by Freddy Silva
The nearby city of Dunhuang was once a strategic religious and trading point along the Silk Road, and in time the site became a major Buddhist place of veneration, with over 1000 caves used for meditation, each elaborately painted and filled with statues, reliefs and other objects used as visual representations of the quest for enlightenment. The entrance to what is now referred as the Library Cave was further concealed behind a wall painting. Nine hundred years later, visiting Daoist monk Wang Yuanhu wondered what lay hidden behind the mural, and upon discovering the cache of historical, mathematical and folkloric texts written in a dozen languages including Old Uyghur, Tangut, early Tibetan, Sanskrit, and the undeciphered Nam language, he appointed himself guardian of the cave temples.
Wang Yuanhu at Dunhuang.
The first Western expedition to reach Dunhuang arrived in 1879, followed two decades later by French explorer Paul Pelliot, who took to the daunting task of sorting and arranging the endless sea of documents, as he graphically illustrates in his letter: “During the first ten days I attacked nearly a thousand scrolls a day.” News of the cache reached John MacMillan Brown, philologist and Chancellor of the University of New Zealand, who took to studying whatever texts were made available outside China. Something must have impressed him because, soon after, he became a leading western advocate for a lost continent in the Pacific. Like the 16th century European navigators collecting stories from island to island, he too remarked that today's Pacific islands are the remnants of an older root civilization, a theory he based upon examination of certain texts from the Mogao caves written in a lost language, Tocharish, which included a map of the original Pacific detailing the location of a missing landmass.
Frustratingly, the map has vanished along with the texts MacMillan was reviewing.
THE HOPI OF MUIA
The trail picks up with the Hopi, who refer to their original homeland as Muia, an island in the Pacific lost to a global catastrophe. “Those people who got here, the flood destroyed most of them but a few survived. They were the remnant of something big... But these Hopi people know that they came from across the ocean and migrated here,” recalls Homer Cooyama Kykotamovi of the Hopi Coyote clan.24 A long time ago the ancestors of the Hopi were seafarers whose oral tradition included descriptions of this land, knowledge of which is typically transmitted to initiates during coming-of-age ceremonies. Bamboo and reeds are used throughout creation myth and storytelling in the kivas, plants totally out-of-place in the arid desert landscape of Arizona.
This missing land in the Pacific is emphasized in Samoan tradition, where it is still referred to as Mu, the Mu’ul of the Olmec. During his time in Tibet, Paul Schliemann, grandson of the noted archaeologist, came across a Chaldean text in a Buddhist temple in Lhasa, written approximately 4000 years ago, in which the island’s final days are recounted: "When the star Bal fell on the place where is now only sea and sky the Seven Cities with their Golden Gates and Transparent Temples quivered and shook like the leaves of a tree in storm. And behold a flood of fire and smoke arose from the palaces. Agony and cries of the multitude filled the air. They sought refuge in their temples and citadels. And the wise Mu, the hieratic of Ra-Mu, arose and said to them: 'Did not I predict all this?' And the women and the men in their precious stones and shining garments lamented: 'Mu, save us.' And Mu replied: 'You shall die together with your slaves and your riches and from your ashes will arise new nations... The land and its inhabitants were torn to pieces and swallowed by the depths in a few months."25
Funny how the essence of the Egyptian god Ra is sprinkled throughout the Pacific as much as its islands — places such as Ra-Iatea in Fiji, literally 'white skinned people of Ra'.
Other Polynesian people refer to this lost land as Hava-Iki, which in time has been shortened to Hiva. According to Hawaii folklore the gods created an ideal land for the first humans in Kahiki-homua-kele, once situated along the present Hawaiian chain of islands but since submerged, which ties in perfectly with the island's tectonic record, and perhaps why the translation of this lost paradise is The Land That Moved Off. Survivors became forest-dwelling races such as the Nawao, large-sized hunters descended from Lua-nu’u, the Mu people, and the Wa people.26 Another Hawaii tradition states that during the Era-of-Overturning, the people's homeland was called Hoahoamaitru. There, a man by the name of Nu'u built a big boat in which to survive the flood whose waters overflowed the land except for the Hawaiian peak of Mauna Kea.27
Academia loves to trash the idea of the missing continent of Mu as much as they do Atlantis. They particularly direct they scorn at the one person who expounded the idea in the late nineteenth century, James Churchward, but regardless how much of Churchward's work is pure research or conjecture, the fact remains that just about every Pacific culture validates the existence of this land, regardless of what it was originally called. During his time and travels in India and Burma, Churchward was informed by the Naacal, an elevated class of priests and wisdom keepers who originated from said lost continent some 15,000 years ago. Much of their information, which includes detailed and accurate descriptions of how the cosmos and the earth works, millennia before NASA, was written in symbolic form on hundreds of clay tablets which Burmese priests claim have been systematically looted from their temples. That's quite a long time to hold a grudge. Among the symbols is the seven-headed serpent representing the formative aspects of nature and the seven Serpent People who once taught them, as written in religious texts such as the Hindu Manava Dharma Sastra, the Rg Veda, and the Nahuatl teachings of Yucatan, with the most scientific of texts found among the Marquesans. The language in which they were written was called Naga-Maya, whose closest translation is serpent-water. Given what is known about the People of the Serpent and their relationship to water places the quackademics on a back foot, to quote the late John Anthony West.
The Ramayana goes so far as to describe the Naacal priests as Maya adepts, “starting from the land of their birth in the east, as missionaries of religion and learning, went to Burma and there taught the Nagas. From Burma they went to the Deccan in India, whence they carried their religion and learning to Babylonia and to Egypt."28 This is somewhat validated in the Troano Codex, the written accounts of the Maya during the Spanish invasion, where Mu is referenced using the same symbols found in India and Burma. One script in a temple at Uxmal confirms "the lands of the west from where we came... that land of Kui... birthplace of our sacred mysteries." A stela in the temple of Akab Dzib in Chichen Itzá likewise describes the lands of the West being shaken to their foundations by earthquakes before being engulfed by the flood. The Troano Manuscript fixes the date of cataclysm at 9937 BC, remarkably close to the Younger Dryas boundary, and further states that the dominant race was light-skinned, great navigators and sailors, learned architects, and builders of great temples in stone.29 The Codex Cortesianus picks up the narrative: "Mu, the country of the hills of earth, was submerged... The place of the dead ruler is now lifeless, it moves no more, after having twice jumped from its foundations... the king of the deep, while forcing his way out, has shaken it up and down, has killed it, has submerged it... Twice Mu jumped from her foundations; it was then sacrificed by fire... By kicking it, the wizard that makes all things move... sacrificed it that very night."30
In describing this missing land as “having twice jumped from its foundations,” the account tallies with the two geological upheavals marking the start and close of the Younger Dryas.
16. STAR PEOPLE
Four-thirty a.m. is the perfect time to go for a walk, even if, like me, you’re not a morning person. Just before sunrise, the desert is the quietest place on Earth. I like the desert, it is a place to find answers, to bring closure. As the song goes, “in the desert you can remember your name.”
The meeting point of Utah, New Mexico and Arizona has always felt like a second home to me — along with Kura Tawhiti in New Zealand and Luxor in Egypt — even back when I was a wee nipper living in Europe. Although I’ve made several
journeys to this region, the one place I desired to experience above all was a panel of petroglyphs in one of its most remote canyons, requiring a seven-hour hike, typically in 100º heat, while carrying a backpack 90% stuffed with water.
The images on the panel are like no other. Painted in red ochre, the seven figures stand over seven feet tall, draped in long tunics, with a central eighth whose eyes stare with a self-assured alertness. These people look nothing like the Hopi or Zuni, they belong to another time and place, and it’s probably for this reason that the frieze has been inappropriately labelled the Ghost Panel.
Before departing on the trek into Horseshoe Canyon I discussed the panel and its figures with Zuni elder, Clifford Mahooty, a man never short of fascinating stories about Native American tribespeople and their traditions. My quest was as personal as it was exploratory, I wished to learn more about the part these ancient people might have played in the flood narrative and the gods who facilitated their appearance in North America, after all, people are known to have been present in this canyon since 9000 BC. Clifford was attentive at my obvious passion to come face-to-face with the cloaked figures. “I feel as thought I’ve known them for a long time, “ I said, “they seem awfully familiar, even with the gowns draped down to their feet.”
Clifford gave me a puzzled look. “But you do know who they are, you’ve come across them before. We call them Lookers.”
THE FOUR WORLDS OF NATIVE AMERICA
According to Hopi tradition the First World, Tokpela, was destroyed by a fire of global proportion.1
In the Second World, Tokpa, the Earth bore little resemblance to the previous one. Where there had been land now there was water and vice versa. This period came to a close when the poles spun out of control and the world "rolled over twice... it froze into solid ice," a remarkably good fit with the period of the Older Dryas.2 The Earth turned on its axis, north became south — the Hopi describe it as “south-facing world” — the consequence of which was an ice age. Members of the Hopi were warned in advance and instructed to follow a cloud of unusual shape by day and a moving star by night that led them to a mound of the Ant People. Once safely inside, the Hopi lived underground until conditions allowed them to return to the surface.3
In the Third World — the one we are immediately concerned with, the period of the Younger Dryas — the population grew rapidly and achieved remarkable progress, building cities and a world civilization.4 Although many people lived in harmony with nature and the spirit world, there developed a parallel and technologically advanced society that used its creative power unwisely which ultimately led to wars. They built “flying shields,” aerial craft capable of traveling quickly to different places in the world to devastate entire cities.5 As expected, this did not sit well with the creator gods, whereupon they decided the world must be destroyed yet again, this time by a great flood, and recreated from scratch. Predictably, instructions were sent out to place selected people on boats — “inside tall plants with hollow stems," was the expression.6
When the survivors emerged they were shocked to see the great landmass where they’d once lived reduced to the top of a tall mountain surrounded by water, lots of water. They took to boats and sailed from island to island, the remains of former lands, slowly migrating eastwards and slightly to the north. The Hopi narrative states how they finally reached a large, flat island, covered with trees and plants, settling there for a short time before being ushered to North America, presumably due to ever rising seas. Upon reaching a mountainous region, they paddled upstream through deep canyons, searching for the Place of Emergence, which they eventually found. From a high elevation they looked west and south and saw the islands from whence they'd migrated, the tips of mountains where once a landmass had been. They were now living in this, the Fourth World.8
The Place of Emergence refers to a symbolic mound at the base of the Grand Canyon. However, the Hopi suggest the description of the labyrinthine journey taken up the Colorado River to this site is an allegorical representation of the journey as a whole, for the mound itself is far too young to be the original — the level of the river 11,000 years ago was much higher than it is today, the mound would have been submerged. Hopi tradition claims the true Place of Emergence lies "down below" in Central America, which the ancestors reached after the mother continent, Kásskara, sank in the central Pacific at the same time as another in the Atlantic by the name Talawaitichqua, the Atitlán of the Itz. Kásskara is said to have covered a fair portion of the central Pacific south of the equator.9
Katcina dance, c.1900. Note the painted white face. If this commemorates an ancient event, who is the white person representing?
A messenger god by the name Massau’u was instructed to stay with the Hopi and oversee the initial settlement and the migrations that would follow. An amalgam of legends depict this individual as a decrepit old man of grey complexion concealing a younger, robust man who lives somewhat remotely among the tribe to whom he gifts knowledge written on stone tablets. Masau’u possesses the power of flight, the ability to traverse vast expanses of territory as though superhuman, and to interact between worlds. In many respects he acts as an observer, a Looker.10 Could his name be related to Mâsu, the name of the mountain in the Epic of Gilgamesh where the seven Apkallu alighted after the flood, and one of the oldest names of Mount Ararat, the resting place of the ark according to the Bible? 11
OF RED ANTS AND ANUNAKI
One fascinating aspect of the Hopi tradition is their vivid recollection of helpful outsiders, especially at times of extreme crisis, the most alluring being the Ant People. What on earth possessed the Hopi to describe them this way?
The Ant People are associated with the color red, but whether this is purely symbolic or descriptive of a physical characteristic, such as red hair, is not known for certain. However, red Ant People are also central to Maya legends, which link them to the building of temple cities, and saqbe, those ruler-straight spirit roads, all of which took place during the time of First Creation. The traditions of Central America state how the red Ant People possessed magical powers which enabled them to control the laws of nature, and how they used sound to move and raise megaliths to create stupendous temples in the course of a single night. The Yucatec called them Chac Zay Uincob (Red Ant Men) because they labored to create order in nature, just as industrious red ants do.12
To the Maya and Hopi, Red Ant People were linked with Orion, specifically its belt, whose central stars are regarded as the tripartite body of an ant. But it’s their terrestrial link that reveals their place in the list of antediluvian gods, specifically a group in the Middle East, for the Hopi word for ant is aanu, while the word nàaki means reddish yellow sand; the derivative naakwatsim means 'friend'. One variation, aanu-nàa-kii, literally means 'ant-father-home'. Whichever interpretation one cares to pick, the overall description is of father figures bearing a complexion akin to reddish-yellow sand, or who originate from a sandy environment, such as the Middle East. And it gets better. The offspring of the Anunaki are described as nemalah, an old Hebrew term for ant. 13
The Hopi recall the leader of the Ant People as an individual by the name Anu-Sinom (ant man or being). In the legend, this unusual humanoid is described as generous and hardworking, willing to provide food to the people and teach them methods of food preservation so they could ride out the prolonged upheaval taking place outside their protective cave.14 This is not as far fetched as it may seem because vast man-made cave systems exist throughout the world. One excellent example, Derinkuyu, lies two hundred miles west of Göbekli Tepe and once comfortably housed 20,000 people while they patiently waited out catastrophes caused primarily by mass coronal ejections.15
WATCHING THE KATSINA
Straddling the Arizona-New Mexico border are another ancient and equally fascinating people, the Zuni. Just like Sumerian and Aymara, Zuni language is not related to any other, it appears to have been invented, a designed language spoken for at least 7000 years. It also contain
s a high proportion of Japanese words. Zuni and Japanese people share the same frequency of Type B blood as well as near-identical flood traditions, the only difference being that the Zuni categorically state they arrived in North America from a sunken land somewhere in the Pacific.
Ant People also feature prominently in Zuni tradition; an excellent life-size depiction of them is painted in red ochre on a wall in Sego Canyon, Utah, a far less strenuous trek than Horseshoe Canyon. They are credited with helping the people relocate after the flood to the region around modern-day Zuni village; the Zuni even have a term of endearment for them — Lookers.16
Seen together, these katcina dolls and Zuni masks of gods and goddesses offer a vivid, if stylistic portrait of the Red Ant People.
There’s a sensational observation in the tradition. It turns out the Zuni gave them the sobriquet Ant People because of the antennae sticking out of their helmets.17
If you find antennae and helmets out of place in the desert southwest then you’ll love the unusual dancers called katsinam, a Hopi collective term for ‘spirit beings’, although the phrase isn’t limited to an ethereal entity, as one might expect. The Navajo consider katsinam to be real beings with a more developed mystical outlook, to whom they refer as Air-Spirit People: "They are unlike five-fingered earth-surface people who come into the world today, live on the ground a while, die at a ripe old age, and then leave the world. They are people who travel in the air and fly swiftly like the wind."18
Certainly it’s an odd choice of word because the syllable ka is not native to Hopi, it appears to have been imported from a visiting Egyptian, it is the word for ‘soul’ or ‘spirit’. The etymological root of katsina is speculative yet suggestive: it may be a compound of the words kátci (spread out or surface of the Earth) and náa (father),19 in essence an ‘overseer of the Earth’, a father figure. As for the plural katsinam, it applies as much to nature spirits as it does to physical intermediaries who possess a working knowledge of the laws of nature and how to bend them — Lookers such as Massau’u and members of his entourage, who similarly assisted another tribe, the Hisat-Sinom, better known as Anasazi.