David Eccott

 

After introducing the audience to the key works available on transoceanic contact in ancient times, David went on to talk about Comalcalco, a key Maya site in Mexico’s Yucatán peninsular. It lies in the state of Tabasco, some 55 kilometres north-west of Villahermosa and probably dates to c. AD 200. Simply by looking at the towering walls that make up the city’s North Plaza and Great Acropolis, there is a sense of recognition for those familiar with Roman architecture. These structures are made almost entirely of fired bricks, resembling those used en masse during Roman times. In addition to this, some of the buildings possess buttresses, wing-walls and large, square windows, all of which ‘are relatively unknown in Maya architecture’. Yet similarity does not necessarily mean contact. We would need far more than comparisons to suggest that an ancient world culture had introduced the Maya to fired bricks and new forms of architecture.

Amazingly, there are other connections between the buildings at Comalcalco and the ancient world. Two of the many temple mounds excavated by American archaeologist Neil Steede – a speaker at the Questing Conference in October - have revealed more than 4500 fired bricks that bear marks incised on the wet clay before they were sun dried. Many of these symbols are unquestionably of Maya origin, yet a small percentage resemble signatures that appear on bricks and tiles from the Roman world. Furthermore, similar markings have been found on adobe bricks used to construct the Huaca Las Ventanas pyramids of north-west Peru, which epigrapher Barry Fell identified as a form of alphabetic Libyan script. These structures are accredited to the Mochica, or Moche, culture and are dated to somewhere between 300 BC and AD 800.

So could Romans have visited Maya sites such as Comalcalco?

David’s view is that knowledge of the use of fired clay bricks may have come from an altogether different location in the ancient world, the key being the maker’s marks. Working alongside other colleagues in this field, he has determined that certain inscriptions which have been found at Comalcalco indicate that the technology, and maybe even the expertise, behind the brick making could be part of a long tradition which stretches back hundreds, if not thousands, of years. In his opinion, certain of the signs represent a form of ancient script familiar to Mesopotamia and the Indus Valley culture of northern India, c. 3000 BC. This is thought to have spread gradually eastwards to China, Sumatra, Easter Island and then, finally, through trans-oceanic contact to Peru, Panama and Mexico. Examples of this Indus Valley script have been identified both at Comalcalco and on the adobe bricks found at Huaca Las Ventanas in northwest Peru. Yet regardless of the controversy surrounding the brickmaker’s marks, there is still the lingering suggestion of a Roman presence in Mexico. Confirmation that the Roman-style head excavated in 1933 at Calixtlahuaca, 72 kilometres west of Mexico City, is indeed a Roman bust dating to around AD 200 makes it possible that Romans could indeed have visited Mexico. On the other hand, David and his colleagues are strongly of the opinion that this artefact, and others like it found in Mexico, were imported into the country through trade with Indo-Chinese cultures from Southeast Asia. They were themselves trading with India, which was itself the destination of Roman traders. Although I accept this is a likely explanation, there is overwhelming evidence that journeys were being made between North Africa and the Americas during Roman times. For instance, we have the evidence of the Roman wrecks laying uninvestigated off the coasts of Brazil and Honduras (and possibly even another in a river which forms the border between Costa Rica and Nicaragua). Furthermore, Statius Sebosus, the Roman geographer of c. 100 BC, tells us that it was forty days’ sail from the Gorgades (the Cape Verdes) and the Hesperides (the Islands of the Ladies of the West, unquestionably the Caribbean – see GATEWAY TO ATLANTIS).

After Comalcalco, David went on to highlight the significance of pre-Columbian rock carvings found in central Utah and accredited to the Fremont tribe. One set of carvings at Rochester Creek greatly resemble mythical themes familiar to the ancient Egyptians. The comparison is undeniable and initially it might appear as if they are the result of Egyptian contact with the Americas. However, this is not necessarily the correct solution. As David points out, it seems more likely that they are the result of Berber contact with the Americas. They were able seafarers who explored the Atlantic Ocean as early as the first millennium BC and, as the Lixitae of classical tradition, acted as pilots, translators and perhaps even crews for Carthaginian sea-captains. Moreover, they are accepted to have been synonymous with the Guanches of the Canary Islands, who also utilised Egyptian religious symbolism – a case made recently on British television by Egyptologist and mummy expert Joanne Fletcher.

Other sites in Utah have also revealed mysterious cave art attributed to the Fremont Indians. Anthropomorphic forms bear attire, weapons and adornments that are clearly Berber (or Tuareg) in origin. One picture even appears to show a black African slave, an important fact for it is known that the Berbers used black Africans for slave labour.

If descendents of Berber seafarers were responsible for this rock art in Utah, then it is good news for the new Atlantis theory as it provides yet more evidence of transatlantic contact between North Africa and the Americas in ancient times.