🚀 go-pugleaf

Graham Harden (G.Harden@bigfoot.com) wrote on Wed, 4 Nov 1998 11:04:32 +1100:

: Why do these pictorial references, carvings etc, have to be maize? 

Dear Graham,

It seems to me that they are maize.

: Is there
: additional material to support this interpretation? 

There's plenty of such material. Look on my webpage. Other evidence comes
from botany, genetics, and historical sources.

http://www.trends.net/~yuku/tran/tmz.htm

: I know they look like
: maize to the Americo-centric eye,

Gupta is an American???

: but to me the first impression I have is
: of the fruit of the Monstera deliciosa..... aka fruit-salad-fruit. 

Perhaps you can explain why you think so.

: This in
: itself proves nothing, what I mean to illustrate is that there are a number
: of botanical items that appear quite similar to the objects in the carvings

Various other candidates have been considered by Johannessen and others.
But they don't seem to fit.

: (if they are "fruits" at all).

They are not fruits.

: There are at the very least questions of tradition to be made before leaping
: into the hypothesis that these are maize and hence indicate commerce between
: continents.

: 1)    What are the ornaments and totems commonly associated with this figure
: (ie the being holding the items)?  Is it vegetation, fertility,

Yes.

: 2)    What do the local people usually interpret the item as being?

I don't know. But local people haven't been planting maize in this area
for centuries (except for some well documented modern re-introductions).
Maize was replaced in this area by rice.

My own theory is that there were populations displacements in later
centuries. The tribes that are traditionally planting maize in India now
live in the highlands. It is probable that they lived in the plains
previously.

: When these are addressed with suitable rigour,

They have been already.

Now, according to the latest published research by Johannessen, these same
Indian temples that have maize ALSO have sunflowers -- another American
crop. And not only this. These sunflower portrayals ALSO are often
strongly associated with astronomical observation of the sun, i.e. with
sun worship. 

You see, as Johannessen writes, in some temples, including the Sri Gave
Ganadeshwara Temple, Bangalore, Karnataka, on the day of the equinox, the
sunflower image is illuminated by the sunlight that passes through a
special astronomically aligned narrow slot. So the sunflower portrayals
are coordinated with temple architecture.

"These complex architectural alignments obviously betoken the high degree
to which the sunflower has been integrated into the ritual configuration
of the Siva cult." (Carl Johannessen, "Pre-Columbian American Sunflower
and Maize Images in Indian Temples: Evidence of Contact between
Civilizations in India and America", in Davis Bitton, ed., _Mormons,
Scripture and the Ancient World: Studies in Honor of John L. Sorenson_,
FARMS, Provo UT, 1998, p. 360)

The above has also been published in _NEARA Journal_, vol. 32, #1 (Summer
1998), pp. 4-18. (Back issues of NEARA Journal can be obtained from NEARA
Publications, c/o Suzanne Carlson, 94 Cross Point Rd, Edgecomb, ME 04556,
(207) 882 8155, fax (207) 882 8162, e-mail krosspt@lincoln.midcoast.com .
($4 per issue).)

Therefore, I don't think there's much doubt about the identification of
these sunflower images. This, to me, is very good additional new evidence
for maize.

Regards,

Yuri.

Yuri Kuchinsky -=O=- http://www.globalserve.net/~yuku

But scientists, who ought to know
Assure us that it must be so.    
Oh, let us never, never doubt    
What nobody is sure about.       
         -- Hilaire Belloc