More Comments Regarding Cuzco Sacsahuaman – Part IV

Here are more comments from the readers of this blog regarding the ancient city of Cuzco and the Fortress of Sacsahuaman.
    Comment #1: “I don’t think you achieve anything by making up distance words and claiming they mean something to try and confuse the reader” Margaret M.
    Response: OK. The word “topo,” pronounced “tupu,” is a Quechua word used in the Andean area centuries before the Spanish arrived as a distance of measurement. What if Mormon wrote: “The distance across the narrow neck of land was 29 topo.” Does that help with the understanding any? The point is not to confuse a reader, but to show that Mormon had a difficult problem in trying to come up with a way to show a distance knowing that a future people, with a different language, would be reading his abridgement and was trying to convey to that future people a measurement of distance they would understand—so he chose how far a normal man (Nephite) could walk on a journey in a day-and-a-half, to make that distance reasonably understood. All we have to do to understand that distance today is to consider how far a normal man (not an athlete, a marathon runner, Indian, or military man could cover in a day-and-a-half if he was to try and rush or set a world record. It is as simple as that.
    Comment #2: “I find it interesting that all this argument over the names of animals seems mute in light of the following comment I ran across recently: “Reynolds and Sjodahl give a well-known example. When the Spanish arrived in the Americas they were introduced to a new food crop for which they had no name. They called it corn. This was the old world name of the food which they found to bare the closest relationship — wheat. Today, when we come across a reference to corn in the Bible, we're sometimes confused. The description just doesn't sound like corn at all. And, of course, it isn't. Today, in popular language, corn almost universally has that new meaning given by those explorers who were stuck for a name to identify an unfamiliar food crop” Carmichael T.

Response: First of all, the generic word “corn” in Europe stood for grain crops in general. It wasn’t that corn resembled wheat, which it does not, but that it resembled a grain crop the way it initially grows, thus it was called “corn,” meaning a grain. Secondly, the early Spanish, seeing something for the first time did not have the advantage of Joseph Smith—there was no Spirit involved in the Spaniards’ translation. This is the issue so many so-called “professionals” seem to neglect in their thinking and that is knowledge of the words they are using as well as the method of translating the Book of Mormon—the spirit placed the words on the seer stone and Jospeh, bending his faculties to the task, read them off. I can just see the Spirit placing the word “corn” when he knew it was “maize,” or “cow” when he knew it was a “deer.” In such cases where Joseph did not know what the plant, metal or animals were and there was no word he would have known the item or animal by, we ended up with the words Joseph didn’t have a translation for, such as neas, sheum, ziff, cumoms and cureloms. 
    This leads to another question along this same line: 
    Comment #3: “Nephi gives us a rather succinct list (1 Nephi 18:25). They found cows, oxen, burros, horses, goats, and wild goats. While there are several items in this list that bare discussion, let's first consider what Nephi is doing here. Experts point out that when Nephi and his family arrived in this new world, wherever they landed, they were greeted by animals that they had never seen before. What was Nephi to call them. The only names he had were those for similar animals in the old country. He did what travelers throughout history have always done, he named these new animals according to their resemblance to that which was familiar” Jason S.

Response: First of all, there is no reason to think that all the animals encountered had never been seen before and that Nephi just made up names—if that were the case, we would not have the names of cumons or cureloms. That is just a “dodge” by a so-called “expert” who doesn’t have the foggiest idea how to handle such a problem as he sees it within the scriptural record. The animals were as Nephi labeled them, given to him by the Spirit and he, being a farmer from several generations of farmers, knew what most of the animals were. To claim otherwise is to suggest that the Jaredites, who brought the animals with them, had numerous animals in Mesopotamia that no one had ever heard of, to which no archaeological record bears agreement. Secondly, in “what was Nephi to call them,” he called them the names given him by the Spirit on the seer stone.

The two he did not know, the cumoms and the cureloms he spelled out so the scribe would get the spelling correct. To claim anything else is to ignore or even disregard the testimony of all those involved in the translation of the plates who have written about how it took place.
    Third, as to what Nephi is doing, he states it quite clearly, giving us a record of what took place: “And it came to pass that we did find upon the land of promise, as we journeyed in the wilderness, that there were beasts in the forest of every kind, both the cow and the ox, and the ass and the horse, and the goat and the wild goat, and all manner of wild animals, which were for the use of men” (1 Nephi 18:25). How much clearer could he make it? 
    Comment #4: “Is there really a secret pass behind Sacsahuaman that would match the comments made by Gideon saying there was one behind the City of Nephi? I always thought that sounded like an adventure story” Walter S. 
    Response: I believe it was Lucian Bane who said, “Fiction is just a mirror of reality for the most part,” but then, while literature was always considered a mirror of reality in the past, the prolific Polish historian and author of 30 books and member of the Polish Academy of Sciences, Jerzy Topolski claims that “literature as a mirror of reality has lost its plausibility.” Whatever is the case, I remember that my first reaction to reading Gideon’s comment as an adult was that it reminded me of the stories I grew up on with Jack Armstrong, the All American Boy, Captain Midnight, and The Shadow.
    However, in this case, there really is a “secret passage” behind the City of Nephi or Sacsahuaman, though the word “secret” might just refer to the fact that the Lamanties, evidently not a curious people, did not know of its existence.

Top: The mass of rocks behind Sacsahuaman known as the hill of Rodadero; Bottom Left: The scattering of rocks all about leading to a labyrinth of openings; Bottom Right: The main passage leading through the “secret” pass Gideon described 

    As Gideon stated to king Limhi: “Behold the back pass, through the back wall, on the back side of the city. The Lamanites, or the guards of the Lamanites, by night are drunken; therefore let us send a proclamation among all this people that they gather together their flocks and herds, that they may drive them into the wilderness by night. And I will go according to thy command and pay the last tribute of wine to the Lamanites, and they will be drunken; and we will pass through the secret pass on the left of their camp when they are drunken and asleep” (Mosiah 22:6-7). As the Captain of the Guard (equivalent to the chief captain of the army except that the Nephites had no army while among the Lamanites in the City of Nephi), he would have known all the areas of defense, attack and escape around the city walls.

Looking southeast over Rodadera Hill behind Sacsahuaman; Yellow Arrow: Hill where Ammon camped overnight; White Arrow: cities of Shilom and Nephi in the valley below the hills; Green Arrow: Sacsahuaman hill; Red Arrow: the Esplanade or plain between Sacsahuaman walls and Rodadero Hill 

    To understand the lack of knowledge on the part of the Lamanites might be explained by the fact that there are numerous openings in the rocks within and to the rear of the complex at Sacsahuaman, called the Hill of Rodadero—a place of retaining walls, curiously polished rocks, and a finely carved series of stone benches known today as "the throne of the Inca"—it is also full of small labyrinths that generally lead nowhere, tunnels and vaulted niches in the rocks seemingly without purpose. 

Secret Pass: LtoR and Top to Bottom: Steps leading out of the city; the first opening not very noticeable, pass through into a mass of rocks called the Rodadero; through a corridor of almost sheer stone sides, and through the hill to the rear of the pass and into the opening well behind the city 

    Most of these tunnels or labyrinth of openings and niches lead nowhere, although some within the complex are said to lead into the maze of tunnels beneath the fortress with some ending up down in the city. In addition there are all sorts of rock formations with carvings on them laying about that seem to have no purpose whatever, so it should not be surprising that this particular “back pass” might have been “secret,” that is, of no interest to the Lamanites, and the particular pass Gideon suggested being unknown to others.

More Comments Regarding Cuzco Sacsahuaman – Part III

Here are some comments from the readers of this blog regarding the ancient city of Cuzco and the Fortress of Sacsahuaman. 
    Comment #3: “You make a case for no writing by claiming the Lamanites destroyed any semblance of Nephite writing; however, they left the buildings and other Nephite remnants intact. That doesn’t seem to make sense to me, especially in Cuzco and Sacsahuamán”  Jessica B.
    Response: At first glance, it sounds like you have a case; however, looking further, the Lamanites in the end did make every attempt to destroy buildings and many were demolished, and in the final war, as the Lamanites were pursuing the Nephites deep into the north country in 379 A.D., “whatsoever lands we had passed by, and the inhabitants thereof were not gathered in, were destroyed by the Lamanites, and their towns, and villages, and cities were burned with fire” (Mormon 5:5). On the other hand, the Lamanites also occupied other cities, like Cuzco and Sacsahuamán, for they did not need to destroy the buildings, they could just occupy them, which gave them the claim of their “so-called” rightful of ownership through possessing the cities. What they would have done was remove anything that they saw as writing, which might have showed the falsity of their fake claim. Unfortunately, the Spanish were not as thoughtful, such as in the case of both Cuzco and Sacsahuamán, which they demolished as much as possible.

The very large complex of Sacsahuamn over looking Cuzco. When the Spanish arrived, this site had three great towers, a large temple, a fortress with a labrynth of tunnels beneath and numerous outbuildings and storage sheds, including water reservoirs—all of which were destroyed by the Spaniards, leaving only the foundations seen here 

    The huge complex of three towers was described by Pedro Pizarro, Francisco Pizarro’s brother, who wrote: “on top of a hill they [the Inca] had a very strong fort surrounded with masonry walls of stones and having two very high round towers. And in the lower part of this wall there were stones so large and thick that it seemed impossible that human hands could have set them in place...they were so close together, and so well fitted, that the point of a pin could not have been inserted in one of the joints. The whole fortress was built up in terraces and flat spaces."
    Of these towers, the center and largest one was between forty and sixty feet high, standing next to the temple, the temple itself, and most of the fortress, and the part of the outer walls were torn down by the superstitious Spaniards who believed that man could not have built such magnificent edifices, but that it had been the devil’s work. In fact, all that is left of these two sites are the larger, base stones that were simply too big for the Spanish to remove. As one archaeologist has said, “The only reason we have buildings remaining with their fantastic rocks and stones that fit together beyond anything that can be done today, is because the Spaniards were unable to destroy them.”

Top: the lower of the three outer walls at Sacsahuamán. Note the stones that used to be on the higher courses have been removed except for the heavy lintel stone; Bottom: The middle and higher walls have also been stripped of their top stones 
    Archaeologists tell us that the walls of Sacsahuamán rose ten feet higher than what we see today. In fact, the Spaniards left little remaining of the fortress that today would take days to fully explore being large enough to house 5,000 warriors. Its series of three zig-zag outer walls are much shorter than originally stood, for the smaller, higher stones were removed by the Spaniards to build their own cathedrals and personal casas and other buildings in the colonial city. The larger, heavier and inter-locking stones could not be moved by the Spaniards and were left in place where we now see them.
    For comparison sake, many of these lower stones in the walls we now see weigh 50 tons, some closer to 100 ton, with the largest estimated at over 120 ton—an Abrams tank of today weights just over 50 tons, so it is easy to see why most of the base stones were not altered and still stand. As the Quechuan-Spanish chronicler writer, Garcilaso de la Vega once wrote of Sacsahuamán: “This fortress surpasses the constructions known as the seven wonders of the world. For in the case of a long broad wall like that of Babylon, or the colossus of Rhodes, or the pyramids of Egypt, or the other monuments, one can see clearly how they were executed. They did it by summoning an immense body of workers and accumulating more and more material day by day and year by year. They overcame all difficulties by employing human effort over a long period. But it is indeed beyond the power of imagination to understand now these Indians, unacquainted with devices, engines, and implements, could have cut, dressed, raised, and lowered great rocks, more like lumps of hills than building stones, and set them so exactly in their places. For this reason, and because the Indians were so familiar with demons, the work is attributed to enchantment.”
    It is unfortunate that so many archaeologists and historians today give the Inca credit for such buildings. A people through most of their history who had no written language, did not know the wheel, had no machines or such instruments as pulleys, levers, winches, etc. Early chroniclers like Cieza de León, Garcilaso de la Vega, Bernabe Cobo, Sarmiento de Gamboa, Pedro Pizarro have fantasized about Sacsahuamán having been built by demons, evil spirits. Nearly all modern writers who are knowledgeable and do not merely repeat what they read, claim the Inca not only could not have built such edifices, but that they were incapable of such building ability overall.

 When the Spanish arrived, they saw the fantastically inter-locking stones weighing 50 tons or more and knew the Inca could not have built them, and asked the Inca, but the Indians had no idea who had built the walls or fortress 
    It should also be noted that not only were the Inca not building anything at all when the Spanish arrived, none of the Inca around Sacsahuamán had any idea how the walls and buildings had been constructed. The typical Inca response to such questions by the Spanish was that they were not the ones who built Sacsahuamán, but it was built by "the giants." In their mythology there were huge people living in the Cuzco area anciently and they carried the huge stone blocks and put them together. Along this line, it might be noted that the term “giants” in Hebrew lore meant spiritual men with great ability who held the priesthood and were the leaders of the people.
    It might also be noted that in 2008 a team of archaeologists discovered a small 2700-square-foot temple made of stones on the periphery of Sacsahuaman, which includes eleven rooms. They also found an irrigation system, with the temple and irrigation pre-dating the Inca period and might have been built by the Ayarmaca, who were in the region in 900 A.D. Much of the temple complex was evidently destroyed a century ago by dynamite blasts from a nearby rock quarry.
    Comment #2: “You seem to quite opposed to speculating on the meaning of words in Mormon’s account of the land of Promise, yet speculation is an important part of understanding” James T.W.
   Response: I do not believe it is worthwhile to speculate what might be meant, when the meaning of a scripture is quite clear, i.e., “Thus the land on the northward was called Desolation, and the land on the southward was called Bountiful” (Alma 22:31) is very specific and does not require any further description, yet John L. Sorenson, former dean of Anthropology at BYU, in his book An Ancient American Setting for the Book of Mormon, spends a considerable amount of time trying to convince us that though Mormon wrote that, and verified these north-south directions time and again, the direction was really east-west. That is not only speculation, but downright misleading direction. As to tis type of speculation, it might be of interest to note that the Jews, according to Robert H. Kennett, responding to a meaning of a Hebrew word in 1908, wrote the ERA and said, in part, “The Hebrew mind is not speculative.” (Improvement Era, “Editor’s Table—The Hebrew Meaning,” October 9,1908, Vol 12, p149).
    In all my studies, I have found that to be 100% accurate. The only time I speculate is where information is not available but reason and knowledge are and the two lead to an obvious conclusion.
    Comment #3: ”It seems to me that you simply do not want to give credit to the Inca for building those fantastic walls” Janet P.

Response: In the photo above, which was taken recently of one of the walls surrounding Sacsahuaman, the larger stones vary in weight from and estimated 60 tons for the largest of the large stones, to about 30 to 40 tons in the smaller large stones. The very small stones weight in at a few pounds. The larger stones are dated to B.C. times, the small stones to about 1500s. The large stones were laid down long before the Inca, and the small stones during Inca times. Having no knowledge of how those large, multi-ton stones were cut and dressed, the Ina in making repairs to their walls just before the Spanish arrived used simple rocks as they ay and placed them into a close fitting form, but the large stones were cut to fit so that not a knife blade or pin will fit between them, yet no mortar was used. How would you describe the building expertise of those Peruvians of B.C. times and the stonework of Inca times? If the Inca had the ability to cut and dress stones, why weaken their repairs with very small stonework that is unstable and much weaker in resistance to the large stones

More Comments from Readers Regarding Cuzco Sacsahuaman – Part II

Here are more questions from the readers of this  blog regarding the ancient city of Cuzco and the Fortress of Sacsahuaman: 
    Comment #1: “Why do you think that Sacsayhuaman and the city of Cuzco were not built by the Inca? Is it just because of the time frame you so often claim, that there wasn’t enough time from their rise in 1438 to their defeat in 1533?” Arthur R.
    Response: When I first began the study of this area about 25 years ago there was so little known that I often wondered about this myself—I just knew it had not been the Inca. My first breakthrough was when I met several people in and around Peru in private discussions who were life-long residents and knowledgeable of the artifacts and ruins in their country. They were often insistent that the tourism comments about the Inca building everything were merely a tourism gimmick and not anything anyone believed.” 
    Over the past dozen years or so, it has become common knowledge among archaeologists and anthropologists as well as a growing number of historians that there were numerous cultures that lived before the Inca who had developed, built, and accomplished most of the things the Inca were credited with building by the early investigators, including the roads. Then reading the original chroniclers who accompanying the Spanish in their conquest, it was seen that even the Inca themselves had no idea who created most of the things they claimed were theirs. ln talking to those of the Andean area, you find that they all know it was not the Inca—however, their incomes often depend upon the tourism industry, which still harps on the Inca involvement.
    Take a look at these three rock walls in Cuzco, that appear very near each other, that archaeologists now know were built in different periods of time and, obviously, by different peoples with different skills:

Nephite Wall. Pre-Inca stonework where the huge stones are cut and dressed (smoothed) and inter-lock with intricate cuts and match perfectly not even a pin can be inserted between them and put together without mortar

Inca work, with normal small rock boulders, about a foot square in size and in their natural state, were fitted according to their natural sizes and shapes as closely together as possible and a mud mortar used between them

Spanish work, where the same kind of rock boulders the Inca used placed within mortar more like we build today. There was no attempt to use similar shaped or sized rocks, giving a very hap-hazard and unfinished look as though it was done in a hurry with limited ability

    Comment #2: “How do you know the tower or towers that were beside the temple on the Sacsayhuaman hill were made of stone and not just wood towers?” Justin P.
    Response: Because when the Spanish dismantled the tower, they wrote about it, as well as leaving some of the stones around the base. The foundation and lower stones were Limestone, a sedimentary rock of very common building and architectural use, (which are still there), with the upper tower stones or wall stones of Andesite, the latter being an extrusive igneous volcanic rock of intermediate (between felsic and mafic) composition of aphanitic (smooth) texture.
    Comment #3: “Why do you think they call Sacsahuaman a fortress? Having been there, other than the three outer walls, there isn’t much there to suggest a fortress—looks more like just a hill” Keith M.

Response: According to Brian S. Bauer (left), an anthropological archaeologist and professor of Anthropology at the University of Illinois at Chicago, it is probably because of its location high above Cusco and its immense, zig-zag terrace walls that provide excellent fields of fire (even for bow and arrow), this area of Sacsahuaman is generally referred to as a fortress (Kasapata and the Arachaic Period in the Cuzco Valley, Cotsen Institute of Archaeology, UCLA Press, Los Angeles, 2007).
    The importance of its military functions was highlighted in 1536 when Manco Inca lay siege to Cusco. According to John Hemming, (The Conquest of the Incas, Macmillan Books, 1970), much of the fighting occurred in and around Sacsahuaman, as it was critical to maintaining control over the city. Descriptions of the siege, as well as excavations at the site, had recorded towers on the summit of the site, as well as a series of other buildings. Pedro Sancho, Pizarro’s official secretary, who visited the complex before the siege, mentions the labyrinth-like quality of the complex and its many storage rooms filled with a wide variety of items. He also notes that there were buildings with large windows that looked over the city. These structures, like so much of the site, have long since been destroyed
    Comment #4: “Archaeologists claim that in the temple of the Sun in Cuzco that the Peruvians placed mummy bundles of past kings on carved seats that faced the audience as a sign of reverence.

That doesn’t sound very Nephite to me” Brenda T.

Response: Actually, these carved seats were of gold. In fact, the area they are talking about is the main room where a huge golden plaque with the likeness of the sun, a round face, with prolonged rays or flames hung on the wall, much like the sunstone design used in connection with the Nauvoo Temple, which symbolized the dawning of the Restoration and the coming forth of the gospel light to illuminate a dark earth. This, of course, would have been very Nephite, and in fact these sun stones were figured prominently on the Nauvoo Temple, and may well have inspired Parley P. Pratt’s hymn “The Morning Breaks.” As for the seats, we find in Mosiah “And the seats which were set apart for the high priests which were above all the other sets, he [king Noah] did ornament with pure gold (Mosiah 11:11). Keep in mind that archaeologists have certain things they like to claim were part of everything ancient like this, with one being human sacrifice, and the other mummy reverence, and the third is sun worship--they almost always weave these three ideas into their interpretation of whatever they find. 
    Comment 5: “When Nephi first arrived in the area his people called ‘Nephi’ (he immediately began to teach everyone to build buildings, a temple, plant and harvest, etc., but nothing is said of building a fortress or fort” Josh C.
    Response: Evidently,the early contentions and battles with the Lamanites didn’t require a fortress or fort—the numbers would have been somewhat small to begin with and contentions are more like heated arguments than outright fighting. However, by two generations we find that Jacob’s grandson, Jarom, the wars between the Nephites and Lamanites were evidently so severe that the Nephites felt the need to do so, for they “fortify [their] cities or whatsoever place of [their] inheritance" (Jarom 1:7).

An example of a defensive fort with three zig-zag walls protecting the only entrance to the fortress, temple, and building complex that once rose on the hill behind them 

    What those fortifications amounted to we are not told, but if Sacsahuaman is an example, then the Nephites built that huge fortress, one at Ollantaytambo, and others along what is now called the Sacred Valley, northward to the narrow strip of wilderness, plus southward to include Tiwanaku (Tiahuanaco), Puma Punku, etc.
    Still, during this time, the Nephites were heavily involved in their daily living, acquiring gold and silver, also they must have been expanding their territory since by 400 B.C., they had “multiplied exceedingly and spread upon the face of the land (Jarom 1:8). It would be another 150 years or so before Mosiah was forced to leave the city, and discover Zarahemla. Those 150 years would have been interesting times before the Nephites began to become so evil that the Lord told Mosiah to flee and take those who would go with him (Omni 1:12).
    Comment 6: “Do we know how old Nephi was when he died?” Brenda B.
    Response: Possibly. If he was about 25 when he left Jerusalem, as I suspect, then in Jacob 1:1 Nephi would have been about 80 (55 years after leaving Jerusalem) in 544 B.C. Nephi died shortly after that (Jacob 1:12), so let’s say he died between the age of 80 and 85.

More Comments from Readers Regarding Cuzco Sacsahuaman – Part I

Here are some comments from the readers of this blog regarding the ancient city of Cuzco and the Fortress of Sacsahuaman.     
Comment #1: “I have been told that there are all sorts of small carvings in stone around Cuzco and Sacsahuaman. Is thit true, and if so, who did them and why?” Karla K.

These boulders are found on the hills beside Sacsahuaman, overlooking the city of Cuzco. No one has even suggested a purpose for them

Response: Yes, there are all sorts of pre-Inca, megalithic monuments carved into giant boulders and large rock formations in that area. They are often called “Inca Ceremonial Sites,” but all were carved long before the Inca, who had only bronze chisels and stone hammers. Engineers claim these boulders of Andesite stone, which is harder than granite, are cut with either steel, carbon steel, tungsten carbide or possibly even diamond. The work is smooth and finished, but lack any apparent use. They sit in the middle of fields on rolling hills, with no connection to one another and no seemingly useful purpose.

Comment #2: “You wrote an article recently which included a description of the horrendous loss of airmen and bombers during World War II that almost spelled the end of the war, but never stated how it was overcome” Gaylord J.

    Response: Sorry. It was not a major topic of the article, but I should have concluded it for curiosity sake. The U.S. Bomber Command, after losing 642 airmen and over 60 B-17s in October 1943, did an about face—an almost unheard of military position of admitting they were wrong—and stopped bombing while long-range fighter escort planes were designed and built. At the time, the fighter escorts were P-47 Thunderbolt which were totally inadequate to carry out the long-range requirements needed to see the  bombers to their targets and back. While a Curtis-built P-40 was built for the British Purchasing Commission in September 1940, it wasn’t until the original Allison V-1710 engine was replaced by the Rolls-Royce Merlin for the p-51 B/C that transformed the Mustang’s performance to match or exceed that of the German Luftwaffe fighters, and even more so with the definitive version, the P-51D, powered by the Packard V-1650-7, a license-built version of the Rolls-Royce Merlin 66 two-stage, two-speed supercharged engine. This P-51D was not only built for two large 150-pound wing fuel tanks, but also armed with six .50 caliber M2/AN Browning machine guns,which dominated the skies over Europe and made daylight precision bombing successful. All of this took only a few months after the bombing runs were stopped toward the end of 1943.

Chuck Yeager’s P-51D 44-14888 of the 8th AF/357th FG/363rd FS, named Glamorous Glennis III, in which he achieved most of his 12.5 kills, including two Me 262s – shown here with twin 108 gallon drop tanks fitted
    With this change, flying daylight prevision bombing runs with new, long-range fighter escort planes, completely caught the Germans off guard, and was perhaps one of the most important singular decisions made in the airwar over Europe. The story of how this came about and what actually took place makes for fascinating reading if you like military stories.
Comment #3: “I heard there was a legend about bearded white men in the Cuzco area of Peru who built all these old buildings. Is that true?” Elicia V.
    Response: John Denison Baldwin says of the area that 'The oldest structures were attributed to bearded white men, who it is said, worked stone with iron implements brought from their own country. The traditions call them 'sons of the sea'.

It is a remarkable fact, not generally known, that these Peruvians worked iron mines on the east side of Lake Titicaca (Pre-Historic Nations. 1869. Harper and Brothers; see also John. D. Baldwin, Ancient America, in Notes on American Archaeology, Harper & Brothers, New York, 1871; and also the Introduction to Popl-Vuh, p224). It is also well known that these early Peruvians had a great knowledge of astronomy at a very early period. Montesinos and De Bourbourg say the Peruvians had an accurate measure of the solar year, and a knowledge of the art of writing, together with paper made of banana leaves at least 1800 years before our era.
    It also might be of interest to know that just recently, an article in Latin American Herald Tribune (Caracas April 21, 2016), under the headline of “12,000 Year Old Mine found in Peru,” stated that “'Archaeologists from the University of Chile have discovered a 12,000-year-old iron oxide mine in the north of the country. Researchers say it is the oldest mine discovered in all the Americas. Chief researcher Diego Salazar said the iron oxide was used by Huentelauquen Indians as a pigment in dying cloth and in religious rituals. the mine was exploited heavily between around 10,000 B.C. and 2,000 B.C. It yielded over the millennia a total of 2,000 tons of pigment extracted from 700 cubic meters of rock. Researchers also found a treasure trove of stone and conch mining tools in the area. "We've found more than 1,000 hammers...but considering the amount of material we have yet to sift through, the real number could rise to several thousands," archaeologist Hernan Salinas said. Before this find, the oldest mine in the Americas was 2,500 years old and located in the United States.' Another factoid is that 12,000-year-old textiles have been found in Peru (Current Anthropology, April 2011).
    It might be suggested also that legends are often modified historical accounts. As an example, the title Manco Capac (pronounced MAY-coh CAW-Pawk), which means “royal master,“ which is a more modern rendition. Anciently, according to Garcilaso de la Vega, the term meant simply: “chief” or “ruler,” which is reminiscent of Nephi, who chose to be called “ruler” rather than “king” (The Incas, translated by Maria Jolas, Grossman Publications, New York, 1961, p5). That is to be a Ruler over his people (2 Nephi 5:18; see also: 1 Nephi 2:22; 3:29; 16:37-38; 18:10), who the people looked on as a “king” or “protector” (2 Nephi 6:2).
    It might also be of interest to know that the Quechua word “Sinchi” (pronounced “zinchi”), which is another name given Manco Capac, and the name he gave his son, means “Chief, leader.” In addition, the legend of Manco was that he carried a golden staff given him by the Sun God to tell him where to settle, where Nephite carried a brass ball (Liahona), given Lehi by God (1 Nephi 16:10) to guide him to the place where he was to settle (1 Nephi 16:26). It is also of interest that Manco is described in legend as being pale-faced, or “white” (Bertrand Flornoy, World of the Incas, Vanguard Press, New York, 1965, p118).
    Further, Manco Capac had a sister-wife, which is usually interpreted to mean that he married his sister (which later became an Inca practice), but the actual wordage of the legend is that there were four brothers who all married “sister wives,” meaning that the women were sisters to one another, not a sister to whom they married. This is also found in Nephi, where Laman, Lemuel, Sam and Nephi all married sisters, i.e., the women were sisters to one another (1 Nephi 16:7).

The legend claims Manco came from the south, moving northward from Titicaca through the fourteen-thousand foot LaRaya pass (which separates the Titicaca basin from the Vilcanota valley) and on to Cuzco. There, according to Garcilaso de la Vega, Manco stuck his golden staff into the ground and it disappeared, telling him that was where he should settle. Nephi, after being tied up and then loosed aboard his ship in the storm, “took the compass and it did work whither I desired it” (1 Nephi 18:21), and after praying the storm ceased and “I, Nephi, did guide the ship, that we sailed again toward the promised land” (1 Nephi 18:22).

Moroni’s Unrecorded 36 Years

We have often been asked what we think Moroni was doing during the time between Cumorah and when he ends his record in 421 A.D. and how old he might have been when he died. In order to do this we need to remember that Mormon was born in 310 A.D., and came south into the Land of Zarahemla in 321 A.D. at the age of eleven (Mormon 1:6). He died at the age of 75 in 385 A.D. at the battle of Cumorah, at least he was wounded in that first wave of Lamanite attacks (Mormon 6:11), and evidently wrote on the plates at least the next day (Mormon 6:11,20), though we assume he died of his wounds shortly after this attack, we do not know exactly when.
Understanding that Mormon took over the army at the age of 15 in 326 A.D. (Mormon 1:15), he was probably heavily engaged in his military work and might not have married until he was older. If he was about 46 years old when Moroni was born, that would be about 356 A.D., which would have been about two years after the treaty had been arranged with the Lamanites (Mormon 2:28).
    If these days are near correct, Moroni would have been about 30 years old when the final battle took place at Cumorah.
    Between 385 and 421 A.D., Moroni finished his father’s record (Mormon 8 and 9), abridged the record of Ether and wrote his own Book of Moroni. He might even have nursed his father for a time before Mormon died, we simply do not know, other than the fact that by the time Moroni began to complete his fathers record, he wrote, “And my father also was killed by them [Lamanites], and I remain alone to write the sad tale of the destruction of my people. But behold, they are gone, and I fulfill the commandment of my father” (Mormon 8:3).
    In some way, Moroni became privy to the fact that the Lamanites had tracked the escaping Nephites at Cumorah into the south countries and that they were all overtaken and killed (Mormon 8:2).

What Moroni’s plan was for his hiding the record when he was completed with it, he did not seem to know. Though he had been at the hill Cumorah, where he was when he finished his father’s record is neither said nor implied, but it must have been some distance away for he says: “Therefore I will write and hide up the records in the earth; and whither I go it mattereth not” (Mormon 8:4). So evidently, he was not near Cumorah at that moment, and was either not planning to hide the records there or did not feel it was feasible. He did understand that he had to hide them in the earth after he was finished with his work on them, for he wrote: “And I am the same who hideth up this record unto the Lord” (Mormon 8:14), and seemed to understand that he would be involved in their eventual discovery as he added, “And whoso shall bring it to light, him will the Lord bless…for it shall be brought out of darkness unto light, according to the word of God; yea, it shall be brought out of the earth, and it shall shine forth out of darkness, and come unto the knowledge of the people; and it shall be done by the power of God” (Mormon 8:16). He also seemed to understand that after the record was retrieved from its hiding place and translated, that it would have numerous critics, “And if there be faults they be the faults of a man. But behold, we know no fault; nevertheless God knoweth all things; therefore, he that condemeth, let him be aware lest he shall be in danger of hell fire” (Mormon 8:17), and “For behold, the same that judgeth rashly shall be judged rashly again; for according to his works shall his wages be” (Mormon 8:19).
    Of course, this is all speculation since we have no direct evidence of what Moroni thought or knew that he did not write about, but the events seem to have led in this direction.
    Much to Moroni’s surprise, thirty-six years later he was not only still alive, but prompted to write more in the record, and begins  by telling us that the civil wars between the Lamanites are still raging and were exceedingly fierce (Moroni 1:2).

Now Moroni was not stationary, sitting in a cave somewhere like Ether, waiting for the end. First of all, the terrible stench from 230,000 to 300,000 dead bodies decaying over the years at Cumorah would have long before this time driven Moroni far away from the hill Cumorah, as it would have the surviving Lamanites, who were still so strongly taken with the blood lust that as soon as they made sure all the Nephites (men, women and children) were dead, commenced this blood lust against one another—a civil war between them, no doubt tribe against tribe, family against family, that had lasted at this point for 36 years.
    No doubt this led to the tribal mentality that existed a thousand years later when the Europeans arrived, where tribe distrusted anyone not of their own tribe and wars between tribes evidently existed down through the ages into the times of the arrival of the Gentiles.
    Where Moroni went, we have no idea. Fifteen years after Cumorah, Moroni tells us he is wandering around keeping clear of the way of the Lamanites for his own safety. We can guess during this time that he did not go south, where the Lamanites were located and no doubt the strongest in numbers, and where they were then tracking down every Nephite that had escaped in that direction. Nor would he have gone West for he would have been stopped by the ocean (West Sea), and it seems likely he would not have gone east into the deep jungles that had so recently come up out of the water. This leaves his most likely direction of travel would be northward, perhaps into the area of modern day southern Colombia.
    Obviously, he was well aware of the danger to his life from the warring Lamanites, who seemed to be everywhere in their wars for he tells us he “wandered whithersoever he could for the safety of his own life” (Moroni 1:3). Who the wars were against or why is not stated, other Lamanites could have come north and challenged those then residing in the Land Northward, or it could have been between converted Lamanites. In all, Moroni had enough space of the plates after abridging Ether to write his own few pages and then the title page as he kept on the move, keeping a keen eye out for Lamanites, and avoiding known trails and paths where they might be traveling. No doubt hiding by day and perhaps engraving his record by moonlight at night, he finished his work—a lone man, the last survivor of the Nephite nation and people.

Of the title page, Joseph Smith said, “I wish to mention here that the title page of the Book of Mormin is a literal translation taken from the very last leaf, on the left hand side of the collection or book of plates, which contained the record which has been translated (Joseph Smith History of the Church, vol 1 p71).
    What is important here is that Moroni does not tell us where he put the record.  We do not know anything more than he said 36 years before this that “I will write and hide up the records in the earth” (Mormon 8:4).
    If there was ever any question by anyone at the greatness of this man, Moroni, consider his wandering around, hiding everywhere he went, trying to keep out of site of the Lamaniters, knowing they would kill him and destroy the records he carried (Moroni 1:1), yet as he sat down to write this final “few thigns” nearly the first thing he says is but I write a few more things, that perhaps they may be of worth unto my brethren, the lamanites, in some future day, according to the will of the Lord” (Moroni 1:4). Not many of us, I think, would be thinking of the souls of those who sought our life at such a time as this. But Moroni was far above the level to which most men live.
    That people read into this what they want, i.e., burying the plates in the hill Cumorah, is without merit—at least not for many years afterward. First of all, the stench as mentioned would have driven all away from Cumorah for many years—an example of this was the battle at the city of Ammonihah where when it was over, “The smell [of dead bodies] was so powerful that no one was willing to live in Ammonihah for many years” and it was called the “Desolation of Nehors: for they were of the profession of Nehor, who were slain; and their lands remained desolate” (Alma 16:11). And this was one city, with the bodies lightly covered with earth—Cumorah had ten times that many dead or more, and they were not covered with earth.
    The stench would have kept the area free of all people for many, many years.

Coriantumr’s Stone History

One of the problems we find with the Mesoamerican theory, is that the theory drives the scriptural record, rather than the scriptural record driving the history. Take for example Coriantumr’s Stone, on which he engraved a brief history of his people during his nine month stay among the Mulekites in the area of Zarahemla. In one Mesoamerican article, it states that “When the people of Zarahemla met the elder Mosiah, they showed him a “large stone … with engravings on it” which stone, of course, is described by Amaleki, but instead of “showing it to Mosiah,” it was brought to Mosiah, which is not quite the same.    First of all, something shown to another person gives no idea of its size, portability, or weight. On the other hand, something brought to a person suggests, despite how it is described, it was small enough to be portable, and though it might have taken more than one person to carry it, it was carryable! And even thought Amaleki described it as a “large stone” it was still portable!

(LtoR) Stela 5 Ixkun at Peten, Guatemala 8.7 feet high and 3.3 feet wide; stela 2 Ixtgonton at Peten, 6.9 feet high by 3.9 feet; Stela E at Quiriguá, 35 feet high, weighing 60 tons—none of which could be carried

    Is this important? Well, let’s take  Mesoamerica for a moment. In this civilization, the cultures engraved large stones, called stela (stelae plural) that were 20-feet, 23-feet, 26-feet, etc. The point is, to equate the stone Coriantumr carved upon as a stationary stela, it suggests a connection to the huge stone stelaes of the Mayan. So in bringing Coriantumr’s stone to Mosiah, it dispels any such connection and suggests a smaller stone upon which the Jaredite wrote down his brief history.
    However, that is not the entire story. As Great Lakes people point out, while Mesoamerica is a culture that throughout writes their history on stone, the Nephites did not, neither did the Jaredites. Both recorded their histories on metal plates. In fact, Nephi tells us quite plainly that "if my people desire to know the more particular part of the history of my people they must search mine other plates." And King Benjamin told his sons that were it not for the history on plates they would have dwindled in unbelief. The Nephites did not write on stones or stelaes, or record their history on such, yet in Mesoamerica, that is all they used—there are no metal plates found there or even metal work of any kind prior to about 900 A.D.

An artists’ rendition of Coriantumr writing on stone; however, the size of the stone would not have been that large. The point is, he had to write on stone because he did not have access to metal plates

    Consequently, when Coriantumr reached the Mulekites, an illiterate people with no written records, therefore, no metal plates on which they engraved, the Jaredite survivor was left engraving his brief history on stone. It is the only example of writing on stone found in the entire scriptural record of the Book of Mormon. It is interesting that while Mesoamericanists consider the writing on stone stelaes as proof of their matching the scriptural record, as Brant A. Gardner writes in Second Witness: Gardner explained, “Mesoamerica is unique in the Western Hemisphere for its writing systems. … Part of that tradition includes inscriptions on stelae, or large stones” (Analytical and Contextual Commentary on the Book of Mormon, 6 vols. (Salt Lake City, UT: Greg Kofford Books, 2007–2008), 3:64)
    As though Nephi had not spoken of where to find the information about Nephite kings, John L. Sorenson writes that “most stelae [in Mesoamerica] were meant to memorialize the king and his accomplishments,” which rather than support the Book of Mormon, actually runs contrary to it as mentioned above when Nephi says the story of their kings would be found on the large plates. 
In fact, it is claimed that “The impetus to erect stelae first came in the Middle Formative (900–300 BC) among the Olmec, when efforts to record history also developed. Stelae at La Venta depict historical rulers attired in regalia that symbolized and reinforce the office and power of an early king” (Miller and Taube, An Illustrared Dictionary of the God andsumbols of Ancient Mexico and the Maya, p157), and by 400 B.C., stelae typically focused on a king or ruler depicting him as a warrior, providing a record of his actions, and listing of the ruler’s ancestors. However, as late as Amaleki we have an unbroken record (Nephi, Jacob, Enos, Jarom, Omni) by several recorders that were obeying Nephi’s injunction to write on the plates—so why would we feel that writing about the kings on rock stelae would be consistent with the scriptural record?
    It is also interesting that the author of the website calls attention in a footnote to the fact that Kerry Hull, “War Banners: A Mesoamerican context for the Title of Liberty,” p109: “The seemingly uninspiring description of the monument as simply a ‘large stone’ may actually be significant. The ancient Maya word for “stela” was lakam-tuun, literally translated as ‘large stone.’ While possibly merely coincidental, that the precise designation of ‘large stone’ for a carved monument with writing on it would be given in the Book of Mormon as well as in myriads of ancient Maya texts is further indication of a shared cultural and linguistic origin” (Hull, “War Banners, 117 n.107 credits Mark Wright with first making the observation in a 2006 Book of Mormon Archaeological Forum Conference).

Flags, hanging banners and other such patriotic or inspiring insignia has as much more in common with lakam-tuun than does the term ‘large stone’ 

     First of all, the term “lakam-tuun” literally means “banner stone,” and can actually mean “flag,” “standard,” which in reality is far more suggestive of a banner or flag depicting an event or patriotic meaning than “large” for stone. Secondly, the problem with Hull’s thinking is that the term “large stone” is just about all that could be said in any language of a stone upon which someone is to carve or engrave a history of his life, thus we find making a correlation between two events that are neither remarkable nor out of the ordinary in any way and trying to tie them together to reach a correlation.
    As Hull writes of his own idea: “The possibility remains that the stela glyph literally reads “banner stone.” That is, stelae were conceived as standards made of stone. We can easily imagine large flags and banners decorating plazas and architecture (as graffiti at Tikal and elsewhere explicitly shows).” Consequently, rather than be a tie in for Mesoamerican connection between history and the Book of Mormon, the idea actually separates the two, since unlike the Book of Mormon who engraved on metal to record their histories and especially the record of their kings, the Mesoamerican cultures engraved on huge stones where not a single instance outside Coriantumr is recorded or even suggested in the scriptural record.
    However, true to his Mesoamerican stand despite no scriptural support, Hull goes on to say: “The more scholars learn about Mesoamerican stelae, the more comfortably Coriantumr’s stela fits the description,” yet, actual banners and flags among the Aztecs at the time of the Spanish invasion were both common and extensive. According to John Pohl and Charles M. RobinsonI II, Aztecs and Conquistadores: The Spanish Invasion and the Collapse of the Aztec Empire (Osprey Publishing, Great Britain, 2005, p75) banners and flags were described in great detail and were used by the Aztec warrior and “essential to coordinating troop movements.” According to the Codex Mendoza (History of the Aztec rulers and their conquests, and description of daily Aztec life in traditional Aztec pictograms with Spanish explanations, 1535), the quaxeletl banner was umbrella-like in shape and was produced in yellow, blue and green.

Top Left: Aztec battle line with the (yellow arrow) tlescocomoctli raised to signal formations; Top Right: Aztec battling Spaniard with a club in one hand and the (yellow arrow) battle flag in the other; Bottom: Aztec warrior wearing a vexiloid, or flag. The veiloid were the ancestor of what we know as flags (vexilloid) 

    The point is, inaccurate statements or misleading ideas have no place in writing about the scriptural record. The stelae found in Mesoamerica were not “large rocks” but “banners and flags” meant to convey a message, and among warriors, formations and battle messages, as well as pomp and ceremony for battle preparation.

What is the Great Deep?

It is interesting that Great Lakes theorists want to define words their own way in order to support their view points. Take the idea of the Great Deep. How would you define that term?

    On a Great Lakes Theorist website, the following statement is provided: “The Book of Mormon refers to the Pacific (or Atlantic) Ocean as the “Great Deep” “Great Water” “Irreantum” “Many Waters” and “Deep."
    Actually, the Book of Mormon does not refer to the Pacific or Atlantic oceans by name, nor by geographical reference. We can assume that is correct and most likely is, but we cannot arbitrarily say outright since the Earth was divided in Peleg’s time, but we do not know in what shape it was divided for the Old Testament and Book of Ether does not tell us that.
    But let us precede as though the Earth in the days of the Jaredites and later Nephites were more-or-less configured as it is today.

The World's Oceans are all tied together and is really one very large area of water and all of the Great Deep is tied together

   The point is, the website article is trying to tie the world’s oceans into the one, singular meaning “the Great Deep,” “Great Waters,” “Many Waters,” “Raging Deep,” “the Deep,” “Waters of the Great Deep,” and “Irreantum.” However, they do not include “Ripliancum,” which by interpretation means waters that are large, or to exceed all” (Ether 15:8).
    We know that Irreantum, which means “many waters,” would be the Sea of Arabia where Lehi stopped at the place he called Bountiful since his journey from Jerusalem is well described. And  “many waters” fits the Sea of Arabia, which flows into the Indian Ocean which flows into the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans and into the Southern Ocean.
    So why are we discounting Ripliancum, which means “large or to exceed all” when the Jaredites had already spent 344 days crossing the Great Deep?
    Since the Great Lakes theorists has to discount any water within or around the Land of Promise, which is what this article on the website is meant to do, by isolating all the oceans far away from where the Land of Promise was located, Ripliancum is discarded and turned into a secondary water area--Lake Ontario in the Great Lakes model.
    Yet, in all of this, they have to ignore Jacob’s comment about being on an island in the midst of the sea over which they sailed from Oman/Arabia to the Western Hemisphere or the Americas. “The Lord has made the sea our path and we are upon an isle of the sea” (2 Nephi 10:20).
    So let’s take a look at their argument and their article outlining it: 
    Theorist: “And when my brethren saw that I was about to build a ship they began to murmur against me saying: Our brother is a fool for he thinketh that he can build a ship; yea, and he also thinketh that he can cross these great waters” ( 1 Nephi 17:17). 

Tehom (Hebrew  תְּהוֹם‎‎) literally the Deep or Abyss (Greek Septuagint:abyssos) refers to the Great Deep of the primordial waters of creation in the Bible. Tehom is a cognate of the Akkadian word tantu and Ugaritic t-h-m which have similar meanings

     Response: First, at the time we are dealing with and the people we are following, these oceans were not separate and did not have different names. It was all “the sea.” When he first saw it, Lehi named this sea “Irreantum,” meaning many waters. And to he and his family and party, the sea was huge. Secondly, looking out from the Bountiful shore along the southern coast of Arabia, they would have seen the Sea of Arabia, which is 1.491 million square miles in size. That his brothers called it “Great Waters” is understandable, standing on the shore, or looking out from a hill or even mountain, you see nothing but water. 

    Theorist: “And they journeyed in the wilderness and were brought by the hand of the Lord across the great waters into the land where Mosiah discovered them; and they had dwelt there from that time forth” (Omni 1:16). 
Response: First, we have to keep in mind that the Hebrews and Jews had no word for “ocean.” Their word was “sea,” which was yam (yawm) and literally meant “sea,” and interpreted as “sea” 278 times and “seas” 27 times in the Bible, but also was used for seacoast (5), and seashore (9). It could also mean “west” (translated 59 times), “west side” (4), “western” (1) and “westward” (12), as well as “south” (1); secondly, in this case, the Mulekites were led across the same Great Waters or deep ocean. Consequently, the word “yam” meant a body of water, and the term Great or Deep, referred to its size. That is, to get from one continent (Asia) to another (Americas), Nephi’s ship had to sail across the deep ocean—the Great Deep, the Raging Deep, the Great Waters. 
    Theorist: “Behold O Lord, wilt thou suffer that we shall cross this great water in darkness?” (Ether 2:22); “And thus the Lord caused stones to shine in darkness, to give light unto men, women, and children, that they might not cross the great waters in darkness” (Ether 6:3). 
    Response: The same can be understood from the Jaredite responses, i.e., the barges they built had to cross the great ocean. So we can interpret Great Waters as Ocean in our English vocabulary. 
    Theorist: “And it came to pass that I looked and beheld many waters; and they divided the Gentiles from the seed of my brethren…separated from the seed of my brethren by the many waters… he went forth upon the many waters, even unto the seed of my brethren, who were in the promised land…beheld the many waters” (1 Nephi 13:10-13). The theorist quotes one more mention of “many waters” separating the nations of the Gentiles (1 Nephi 13:29), again referring to the deep oceans of the world and those separating the Western Hemisphere (Atlantic). 

Response: First, we see that the great oceans are being referred to here, and now we see that the Hebrews referred to both the Pacific and Atlantic as “Great Waters,” and “Many Waters.” Second, we see that the waters being mentioned and called the Great Deep, Many Waters, Great Waters, etc., border the promised land as “he went forth upon the many waters, even unto the seed of my brethren, who were in the promised land). 
    Theorist: “O Lord, look upon me in pity and turn away thine anger from this thy people, and suffer not that they shall go forth across the raging deep in darkness; but behold these things which I have molten out of the rock (Ether 3:3); and when they were buried in the deep there was no water that could hurt them” (Ether 6:7); he remembered what the Lord had done in bringing Jared and his brother across the deep and he did walk in the ways of the Lord and he begat sons and daughters.(Ether 10:2) 
     Response: From this we learn that the Raging Deep, Great Deep, the Deep are all the same waters. 
    Theorist: “My God hath…led me through mine afflictions in the wilderness; and he hath preserved me upon the waters of the great deep” (2 Nephi 4:20). And behold, I prepare you against these things; for ye cannot cross the great deep save I prepare you against the waves of the sea, and the winds which have gone forth, and the floods which shall come. Therefore what will ye that I should prepare for you that ye may have light when ye are swallowed up in the depths of the sea?” (Ether 2:25). 
    Response: “First, we learn that the Great Deep and the Deep are the same area of seas or oceans; and second, we find that the depths of the Sea and the Great Deep are the same. 
    Theorist: “And there were no more wars in the days of Shule; and he remembered the great things that the Lord had done for his fathers in bringing them across the great deep and into the promised land…” (Ether 7:27).
    Response: From this we learn that the Great Deep bordered on the Land of Promise, for they went from the sea (crossing the great deep) into the land, that is the promised land. 
    Theorist: “While they were buried in the deep…they were encompassed about by many waters (Ether 6:7) 
    Response: Thus we see that the term “Great Deep” and “Many Waters” also have the same meaning. 
    Theorist: “And we did come to the land which we called Bountiful, because of its much fruit and also wild honey; and all these things were prepared of the Lord that we might not perish. And we beheld the sea, which we called Irreantum, which being interpreted, is many waters” (1 Nephi 17:5). 

Response: Thus we see that the words or terms Sea (that stretches out from the shore at Bountiful), Many Waters, and Irreantum, all mean the same thing.
    So using the exact scriptures that the Theorist presents to prove his point, we can see that all these waters mentioned are the same waters, whether the Deep, Great Deep, Raging Deep, Great Waters, Many Waters, and even Irreantum all mean the same thing. 
    Theorist: [his conclusion} At no point in time however are these terms used to describe the waters that border Book of Mormon lands. 
    Response: Which is not true at all. Using his very own words and how he used them, we find that the Great Deep bordered on the Land of Promise, for they went from the sea (crossing the great deep) into the land, that is the promised land; and “…we see that the waters being mentioned and called the Great Deep, Many Waters, Great Waters, etc., border the promised land as “he went forth upon the many waters, even unto the seed of my brethren, who were in the promised land.” Here we have a specific instance of the scriptural record showing that the Great Deep bordered the Land of Promise. In addition, using Jacob’s words, we find that the Land of Promise is an island in the sea over which they sailes (2 Nephi 10:20).