The Red Record

[E.P. Grondine]

Hi Nanticoke -

I didn't say any of that, and for that matter never wrote it, so why are you trying to
put those words in my mouth?

The Andaste were seven and a half feet tall, however, and yes, their remains were dug up,
and yes, they were seven and a half feet tall.

Now, back to the Lenape. Aside from what Rafinesque provided in the Walum Olum,
there are two direct accounts from Lenape Medewiwin of their migration in
the Little Ice Age: that preserved by Heckewelder, and that by Sutton. The Lenpae
Medewiwin's accounts agree with the archaeological record.

I don't hold this as a grudge. Extraordinary circumstance will cause people to take actions
which they never would normally have taken.

Now some archaeologists are working with some Lenape to deny all of this and
claim Shawnee ceremonial sites. I will do whatever I can to stop them and expose them.

It's kind of a sensitive issue for me.

How would Lenape feel if I were to claim that their ancestral grounds were someone else's
and turn archaeologists loose on them?

E.P. Grondine
Man and Impact in the Americas

PS - From what I've heard, sadly, the Lenape shut down their Big House ceremonies about
thirty years ago.
 

[NanticokePiney]

Hi Nanticoke -

I didn't say any of that, and for that matter never wrote it, so why are you trying to
put those words in my mouth?

The Andaste were seven and a half feet tall, however, and yes, their remains were dug up,
and yes, they were seven and a half feet tall.

Now, back to the Lenape. Aside from what Rafinesque provided in the Walum Olum,
there are two direct accounts from Lenape Medewiwin of their migration in
the Little Ice Age: that preserved by Heckewelder, and that by Sutton. The Lenpae
Medewiwin's accounts agree with the archaeological record.

I don't hold this as a grudge. Extraordinary circumstance will cause people to take actions
which they never would normally have taken.

Now some archaeologists are working with some Lenape to deny all of this and
claim Shawnee ceremonial sites. I will do whatever I can to stop them and expose them.

It's kind of a sensitive issue for me.

How would Lenape feel if I were to claim that their ancestral grounds were someone else's
and turn archaeologists loose on them?

E.P. Grondine
Man and Impact in the Americas

PS - From what I've heard, sadly, the Lenape shut down their Big House ceremonies about
thirty years ago.
 

  The "Little Ice Age" happened in the 15th to 17th Century.  The First Proto-Algonquians ( Adena Middlesex and Fox Creek) migrated into the Delaware Valley and down the Coast during the Terminal Archaic. The Shawnee sprung from this group ( Chawano, Chawanoc). They did not become wanderers into the Ohio Valley until they were battered up and down the Carolina Rivers by Spanish Slavers.
  The Northern Algonquians (Munsee, Mohican) did not migrate down into The New York, New Jersey area until the Middle Woodland. Their migration fits more in line with the Walum Olum that is why many still believe it.
  As for Delawares claiming Shawnee sacred sites. Which ones? There is as much fraudulent Delaware out there than there is Cherokee. Many of them are outright cults who make up their own culture. Are you sure it isn't one of those groups?

[E.P. Grondine]

Actually, Nanticoke:

The ancestors of the Shawnee people were compromised of three streams:

The first stream was Iroquoian, and came across the land bridge after 50,000 BCE. They survived the Holocene Start Impacts
of 10,900 BCE in the Big Lick area.

The second stream came up from South America sometime in the third millenia BCE, and assimilated with the
Iroquoian peoples. They headed up the Mississippi and Ohio Rivers, and assimilated with the Iroquoian peoples living
there. That's why you have those "formative" mounds at Baton Rouge, and why Poverty Point fell.

That's also why you have that "formative" sacbe road connecting Chiliothe and Newark, which Brad Lepper did such a
wonderful job in tracing. And by the way, the other route into Newark, meeting place of the Tchiligatha and Kishpoko
divisions, came up from Marietta, ancestral home of the Kishpoko. It goes via Salt Creek, and yes there is a big mound on
the Licking River at the ford. 

That's why you had those two pairs of astronomical rings and rectangular enclosures there in Newark - its where the
divisions met.

The Shawnee Primary Narative was an astronomical allegory, and their meetings and ball games were timed to astronomical
events. Hence the astronomical celebration function of the rings. (And by the way, the eastern jaguar was grey with
red markings, and that's one of the reasons why the same word is used for comet in Shawnee.)

The third stream of the Shawnee ancestors were Algonquin, and they came across Lake Erie in the global climate collapse of
536 CE.  They assimilated with what remained of the existing peoples along the Ohio, though part of the Tshiligatha
removed south east and were ancestral to the Tsulagi.

The distribution of the Shawnee divisions was such along the Ohio: Thewighili (my granmothers division)
controlled the pass between the Ohio and Potomac rivers, with their principle settlement at Shawnee Oldtown, Maryland.
Next down river was Piqua, then Kishpoko, then Tshiliga/tha (excuse my spelling, but this division held common ancestry
with the Tsulagi before 536), and then Mekoche.

Now as to this "wandering" Shawnee nonsense:

First you had the Lenape migration, as their medewiwin related.

You can read about the Shawnee Divisions' locations at first European contact in Charle's Adams, The Wilderness Road.
The divisions were dispersed by the Five Nations, who were armed by the English and used by them as mercenaries.

The divisions fled to different places, and we have excellent well dated reports of their arrivals from other European colonists.
Alford covered some of this, some was covered in the book Red Carolinians, some by historians in Illinois (Dickson Mounds and
Starved Rock. The Mekoche and Tshiligatha divisions headed up the Vermillion River to try to get fire-arms from the French).

After the Three Fires defeated the Five Nations, the Shawnee divisions started to return to their ancestral homes, but by
then the English colonists were showing up in force, and we all know what happened next.

Now the Lenape medewiwin remembered their migration with a wampum count, and the dates for Oneota are pretty well
established by radio carbon dating, including the later eastern variants.  That's set out at the wikipedia discussion link.

For some reason you seem to think that if you impugn Rafinesque, that will eliminate Heckewelder's and Sutton's preservations of the Lenape medewiwin traditions. It won't.

The climate collapse in North America during the Little Ice Age started earlier here than in Europe, and prompted Kushita,
Chicasa, Choctaw and Abikhas to start their migration from the Three Rivers petroglyphs area in New Mexico into
southeast North America.  We would do well to remember these traditions, as we are living here now, and the same climate
collapses will happen again; it would be good to be ready for them.

I bear the Lenape no ill will for their migration, as the Algonquin stream of the Shawnee came south in the climate collapse
of 536 CE.

If you wish to speak about the Adena (Andaste), I suggest you read the fundamental introduction to them, Dragoo's
"Mounds for the Dead", before you do so again. Again, they were seven and half feet tall, and the Ojibwe, Menominee,
Hotsega (HoChunk), Five Nations, Cherokee, and Shawnee tradition keepers all held the memories of their ancestors' battles
with them.

In closing, while Oestreicher would have us believe that Rafinesque produced the Walum Olum in one month, that is simply
super human. I think that Rafinesque was just thrown by the use of historical present tense in Lenape, and once he had a
key to that, he proceeded with his translation. I stated the reasons for my thinking on this over at the wikipedia discussion. 

I have no problem with early Algonquin in what later became New England, and I have no problem with a very early date for
their migration there. They just were not Lenape.

I have gifted copies of my book to major libraries, and you can read it via interlibrary loan for free.
I stopped it at European contact. The rest was too painful.

E.P. Grondine
Man and Impact in the Americas

[NanticokePiney]

 I'm still confused about the Adena being exceptionally tall. As "token Nanticoke" for the 'Cumberland County Prehistoric Museum' I have seen many Adena Burials and many reports on the same. I have even seen one of those "wolf shamans" with the alveolar ridge destruction on the front of his face where a wolf maxilla was installed installed up close and personal. He was only about 5'9". I have just recently seen Adena/ Middlesex remains from the Delmarva Complex in a confidental site in Atlantic County, New Jersey. I have seen nothing to the contrary that they were not average height.
  Oh! Call me Rich or Piney. Nanticoke is what tribe I am.   

[wolfhawaii]

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9E0DEEDB1439E233A25753C3A9619C946796D6CF
I googled "Andaste" and found this old article which has some descriptions.

[E.P. Grondine]

Hi Rich -

The archaeologists will define "Adena" based on technologies, just as they do "Hopewell",  another name they made up.

The easiest way to get the first hand contact accounts of the Andaste (the Adena Adena proper) survivors is through my book "Man and Impact in the Americas".  The volumes containing the material on them otherwise are pretty rare.

PS - Dr. Dallas Abbott is working through the material remains of recent impact mega-tsunami's on the North East coast, and certainly some of the peoples must have remembered them. Perhaps you're familiar with their traditions.

E.P. Grondine
Man and Impact in the Americas

[E.P. Grondine]

Hi Rich, everyone -

I need to share some further thoughts on Rafinesque with all of you, just to free my mind of them and leave a path for those who follow.

Among scholars of classical Greek and Latin, it is a common practice to "reconstruct" lost writings from the fragments of them that remain. For that matter, those scholars will even use translations into other languages, such as Arabic, to gain materials for those reconstructions.

Rafinesque knew all of their techniques and would not have hesitated to apply them to Lenape traditions. Rich has spoken of Oestriecher's article in the New Jersey Archaeological Society publication; it is useless for the purpose of determining what Rafinesque did and what he was working from. Instead, one must go to Oestreicher's thesis, where he set out what he thought were the names of the historical Lenape leaders known from other sources, and then carefully work one's way through it. That would take tens of thousands of dollars.

Then there's Heckewelder's 1822 paper. Again, tens of thousands of dollars to work with it.

A similar situation exists as far as the pictographs goes. Europeans commonly viewed Native American art through European eyes, and it is common to see Mayan art looking Greek or Roman in their representations of it. In addition, in Rafinesque's case Chinese and Egyptian writing systems were not well understood at the time, and he had no firm chronology to work with, as we do today. In this case, baring further archaeological discoveries, we pretty much have what we have, and that's it.

Tracking Dr. Ward (not his full name, by the way) from Anderson would take tens of thousands of dollars more. In this regard, it is greatly to be regretted that the bulk of Thomas Jefferson's Native American materials were lost on his move from Washington back to Charlottesville, Virginia. Maybe Dr. Ward (again, not his full name) corresponded with Jefferson, and perhaps some part that correspondence may survive, but taking a look for it would require tens of thousands of dollars.

Anyone dealing with the traditions of the eastern peoples faces a situation similar to that faced by Rafinesque. Bits and pieces of their traditions are scattered here and there, not assembled, and usually corrupted, through both translation problems and the biases of those recording them. 

Anyone working with Chicasa, Choctaw, Kushita, Miami, Wendat, etc. traditions faces the same problems. The loss of the history of the Cherokee assembled by Sequoia's colleague is greatly to be regretted. There is no center for this kind of work, no funding, and for the eastern peoples, nearly everyone's languages and traditions are fading.

E.P. Grondine
Man and Impact in the Americas

[BuboAhab]

I suggest that rather than spending all that money, One can freely find solace in the fact that Native Americans wrote the Walam Olum.  Also, it is acceptable to completely ignore the detractors that will commit libel against anyone that has researched such matters.

A quote copied from another website stated on Saturday, May 08, 2004: "See the "Walam Olum" published by the Indiana Historical Society. Also, See "The Lenape and their Legends" by Brinton. It is believed that it is not a hoax. The history of the Lenape was handed down for millenia by means of pictographs on sticks or bark as well as orally ( or story telling."James Albany President,Lenni Lenape Historical Society. Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Walam_Olum"

[shkaakwus]

This topic should be moved to Frauds.  The Walam Olum is one of the greatest hoaxes ever perpetrated. 

[E.P. Grondine]

This topic should be moved to Frauds.  The Walam Olum is one of the greatest hoaxes ever perpetrated. 

In your opinion. I differ with you on that, and I've stated the reasons for my opinion.

Let me remind you that besides the Walam Olum, we have two other records of tellings of the Lenape migration by their mediwiwin, both of which accord with the archaeological record.

Its sad how much was lost in the conquest. If the devastation had not been so complete, the traditions would have been better preserved and there for all to hear.

E.P. Grondine
Man and Impact in the Americas

[shkaakwus]

E.P. Grondine writes:

"Let me remind you that besides the Walam Olum, we have two other records of tellings of the Lenape migration by their mediwiwin, both of which accord with the archaeological record."
 
First of all, "walam" has been ungrammatically truncated from Delaware, "wallamman" ('red paint'), in an amateur attempt to create a descriptive adjective meaning, 'red.'  You can't do that!  To translate 'red,' in a phrase like 'Red Record,' the word "machkeekhasik" ('that which is marked red') would likely be used.  Even if this record was supposed to have been done in traditional 'red paint,' the adjective (prenoun) would have been "wallammanni"--NOT "walam"!  Next, "olum," is also grammatically deficient.  An "olum" is a single notch on a tally stick.  It can't refer to the hundreds of different engraved images which supposedly make up this work.  It would have to be pluralized to "olumall," at a minimum, to force-fit it to signify this title!  Your "mediwiwin" is not a Delaware word, which would be "metewak" or "meteinowak," in Lenape.  
 
The fact that John Heckewelder, in his Indian Nations, related a migration story based on accounts he heard from Lenape informants, parts of which look a lot like what we read in the Walam Olum, is because Rafinesque lifted those details directly from Heckewelder's account!  Nobody is denying that the Lenape had some traditional stories of a migration, which came to the notice of chroniclers in the 18th-century.  However, that Rafinesque incorporated some of that in his fraudulent "epic," does not make that "epic" any less of a fraud!  The Gaelic speakers of Ireland and Scotland have numerous authentic traditional tales of their folk-hero, Ossian; however, the fact that James Macpherson salted, here and there, his monumental counterfeit, Ossian, with some of these, does not make his work any less of a forgery!  Likewise, with Rafinesque's ridiculous production.                  

"Its sad how much was lost in the conquest. If the devastation had not been so complete, the traditions would have been better preserved and there for all to hear."
 
There is plenty left!  Enough to occupy a willing person in a lifetime of learning.  Three comprehensively documented dialects of Delaware, and over two hundred traditional stories, tons of cultural observations by Moravian missionaries and others--and NOT A SINGLE MENTION of this so-called "Walam Olum."  Thankfully, the oldest living speakers told us, unanimously, that they never heard of the "Walam Olum."  Even those questioned in the late 19th and early 20th centuries never heard of it!

[E.P. Grondine]

First of all, "walam" has been ungrammatically truncated from Delaware, "wallamman" ('red paint'), in an amateur attempt to create a descriptive adjective meaning, 'red.'  You can't do that!  To translate 'red,' in a phrase like 'Red Record,' the word "machkeekhasik" ('that which is marked red') would likely be used.  Even if this record was supposed to have been done in traditional 'red paint,' the adjective (prenoun) would have been "wallammanni"--NOT "walam"!  Next, "olum," is also grammatically deficient.  An "olum" is a single notch on a tally stick.  It can't refer to the hundreds of different engraved images which supposedly make up this work.  It would have to be pluralized to "olumall," at a minimum, to force-fit it to signify this title!  Your "mediwiwin" is not a Delaware word, which would be "metewak" or "meteinowak," in Lenape.

If you have non-Lenape speakers trying to record utterances, you can expect mistakes, not perfection.  Compare, for example "Nicotani" for Cherokee "Ani Kitani" in Mooney. If my memory serves (and since my stroke it sometimes does not), the term "Mediwiwin" was used in later Lenape records at Anderson, referring to the fact that Chief Anderson himself could not be mediwiwin, because of his mixed blood. But that may have been an Ojibwe borrowing by that time. Or perhaps it was "mediwi", without the /wak - I'd have to go back to Anderson to check.

The fact that John Heckewelder, in his Indian Nations, related a migration story based on accounts he heard from Lenape informants, parts of which look a lot like what we read in the Walam Olum, is because Rafinesque lifted those details directly from Heckewelder's account!

Or did Heckwelder compose his list from a transcript of the Walam Olum? He only provided part of the migration tradition, did he not?

Nobody is denying that the Lenape had some traditional stories of a migration, which came to the notice of chroniclers in the 18th-century.

Actually, a lot of people are denying the Lenape migration, and attack the Walam Olum because they think that was the only recording of the tradition of that migration; hence Kraft's sponsorship of Oestreicher's work.

The accounts of Heckewelder and Sutton of the migration tradition I repeated in my book "Man and Impact in the Americas".

However, that Rafinesque incorporated some of that in his fraudulent "epic," does not make that "epic" any less of a fraud!  The Gaelic speakers of Ireland and Scotland have numerous authentic traditional tales of their folk-hero, Ossian; however, the fact that James Macpherson salted, here and there, his monumental counterfeit, Ossian, with some of these, does not make his work any less of a forgery!  Likewise, with Rafinesque's ridiculous production.

 

I set out above what in my opinion will have to be done before Rafinesque's activities will be fully understood, and provided some rough cost estimates of what it will take to do them.

I would be most pleased to see the fragments of the Lenape migration tradition (history) assembled all together in one place.

"Its sad how much was lost in the conquest. If the devastation had not been so complete, the traditions would have been better preserved and there for all to hear."
 

There is plenty left!  Enough to occupy a willing person in a lifetime of learning.  Three comprehensively documented dialects of Delaware, and over two hundred traditional stories, tons of cultural observations by Moravian missionaries and others--and NOT A SINGLE MENTION of this so-called "Walam Olum."

Excuse me, but what do you think the Lenape mediwiwin were reciting, of which we have two other accounts? Pictographic record use is well attested among other nations, by the way.

Thankfully, the oldest living speakers told us, unanimously, that they never heard of the "Walam Olum."  Even those questioned in the late 19th and early 20th centuries never heard of it!

My current thinking is that Chief Anderson turned the pictographs over to Dr. Ward when the Lenape were driven from Anderson, for which I seem to recall a date of 1820. The devastation by this point was pretty complete.

There are simply too many coincidences of detail confirmed by much later archaeological excavations to concede that R. simply fabricated the WO. Would you see the wikipedia discussion of this as well? It is hard for me to type in again here what I typed in there.  Another confirming "coincidence" left out from that discussion is the mention in the Walam Olum of the Norse plagues ca. 1275 CE., which pretty much extincted the "Dorset" peoples.             

You expect me to accept that R. created the whole of it in one month, but I think that he was just thrown by the Lenape use of the historical present, and once he had that key...

[shkaakwus]

E.P. Grondine writes:
 

"If you have non-Lenape speakers trying to record utterances, you can expect mistakes, not perfection.  Compare, for example "Nicotani" for Cherokee "Ani Kitani" in Mooney."
 
And, a similar result is produced by non-Lenape speakers trying to forge a hoax.  Why is it, do you suppose, that Rafinesque, who said he made "a deep study of the Linapi" in order to "translate" the Walam Olum, never points out a single mistake in the text?  Even the veriest tyro should be able to find many of these kinds of mistakes!
 
 
"If my memory serves (and since my stroke it sometimes does not), the term "Mediwiwin" was used in later Lenape records at Anderson, referring to the fact that Chief Anderson himself could not be mediwiwin, because of his mixed blood. But that may have been an Ojibwe borrowing by that time. Or perhaps it was "mediwi", without the /wak - I'd have to go back to Anderson to check."
 
As this is a side issue, which has no bearing on the authenticity of the Walam Olum, don't take any trouble checking it on my account.  
  

"Or did Heckwelder compose his list from a transcript of the Walam Olum? He only provided part of the migration tradition, did he not?"


The Lenape chiefs in this list of Heckewelder's are ALL figures from the historical period--most known from other sources, as well.  To this list, Rafinesque added many other names, which he cobbled together from a list of placenames compiled by Heckewelder!  
 
 
"Actually, a lot of people are denying the Lenape migration, and attack the Walam Olum because they think that was the only recording of the tradition of that migration; hence Kraft's sponsorship of Oestreicher's work."
 
I didn't say that some people aren't questioning the historicity of these migration stories.  I said nobody denies that these migration stories were being told, by some Lenape people, in the 18th-century.
 


"The accounts of Heckewelder and Sutton of the migration tradition I repeated in my book 'Man and Impact in the Americas'."
 
Okay.


"I set out above what in my opinion will have to be done before Rafinesque's activities will be fully understood, and provided some rough cost estimates of what it will take to do them."
 
Yes.  I have no idea how you calculated those costs.


"I would be most pleased to see the fragments of the Lenape migration tradition (history) assembled all together in one place."
 
They are.  In Heckewelder's Indian Nations, together with his manuscript appendix, thereto, which is readily available from the American Philosophical Society; and, in that short account of Benjamin Sutton.  There aren't any other known "fragments."    

  

"Excuse me, but what do you think the Lenape mediwiwin were reciting, of which we have two other accounts?"
 
First:  I don't accept your contention that these migration legends were recited by Lenape metewak.  
 
 
"Pictographic record use is well attested among other nations, by the way."
 
It is attested among the Delaware!  So, what?  None of the real Lenape pictographs have any similarity, whatsoever, with those Rafinesque invented and/or lifted from other sources.
 
 

"My current thinking is that Chief Anderson turned the pictographs over to Dr. Ward when the Lenape were driven from Anderson, for which I seem to recall a date of 1820. The devastation by this point was pretty complete."
 
 
In the absence of any actual evidence of this, you're free to imagine whatever you like.  
 


"There are simply too many coincidences of detail confirmed by much later archaeological excavations to concede that R. simply fabricated the WO."
 
I find it interesting that you are seeing coincidences in the archaeological record which no modern archaeologist sees.  Much more interesting are the "coincidences of detail" between what is related in the Walam Olum and Rafinesques 1824 work, Ancient History, or Annals of Kentucky, where he sets forth his theories on the peopling of North America--ten years prior to his mention of the Walam Olum!  How convenient the Walam Olum came along to corroborate his theories!  
 
 
"Would you see the wikipedia discussion of this as well? It is hard for me to type in again here what I typed in there."
 
I've read that.  The most persuasive part of that is all the praise from scholars regarding David Oestreicher's exposure of Rafinesque's Walam Olum as a fraud.
 
 
 
"Another coincidence left out from that discussion is the mention in the Walam Olum of the Norse plagues ca. 1275 CE., which pretty much extincted the "Dorset" peoples."
 
That is your interpretation of what is being mentioned.  In my opinion, it is no more possible to connect these two things than it is to find historical events in the writings of Nostradamus.
 
            

"You expect me to accept that R. created the whole of it in one month, but I think that he was just thrown by the Lenape use of the historical present, and once he had that key..."
 
You lost me here.  By my reading, Rafinesque had been cooking this thing up for more than a decade prior to publication.
 
 My favorite part of Rafinesque's forgery is where he directly copies some words from the printed works of Zeisberger and Heckewelder--including typographical and typesetting errors in the words from those books!  LOL!

[shkaakwus]

Summary of scholarly opinion regarding David Oestreicher's dissection of Rafinesque's "Walam Olum."

-----------------------------

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Walam_Olum

. . . your prodigious effort has convincingly demolished the Rafinesque fake. For all thoughtful, rational people, the controversy is now buried once and for all. Congratulations. -- W. W. Newcomb, author of Culture and Acculturation Among the Delawares.

Your control over R[afinesque's] manipulations is phenomenal [and] should kill any further attempts to resuscitate the W.O. . . . I'm sorry my contemporaries have not lived to read the total destruction of the W.O. -- the late James B. Griffin, former member of the Lilly team and leading archaeologist, Smithsonian Institution.

. . . it is with great satisfaction that I have been reading your pieces on the Walam Olum in the New Jersey Archaeological Society bulletins and in Natural History. It is an impressive and convincing job of historical detective work and congratulations are in order. -- Anthony F. C. Wallace, University Professor of Anthropology Emeritus at the University of Pennsylvania, member of the APS, and author of numerous seminal works.

I'm sorry to say you have convinced me completely. Rafinesque forged the Walam Olum . . . its a real pleasure to read such great work. -- The late Rafinesque scholar and translator of Rafinesque's works, Arthur J. Cain, University of Liverpool, England.

Alas, three times alas! I am very convinced of the fraudulence of this sacred (or satanic?) C.S.R.! He would without doubt be delighted to know that people still speak about him 150 years after his death, and perhaps even in spite of the unflattering terms . . . Bravo . . . for your pugnacity and patience. -- Rafinesque scholar and author Georges Reynaud, Université de Provence, Marseille, France.

I did think it would be impossible to demonstrate beyond cavil after all this time that Rafinesque had concocted it from whole cloth. But I think that you've been able to do just that, to an even more striking degree than critics were able to accomplish for the Kensington Stone. -- David Henige, University of Wisconsin.

. . . a magnificent and wholly gratifying piece of literary sleuthing and scientific research. I heartily congratulate you [Natural History magazine] and Mr. Oestreicher for another example of Natural History's informative, highly readable, and scientifically sound stories. -- J Harold Ellens, University of Michigan.

. . . a fine piece of scholarly detective work and an airtight case against the accused . . . Thanks again for your sleuthing and for giving us a fascinating forger who makes our Henry Rowe Schoolcraft look like a paragon of scholarly probity. -- Martin W. Walsh, University of Michigan.

I write to . . . record my admiration for your thoroughness, imagination, and lucid literary style in your investigation . . . You seem to have left no stone unturned in solving the mystery, and you have been eminently fair to Rafinesque and to his commentators. -- John C. Green, Professor Emeritus of History, University of Connecticut, author of American Science in the Age of Jefferson and The Death of Adam.

It is a splendid piece of work -- you have indeed, without a possible shadow of a doubt, proven that Rafinesque forged the Walam Olum . . . You have caught R. red-handed time and time again. -- Stephen Williams, author of Fantastic Archaeology, and Curator for North American Archaeology, Peabody Museum, Harvard University.

David Oestreicher has employed linguistic, historic, and archival evidence that details, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that the entire Walam Olum is a fraud perpetrated by Constantine Samuel Rafinesque. -- the late Herbert C. Kraft, former Director of Seton Hall University Museum and author of numerous seminal works on the Lenape.

I congratulate you on not only your scholarship but the great detective work in tracking down the sources that matter most in . . . the unraveling of the mystery surrounding the Walam Olum . . . a genuine achievement, something that many have tried and no one until now has succeeded at doing. -- Joe Napora, author of the Walam Olum [a new translation, 1992], conceding that he had been mistaken about the Walam Olum.

Its great! Its crushing, convincing, clever and thoughtful. And interestingly and entertainingly written. Way to go! -- Stephen Epstein, Curator at the University of Pennsylvania Museum.

Its exciting and controversial and pioneering and there you have it! -- Jennifer Brown, University of Winnipeg.

I am amazed at the depth and detail of the scholarship . . . the historical study of early anthropology is also highly developed and very sophisticated. -- J. Peter Denny, University of Western Ontario.

I was just thrilled to observe your sophisticated analysis of the Walam Olum . . . -- Rafinesque scholar Vilen Belyi, Vinnitsa Technical University, Ukraine.

It will raise the level of scholarship . . . I think it opens up a whole new chapter in the history of anthropology. -- Noted anthologist of Amerindian Literature, John Bierhorst.

Very accessibly written and persuasively argued. Altogether superb. -- Alex Shoumatoff, author of The Mountain of Names, The Rivers Amazon, and other noted works.

When David Oestreicher was able to show it was a fraud, many people were offended. But you have to go where the facts lead you. -- Bruce Pearson, renowned Lenape Language scholar and retired linguistics professor, University of South Carolina.

Oestreicher presents conclusive proof of the fraudulence of one of the most widely discussed 19th-century American Indian documents, laying to rest a controversy that has raged ever since Constantine Rafinesque "discovered" it in 1834 .-- Newsletter XV:1, The Society for the Study of the Indigenous Languages of the Americas.

Oestreicher's work has spelled an end to more than 150 years of denial by scholars . . . Oestreicher's work is considered to be solid. It's receiving increasing attention and acceptability in both native circles and scholarly circles. -- ethnohistorian Lawrence Hauptman, State University of New York at New Paltz and author of numerous seminal works on American Indians.

I am most impressed by the hard and imaginative research you have done. It sure looks like you have unmasked the hoax. -- James H. Madison, Chair, Department of History, Indiana University, and author of Eli Lilly: A Life, 1885-1977.

I have given it a thorough reading and I believe that you make your case. -- William N. Fenton, Distinguished Professor of Anthropology, State University of New York at Albany, and acknowledged Dean of Iroquois studies.

I am absolutely overwhelmed by the thoroughness of your exposé. You effectively attack this work's authenticity from many different directions, any one of which would have convinced the most stubborn romantic . . . We owe you a great debt of gratitude for the finality with which you have disposed of all doubts! -- Raymond Whritenour, Lenape Language scholar and editor of Delaware-English Lexicon.

Oestreicher convincingly argues that the Walam Olum . . . is in fact a fraud composed by Constantine Rafinesque . . . Oestreicher's paper on this issue . . . is definitive, if correct. -- Hugh McCulloch, Ohio State University. Doug Weller (talk) 21:28, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

[E.P. Grondine]

E.P. Grondine writes:

"If you have non-Lenape speakers trying to record utterances, you can expect mistakes, not perfection.  Compare, for example "Nicotani" for Cherokee "Ani Kitani" in Mooney."
 
And, a similar result is produced by non-Lenape speakers trying to forge a hoax.  Why is it, do you suppose, that Rafinesque, who said he made "a deep study of the Linapi" in order to "translate" the Walam Olum, never points out a single mistake in the text?  Even the veriest tyro should be able to find many of these kinds of mistakes!

When I researched this in about the year 2000, I relied on Brinton's opinion, as Oestreicher's analysis had not gained much acceptance by that time.
Given the number of languages that R. worked with, I expect little more than an analysis by him at the morpheme level, working solely with written materials that he had at hand.

E.P. Grondine writes:
"If my memory serves (and since my stroke it sometimes does not), the term "Mediwiwin" was used in later Lenape records at Anderson, referring to the fact that Chief Anderson himself could not be mediwiwin, because of his mixed blood. But that may have been an Ojibwe borrowing by that time. Or perhaps it was "mediwi", without the /wak - I'd have to go back to Anderson to check."
 
As this is a side issue, which has no bearing on the authenticity of the Walam Olum, don't take any trouble checking it on my account. 

Ah, but it isn't a side issue, anymore than whether or not Dr. Ward (not his full name, by the way) existed.
It goes to the question of why any Lenape would give the pictographic mnenonic aides to a European. 

E.P. Grondine writes:

"Or did Heckwelder compose his list from a transcript of the Walam Olum? He only provided part of the migration tradition, did he not?"

The Lenape chiefs in this list of Heckewelder's are ALL figures from the historical period--most known from other sources, as well.  To this list, Rafinesque added many other names, which he cobbled together from a list of placenames compiled by Heckewelder! 
 

Unfortunately, O.'s article does not evidence that, but merely repeats his claim, as you do here. You are obviously certain about O.'s identifications with figures from the contact period; I'm not, at least not yet. I need to take a look at O.'s thesis, and check his readings there for myself, before I'll concede this.

You want to label R. as a fraud, fraud, FRAUD, although while nearly all of the Kentuckians around Rafinesque were killing the peoples, he was trying to preserve their memory. He did a lot more work than simply the WO, and he did that work in a hostile environment, always treating the peoples with respect.

Again there are details that R. could not have known of which are in the WO, the stockades being one, the plague being another. There are simply too many of these details for me to concede to O's analysis yet, at least as published in the NJ archaeological journal. At this point I would rather suspect that R. sought H.'s help, and that H. compiled his lists from the WO.
 

"Actually, a lot of people are denying the Lenape migration, and attack the Walam Olum because they think that was the only recording of the tradition of that migration; hence Kraft's sponsorship of Oestreicher's work."
 
I didn't say that some people aren't questioning the historicity of these migration stories.  I said nobody denies that these migration stories were being told, by some Lenape people, in the 18th-century.

I see. You're giving us transcriptions for Lenape mediwi (mete/wak, by your informants pronouciations, whatever years those were taken), and claiming that the migration tradition was not held by them. How ingineous.

"The accounts of Heckewelder and Sutton of the migration tradition I repeated in my book 'Man and Impact in the Americas'."
 
Okay.

Thank you. I remind you again that the Lenape migration accounts are demonstrated by the rock hard evidence of the archaeological record.

"I set out above what in my opinion will have to be done before Rafinesque's activities will be fully understood, and provided some rough cost estimates of what it will take to do them."
 
Yes.  I have no idea how you calculated those costs.

Based on experience.

"I would be most pleased to see the fragments of the Lenape migration tradition (history) assembled all together in one place."
 
They are.  In Heckewelder's Indian Nations, together with his manuscript appendix, thereto, which is readily available from the American Philosophical Society; and, in that short account of Benjamin Sutton.  There aren't any other known "fragments."

Nothing from the Big House, then?
I would like to see where O. claims R. lifted the opening passsages of the WO from.

"Excuse me, but what do you think the Lenape mediwiwin were reciting, of which we have two other accounts?" [/i]
 
First:  I don't accept your contention that these migration legends were recited by Lenape metewak.

 

Yeah, I know. Unlike other Alqonquin, the Lenape had no history that was held by chosen and trained individuals, say a group called mete/wak.
And the archaeological evidence of their migration simply does not exist either.
 
How about this for a working hypothesis: You're giving us transcriptions for Lenape mediwi (mete/wak, by your informants pronouciations, whatever years those were taken), and claiming that the migration tradition was not held by them. Then relying on that, you deny Lenape migration, allowing archaeologists digging rights at sites which are not Lenape.

"My current thinking is that Chief Anderson turned the pictographs over to Dr. Ward when the Lenape were driven from Anderson, for which I seem to recall a date of 1820. The devastation by this point was pretty complete."

In the absence of any actual evidence of this, you're free to imagine whatever you like.

Ah, go back to the beginning of this thread, where most of it is laid. Or go to Anderson. Fly into Indianapolis, rent a car, pay for gas, mileage, motel, food...
 

"There are simply too many coincidences of detail confirmed by much later archaeological excavations to concede that R. simply fabricated the WO."
 
I find it interesting that you are seeing coincidences in the archaeological record which no modern archaeologist sees.

Uhhh, you're mistaken there. Do you watch tv? NOVA?

Much more interesting are the "coincidences of detail" between what is related in the Walam Olum and Rafinesques 1824 work, Ancient History, or Annals of Kentucky, where he sets forth his theories on the peopling of North America--ten years prior to his mention of the Walam Olum!  How convenient the Walam Olum came along to corroborate his theories!

Yeah, what a strange theory R. held: people crossed from Asia into North America. I'll grant you that R. held his views for a long time, but still, producing the WO in one month would have been superhuman.

Again, O.'s claim is that R concocted it in one month, and that would have to have been superhuman.
 

"Would you see the wikipedia discussion of this as well? It is hard for me to type in again here what I typed in there."

I've read that.  The most persuasive part of that is all the praise from scholars regarding David Oestreicher's exposure of Rafinesque's Walam Olum as a fraud.

It is a pretty good list. Once again, I'll need to take a close look at O.'s thesis before I'll cede this one, or even any points.
PS - It was damn difficult for me even to get hold of a copy of the NJ archaeology journal article.
 

"Another coincidence left out from that discussion is the mention in the Walam Olum of the Norse plagues ca. 1275 CE., which pretty much extincted the "Dorset" peoples."
 
That is your interpretation of what is being mentioned.  In my opinion, it is no more possible to connect these two things than it is to find historical events in the writings of Nostradamus.

             
Not according to the Natchez.

"You expect me to accept that R. created the whole of it in one month, but I think that he was just thrown by the Lenape use of the historical present, and once he had that key..."
 
You lost me here.  By my reading, Rafinesque had been cooking this thing up for more than a decade prior to publication.
 
My favorite part of Rafinesque's forgery is where he directly copies some words from the printed works of Zeisberger and Heckewelder--including typographical and typesetting errors in the words from those books!  LOL!

Well, R. did claim to have studied Linape, and if he found any conflicts with his transcription, he probably would have adopted Z. and H.'s spellings.

E.P. Grondine
Man and Impact in the Americas