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Light from St Paul

March 27, 2020, 11:46 pm
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The Maya Society of Minnesota regularly invites eminent Mesoamericanists to present lectures and labs on the campus of Hamline University in St. Paul. The 2019 - 2020 speakers were intriguing and we have grandchildren in Minneapolis, so I joined the society and managed to make it to two meetings. This is a synopsis of what I found interesting in the presentations from a Book of Mormon perspective. My Book of Mormon insights are bolded.

September 20, 21, 2019 Andrew K. Scherer is a colleague of Stephen D. Houston at Brown Univeristy. Scherer was a student at Hamline who went on to get his PhD from Texas A&M. He taught at Wagner and Baylor before joining the Brown faculty. Bioarchaeology is his focus and he has received funding from NSF, NGS, and NEH. Much of his research has been in collaboration with Charles W. Golden from Brandeis. The two of them are leading authorities on the Usumacinta River area around Piedras Negras and Yaxchilán. Anything they publish has potential relevance because the Book of Mormon geography correlation I consider most likely to be correct (it passed a strict audit with a perfect score of 100%) locates the land of Melek in and around Yaxchilán. In Community of Christ/Restoration Branch circles, Book of Mormon scholars for over 100 years have correlated Yaxchilán with the city of Zarahemla. M. Wells Jakeman in the 1950's thought El Cayo may have been the city of Zarahemla.
Major Sites in the Area Scherer and Golden Have Studied
Scherer, Golden, Houston, and other collaborators published a major article entitled "Centering the Classic Maya Kingdom of Sak Tzi'i'" in Journal of Field Archaeology, Volume 45, 2020 - Issue 2, pp. 67-85. Sak Tzi'i' (white dog) was known from inscriptions, but archaeologists were not sure which site it was until Scherer et al. positively identified it as the site of Lacanja Tzeltal at the headwaters of the Lacanja River. Sak Tzi'i' was first settled ca. 750 BC.

Notes from Scherer: More than 2,000 ancient human remains have been recovered from Piedras Negras burials. Piedras Negras and Yaxchilán were peers and enemies. Sak Tzi'i' was a smaller site in the orbit of these two giants. Sak Tzi'i' had an Ajaw (lord) while the larger sites had a K'uhul Ajaw (holy lord). La Mar was another site that only had an Ajaw and it was subordinate to Piedras Negras. Piedras Negras Stela 26, Bonampak Lintel 2, and Toniná Monument 8 all mention taking captives from Sak Tzi'i'. Major sites in this area included Palenque, Toniná, Piedras Negras, and Yaxchilán.
About a dozen inscriptions from AD 608 through 864 mention Sak Tzi'i'. It was heavily looted in the 1960's and pieces from Sak Tzi'i' are now in major museum collections such as Denver, Brussels, New York, etc. The site dynasty endured for 300 years from AD 564 to 864.

An inscription from Sak Tzi'i' mentions och bi (road entering) which is a well-known ancient Mayan expression meaning "death." This reminds us of Lehi's words when his demise was imminent that he "must soon lay down in the cold and silent grave, from whence no traveler can return; a few more days and I go the way of all the earth."2 Nephi 1:14.

Stelae in this Upper Usumacinta region are mortuary monuments. This reminds us of the large stone Coriantumr carved to memorialize his life described in Omni 1:20-22.

An inscription from Sak Tzi'i' mentions a deluge event that happened in the remote past. The Maya believed the current world age which began on August 11, 3114 BC (4 ahau 8 kumk'u), was created after a universal flood. The Book of Mormon mentions the flood of Noah three times, in Alma 10:22, 3 Nephi 22:9, and Ether 6:7. See the blog articles entitled "Base Dates" and "Primordial Flood" for additional context.

Sak Tzi'i' was protected by steep riverbanks on one side and defensive walls on the other. The walls were 1 meter wide foundations for wooden palisades. This matches the Book of Mormon precisely. Alma 50:2-3 and 53:4 describe cities surrounded by earthen walls topped with wooden pickets.

UNAM and UADY were excavation partners. Sak Tzi'i' had a triadic group more or less following the pattern of the cross group at Palenque. The Usumacinta sites all had ballcourts in polity capitals. Sak Tzi'i' had a single altar ballcourt like Plan de Ayutla. One carving shows 2 bound captives. Flint and obsidian lance or spear points were deposited in a cache. In other words, this was a typical middle-sized classic Maya city state with 24 stelae, 11 altars, 1 panel, and 11 stone "squat monuments." Rulers are depicted holding serpent bars and some stelae are columnar. This map shows relative site locations.
Sites with Sak Tzi'i' Relationships
Sak Tzi'i' was a large center in the pre-classic. Early pots date from the middle to the late pre-classic. This makes it likely relevant to the Book of Mormon which took place largely in the pre-classic.

Many Sak Tzi'i' rulers had a Te' (tree) element in their names. K'ab' kan Te' is attested AD 628. K'ab' chan Te' is dated AD 636. Another K'ab' chan Te' has a date AD 722. Ye te' K'inich is dated AD 787 and another K'ab' chan Te' is attested AD 864. This is interesting because the idea that humans can become trees as described in Alma 32:28-43 is found throughout Mesoamerican art and iconography.
Pakal Ancestor K'an Joy Chitam as a Tree
Sarcophagus, Temple of the Inscriptions, Palenque
Drawing by Merle Greene Robertson
For more information, see the blog article "Anthropomorphic Trees."

Takeshi Inomata has the most exciting site (Aguada Fénix) in Mesoamerica. See the article "Usumacinta Olmec" for more information. Aguada Fénix will almost certainly re-write the book on Olmec - Maya interaction in the 1,000 - 700 BC time frame. For example, at the same time (ca. 700 BC) that Izapa on the south had over a dozen smaller copies of itself in its orbit (see the blog article "Izapa"), Aguada Fénix on the north had over a dozen smaller copies of itself in its area of influence, all following the "Middle Formative Usumacinta" site layout plan.

The agriculture that supported Piedras Negras was on the Mexican side of the Usumacinta. They used drained fields like the chinampas in Central Mexico. Yaxchilán collapsed AD 810. We see defensive fortifications (earthen walls) at Piedras Negras, Yaxchilán, and La Mar. Moroni commented ca. AD 400 that war was endemic among the Lamanites Mormon 8:8.

Scherer presented at a 2018 Tulane conference on warfare. In the 1940's, Experts thought the Maya were a peaceful people. Sir J. Eric S. Thompson wrote that warfare came late to the Maya area from Central Mexico, and that the Maya were astronomers, theologians, and timekeepers. Sylvanus Morley thought the "old empire" sculpture lacked militarism. In 1949, Life Magazine published an article about the murals at Bonampak that clearly showed warriors fighting. It was largely dismissed because archaeologists had not found fortifications or defensive structures.

The picture began to change when Stephen D. Houston wrote his dissertation at Yale (PhD 1987) describing defensive walls at Dos Pilas. Arthur Demarest published an article in National Geographic showing walls at Dos Pilas and a moat around Punta de Chimino. Chaak Ak' al, occupied from 300 BC to AD 150, had large scale defensive fortifications built ca. 75 BC, precisely at the time the Book of Mormon describes Captain Moroni fortifying cities throughout the greater land of Zarahemla Alma 50:1. The leading Book of Mormon geography correlation (the one that successfully passed a strict audit) identifies Noah with Chaak Ak' al. Scherer's grad student, Omar Andrés Alcover Firpi, studied fortifications at Becan which date from AD 100 - 250. Ceibal also has fortifications that date to ca. 75 BC. The leading Book of Mormon geography correlation places Aaron at Ceibal. Richard Terry and Bob Roylance identify Ceibal with the city of Zarahemla.

La Pasadita was a site subordinate to Yaxchilán. La Pasadita Lintel 1 is in the Ethnological Museum of Berlin. It is among a fortified ring of sites north of Yaxchilán that took advantage of natural barriers such as swamps and hills. La Pasadita is surrounded by low, short, linear rubble mounds built with rough, irregular rocks. The Book of Mormon says the Nephites built stone walls as fortifications Alma 48:8. Yaxchilán border settlements were typically on hilltops. Most of the people in Yaxchilán lived in low lying areas on the Guatemalan side of the Usumacinta. This supports the leading Book of Mormon geography correlation which has Alma II preaching in Melek adjacent to wilderness west of Sidon Alma 8:3, then crossing over Sidon and traveling 3 days journey (about 45 air kilometers) north to Ammonihah Alma 8:6. The correlation we are following places Ammonihah at El Hormiguero II on the Guatemalan San Pedro 7 air kilometers from the Mexican border.

This map shows Becan in the north and Izapa in the south, about 500 air kilometers distant from each other.
Archaeological Sites with Becan in the NE and Izapa in the SW
And this map shows the sites mentioned so far in the upper and middle Usumacinta areas.
Sites from Aguada Fénix in the North to Punta de Chimino in the South
Richard Terry (BYU Plant & Wildlife Sciences, Emeritus) determined that the main market at Piedras Negras was in the southern portion of the site. Helaman 7:10 verifies that Nephite cities had chief markets.

Yaxchilán was surrounded by a defensive ring of fortified settlements that included Chicozapote and Nuevo Guerrero on the Mexican side of the river and Tecolote, La Pasadita, and Oso Negro on the Guatemalan side. They protected Yaxchilán from Piedras Negras, its perennial enemy to the north. The Usumacinta north of Añaite is treacherous with rapids and the steep Chicozapote Canyon. There is an area of marshland around Laguneta Lacandon that is a natural chokepoint and border between Piedras Negras and Yaxchilán. About every 3 kilometers in this area a creek flows into the big river. There are travel routes both east and west of the Usumacinta. To go from Palenque to Piedras Negras to Yaxchilán you would travel east of the Usumacinta. This agrees precisely with the leading Book of Mormon correlation and the text. Palenque is thought to be in the lesser land of Zarahemla and the text says people traveling from Zarahemla to points south typically crossed over Sidon to Gideon and traveled southward from there Alma 6:7, Alma 16:7, Alma 17:1.
Book of Mormon Lands According to the Leading (Audited) Correlation
This map zooms in on the heavily fortified border area between Piedras Negras and Yaxchilán.
Piedras Negras, Yaxchilán, Natural Barriers and Fortified Border Sites
West of Piedras Negras are the Cola del Diablo Rapids where the Busiljá River enters the Usumacinta. The Chicozapote Rapids, aka Chicozapote Falls, aka Añaite Rapids, are between Yaxchilán and El Cayo. Arroyo Macabilero by Laguneta Lacandon is the border area. The Usumacinta in this area rises and falls by 10 meters from the dry season to the rainy season and back again. Streamflow varies from just under 500 cubic meters per second at low flow to as much as 5,500 cubic meters per second at peak flow in a wet year. The foliage is so thick and inclines so steep around Tecolote it can take up to 12 hours to travel 3 kilometers. On the other hand, you can walk the gentle slopes from Yaxchilán to La Pasadita in one day. The distance from Yaxchilán to La Pasadita is 15 air kilometers. 15 air kilometers is exactly the distance the leading (audited) Book of Mormon model deduces for the standard measure the text calls a "day's journey." See the blog article "Land Southward Travel Times."

There are low walls south of Arroyo Macabilero in the saddles between hills. 14 walls have been identified at Tecolote, 2 at La Pasadita, and 1 at El Tunel. 1 wall has been discovered at Yaxchilán and  that served as a foundation for wooden palisades or barricades. Bernal Diaz del Castillo in his The True History of the Conquest of New Spain translated by A.P. Maudslay and published by the Hakluyt Society of London in four volumes, 1908 - 1916, at approximately p. 300, talks about indigenous American's use of defensive barricades. The Lienzo de Quauhquechollan which depicts Alvarado's conquest of Central America shows native defensive barricades. A restored copy of the Lienzo is in the Museo Popol Vuh in Guatemala City. Some of the Guatemalan barricades had gates. The Lienzo also shows spiked pit horse traps.
Lienzo de Quauhquechollan Painted ca. 1530 Showing Wooden Palisades
Universidad Francisco Marroquín Digital Restoration
In an article entitled "Tecolote, Guatemala: Archaeological Evidence for a Fortified Late Classic Maya Political Border" published in Journal of Field Archaeology, Vol. 34, 2009, pp. 285-305, Scherer and Golden show a drawing of what defensive wooden palisades looked like anciently in this part of Guatemala.
Andrew Scherer's Drawing of Defensive Wooden Palisades at Tecolote
Andrew Restall in an article entitled "Invasion: The Maya at War, 1520's to 1540's" published in Embattled Bodies, Embattled Places: War in Pre-Columbian Mesoamerica and the Andes, Andrew K. Scherer and John W. Verano, editors (Washington DC: Dumbarton Oaks, 2014) says Maya defensive structures, including wooden barricades, were often designed to funnel and route invading warriors into designated killing fields.

In the Tecolote area, settlements were on hilltops with defensive structures including palisade-topped walls between the hills. Watch towers have been discovered around Tecolote, La Pasadita, and El Tunel. The Book of Mormon describes watch towers as part of Captain Moroni's defensive fortification strategy Alma 50:4.
Watch Towers Overlooking Defensive Walls in the Tecolote/La Pasadita Area
Map by Andrew K. Scherer published in Scherer and Golden 2009
This is a diagram of what the hilltop watch towers looked like from the air compared with a typical hilltop residential settlement.
a Watch Tower and b Hilltop Residential Patio in the Tecolote/La Pasadita Area
Diagram by G. Valle published in Scherer and Golden 2009
El Kinel is located inside a bend in the Usumacinta. A circular moat was constructed on the other side of the site so it was surrounded by water. This moat is almost identical to the one at Punta de Chimino. Bernal Diaz del Castillo in his The True History of the Conquest of New Spain, Maudslay translation, p. 305, describes very deep fosse (ditches or moats) used by native Mesoamericans in defensive fortifications. Large ditches were part of Captain Moroni's defensive fortification strategy Alma 49:18,22; 53:3-4.
Remains of Ancient Circular Moat Visible in Aerial Photography
El Kinel, 10 Air Kilometers SE of Yaxchilán
Zancudero is a pre-classic site with a high defensive wall 5 air kilometers east of Yaxchilán. Macabilero has good evidence of pre-classic warfare. On the Guatemalan side of the river are cut stone blocks 15 to 20 feet tall. This kind of megatlithic defensive architecture is rare in Mesoamerica. Megalithic blocks of granite may have been Mormon's defensive architecture strategy at the city of Desolation Mormon 3:6, 4:4. See the blog articles "French Connection" and "The Narrow Pass and Narrow Passage."

At Macabilero, excavators found quantities of small round sling stones. They are about the size of tennis balls. Houston and Garrison found similar stocks of small round sling stones at La Cuernavilla Fortress west of Tikal. The Book of Mormon says both the Nephites and Lamanites commonly used stones as weapons Alma 49:2,4,19,22. Alma 50:5 says the Nephites cast stones from their defensive towers which probably means they used slings.

This is a screen capture from the video "Dr. Stephen Houston - Recovering a Lost World" of a presentation the noted Mayanist gave at BYU on Monday, October 28, 2019. It shows a Maya warrior on attack.
Maya Warrior Armed with a Stone in His Hand
And these are some of the tennis ball-sized stones found at La Cuernavilla from the same video.
Sling Stones Excavated at La Cuernavilla Fortress near El Zotz, Peten
There are 13 walls in saddles between hills around La Mar, Chiapas. The walls clearly show post holes where wooden palisades once stood. Wall fill includes dart points and bi-faces rather than the pot shards commonly found at other sites.
Post Molds in Defensive Wall from El Kinel, Peten
This photo was published in Golden and Scherer, "Border Problems: Revent Archaeological Research Along the Usumacinta River,"The PARI Journal, Vol. VII, No. 2, Fall 2006. I thank my friend, Richard Terry, for bringing this to my attention.

10 defensive walls have been discovered at Piedras Negras, north of the site center. They date to the early classic. 2 defensive walls have been discovered by Yaxchilán in addition to the one in the city. Lacanja Tzeltal (Sak Tzi'i') was fotified. There were late pre-classic fortresses at Macabilero and Zancudero. Chinikiha also dates to the pre-classic, although no fortifications are presently known. Some walls, such as those at La Mar, protected the city. Other walls, such as those at La Pasadita and Oso Negro, protected the greater polity (in this case, Yaxchilán).
Sites Referenced in the Greater Yaxchilán Area
These are sites referenced in the Greater Piedras Negras Area.
Sites in theVicinity of Piedras Negras
Andrew Scherer closed out his presentation talking about sacrifices. The Maya sacrificed themselves, animals, children, and captives. Auto-sacrifice was generally done by piercing the tongue or genitals with a stingray spine, obsidian blade, or sharpened bone handle. Yax ch'ab was the royal imperative to feed the gods and placate the supernaturals. Royal blood was dripped on paper which was burned and the ascending smoke was thought to provide divine nourishment, forestall divine ire, and ensure human well-being. Well-known iconographic portrayals include Dos Pilas Panel 19, Yaxchilán Lintel 3, Yaxchilán Throne 1, and a monument from Palenque Temple XXI. The Hauberg Stela references god G1 and depicts a young royal's first bloodletting.
Hauberg Stela, Princeton Museum of Art
The Book of Mormon references the Mesoamerican cultural practice of royal bloodletting in Alma 34:11.

Animals sacrificed by the Maya included bobwhites. The Book of Mormon says the Nephites offerred animal sacrifices Mosiah 2:3.

 Child sacrifices are depicted on El Cayo Altar 4 and Piedras Negras Stela 11. El Zotz Burial 9 contained six children in ceramic vases. They ranged in age from six months to 4 years. El Zotz Burials 6 and 15 also contained children sacrificed in ceramic offering vessels.
Child Sacrifice in a Cache Vessel Atop a Tripod, Justin Kerr Photo K1645
The Book of Mormon describes Lamanites sacrificing children Mormon 4:14, 21.

Sacrificing captives was a widespread practice among the Maya.
Captive Prisoners Awaiting Decapitation, Justin Kerr Photo K680
The Book of Mormon describes Lamanites killing Nephite prisoners of war Alma 56:12 and sacificing war captives Mormon 4:14, 21.
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On October 19-20, 2019, I was privileged to hear Takeshi Inomata discuss his recent work at Aguada Fénix. He enntitled his presentation "Large Ceremonial Constructions at the Dawn of Maya Civilization." Inomata frequently teams up with Daniela Triadan. He directed the Ceibal-Petexbatun Archaeological Project from 2005 - 2017 in Peten, Guatemala and currently directs the Middle Usumacinta Archaeological Project in Tabasco, Mexico. He thrives on paradigm changes. He received his PhD from Vanderbilt. My notes from a lecture he gave at BYU on March 8, 2016 are in the blog article "Takeshi Inomata."

Maya origins were explosive, not gradual. From 330 BC to AD 250 sites in the Mirador Basin rose to great heights. During the early pre-classic, prior to 1,000 BC, those same sites were pre-ceramic. in 1,200 BC, artisans at San Lorenzo erected an enormous artificial plateau. By the middle pre-classic, 1,000 BC, La Venta was just beginning to develop. Aguada Fénix began at 1,000 BC. It had no direct Olmec influence. La Venta had an E Group. It has been said that La Venta was part of the Middle Formative Chiapas cultural tradition widely attested throughout the Grijalva Basin. That nomenclature is not necessarily accurate. There were E Groups throughout the Maya area. It has been said that greenstone and centerline caches were not present in the Maya area but were characteristic of the Middle Formative Chiapas sites such as La Venta, San Isidro, Chiapa de Corzo, and La Libertad. That is expressly not true. Inomata began working at Ceibal in 2005. They found a cache, then more greenstone caches along the E-W centerline axis of an E Group. They found an Olmec carving in the early Ceibal construction phase from 1,000 to 700 BC. 176 C-14 dates have been analyzed from Ceibal, making it the most accurately-dated Maya site.

Ceramics first appear at Ceibal at 950 BC. They first appear at La Venta 1,000 - 900 BC. La Venta was a large center by 800 BC. Ceibal was founded in the gap after the collapse of San Lorenzo and before La Venta became powerful. La Carmelita, west of the Usumacinta on the outskirts of Emiliano Zapata, Tabasco, dates to 900 BC. It shows both Middle Formative Chiapas (MFC) and Middle Formative Usumacinta (MFU) characteristics. MFC and MFU are planned site layout patterns.
MFC (White Pins) and MFU (Yellow Pins) Sites, San Lorenzo
Aguada Fénix (AF) is only 3 kilometers from the site of El Tiradero which follows the MFC pattern. AF and most of the other MFU sites were discovered with LiDAR. It has ramps, reservoirs, North South causeways, and a 15 meter high artificial platform. It has a 5 kilometer causeway to the north that is 200 meters wide. It has an E Group and a small pyramid. The site is as large as central Tikal or central Teotihuacan. Excavators found a floor with a checkerboard pattern made from different colored clays. It looks like the floral carpets you see in Antigua, Guatemala during Semana Santa.

1,200 BC AF was nothing but a midden. The plateau was built beginning 1,000 BC, which makes AF slightly older than Ceibal. Construction stopped at AF 800 BC. Some of the construction was with large stones. The causeways were built 900 - 800 BC. Some of them have multiple floors. Some comparative sizes:
  • Pyramid of the Sun, Teotihuacan 1,600,000 cubic meters
  • Platform, Aguada Fénix 2,800,000 cubic meters
  • La Danta, El Mirador 2,800,000 cubic meters
  • Platform, San Lorenzo 4,000,000 cubic meters
Some comparative dates:
  • 1,400 - 1,100 BC San Lorenzo
  • 1,000 - 800 BC Aguada Fénix
  • 950 BC Ceibal construction began
  • 800 - 400 BC La Venta
Comparative characteristics:
  • San Lorenzo had artificial plateaus and no pyramids
  • Aguada Fénix had an artificial plateau and a small pyramid
  • Ceibal had multiple pyramids
  • La Venta had no plateau and pyramids
There is movement over time from horizontal monumentality to vertical monumentality. There was not much maize cultivated prior to 1,000 BC. Beginning 1,000 BC, maize was prevalent. The Book of Mormon says the Jaredites raised grain Ether 9:17, 10:12.

Maize agriculture provided the caloric base to support large populations. The Book of Mormon says the Jaredites had large populations Ether 15:2.

Ceramics are well-established in the Olmec heartland by 1,200 BC. They enter the Maya area at 1,000 BC. The clay is similar at San Lorenzo, Ceibal, and AF. No caches have been discovered yet at AF. One cache at Ceibal has greenstones with depictions of the Olmec maize god. The main North South axis at AF is 9 degrees east of true north. The MFC pattern dates from 800 - 400 BC. The Grijalva centers declined in 400 BC along with La Venta. The MFU pattern pre-dates MFC.

Inomata's lab on Saturday focused on LiDAR and then covered a miscellany of topics. Arlen and Diane Chase who dig Caracol were the first to use LiDAR. Inomata followed at Ceibal. LiDAR flights are done at the end of the dry season. Dense vegetation at ground level in northern Yucatan makes LiDAR less effective. You can change from near infrared to intermediate infrared to far infrared depending on the tree canopy cover. Besides Caracol and Ceibal, LiDAR has now been done at Teotihuacan, Aguada Fénix I and II, Izapa, Dzibanche, Peten (PACUNAM I and II), El Mirador, a Belizean consortium funded by the Alphawood Foundation, Mayapan, Chichen Itza, the Coba causeway, Tres Zapotes, Palenque, and Yaxchilán. LiDAR is effective in primary forest, less so in secondary forest.

The Petexbatun E groups end ca. 300 BC, just after the MFC sites in the Grijalva Basin. Around Ceibal, structures were built on high ground. The structural density at Ceibal is 450 structures per square kilometer. Ceibal was abandoned between AD 900 - 950.

Aguada Fénix is oriented 9 degrees E of true N. El Tiradero 3 kilometers away is oriented precisely N S. Aguada Fénix (AF) got its name from Rancho Fénix whose land its on. Balancan, 45 air kilometers west of AF,  has Olmec iconography. Sediment analysis from cores drilled in Lake Pajonal 10 kilometers east of Villahermosa shows data patterns almost identical with those from La Venta. It is possible the Villahermosa area was part of greater La Venta from 800 - 400 BC. This is interesting because La Venta was likely part of the Jaredite land northward. If La Venta extended all the way to Villahermosa, then we may have to re-think the current proposal for the land northward/land southward boundary.
La Venta, Villahermosa, and Current Proposed Jaredite Boundary
The Usumacinta at Boca del Cerro pre-dates the mountains which is why it cut right through the ridge. Inomata is impressed with Boca del Cerro. So am I. It is one of the most dramatic physical features I have seen anywhere on earth. It is the point where a lush coastal plain, big river, steep canyon, and high jungle mountain all come together. In the leading (audited) Book of Mormon correlation, Boca del Cerro is the boundary between the lesser land of Zarahemla on the north and the upland wilderness on the south that eventually leads to the land of Nephi.
Boca del Cerro, Tabasco, a Geographical Inflection Point
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I did not make it to hear Ruud van Akkeren who is a Research Associate with the Universidad del Valle in Guatemala City, but his material is useful to students of the Book of Mormon, so I include a brief note here. A handful of people over the years have spent so much time with the Maya they have practically gone native which makes them invaluable resources for Maya thought processes, speech patterns, and lifeways. Dennis Tedlock is one of these people and he has produced a splendid library of works including the very important Rabinal Achi (See the blog article "Rabinal Achi" for Book of Mormon connections). Allen Christenson is another and he has produced the quintessential Popol Vuh. My friend, Kerry Hull, is another and he has produced dictionaries of Ch'orti' Maya as well as studies of Maya poetry. Ruud van Akkeren is one of these exceptional Mayanist/ethnographers and he is working on the Kaqchikel Memorial de Sololá.

Dr. Akkeren contends that the academic division specialists make between highland and lowland Maya is artificial and misleading. For him, the Popol Vuh and other Maya documents are highly relevant to our understanding of the classic Maya inscriptions from the lowlands. He emphasizes lineage connections over ethnic or language groups and believes Maya writings are best understood as lineage histories. In other words, blood is thicker than water. The Book of Mormon is a lineage history. Lehi was a descendant of Manasseh Alma 10:3 which tied him into Abraham through Joseph 1 Nephi 5:14. Ammon was a descendant of Zarahemla Mosiah 7:3 who was a descendant of Mulek Mosiah 25:2. Lamoni was a descendant of Ishmael Alma 17:21. Ammoron was a descendant of Zoram Alma 54:23. Before Amulek preached to his fellow citizens in his home town of Ammonihah, he recited an 8 step genealogy that tied him into Joseph who was sold into Egypt, a heroic figure who had lived approximately 1,500 years earlier Alma 10:2-3. We could go on and on. The book of Ether is organized genealogically around the descendants of Jared. After the founding epic, Jared's famous brother gets basically ignored because his descendants were not the Jaredite kings. At the end of his record, Mormon re-stated his lineage Mormon 8:13, a fact he had already mentioned twice before 3 Nephi 5:20, Mormon 1:5. Like Maya writings, the Book of Mormon is best understood as a lineage history.
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Herschel Pedersen (1929 - 2020)

April 3, 2020, 12:59 am
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My friend and mentor, Herschel Noel Pedersen, died April 1, 2020 at age 91. He was a giant of a man who kindled a spiritual flame inside me that has never dimmed. I was privileged to grow up in the American Fork 12th Ward where Herschel was a larger-than-life hometown hero. A better missionary I have never known. Herschel was fearless and disarmingly self-effacing. He talked the talk and walked the walk with a flair for public speaking that kept audiences spellbound. Miracles large and small hovered around him. His work ethic was legendary. In his prime, his recall was nearly photographic. He read all four standard works multiple times each year and could quote chapter and verse for hours. Herschel was a champion basketball player, a champion steelworker, a champion storyteller, a champion patriarch, a champion Latter-day Saint.
Herschel and Shirley Pedersen
Story #1. American Fork Canyon. When I was young the local seventies proselytized out of staters camping in American Fork Canyon. We looked for interesting license plates and visited with folks, giving them a loaf of homemade bread or a plate of cookies and a copy of the Book of Mormon. When I first heard about this outreach, I was appalled. How dare we Latter-day Saints impose our beliefs on unsuspecting tourists who just happen to be spending part of their vacation in our gorgeous canyon? Herschel persuaded me to be his junior companion. One evening with him visiting around campfires was all it took. We had incredible experiences getting to know amazing sons and daughters of God. Herschel had a knack for asking deep, probing questions such as "Do you know anyone who has actually seen an angel?" I went up the canyon with him many times. It felt a little odd giving copies of the Book of Mormon to campers who were holding a can of Coors in the other hand, but we always left smiling. Herschel endeared himself to his new friends swapping hunting, fishing, or sports stories before bearing his testimony. When I landed in the mission field at age 19, sharing the Gospel was perfectly natural. Peru was a cake walk. I had been a "canyon missionary" with a pro.

Story #2. John Sagers. John was a fellow graduate, American Fork High School, class of '71. He was a bright, handsome, talented young man and a good friend. We had played football together all through junior high and high school. John's family were Episcopalians so he got to drink real wine in their version of the Sacrament. John's dad was the superintendent of the training school, now the Utah State Developmental Center, and they lived in a stately home on the campus grounds. John was dating Ann Richards, a Latter-day Saint girl who got him thinking about the Church. The summer after our high school graduation, he worked alongside DR Gardner and the two of them talked religion. DR gave him a copy of the Book of Mormon and John began to read. His parents wouldn't allow the book in their home, so he hid it inside a plastic bag under a lilac bush near the training school ampitheater. He would read for an hour or so every day after work before returning home. Late one evening, I visited him and all he wanted to talk about was the Book of Mormon. I suggested we visit Herschel. It was after 11 pm when we knocked on Herschel's door and he welcomed us in his pajamas. For about two hours light and spirit and joy filled the Pedersen dining room so powerfully that a couple of high school football buddies couldn't hold back the tears. John went home that night with a spiritual flame inside that never dimmed. He died a few days later on August 5, 1971, in a tragic automobile accident on I-15 in Salt Lake County.

Story #3. Patriarch. Blaine Durrant is Herschel's grandson. Blaine and Caroline were our next-door neighbors for several years. Blaine told me this story. A few years ago, before Herschel and Shirley moved from their home on 850 East, Herschel gathered his posterity together and gave every one of them a father's, grandfather's, or great-grandfather's blessing. His family was so large the process took two days, but he wanted to do what Adam D&C 107:53-56, Jacob (Israel) Genesis chapters 48 and 49, and Lehi 2 Nephi 4:12 had done. He had been a young missionary in Denmark, a Regional Representative of the Twelve, a mission president in New Zealand, a senior missionary in Denmark, and a counselor in the Mount Timpanogos Temple Presidency. He was a Temple sealer. Visions and blessings and the scriptures had been his daily fare for decades, but this was special. These were the members of his and Shirley's eternal family. Some of the blessings were prophetic. Some were wake up calls. All were profoundly personal and insightful. Things were communicated spiritually to Herschel acting in his office as patriarch that he could not possibly have known beforehand. It was a sacred revelatory experience none of his family members will ever forget. Herschel kindled many spiritual flames that will never dim.

The year before we all left on our missions, DR Gardner, Paul Terry, Claire  Rinehart, John Lambert, Bruce McDaniel, and I met almost every Sunday night with Herschel around his dining room table for an informal mission prep. Sometimes Shirley would bring out cardboard boxes full of press clippings from his basketball days. Sometimes he would regale us with stories of his Korean War experience playing volleyball all over Japan on some high-ranking general's personal team. He told great stories about courting Shirley and the little dramas of raising a large family. Occasionally, his wife would chime in, "Husband (she always called him "husband"), that's not true!" Herschel was not above a little hyperbole now and again for dramatic effect. Stories from "the plant" (Geneva Steel) were legion and often heart-wrenching. Preaching the Gospel daily to a tough bunch of steelworkers was a dicey proposition. One evening, Herschel inquired about our dates. We were all freshmen at BYU. I volunteered that I wanted to ask out Sharmon Oaks whose father, Dallin, was the new President of BYU, but I was scared to call her. He said in his big booming voice, "That's a problem we can solve!" He picked up the phone, dialed the Oaks residence, asked for Sharmon, and announced, "We have a problem and you're part of it," then handed me the phone.    

American Fork will never be the same without Herschel Pedersen, but oh what glory now attends this great man.
Herschel as a Foreman at Geneva Steel
For a fascinating story about Herschel's constructive role in a curious Book of Mormon plot, see the blog article "Frauds and Hoaxes."
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This from DR Gardner: What a blessing to have known Herschel. My testimony received a huge kick start stitting around his table on the Sundays of 1971. He performed the marriage for both of my daughters.
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This from Claire Rinehart: I have been recording memories of my youth and I recently wrote thoughts about John Sagers, where I mentioned Herschel. I will need to record more thoughts about him since this message has brought a flood of good memories.
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This from Deseret News sportswriter Dick Harmon: https://www.deseret.com/2020/4/3/21206947/herschel-pederson-byu-lds-mormon-missionary-danish-basketball-death-american-fork
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Herschel's Eulogy: http://warenski.com/wpstaging/2020/04/03/herschel-n-pedersen/
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One Aspect of President Nelson's Hinge Point

April 5, 2020, 12:53 pm
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While in Rome for the dedication of the Rome Temple in March, 2019, Pres. Russell M. Nelson said this particular temple is "a hinge point in the history of the Church." https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/church/news/president-nelson-calls-rome-temple-dedication-a-hinge-point-in-church-history?lang=eng
The prophet then added "Things are going to move forward at an accelerated pace."

This prophetic observation was repeated by Church News in their 2019 year end recap. https://www.thechurchnews.com/leaders-and-ministry/2019-12-27/president-nelson-rome-hinge-point-church-history-170654

Then, as the prophet gave his 2020 New Year's admonition, he asked all members to share the Gospel and prepare to celebrate the bi-centennial of the First Vision in April General Conference. He added "The time to act is now. This is a hinge point in the history of the Church and your part is vital." https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/church/news/president-nelson-extends-important-invitation-to-all-latter-day-saints-in-2020?lang=eng

In one important way, 2019 was a literal hinge point in the history of the Church. The rate of Church membership growth increased in 2019 after 6 years of steady decline. Here are the numbers. As with all images on this blog, click to enlarge.
Church Membership Growth 1975 - 2019
And here is the graph showing the literal hinge point in 2019.
Church Membership Growth Rate 1975 - 2019
Under the inspired leadership of Pres. Nelson, we as a Church experienced not only growth but an increase in our growth rate in 2019.

The prophet asked us all to act because our part is vital. With talented and dedicated associates, I volunteer as Executive Director of Book of Mormon Central. From 2016 - 2019 we achieved 152k followers on Facebook, 4.7 million views on YouTube, 2.8 million listens on Soundcloud and iTunes, and 8.7 million pageviews on websites. These results are from our English and Spanish initiatives combined. With the alignment of Come Follow Me and our stellar Book of Mormon content, all of these numbers are up dramatically in 2020. We are going to work hard doing our small part to help the upward trajectory of the hinge continue.
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New Church Symbol - Book of Mormon Connection

April 5, 2020, 5:00 pm
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We are all indebted to mesoamericanist and BYU faculty member Mark Alan Wright for this remarkable insight. He published it in his 2014 Axes Mundi article in Interpreter and shared it with us on his 2015 tour of Guatemala.
Mark Wright with Tikal Temple I in Background
Book of Mormon Central published it as part of KnoWhy #211 that came out in October, 2016.

When the Savior appeared to his apostles in the Old World after his resurrection, they were shown first the nail prints in his hands and second the wound in his side. We see this order in John 20:20, 25, 27. The version in Luke 24:39, 40 mentions only his hands and his feet. His followers in Judea, familiar with Roman execution by crucifixion, would have focused primarily on the prints of the nails in his hands and his feet.

When the Savior appeared to his disciples and others gathered at the Temple in land Bountiful about a year after his death and resurrection in Jerusalem, he showed them his wounded body, but this time the order of the sacrificial symbols was reversed. The Nephites were invited to first thrust their hands into his side and second feel the prints of the nails in his hands and feet 3 Nephi 11:14, 15. In Mesoamerica, where human sacrifice was often by heart extraction, people would have focused primarily on the wound in his side.

The resurrected Savior bore physical sacrificial symbols meaningful to both his Old and New World followers. He explicitly told the Nephites these symbols would convince them he was "the God of the whole earth"3 Nephi 11:14.

The magnificent new Church symbol, derived from Bertel Thorvaldsen's Christus statue in the Church of Our Lady, Copenhagen and McRay Magleby's 1995 logo design, shows both the wound in the Savior's side and the prints of the nails in his hands and feet.
New Church Symbol
Representing the Risen Lord
Atop a Cornerstone
A fitting symbol for "the only true and living church upon the face of the whole earth"D&C 1:30.
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COVID-19 Death Rates by State

April 8, 2020, 9:46 am
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The Center for Systems Science and Engineering at Johns Hopkins University publishes COVID-19 cases and dates by state. This is their data as of April 7, 2019. As with all images on this blog, click to enlarge.
COVID-19 Death Rates by State
If you are infected with the virus, how likely are you to die? Where you live makes a difference. Among all US states and territories, only American Samoa has had no cases of the virus and only Wyoming has had cases but no deaths. Both are statistical outliers. The population of American Samoa (2017 estimate) is only 55,641 and Wyoming (2020 estimate) has the smallest population of any US state with 567,025 inhabitants. Among all other US states and territories, Utah has the lowest death rate at .74% of COVID-19 cases. This is partly because Utah has the lowest median age (31) of any US state. Families in Utah have more children than families in other states. The median household size in Utah is 3.13, highest in the nation. Utah also has excellent health care infrstructure and a relatively low poverty rate. Most people know 68.01% of Utahns are members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Frequently the national media publishes "beauty pageant" data ranking the US states for this, that, or the other criteria. Over the years, I have been intrigued to notice how often Utah ranks #1 for the good stuff and #50 for the bad. When the Internet was fairly new, I published a website called "ProUtah." It was a lot of work and after a couple of years, I gave it up, but in that time I compiled about 100 examples of Utah's relative superiority to the other 49 states. Some contrary examples surfaced, so I quickly put up a sister site named "ConUtah," but overall the trend was strongly favorable toward the Beehive State. My motive, of course, was to see if I could demonstrate empirically that the Latter-day Saint belief system and lifestyle led to desirable outcomes. "By their fruits ye shall know them."Matthew 7:20. This statistical approach to comparative religion, using Utah as a convenient proxy for membership in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, seemed to me to validate the promise in Mosiah 2:41 that adherence to God's commandments leads to temporal and spiritual blessings.
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Zeroing in on Cumorah

April 23, 2020, 12:09 pm
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It occurred to me last night that Mosiah 8:8 adds an additional element to the list of textual criteria describing the land of Cumorah. The land where we will find hill Ramah/Cumorah was not just a land of many waters, rivers, and fountains Mormon 6:4. (The term "many waters" as used by Book of Mormon authors refers to salt water ocean as in 1 Nephi 17:5 and Psalm 93:4. See the blog article "Many Waters.") The place where the Jaredites destroyed themselves in civil war and where the combined forces of the Lamanites and Gadianton Robbers Mormon 2:27,28; 8:9 annihilated the Nephites (Ramah = Cumorah per Ether 15:11) was a land among many waters Mosiah 8:8.

The OED says "among" derives from crowd or assemblage and means "surrounded by" locally. Thus, Columbus was among the Gentiles 1 Nephi 13:12 before he embarked on his epic voyage of discovery in 1492. Adam and Eve hid among the trees in the Garden of Eden Genesis 3:8 (which reads "among" rather than "amongst" in the 1535 Coverdale Bible). Ether 9:3 tells us there was a seacoast due east of hill Ramah/Cumorah. Mosiah 8:8's use of the word "among" tells us salt water ocean surrounds the land of Cumorah on more than one side.

The Book of Mormon geographic correlation that passed a strict audit with a perfect score of 100% (see the blog article "Auditing Book of Mormon Geography Models") places the land of Cumorah in the Tuxtla Mountain region of southern Veracruz where it is literally surrounded by salt water on more than one side.
Land of Cumorah Among Many (Salt) Waters
For another 30 textual criteria this correlation satisfies, see the blog article "Ramah/Cumorah." For an independent corroboration of this correlation, see the blog article "Linguistic Cumorah."
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Mesoamerican Chronological Alignment with Book of Mormon Events

April 29, 2020, 10:27 pm
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This article is a work in process documenting remarkable temporal concordance between Mesoamerican events known to science and historical events recorded in the Book of Mormon.
  • Ceramics first appear in the archaeological record in Oaxaca/Puebla ca. 2,000 BC. See the blog article "Early Settlement Sequence." The Book of Mormon describes the Jaredites in an upland land of Moron early in their history Ether 7:5-6.
  • Ceramics show up in the Olmec heartland (Veracruz/Tabasco) ca. 1,500 BC. See the same blog article "Early Settlement Sequence." The Book of Mormon describes Jaredite movement out of Moron into coastal lowlands midway through their history Ether 9:3.
  • Ca. 550 BC the formerly Olmec Izapa experienced an influx of new artistic and cultural influences that created the vibrant monumental art the site is known for today. This is just when Laman and Lemuel were establishing what would become Lamanite civilization in the land of first inheritance. See the blog article "Izapa."
  • The eastern portion of the Olmec heartland declined ca. 400 - 350 BC, and the capital, La Venta, was abandoned. See Richard A. Diehl, The Olmecs: America's First Civilization, (London and New York: Thames and Hudson, 2004) p. 82. This correlates well with the Jaredite demise. Coriantumr spent nine moons with the people of Zarahemla prior to the arrival of Mosiah I who discovered the Mulekite capital ca. 200 BC Omni 1:21.
  • Ca. 100 BC imposing Teotihuacan began its rise to prominence and some of its early inhabitants came from the Maya area of southern Mesoamerica. See George Cowgill, "State and Society at Teotihuacan, Mexico" in Annual Review of Anthropology, 26 (1) (1997) pp. 129-161. Ca. 55 BC the Book of Mormon describes the first of many large-scale Nephite migrations into the land northward Alma 63:4.
  • Takeshi Inomata and associates, in their Ceibal-Petexbatun Archaeological Project (CPAP), discovered large-scale defensive structures that were built ca. 75 BC. This is precisely the time Captain Moroni was fortifying Nephite cities through greater Zarahemla. See the blog article "75 BC."
  • Popocatépetl between Puebla and the Valley of Mexico and Tacaná on the Mexico/Guatemala line both erupted ca. AD 30. See the blog article "Volcanic Eruptions Near the Time of Christ." The Book of Mormon describes regional destruction in the lands southward and northward at the Savior's death 3 Nephi 8:11-12.
  • Takeshi Inomata and associates identified an upheaval and decline they call the "Preclassie Pan-regional collapse" ca. AD 125 - 175. El Mirador is the type site for this Preclassic collapse. See Inomata, et al., "High-precision radiocarbon dating of political collapse and dynastic origins at the Maya site of Ceibal, Guatemala" in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), 114 (6) (February 7, 2017) pp. 1293-1298. This is precisely the time when Lamanites appear again in the Nephite record 4 Nephi 1:20 after the great period of peace that followed the Savior's appearance in land Bountiful.
  • On January 16, AD 378, Teotihuacan military emmisary Siyaj K'ak' presided over the death of the king of Tikal. Eventually he installed a new ruler loyal to Central Mexico and ushered in a new political order in the Maya lowlands that lasted 150+ years until the first Tikal-Calakmul war began in AD 537. This is the famous "entrada" recorded on El Peru Stela 15, Tikal Stela 31, and Naachtun Stela 24, among others. This precisely matches the time Mormon was preparing the Nephites for the final battle at Ramah/Cumorah where they were annihilated by a combined army of Lamanites and Gadianton Robbers. See the blog article "Robbers and Lamanites."
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Money in Ancient America

May 26, 2020, 10:50 pm
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The Book of Mormon describes an advanced market economy with:
  1. Chief markets Helaman 7:10
  2. Many merchants, lawyers, and officers 3 Nephi 6:11
  3. Written records that facilitated trade Mosiah 24:6
  4. Riches gained through trade Mosiah 24:7
  5. Taxes imposed by the central government Mosiah11:3, Ether 10:5
  6. Money as a store of value Alma 1:5, Helaman 7:5, 9:20
  7. Precious metal tokens as standardized exchange currency Alma 11:13-19
  8. Value of currency tokens tied to fixed measures of agricultural commodities Alma 11:7,15
  9. Judges paid hourly wages Alma 11:1
  10. Debt collection via legal process Alma 11:2
  11. Free trade zones over wide areas Helaman 6:8
  12. Forced tribute payments Mosiah 7:15
We now know that the ancient Maya had an advanced market economy with many of these same characteristics. An important article entitled "Imagining a Complex Maya Political Economy: Counting Tokens and Currencies in Image, Text and the Archaeological Record" by David A. Freidel, Marilyn A. Masson, & Michelle Rich was published in Cambridge Archaeological Journal, Volume 27, Issue 1 (February, 2017) pp. 29-54. The article discusses a number of points interesting to serious students of the Nephite text. The number in aqua at the end of each point indicates which Book of Mormon characteristic from the list above it resembles or corroborates.
  • P. 29 Accounting practices have a long history of use in ancient Mesoamerica. 3
  • P. 29 Currencies have a long history of use in ancient Mesoamerica. 6
  • P. 29 Some Mesoamericans were literate and numerate. 3
  • P. 29 Mesoamerican socieites had authorities. 2
  • P. 29 Potential accounting devices (counting sticks and tokens) have been discovered.
  • P. 29 Standardized objects made from marine shells were likely used as money. 6
  • P. 29 Tribute payments were widespread throughout Mesoamerica 12
  • P. 29 It is now understood that the Maya had marketplaces 1
  • P. 29 The Maya used currencies as media of exchange 7
  • P. 29 References to ancient Maya merchants have been identified 2
  • P. 29 Trade zones were extensive 11
  • P. 30 The Maya used currency to measure debt 10
  • P. 30 The Maya employed scribal accountants 2
  • P. 30 In the Maya monetary system, tokens represented key commodities 8
  • P. 31 Marine shells, cacao beans, and woven cloth all served as currencies 6
  • P. 32 Book keepers recorded numbers on written leaves, tally scrolls, or books 3
  • P. 32 Shells carved to look like cacao beans represented the real commodity 8
  • P. 33 Exchanges included vessels filled with corn tamales 8
  • P. 37 Artistic portrayals depict writing tablet and stylus combinations in transactional contexts 3
  • P. 42 Units of money had standardized values 7
  • P. 42 Metal bells and axes were used as money 7
  • P. 44 Effigies depict conspicuous displays of wealth 4
  • P. 45 40,000 cacao beans was a large tribute payment 12
  • P. 47 Greenstone and metal were both used as money 7
Anthropologists have discovered analogues in the ancient Maya world for ten of the twelve market characteristics described in the Nephite text.
Carved Shell Tokens from El Perú-Waká Burial 37
Photo by Juan Carlos Meléndez 
Objects known to have been used as stores of value and currencies for exchange among the ancient Maya:
Cacao Beans, Copper Bells, Carved Shell Beads
A scene depicting commerce or tribute and bookkeeping:
K2914 Photograph by Justin Kerr
Another scene depicting commerce or tribute and bookkeeping:

K625 Photograph by Justin Kerr
This from the Tarlton Law Library, UT Austin, Article entitled "Maya Property and Commercial Law:" The Maya did have a currency system, and used cacao beans, gold, copper bells, jade, and oyster shell beads as forms of money.
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    Guatemala Guatemala Guatemala

    June 27, 2020, 11:30 am
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    Today I was transcribing the special episode on Book of Mormon geography from Taylor Halverson and Tyler Griffin's excellent Come Follow Me Insights show on the Book of Mormon Central YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCSsrx8lFpeuBjNIE7FNm2CQ.



    29 minutes into the video, Tyler makes the important point that the Nephites used the term "Zarahemla" in multiple ways. It was their capital city 3 Nephi 9:3, a lesser land (city state, region) Alma 62:6, and their greater land (nation) Alma 50:7. Ditto the term "Nephi" which was a capital city Alma 47:31, a lesser land Alma 47:20, and a greater land Alma 50:8, 11.

    Two countries on earth today follow this naming convention where their capital city, leading region (state, department), and nation all carry the same name: Guatemala, Guatemala, Guatemala and Mexico, Mexico, Mexico. See the blog article "Light from Guatemala" for maps.
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    Destroying History

    June 27, 2020, 7:49 pm
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    Communication channels these days bring news of mobs toppling statues, trying to destroy history they find opprobrious. I am reminded of the Taliban who in March, 2001, blew up statues of Guatama Buddha in the Bamyan Valley, Hazarajat, Afghanistan. The monumental Bamyan Buddhas were carved in the 6th century AD directly into sandstone cliffs and had been the centerpieces of a pilgrimage site for more than 1,400 years.
    The Larger of the Bamyan Buddhas pre-Taliban
    Zealots justified wanton destruction of history and culture for political ends.
    Bamyan Buddha in Rubble post-Taliban
    This attempt to sanitize history and eradicate culture is as old as the human race. We see it in the Book of Mormon. Enos, ca. 480 BC, reported that the Lamanites in and around the city of Nephi wished to destroy Nephite records, Nephite people, and "the traditions of our fathers"Enos 1:14. Why? The Lamanites harbored hatred toward the Nephites Enos 1:20. Mormon, ca. AD 385, went to considerable effort to preserve sacred Nephite records because he knew the Lamanites would destroy them Mormon 6:6. Why? Again, because of Lamanite hatred toward the Nephites Moroni 1:2.

    We see similar destruction of history via monument defacement in the Mesoamerican archaeological record. Chalchuapa Monument 1 dated from 100 BC to AD 200 was deliberately defaced. Muriel Porter Weaver, The Aztecs, Maya, and their Predecessors: Archaeology of Mesoamerica, Third Edition (Abingdon: Routledge, 1993) chapter 4, The Southeastern Highlands. Many stelae at Tikal suffered what the original excavators from the University of Pennsylvania called "mutilation." Linton Satherwaite, "The Problem of Abnormal Stela Placements at Tikal and Elsewhere," The University Museum, University of Pennsylvania, Tikal Reports 1-4, 1958.
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    Ancient American Warfare

    August 1, 2020, 9:00 pm
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    A naive myth persisted for decades among archaeologists that the ancient Maya were for the most part peaceful astronomers and theologians. This was a serious problem for the Book of Mormon which describes many large-scale wars in grim detail. The last few decades have seen a complete revolution in our understanding of ancient American warfare. The Maya fought many large-scale wars with horrific consequences. Decipherment of Mayan glyphs and airborne LiDAR scans have provided a wealth of information that corroborates the Nephite text in such incredible detail it nearly takes your breath away.

    This study analyzes more than 75 correspondences between Nephite and Lamanite warfare as described in the Book of Mormon and characteristics of ancient Mesoamerican warfare known to science. The correspondences cluster into 18 topical categories. Many have multiple attestations. Scholarly sources are listed below by publication year to highlight recency.

    1983 Carmack Robert M. Carmack and James L. Mondloch, translators, El Titulo de Totonicapán (Mexico City: Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, 1983)

    1991 Ricks Stephen D. Ricks and William J. Hamblin, editors, Warfare in the Book of Mormon (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book and FARMS, 1991)

    1993 Williams Sandra Williams, "The Impact of the Holocaust on Survivors and their Children," paper written for the Program in Judaic Studies, University of Central Florida, 1993

    1996 Berdan Frances Berdan, et. al. Aztec Imperial Strategies (Washington DC: Dumbarton Oaks, 1996)

    2000 Stuart David Stuart, "The 'Arrival of Strangers': Teotihuacan and Tollan in Classic Maya History" in David Carrasco, Lindsay Jones, and Scott Sessions, editors, Mesoamerica's Classic Heritage: From Teotihuacan to the Aztecs (Boulder: University Press of Colorado, 2000) pp. 465-513

    2003 Tedlock Dennis Tedlock, translator, Rabinal Achi: A Mayan Drama of War and Sacrifice, (New York: Oxford University Press, 2003)

    2005 Brady James Brady and Keith M. Prufer, editors, In the Maw of the Earth Monster: Mesoamerican Ritual Cave Use (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2005)

    2005-2008 Mathews Peter Mathews and Péter Bíró, "Maya Hieroglyph Dictionary," Foundation for the Advancement of Mesoamerican Studies (online at famsi.org)

    2006 Aguilar-Moreno Manuel Aguilar-Moreno, Handbook to Life in the Aztec World (New York: Oxford University Press, 2006)

    2006 Golden Charles Golden and Andrew K. Scherer, "Border Problems: Recent Archaeological Research along the Usumacinta River," Precolumbian Art Research Institute: PARI Journal, Vol. VII, No. 2 (Fall, 2006)

    2006 Johnstone Kevin J. Johnstone, "Preclassic Maya Occupation of the Itzan Escarpment, Lower Río de la Pasión, Petén, Guatemala," Cambridge Univeristy Press: Ancient Mesoamerica Vol. 17, No. 2 (July, 2006) pp. 177-201

    2006 Maxwell Judith M. Maxwell and Robert M. Hill, translators, Kaqchikel Chronicles: The Definitive Edition, with translation and exegesis (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2006)

    2008 Martin Simon Martin and Nikolai Grube, Chronicle of the Maya Kings and Queens: Deciphering the Dynasties of the Ancient Maya, 2nd Edition (London and New York: Thames and Hudson, 2008)

    2008 Stuart David Stuart and George Stuart, Palenque: Eternal City of the Maya (London and New York: Thames and Hudson, 2008)

    2009 Chase Arlen F. Chase, Diane Z. Chase, Michael E. Smith, "States and Empires in Ancient Mesoamerica," Cambridge University Press: Ancient Mesoamerica Vol. 20, No. 2 (September, 2009) pp. 175-182

    2009 Scherer Andrew K. Scherer and Charles Golden, "Tecolote, Guatemala: Archaeological Evidence for a Fortified Late Classic Maya Political Border," Taylor & Francis: Journal of Field Archaeology Vol. 34, No. 3 (January, 2009) pp. 285-305

    2012 Medina Paulo Medina, "Maya Warfare: Implications of Architecture that Infers Violence in the Preclassic Maya Lowlands," MA Thesis, Cal State Los Angeles Department of Anthropology, September, 2012

    2013 Tokovinine Alexandre Tokovinine, Place and Identity in Classic Maya Narratives (Washington DC: Dumbarton Oaks, 2013)

    2014 Scherer Andrew K. Scherer and John Verano, editors, Embattled Bodies, Embattled Places: War in Pre-Columbian Mesoamerica and the Andes (Washington, DC: Dumbarton Oaks, 2014)

    2014 Stuart David Stuart, "Naachtun's Stela 24 and the Entrada of 378,"Maya Decipherment, May 12, 2014

    2015 Hansen Richard Hansen and Michael Coe, "Mesoamerican Talks: New Perspectives on the Ancient Maya and their Environment," lectures given at the Utah Museum of Natural History sponsored by the University of Utah Department of Anthropology, October 16, 2015

    2017 Inomata Takeshi Inomata, Daniela Triadan, Jessica MacLellan, Melissa Burham, Kazuo Aoyama, Juan Manuel Palomo, Hitoshi Yonenobu, Flory Pinzón, and Hiroo Nasu, "High-precision radiocarbon dating of political collapse and dynastic origins at the Maya site of Ceibal, Guatemala," National Academy of Sciences: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) Vol. 114, No. 6 (February 7, 2017) pp. 1293-1298

    2017 Laub Dori Laub and Andreas Hamburger, editors, Psychoanalysis and Holocaust Memory: Unwanted Memories of Social Trauma (London and New York: Routledge, 2017)

    2018 Canuto Marcello A. Canuto, Francisco Estrada-Belli, Thomas G. Garrison, Stephen D. Houston, Mary Jane Acuña, Milan Kovác, Damien Marken, Philippe Nondédéo, Luke Auld-Thomas, Cyril Castanet, David Chatelain, Carlos R. Chiriboga, Tomás Drápela, Tibor Lieskovsky, Alexandre Tokovinine, Antonín Velazquez, Juan C. Fernández-Díaz, Ramesh Shrestha, "Ancient lowland Maya complexity as revealed by airborne laser scanning of northern Guatemala," American Association for the Advancement of Science: Science Vol. 361, No. 6409 (September 28, 2018) p. 1355

    2018 Clynes Tom Clynes, "Exclusive: Laser Scans Reveal Maya 'Megalopolis' Beneath Guatemalan Jungle,"National Geographic, online February 1, 2018

    2018 Helmke Christophe Helmke, Julia A. Hoggarth, Jaime J. Awe, A Reading of the Komkom Vase Discovered at Baking Pot, Belize (San Francisco: Precolumbia Mesoweb Press, 2018)

    2018 NatGeo"Lost Treasures of the Maya Snake Kings,"National Geographic Special, aired February 6, 2018 video online at: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/tv/movies-and-specials/lost-treasures-of-the-mayan-snake-king

    2019 Clynes Tom Clynes, "Lasers reveal Maya war ruins,"National Geographic, online March 1, 2019

    2019 Garrison Thomas G. Garrison, Stephen D. Houston, Omar Alcover Firpi, "Recentering the rural: Lidar and articulated landscapes among the Maya," Elsevier: Journal of Anthropological Archaeology Vol. 53 (March, 2019) pp. 133-146

    2019 Houston a Stephen D. Houston, "Watery War,"Maya Decipherment, June 17, 2019

    2019 Houston b Stephen D. Houston, "Recovering a Lost World," John L. Sorenson Lecture, BYU, October 28, 2019 video online at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nxh3MjL9Y6Q

    2019 Roman-Ramirez Edwin Roman-Ramirez, Presentation at VII Convención Mundial de la Arqueología Maya, Antigua, Guatemala, February 15, 2019

    2019 Scherer Andrew K. Scherer, Lecture and Workshop given to the Maya Society of Minnesota, Hamline University, September 20-21, 2019

    2019 Vernimmen Tim Vernimmen, "Ancient Maya practiced 'total war' well before the climate stress," National Geographic, online August 5, 2019

    2019 Wahl David Wahl, Lysanna Anderson, Francisco Estrada-Belli, Alexandre Tokovinine, Paleoenvironmental, epigraphic and archaeological evidence of total warfare among the Classic Maya," Springer: Nature Human Behavior Vol. 3 (August 5, 2019), pp. 1049-1054

    2020 Beliaev Dimitri Beliaev and Stephen D. Houston, "A Sacrificial Sign in Maya Writing,"Maya Decipherment, June 20, 2020

    2020 Golden Charles Golden, Andrew K. Scherer, Stephen Houston, Whittaker Schroder, Shanti Morell-Hart, Socorro del Pilar Jiménez Álvarez, George Van Kollias, Moises Yerath Ramiro Talavera, Mallory Matsumoto, Jeffrey Dobereiner, Omar Alcover Firpi, "Centering the Classic Maya Kingdom of Sak Tz'i'," Taylor & Francis: Journal of Field Archaeology, Vol. 45, No. 2 (2020) pp. 67-85

    2020 Stuart David Stuart, "After the Entrada: The Memory of Teotihuacan among the Late Classic Maya," lecture given at Boundary End Center (BEC), Bernardsville, NC, May 27, 2020 video online at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YHAJw4YQ40o

    Most of the points below were discussed in the following blog articles:
    "Kaqchikel Chronicles" February 17, 2015
    "Rabinal Achi" March 5, 2015
    "Titulo de Totonicapan" March 30, 2015
    "Light from LA" May 8, 2015
    "Hansen and Coe" October 19, 2015
    "Aztec Garrisons" November 29, 2015
    "75 BC" February 4, 2017
    "Holocaust Survivors in the Book of Mormon" December 2, 2017
    "LiDAR" February 2, 2018
    "Ground-truthed LiDAR" October 1, 2018
    "Light from Guatemala" March 3, 2019
    "Komkom Vase" April 28, 2019
    "Captain Moroni's Towers" August 27, 2019
    "Moroni's Total War" September 19, 2019
    "Burned Cities" September 22, 2019
    "Seasons of War" September 22, 2019
    "Cacaxtla" February 8, 2020
    "Robbers and Lamanites" February 12, 2020
    "Light from St Paul" March 27, 2020

    A. Metaphysics - Belief Systems


    A1a. The Nephites sought prophetic guidance before embarking on military missions Alma 16:5, Alma 43:23-24
    A1b. The Kaqchikel consulted a divining stone on military matters 2006 Maxwell part 1, p. 21
    --
    A2a. The Book of Mormon uses the term "spirit of prophecy" 19 times Jacob 4:6, Alma 5:47. Nephites appointed supreme military commanders who had this spirit of prophecy 3 Nephi 3:19
    A2b. The phrase "divining power" is used frequently in Kaqchikel writings. Great warriors in Kaqchikel history had "divining power"2006 Maxwell part 1, p. 32
    --
    A3a. Nephite writers correlated battlefield success with righteousness and spirituality Alma 57:35-36, Helaman 4:24-26, 3 Nephi 3:2
    A3b. The Kaqchikel thought righteousness and spirituality led to battlefield success 2006 Maxwell part 1, p. 31
    --
    A4a. King Benjamin prophesied that if the Nephites ever became wicked, they would become weak militarily and lose their comparative advantage over the Lamanites Mosiah 1:13. Helaman 4:24 and Mormon 2:26 record that fulfilment of that prophecy.
    A4b. In his sixth speech, Man of Rabinal says Cawek of the forest people lost his strength through misdeeds and no longer enjoyed a comparative advantage over his enemeis 2003 Tedlock pp. 52, 57
    --
    A5a. The Book of Mormon repeatedly says God delivers people either into (Mosiah 11:21, Alma 44:3) or out of (Mosiah 2:4, Alma 58:37) the hands of their enemies. Military success comes from God 3 Nephi 3:2
    A5b. Man of Rabinal says it was an act of God that caused Cawek of the forest people to fall under his power 2003 Tedlock p. 75 and attributes his power as a warrior to a divine source 2003 Tedlock p. 249
    --
    A6a. In the Book of Mormon some battles were publicly announced in advance Mormon 3:4, 6:2-3
    A6b. The Quiche had a custom of publicly announcing the future date of a battle 1983 Carmack p. 178

    B. Totemism - Animal Attributes


    B1a. In times of extremity, great warriors in the Book of Mormon acquired animal-like attributes and power Mosiah 20:11, Alma 43:44
    B1b. In times of extremity, great Kaqchikel warriors acquired animal attributes and power through "nawal power" aka "transforming power"2006 Maxwell part 1, p. 32

    C. Leadership - Kings and Judges


    C1a. Included among the Nephite crown jewels was the sword of Laban which kings used in real battles Jacob 1:10, Words of Mormon 1:13
    C1b. Included in the investiture bundles ancestral Kaqchikel brought from Tulan were weapons of war which were subsequently used in real battles 2006 Maxwell part 1, p. 31
    --
    C2a. The Book of Mormon documents places where the military and settlers worked together to colonize new lands Alma 27:22-24, 50:7-9
    C2b. Achij, the Quichean military, participated in provincial colonization programs throughout the kingdom 1983 Carmack, pp. 21, 198, 226
    --
    C3a. In the Book of Mormon, chief judges led military campaigns Alma 2:16, 62:7-8
    C3b. Among the Quiche, judges sometimes served simultaneously as military leaders 1983 Carmack p. 226
    --
    C4a. In the Book of Mormon, kings and political leaders were warriors Omni 1:24, Mosiah 10:10, Alma 2:16
    C4b. Among the Maya, elites thought of themselves as warriors 2019 Houston b
    --
    C5a. In the Book of Mormon, kings or rulers engage other kings or rulers in single combat Alma 2:29, Ether 15:28-30
    C5b. Single combat between kings is well attested in Mayan epigraphic sources 2019 Houston b

    D. Politics - Lands, States, Empires


    D1a. The Nephite system of government was an alliance of semi-autonomous city states which could take themselves out of the confederation at will Alma 2:9, 43:4. Changes in the alliance inevitably led to war. Alma 2:10, 43:5
    D1b. Most state level societies in Mesoamerica were "hegemonic" (collective) rather than "territorial" (centralized) polities with alliances whose composition shifted over time 2009 Chase p. 182. War resulted from shifts in the alliance.
    D1c. By AD 500 at El Zotz, there were wars and shifting alliances 2019 Roman-Ramirez
    --
    D2a. The Nephites at the end, ca. AD 326 - 401, faced a military alliance consisting of the Gadianton Robbers headquartered in the "northernmost parts of the land"3 Nephi 7:9-13, and the Lamanites in the land southward Mormon 2:29. This correlates well with Teotihuacan headquartered in central Mexico and the Maya in southern Mesoamerica. See the blog article "Robbers and Lamanites." Ca. AD 326, the Gadianton Robbers were among the Lamanites Mormon 1:18. Ca. AD 330 the land southward was filled with robbers and Lamanites Mormon 2:8. Ca. AD 350 the Nephites negotiated a three-way treaty with the Lamanites and the robbers, in which the Nephites gave up all claim to the land southward Mormon 2:28-29. Ca. AD 401 Moroni was alone, the last survivor of the former Nephite nation. Only Lamanites and robbers remained on the face of the land Mormon 8:9. It is clear from Mormon's and Moroni's words that the Gadianton robbers and the Lamanites had different identies, but were sharing the same physical space in some kind of political relationship.
    D2b. In this time period, AD 326 - 401, Teotihuacan influence was widespread throughout southern Mesoamerica. Teotihuacanos had their own identity, but were physically present and highly influential in regional politics at places like Los Horonces, Tikal, Uaxactun, Piedras Negras, Copan, and La Sufricaya 2000 Stuart, 2014 Stuart,2020 Stuart
    D2c. Teotihuacan was a powerful force in the Maya lowlands around the time of the "entrada" (AD 378) and for several generations afterward. There is talud tablero (Teotihuacan-style) architecture near La Cuernavilla and at Tikal. Pots have been discovered that came from Central Mexico 2019 Roman-Ramirez, 2019 Houston b
    --
    D3a. Mormon, ca. AD 330, said there was blood and carnage spread throughout all the face of the land (southward) and it was one complete revolution throughout all the face of the land Mormon 2:8.
    D3b. Defensive walls were built in the early Classic (AD 250 - 500) and by AD 500 in the central lowlands there was nearly constant war with shifting alliances 2019 Roman-Ramirez
    D3c. In the area around Lacanjá Tzeltal (ancient Sak Tz'i'), interdynastic relationships evolved with shifting alliances 2020 Golden

    E. Scale - Intensity


    E1a. At the close of the Nephite era, Moroni reported nearly continuous warfare among the Lamanites Mormon 8:8. As recently as 20 years ago, this was a problem for the Book of Mormon. Most specialists did not believe warfare was endemic in Mesoamerica ca. AD 400. They believed token wars were ritualized and small-scale until the Terminal Classic (AD 800 - 950) when drought reduced the food supply, inciting violence that led to the Classic Maya collapse. All that has changed. We now know that warfare has been nearly constant throughout Mesoamerica from Book of Mormon times to European contact.
    E1b. Once the Quiche ended their ancestral migration and reached their current homeland, they had nearly continuous war with their neighbors 1983 Carmack p. 242
    E1c. Witzna (ancient Bahlam Jol), was almost totally destroyed by fire in an act of war from Naranjo on May 21, AD 697. In the same destructive campaign, Naranjo also burned Buenavista del Cayo (ancient Komkom), Ucanal (ancient K'an Witznal), and the as yet unidentified K'inchil 2019 Wahl pp. 1049-1053
    E1d. Witzna suffered similar burnings on at least two previous occasions 2019 Wahl p. 1053
    E1e. "There is an increasing understanding that there were destructive wars throughout the Classic period." Takeshi Inomata 2019 Vernimmen
    E1f. "War was a common theme of daily discourse among the elites." Takeshi Inomata 2014 Scherer pp. 36, 37
    E1g. "Toward the end of the Preclassic period (AD 250), physical conflicts in the Maya Lowlands appear to have further intensified." Takeshi Inomata 2014 Scherer p. 45 
    E1h. "It (warfare) must have been a fact of life from a very early time." James Brady 2019 Vernimmen
    E1i. Endemic warfare over centuries was the norm 2018 Clynes
    E1j. There was much more war among the Maya than we had ever supposed 2018 NatGeo
    E1k. Sizable defensive features imply large-scale conflict 2018 Canuto
    E1l. The entire 2018 Maya Symposium at Tulane was dedicated to warfare. Andrew K. Scherer was one of the presenters 2019 Scherer

    F. Seasonality - Timing


    F1a. The Book of Mormon states that war among the Nephites was seasonal Omni 1:3. John L. Sorenson showed that war events in the Book of Mormon generally took place in months 11, 12, 1, 2, and 3; occasionally in months 4, 5, and 10; and hardly ever in months 6, 7, 8, or 9. In other words, Nephite wars were generally not fought in the season roughly corresponding with our June through September. 1991 Ricks pp. 445-477
    F1b. Mesoamerica has well-defined rainy and dry seasons. The rainy season generally starts in May and runs through October. Crops are usually planted in April or May and harvested in October or November. The dry season (November through April) was when agriculturists were pressed into military service, surplus food supplies were available for provisions, infantry marches were feasible, and conditions in field camps were tolerable. Warriors were home tending their crops during the rainy season (May through October). Numerous war events in the corpus of Mayan inscriptions can be securely dated, and they follow the expected seasonal pattern. The Maya went to war in the dry season and stayed home farming in the rainy season. 2019 Houston a citing data from Simon Martin

    G. Pageantry - Regalia


    G1a. Trumpets sounded on Jaredite battlefields Ether 14:28
    G1b. Conch shell trumpets sounded battle calls in Kaqchikel warfare 2006 Maxwell part 2, p. 201

    H. Linguistics - Word Patterns


    H1a. In the Book of Mormon, sleep leads to military defeat and loss of dominion Mosiah 24:19, Alma 55:15-16
    H1b. In Kaqchikel writings, when the amaq' (land) sleeps, it loses battles and forfeits territory 2006 Maxwell part 1, p. 36
    --
    H2a. Nephites threw enemy bodies into river Sidon so the corpses decomposed in the sea Alma 2:34, 3:3, 44:22 as Egyptian bodies had done in the days of Moses Helaman 8:11
    H2b. In Kaqchikel terminology, losers in battle "enter water,""become water," or "dissolve in death"2006 Maxwell part 1, pp. 36-37; part 2, p. 129
    H2c. Tikal Stela 31 contains the phrase och ha which means "enter water at death"2006 Maxwell part 1, p. 37
    H2d. Cawek of the forest people, knowing he will be killed as a war captive, describes himself as a drop of water 2003 Tedlock p. 35
    --
    H3a. In Nephite military affairs in the days of Alma II and Captain Moroni, historians recorded precise troop strength and casualty count numbers up to 19,094 Alma 2:19. Numbers larger than that could not be counted Alma 2:35, 3:1 so historians estimated "tens of thousands"Alma 3:26, 28:2 or called them "innumerable"Alma 58:8, Helaman 1:14
    H3b. In Kaqchikel military affairs, a force of 8,000 or 16,000 troops could be counted precisely. Numbers larger than that were called "innumerable"2006 Maxwell part 2, p. 197. The Kaqchikel term ma-ki ajil-am meant "not able to be counted"2006 Maxwell part 2, p. 221
    --
    H4a. In the Book of Mormon, the couplet "with their swords and with their shields" represents military power Ether 15:24
    H4b. In the Rabinal Achi drama, the couplet "ax and shield" or "weapon and shield" represent military power 2003 Tedlock pp. 1, 30
    H4c. In Mayan texts, the couplet "flint and shield" represents military power 2019 Houston b. This is an example of "diphrastic kenning." Kerry M. Hull, "Poetic Tenacity: A Diachronic Study of Kennings in Mayan Languages," in Kerry M. Hull and Michael D. Carrasco, editors, Parallel Worlds: Genre, Discourse, and Poetics in Contemporary, Colonial, and Classic Maya Literature (Boulder: University Press of Colorado, 2012) pp. 73-122.
    --
    H5a. In the Book of Mormon, military forces in extreme situations burned towns, villages, and cities with fire Ether 14:17, Mormon 5:5
    H5b. The ancient Mayan word for burning was puluy or puluuy 2005-2008 Mathews
    H5c. Naranjo stelae 22 and 23 memorialize the burning of Witzna (ancient Bahlam Jol) using the term puluy2013 Tokovinine pp. 33-34
    H5d. Puluy was a common war statement and such tactics were not rare 2019 Wahl
    H5e. Puluuy is a clear verb for war meaning "to burn" and has been noted in many war contexts. The hieroglyph puluuy is a well-accepted verb for war 2005 Brady p. 158
    H5f. Puluuy (to burn) in Mayan is used in military contexts 2012 Medina p. 9
    H5g. Pul-yi (gets burned) is a term used in Maya warfare 2019 Houston b
    --
    H6a. The Book of Mormon uses the terms "cut" and "cut off" in a military context Alma 46:30, 50:11, 52:34, 58:20, 3 Nephi 4:21, Mormon 3:10
    H6b. Ch'ak (to chop, to axe, to cut) in Mayan refers to warfare 2012 Medina p. 9
    --
    H7a. The Book of Mormon uses the term "strike" in a military context Alma 52:36
    H7b. Jatz' (to strike, is struck) in Mayan is used to describe military actions 2012 Medina p. 9
    --
    H8a. The Book of Mormon uses the term "captive" in a military context Alma 16:3, Helaman 11:33
    H8b. Baak (bone, captive) and yeht (captive, captor) in Mayan are used in war contexts 2012 Medina p. 9
    H8c. Captors grabbed or seized captives in Maya war texts 2019 Houston b
    --
    H9a. In the Book of Mormon, military forces "go up" to battle Mosiah 10:6, 10, Alma 3:22, Mormon 3:10 and "come up" to war Mosiah 20:14-15
    H9b. In Mayan texts, people go up or rise up to war 2019 Houston b
    --
    H10a. In the Book of Mormon, the words "fall" and "fall to the earth" represent military defeat Alma 44:12-14
    H10b. In Mayan war texts, the vanquished go "down" and the phrases "drops down" and "falls down" represent military defeat 2019 Houston b
    --
    H11a. The Book of Mormon speaks of military captains among the Nephites Alma 2:13, 52:19 and the Lamanites Alma 43:6
    H11b. Mayan epigraphy mentions the title sajal applied to military captains 2012 Medina p. 223

    I. Fortifications - Defensive Structures


    I1a. Nephite cities had earthen defensive walls Mosiah 7:10, 9:8, Alma 50:1. Some of the walls were high Alma 49:18
    I1b. Precontact Kaqchikel cities were surrounded by fortified walls 2006 Maxwell part 1, p. 65
    I1c. Lord Five Thunder's Red Mountain fortress had great walls 2003 Tedlock p. 34
    I1d. Man of Rabinal describes several fortresses and sets of defensive walls presided over by multiple lords 2003 Tedlock p. 76
    I1e. The Quiche surrounded their settlements with defensive walls 1983 Carmack pp. 187, 236
    I1f. The Maya built hilltop ditch and rampart fortifications 2018 Canuto
    I1g. There was an earthwork wall surrounding Tikal 5 meters high and 16 kilometers long. Archaeologists have begun calling it "the great wall of Tikal"2018 NatGeo
    I1h. One defensive wall was 6 meters (19 feet) high. The tallest defensive wall yet discovered was 7.6 meters (25 feet) high 2019 Roman-Ramirez
    I1i. Near El Zotz, LiDAR has identified a veritable fortress, the largest defensive structure yet discovered in the Peten. Thomas G. Garrison named it "La Cuernavilla"2018 NatGeo
    I1j. Stephen Houston said La Cuernavilla had 20 foot high walls, moats, and watchtowers 2019 Clynes
    I1k. Earthen walls as defensive fortifications were built at Piedras Negras, Yaxchilán, and La Mar 2019 Scherer
    I1l. Stephen Houston's 1987 dissertation at Yale documented defensive walls at Dos Pilas 2019 Scherer, 2019 Houston b
    I1m. Yaxchilán was surrounded by a defensive ring of fortified settlements that included Chicozapote and Nuevo Guerrero on the Mexican side of the river and Tecolote (14 walls), La Pasadita (2 walls), and Oso Negro on the Guatemalan side. Walls have also been discovered at Arroyo Macabilero and El Tunel 2019 Scherer
    I1n. The defensive wall on the western periphery of El Mirador was massive: 8 - 10 meters (26 - 32 feet) high and up to 11 meters (36 feet) wide 2012 Medina pp. 29-44
    I1o. Zancudero is a pre-classic site with a high defensive wall 5 kilometers east of Yaxchilán 2019 Scherer
    I1p. 10 defensive walls have been discovered at Piedras Negras, north of the site center. They date to the early classic 2019 Scherer
    --
    I2a. Captain Moroni built forts of security for every city in all the land round about. In other words, Nephite defensive architecture was widespread Alma 49:13, 50:1, 6
    I2b. LiDAR showed ubiquitous fortresses, ramparts, and defensive walls 2018 Clynes
    I2c. Defensive structures and fortifications were everywhere 2018 NatGeo
    I2d. The PACUNAM LiDAR Initiative (PLI) found 31 instances of defended areas in the 2,144 square kilometers they mapped. This high fortification density was entirely unexpected 2018 Canuto
    --
    I3a. Nephites fortified their cities by digging ditches around them and using the fill to build earthen embankments Alma 53:3-4. Some of the ditches were deep Alma 49:18
    I3b. Kaqchikel writers described people fortifying their city by digging trenches and using the fill to erect walls 2006 Maxwell part 2, p. 213
    I3c. Tintal had a late pre-classic moat around it 10 times larger than the widely-publicized moat around Becan, Campeche. The Tintal moat was 40 meters wide and 10 meters deep 2015 Hansen
    I3d. El Mirador was also surrounded by a moat 2015 Hansen
    I3e. The Maya built landscape ditch and rampart fortifications 2018 Canuto
    I3f. Tikal had a massive ditch and rampart stretching for miles 2019 Roman-Ramirez
    I3g. Arthur Demarest published an article in National Geographic (February 1993) showing walls at Dos Pilas and a moat around Punta de Chimino 2019 Scherer
    I3h. Cerros had a moat surrounding the site core 2012 Medina p. 82
    I3i. Tintal and Xulnal both had moats 2012 Medina p. 93
    I3j. El Kinel is located inside a bend in the Usumacinta. A circular moat was constructed around the landward side of the city so the entire settlement was protected by water 2019 Scherer
    I3k. La Cuernavilla, a massive fortress near El Zotz, was protected by ditch and rampart systems. It was the largest system of fortifications in ancient America 2019 Houston b
    I3l. The ditches at La Cuernavilla were 20 feet deep and some were moats 2019 Houston b
    --
    I4a. Captain Moroni's earthen walls fortifying Nephite cities were topped by timbers Alma 50:2
    I4b. In their capital, Iximche, the Kaqchikel surrounded it with a wall topped by timbers 2006 Maxwell part 2, p. 185
    I4c. Lacanjá Tzeltal (ancient Sak Tzi'i') was protected by step riverbanks on one side and defensive walls on the other. The walls were wooden palisades with a 1 meter wide foundation 2019 Scherer
    I4d. Wooden palisades were built for defense at Aguateca and Dos Pilas during the Classic period 2012 Medina p. 30
    I4e. Wooden palisades protected Tecolote 2009 Scherer
    I4f. There are 13 defensive walls in saddles between hills around La Mar, Chiapas. The walls clearly show post holes where wooden palisades once stood 2019 Scherer
    I4g. Post molds are clearly visible in defensive walls excavated at El Kinel, Peten 2006 Golden
    --
    I5a. Atop the timbers, Captain Moroni ere cted frames of wooden pickets Alma 50:3
    I5b. Colonial sources such as Bernal Diaz del Castillo and the Lienzo de Quauhquechollan describe and depict wooden pickets, cross-hatched frames, and barricades 2019 Scherer
    --
    I6a. Captain Moroni erected watchtowers that overlooked the earthen ridges topped by timbers and pickets Alma 50:4
    I6b. The PACUNAM LiDAR Initiative (PLI) revealed 37 defensive towers in the El Zotz survey block alone. 7 towers overlook ditch and wall structures 2019 Garrison figure 3
    I6c. Watchtowers have been discovered overlooking defensive walls at Tecolote, La Pasadita, and El Tunel on the Guatemalan side of the Usumacinta north of Yaxchilán 2019 Scherer
    I6d. In the area around La Cuernavilla, LiDAR showed many watchtowers 2019 Houston b
    --
    I7a. Some Nephite defensive walls were built with stone Alma 48:8
    I7b. The defensive wall built at Chaak Ak' al had crudely hewn limestone blocks at its base 2006 Johnstone
    I7c. Stone walls up to 1 kilometer in length have been discovered 2018 Canuto
    I7d. The site of Lacanjá Tzeltal (ancient Sak Tzi'i') has stone walls 1 meter high, likely topped anciently by wooden palisades 2020 Golden
    I7e. La Pasadita is surrounded by low, short, linear rubble mounds built with rough, irregular rocks 2019 Scherer
    I7f. Macabilero had pre-classic defensive walls built with huge stone blocks 15 to 20 feet tall. This kind of megalithic architecture is rare in Mesoamerica 2019 Scherer
    --
    I8a. In addition to walls, ditches, and wooden palisades around cities and watchtowers overlooking the defenses, the Nephites also built small forts or places of resort apart from urban areas Alma 48:5, 8, 52:6.
    I8b. The PLI Survey showed that the Maya built small military forts designed for short stays apart from urban areas. Archaeologists call these isolated structures "refuges" and five have been identified: RS028, Turca East, Kanalna North, Kanalna South, and El Achiotal Peninsula 2018 Canuto
    --
    I9a. Nephite cities had stronger and weaker areas Alma 48:5
    I9b. Some parts of Maya cities were more heavily fortified than others 2018 Canuto
    --
    I10a. Some Nephite cities were more heavily fortified than others Alma 49:14-15
    I10b. Some Maya cities were more heavily fortified than others 2018 Canuto

    J. Armor - Protective Gear


    J1a. Lamanites sometimes went into battle wearning only leather loin cloths Enos 1:20, Mosiah 10:8, Alma 43:20
    J1b. Most combatants (depicted in battle murals) wear relatively light costumes, with many wearing only loin cloths 2014 Scherer p. 17 Takeshi Inomata
    --
    J2a. The Nephites wore "thick clothing" into battle Alma 43:19
    J2b. The Kaqchikel fought with quilted cotton body armor called k'ub'ul. The name in Nahuatl was ichcayapul or achcayopilli2006 Maxwell part 2, pp. 198, 222
    J2c. The K'iche' term for quilted cotton body armor was Xak pot1983 Carmack p. 216
    J2d. Photograph of tightly woven cotton body armor called ichcahupilli. Replica from Oaxaca. MAW Collection. On display at Cal State Los Angeles, April 10, 2015.
    Ichcahupilli. Photo by Kirk Magleby
    --
    J3a. Book of Mormon warriors wore breastplates as body armor Mosiah 8:10, Alma 43:19. Helaman1:14
    J3b. The Kaqchikel used breastplates for armor, calling them xajpota2006 Maxwell part 2, p. 62
    --
    J4a. The Jaredites used copper and brass for breastplates Mosiah 8:10
    J4b. The Quiche made shields out of metal 1983 Carmack p. 196
    --
    J5a. The Book of Mormon mentions head shields Alma 43:19 and head plates Alma 43:38, Helaman 1:14
    J5b. Photograph of warrior figurine from the Shaft Tomb Culture of Western Mexico, MAW Collection. On display at Cal State Los Angeles, April 10, 2015.
    Warrior with Head Plate. Photo by Kirk Magleby
    --
    J6a. The Book of Mormon describes warriors with breastplates and head plates, but exposed legs Alma 49:24
    J6b. The photo of the warrior above shows a breastplate, head plate, and exposed legs.
    --
    J7a. Shields are mentioned many times in the Book of Mormon Alma 43:19, 49:6. Helaman 1:14, 3 Nephi 3:26.
    J7b. Several battle murals at the site of Cacaxtla, Tlaxcala depict elaborately decorated shields
    Cacaxtla Mural Showing Shields. Photo by Kirk Magleby January 29, 2020

    K. Weapons - Arms


    K1a. The Book of Mormon describes the use of arrows, shields, spears, and slings Alma 17:7, 49:24, Helaman 1:14
    K1b. The Kaqchikel fought with arrows, shields, and spears 2006 Maxwell part 2, pp. 16, 29. 101
    K1c. The Quiche fought with slings, spears, arrows, and shields 1983 Carmack, p. 193
    K1d. Several battle murals at the site of Cacaxtla, Tlaxcala depict spears or lances
    Cacaxtla Mural Showing Spears. Photo by Kirk Magleby January 29, 2020
    --
    K2a. Book of Mormon peoples fought with axes Enos 1:20, Mormon 6:9
    K2b. Stone axes were important weapons and symbols among the Maya 2003 Tedlock p. 2
    --
    K3a. Captives in the Book of Mormon were bound with strong cords Mosiah 7:13, Alma 14:22, 20:29, 26:29
    K3b. The Achi Maya bound captives with henequen rope or cord 2003 Tedlock pp. 28, 75
    --
    K4a. In the Book of Mormon, military leaders provided weapons and armor to their soldiers Mosiah 9:16, Alma 43:19, 51:9, 55:16-17
    K4b. Man of Rabinal's weapons were gifts from Lord Five Thunder 2003 Tedlock p. 83
    --
    K5a. The Book of Mormon makes the obvious point that captors retain their weapons while captives are forcibly disarmed Alma 55:16-17, 57:14, 62:15
    K5b. Photo of a ceramic figurine from the Shaft Tomb Culture of Western Mexico depicting armed warriors leading disarmed prisoners of war along a trail. MAW Collection. On display at Cal State Los Angeles April 10, 2015.
    Captors and Captives. Photo by Kirk Magleby
    --
    K6a. The Book of Mormon describes captive King Noah suffering death by fire Mosiah 19:20
    K6b. The Komkom vase text talks about a captured king who was killed with a torch 2018 Helmke p. 66
    --
    K7a. According to the Book of Mormon, the Lamanites fought with stones and arrows Alma 49:2, 50:4. The Nephites also fought with stones and arrows launched from atop their fortifications Alma 49:19. In their watchtowers, the Nephites stockpiled stones to cast down as weapons Alma 50:5
    K57b. Stephen Houston said La Cuernavilla had stockpiles of round stones that probably served as ammunition for warrior's slings 2019 Clynes, 2019 Houston b
    K57c. At Macabilero, excavators found quantities of small, round sling stones about the size of tennis balls 2019 Scherer

    L. Tactics - Techniques


    L1a. Book of Mormon military commanders used spies Mosiah 9:1. Alma 2:21, 56:35
    L1b. In a military campaign, Cawek of the forest people spied on enemy forces 2003 Tedlock p. 18
    L1c. Quichean writers documented spying prior to military conquest 1983 Carmack p. 188
    --
    L2a. General Shiz spread terror throughout the Jaredite countryside by annihilating inhabitants and then burning their cities Ether 14:17-18. Lamanites ca. AD 379 used similar scorched-earth tactics, killing Nephite men, women, and children and then burning their towns, villages, and cities Mormon 5:5
    L2b. The Komkom vase text mentions a military campaign ca. AD 696 where enemy structures were set ablaze and another campaign where a town was burned 2018 Helmke pp. 41, 56
    L2c. Naranjo invaded Witzna (ancient Bahlam Jol) on May 21, AD 697 and burned it to the ground, leaving a 1 inch charcoal layer that was preserved in the sediment of nearby Laguna Ek' Naab 2019 Wahl
    L2d. Naranjo inscriptions describe 5 cities in the region that were all burned over a five year period. One of them was Buenavista del Cayo (ancient Komkom) that was burned on March 27, AD 696 2008 Martin pp. 66-82
    --
    L3a. Lehonti in the Book of Mormon ascended to the top of Mount Antipas to evade military pressure Alma 47:10
    L3b. The Komkom vase text talks about a king who ascended a mountain to evade military pressure 2018 Helmke p. 71

    M. Mutilation - Desecration


    M1a. Lamanites carried severed arms to King Lamoni as proof of a battlefield casualty count Alma 17:39
    M1b. Nine Achi Maya warriors were killed in battle and their forearms were used as proof of this casualty count 2003 Tedlock p. 37
    --
    M2a. Warriors in the Book of Mormon butchered the bodies of their victims as a token of bravery Moroni 9:10
    M2b. Quiche warriors carrried body parts from vanquished victims as tokens of battlefield success 1983 Carmack pp. 221-222
    --
    M3a. The Book of Mormon mentions bones being scattered Omni 1:22 and heaped up Alma 2:38
    M3b. The Komkom vase text talks about a conquering army scattering the bones of an enemy king 2018 Helmke p. 51

    N. Geography - Relative Distance


    N1a. The best Book of Mormon geography correlations predicit that the Nephites and Lamanites were capable of projecting military force and maintaining supply lines at places hundreds of kilometers distant from their respective capitals Alma 52:10-11
    N1b. Kaqchikel writers described military action at places hundreds of kilometers distant from their capital, Iximche 2006 Maxwell part 2, note 109
    N1c. From their capital, Tenochtitlan, the Aztecs projected military force and maintained supply lines at points hundreds of kilometers distant. Xoconocho on the Pacific coast of modern Chiapas was 900 air kilometers from Tenochtitlan 1996 Berdan p. 153
    N1d. We now know that attempts to minimize Teotihuacan's presence in the Maya area are wrong. We find green obsidian from Pachuca (pachuquia) at Altun Ha. Caracol has cremated burials and green obsidian by AD 330 2019 Roman-Ramirez
    N1e. The Kanul empire ca. AD 690 extended from Coba in the north to Quirigua in the south (600 air kilometers) and from Palenque on the west to the Caribbean on the east (400 air kilometers). The snake kings ruled over 10 million people 2019 Roman-Ramirez presentation by Tomas Barrientos
    N1f. The Teotihuacan-Tikal alliance was at the pan-regional level. It was hundreds and hundreds of miles between these two urban centers 2019 Houston b
    --
    N2a. In his epistle to Captain Moroni, Helaman describes the Nephite army defending the SW front being re-supplied from both Melek and Zarahemla Alma 56:27-28
    N2b. In long-distance campaigns, Aztec military units were re-supplied from both the capital, Tenochtitlan, and from provincial centers closer to the front 2006 Aguilar-Moreno p. 130

    O. Chronology - Dating


    O1a. Ca. 72 BC, Captian Moroni fortified Ammonihah, Noah, and every other Nephite city Alma 49:13, 50:1
    O1b. Ca. 75 BC, warfare intensified and fortifications were built at Ceibal. Fortifications were also built near this time at Chaak Ak' al, Edzna, Becan, El Mirador, Cerros, Muralla de Leon, Cival, and a number of sites along the upper Usumacinta between Piedras Negras and Yaxchilán 2017 Inomata
    O1c. Chaak Ak' al, occupied from ca. 300 BC to ca. AD 150, had massive fortifications built ca. 75 BC. Ceibal also had fortifications built ca. 75 BC 2019 Scherer
    --
    O2a. Ca. AD 330 the Nephites were continuing to fortify their cities Mormon 2:4
    O2b. Defensive walls were built throughout the Maya lowlands in the early Classic (AD 250 - 500) 2019 Roman-Ramirez
    O2c. Omar Andrés Alcover Firpi studied fortifications at Becan that date from ca. AD 100 - 250 2019 Scherer
    --
    O3a. Ca. AD 378 the Nephites lost effective control of their territory Mormon 5:5 and from then on, General Mormon never won another battle Mormon 5:6
    O3b. January 16, AD 378 was the "11 Eb" day Siyaj K'ak' deposed the ruler of Tikal and inaugurated a new era of Teotihuacan-influenced empire throughout the Maya lowlands as mentioned on Tikal Stela 31, El Peru Stela 15, Naachtun Stela 24, and Bejucal Stela 3 2014 Stuart, 2019 Houston b, 2020 Stuart
    --
    O4a. Moroni, writing ca. AD 401 - 421, said wars were exceedingly fierce among the Lamanites Moroni 1:2
    O4b. Warfare was particularly prevalent in the Early Classic (AD 250 - 500) 2018 Clynes
    O4c. In the Preclassic, settlement in the Buenavista Valley was in the lowlands around Laguna Palmár. In the early Classic, settlement moved up into the hills. People were worried about defense. Teotihuacan presence (AD 378) coincided with defensive architecture and intensified warfare. In the Classic, these (Maya Lowlands around Tikal) were embattled lands. The period of intense fortification around La Cuernavilla lasted 3 - 4 generations 2019 Houston b
    --
    O5a. Nephite scribes recorded wars in their histories with precise dates per instructions from Nephi himself 1 Nephi 9:4, Alma 43:3
    O5b. Mesoamericans recorded hundreds of war events with precise dates 2019 Roman-Ramirez
    O5c. On dated monuments from Toniná, Yaxchilán, Bonampak, Piedras Negras, and La Mar, warfare is a frequent theme 2020 Golden

    P. Demographics - Troop Strengths, Casualty Counts


    P1a. The Book of Mormon describes a war of annihilation where only Coriantumr and Ether remained alive Ether 15:29-33
    P1b. The Quiche remembered a war of annihilation where only 2 of the enemy remained alive 1983 Carmack p. 239
    --
    P2a. The Book of Mormon mentions war casualties in the hundreds of thousands Mormon 6:11-15 and millions Ether 15:2. These high numbers were a problem for the Book of Mormon for generations. Scientists simply did not believe that ancient American populations were large enough to sustain losses of that magnitude. All that has changed with large-scale LiDAR surveys showing aneient Mesoamerican populations in the tens of millions.
    P2b. Specialists now estimate populations in the 7 - 11 million range at apogee in just the 95,000 square kilometers of the Central Maya Lowlands, which constitute only about 15% of Mesoamerica 2018 Canuto p. 1355
    P2c. Lowland Maya population at apogee could have reached 15 - 20 million 2018 Clynes
    P2d. Tikal was 3 or 4 times larger than we thought. Previous population estimates were 60,000 at apogee. That number should now be 250,000 or more 2018 NatGeo
    P2e. Estimates of the population in the Maya area at apogee have been revised upward to about 20 million. That was one-half the population of Europe at the time, even though the Maya occupied only one thirtieth as much land area 2018 NatGeo
    P2f. Northern Guatemala had the largest city in the ancient world - bar none 2019 Houston b
    P2g. Caracol, Belize, had a population in the hundreds of thousands 2019 Houston b
    --
    P3a. In his epistle to Captain Moroni, Helaman explained that it was extremely labor-intensive to guard prisoners of war, and it required a large percentage of the Nephite force to conduct Lamanite prisoners from Cumeni down to the land of Zarahemla Alma 57:13-18
    P3b. The photo in K5b shows 5 soldiers wearing headgear with weapons in hand guarding 4 captives.

    Q. Sociology - Aftermath


    Q1a. Unsuccessful military action in the Book of Mormon resulted in bondage and captivity Mosiah 12:15
    Q1b. K'iche' warriors who survived the unsuccessful invasion of Iximche were enslaved by the Kaqchikel 2006 Maxwell part 2, p. 203
    Q1c. Piedras Negras Stela 26, Bonampak Lintel 2, and Toniná Monument 8 all mention taking captives from the site of Sak Tzi'i'2019 Scherer
    Q1d. One monument at Lacanja Tzeltal (ancient Sak Tzi'i') shows 2 bound captives 2019 Scherer
    Q1e. One of the results of Maya warfare was captivity 2019 Houston b
    --
    Q2a. In the Book of Mormon, some war captives were sacrificed Mormon 4:14, 21
    Q2b. The Kaqchikel sacrificed war captives 2006 Maxwell part 2, p. 97
    Q2c. The Maya fought bitter wars that ended in bloody sacrifices 2019 Clynes quoting Stephen D. Houston
    Q2d. Captives were sacrificial victims 2019 Houston b
    Q2e. Many, perhaps most, captives were later killed 2014 Scherer p. 60
    Q2f. Recent advances in Mayan epigraphy have identified glyphic characters and iconography associated with sacrifice 2020 Beliaev
    --
    Q3a. The Book of Mormon records a battle where captives were killed unless they were chief captains Alma 56:12
    Q3b. Kaqchikel writings record an incident where war captives were killed unless they were nim-a' q achi"great warriors"2006 Maxwell part 2, p. 168
    --
    Q4a. The Book of Mormon says Nephite children were sacrificed Mormon 4:14, 21
    Q4b. At the site of Cacaxtla, Tlaxcala, over 200 children were sacrificed and interred as an offering during the construction of the palace INAH site signage photographed January 29, 2020
    Q4c. Child sacrifices are depicted on El Cayo Altar 4 and Piedras Negras Stela 11. El Zotz burial 9 contained the remains of 6 children in ceramic vases. They ranged in age from 6 months to 4 years. El Zotz burials 6 and 15 also contained sacrificed children whose remains were in ceramic offering vessels 2019 Scherer
    --
    Q5a. In the Book of Mormon, war incited fear and terror Helaman 11:32, Mormon 6:7-8, Ether 14:18
    Q5b. Stephen D. Houston described the fortress, La Cuernavilla, creating "an almost palpable sense of fear in this landscape"2019 Clynes
    --
    Q6a. The Book of Mormon records an instance where former combatants were given land and became farmers Alma 62:29
    Q6b. Cawek of the forest people was promised land as a reward for military service 2003 Tedlock p. 18
    --
    Q7a. In the Book of Mormon, people surrender their weapons to find peace Alma 24:19, 44:14-15
    Q7b. Former warrior, Man of Rabinal, surrendered his weapons to find rest 2003 Tedlock p. 264
    --
    Q8a. In the Book of Mormon, victorious warriors take women as captives Alma 54:3, 60:17, Moroni 9:7
    Q8b. Maya ara depicts victorious warriors seizing women 2019 Houston b
    --
    Q9a. The dominant image of Maya warfare is the depiction of live captives on monuments and portable objects 2014 Scherer p. 59
    Q9b. The Book of Mormon mentions the terms "prisoner"Alma 54:1, Mormon 4:2; "captive"Alma 60:17, Helaman 11:33; or "captivity"Alma 5:5, Ether 13:23 more than 100 times in the text.

    R. Psychology - Impact


    R1a. Trauma psychology recognizes a group of behavioral and attitudinal traits called "Holocaust Survivor Syndrome." Characteristics include:
    1. Death imprint - extreme anxiety about death, recurring mental images of violence and death.
    2. Death guilt - uncertainty, aimlessness, wondering why one survived when most did not.
    3. Psychic numbing - insensitivity or diminished ability to feel.
    4. Suspicion and distrust - foreboding sense that everything, even life itself, is an illusion.
    5. Witness imperative - a sense of mission to bear witness to future generations.
    1993 Williams, 2017 Laub
    R1b. Mormon and Moroni were holocaust survivors. The behavioral and attitudinal traits of Holocaust Survivor Syndrome come through loud and clear in their writings:
    1. Death imprint. Mormon 4:11 "the horrible scene of the blood and carnage which was among the people"Mormon 5:8"such an awful scene of blood and carnage as was laid before mine eyes"Mormon 6:7"that awful fear of death."
    2. Death guilt. Mormon 8:3"whether they will slay me, I know not"Mormon 8:4"whither I go, it mattereth not"Mormon 8:5"I have not friends, nor whither to go. And how long the Lord will suffer that I may live, I know  not."
    3. Psychic numbing. Mormon 3:12"the hardness of their hearts"Moroni 9:5"they have lost their love one towards another"Moroni 9:20"they are without principle and past feeling."
    4. Suspicion and distrust. Mormon 1:18"the inhabitants thereof began to hide up their treasures in the earth; and they became slippery"Mormon 1:19"sorceries and witchcrafts and magics"Mormon 2:10"no man could keep that which was his own."
    5. Witness imperative. Mormon 3:16"I did stand as an idle witness to manifest unto the world the things which I saw and heard"Moroni 9:22"to witness the return of his people unto him or their utter destruction."
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    FOMO in the Book of Mormon

    August 8, 2020, 11:09 pm
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    Fear of Missing Out, FOMO, is referenced frequently in contemporary popular culture. It is an anxiety that others may be enjoying something while you are on the sidelines, not participating. It can lead to obsessive social media consumption as victims try to stay abreast of other's lives. 

    Photo Illustration by Gary Meander, Duluth News Tribune

    Marketers cleverly exploit FOMO to incite a herd mentality to purchase the latest iPhone, watch SuperBowl ads, etc. The term "FOMO" entered our lexicon in 2004 in a Harvard Business School publication. The idea, though, it is as old as the human race. In earlier years it went by the name "keeping up with the Joneses." I have seen it many times in my lifetime as televisions, microwave ovens, the Internet, smart phones, and big-screen TV's have quickly swept through the world and been adopted by a large percentage of people on the planet.

    We see FOMO in the Book of Mormon. Ca. 64 BC Helaman and the 2,000 stripling warriors decoyed a strong army of Lamanites out of the fortified city of Antiparah with a strategem. They pretended to be taking provisions to the city by the west sea. The Lamanites detected their small numbers and stripling stature (the English word "stripling" means immature, not yet filled out according to the OED), left the city of Antiparah in droves, and followed as Helaman led them on a wild goose chase northward with Antipus in pursuit Alma 56:35-37. Why did the Lamanites en masse fall for Helaman's ploy? FOMO. They were bored cooped up in Antiparah and a lop-sided fight with 2,000 youngsters seemed like an attractive diversion. After a terrible battle in which Antipus was killed, Antiparah was repatriated into Nephite hands without further loss of life Alma 57:4.

    Ca. 64 BC in the battle of Mulek, Captain Moroni and Teancum executed a similar feint. Teancum decoyed a strong Lamanite army out of the fortified city of Mulek with a small force who led the previously bored enemy on a wild goose chase northward up the east coast Alma 52:22-24. So many Lamanites left Mulek that Moroni had little trouble taking the city while surrounding the tired enemy on the south as Lehi pressed them into surrender from the north. The Lamanites in Mulek fell for Teancum's ruse, sensed a quick kill, and nearly everyone wanted to get in on the action.

    The same tactic worked for Helaman a year later in the battle of Manti. The weaker Nephite army decoyed the stronger Lamanite army out of their fortified city in such numbers that a small force of Nephites under Gid and Teomner easily overpowered the few defenders left in Manti Alma 58:14-19. Few Lamanite soldiers occupying Manti wanted to miss out on what seemed to them like an easy victory.

    Nephite tacticians took advantage of Lamanite FOMO to lure the enemy into 3 separate traps in a 2 year time span.

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    Aguada Fénix Update

    August 9, 2020, 9:42 pm
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    Takeshi Inomata has the most exciting site in Mesoamerica, Aguada Fénix on the San Pedro in the municipality of Balancán, Tabasco. 













    LiDAR Image of Aguada Fénix

    It sits at the nexus of Olmec and Maya civilizations. Inomata also has an enviable publication record. His major article in Science, the #2 science journal on the planet (impact factor 41.845), appeared in 2013: "Early Ceremonial Constructions at Ceibal, Guatemala, and the Origins of Lowland Maya Civilization." His major article in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), often considered the #3 science journal in the world (impact factor 9.412), appeared in 2017: "High-precision radiocarbon dating of political collapse and dynastic origins at the Maya site of Ceibal, Guatemala." His major article in Nature, the #1 science journal on earth (impact factor 42.778), appeared in 2020: "Monumental architecture at Aguada Fénix and the rise of Maya civilization."

    I heard Inomata at BYU in March, 2016 and wrote an article about him entitled "Takeshi Inomata." Soon after his PNAS article appeared, I summarized an important potential Book of Mormon connection in the article "75 BC." When Aguada Fénix began receiving major publicity following the 2019 SAA meetings in Albuquerque, I tried to make sense of it in an article entitled "Usumacinta Olmec." I heard Inomata at Hamline University in October, 2019 and blogged about his presentation in an article entitled "Light from Saint Paul."

    Today, I listened to a Zoom presentation Inomata gave in Spanish to interested Tabasqueños on July 17, 2020. This is what I found interesting:

    1. Construction began at Aguada Fénix ca. 1,000 BC just as maize agriculture was becoming a major factor in the local Maya diet. Prior to this time, the proto Maya were hunter-gatherers who subsisted largely on fish, turtles, shellfish, and other riverine resources. Ceramics also appear in the Maya area for the first time ca. 1,000 BC.

    2. Aguada Fénix is not Olmec in the San Lorenzo/La Venta cultural tradition. Its monumental platform, though, had strong influence from San Lorenzo.

    3. The Middle Formative Chiapas pattern (E Group without platform), described by BYU's John Clark, implies lively communication between the Grijalva basin and Ceibal in the 1,000 - 800 BC timeframe. The following images are screen captures from a YouTube video of a Zoom presentation, so pardon the grainy resolution.

    Sites Inside the Blue Polygon Show the Middle Formative Chiapas E Group Architectural Pattern.

    4. One way to measure a structure is the volume of material it contains. By this measure, Temple I at Tikal and Temple 26 at Copan are tiny. The Pyramid of the Sun at Teotihuacan contains over a million cubic meters of material. La Danta at El Mirador has 2.8 million cubic meters of material. For years, archaeologists thought La Danta was the largest structure in Mesoamerica. Now we know that Aguada Fénix, with 3.8 million cubic meters of volume in its main platform, is the largest structure in the Maya area. The meseta (plateau) at San Lorenzo, it turns out, contains almost 7 million cubic meters of material. The Pyramid at Cholula is another very large structure.
    Material Volume of Major Mesoamerican Structures
    The fact that the 4 largest structures in Mesoamerica were all built in the Pre-classic is frankly astonishing. No archaeologist would have believed this a generation ago. It dovetails nicely with the Book of Mormon, though. The Nephite text describes the Jaredites as the greatest nation on earth in their era Ether 1:43.
    5. San Lorenzo collapsed ca. 1,100 BC. Aguada Fénix and Ceibal began ca. 1,000 BC. Aguada Fénix collapsed ca. 800 BC just as La Venta was reaching apogee. La Venta collapsed after 400 BC and Ceibal continued on into the Classic.
    Pre-classic Timeline.
    I have not yet visited Aguada Fénix. John Clark has. I asked him the burning question everyone has on their mind: "Who were these people and how did they appear on the scene literally out of nowhere and build a main platform 1.4 kilometers long X 400 meters wide requiring 3.8 million cubic meters of fill material? John was non-commital. Were they Olmec survivors from the collapse of San Lorenzo who migrated east? Perhaps. The Aguada Fénix platform derives from the earlier San Lorenzo model. Were they antecedents of the early Maya at El Mirador? Perhaps. San Lorenzo had no pyramids. Aguada Fénix had a few small pyramids. El Mirador had spectacular pyramids.
    6. Aguada Fénix had an E Group and a platform. This combination Inomata is calling the Middle Formative Usumacinta pattern. About 15 sites between Aguada Fénix and Villahermosa, Tabasco have this pattern. Aguada Fénix is the largest of the 15. Based on his experience at Ceibal, Inomata fully expected to find a centerline cache in the Aguada Fénix E Group. His team did.
    Centerline Cache from Aguada Fénix E Group
    These polished stone hachas confirmed a cultural relationship with Ceibal which prior to this discovery had the earliest E Group known from the Maya area.
    The new "Tren Maya" being developed as a major tourist attraction by the Mexican Government will pass right by Aguada Fénix. Covid shut down the 2020 field season, but Inomata and his wife, Daniela Triadan, will be back with their exciting Middle Usumacinta Archaeological Project.
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    Mighty Nation = Spain

    September 20, 2020, 8:41 am
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    In December, 2018, I authored an important blog post entitled "Prophecy Fulfilled 016" identifying the mighty nation among the Gentiles described in 1 Nephi 22:7 as Spain. The article explained the historical succession of Spain/France/England as global superpower and interpreted 1 Nephi 13:30 in that light.

    Chronology clinches the identification of Spain as the mighty nation. What did the mighty nation do? They scattered Lehi's descendants 1 Nephi 22:7. When was Lehi's seed scattered? Before the marvelous work among the Gentiles began 1 Nephi 22:8. What was the marvelous work? The coming forth of the Book of Mormon 2 Nephi 25:17, 27:26 was a major part of it.

    Key dates associated with the modern Book of Mormon include:

    • December 23, 1805 Joseph Smith, Jr. was born
    • September 21, 1823 Angel Moroni first appeared to Joseph Smith, Jr.
    • March 26, 1830 Book of Mormon went on sale to the public 
    So, the mighty nation, pre-eminent among all others in the New World, scattered Lehi's posterity prior to the 1805 - 1830 time frame. The various Latin American nations gained their independence from Spain between 1810 and 1825. From 1500 - 1810, Spain scattered Lehi's children and appropriated native American lands from California to Argentina.
    Map of the United States in 1800 

    During those 300 years preceding the marvelous work of the restoration, no other nation came close to the level of influence Spain exercised in the Western Hemisphere.

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    Outstanding Come Follow Me Resources

    September 26, 2020, 10:21 pm
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    I volunteer as Executive Director of Book of Mormon Central. Our vision is to build enduring faith in Jesus Christ by making the Book of Mormon accessible, comprehensible, and defensible to people everywhere. With a dedicated team of volunteer directors and advisors, donors, paid staff, and volunteers including service missionaries, we are engaging about 250,000 people every 24 hours with the good news of Jesus Christ and the Restoration in English, Spanish, and Portuguese.

    Book of Mormon Central (BMC) engages our audience with several strategic imperatives:

    In addition, Book of Mormon Central (BMC) offers 14 superb resources to help Latter-day Saints get the most out of their Come Follow Me (CFM) study.

    1. English CFM Teach Learn Share Facebook Group
    2. Spanish Ven sígueme CLDM Facebook Group
    3. John W. Welch Notes on the Book of Mormon in English. They are in both English and Spanish in the ScripturePlus Mobile App. 
    4. Brant Gardner Book of Mormon Minute in both English and Spanish in the ScripturePlus Mobile App
    5. Come Follow Me Reading Plan in the ScripturePlus Mobile App
    6. English KnoWhys correlated with the CFM schedule
    7. Spanish KnoWhys correlated with the CFM schedule
    8. Taylor Halverson and Tyler Griffin Come Follow Me Insights on the BMC YouTube Channel and in Portuguese on the BMC Portuguese YouTube Channel
    9. Come Follow Me with John Hilton III on the BMC YouTube Channel and in Portuguese on the BMC Portuguese YouTube Channel
    10. Weekly English CFM Resource Guides
    11. Por Fe y Estudio with Noe Correa on the BMC Spanish YouTube Channel
    12. Ven Sigueme Kids on the BMC Spanish YouTube Channel
    13. Te Lo Cuento en 10 with Cecy Gastelum on the BMC Spanish YouTube Channel
    14. Abundant enrichment material such as quotes, images, videos, etc. curated at the verse level in both English and Spanish on the ScripturePlus Mobile App
    This rich offering is shared with the world free of charge in the spirit of Isaiah 55:1 and Alma 1:20. BMC measures success by the number of user engagements (aka touches). Every read, view, listen, like, share, comment, etc. is a user engagement. Dividing our cumulative dollar spend by user engagements gives us our cost per user engagement, a measure of how productively we are utilizing our donor's money. The trend is sharply downward from 36 cents per user engagement in 2016, our first year of operation, to 4 cents so far in 2020. 
    Cost per User Engagement Decreasing over Time


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    Mounds

    September 27, 2020, 11:35 pm
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    Ancient earthen mounds exist worldwide. Known as "barrows" in England, "kurgans" in Turkey, and "tumuli" in many parts of the world, earthen mounds are known from:

    • Sweden (Gamla Upsalla, 2,000 tumuli)
    • Austria (Sulm Valley Necropolis, 2,000 tumuli)
    • Hungary (Great Hungarian Plain, 40,000 tumuli)
    • Japan (Kofun Keyhole Mounds, 161,000 tumuli
    • Uruguay (Cerritos de Indios, 3,000 tumuli)
    Some are very large. The tomb of King Alyattes (ca. 619 - 560 BC) at Bin Tepe in modern Turkey has a diameter of 360 meters and is 61 meters high. This makes it over twice as large as the biggest mound in the Mississippi drainage basin (Monks Mound, Cahokia). About 1,000 tumuli are known from the Bin Tepe necropolis and tens of thousands more are found throughout modern Greece, North Macedonia, and Turkey.
    Tomb of King Alyattes, Bin Tepe, Turkey

    Earthen mounds are such basic structures they were built by people with relatively low levels of cultural attainment. Case in point: the Aborigines built clusters of tumuli at 10 sites in northern Australia. See Sally Brockwell, "Earth Mounds in Northern Australia: A Review" in Australian Archaeology 63:1 (December, 2006).

    Relatively small numbers of people were capable of moving large amounts of dirt. For example, the population of Cahokia in modern Illinois at apogee (ca. AD 1100) is generally estimated at between 20,000 and 50,000. This was the largest urbanization north of Mexico in pre-Columbian times. Over 300 years (ca. AD 1050 - 1350), this group built the 120 mounds that made up ancient Cahokia, including 700,000 cubic meter Monks Mound.

    Drone View of Cahokia Overlooking the Mississippi

    A modern earthen mound exists in American Fork, Utah, in my backyard. At 16 feet long X 12 feet wide X 8 feet tall, it is large enough to show up on Google Earth. I built it in one day with picks and shovels, assisted by two strong helpers. A landscaper with a Bobcat moved it a few years ago to its present location. My children, grandchildren, and two generations of neighborhood kids have all played on our backyard "hill."

    Red Arrow Indicates "Hill" in American Fork, UT via Google Earth

    An irrational faction within the Church tries to identify the Jaredites, Nephites and Lamanites with the North American Adena and Hopewell mound builders. This notion is utter nonsense. I have visited dozens of mounds in the US including Grave Creek, Marietta, Newark, Mound City, and Miamisburg. My personal favorite, Serpent Mound, I have visited several times. I have spent time in the Ohio History Connection Museum in Columbus learning about Adena and Hopewell lifeways. There is nothing I have seen in American mound builder culture that rises to the level of the sophisticated civilizations described in the Book of Mormon. (See the blog article "State Level Society"). I have seen no evidence in the Mississippi River drainage basin of the population sizes or densities described in the Nephite text. (See the blog articles "Prophecy Fulfilled 010" and "LiDAR."

    Ancient peoples heaped up dirt. With modest populations, they heaped up lots of dirt. Low-skilled cultures heaped up dirt. The Book of Mormon more than 20 times describes elegant and spacious "buildings"Mosiah 11:8, Ether 10:5. Mounds, barrows, kurgans, or tumuli are not what the Nephite scribes were talking about.
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    David Whitmer's Testimony

    October 13, 2020, 12:16 am
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     David Whitmer (1805-1888) was one of the three witnesses shown the golden plates by the Angel Moroni in Fayette, NY in June, 1829.

    David Whitmer, Portrait by Lewis Ramsey

    On Tuesday, August 21, 1883, James H. Hart (1825-1906) interviewed Whitmer, then 78, at the elderly gentleman's home in Richmond, Missouri. According to Hart, Whitmer told him, "When we (the three witnesses) were first told to publish our statement, we felt sure the people would not believe it, for the Book told of a people who were refined and dwelt in large cities; but the Lord told us that He would make it known to the people, and the people should discover the ruins of the lost cities and abundant evidence of the truth of what is written in the Book."

    If this is an accurate rendition of what the three witnesses came to know from a divine source, it helps locate Book of Mormon lands in ancient America.
    1. In 1829, the three witnesses believed the antiquities discovered so far in the Americas evidenced ancient civilizations less refined than the ones described in the Book of Mormon. See the blog article "State Level Society" for context.
    2. In 1829, the three witnesses were unaware of any American ruins of ancient cities as large as those described in the Book of Mormon. See the blog article "Mounds" for context.
    3. In 1829, the three witnesses believed archaeological remains directly supporting the Book of Mormon record had not yet been discovered in the Americas, but would be forthcoming.
    This rules out the North American mound builders as candidates for Book of Mormon peoples. Mounds were well-known in the young United States of America by 1829. It strongly supports a Mesoamerican setting for Book of Mormon lands. The splendor of Maya civilization burst upon the US scene when Stephens and Catherwood published their blockbuster Incidents of Travel in Central America, Chiapas, and Yucatan (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1841).

    Tens of thousands of mounds were discovered by early settlers homesteading land in what are now the states of Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, New York, and Kentucky. In the 1820 US Census, those 5 states had a combined population of 2,881,121. Ten years later, in the 1830 US Census, those 5 states had grown by 71% and had a combined population of 4,044,914. Many thousands of mounds were explored, surveyed, partially excavated, looted, plowed under, or obliterated by urban sprawl in the decades leading up to 1829. Publications describing and trying to explain the mounds included:
    • Cadwallader Colden, History of the Five Nations, 1747
    • David Zeisberger, History of the North American Indians, 1770
    • Royal American Magazine, Boston, 1775
    • James Adair, History of the American Indians, 1775
    • Thomas Jefferson, Notes on the State of Virginia, 1785
    • Benjamin Smith Barton, Observations on Some Parts of Natural History, 1787
    • William Bartram, Travels through North and South Carolina, Georgia, East and West Florida, 1791
    • Winthrop Sargent, Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, 1799
    • James Madison, Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, 1803
    • Thaddeus M. Harris, Journal of a Tour into the Territory Northwest of the Allegheny Mountains, 1805
    • H.H. Brackenridge, "On the population and tumuli of the aborigines of North America" in Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, 1818
    • Caleb Atwater, Archoeologia Americana: Transactions and Collections of the American Antiquarian Society, 1820
    • John Van Ness Yates and Joseph White Moulton, History of the State of New York Including its Aboriginal and Colonial Annals, 1824
    The three witnesses in 1829 had some knowledge of the North American mound builders. They knew that neither the level of cultural attainment nor the size of the urbanizations created by the mound builders satisfied the level and sizes the Book of Mormon requires. That makes David Whitmer a witness for a Book of Mormon location further south than the United States of America.
    I thank Warren Aston for bringing this Whitmer reference to my attention.
    Kirk Magleby, volunteering as Executive Director, Book of Mormon Central.
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    Early Book of Mormon Geography

    October 29, 2020, 1:09 am
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    First and second generation Latter-day Saints didn't spend much time working out the details of Book of Mormon geography, but they had some definite ideas that can help guide us today in our search for Nephite and Lamanite lands. They believed that the Lord Himself in 1829 promised to bring forth strong evidence of advanced civilizations and large cities in ancient America. They thought discoveries of the spectacular Maya culture in Central America, Chiapas, and Yucatan fulfilled that promise.

    • These early saints were acquainted with the burial, defensive, and ceremonial mounds we know today as Adena (ca. 800 BC-AD 100) and Hopewell (ca. AD 100-AD 500) earthen structures. 1
    • Ambiguity surrounded the earthen mounds. Were they built by ancestors of the modern American Indians, or were they the work of an extinct race of Old World immigrants? 2
    • In terms of cultural attainment, the early saints, and Americans generally, ranked ancient New World civilizations like this: 3
      • The native Americans found by European colonists were at a low level of civilization.
      • The mound builders had been somewhat more advanced than contemporary Indians, but still primitive. Tribal societies worldwide built earthen mounds. 
      • The Mexican (Aztec) and Peruvian (Inca) civilizations conquered by the Spanish built large cities and were advanced in some ways, but they lacked writing.
      • The Maya (sometimes conflated in those early days with the Toltec) of Central America, Chiapas, and Yucatan built large cities, were highly advanced, and had writing. This civilization had the features described in the Book of Mormon and was often used as "proof" of the Nephite text's historical authenticity.
    These milestones helped inform early Latter-day Saint opinions about Book of Mormon geography:
    • February, 1828 to June, 1829: The 3 witnesses (Martin Harris (1783-1875), Oliver Cowdery (1806-1850), & David Whitmer (1805-1888) all participated in various ways with Joseph Smith's translation of the plates.
    • Late June, 1829: The 3 witnesses along with Joseph Smith (1805-1844) in woods adjacent to the Peter (1773-1854) and Mary Whitmer (1778-1856) farm in Fayette, New York, were shown the plates by the Angel Moroni and spoke with the Lord. When the 3 witnesses were commanded to bear witness of the plates, they objected. They feared their testimony would be rejected because the plates described advanced civilizations that built large cities. Most Americans in 1829 were only familiar with uneducated Indians and primitive mounds.  The Lord assured them that undeniable evidence of sophisticated civilizations and massive cities would soon be discovered to support the historical accuracy of the Book of Mormon. 4
    • March 26, 1830: The Book of Mormon went on sale to the public in Palmyra, New York.
    • October 15, 1831: A widely-circulated London newspaper published a report from Anglo-Irish Juan Galindo (1802-1840) of his 1831 visit to Palenque. Galindo said the ruins, with phonetic writing, "rescue ancient America from a charge of barbarism." The Maya civilization, Galindo believed, "far surpassed that of the Mexicans and Peruvians."5
    • February, 1833: W. W. Phelps (1792-1872) in Independence Missouri published an article entitled "Discovery of Ancient Ruins in Central America" that cited the 1831 Galindo report. Phelps considered this the first "proof" that large cities and high civilization existed in ancient America as described in the Book of Mormon. 6
    • 1839: Parley P. Pratt (1807-1857), in the second edition of his important missionary tract, "A Voice of Warning", mentioned Palenque (aka Otolum) as evidence of the immense cities and high civilizations described in the Book of Mormon. 7
    • May 31, 1841: The first copies of John L. Stephens (1805-1852) and Frederick Catherwood's (1799-1854) blockbuster 2- volume Incidents of Travel in Central America, Chiapas, and Yucatan began coming off the press in New York City. It described and lavishly illustrated the ruins of Copan, Palenque, and Uxmal. The initial press run sold out within days. By December, 1841, the book was in its eleventh printing. It was an instant classic on both sides of the Atlantic and is still in print today. This book single handedly established the grandeur of Maya civilization in the minds of the English-reading public. 8
    • June 15, 1841: The Times and Seasons in Nauvoo under the editorship of Don Carlos Smith (1816-1841) and Robert B. Thompson (1811-1841) published reports of Stephens and Catherwood's explorations as "more proofs of the Book of Mormon."9
    • 1841: Dr. John M. Bernhisel (1799-1881) purchased a copy of Stephens and Catherwood in New York City and had Wilford Woodruff (1807-1898) deliver it to Joseph Smith in Nauvoo.
    • November 16, 1841: The prophet read both Stephens and Catherwood volumes, commented on them favorably, and said they supported the testimony of the Book of Mormon. 10
    • March, 1842: The Latter-day Saints' Millennial Star in Manchester, UK under the editorship of Parley P. Pratt ran an article entitled "Ruins in Central America," a 5-page review of Stephens and Catherwood's book. Pratt said the Maya ruins depicted in the book were ancient Nephite cities. 11
    • July 15, 1842: The Times and Seasons in Nauvoo under the editorship of Joseph Smith spoke glowingly about Maya civilization, Stephens and Catherwood's book, and Book of Mormon relationships. 12
    • July 20, 1842: The Morning Chronicle published in Pittsburgh ran a letter written by John E. Page (1799-1867) in which he said Alma was "not far from Guatemala or Central America" when he spoke the Messianic prophecy recorded in Alma 7:10. 13
    • September 15, 1842: The Times and Seasons in Nauvoo quoted extensively from Stephens and Catherwood as "proof, that even the most incredulous cannot doubt" of the Book of Mormon. According to the article, the "wonderful ruins of Palenque are among the mighty works of the Nephites." The article asked "who could have dreamed that twelve years could have developed such incontrovertible testimony of the Book of Mormon?"14
    • September 15, 1842: The Times and Seasons in Nauvoo again quoted Stephens and Catherwood as "proof of the Nephites and Lamanites dwelling on this continent." The article continued "the Lord has a hand in bringing to pass his strange act, and proving the Book of Mormon true in the eyes of all the people."15
    • October 1, 1842: The Times and Seasons in Nauvoo, still under the editorship of Joseph Smith, yet again quoted Stephens and Catherwood as evidence of "the divine authenticity of the Book of Mormon." The article went on to speculate that Quirigua may have been Zarahemla. 16
    • November 17, 1842: A letter written by Orson Spencer (1802-1855), published in The Times and Seasons in Nauvoo under the editorship of John Taylor and Wilford Woodruff, said Stephens and Catherwood's Incidents of Travel helped convince him the Book of Mormon was true. 17
    • October 1, 1843: The Times and Seasons in Nauvoo under the editorship of John Taylor (1808-1887) and Wilford Woodruff said Stephens and Catherwood proved that "America had once been peopled by a highly polished, civilized and scientific race, with whom the present aborigines could not compare." It reported that tens of thousands of copies of Incidents had been sold in Europe. 18
    • January 1, 1844: The Times and Seasons in Nauvoo under the editorship of John Taylor and Wilford Woodruff said that in 1829 ruined cities and buildings were virtually unknown, people did not believe high civilizations had ever existed in the New World, and the Book of Mormon descriptions of large cities and advanced societies were "generally disbelieved and pronounced a humbug." The article went on to cite Stephens as providing a "flood of testimony" supporting the Book of Mormon. 19
    • September 30, 1848: Orson Pratt (1811-1881) in a missionary pamphlet cited Stephens and Catherwood as having "demonstrated years after by actual discovery" that the large and splendid Book of Mormon cities actually existed in Central America. 20
    • January 10, 1857: George Q. Cannon (1827-1901) wrote an article that appeared in The Latter-day Saints' Millennial Star published in Liverpool, UK. Cannon said the cities and enlightened civilizations described in the Book of Mormon were discovered in Central America years after the Nephite history was published. 21  
    • August 7, 1875: the Chicago Times ran an article describing an interview with David Whitmer in Richmond, Missouri. Whitmer is reported to have mentioned "innumerable evidences, in the shape of ruins of great cities existing on this continent, of its former occupation by a highly civilized race" supporting the authenticity of the Book of Mormon. 22
    • August 23, 1877: Brigham Young (1801-1877) wrote a letter to his son, Feramorz Little Young (1858-1881), who was then a student at the Rennssaeler Polytechnic Institute in New York City. Pres. Young advised his son not to waste time with novels, but to read Stephens' and Catherwood's Travels in Central America. 23
    • March 1, 1879: George Martin Ottinger (1833-1917) speculated in the Juvenile Instructor edited by George Q. Cannon (1827-1901) that Palenque may have been Zarahemla. 24
    • March 10, 1884: James H. Hart interviewed David Whitmer a second time at Whitmer's home in Richmond, Missouri. Hart was shown the printer's manuscript, and the "caractors document" sometimes called the "Anthon transcript" that illustrates what Martin Harris showed to professors Charles Anthon (1797-1867) and Samuel L. Mitchill (1764-1831) in February, 1828. Hart thought the characters on the Missouri transcript reminded him of Egyptian characters he had seen in the British Museum. Citing current (1884) scholarship published in the New York Tribune linking Mayan glyphs with Egyptian writing, Hart quoted Mormon 9:32 about Nephite use of reformed Egyptian and thought it marvelous that Joseph Smith anticipated the scholarly world on this point. He then mentioned Palenque, Copan, and the ruins of Yucatan as evidence of enlightened people and cities in ancient Central America in support of the Book of Mormon. 25 
    • Mid July, 1884: a reporter from the St. Louis Republican visited David Whitmer at his home in Richmond, Missouri while a delegation from the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints was working in the home, preparing a new edition of the Book of Mormon by comparing printed editions with the printer's manuscript. The delegation consisted of Joseph Smith III (1832-1914), oldest living son of Joseph and Emma; William H. Kelley (1841-1915); Alexander Hale Smith (1838-1909), second living son of Joseph and Emma; and Thomas Wood Smith (1838-1894), a cousin to the Palmyra Smiths. The reporter said Thomas W. Smith cited Stephens and Catherwood and other antiquarian writers to show how evidence had surfaced to support the Book of Mormon after the Nephite record was published. 26 
    • LeGrand Richards (1886-1983), then Presiding Bishop of the Church, said in October, 1946 General Conference: "I heard Brother Callis [Elder Charles A. Callis (1865-1947)] once say that when Joseph received the plates he got down on his knees before the Lord, and said, 'O, God, what will the world say?' And the voice of God came to him, 'Fear not, I will cause the earth to testify of the truth of these things.'"27
    1 This map from the Smithsonian shows major ancient mounds in red. The small blue circle represents Seneca County, New York where David Whitmer grew up. Earthen mounds were ubiquitous in all the early gathering places of the saints in New York, Ohio, Missouri, and Illinois.  
     2 Robert Silverberg discusses the debate that went on for more than 100 years in The Mound Builders (Athens: Ohio University Press, 1986)

    3 e.g. John Van Ness Yates (1779-1839) and Joseph White Moulton (1789-1875) in their History of the State of New York Including its Aboriginal and Colonial Annals (New York City: A. T. Goodrich, 1824) distinguished the rude contemporary Indians from the primitive mound builders in the Great Lakes region and the somewhat less primitive mound builders along the Ohio and Mississippi rivers. The mound builders they then distinguished from the more advanced Mexicans who in turn were less developed than the Maya who built Palenque. The first report in English of Palenque was published in London in 1822. Antonio del Rio, translated by Dr. Paul Felix Cabrera, Description of the Ruins of an Ancient City, Discovered near Palenque, in the Kingdom of Guatemala, in Spanish America (London: Henry Berthoud, 1822). Many were highly skeptical of this 128 page booklet with dozens of drawings. The London Literary Gazette and Journal of Belles Lettres, Arts, Sciences, etc. No. 303 (November 9, 1822) called it "about as fanciful an antiquarian hypothesis as we have ever met with." This material was so new Yates and Moulton (and others) thought Palenque was in South America. After corroborating reports were published in London and elsewhere (see the blog article "1829"), the London Literary Gazette No. 574 (January 19, 1828) said the earthen mounds found throughout the Ohio and Mississippi River Valleys were made by people more advanced than the Indians at European contact. The North American earthworks, though, were "trifling compared with the civilization of the ancient inhabitants of Palenque."   

    4 Edward L. Hart, Mormon in Motion, The Life and Journals of James H. Hart (1825-1906) (Provo: Windsor Books, 1978), p. 216. Hart took shorthand dictation of an interview with David Whitmer in Richmond, Missouri on August 21, 1883. Whitmer said, "When we were first told to publish our statement, we felt sure the people would not believe it, for the Book told of a people who were refined and dwelt in large cities; but the Lord told us that He would make it known to the people, and people should discover the ruins of the lost cities and abundant evidence of the truth of what is written in the Book."

    In the Deseret Evening News version published on September 4, 1883, Hart reported that Whitmer said, "When they were first commanded to testify of these things they demurred and told the Lord the people would not believe them for the book concerning which they were to bear record told of a people who were educated and refined, dwelling in large cities; whereas all that was then known of the early inhabitants of this country was the filthy, lazy, degraded and ignorant savages that were roaming over the land. 'The Lord told us, in reply that he would make it known to the people that the early inhabitants of this land had been just such a people as they were described in the book, and he would lead them to discover the ruins of the great cities,' and they should have abundant evidence of the truth of that which is written in the book." Whitmer went on to say "All of which, has been fulfilled to the very letter."

    Hart also authored a poetic version of his interview with David Whitmer that was printed in The Contributor, No. 5 (October, 1883). This is the front piece to that issue:
    David Whitmer read this issue of The Contributor and commented that it was a "correct expression of his sentiments." James H. Hart Interview with David Whitmer in Richmond, Missouri on March 10, 1884, Deseret News, March 25, 1884.

    5 Letter from Juan Galindo in The London Literary Gazette and Journal of Belles Lettres, Arts, Sciences, etc. No. 769 (October 15, 1831). "Sir, I am desirous of communicating to the literary world, through your universally circulated Gazette, some idea of these antiquities, which rescue ancient America from a charge of barbarism. These ruins extend for more than twenty miles...and must anciently have embraced a city and its suburbs. The principal buildings...are wholly of stone and plaster...square tablets, containing characters very neatly executed..I have seen sufficient to ascertain the high civilisation of their former inhabitants, and that they possessed the art of representing sounds by signs, with which I hitherto believed no Americans previous to the conquest were acquainted...the metropolis of a civilised, commercial, and extended nation...Everything bears testimony that these surprising people were not physically dissimilar from the present Indians; but their civilisation far surpassed that of the Mexicans and Peruvians." The editor describes Palenque as "a place utterly unknown to European geography and antiquities."

    6The Evening and the Morning Star, published at Independence, Missouri by W. W. Phelps. Vol. 1, No. 9 (February, 1833). "We are glad to see the proof begin to come, of the original or ancient inhabitants of this continent. It is good testimony in favor of the Book of Mormon, and the Book of Mormon is good testimony that such things as cities and civilization, 'prior to the fourteenth century', existed in America."

    7 Parley P. Pratt, "A Voice of Warning, and Instruction to All People, or An Introduction to the Faith and Doctrine of the Church of Jesus Christ, of Latter Day Saints, Second Edition, Revised," (New York: J. W. Harrison, 1839). Pratt compared Palenque to "Thebes of Ancient Egypt."

    8 John L. Stephens and Frederick Catherwood, Incidents of Travel in Central America, Chiapas, and Yucatan, 2 vols. (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1841). This is the famous Copan Altar Q as illustrated in Vol. 1 that depicts 16 rulers from the Copan dynasty:
    2 Sides of 4-Sided Copan Altar Q, Frederick Catherwood

    9The Times and Seasons, published at Nauvoo, Illinois by Don Carlos Smith and Robert B. Thompson. Vol. 2 No. 16 (June 15, 1841). "More Proofs of the Book of Mormon" described "the remains of ancient buildings, architecture, etc. which prove beyond controversy that, on this vast continent, once flourished a mighty people, skilled in the arts and sciences, and whose splendor would not be eclipsed by any of the nations of antiquity."

    10 Joseph Smith Papers Project, Letter to John M. Bernhisel 16 November, 1841. The prophet said that of all the modern histories that had been written about ancient America, Stephens and Catherwood was the "most correct, luminous, and comprehensive." 

    11 Parley P. Pratt, "Ruins in Central America," after publishing a lengthy extract from Stephens and Catherwood, said "'We publish the foregoing for the purpose of giving our readers some ideas of the antiquities of the Nephites - of their ancient cities, temples, monuments, towers, fortifications, and inscriptions now in ruin...I say it is remarkable that Mr. Smith, in translating the Book of Mormon from 1827 to 1830, should mention the names and circumstances of those towns and fortifications in this very section of country, where a Mr. Stephens, ten years afterwards, penetrated a dense forest, till then unexplored by modern travelers, and actually fines (sic)  the ruins of those very cities mentioned by Mormon. The nameless nation of which he (Stephens) speaks were the Nephites. The lost record for which he mourns is the Book of Mormon. The Latter-day Saints' Millennial Star, published at Manchester, UK, under the editorship of Parley P. Pratt, Vol. 2, No. 11 (March, 1842), pp. 161-165.

    12 The Times and Seasons, published at Nauvoo, Illinois by Joseph Smith. Vol. 3 No. 18 (July 15, 1842). The article explained "that a great and a mighty people had inhabited this continent, that the arts sciences and religion, had prevailed to a very great extent, and that there was as great and mighty cities on this continent as on the continent of Asia...Stephens and Catherwood's researches in Central America abundantly testify of this thing...Men of great minds, clear intellect, bright genius, and comprehensive designs inhabited this continent. Their ruins speak of their greatness; the Book of Mormon unfolds their history."

    13"Mormonism - Concluded" by John E. Page, "Let it be distinctly understood that the Prophet Alma uttered this prophecy, not far from Guatamalla or Central America, some 82 years before the birth of Christ." Letter from John E. Page to The Morning Chronicle, published at Pittsburgh, PA, Vol. 1, No. 290 (July 20, 1842).

    14 15 The Times and Seasons, published at Nauvoo, Illinois by Joseph Smith. Vol. 3 No. 22 (September 15, 1842). "The foregoing extract has been made to assist the Latter-Day Saints, in establishing the Book of Mormon as a revelation from God. It affords great joy to have the world assist us to so much proof, that even the most credulous cannot doubt...these wonderful ruins of Palenque are among the mighty works of the Nephites...Mr. Stephens' great developments of antiquities are made bare to the eyes of all the people by reading the history of the Nephites in the Book of Mormon. They lived about the narrow neck of land, which now embraces Central America, with all the cities that can be found...Who could have dreamed that twelve years would have developed such incontrovertible testimony to the Book of Mormon? Surely the Lord worketh and none can hinder."

    "From an extract from 'Stephens' Incidents of Travel in Central America,' it will be seen that the proof of the Nephites and Lamanites dwelling on this continent, according to the account in the Book of Mormon, is developing itself in a more satisfactory way than the most sanguine believer in that revelation, could have anticipated. It certainly affords us a gratification that the world of mankind does not enjoy, to give publicity to such important developments of the remains and ruins of those mighty people. When we read in the Book of Mormon that Jared and his brother came on to this continent from the confusion and scattering at the Tower, and lived here more than a thousand years, and covered the whole continent from sea to sea, with towns and cities; and that Lehi went down by the Rea Sea to the great Southern Ocean, and crossed over to this land and landed a little south of the Isthmus of Darien, and improved the country according to the word of the Lord, as a branch of the house of Israel, and then read such a goodly traditionary account, as the one below, we can not but think the Lord has a hand in bringing to pass his strange act, and proving the Book of Mormon true in the eyes of all the people. The extract below, comes as near the real fact, as the four Evangelists do to the crucifixion of Jesus. Surely 'facts are stubborn things.' It will be as it ever has been the world will prove Joseph Smith a true prophet by circumstantial evidence, in experiments, as they did Moses and Elijah. Now read Stephens' story:" 

    16 The Times and Seasons, published at Nauvoo, Illinois by Joseph Smith. Vol. 3 No. 23 (October 1, 1842). "Since our 'Extract' was published from Mr. Stephens''Incidents of Travel,'&c., we have found another important fact relating to the truth of the Book of Mormon. Central America, or Guatemala, is situated north of the Isthmus of Darien and once embraced several hundred miles of territory from north to south. The city of Zarahemla, burnt at the crucifixion of the Savior, and rebuilt afterwards, stood upon this land...It is certainly a good thing for the excellency and veracity, of the divine authenticity of the Book of Mormon, that the ruins of Zarahemla have been found where the Nephites left them: and that a large stone with engravings upon it as Mosiah said; and a 'large round stone, with the sides sculptured in hieroglyphics,' as Mr. Stephens has published, is also among the left remembrances of the, (to him,) lost and unknown. We are not going to declare positively that the ruins of Quirigua are those of Zarahemla, but when the land and the stones, and the books tell the story so plain, we are of opinion, that it would require more proof than the Jews could bring to prove the disciples stole the body of Jesus from the tomb, to prove that the ruins of the city in question, are not one of those referred to in the Book of Mormon.

    It may seem hard for unbelievers in the mighty works of God, to give credit to such a miraculous preservation of the remains, ruins, records and reminiscences of a branch of the house of Israel...It will not be a bad plan to compare Mr. Stephens' ruined cities with those in the Book of Mormon: light cleaves to light, and facts are supported by facts. The truth injures no one, and so we make another extract from Stephens''Incidents of Travel in Central America.'"

    17 Letter written by Orson Spencer, November 17, 1842 from Nauvoo to a Baptist minister and former colleague in Boston. In May, 1841, Spencer was baptized in West Stockbridge, Massachusetts. "As you enquire after the reasons that operated to change my mind to the present faith, I only remark that Stevens' Travels had some influence as an external evidence of the truth of the Book of Mormon."The Times and Seasons, published at Nauvoo, Illinois by John Taylor and Wilford Woodruff, Vol. 4 No. 4 (January 2, 1843)

    18 The Times and Seasons, published at Nauvoo, Illinois by John Taylor and Wilford Woodruff. Vol. 4 No. 22 (October 1, 1843). "We have lately perused with great interest, Stephen's works on Central America, Chiapas, and Yucatan. Mr. Stephens published about two years ago, a very interesting work entitled 'Incidents of travel in Central America, Chiapas and Yucatan,' in which he details very many interesting circumstances; discovered the ruins of magnificent cities, and from hieroglyphical representations, sculpture and rich specimens of architecture, proved one important fact, which had been disputed by many of our sages; that America had once been peopled by a highly polished, civilized and scientific race, with whom the present aborigines could not compare.

    This work has been read with great interest throughout this continent, and tens of thousands of copies have been sent to, and sold in Europe, where it has been investigated with the greatest scrutiny and interest. It has already passed through twelve editions; it is published in two volumes, 8 vo.

    Since the publication of this work, Mr. Stephens has again visited Central America, in company with Mr. Catherwood, and other scientific gentlemen, for the purpose of making further explorations among those already interesting ruins. They took with them the Daguerreotype, and other apparatus, for the purpose of giving views and drawings of those mysterious relics of antiquity. His late travels and discoveries, have also been published in two volumes of the same size, entitled 'Incidents of travel in Central America.' [The actual title of Stephens' second 2-volume Middle American work is Incidents of Travel in Yucatan (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1843)]

    It is a work of great interest, written with precision and accuracy. The plates are elegantly executed, and its history unfolds the ruins of grandeur, civilization and intelligence. It is published by Harper & Brothers, N. Y.

    This is a work that ought to be in the hands of every Latter Day Saint; corroborating, as it does the history of the Book of Mormon. There is no stronger circumstantial evidence of the authenticity of the latter book, can be given, than that contained in Mr. Stephens' works.

    Mr. Stephens gives an account of ancient cities he has visited, where once dwelt the powerful, the wise, the scientific, and to use his own words; 'architecture, sculpture and painting, all the arts which embellished life had flourished in this overgrown city; orators, warriors, and statesmen, beauty, ambition, and glory, had lived and passed away, and none knew that such things had been, or could tell of their past existence.' In the last clause, Mr. Catherwood is mistaken. It has fallen to his lot to explore the ruins of this once mighty people, but the 'Book of Mormon' unfolds their history; and published as it was, years before these discoveries were made, and giving as it does, accounts of a people, and of cities that bear a striking resemblance to those mentioned by Mr. Stephens, both in regard to magnificence and location, it affords the most indubitable testimony of the historical truth of that book, which has been treated so lightly by the literati and would be philosophers of the present age."

    19 The Times and Seasons, published at Nauvoo, Illinois by John Taylor and Wilford Woodruff. Vol. 5 No. 1 (January 1, 1844). "Every day adds fresh testimony to the already accumulated evidence on the authenticity of the 'Book of Mormon.' At the time that book was translated there was very little known about ruined cities and dilapidated buildings. The general presumption was, that no people possessing more intelligence than our present race of Indians had ever inhabited this continent, and the accounts given in the Book of Mormon concerning large cities and civilized people having inhabited this land, was generally disbelieved and pronounced a humbug. Priest (Josiah Priest 1788-1851), since then has thrown some light on this interesting subject. Stephens in his 'Incidents of Travels in Central America,' has thrown in a flood of testimony, and from the following statements it is evident that the Book of Mormon does not give a more extensive account of large and populous cities than those discoveries now demonstrate to be even in existence."

    20 Orson Pratt, "Divine Authority; or the Question, Was Joseph Smith Sent of God?" (Liverpool: R. James, Printer, September 30, 1848). "In the Book of Mormon are given the names and locations of numerous cities of great magnitude, which once flourished among the ancient nations of America...Splendid edifices, palaces, towers, forts, and cities, were reared in all directions...Now since that invaluable book made its appearance in print, it is a remarkable fact, that the mouldering ruins of many splendid edifices and towers, and magnificent cities of great extent, have been discovered by Catherwood and Stephens in the interior wilds of Central America, in the very region where the ancient cities described in the Book of Mormon were said to exist. Here then, is a certain and indisputable evidence that this illiterate youth - the translator of the Book of Mormon - was inspired of God. Mr. Smith's translation describes the region of country where great and populous cities anciently existed, together with their relative bearings and approximate distances from each other. Years after, Messrs. Catherwood and Stephens discovered the ruins of forty-four of these very cities and in the very place described. What, but the power of God, could have revealed beforehand this unknown fact, demonstrated years after by actual discovery?" 

    1890 Alfred Maudslay Photograph of the Palace, Palenque

    21 George Q. Cannon, article entitled "Buried Cities of the West.""There existed in Central America a vast empire of great civilization and great antiquity...The history containing this highly important and invaluable information...informs us how the ancient inhabitants of Central America obtained their knowledge...It informs us that the builders of those ruined cities were the possessors of the correct traditions of the creation as they were known to Moses and his progenitors, and were sufficiently advanced in enlightenment to perpetuate them in writing...This history is known as the Book of Mormon...The Book of Mormon pointed out with remarkable definiteness, years before the discovery of ruins in Central America, the situation of cities built and occupied by the ancient dwellers of this continent. Explorations made subsequent to the printing and extensive circulation of this Book, revealed the fact that ruins occupying the precise situation of these ancient cities, did really exist. Prior to their discovery the non-existence of ruins of cities such as the Book of Mormon described, had been plausibly urged as an argument against its authenticity. If, said the objector, such an enlightened and highly advanced people every occupied this continent - if they built cities and temples of such magnitude as stated by the Book of Mormon, where are the ruins? The discoveries of Stephens and Catherwood in the country declared by the Book of Mormon to be the principal residence of one of the colonies that were led to this land, overthrew this argument...This Book has been presented to the world, supported by an overwhelming amount of irrefragable testimony. No book ever was supported by a greater amount."The Latter-day Saints' Millennial Star, published in Liverpool, UK under the editorship of Orson Pratt, Vol. XIX, No. 2 (January 10, 1857), pp. 17-19.

    22The Chicago Times, August 7, 1875. The reporter said David Whitmer, "referring to the innumerable evidences, in the shape of ruins of great cities existing on this continent, of its former occupation by a highly civilized race, reverently declared his solemn conviction of the authenticity of the records in his possession."

    23 Brigham Young to Feramorz Little Young, August 23, 1877, "We should read the true and wise. The perusal of the rest is worse than time wasted, it is time abused. Sell your Dickens' works and get Stephens'& Catherwood's Travels in Central America, or Josephus's or Mosheim's History." Dean C. Jesse, Editor, Letters of Brigham Young to His Sons (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book: 1974), p. 314. Feramorz went on to serve a mission in Mexico. Brigham Young died August 29, 1877, just 6 days after this letter was written. This was the last letter Pres. Young wrote to any of his children.  

    24 The Juvenile Instructor, published at Salt Lake City by George Q. Cannon. Vol. 14 No. 5 (March 1, 1879). "Is it not possible that the great Rio Usumacinta, flowing north into the sea, may be the ancient river Sidon? Those remarkable and world-famous ruins known under the name of Palenque may yet be proven to be the remains of that great city and religious center of the aboriginals called Zarahemla...All the old traditions and records relating to the early colonizers are unanimous in describing them as white men with beards...The whole country is dotted with ruins, and there are unmistakable evidences of its having at one time been inhabited by a dense and industrious population." George Martin Ottinger (G.M.O.) discussed Palenque and other ruins in The Juvenile Instructor in 1875 and 1876 as well.

    25 James H. Hart letter published in the Deseret News, March 25, 1884. "The writer of the Tribune article might learn from this correspondence that the hieroglyphics - of the ancient and interesting people who built the cities of Central America - that are the most acceptable, are not those in Dresden [referring to the Dresden Codex], but those that were shown by your correspondent the other day in Richmond, Ray County, Missouri. He might learn moreover that over 600 pages have been fully translated from such hieroglyphics he has mentioned, which constituted the record called the Book of Mormon, which throws a flood of light upon the religion, science and history of the ancient, interesting, and enlightened people who have dwelt upon this continent during the ages of antiquity...When we take into consideration the fact that this was written in 1829, and published in 1830, which was many years before the ruined cities of Palenque, Copan and Yucatan were discovered, or anything was known concerning the hieroglyphics that were subsequently discovered by Stephens and Catherwood and other travelers, it is simply marvelous that an unlettered boy should be the first to publish these things to the world, and can be accounted for on no other principle than that he and his friends have claimed from the first, namely, that they were translated by the gift and power of God." This same letter was published in the Bear Lake Democrat, March 28, 1884.

    26 St. Louis Republican, July 16, 1884. "This colony came to this continent before Christ, landing as is supposed in Peru, South America. The description of the country in the Book of Mormon answers to the accounts given by modern explorers, and shows conclusively that they passed over the Isthmus of Panama. They afterwards scattered all over the country, leaving mounds, temples, tablets, statuary, inscriptions, and other memorials of their occupation. It is a curious and noted fact that all of the explorations made by Squires (Ephraim George Squier 1821-1888), Priest, Stephens and Catherwood and others of these remains of an ancient people were made subsequent to the publication of the Book of Mormon, which is the only book that gives the key to these prehistoric migrations."
    [A convenient source for the dozens of published David Whitmer interviews is Lyndon Cook, editor, David Whitmer Interviews: A Restoration Witness (Orem: Grandin Book Company, 1991).]

    27 Bishop LeGrand Richards in Conference Report, October, 1946. Elder Charles A. Callis of the Quorum of the Twelve was in attendance and spoke at the conference.

    Elder LeGrand Richards, then an Apostle, gave a longer version of this reminiscence in the April, 1955 General Conference. "I was thrilled by Brother Hunter's [Milton R. Hunter (1902-1975)] testimony of these records that parallel the records of the Book of Mormon. I have never seen this in print, but I heard President Callis make this statement: that after the Book of Mormon came forth the Prophet Joseph was terribly worried about what the world would say, and he said, 'O Lord, what will the world say?' And the answer came back, 'Fear not, I will cause the earth to testify of the truth of these things,' and from that day until now, and only the Lord knows what is yet ahead, external evidences have been brought forth of the divinity of that book." I am indebted to Brant Gardner for pointing out this LeGrand Richards reference.
    --
    The narrative thread running through all of these sources:
    • The Book of Mormon describes high civilizations with writing and large cities.
    • Europeans perceived the native Americans as illiterate and barbaric.
    • It was not clear who built the North American earthen mounds, but the structures themselves were relatively primitive.
    • Joseph Smith and the Three Witnesses were initially reluctant to bear testimony of the Book of Mormon, fearing general disbelief. The English-speaking public in 1829-30 did not think advanced civilizations and large cities had ever existed in ancient America.
    • The voice of the Lord assured Joseph Smith and the Three Witnesses that powerful evidence for refined societies and great cities in ancient America was forthcoming.
    • The Saints welcomed early reports of the ancient Maya civilization with its impressive architecture, hieroglyphic writing, and mighty cities. They believed the Maya ruins recently discovered in Central America were the "proof" the Lord had promised.
    People who helped publicize this narrative included:
    • Joseph Smith Jr., the Prophet
    • Don Carlos Smith, the Prophet's younger brother
    • Joseph Smith III, the Prophet's son
    • Alexander Hale Smith, another of the Prophet's sons
    • Brigham Young, 2nd President of the Church
    • John Taylor, 3rd President of the Church
    • Wilford Woodruff, 4th President of the Church
    • David Whitmer, one of the Three Witnesses
    • William Wine (W.W.) Phelps, scribe & clerk to the Prophet
    • Robert B. Thompson, scribe to the Prophet
    • Parley P. Pratt, original 1835 Quorum of the Twelve
    • Orson Pratt, original 1835 Quorum of the Twelve
    • John E. Page, 1838 Quorum of the Twelve
    • Orson Spencer, President of the University of Nauvoo
    • George Q. Cannon, Councilor in the First Presidency to Brigham Young, John Taylor, Wilford Woodruff, and Lorenzo Snow (1814-1901)
    --
    The blog article "David Whitmer's Testimony" was my first attempt to understand the implications of the 1883 James H. Hart interview. The blog article "Mounds" helps contextualize North American earthen mounds in their global setting. The timeline explained in this blog post is part of a larger picture developed in the article "1829."
    --
    I'm Kirk Magleby, volunteering as Executive Director of Book of Mormon Central (BMC) which builds enduring faith in Jesus Christ by making the Book of Mormon accessible, comprehensible, and defensible to people everywhere. BMC currently publishes in English, Spanish, and Portuguese. See the blog article "Outstanding Come Follow Me Resources." All BMC content is donor-supported, shared with the world free of charge in the spirit of 2 Nephi 9:50 and Isaiah 55:1. BMC currently reaches 600,000 people each week with the good news of Jesus Christ and the Restoration.
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    Prophetic Timeline

    November 26, 2020, 1:00 am
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    ca. 3300 BC The Lord prophesied to Enoch that "righteousness will I send down out of heaven."Moses 7:62. This prophecy was repeated ca. 530 BC "righteousness shall look down from heaven."Psalms 85:11. ca. 96 AD John the Revelator saw this as "another angel fly in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation, kindred, tongue, and people."Revelation 14:6. The Book of Mormon prophet Moroni realized he was that angel Moroni 10:34. Prophecy #1 An angel of righteousness, Moroni, will bring the gospel from heaven to earth.

    ca. 3300 BC The Lord prophesied to Enoch that righteousness from heaven would be associated with "truth will I send forth out of the earth, to bear testimony of mine Only Begotten, his resurrection from the dead..."Moses 7:62. This prophecy was repeated ca. 530 BC "Truth shall spring out of the earth."Psalms 85:11. ca. 720 BC Isaiah prophesied that the Nephites would "be brought down, and shalt speak out of the ground, and thy speech shall be low out of the dust, and thy voice shall be, as of one that hath a familiar spirit, out of the ground, and their speech shall whisper out of the ground."Isaiah 29:4. The Book of Mormon prophets Lehi (2 Nephi 3:19-20), Nephi (2 Nephi 27:9, 33:13) and Moroni (Mormon 8:16, 23, 26; Moroni 10:27) realized their words would fulfill this ancient prophecy. Prophecy #2 Truth, prophetic speech, will come forth out of the ground to bear witness of Jesus Christ. There is no stronger testimony of the resurrection of Jesus Christ than the Book of Mormon account of his visit to the Americas as a glorified being.

     ca. 720 BC Isaiah prophesied that "The Lord shall rise up as in mount Perazim, he shall be wroth as in the valley of Gibeon, that he may do his work, his strange work; and bring to pass his act, his strange act. Isaiah 28:21. Prophecy #3 The Lord will perform a strange act.

    ca. 720 BC Isaiah prophesied that the Lord "will proceed to do a marvelous work among this people, even a marvelous work and a wonder: for the wisdom of their wise men shall perish, and the understanding of their prudent men shall be hid."Isaiah 29:14. The Book of Mormon prophet Nephi understood that the Book of Mormon itself would be part of this marvelous work and wonder 2 Nephi 25:17-18, 27:6, 26. Prophecy #4 The Lord will do a marvelous work and a wonder involving the words of a book.

    ca. 530 BC Daniel prophesied that in the latter days a stone would be cut out without hands, that it would roll forth until it "became a great mountain, and filled the whole earth."Daniel 2:34-35. Daniel went on to explain that this stone was the kingdom of God upon the earth. Daniel 2:44. Prophecy #5 God's kingdom in the latter days will start small, then grow to fill the whole earth.

    ca. 550 BC Nephi prophesied that the Book of Mormon plates delivered to Joseph Smith "shall be hid from the eyes of the world, that the eyes of none shall behold it save it be that three witnesses shall behold it, by the power of God, besides him to whom the book shall be delivered; and they shall testify to the truth of the the book and the things therein."2 Nephi 27:12. ca. AD 420 Moroni gave instructions to Joseph Smith, "And behold, ye may be privileged that ye may show the plates unto those who shall assist to bring forth this work; And unto three shall they be shown by the power of God; wherefore they shall know of a surety that these things are true. And in the mouth of three witnesses shall these things be established...as a testimony against the world at the last day."Ether 5:2-4. Prophecy #6 Three witnesses, in addition to Joseph Smith, will be shown the plates by divine power and commanded to testify of them and their contents to the world.

    ca. 550 BC Nephi recorded a vison in which he saw the Bible go forth from the Gentiles to Lehi's seed, followed by other books, including the Book of Mormon. These other books would have convincing power. 1 Nephi 13:39. Prophecy #7 The Gentiles will take the Bible to the Lamanites, followed by the Book of Mormon and other books. 

    --

    Revelations in the Doctrine and Covenants, Church membership, and the writings of early Church leaders documented the explicit fulfillment of these seven prophecies.

    5 times between February, 1829 and June, 1829 in Harmony, PA and Fayette, NY the Lord said his marvelous work was about to come forth in fulfillment of Prophecy #4. D&C 4:1, 6:1, 11:1, 12:1, 14:1. Oliver Cowdery in his Letter IV to W.W. Phelps said Moroni told Joseph Smith in 1823 that the Book of Mormon would bring to pass the marvelous work and a wonder. Latter Day Saints' Messenger and Advocate, Vol. 1, No. 5, February, 1835 p. 79.

    March, 1829 The Lord said 3 witnesses would testify of the Book of Mormon and their testimony would be included in the book itself. D&C 5:11. Their testimony would consist of two parts: 1) the truth of the words in the book authenticated by divine pronouncement D&C 5:12 and their visual experience seeing the plates and other ancient artifacts D&C 5:13. Then the Lord said that his word would be verified by historical events just as the prophesied destruction of Jerusalem was verified D&C 5:20.

    Late June, 1829 The Lord commanded the 3 Witnesses to bear testimony of the Book of Mormon to the world in fulfillment of Prophecy #6. D&C 1:18 dated November 1, 1831.

    Late June, 1829 The 3 Witnesses said an angel came down from heaven in fulfillment of Prophecy #1 and showed them the plates. The voice of the Lord told them Joseph's translation was true and commanded them to bear witness of it. They obeyed the Lord's command. The Testimony of Three Witnesses was first published in 1830.

    April 6, 1830 D&C 1:30 dated November 1, 1831. The brethren who previously received commandments from the Lord were the ones who laid the foundation of the Church. Joseph Smith, Oliver Cowdery, and David Whitmer all heard the voice of the Lord in late June, 1829 command them to testify of the Book of Mormon to the world. Smith, Cowdery, and Whitmer were 3 of the 6 original incorporators of the Church when it was organized in Fayette, NY on April 6, 1830. The other 3 original incorporators (Hyrum Smith, Samuel H. Smith, Peter Whitmer, Jr.) were among the 8 Witnesses. D&C 20:16, given on April 6, 1830, describes the voice of the Lord to Book of Mormon witnesses who testify of divine words in their roles as elders of the Church.  

    October, 1831 D&C 65:2 The gospel will roll forth as the stone in fulfillment of Prophecy #5. At the end of 1830, Church membership stood at 280. The net increase in 1831 was 400 for a total at year end of 680 which was a growth rate of 142%. Then in 1832, immediately after D&C Section 65 was revealed, the floodgates opened. The net increase in 1832 was 1,961 for total membership at year end of 2,661. That 291% year over year growth surge, a rate not equaled since, laid a strong foundation for the modern Church.

    November 3, 1831 D&C 133:36 The Lord in a revelation verified that Moroni was the angel who flew through the midst of heaven in fulfillment of Prophecy #1.

    June 1, 1833 D&C 95:4 The Lord's strange act, Prophecy #3, was still in the future. 

    December 16, 1833 D&C 101:93-95 Something the Lord said previously will happen, and leave all men without excuse. Wise men and rulers will hear and learn things of which they were previously unaware. The Lord's strange act, Prophecy #3, was still in the future.

    September 6, 1842 D&C 128:19-20 Joseph Smith said the Book of Mormon was truth out of the earth in fulfillment of Prophecy #2. He said the Angel Moroni at Hill Cumorah (1823-27) declared that the Book of Mormon fulfilled ancient prophecy and the voice of the Lord in Fayette, NY (late June, 1829) commanded the 3 Witnesses to bear record of it.

    September 15, 1842 Vol. 3 No. 22 of The Times and Seasons published at Nauvoo, IL by Joseph Smith, said information in John L. Stephens and Frederick Catherwood, Incidents of Travel in Central America, Chiapas, and Yucatan, 2 vols. (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1841) was part of the Lord's "strange act, and proving the Book of Mormon true in the eyes of all the people." This was fulfillment of Prophecy #3. George J. Adams gave a lecture in Charlestown, MA on February 4th and 7th, 1844 entitled "A Lecture on the Authenticity and Scriptural Character of the Book of Mormon." (Boston: J.E. Farwell, 1844). In his lecture, Elder Adams said Stephens and Catherwood proved the Book of Mormon true and that proof was "a wonder and a strange act."

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    Come Follow Me 2021 Resources

    February 3, 2021, 10:47 am
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    I volunteer as Executive Director of Book of Mormon Central (BMC). As 2020 progressed, we became the most important source of Come Follow Me enrichment material outside the institutional Church. My blog article entitled "Outstanding Come Follow Me Resources" describes what we did last year.

    Our offerings for 2021 are even more robust. Content that follows the Come Follow Me 52-week schedule is posted on Book of Mormon Central. Content about the Doctrine and Covenants and Church History is posted on our exciting new Doctrine and Covenants Central. Content from both centrals makes it into ScripturePlus and the BMC Archive. These four, each a major entity in the expanding BMC ecosystem, offer a rich array of material to help people maximize their scripture study experience in the 2021 Doctrine and Covenants year.

    • BMC co-founder, Lynne Hilton Wilson, has a thoughtful series of YouTube videos called "Hard Questions in Church History" that draw on her experience directing the Stanford Institute of Religion.
    • Outstanding BYU Religious Ed professor, Anthony Sweat, has an engaging series of YouTube videos entitled "The Unfolding Restoration" that draw on his experience teaching the popular BYU course, "Foundations of the Restoration."
    • Talented BYU Idaho Religious Ed professor, Scott Woodward, produces an animated short YouTube video explaining each section in the Doctrine and Covenants that many families are finding helpful since Scott's approach appeals to students of all ages.
    • Former BMC staff member, Stephen Smoot, did a series of 7 YouTube videos explaining aspects of Joseph Smith's First Vision that draw on the articles he published in the Joseph Smith History section of Pearl of Great Price Central.
    • The Doctrine and Covenants Central website, curated by Scott Woodward (BYUI) and Casey Griffiths (BYU) launched on January 1, 2021. It includes:
    • Our weekly Come Follow Me Resource Guide is a visual index with links to content from BMC and others organized by the sections specified for each week in the Come Follow Me curriculum.
    • The BMC Archive Doctrine and Covenants section houses a growing collection of books, book chapters, articles, insights, media, and other content relevant to the Doctrine and Covenants.
    • BMC's signature KnoWhys in 2021 generally treat Doctrine and Covenants or Church History themes.
    • The most-watched Come Follow Me weekly YouTube video presentation in the Church in 2021 is the long-form "Come Follow Me Insights" with Taylor Halverson and Tyler Griffin.
    • Marianna Richardson and Stephanie Sorensen, both on the BYU faculty, bring unique insights to their weekly YouTube video series entitled "Come Follow Me: Act in Doctrine."
    • A loyal following is developing behind "Come Follow Me with John Hilton III" who shares wit and wisdom each week in his YouTube video series.
    • "Come Follow Me with Taylor Halverson" takes one point from each week's reading and elaborates on it in a characteristically erudite YouTube video series.
    • "Come Follow Me with Casey Paul Griffiths" is a delightful weekly YouTube video series from one of the best Doctrine and Covenants teachers in the Church.
    • ScripturePlus has transformed the way tens of thousands of Latter-day Saints read their scriptures. The pattern of verse/enrichment material/next verse/enrichment material is so engaging and thought-provoking it transforms one's daily devotions. ScripturePlus brings commentary from Steve Harper, Casey Griffiths, and Susan Easton Black together, linked to a section or a verse in the text. It has images from Ken Mays, Jack Welch, and others. It has 360 degree tours of key Church History sites, as well as BMC KnoWhys with their videos. The most used feature in ScripturePlus are the reading plans. We currently have 13 reading plans available with more coming online regularly. The 2021 Doctrine and Covenants reading plan averages 14 verses per day and is a superb way to do Come Follow Me. ScripturePlus is currently available in both English and Spanish.
    • The most-watched Come Follow Me weekly YouTube video presentation in the Church in 2021 in Spanish is the long-form "Ven, Sígueme con Pepe Valle."
    • For a woman's perspective, Spanish-speaking members watch Cecy Gastelum's weekly YouTube video series "Ven Sígueme: Te lo Cuento en Diez."
    • Youth are attracted to "Melody Dice," a weekly YouTube video series where Melody Monroy treats Church History topics in the context of contemporary, faithful, fun-loving Hispanic Latter-day Saint life.
    • Spanish-speaking children of all ages increasingly like the clever, animated weekly YouTube series "Ven Sígueme Kids" produced by Daniel Acosta. 
    • Diligent students of the Restoration are attracted to the more erudite occasional YouTube video series "Historia de la Iglesia" by Hispanic gospel scholar, Noé Correa as part of his long-running "Por Fe y Estudio" programs.
    • Hispanic families around the Church increasingly gather on Monday evenings to participate in "La Noche de Hogar con Benji Monroy," a weekly YouTube video series designed for families to interact with each other and the Come Follow Me curriculum.
    • "Come Follow Me Insights" with Taylor Halverson and Tyler Griffin are subtitled in Portuguese and posted as a weekly YouTube video series entitled "Estudo do Vem, e Segue-Me." 
    • "Come Follow Me with John Hilton III" episodes are subtitled in Portuguese and posted as a weekly YouTube video series entitled "Vem, e Segue-Me com John Hilton III."
    • Former Brazilian Mission President & former Director of the Sacred Grove Historic Site, Dale Bradford, narrates a weekly YouTube video series in Portuguese entitled "Histórias de Joseph Smith" that provides background details illuminating the Doctrine and Covenants.
    • All of this BMC content is supplemented by user generated content shared by members of the Church among themselves in our three Come Follow Me Facebook groups:
    --
    All of this content is packaged alongside Book of Mormon material which appears on BMC websites, Facebook pages, Instagram channels, etc. A few key metrics across our 3 publication languages @ February 2, 2021:
    • BMC Facebook followers: 201K
    • Members of BMC Facebook Groups: 203K
    • BMC YouTube subscribers: 403K
    • BMC unique website visitors: 3.5 Million
    • ScripturePlus mobile app launches: 3.7 Million
    • BMC website pageviews: 16.7 Million
    • BMC YouTube video views: 46.5 Million
    • BMC user engagements across all channels: 200 Million
    Kirk Magleby, volunteer Executive Director, Book of Mormon Central. We build enduring faith in Jesus Christ by making the Book of Mormon and other Restoration Scripture accessible, comprehensible, and defensible to people everywhere. We educate the curious, support the struggling, and reinforce the strong.
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