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Essay on He Westward Spread Of Inca And Egyptian Culture
| Date: |
07-11-03 4:59pm |
| Subject: |
History |
| Word Count: |
2230 |
| Page Count: |
8.92 |
He Westward Spread Of Inca And Egyptian Culture
The second half of the twentieth century has seen many changes in
theories
concerning the mode of colonization of the islands of Micronesia, and the
rise of the Inca
Empire, with it's striking similarities to Egypt. In the past, it has been
suggested that
Asians had worked their way through the Pacific, over a period of thousands
of years. It
was believed that each island group had formed independently, and that the
residents,
while they were of the same race, had totally different cultures. Since
the 1940's,
however, these views have been changing. It is now accepted by many
scholars that early
Egyptians sailed as far west as South America, in their huge reed boats.
In turn, the Incas,
who owe many of their technological advancements to these Egyptian
travelers, set sail to
the west, colonizing Easter Island, Hawaii, and the other Pacific islands.
The most common misconception about these early travels is that they
took place
on boats or ships. This is definitely not the case. In fact, the
Egyptians and Incas relied
on rafts; the Incas used balsa logs ( Kon-Tiki 21), the Egyptians
used bundles of papyrus
reeds (Ra 3). One striking piece of evidence for Egyptian-Inca contact is
the existence of
reed rafts on Lake Titicaca that are exactly like rafts used on Lake Chad
and the Nile (Ra
3). Of course, this could be merely coincidence, but much more evidence
exists to
support the theory of ancient contacts between Egyptians and Pre-Colombian
Incas.
The most positive, though hardly concrete, item is the legends of the
*I*Viracocha*/I* (which
translates as white man in English) people of Lake Titicaca in South
America. The
*I*Viracocha*/I* are said to have been the first builders of the reed boats
in South America and
came forth in a flotilla of reed boats,... appearing to the local Indians
who at the time
were ignorant of sun worship, architecture, and agriculture (Ra 30).
These reed boats
were the same size and specification of the boats used by Egyptians, and
the people who
crewed them began, among other things, building pyramids and statues, many
of which
still stand throughout Central and South America (Ra 3). In fact, the most
concrete piece
of evidence linking the Egyptians and early Americans is a small stone
statue, discovered
in Mexico, bearing features that are decidedly similar to those of Egyptian
sculpture. The
statue was carbon dated 800 BC (Begley, et al 28), long before Europeans
were said to
have contacted Central and South Americans.
The Aztecs and Mayas of Central America also provide
evidence of Egyptian
contact. The starting date of the Maya calendar is 12, 3113 BC. This is
in the middle of
the first dynasty of the Pharaohs. If these Indians had already been in
the Western
Hemisphere for 15,000 years, why was it only after the Egyptians started
using calendars
that they did, and used such similar methods. Mayan and Aztec texts also
state that they
became civilized only after a man, claiming descent from the sun arrived
from the Gulf of
Mexico, with a complement of astronomers, architects and priests. The
Aztecs called the
man/god Quetzalcoatl, and the Mayans called him Kukulkan. Both names
translate as
Plumed Serpent (Ra 258). A plumed serpent decorates some of the
Pharaohs' tombs in
Egypt, as well as Papyrus scripts. This mixture of birds and snakes is
prevalent in Egypt,
Mexico, and Peru. In addition, Peruvian and Egyptian art depicts
birdmen, assisting
the sun king's voyages. It is not, however these supernatural men who are
credited with
the technological advancements in the area (Ra 259).
Instead, normal men, who wore sandals and robes, and
arrived on reed boats are
attributed with this. They taught the primitive natives to write, build,
weave, and worship
the sun. They also built schools primarily teaching history. Native
legends throughout
Central America, and the Inca empire, from Bolivia to Peru agree that men
on reed boats
brought them technology (Ra 259).
Portraits found in Olmec ruins in Mexico bear decidedly
African features, including
black skin, rounded faces, and broad noses, versus the angular faces of the
American
natives. Moreover, there are paintings and statues bearing Semitic
characteristics,
including hooked noses, goatees, and sharp facial features. Some are
depicted as carrying
walking staffs (Ra 260).
A good deal of 'circumstantial' evidence also points to
Egypt-Inca contact. This
includes the fact that both cultures demonstrate traditions of
intermarriage to preserve
royal blood lines, and hieroglyphic writings. Both societies also embalmed
their dead in
the same way, and performed cranial surgery (Geographic 47). One noted
anthropologist
with the University of California documented sixty features, all of an
unusual nature,
unique to only the Egyptian and Inca empires (Ra 24). These include, in
addition to the
aforementioned ceremonies, paper-making with reeds, the use of adobe
bricks, false
beards for religious leaders, and circumcision of males. Perhaps the most
bizarre trait
shared by both civilizations is the practice of, expeditions in search of
special mollusks,
highly valuable for their red shells or for the red dye extracted from the
snail (Ra
87-88).
Nonetheless, in order to further theories of Egyptian-Inca
contact scientists must
establish a means whereby such contact could have occurred. The
feasibility of Egyptian
voyages to South America has been proved by Thor Heyerdahl. In 1970, he
and a
hodgepodge team of various nationalities built a large reed raft in Egypt,
using Egyptian
designs and Peruvian Indians to provide technical advice. They hauled the
raft on a sledge
across the continent, and sailed to a landfall in Barbados, in the
Caribbean. The only tools
used in constructing this raft were those that ancient Egyptians would have
had, and the
expedition was a complete success, proving that with their technology,
ancient Egyptians
could certainly have traveled to the Americas (Ra Poscript).
As far as the overland journey from a landing point in the
Caribbean to Peru, the
Spanish explorer Francisco Pizzaro provided proof that it wasn't an
insurmountable
distance. Indeed, he sailed from the Mediterranean to South America, and
marched
overland, with his crew, to the Inca empire in Peru, and then returned to
Spain almost as
fast as Hernan Cortes hacked through Mexico to the Aztec empire (Ra
267-268).
Despite all this evidence, though, it has not been
unequivocally proved that
Egyptians sailed to South America. There is an entire ocean, and two
continents
separating the cultures. It would have been a remarkable feat to have
traveled that
distance. But one must keep in mind that the Egyptians were the builders
of the Pyramids,
and crossing the vast distances may have been a similarly worthy
undertaking to this
mighty people.
As pointed out by Thor Heyerdahl, there is a much stronger
case for Inca
colonization of the Pacific Islands. The single most obvious indicators of
such contact are
the sweet potato and bottle gourd. The common sweet potato, Ipomoea
batatas is native
to South America. It was brought into North America by natives, and wasn't
known in
Europe until the sixteenth century. Yet it is prolific throughout all of
the Polynesian
islands. Its distribution among these scattered islands could only have
been accomplished
by human intervention. On Easter Island, huge sweet potato plantations
have flourished
for hundreds of years. Like the sweet potato, the bottle gourd, native
only to South
America, is found throughout the Pacific. Even more striking is the
linguistic similarities
between the names given to these vegetables by the different cultures.
The sweet potato is
called kumara, and the bottle gourd is known as kimi in
almost all Polynesian dialects, and
by the traditional languages in Peru (Kon-Tiki 102-103).
There are also legends, on both sides of the Pacific that
support the theory of
contact between the peoples of the Polynesian islands and the Inca culture.
Peruvians
contend that a race from the North who lived on Lake Titicaca fled to the
west on great
rafts made of balsa. Their leader's name was Kon-Tiki (Kon-Tiki 19). Furthermore, the
Polynesians contend that they are descendants of a group that had come
across the sea
from a land in the east which was scorched by the sun (Kon-Tiki
19). The leader of this
legendary group- Tiki; who was said to be a direct scion of the sun god.
It is said, Tiki,
he was both god and chief. It was Tiki who brought my ancestors to these
islands where
we live now. Before that, we lived in a big country beyond the sea
(Kon-Tiki 12).
Many who oppose the theory of Inca colonization of the
Pacific islands point to
the vast distances between Peru and the Pacific islands as evidence against
the possibility
of their migration. This, as Heyerdahl points out, is in error. The
distance from Peru to
the Tuamoto island chain is 4,000 miles. However, after a raft or sailboat
has traveled
1,000 miles over the sea surface, it will have reached the Tuamotos. This
is due to the
Humbolt Current, which flows up from Antarctica, along the coast of South
America, and
due west, towards Asia. In Thor Heyerdahl's 101 day crossing from Peru to
the
Tuamotos, the ocean displaced his raft, the Kon-Tiki, 3,000 miles,
and the wind was
actually responsible for only one thousand miles of displacement.
Unfortunately, on a
west-to-east journey, the sea distance to be covered is 7,000 miles. That
would mean a
700-day journey just to overcome the current. However, any craft
attempting that journey
would have to tack several hundred miles in order to avoid the trade winds.
Most experts,
Heyerdahl included, feel that such a voyage would be impossible (Early Man
33). This
would serve to explain the failure of a return route to Peru and negates an
Asian migration
to the eastern-most. The distances between the islands are also frequently
misconceived.
Easter Island, source of the oldest remnants of civilization is the
furthest removed from
Asia as all the islands, suggesting a migration from South America, which
is only 2,000
miles from Easter Island, while the nearest island is 2,000 miles west, and
it is 8,000 miles
to mainland Asia (Kon-Tiki 127). Nonetheless this tiny, dry
desolate island is the home of
the oldest statues and pyramids in the Pacific islands. The famous
red-haired statues
discovered on the island are found elsewhere, but only on the islands
closest to the
Americas. In addition, the details and skill levels shown in the
construction of these
statues decreases as distance from America increases (Kon-Tiki 133-136). This all points
towards a westward spread of culture, rather than the traditional eastward
diffusion
suggested by most anthropologists.
Once again, legend offers evidence for the westward
migration theory, this time
involving Easter Island. The first Europeans to visit the island, were
astonished to see
mysterious white men on shore,... with long flowing beards
(Kon-Tiki 138). This race,
characterized by their light skin, red hair, and artificially-lengthened
ear lobes, are said to
have first come to Polynesia around 400 AD The Polynesians contend that
this race,
known as the big-ears, led by the sun-god Kon-Tiki, came from the east,
and built the
statues that bear an incredible likeness to them. They continued west,
scattering from
Hawaii to New Zealand, and intermingled with and dominated the scattered
tribes that
lived on the islands (Kon-Tiki 139). The statues on Easter Island
are the oldest, and most
similar to the statues found around Lake Titicaca. Decorating the statues
on Easter Island
are tufts of red hair, long ears, and a belt carved around the stomach.
These belts are also
on every statue in the ruins around Lake Titicaca, and are the emblem of
the sun-god
(Kon-Tiki 140). These remarkable similarities suggest a common
designer.
The traditional names of the islands also serve as
evidence towards a westward
migration, as Heyerdahl points out. One of Easter Island's native names is
Rapa Nui,
which means Great Rapa. To the west is an island of the same size, with
the name Rapa
Iti, which means Little Rapa. As it is common tendency for a second
home to be
referred to as Little__, or New__, this suggests that it is a satellite of
Rapa Nui. Indeed,
the natives contend they came from the East. The other aboriginal name for
Easter Island
is Mata-Kite-Rani, which means the eye that looks toward heaven.
There are no
significant mountains on Easter Island, compared to say, Tahiti or Hawaii
(Kon-Tiki 141).
Rani, which means Heaven, has two meanings: literal Heaven, and the
homeland of the
Polynesians' ancestors. Finally, Mata-Rani means the eye of heaven,
and is a traditional
name for a spot on the Pacific coast of Peru [directly] opposite Easter
island and right at
the foot of Kon-Tiki's [the god/leader of the Peruvians cum Polynesians]
old ruined city in
the Andes (Kon-Tiki 141).
The third native name of Easter Island, Te-Pito-te-Henua,
means navel of the
islands, which suggests it was an important part of the Polynesian
Islands. On the island's
eastern shore, near the supposed landing site of the original 'long-ears'
is a spherical stone,
known as the golden navel, and considered the symbolic navel of the
island. This takes
on greater significance because tradition refers to the discovery of the
islands as the birth
of the islands. As the navel is where the umbilical cord ties a fetus to
the mother, this
seems to suggest that Easter Island was the last link to the
motherland-Peru ( Kon-Tiki
140).
The final factor in considering the westward migration
theory is the logistics of
such journeys. Once again, Thor Heyerdahl provided absolute evidence for
the feasibility
of this voyage with his Kon-Tiki expedition of 1947. He and five other
men, four
Norwegians and a Swede, sailed from Callo, Peru, to an island near Tahiti.
As with his Ra
expedition, twenty-five years later, only traditional tools, food and
equipment were used,
with the exception of running lights and meteorological equipment (Kon-Tiki
supplement
4).
It has now been over half a century since Heyerdahl first
suggested the theory
westward migration theories. As time goes by, more evidence has served to
reinforce his
ideas. There are still indecipherable hieroglyphs in Peru and Polynesian
islands. If they
are ever unraveled, they may well present new evidence, either for or
against the theories.
The similarities between these carvings and glyphs on the west coast of
North America has
sparked debates on connections between these areas, either directly or via
Peru.
There are also numerous references towards white men, with
blonde hair. Mayans
refer to them as having come with the reed-boatmen. Some members of the
group who
fled Lake Titicaca with Kon-Tiki were white. The Spanish conquistadors
reported blonde
and red-haired white men in Peru and on Easter Island (Ra 260). Perhaps
these white
men's ancestors were Vikings-it is generally accepted that Leif Erikson
traveled at least as
far south as New England, and some legends of North American Natives have
made
reference to explorers that fit Norse characteristics ( Early Man 130).
Explanations for the similarities in these three distant
cultures have included divine
intervention, extra-terrestrial intervention, or an as-yet undiscovered
master race of
humans, perhaps from Atlantis, that brought the societies together.
Indeed, Heyerdahl's
theories, once considered outlandishly radical, are now considered tame by
many people.
The possibilities are certainly endless, but in light of the evidence so
far gathered, the idea
of westward migration seem the most logical explanation for the
similarities between
Egyptian and Inca cultures, and the colonization of the Pacific
Islands.
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