A New Landing Site for Lehi – Part VI

Continued from the previous post regarding additional coverage of the Heartland Theorists claim that the Chattanooga area of Tennessee being the city of Nephi and the area of Montrose, Iowa, being Zarahemla. In the list of reasons why these theorists believe that Chattanooga was the city of Nephi, they list several points—the first eleven (along with our responses) were covered in the previous posts:
12. “The people hauled soil in baskets or sacks or dragged it on hides or cloths to pile it up and build mounds. They made both beautiful and plain pots, paints, points, pipes, musical instruments, and other artifacts, and used many in special ceremonies that also involved burnt offerings to accompany burial of their dead.”

(Top row) Artifacts found in both the western Florida among the mounds; and (Bottom row) in Andean South America. In both cases from 1000 BC to 100 BC. Note the extremely different quality of each—one from inexperience to that of extreme experience, so which was the Nephite quality?

Response: Again, mounds have no connection to the Jews, Israelites the Law of Moses, or the area of Mesopotamia. It simply has no reference or suggestion in the scriptural record. The oft mis-quoted statements regarding piling ujp dirt in the scriptural record have nothing to do with building either ceremonial, burial, or aesthetic mounds—it has to do with building defensive positions, where earth was used to shield after Lamanite arrows and attack.
    “Moroni, caused that they should commence laboring in digging a ditch round about the land, or the city, Bountiful. And he caused that they should build a breastwork of timbers upon the inner bank of the ditch; and they cast up dirt out of the ditch against the breastwork of timbers; and thus they did cause the Lamanites to labor until they had encircled the city of Bountiful roundabout with a strong wall of timbers and earth, to an exceeding height” (Alma 53:3-4). As well as “And behold, the city had been rebuilt, and Moroni had stationed an army by the borders of the city, and they had cast up dirt around about to shield them from the arrows and the stones of the Lamanites; for behold, they fought with stones and with arrows” (Alma 49:2), and “the Nephites had dug up a ridge of earth round about them, which was so high that the Lamanites could not cast their stones and their arrows at them that they might take effect, neither could they come upon them save it was by their place of entrance” (Alma 49:4). Also, “they should commence in digging up heaps of earth round about all the cities, throughout all the land which was possessed by the Nephites. And upon the top of these ridges of earth he caused that there should be timbers, yea, works of timbers built up to the height of a man, round about the cities” (Alma 50:1,2).
    The point, once again, all this work of building up earthen defenses was strictly for the safety and protection of those within the banks of earth. This is not at all what the mounds all over the eastern U.S. were for. They were burial mounds, or in some cases, believed to be used to build huts on top. Whatever they were for, and whoever built them, they certainly have no bearing or reference within the scriptural record by. Mormon or anyone else.
    Consequently, there is absolutely no connection between the Book of Mormon and the Gulf Coast or Heartland or Eastern United States.
13. “The people living along the river controlled trade northward up the river and along the Gulf coast where there is evidence they imported cornmeal to broaden their diet.”
Response: With whom did they trade? When Lehi landed around 587 BC, he said none had already been led to the Land of Promise that were still there, speaking of those who would follow all in the future tense (2 Nephi 1:5-7,9). He also stated that “it is wisdom that this land should be kept as yet from the knowledge of other nations; for behold, many nations would overrun the land, that there would be no place for an inheritance” (2 Nephi 1:8).
14. “In the mounds at Pierce, Clarence Bloomfield Moore unearthed elegant ceramic vessels, stone spear and arrow points and plummets, freshwater pearls, copper and silver ornaments, shell beads and drinking cups, and even a bison-bone ornament, associated with many burials of the honored dead, 99 of whom he unearthed from Mound A of the Pierce Mound complex.”
Response: Early on the larger mounds, especially the one called the temple mound, had been mined for fill; however, 99 burials from Mound A, including skeletons, weapons, jewelry and pottery were uncovered since Moore’s initial publication of the site in 1902. Moore was a wealthy Philadelphian whose digs into Indian mounds all over the South are well known because he described them in journal articles, and he kept detailed notes of his digs.
    It should be noted that all of this activity took place along the southern Gulf Coast, over a long enough period, it would have passed through Nephi’s time and even later—which is all contrary to the scriptural record.

Burial Mound at Tallahassee, where Lehi was supposed to have lived after landing along the Gulf Coast

It should be noted that the “temple mound” in the northern part of Tallahassee, by Lake Jackson, was built after 1050 AD and the site occupied up until about 1500 AD, in periods called Jackson I, II, and III, all of this was centuries after the demise of the Nephites in 385 AD.
    In addition, other statements, such as “Archaeology, Bees, Honey, Climate, Latitude, Wind Currents, Promised Land (USA), Abundance of Food, Scripture Text, all lead to the location of the Land of Promise, and all of “It Just Makes Sense.” Under the heading of “Why Apalachicola Florida is plausible for the land of Lehi’s landing in 591 BC,” the following points are listed:
1. “Oman and Florida both called “A” Land Bountiful”
Response: Neither Salalah in Oman, nor any place along the coast of the Arabian Peninsula in either Oman or Yemen, is named Bountiful except for the brief year or two when Lehi was there. In addition, the word “Bountiful” in Florida is referring to a general label, not a name. As an example, there are other places that are called “Bountiful,” including Bountiful, Utah and Bountiful, Colorado, plus an island in Micronesia is referred to as the Bountiful Island (David Damas, Bountiful Island, Wilfred Laurier University Press, Ontario, Canada, 1994).
2. “500-700 BC pottery, copper, tools, and bones at Pierce Mounds. Buried Mammoths at Wakulla Springs which is also a first magnitude spring and aquifer. Route of Hopewell Indians.”
Response: Copper has been found, but no metals, such as iron and steel, or the alloys of brass or bronze, or any evidence of metallurgy dating anywhere near the time of the Jaredites or that of the Nephites.  3. “The Book of Mormon speaks of a Land of Liberty. USA, not Mesoamerica is referred to as a land of liberty.”
Response: The term “Land of Liberty” as applied to the United States, was taken from President Thomas Jefferson’s declaration that North America was an “Empire of Liberty.”

This in turn was taken by Jefferson from the British term “Colonial Empire” which England earlier claimed was their control over the colonial North American area. The result of Jefferson’s declaration was that the new colonial government of the united colonies (states) and the British seapower kept the U.S. isolated and sheltered the new colonial government from their previous imperial oppressors.
    At the same time, the new colony government, or the United States, stepped into the place of the colonial empires, assuring that political and economic change followed its own model. America intervened south of the border to support revolutions that promised democratic governance and free trade, and repressed revolutions that entailed extreme violence, limitations on commerce, and challenges to U.S. regional domination. Jefferson’s early declaration became the forerunner of the later Monroe Doctrine
    The result of this, once European governments were forced out of Central and South America, elected governments were formed and have, through a rocky chain of events, claimed liberty for their people. Following the American model, these countries developed their own forms providing freedom and liberty for most of the people of the Latin countries in America.
    While the United States is by far a provider of Liberty, it is not the only country in the world that enjoys independence and provides liberty and freedom for its people. In fact, several South American countries refer to themselves as lands of liberty.(See the next post, “A New Landing Site for Lehi – Part VI,” regarding additional coverage of the Heartland Theorists claims of the Chattanooga area of Tennessee being the city of Nephi and the area of Montrose, Iowa, being Zarahemla