| Traditional
High Cultures |
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| Oral and Written
Traditions and Rock Art as the Histories of Both Ancient and Living Peoples,
Especially of the Americas before the Arrival of Europeans |
Legend Motif Distributions on a Continental Scale -- Tools for Analysis, Links with Archaeology & Iconography |
For a very nice map to help with the following discussions, please go to our area “North America” above. |
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| Abstract of session as a whole The session co-chairs are Yuri Berezkin (Russia) and Lloyd Anderson (USA). Session is scheduled for 23 June, 4:00 to 6:00 pm |
The Distribution of Traditional Narratives can be studied on a continental scale. In some cases, entire tales are shared between distinct peoples, which must imply common inheritance or borrowing. When only motifs are shared, explanations are more difficult. But multivariate analysis of the distributions of hundreds of motifs can be a basis for drawing some conclusions. We compare hypotheses derived in this way with results from other fields such as archaeology, linguistics, anthropology, and biogeography. |
| Northern Parallels in Southern
Athabascan Folklore |
The point of the set of papers by Dr. Berezkin's is that some motifs or episodes in legends and folklore are so specific that they are not likely to arise independently by chance, and their distributions among different peoples can therefore be revealing of earlier history. The distribution of certain motifs preserves a record of the migrations of the Southern Athabaskans, a migration down the eastern side of the Rocky Mountains, because only isolated members of neighboring groups also have these motifs, presumably the ones who were in the right kind of contact with the migrating peoples. Read Preliminary Paper Here Email Yuri Berezkin |
| The Algonquian Migration from Plateau to Midwest: Linguistics and Archaeology by J. Peter Denny 1991 For reference, not a paper in this session. |
This paper argues that the earlier history and migrations of the Algonquian peoples can be linked to two very specific archaeological traces, one on the east side of the Middle Snake River of western Idaho, until about 2500 BCE, the second between Lake Michigan and the Ohio River, from about 1500 BCE. Dates are slightly adjusted following a later publication by Dr. Denny. They refer to the end of the Western Idaho Archaic burial complex, and the beginning of the twinned Red Ochre and Glacial Kame traditions. The great migration presumably occurred between these. This paper is published in Papers of the Twenty-Second Algonquian Conference, ed. by William Cowan pp.103-124. It is mentioned here only as background reading. It is not part of this session. |
| Techniques for estimating shared inheritance vs. chance resemblance of legend motifs by Lloyd Anderson, Ecological Linguistics. |
In estimating the origins and transmission of particular legends, motifs, and cycles of legends, it is crucial to distinguish between shared inheritance, borrowing and influences during times of contact of peoples carrying different traditions, and chance or accidental similarities which say nothing about the history of the peoples concerned, because they arose independently in different times and places, in response to common needs. We can estimate these differences from the random vs. clustered distribution of motifs and from the degree of general universality vs. specificity of the motifs. Read outline of paper here Email Lloyd Anderson |
| Folklore Parallels between Central Algonquians and the Peoples of the Plateau by Yuri Berezkin, Academy of Sciences, St. Petersburg, Russia. |
Shared motifs or episodes from legends and folklore provide independent support for the hypothesis of a migration of the proto-Algonquian peoples from the Plateau to the Great Lakes region. These appear to confirm hypotheses developed by linguists and archaelogists (compare the paper by J. Peter Denny, cited above). This is a more difficult case than the Athabaskan migrations, presumably also earlier (if Denny is right, between 2500 and 1500 BCE, rather than perhaps after 1000 CE). Read Preliminary Paper Here Email Yuri Berezkin |
| Otherworld Dragons in Ethnography and Archaeology of Eastern North America By F. Kent Reilly III |
From its first sighting and description by Father Marquette in the mid-sixteenth century the dragon-like image of the "Piasa" has fascinated art historians, ethnographers, and folklorist alike. Close investigations of ethnographic material, amassed over three centuries and collected from several linguistic groups, clearly demonstrate the geographically widespread occurrence of this profoundly significant cosmological image. Specifically, investigations of the ethnographic, iconographic, and linguistic sources for the Piasa reveal it as one of the oldest concepts in eastern Native North American art and ideology. Within the corpus of Spiro Shell Engravings the prominence of the motif, executed in several styles, also strongly suggest that the Piasa Motif can be linked to a stylistic chronology, perhaps a specific linguistic group, as well as dance and medicine societies from both the Native American distant past and immediate present. [This presentation will cover the geographical distribution and heaviest concentrations of the imagery, its earliest occurrences, and which peoples retain it today.] |
| Motifs shared between the Southeastern USA and the Maya by Yuri Berezkin, Academy of Sciences, St. Petersburg, Russia. |
Email Yuri Berezkin |
| Rock Art Depictions of Ancient Legends or Beliefs in Siberia and North America By Alice Tratebas, BLM, Wyoming |
The oldest rock art in North America may be linked to Asian rock art by shared themes that derive from ancient legends and beliefs. Because religious concepts can have great stability and longevity in many cultures, we may be able to link concepts in ethnographies and oral histories to depictions in ancient rock art. One such theme is the emergence of animals from the underworld to life on the earth. Early south-central Siberian petroglyphs depict animals in vertical and oblique positions. Some panels that are at ground level have only the front half of the animal depicted as if emerging from the earth. This idea appears to have been retained and depicted in North American rock art in one of two ways: (1) animals positioned obliquely on the rock face and (2) animals positioned as if emerging from cracks in the bedrock. In North America, oblique animals generally occur only in the oldest petroglyphs, while later rock art images position the animals parallel to the ground surface. In some cases it is difficult to determine whether oblique animals in North American rock art retain the concept of emergence or the placement of the glyph on the rock face has now devolved to a stylistic convention. Email Alice Tratebas |
| Central Eurasian - North American Folklore Links: Areal Correlation of a Series of Motifs by Yuri Berezkin, Academy of Sciences, St. Petersburg, Russia. |
This paper by Dr. Berezkin explores the distribution of twelve legend motifs or episodes which are shared by Southern Siberian peoples and by peoples of North America. He observes the lack of matches for these motifs among peoples who have come rather late to the northern Pacific area and Beringia, namely the Yakut and Tungus, Paleoasiatic, Eskimo, and except for one of the motifs, also the Athabaskans of the Subarctic. He suggests that the cultural links must have been early, perhaps during the early Holocene. But they were probably not at the time of a single earliest peopling of the Americas, because these same motifs are absent in South America. Physical anthropology and DNA studies reveal an especially close link of Southern Siberian with northern American populations, a close match of some genetic distributions with distributions of these legend motifs. Read Preliminary Paper Here Email Yuri Berezkin |