migrated to America earlier than believed, and, if we consider the age of the footprint, then we can identify the hominid: only a Homo erectus could have left the Footprint at that time.

More footprints, photos and details at González website: http://www.mexicanfootprints.co.uk/

However the story does not end in 2005, recently, in May 2010, a new paper by González with Darren Mark [3] concedes that they:

have accepted that the age of the Xalnene Ash is approximately 1.3 (million years). Considering what we know about the timings of hominid migrations out of Africa up into Europe and Asia, it is highly improbable that hominids could have made it to the America's by 1.3 million years before present. [3]

That is, highly improbable according to the classic view of anthropologists. Perhaps it is not so, and we are only lacking proof of hominid migration prior to modern human’s appearance on the Earth.

Sources.

[1] Silvia Gonzalez and David Huddart, (2007). The Late Pleistocene Human Occupation of Mexico. FUMDHAMentos 7:236-259
[2] Renne, P., Feinberg, J.M. Waters, M.R., Arroyo-Cabrales, J., Ochoa-Castillo, P., Perez-Campa, M. and Knight, K.B., (2005). Age of Mexican ash with alleged ‘footprints’. Nature, 438, doi:10.1038/nature04425.
[3] Darren F. Mark, Silvia Gonzalez, David Huddart and Harald Bohnel, (2010). Dating of the Valsequillo volcanic deposits: Resolution of an ongoing archaeological controversy in Central Mexico. Journal of Human Evolution Volume 58, Issue 5, May 2010, pp. 441-445.

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