by Bob Curran
Still the Spanish did not give up. As late as 1711, expeditions were still being mounted to locate Welsh-speaking Indians. Part of the brief was also to find Indians with beards that would suggest European descent. Around this time, the Sieur d’Iberville arrived on the Alabama coast to found a new settlement. He chose a place known locally as The Mad Dog River (known as the Dog River today). In local parlance this was actually known as The Madog River which, some have argued, is a corruption of the name Madoc. Further up this river, it was claimed, lay the remains of an ancient stone fort (although this had been cleared away by local Indians by the time explorers arrived), which had been built by a great chieftain in times long past. Might these, it was argued, have been the ruins of a castle reminiscent of those in Wales?
In 1782, the explorer and Indian agent John Sevier (later the first governor of Tennessee), stumbled across the ruins of several stone fortresses in Tennessee and Kentucky while conducting a number of campaigns against local Indian tribes. Asking an old Indian, Chief Oconosoto, what these were, he was told that they had once belonged to a fair-skinned race of Indians, descended from a people known as “Welsh” who had come across the sea in a great boat and had landed at the mouth of the Alabama River near Mobile. They had settled there, but had been driven out through conflicts with local indigenous tribes, pushed back further inland and across the Hiwassee River just inside the present-day Tennessee border. Oconosoto claimed that his forefathers had engaged the “foreigners” in a massive battle near what is today Muscle Shoals, and drove them further back along the Mississippi River. They later settled along the Missouri and Ohio Rivers. However, he also said that these “foreigners” had married among local Indian tribes, particularly the Mandans, who were now in the upper reaches of the Missouri. Sevier revealed this information in a letter to Major Amos Stoddard, who had written to him enquiring about Welsh Indians. He also included the story related by a French trader who had lived for a time among the Cherokee. The Frenchman told Sevier that the Cherokee had traded with a tribe of light-skinned Welsh-speaking Indians who told him that they had sprung from a nation of white settlers.
The explorers Meriwether Lewis and William Clark also told about a light-skinned tribe of Indians, supposedly related to the Mandans, who had exhibited a style and manner that amounted to “European superiority” when compared to the tribes around. Clark, who was in charge of Indian affairs in the St. Louis area between 1822 and 1838, later stated that some Mandan women were “exceptionally pretty” and bore a distinct European cast to their features. This impression was borne out by other adventurers who met branches of the Mandan, and many assumed that at least some of these Indians boasted European ancestry.
Another writer, Francis Lewis (Welsh by birth), and one who signed the Declaration of Independence, had been captured by Indians after the fall of Oswego (August 1756) in present-day New York state, and was held prisoner by them for a while near Albany. He states that his captors often spoke to each other in a Welsh-like dialect, and when they spoke to him in English, they phrased it in a particular way—as “Welsh people might speak English.” He eventually spoke to them in his own native Welsh and they let him go.
Today, the Mandan would make a fascinating study and the roots of their language might be explored. Unfortunately, between 1836 and 1837, many of the tribes were wiped out by a severe epidemic of smallpox. A tribe of 15,000 was shrunk to a few hundred, which were quickly assimilated into other surrounding tribes. The Welsh-speaking Indians seem to have disappeared completely as stronger, harsher dialects took over.
Evidence of Madoc
Apart from the language, what else could Madoc and his followers have left behind? The strongest evidence of their presence were a number of stone fortifications that closely resemble medieval Welsh strongholds. Whereas Indians may have built their forts on the plains where they camped, many of these fortresses are built defensively on unassailable clifftops and heights as European soldiers might have done. The overgrown ruins of such forts have been found in Tennessee, Alabama, and Georgia. What is interesting, too, is that, given the age of these ruins, the stone appears to have been cut using a form of chisel—a tool that would not have been available to the Indian tribes of the area. The geometry of the structures is also highly unlike anything the Indians might have constructed and instead resembles a medieval English or Welsh castle; in Tennessee, these forts form a defensive pattern. In 1823 a local judge, John Haywood, wrote down some history about Tennessee, and claimed that at least five of the forts near Chattanooga were designed to protect a white European people who were living in the Tennessee hinterland, many centuries ago. Some of these are surrounded by a deep ditch or moat, reminiscent of Norman or medieval fortifications, which suggest that Haywood might be right.
In 1540, the Spanish explorer and conquistador Hernando deSoto led an expedition across Alabama and Georgia in search of the fabled Seven Cities of Gold and Indian gold mines that were reputed to be in the area. He is alleged to have recorded a number of stone fortifications (then abandoned), which he claimed had been “built by the English or by an English prince,” according to Indian legend. Could he have meant Welsh? There are certainly the remains of such a stone fortification at DeSoto Falls near Mentone, Alabama, where the Spaniard and his men made camp. The size and positioning of the fortress suggests that it may have been an important site, perhaps the camp of a great chieftain. Intriguingly, it has been noted that there are many architectural similarities between the fortress at DeSoto Falls and Dolwyddelan Castle in Gwynedd. These include low entrances, exactly the same arrangement of moats and defenses, and the same method of construction for the outer walls. Dolwyddelan lay in Madoc’s homeland, and was a castle with which he would have been familiar. Is the coincidence too close? It is possible that in 1171, the Welsh, having failed to return to their original encampment on the Gulf of Mexico, made their way inland using the main river systems, primarily the Alabama and Coosa, until they reached what is now De Soto Falls where they built their first major castle? The ruins of another such castle lie not all that far away, at Fort Mountain, which displays many of the same architectural characteristics as the one at De Soto Falls. It is worth noting that none of the Indian tribes in the locality—principally the Cherokee—built stone fortifications; the engineering skills demonstrated in both these forts and a similar one at Old Stone Fort, were far beyond their competence.
These are not the only such forts to be found in the States. There was a large fort at the mouth of Chickmauga Creek that has now been submerged in an irrigation scheme; another stood at Pumpkinville (now part of Athens, Tennessee) on the Hiwassee; and another still on a high precipice above the Duck River, near Manchester, Tennessee. On the map, these forts form a network—some connected by waterways—and are in keeping with the medieval idea of building small castles in order to keep power and law in a district. They would therefore be consistent with the establishment and maintenance of a small kingdom in the region. Did Madoc rule the lands around Alabama, Georgia, and Kentucky as a kind of Welsh feudal king? On the suggestions of the physical evidence, it would appear so. Although the major fort above De Soto Falls is now gone (locals carried away its stones to build barns and walls), we have enough description of it to identify it as a medieval European prince’s stronghold. An Alabaman historian, Albert Picket, who visited the site around 1851, remarked on how well the complicated system of defensive ditches had been designed, suggesting that their skills were advanced for any of the local Indians of the time.
Also near the De Soto Falls site is yet another intriguing piece of evidence. About three quarters of the way down the bluff, above the nearby Little River, is a series of five caves. Initially, these may well have been natural caverns, but, at some point, they had been extended and developed as defensive fortifications. In fact, there may have been a defense wall of earth and rubble in front of the caves’ mouths. A single path up the side of the cliff, suitable only for one man at a time t
o climb, leads up to them. All the caves have been extended and widened, once again by using chisel-like implements, which, it is argued, would probably not have been available to the local Indians. The area is quite clearly a defensive position, consistent with those found in medieval France and England. On this defensive position, an armed group of men could hold off the advance of an enemy as they tried to climb to attack the castle above. Most commentators and historians agree that this was not an Indian tactic, but the mark of European warfare. Some have argued that Hernando de Soto’s men constructed the defense themselves, but others state that the cave extensions are far older than the Spaniard.
Perhaps de Soto himself had heard of Prince Madoc, as there is rumored to be an old map of Alabama, Georgia, and parts of Kentucky attributed to the explorer (which several claim to have seen) on which one word appears. That word is “Madoc.” For centuries, it was thought to be the name of a tribe, but might it be something more? A copy of this map is still said to be extant in Seville, Spain, today.
Despite such a crushing weight of circumstantial evidence, there is still no recognition of the Welsh kingdom in Alabama, or of its medieval ruler. Most historians today tend to regard the Madoc story as a popular myth or medieval romance without any foundation. And yet, of all the stories of lost realms and kingdoms, arguably the legend of a Welsh prince ruling in some parts of Alabama and Georgia during the 12th century seems to be the most credible. And even if it were only partially true, it gives a fascinating and intriguing insight into a history of the American continent which has, in many respects, been all but ignored. Whether or not he truly existed as a medieval king of America, the story of Prince Madoc provides an enduring and intriguing mystery that certainly deserves further investigation.
14
Hyperborea
Fans of Robert E. Howard’s Conan the Cimmerian series or other “sword and sorcery fiction” will perhaps be familiar with Hyperborea. In much of the writing, it is simply a land that is unimaginably far away, and which seems to be permanently locked in winter—a place of intense cold and solitude. It is a place of glaciers and snowstorms, where the wind whistles continually across frozen plains. Its only inhabitants are said to be tribes of ferocious, fur-clad warriors who eke out a harsh and violent existence in the desolate wasteland. This, of course, is the fictional version of the countryside, but did such a place actually exist? If so, where might it have been?
In a Land Far, Far Away
For the ancient Greeks, Hyperborea was the furthest point in the world that they could possibly imagine. And for some, it was as different from their own pleasant and temperate Mediterranean homeland as could be conceived. Even the name Hyperborea (“the land behind Boreas, or the north wind”) suggested desolation and bleakness to them. Yet, for others, it was an earthly Paradise where the inhabitants didn’t have to work, lived in splendid towns and cities, and made no war against each other. The picture of Hyperborea across the Greek world was therefore an extremely confusing one.
Its location, too, was a matter of some dispute. For some Greeks it lay far to the North, beyond the lands of Scythia. The Scythian kingdoms comprised areas of what is now today Kazakhstan, Belarus, and parts of Russian Georgia. It was also taken to include parts of the Ukraine. To its north lay the land of Hyperborea that was either a frozen wilderness or a wonderful sundrenched country. In both mythologies, it was a land where the sun never set. This idea may have come about through descriptions of the extended winters and summers in northern climes when, indeed, the sun shone continually for almost six months of the year. To those living around the edges of the Mediterranean, it must have seemed as though the northern lands lay in perpetual daylight. Within this daylight lay either endless, sparkling snow or a wonderful lush green country, punctuated by flowing rivers.
Other Greeks, however, took a different view regarding Hyperborea’s location. They described it as a massive island-continent beyond the Pillars of Hercules in the Atlantic Ocean. According to Plato, such a country had been visited by the Carthaginian explorer Hanno the Navigator around 570 B.C. Hanno had spent most of his career mapping out the coasts of North Africa, and had even traveled further south. However, he claimed that Hyperborea contained a number of significant Berber-like kingdoms similar to those that had already been established in Morocco and Algeria. The continent, he claimed, lay not far from the North African coast and traded with Morocco and the Iberian Peninsula (present-day Spain and Portugal). Other explorers, however, disagreed, and placed the Hyperborean continent further north. Around 325 B.C., according to Pliny the Elder, a Greek explorer named Phytheas of Massilia sailed through the Pillars of Hercules, following a course that took him well to the north of Ireland. After several days’ sailing he made landfall in a warm and temperate place that he named Thule (which others have declared was Hyperborea), where the inhabitants were extremely jolly and pleasant, and seemed to spend most of their time holding large festivals in honor of Greek gods. This was where, it was said, Apollo wintered and took his ease among such pleasant and generous people. His description of these inhabitants has led many to believe that they were a Celtic people and has caused some, including the philosopher Aristotle, to suggest that this was where the Druids (Celtic holy men) came from and where the “mysteries” of Celtic religion began. It is possible that Phytheas had actually visited the Outer Hebrides, an island chain far off the coast of northern Scotland, and had mistaken the peoples there for the mythical Hyperboreans.
The notion of this land in the Northern Atlantic was taken up again around 55 B.C. by the Greek historian Diodorus Siculus. He spoke of an island far beyond the Pillars of Hercules, no bigger than Sicily, on which there was a wonderful round temple dedicated to the moon. The “temple” that Diodorus describes may well have been the impressive stone circle at Callanish on the Isle of Lewis in the Hebrides, which was supposedly raised by a proto-Celtic peoples and may have been dedicated to both sun and moon worship. Although Diodorus had never been there, he was probably relying on another, earlier work written around A.D. 300 by the Greek geographer Hecataeus of Miletus, which mentioned an island, slightly smaller than Sicily, lying in the northern oceans. It was said that Latonia, the mother of Apollo, had been born here, and so the god had a special association with this land. The people there worshipped him in his incarnation as the sun—perhaps reflecting the old Celtic sun-veneration of the Northern Isles.
Others in the Greek world disputed the location of Hyperborea. How, they argued, could such a delightful and temperate climate exist in the North when the lands there were covered with snow and ice? Hyperborea therefore must lie in some warmer part of the world, such as Thrace (parts of Turkey, Greece, and Bulgaria); some even placed it on the other side of the Black Sea, while others still gave it as a warm valley somewhere in the Ural Mountains. Although Pliny the Elder (A.D. 23–79) tried to resolve the problem by establishing a belief in various climatic zones, much doubt as to the location of such a temperate area remained.
To add further confusion, Hyperborea was often linked with another distant, mythical land that the Greeks named Thule (later Ultima Thule in medieval times, although it was also mentioned as such by the Roman poet Virgil). This, for the Greeks, was another far-away point, one of the most distant they could imagine, and it was also the name that Phytheas had given to the country on which he had landed beyond the Pillars of Hercules. Later, Thule was actually believed to have been in the British Isles, although some also identified it as Scandinavia or some of the Baltic isles. Explorers of the 15th and 16th centuries would identify it with Greenland or Lapland. Some of the early Greek writers even doubted whether Hyperborea actually constituted land or not. Polybus, writing in his Histories (written around 140 B.C.) suggests that, as a landmass, it was neither solid, water, nor air, but a combination of all three, and it had the consistency of jellyfish and could not be walked upon. Most of the early peoples, however, agreed that Hyperborea/Thule was an island-continent far to the no
rth that could only be reached by an impossibly long sea-journey.
But what of those who lived there? What sort of people were they? The remoteness of their country, it was said, did not stop them from trading with other people, and the Hyperboreans sent gifts to Greek centers such as Athens, Delos, and Delphi. The Delphic Oracle of Apollo was said to frequently receive gifts and offerings from that far-away country in honor of the god. One of the earliest references to Hyperboreans comes from the Greek scholar Hesiod, writing in 700 B.C., who makes reference to them. Later Greek and Roman writers such as Herodotus (484–425 B.C.) generally regarded as “the Father of History,” and the Roman poet Cicero (106–43 B.C.) also mention them, stating that the people of Hyperborea were extremely fit and healthy, and lived to almost 1,000 years old. They also lived in a state of complete happiness in a pleasant and temperate land and were extremely wealthy, having much gold that they had won from griffins, which inhabited part of their country, and had guarded large treasures left by former races. The celebrated Greek heroes Theseus and Perseus were supposed to visit them, and found them to be extremely able warriors although they refused to be drawn into the wars of other races.
But what did the Hyperboreans actually look like? According to Hanno, who had visited them around 500 B.C., they resembled a people who would later come to be known as Moors, inhabiting much of the North African coast and parts of Spain. They were, reputedly, dark and swarthy skinned, but lighter in color than the Africans who lived further south and, according to some accounts, smaller than many Europeans. Some descriptions are suggestive of Berber peoples while others seem to point to a Semitic-type race. Hanno, of course, located their land not far from the North African coast, so at least some of these descriptions would seem to be fairly consistent with the region.