🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <mcculloch.2.59.36276C7C@osu.edu>,
  mcculloch.2@osu.edu (Hu McCulloch) wrote:
>
> Oscar Schlaf writes, concerning Yuri's comment on my 10/13
> review of Shakti M Gupta's 1996 book _Plants in Indian Temple
> Art,_
>
> > It's over two decades old and dismissed by subsequent investigations...
> > (see quoted article at the end of this follow-up)
>
> I don't understand Oscar's math here -- it seems to me that
> 1998 - 1996 = 2, not a number in excess of 20.  Gupta's work
> confirming the presence of maize and at least 5 other [!] New World
> plants in pre-Columbian Indian sculptures  is _subsequent to_
> the 1993 Payak and Sachan critique of Johannessen and Parker,
> not the other way around.

 Yuri used direct quotes from her earlier books & use her earlier books as
proof of her expertise.

"Plant Myths and Traditions  in India"(1971)
"Vishnu and His Incarnations" (1974)
"Legends  around Shiva"(1979)

 And like Mr. Hyerdahl, she includes much of her older material to support
her newer theories.  And as I pointed out the theories stated in her older
books have been challenged by others subsequently, such as Sachan ,Payak,
Mangelsdorf, and Anderson.



> [snip]
> > Yawn.....See what a two non-European non-American Hindus had to say about
> >the "Maize statues":
>
> > Payak, M.M., and Sachan, J.K.S.
> > 1993 "Maize Ears Not Sculpted in 13th Century Somnathpur
> >         Temple in India." Economic botany. APR 01 1993, vol. 47
> >        no. 2, P. 202->
>
> While it is true that Johannessen and Parker are neither Indian nor Hindu
> nor experts on Hindu temple art (apart from what they have picked up in
> their search for maize), the significance of Gupta's book is that she
> is an Indian,

 Nationality really doesn't matter, least to me. It is Mr. Kuchinsky that
seems to have the preoccupation with all European Archaeologists being
Eurocentric, except Mr. Hyerdahl of course....

 she is a recognized expert on the Hindu religion (both
> Vaishnavite and Shaivite) and specifically on the use of
> plants in Hindu mythology, and

> she has no axe to grind for pre-Columbian contacts.

 Neither do most of the people critical of the statues, and other temple art.



  Indeed she  doesn't even seem to
> be aware that this is a serious possiblity,

>yet 6 of the 70-odd  plants she
> identifies in pre-Columbian sculptures are New World species.

 She interpeted that way, others disagree & a serious lack of linguistical,
and physical evidence is against her. Which is probably why she didn't touch
on the subject that much....


  Payak and
> Sachan are biologists, and do not share Gupta's expertise on either Hindu
> relgion or Hindu/Jain/Buddhist temple art.

 Payak & Sachan are biologists, Gupta does not share thier expertise on
Maize, nor is she a linguist, nor a historian of trade unlike  Panchamukhi.

 See:

  Panchamukhi, R. S., 1975, Agriculture and Trade in Ancient
   Karnataka. Studies in Indian Epigraphy


  I mentioned in my review that it
> was unfortunate that Gupta did not address their arguments (or mention
> Johannessen and Parker, for that matter), but this does not reduce
> the expertise or relevance of her opinion.

 The clear lack of all other evidence beyond an personal interpetation of
a few statues, though reduces the theory on Pre-Columbian Maize in India
greatly.


> It is interesting that Sachan, with M. Kumar, does endorse _genetic_
> evidence for the antiquity of maize in India (see working paper linked
> on my web site below).

 He also mentions before fully endorcing it, much further testing needs to be
done, genetic drift and other things still needing to be worked out.


> >This article's abstract says:
>
> >The contention that objects in the hands of male and female deities sculpted
> >on the exterior of the Kesav Temple at Somnathpur near the city of Mysore,
> >Karnataka State, India, represent maize ears is rejected on linguistic,
> >religious, sculptural, archaeological, and botanical grounds. The stone
> >inscriptions associated with the temple list items or commodities used in
> >worship, maize is not included. We find no evidence for maize figuring in
> >any kind of religious ritual or worship.  The word for maize used currently
> >in the Kannada language is "Musukin Jola" which refers to a kind of millet
> >resembling sorghum (jola).  This appelation is of recent origin and does not
> >appear in any literary work contemporary with the period of construction  of
> >Somnathpur temple.
>
> I'd like to see a list of what words _are_ used in these temple lists,
> with each of them identified as to what they represent.  Just because
> a modern word for maize does not appear, does not necessarily mean
> that maize was not formerly  known by a different term, eg muktaphala.


 (snip)

> >The beaded ornamentation, likewise, of
> >the hand-held object shows considerable variation and its comparison whether
> >on qualitative or quantitative basis with actual maize kernels of both
> >primitive and modern maize is inappropriate.
>
> Johannessen and Parker (_Economic Botany_, 1989) point out that
> maize has substantial variation in its size, proportions, and kernel
> arrangement,

 It does now, but one would have to ask:

 a) exactly which Meso-American group traded thier Maize to East Indians

 b.) What was the varation among the Maize these Meso-Americans raised.



 and that the Karnataka temple objects lie within this
> range.   Again, Gupta has no problem identifying these objects as
> corncobs, despite her exertise on plants in Hindu mythology and
> in particular in Indian temple art.

 Maize doesn't appear in Hindu mythology, any expert could tell you that. :)
Even if it did appear under a differant name, one would think at least a few
physical descriptons of it would appear, along with pictures of it.


  Can anyone on bionet.general
> tell a corncob from a banana in the Johannessen photos I link
> on my website?   The nearest other object to maize is the custard
> apple, which Gupta also identifies in the temple art.  But it's
> New World too!
>
> >The variation in form and
> >proportion and stylistic features of these objects is ascribed to their being
> >the work of different sculptors.  Maize now grown near the temple comprises
> >modern cultivars, especially hybrids released during the early 1960's.  It is
> >inconceivable that none of the primitive and advanced types of maize
> >purported to be represented in the temple sculpture would have been
> >considered worthy of cultivation from
> >thirteenth century to the present time.
>
> My hunch is that maize fourished in Karnataka at the time of the temples,
> but soon got zapped by a smut or mildew.


 Why haven't any corncobs radio-carbon dated to the time been found?

 Why is there no mention in any Indian text of the time of the plant(or any of
the other New World ones)?

 Why isn't there any mention of voyages to or from the New World prior to
1500ad?

 Why & how would the East Indian sailors go all the way across the Pacific?

 Why would the East Indians end up with Maize, but not The Polynesians or
Maylasians would would be first on any presumable trade route between the
new World & South India?


 Payak and Sachan themselves
> note that the 1960's introduction of maize was for a time frustrated by
> an endemic sorghum mildew.

 Modern Hybrid Maize is what they introduced, not "Indian Maize" which would
be the closest modern relative any presumable maize brought to India in the
1200s or earlier.  The Modern Hybrid Maize has less genetic varitey, and thus
more suscepitable to diease.


> This might be the very mildew that
> wiped out the local pre-Columbian cultivation.

 Even if that were the case, one would think at least some physical
evidence of Maize dating from the time would show up.  Also major blights of
such staple foods, would have no doubt been mentioned, and there isn't any
indication of any major crop blight in the area of any "Muktaphala" or
"Muskin Jola".

> >We hold that these temple sculptures
> >do not represent maize or its ear but an imaginary fruit bearing pearls known
> >in Sanskrit as "Muktaphala"
>
> Muktaphala literally means "pearl-fruit".  My hunch here is that this was
> an an ancient word for maize.

> What better name for maize than pearl-fruit?

 Why the name Maize or Musukin Jola, :)  The question is, why exactly would
the basic word for a plant change so dramatically?

 While Gupta's work is interesting, esentially it is nothing new, only yet
another opinion on a very limit amount of evidence.  If some new evidence
were presented it might be a bit differant. As it is, this particular debate
has been going on for over 30 years in academia & about four to five years on
the net here....


                                     ---Oscar Schlaf---

 "A witty quote proves nothing" - Voltaire


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