The Fuente Magna bowl was found accidentally by a worker from the CHUA Hacienda, property of the Manjon family located near Lake Titicaca about 75-80 km from the city of La Paz, Bolivia (see Photo). The site where it was found had not been studied for artifacts previously. The Fuente Magna is beautifully engraved in earthen-brown both inside and out and bears zoological motifs and anthropomorphic characters within A controversy arose about the cuneiform script on the Fuente Magna. Dr. Alberto Marini, translated it and reported that it was Sumerian.. After a careful examination of the Fuente Magna, linear script Dr. Clyde A. Winters determined that it was probably Proto-Sumerian, which is found on many artifacts from in Mesopotamia. ... http://www.faculty.ucr.edu/~legneref/archeol/fuentema.htm
Absolutely fascinating! Thank you for bringing up this topic. But the article says the bowl was found around 1958. Why am I only hearing about this now? And regardless of when it was found, could it not have been brought to South America some time within the last few centuries? Do keep us posted!
There was no evidence or indication to suggest that any of the members of the Manjon family travelled outside South america prior to the 1950s. It is also not known whether any ancient artifacts from the middle east may have ended up in south america by a exchange of trade over the years.
good grief winters deciphered the indus valley script? Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
Okay, but surely,scientists are concerned with how this bowl got to South America. Surely it's being transported there sometime after the Spanish Conquest is the logical explanation. Is there no information at all about where it was found? At an excavation under a certifiable amount of dirt? In someone's attic?
The designs in the photo don't resemble cuneiform, which is done with a wedge shaped stylus. The concentric squares look Mesoamerican. This Clyde Winters, superimposing his face on an Olmec colossal head - on the cover of his book, beside the word "Atlantis" - looks like a cartoon character. Even if a tablet from Nineveh were found near Titicaca, it's a long way from showing a cultural connection. There should be more artifacts. The symbols that Winters claims to have translated are not even certain to represent language. For example, the Indus Valley bowl has a fish with a roof over it, a star, and there are some seals with depictions of headgear made of bulls horns. The fact that he can derive words like "phenomena" or "seminal fluid" from these and conclude that the bowl may be associated with a fertility ritual sounds like a fabrication. The blogger links the cultures of Libya, Crete, India and the Cush with Sumer. Even if there was some basis for showing a connection there is not nearly enough to develop a west-to-east migratory pattern. Nor is there proof that one evolved from the other. Besides, there are thousands of tablets from Mesopotamia. Any similar artifacts found in Libya, Crete, Somalia and the Indus Valley would pale in comparison to Sumerian finds. Even if several matching artifacts were found in scattered locales, it establishes little more than the fact that there was possible contact, or someone simply carried artifacts from one place to another. The blogger also states rather matter-of-factly that the Sumerians were noted seafarers. At best they may have had contact with the Harappan culture of the Indus Valley. The Egyptians tell of invaders they call the Sea People, but this is later than Sumer, in the era of Phoenicians and their contemporaries, who sailed the Mediterranean. Although there might be some connection between Sumer and the Indus Valley culture, I think even that evidence is limited to a few objects and symbols found to support it. To claim that the Sumerians sailed to South America is a huge leap, just to explain a particular bowl.
