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The Grave Creek Stone

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posted on Nov, 17 2008 @ 11:05 AM
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The Grave Creek Stone was discovered in 1838 during the excavation of the Grave Creek Mound, in Moundsville, West Virginia, on the Ohio River, about 10 miles south of Wheeling. The stone, an actual photograph of which appears in Figure 1 above, was a small inscribed sandstone disk, about 1 7/8" (4.8 cm) wide, and 1 1/2" (3.6 cm) high. The reverse side was uninscribed.


It's interesting to read about the inital controversy the people who supported it and those that didn't.....



Website on the stone

Then go the latest finding

The stone found to be faked



Last month, at the annual meeting of the West Virginia Archeological Society, anthropologist David Oestreicher offered evidence to suggest that the Grave Creek stone can be dismissed as a fraud.



Mod Note: External Source Tags – Please Review This Link.

[edit on 18/11/08 by Jbird]



posted on Nov, 17 2008 @ 11:20 AM
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The stone's website is a wonderful read, particularly in the way that the scientists go around and around about its authenticity. The tests they used to determine if it's an alphabet or someone just putting out a fake are interesting... you get some idea of how sophisticated the methods could be even 100 years ago.

The possibility raised that the fraud was perpetuated by the person who bankrolled the excavation is interesting. If memory serves, that also happened recently in China where some dubious dinosaur fossils turned out to be complete hoaxes.



posted on Nov, 17 2008 @ 11:29 AM
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Howdy Byrd

Yes one of the key things I've learned in my exploration of pseudo-archaeology and history is just how many fakes there were! I remember this stone being used as evidence for the "new world occupied by the old world" ideas that were popular in the 18th, 19th and 20th century.

The controversy is always interesting - the ebb and flow.



posted on Nov, 17 2008 @ 12:03 PM
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reply to post by Hanslune
 


An interesting read and find. I do not know if the stone is a fraud, but sometimes the story on a fraudulent claim is more fascinating than the claim itself.



posted on Nov, 17 2008 @ 01:59 PM
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I'm not sure if this is the same stone I read about a few years back, but anyway there was a ancient stone found that may have been written by a small group, maybe a few women and men from the 'old world', writing that 'The hand of Baal' swept them across the ocean to America, but this was when the Americas were already inhabited.



posted on Nov, 17 2008 @ 03:23 PM
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reply to post by star in a jar
 


I believe you may be referring to the Paraiba Inscription.




AFAIK this one has never been shown conclusively to be fake or real but unfortunately was obtain out of context.



posted on Nov, 17 2008 @ 04:05 PM
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The Grave creek stone has been called a fraud for over a century now:

Distortion - The Grave Creek tablet and the Newark Decalogue tablet are used as examples of Hebrew and South Iberian inscriptions to support the claims of early Irish visitors to West Virginia. But both tablets have long been recognized as frauds. (Whittlesey 1872, 1876, 1879).

Source - Article from (yet again) Doug's Archaeology Site - I told ya'll to go there!!!

That article concerns that idiot Barry Fell and the way he'd translate anything as Ogham, but mentions the Grave Creek stone and gives the name of it's debunker (Whittlesey).

Harte



posted on Nov, 17 2008 @ 05:17 PM
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The latest information / debunking involves finding the contemporary book that the phrases were taken from

Kinda over kill but a good cleaning up the claim.



posted on Nov, 17 2008 @ 10:08 PM
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I've come across a book, "Didn't All the Indians Come Here? Separating Fact from Fiction at Hot Springs National Park" by Mark Blaeuer, that does a pretty thorough examination of popular legends. What he has found is that many of them were created by the railroad and the spas, to get people to spend money on their products.

I was interested to find that some of the Native Americans feel very negatively about this book. Not all of them... just the ones who (as one writer said with a very angry tone) had Cherokee ancestors who knew about the healing powers of the water.

As someone of Cherokee descent, myself, I'll point out that we did live in Arkansas at one time, but it sure wasn't anywhere near Hot Springs:
cherokeehistory.com...



posted on Nov, 17 2008 @ 11:32 PM
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I appreciate the detective work on searching out a fake. With this in mind, how would you or Byrd recommend the excavation of an accidental find?

Let's say an individual was hiking on a mountain trail and he stumbled over a rock, which loosened and revealed artifacts.

What should a discoverer do to keep the spot preserved for an archaeologist's review?



posted on Nov, 18 2008 @ 01:47 PM
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Originally posted by lostinspace
I appreciate the detective work on searching out a fake. With this in mind, how would you or Byrd recommend the excavation of an accidental find?

Let's say an individual was hiking on a mountain trail and he stumbled over a rock, which loosened and revealed artifacts.

What should a discoverer do to keep the spot preserved for an archaeologist's review?



First, take a photo if you can. Mark the spot and contact a local museum and explain what you've found. Go back and take photos.

This really does happen... we had a mososaur found recently near where I live. Sometimes it's hard to get any interest, particularly if the item is apparently modern or one of those cases where fractured rock sorta looks like a hand axe.

An easier route is to approach a local archaeological society or paleontological society (they have those) and show them a photo and ask how to deal with it. Often you will have to deal with land owners and collecting policies. Sometimes you will have to deal with Native American tribes... and that's best left to experts who have friends they can contact and work through.

More later. Must run to teach a class.



posted on Nov, 18 2008 @ 06:13 PM
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As Byrd said. Also if there is a local University around contact their archaeology department and suggest the site for use as training field school. There is always a shortage of that.

Most Archaeologist are looking for that big site - the one that will give them grant money, reasons to publish, tenure and book deals- besides the sheer pleasure of adding knowledge and finding stuff. Or in otherwords Archaeologists tend to be "hungry".



posted on Nov, 18 2008 @ 07:23 PM
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Thanks Byrd and Hanslune for the recommended actions. Hopefully people will read your comments and handle a discovery as you both said. It would be horrible if a great find is spoiled by tampering and couldn't be used as a legitamate source of ancient data, eventhough the site was originally authentic.

Keep the recommondations coming.



posted on Nov, 18 2008 @ 07:28 PM
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reply to post by lostinspace
 


Lots and lots are destroyed. Once in Cyprus we were informed that a new road would be put thru a mound we planned on excavating - in about ten years. Based on the news that the bulldozers would be there (and after a survey crew DID show up) we pre-empted the assault and bulldozed the mound outselves so we could get to the bronze age layers.......as it turned out they didn't build the road....that still annoys me.

If all else fails, buy the land, buy a book and do it yourself!



posted on Nov, 19 2008 @ 11:25 AM
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Y'know... we could discuss techniques, Hans. I can't right now... hurrying off to class... but let's at least open it up to discuss how things are done.

I'd like to note that paleontologists do things differently (their system of numbering sites just drives me nuts.)



posted on Nov, 19 2008 @ 11:43 AM
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reply to post by Byrd
 


Lots of different variance in digging styles. Like the guys who leave little walls around each meter square instead of clear cutting.

For some reason I've always found that annoying.




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