SV: Peterborough petroglyph site


Eric Stevens <eric.stevens@xxxxxxxxx> skrev i
diskussionsgruppsmeddelandet:9i2453hjcbrstpk8rnhlblhrf47k6vns1k@xxxxxxxxxx
On 2 May 2007 20:27:10 -0700, Carl <pchristainsen@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

On May 2, 4:17 pm, Carl <pchristain...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On May 2, 12:33 pm, Tom McDonald <kilt...@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:





Carl wrote:
On May 2, 12:44 am, benli...@xxxxxxxxxx wrote:

<snip>

The Peterborough petroglyph site was discussed at some length on
sci.arch a few years ago. At that time IIRC David Kelley of the
University of Calgary was promising further work on it. He didn't
accept Fell's attempted readings of parts of it as Proto-Germanic
(?),
but still thought there was something worth pursuing. Petroglyphs
can
be fascinating, of course, but I don't see anything there that
looks
like writing.

Note well - for Peterborough site Fell (1982) says mostly Tifinag
with
a little Ogam.

Non sequitor. The script does not equate to the language.
...

Volume 19 - ESOP
http://www.epigraphy.org/volume_19.htm

Extract -
Review: Out of Egypt (4 pp) Michael Skupin 19-p 22

"Proto-Tifinagh and Proto-Ogam in the Americas" by David H. Kelley
appeared in the Review of Archaeology, Spring 1990. Skupin commented:
"An intelligent critique of Fell's work is such a novelty that one is
tempted to simply report it as a wonder..." The general tenor of
Kelley's paper (which dealt in detail with Fell's work on the
Peterborough inscriptions) is that Fell was right in general, but
wrong in certain particulars. Kelley goes on to say: "The presence of
a proto-Tifinagh alphabet at Peterborough seems to me certain." and
"The iconography of the Peterborough site is thoroughly Bronze Age
Scandinavian, particularly resembling materials from Bohuslan." Dr.
Kelley gives confirmation of the broad outlines of Fell's work in an
important archaeological journal.

---

BARRY FELL REVISITED
http://home.comcast.net/~carlbjork/newdir.html

Subj: "Petroglyph Theory is Nothing New" (August 20)
by

Joan M. Vastokas
Professor and Chairperson
Department of Anthropology
Trent University
Peterborough, Ontario K9J 7B8


Kelley has been arguing in favour of the presence of proto-Tifinag
script in the Peterborough petroglyphs for some years. As may be seen
at http://tinyurl.com/ysvwqc this was discussed in this news group in
2001. At that time I wrote:

Begin quote
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The NEARA publication "Across before Columbus" contains a paper by
Kelley titled "The identification of Proto-Tifinagh Script at
Peterborough Ontario" His opening remarks deal with the role played by
Fell.

Selected items are:

========================
The recognition of the existence of a Proto-Tifinagh script in
inscriptions near Peterborough, Ontario, and in Scandinavia is
entirely the work of Barry Fell (1982a; 1982b; 1984; 1985a; 1985b;
1986; 1987; 1989).

....

All of these inferences stem from the identification of Proto-Tifinagh
at Peterborough and in Scandinavia. They depend in no way upon the
decipherment of the script, which requires a very different level of
inference. Fell's contention that the script was being used to write
some form of ancestral Germanic depends, in part, on repeats letter
sequences (a standard way of recognizing the presence of a script) and
on the association of repeated sc quences with iconographically
similar figures, both at Peterborough and in Scandinavia.

....

In preliminary decipherments, I think that one is doing well to be
correct one time in ten. In Bronze Age America (1982:282-287), Fell
proposed 94 decipherments of particular words, of which 82 were
phonetically read (or reconstructed). I would not be surprised if
eight or ten of these were correct.

....

Remember that the decipherment of Proto-Sinaitic as Semitic rested for
many years upon the decipherment of a single deity name.

....

Orthodox linguists and comparative mythologists must be added to the
list of scholars outraged by the implications of Fell's work, if Fell
is correct not only about the identification of the script, but also
about the decipherment. I think that he probably is correct and will
shortly attempt to show why.
A third level of interpretation is represented by Fell's
attempts at translation. Here, 1 think, he falls into the errors of a
William Foxwell Albright or a Herbert Grimme and furnishes ammunition
in abundance to his critics.

....

In Proto-Sinaitic studies, it took about 30 years to get to the stage
of the useful but error-laden translations which seem to me comparable
with what Fell has provided for us.

....

For myself, I am more interested in what I perceive as massive
accomplishments, rather than in criticizing Fell's work.

....

Fell's work has been met with scholarly vituperation and accusations
of racism. It seems to me very unfortunate that scholarly problems
about the identification of inscriptions in an ancient script should
become associated with matters of academic dogma about the absence of
Old World influences in the New World, on the one hand, and with
modern problems about the mistreatment of some human beings and
groups, on the other.

....

At the time of the first extensive publications of the materials, by
the Vastokases, they thought that all of the carving had been done by
Algonquian Indians, a supposition which was certainly the most
probable explanation a priori, and which seemed to agree with the use
of equivalents of some of the symbols by modern Algonquians. Fell's
later contention that the site had been produced by Bronze Age
Scandinavians seemed, and still ' seems to most anthropologists, so
improbable that it could be dismissed essentially without examination.

The complete text of the opening section of the paper is as follows:
=======================
In a presentation at Brown University and in a subsequent long
paper, still unpublished, 1 attempted to show similar problems and
difficulties, together with some differences, between decipherment of
Proto-Sinaitic of the ancient Near East, well summarized by Benjamin
Sass (1988), and the identification and decipherment of Proto-Tifinagh
in Ontario, Scandinavia, and northern Italy. 1 also attempted to
appraise particular claims of decipherment and iconographic
parallelism among the three areas. In the present paper, 1 am
limiting myself largely to the identification of the ProtoTifmagh
script. The recognition of the existence of a Proto-Tifinagh script
in inscriptions near Peterborough, Ontario, and in Scandinavia is
entirely the work of Barry Fell (1982a; 1982b; 1984; 1985a; 1985b;
1986; 1987; 1989).
This identification has at least four major implications for
culture history. First, it demonstrates that there was a phonetically
sophisticated alphabet in existence in Scandinavia in the Bronze Age.
Second, it reveals that, although the alphabet virtually died out in
its homeland, it was somehow introduced to North Africa where the
Tifmagh form is still in use among the Tuaregs and other North African
tribes. Third, it shows that users of this alphabet reached the New
World. And fourth, analysis of this alphabet as found in all three
locations produces little indication of derivation from Proto-Sinaitic
or its kin. It now seems to me that the inscriptions at Peterborough
probably date between 1000 and 700 BC, much later than Fell thought,
but we do not yet have good evidence as to how much earlier the script
appears in its presumed Scandinavian homeland. It could even be as
early as ProtoSinaitic, especially if the later date for
Proto-Sinaitic is preferred.
Any one of these implications alone is shattering enough to
scholars having a strong interest in the specific problem. Taken
together, they must either be dismissed ,as rubbish, or they must be
recognized as a substantial contribution to our knowledge of the past,
which requires some drastic changes in our perceptions, and perhaps
even in our theoretical orientations.
All of these inferences stem from the identification of
Proto-Tifinagh at Peterborough and in Scandinavia. They depend in no
way upon the decipherment of the script, which requires a very
different level of inference. Fell's contention that the script was
being used to write some form of ancestral Germanic depends, in part,
on repeats letter sequences (a standard way of recognizing the pr(
sence of a script) and on the association of repeated sc quences with
iconographically similar figures, both at Petei borough and in
Scandinavia.
In preliminary decipherments, 1 think that one is doing well
to be correct one time in ten. In Bronze Age America (1982:282-287),
Fell proposed 94 decipherments of particular words, of which 82 were
phonetically read (or reconstructed). I would not be surprised if
eight or ten of these were correct. Validation of these would be more
than enough to prove that the texts are Germanic. I understand the
term 'decipherment' to mean both the first correct recognition and
demonstration that a particular script was being used for a particular
language, and the continuous process by which scholars determine the
details of reading a particular script. Remember that the
decipherment of Proto-Sinaitic as Semitic rested for many years upon
the decipherment of a single deity name. If any considerable number
of Fell's readings of mythological names is correct, then we must
suppose not only that a language ancestral to some or all of the
present Germanic languages was present in Scandinavia in the Bronze
Age, but we must also suppose that the Scandinavian mythology of AD
1000 has amazingly detailed prototypes at about 1000 BC or even
substantially earlier.
Of scholars who have worked on these problems, only Colin
Renfrew (1987) is apt to be pleased with the linguistic implications
of this decipherment. Orthodox linguists and comparative mythologists
must be added to the list of scholars outraged by the implications of
Fell's work, if Fell is correct not only about the identification of
the script, but also about the decipherment. 1 think that he probably
is correct and will shortly attempt to show why.
A third level of interpretation is represented by Fell's
attempts at translation. Here, 1 think, he falls into the errors of a
William Foxwell Albright or a Herbert Grimme and furnishes ammunition
in abundance to his critics. In Maya studies, it took us about 120
years to get to the point where we could read simple sentences
adequately and consistently, despite having perhaps 100 times more
material in inscriptions and books and systematic access to meaning.
In Proto-Sinaitic studies, it took about 30 years to get to the stage
of the useful but error-laden translations which seem to me comparable
with what Fell has provided for us. It is time now for competent
specialists in the Germanic languages to take over and work on the
hundreds of ...

Read More
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Unfortunately the 'Read More link does not seem to work.



Eric Stevens

Eric,
I ran accross information that a Norwegian archaeologist is about to present
strong facts which link some artifacts as well as petroglyph in NA to a
named Norwegian king who in the myths are said to have lived during late
Bronze Age. Only read part of the proofs and most of it holds more water
than some here would want it to. The detail or part, what ever, I have left
to check is how far back the myth can be proven to have existed here in
Scandinavia.

Inger E


.

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