Vatic Note: Hmmm, a stone mason, huh? Wonder if that has anything to do with the "controversy"?
http://www.examiner.com/architecture-design-in-national/mayas-the-usa-controversy-you-be-the-juror
By: Richard Thornton
Date: 2011-12-24
http://www.examiner.com/architecture-design-in-national/mayas-the-usa-controversy-you-be-the-juror
By: Richard Thornton
Date: 2011-12-24
A recent article "Ruins in Georgia mountains possibly linked to ancient Mayans" has become a very popular topic on Examiner.com. The article presents evidence to support a position long held by the Creek, Cherokee and Chitimacha Indians; namely that sea-going merchants, illiterate farmers and escaped slaves fled Mesoamerica during a period of chronic wars, drought and volcanic eruptions, then settled in what is now the Southeast and Mississippi Basin.
Although already generating approximately 81,000 “Likes” on Facebook, the article has also generated considerable controversy. A group of archaeology professors in the Southeast have vigorously objected to the article and created a separate web site to organize opposition to it. Numerous archaeologists from around North America, however, have also placed positive comments on the article.
Examiner.com is offering you the reader, the opportunity to take the role of a juror on this controversy. You will be allowed to review the scientific evidence presented by both sides, then state your opinion as a comment at the end of the article.
There were numerous negative comments from archaeologists that challenged the author’s educational qualifications. Richard Thornton is a card-carrying Creek Indian architect and city planner, with seven years of university education. He has worked as an architectural-town planning consultant to archaeologists on Native American sites, and as a historic preservation architect for Early American structures, throughout his entire adult life.
He was awarded a fellowship to study Mesoamerican architecture & town planning in Mexico under the tutelage of one of the greatest archaeologists who ever lived, Roman Piña-Chan, Director of the Museo Nacional de Antropologia. He has written seven books on Native American and Mesoamerican culture, and taught Pre-Columbian architecture at Georgia Tech.
He created the seven models of ancestral Creek towns in the Capitol of the Muscogee-Creek Nation in Okmulgee, OK. Richard was the architect for Oklahoma’s Trail of Tears Memorial in Council Oak Park, Tulsa. He is also an expert stone mason and very knowledgeable about prehistoric & colonial stone masonry techniques.
Description of the Research Project
In 2007 an alliance of Native American professors and professionals around the United States, known as the People of One Fire, began an exhaustive analysis of available archaeological reports, early maps, plus Spanish, French and English colonial archives in order to develop a more accurate description of the Southeast’s Native American history,
The impetus for this gargantuan project was a series of popular books published by archaeology professors at certain Southeastern universities during the previous 20 years that mistranslated Native American words and misrepresented the known indigenous history of the Southeast. An early objective of the project was to develop a list of Native American words recorded by early explorers in order to provide the public with their correct translations.
Although already generating approximately 81,000 “Likes” on Facebook, the article has also generated considerable controversy. A group of archaeology professors in the Southeast have vigorously objected to the article and created a separate web site to organize opposition to it. Numerous archaeologists from around North America, however, have also placed positive comments on the article.
Examiner.com is offering you the reader, the opportunity to take the role of a juror on this controversy. You will be allowed to review the scientific evidence presented by both sides, then state your opinion as a comment at the end of the article.
There were numerous negative comments from archaeologists that challenged the author’s educational qualifications. Richard Thornton is a card-carrying Creek Indian architect and city planner, with seven years of university education. He has worked as an architectural-town planning consultant to archaeologists on Native American sites, and as a historic preservation architect for Early American structures, throughout his entire adult life.
He was awarded a fellowship to study Mesoamerican architecture & town planning in Mexico under the tutelage of one of the greatest archaeologists who ever lived, Roman Piña-Chan, Director of the Museo Nacional de Antropologia. He has written seven books on Native American and Mesoamerican culture, and taught Pre-Columbian architecture at Georgia Tech.
He created the seven models of ancestral Creek towns in the Capitol of the Muscogee-Creek Nation in Okmulgee, OK. Richard was the architect for Oklahoma’s Trail of Tears Memorial in Council Oak Park, Tulsa. He is also an expert stone mason and very knowledgeable about prehistoric & colonial stone masonry techniques.
Description of the Research Project
The impetus for this gargantuan project was a series of popular books published by archaeology professors at certain Southeastern universities during the previous 20 years that mistranslated Native American words and misrepresented the known indigenous history of the Southeast. An early objective of the project was to develop a list of Native American words recorded by early explorers in order to provide the public with their correct translations.
