Racism in archaeology covers the phenomenon of interpreting archaeological remains in terms of speculations about the putative racial profiles of the peoples who created the structures which excavations have brought to light. Archaeologist Chris Gosden wrote "Racism occurs when judgements about people always proceed from their physical features of their body; when biology is given social force." [1]
Such racial readings of archaeological remains have a history which may be traced back at least to Josiah Priest and his 1833 book American Antiquities.
Great Zimbabwe is a medieval city in the south-eastern hills of Zimbabwe near Lake Mutirikwi and the town of Masvingo. It is thought to have been the capital of a little-known great kingdom during the country's Late Iron Age. [2] Construction on the city began in the 9th century and continued until it was abandoned in the 15th century. [3] [4] The edifices are believed to have been erected by the ancestral Shona. [5]
In the mid-16th century the Portuguese historian João de Barros remarked with awe on the 'marvellous grandeur' of these ruins which far outstripped Portuguese attempts to build castles in Sofala. He did not believe any indigenous culture could have produced them, commenting:
To say how and by whom these buildings could have been made is an impossible thing, for the people of that land have no tradition of that sort of thing and no knowledge of letters: therefore they take it for the work of the devil, for when they compare it with other buildings they cannot believe man could have made it.' [6]
The first excavation to be carried out at the site was by J. Theodore Bent who undertook a season at Zimbabwe with Cecil Rhodes's patronage and funding from the Royal Geographical Society and the British Association for the Advancement of Science. This and other excavations undertaken for Rhodes resulted in a book. Bent had no formal archaeological training, but had travelled very widely in Arabia, Greece and Asia Minor. He was aided by the expert cartographer and surveyor Robert M. W. Swan (1858 –1904), who also visited and surveyed a host of related stone ruins nearby. Bent stated in the first edition of his book The Ruined Cities of Mashonaland (1892) that the ruins revealed either the Phoenicians or the Arabs as builders, and he favoured the possibility of great antiquity for the fortress. By the third edition of his book (1902) he was more specific, with his primary theory being "a Semitic race and of Arabian origin" of "strongly commercial" traders living within a client African city.
The first scientific archaeological excavations at the site were undertaken by David Randall-MacIver for the British Association in 1905–1906. In Medieval Rhodesia, he rejected the claims made by Adam Render, Carl Peters and Karl Mauch, and instead wrote of the existence in the site of objects which were of Bantu origin. Randall-MacIver concluded that all available evidence led him to believe the Zimbabwe structures were constructed by the ancestors of the Shona people. [7] [8] [9]
Other reports arguing for an African origin followed but were controversial, as the white government of Rhodesia pressured archaeologists to deny its construction by black Africans. [10]
The Mound Builders were members of various indigenous North American cultures who constructed earthwork mounds from roughly 3500 BCE (the construction of Watson Brake) [11] to the 16th century CE. Geographically, the cultures were present in the region of the Great Lakes, the Ohio River Valley, and the Mississippi River valley and its tributary waters. [12] Mounds and Mound Builders had been visited and painted since the 16th century but it was Thomas Jefferson who in the 1780s did the first excavation. He dug a three foot deep strata trench in an effort to determine the purpose of the mound, something not attempted in America before. His conclusion was that they were barrows, not monuments, temples or settlements as they are now known to be. He saw Native Americans as too uncivilized to survive on their own and eventually used force to assimilate them into American society. [13]
A number of reports by French and English travel writers and colonists during the 17th and 18th century by writers such as William Bartram wrote about and illustrated the mounds, accepting that they were likely built by Native Americans. Irish historian James Adair wrote a book the History of the American Indians in which he acknowledged that they built the mounds, while at the same time arguing they were descended from a "lost tribe of Israelites. [14]
It was in the late 18th century a myth emerged that a separate race of Mound Builders unrelated to indigenous groups had created the mounds. At the same time a spirit of nationalism was developing in the United States, and historian Nicholas Timmerman wrote that "The Mound Builder theories posited an explanation for the mounds that allowed them to account for the often-elaborate constructions they encountered as the products of a “civilized” race that had been overrun by a “savage” one." [14]
In 1820 American archaeologist Caleb Atwater published his investigation into mounds along the Ohio River. His report followed archaeological principles of field work such as dendrochronology and stratigraphy. At the same time, influenced by the work of Constantine Samuel Rafinesque and a merchant named John D. Clifford, Atwater argued the mounds were created by “a people far more civilized than our Indians, but far less so than Europeans” which he considered to be a lost race of Hindus. [15]
In 1848 the fledgling Smithsonian Museum's first publication Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi Valley by Ephraim George Squier and Edwin Hamilton Davis, a major survey of sites according to apparent function, such as burial grounds, effigies, fortifications, and building foundations. It put forward what had become the common view of the time, that the Mound Builders were a more sophisticated race than 19th century Native American cultures. Suggested connections were to the Aztecs, Incans, Mayans or Egyptians. [14]
Archaeologist Samuel Foster Haven was later commissioned by the Smithsonian to write for their "Contributions to Knowledge" series about the current state of knowledge of American archaeology. The Smithsonian published his "Archaeology of the United States" in 1856 which accepted that the mounds were built by "the aborigines of the country. [16] [14]
The Bureau of American Ethnology published a study by Cyrus Thomas as its Annual Report of 1894. In it Thomas, who had begun by accepting the idea of a vanished race, argued that the Native Americans were not only capable but did build the mounds. This effectively ended the archaeological debate. [17] [14]
Today the archaeological consensus is clear - the various cultures that built mounds are descendants of the original settlers of the Americas. This has not stopped the myth from being spread. In a January 2023 an episode of Tucker Carlson's Fox Nation show "Tucker Carlson Today" had a guest who stated that "They didn't build 'em. Someone before them built 'em". Carlson replied "That's right" and saying there was "skeletal evidence of people who bear no genetic resemblance to the current Indians". [18]
Josiah Priest's 400-page publication American Antiquities centered around his study of the Bible and antiquarian journals, supplemented by information from his travels. After visiting earthworks in Ohio and New York, Priest concluded that these mounds could be traced back to a lost race that had inhabited America even before the Native Americans. This idea is now referred to as the "mound builder myth". The book grew in popularity because of Priest's views on Native Americans. "It tapped into the widely accepted view of those times that Native Americans were merely bloodthirsty savages, bent on the destruction of all but their own race. It was inconceivable to Priest and like-minded men that a race so lazy and inept could conceive and build such huge, elaborate structures." [19] Priest speculated that the original dwellers could be the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel. [20]
The reasoning Priest gives for his conclusion that there was an even earlier settler than the Native Americans relies upon his own interpretation of the Biblical flood story. According to Priest, after the great flood disappeared, Noah and his ark landed on America. While surveying the land, Noah also discovered mounds that had been constructed before the waters rose up. Upon seeing this, Noah questioned where these agricultural phenomena came from. "Surveying the various themes of mound builder origins, he could not decide whether the mounds were the work of Polynesians, Egyptians, Greeks, Romans, Israelites, Scandinavians, Welsh, Scotts, or Chinese, although he felt certain the Indians had not built them." [21] Priest's racism has also been discussed in detail by author Robert Silverberg, [22] archaeologist Stephen Williams, [23] and author Jason Colavito. [24]
Flinders Petrie worked closely with the scientific racists Francis Galton and Karl Pearson and over the years of his digging career sent bones, skulls and horses to their Anthropometric Laboratory at the University College London which led to him forming personal relationships with both. In turn his ideas on society were developed by their analyses of the biometric data. [25] Historian Debbie Challis wrote that "Petrie was a prestigious advocate of Galton's anthropometric data gathering and racial science in understanding ancient Egypt and archaeological evidence, as well as a backer of Galton’s eugenic vision in contemporary society." [26] Petrie argued that the culture of Ancient Egypt was derived from an invading Caucasoid "Dynastic Race", which had entered Egypt from the south in late predynastic times, conquered the "inferior, exhausted mulatto" natives, and slowly introduced the higher Dynastic civilisation as it interbred with them. [27] [28]
Gustav Kossinna, a German archaeologist, used archaeology to promote the ideology that a prehistoric 'Fatherland', and a superior 'Aryan race', once existed in ancient Europe that extended beyond Germany into Poland and other areas, and that this territory should be reunified to restore the German state. Later his ideas were adopted by the Nazis, and Kossina's theories became official doctrine. Archaeology was heavily expanded in Nazi Germany, but those who disagreed with Kossinna's archaeology were removed from teaching positions. Kossinna's approach, and its association with the Nazis, had a long-lasting effect on European archaeologists, making them reluctant to investigate questions of race or ethnicity in archaeological contexts. [29]
Great Zimbabwe is a medieval city in the south-eastern hills of the modern country of Zimbabwe, near Lake Mutirikwe and the town of Masvingo. It is thought to have been the capital of a kingdom during the Late Iron Age. Construction on the city began in the 11th century and continued until it was abandoned in the 15th century. The edifices were erected by ancestors of the Shona people, currently located in Zimbabwe and nearby countries. The stone city spans an area of 7.22 square kilometres (2.79 sq mi) and could have housed up to 18,000 people at its peak, giving it a population density of approximately 2,500 inhabitants per square kilometre (6,500/sq mi). It is recognised as a World Heritage Site by UNESCO.
Sir William Matthew Flinders Petrie, commonly known as simply Sir Flinders Petrie, was a British Egyptologist and a pioneer of systematic methodology in archaeology and the preservation of artefacts. He held the first chair of Egyptology in the United Kingdom, and excavated many of the most important archaeological sites in Egypt in conjunction with his wife, Hilda Urlin. Some consider his most famous discovery to be that of the Merneptah Stele, an opinion with which Petrie himself concurred. Undoubtedly at least as important is his 1905 discovery and correct identification of the character of the Proto-Sinaitic script, the ancestor of almost all alphabetic scripts.
Pseudoarchaeology—also known as alternative archaeology, fringe archaeology, fantastic archaeology, cult archaeology, and spooky archaeology—is the interpretation of the past by people who are not professional archaeologists and who reject or ignore the accepted data gathering and analytical methods of the discipline. These pseudoscientific interpretations involve the use of artifacts, sites or materials to construct scientifically insubstantial theories to strengthen the pseudoarchaeologists' claims. Methods include exaggeration of evidence, dramatic or romanticized conclusions, use of fallacious arguments, and fabrication of evidence.
The Cahokia Mounds State Historic Site is the site of a pre-Columbian Native American city directly across the Mississippi River from present-day St. Louis, Missouri. This historic park lies in south-western Illinois between East St. Louis and Collinsville. The park covers 2,200 acres (890 ha), or about 3.5 square miles (9 km2), and contains about 80 manmade mounds, but the ancient city was much larger. At its apex around 1100 CE, the city covered about 6 square miles (16 km2), included about 120 earthworks in a wide range of sizes, shapes, and functions, and had a population of between 15,000 and 20,000 people.
The relationship between Archaeology and the Book of Mormon is based on the claims made by the Book of Mormon that could be verified or discredited by archeological investigations. While members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and other denominations of the Latter Day Saint movement believe the Book of Mormon describes ancient historical events in the Americas, the available historical and archaeological facts point to the book being an anachronistic invention of Joseph Smith. Since the book's publication in 1830, Mormon archaeologists have been trying to use archaeological evidence to confirm the veracity of the narratives, but this has proved unsuccessful.
Below are notable events in archaeology that occurred in 1905.
Archaeology is the study of human activity in the past, primarily through the recovery and analysis of the material culture and environmental data that they have left behind, which includes artifacts, architecture, biofacts and cultural landscapes.
Many pre-Columbian cultures in North America were collectively termed "Mound Builders", but the term has no formal meaning. It does not refer to specific people or archaeological culture but refers to the characteristic mound earthworks that indigenous peoples erected for an extended period of more than 5,000 years. The "Mound Builder" cultures span the period of roughly 3500 BCE to the 16th century CE, including the Archaic period, Woodland period, and Mississippian period. Geographically, the cultures were present in the region of the Great Lakes, the Ohio River Valley, Florida, and the Mississippi River Valley and its tributary waters.
Cyrus Thomas was an American ethnologist and entomologist prominent in the late 19th century and noted for his studies of the natural history of the American West.
Below are notable events in archaeology that occurred in 1894.
Gertrude Caton Thompson, was an English archaeologist at a time when participation by women in the discipline was uncommon. Much of her archaeological work was conducted in Egypt. However, she also worked on expeditions in Zimbabwe, Malta, and South Arabia. Her notable contributions to the field of archaeology include creating a technique for excavating archaeological sites and information on Paleolithic to Predynastic civilizations in Zimbabwe and Egypt. Caton Thompson held many official positions in organizations such as the Prehistoric Society and the Royal Anthropological Institute.
An effigy mound is a raised pile of earth built in the shape of a stylized animal, symbol, religious figure, human, or other figure. The Effigy Moundbuilder culture is primarily associated with the years 550–1200 CE during the Late Woodland Period, although radiocarbon dating has placed the origin of certain mounds as far back as 320 BCE.
Nazi archaeology was a field of pseudoarcheology led and encouraged by various Nazi leaders and Ahnenerbe figures, such as Adolf Hitler and Heinrich Himmler, which directed archaeologists and other scholars to search Germany's archeological past in order to find material evidence supporting an advanced, Aryan ancestry as alleged and espoused by the ultranationalist Nazi Party.
Gustaf Kossinna was a German philologist and archaeologist who was Professor of German Archaeology at the University of Berlin.
The Bat Creek inscription is an inscribed stone tablet found by John W. Emmert on February 14, 1889. Emmert claimed to have found the tablet in Tipton Mound 3 during an excavation of Hopewell mounds in Loudon County, Tennessee. This excavation was part of a larger series of excavations that aimed to clarify the controversy regarding who is responsible for building the various mounds found in the Eastern United States.
David Randall-MacIver FBA was a British-born archaeologist, who later became an American citizen. He is most famous for his excavations at Great Zimbabwe which provided the first solid evidence that the site was built by Shona peoples.
Archaeology or archeology is the study of human activity through the recovery and analysis of material culture. The archaeological record consists of artifacts, architecture, biofacts or ecofacts, sites, and cultural landscapes. Archaeology can be considered both a social science and a branch of the humanities. It is usually considered an independent academic discipline, but may also be classified as part of anthropology, history or geography.
Josiah Priest (1788–1861) was an American nonfiction writer of the early 19th century. His books and pamphlets, which presented both standard and speculative history and archaeology sold in the thousands. Although Priest appears to have been poorly educated, he attempted to portray himself as an authority in his books. Priest is often identified as one of the creators of pseudoscientific and pseudohistoric literature. Although his work was widely read and several of his works were published in multiple editions, his books were characterized by theories that were used to justify the violent domination over both the Native American and African-American peoples. Priest's works were among the most overtly racist of his time. Priest's works help set the stage for the Trail of Tears and the defense of slavery that contributed to the conflicts of the American Civil War.
Jason Colavito is an American author and independent scholar specializing in the study of fringe theories particularly around ancient history and extraterrestrials. Colavito has written a number of books, including The Cult of Alien Gods (2005), The Mound Builder Myth (2020), and Legends of the Pyramids (2021).
Giant skeletons reported in the United States until the early twentieth century were a combination of hoaxes, scams, fabrications, and the misidentifications of extinct megafauna. Many were reported to have been found in Native American burial mounds. Examples from 7 ft (2.1 m) to 20 ft (6.1 m) tall were reported in many parts of the United States.