Olmec remains

[Martha Murphy]

In 2003 archaeologist Carmen Fajardo announced the discovery of Olmec skeletal remains. Was there ever any follow-up news? Were the remains DNA tested?

I understand Olmec remains are pretty rare.

I'm a newby.

Martha

[Minimalist]

I recall teh report but not a follow up to the initial discovery.

Welcome aboard, btw.


Good first question!

[Roberto]

http://www.hondurasthisweek.com/2003nov/national.htm

Might have to scroll down a bit to find the article.
It has a picture of the skull.
Neat stuff!

So ... did the Olmec migrate North out of South America
and bring the rubber tree and the ball game with them?
Or ... did they meet the Andean people in the Central
American region of Honduras and acquire this technology.
From what I've read, the rubber tree originated in South
America and was brought into Mesoamerica. This trade
route or migration must have been up the east coast.
I bet rubber would have been an excellent sealer for
making water tight seams, especially for "boats." Early
horticulturalist would have discovered this for sure.

[kbs2244]

Great post Roberto.
I did not know the Olmec did skull molding.
All I knew of them appearance wise was the famous Negroid stone heads.

[Minimalist]

I was looking for something else and came across this. Dr. Clyde Winters has been quoted before on this site. If I recall correctly Beagle used his work to drive marduk nuts!

http://www.geocities.com/Tokyo/Bay/7051/Skeletal.htm

Dr. Wiercinski (1972) claims that some of the Olmecs were of African origin. He supports this claim with skeletal evidence from several Olmec sites where he found skeletons that were analogous to the West African type black. Many Olmec skulls show cranial deformations (Pailles, 1980), yet Wiercinski (1972b) was able to determine the ethnic origins of the Olmecs. Marquez (1956, 179-80) made it clear that a common trait of the African skulls found in Mexico include marked prognathousness ,prominent cheek bones are also mentioned. Fronto-occipital deformation among the Olmec is not surprising because cranial deformations was common among the Mande speaking people until fairly recently (Desplanges, 1906).

Many African skeletons have been found in Mexico. Carlo Marquez (1956, pp.179-180) claimed that these skeletons indicated marked pronathousness and prominent cheek bones.

[kbs2244]

OK,
That brings up the question of which Africian tribes, located where, had a tradition of skull molding.

[War Arrow]

And in two paragraphs the supposedly carefully made argument falls apart:

In conclusion, the Olmec people were called Xi. They did not speak a Mixe-Zoque language they spoke a Mande language, which is the substratum language for many Mexican languages.

The Olmec came from Saharan Africa 3200 years ago.They came in boats which are depicted in the Izapa Stela no.5, in twelve migratory waves. These Proto-Olmecs belonged to seven clans which served as the base for the Olmec people.

There is no way we can be certain of such a claim without access to a time machine, and the rest of the article seems to be based on the 'this looked like that so therefore' argument. Maybe there's something in the claim of African Y chromosomes (whatever that may mean), but if so why not concentrate on the DNA evidence rather than waste time with the rest of it, given that it's a lot harder to argue against DNA than the rest of the "evidence" here. If someone like Richard Diehl thinks this guy is full of shit, I kind of suspect that this guy is probably full of shit.

'Negroid' stone heads depict heads of infants - the Olmecs were obssesed with infants, as a great percentage of their art demonstrates.

The Olmecs were a fascinating people, and very little is known about them, yet once again here we are raving about Elvis because we're fascinated by his estate agent.

[Minimalist]

I'd like to see a peer-reviewed rebuttal to Wiercinski's work, which Winters has provided in a clumsy format but it is there.

http://www.geocities.com/Tokyo/Bay/7051/content.html

[Martha Murphy]

I take it Carmen Farjado isn't checking this site regularly.

I'm trying to get past that "Olmecs were from Africa" hyperbole.

The Olmecs are pretty interesting. What did they do with the bodies?

[Minimalist]

There are 3 main methods for disposing of bodies: burial, cremation and exposure to the elements.

In that climate I wouldn't expect to find much in the way of preserved flesh unless they figured out a way to hermetically seal a tomb. I'm not sure where you are going with this, Martha.

[Martha Murphy]

I'm just looking for information.

[Minimalist]

That's cool.

Perhaps W/A can chime in. I'm not at all sure about the logistics of finding actual bodies in the traditional Olmec/Maya areas.

[War Arrow]

Ooh... so far as I'm aware the only bodies I can recall being found in that region (and wouldn't absolutely swear that this isn't later than Olmec culture) were sacrifices (often of children) preserved in very dry cliff top caves in that Gulf Coast region. Dammit - there was a BBC TV documentary on this a few years back. I'll have to go and check out my library but I think Min's right about there not being much hope of anything being preserved from that region. I think it's assumed that Olmec funerary practices were similar to those of elsewhere and later in Mesoamerica, though not sure how much evidence there is for this.

[Roberto]

http://www.latinamericanstudies.org/olm ... eads-1.htm

Ok, here's something to ponder. The Olmec are known to have
vanished around 800 B.C., which is still unbeknownced as to why.
Archaeologist comment that the colossal heads and monuments
where largely mutilated by possible invaders, or the Olmec themselves
destroying their history before departure. Now, check out some of the
patterns on some of the colossal heads. To me some of them look like
they may have been hit by something (rocks?) randomly all over. Sort of like what a shotgun blast would leave with a wide pattern. Why would a human randomly knock holes all around the head? I would think that a person would sit down and mutilate one persific area, say the face, not
just put pock marks randomly around the sculpture.

So what happen around 800 B.C. The Olmec vanished along with the
Poverty Point Culture around the same time. Along with similiar vanishing of cultures in the Old World. So kicking this around I came across this information concerning the comet Encke. I just wanted some feed back
concerning this article from y'all.

Could Mesoamerica have been hit by a comet/meteor shower around
800 B.C. whipping out the Olmec? Exactly what made the pock marks
in random pattern on these Colossal heads? What exactly does the
stratigraphy tells us around the Olmec heart land? Does a "black mat"
evidence exist here too? All this early archaeological work in the Olmec
heartland was done around the 1940's and way before our present knowledge of how ofTen the earth actually is hit by such aspects of
nature. Ok, let me retrieve that article and I'll post it at the bottom,
and I'll await for commnets.
CHEERS!

http://www.burlingtonnews.net/map2.html
How much credit would you give this website. The time frame
and the comet Encke occurrance is very interesting.

[Sam Salmon]

'Negroid' stone heads depict heads of infants

That is absolute nonsense as anyone who's seen the heads up close (I have) can tell you.

Archaeologist comment that the colossal heads and monuments
where largely mutilated by possible invaders, or the Olmec themselves
destroying their history before departure. Now, check out some of the
patterns on some of the colossal heads. To me some of them look like
they may have been hit by something (rocks?) randomly all over. Sort of like what a shotgun blast would leave with a wide pattern. Why would a human randomly knock holes all around the head? I would think that a person would sit down and mutilate one persific area, say the face, not
just put pock marks randomly around the sculpture.

Some of the heads show weathering-and having experienced the debilitating heat and rain of Mexico's Gulf Coast I can see why even Basalt would be eaten up after centuries.