An example of re-invented history as is common in alternative history and psuedo archeology books the past few years, where “Templars in America” (2004) and the books by Laurence Gardner.

For example nobody is certain how many Norse Greenlanders there were during  an attempted settlement in New Foundland (USA), that  lasted only a matter of months. At any time during the existence of  two settlements,  most modern scholars concerned with the problem estimate between three thousand and five thousand at the peak of the curve. This is a far lower number than the population envisioned by nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century enthusiasts, whose intellectual footprints have proved resistant to erosion.

Besides the Kensington Rune Stone, a number of large and small objects found in continental North America have been used as evidence of how far afield the Norse allegedly went. However, Norse mooring holes found in Minnesota have proved as disappointing in this respect as swords, drinking horns, and an assortment of big and little rocks bearing the marks of human hands, including the Dighton Rock, whose inscriptions have been identified as Amerindian petroglyphs.

Some believers  have even linked a big rock (found at Westford, Massachusetts, and said by some to reveal the portrait of a medieval knight) with "Prince" Henry Sinclair of Orkney as well as with the Venetian Nicol6 Zeno the Younger's 1558 publication of material con­taining supposedly firsthand medieval experience with the more remote sec­tions of the North Atlantic. Fortunately, recent work by the Shetland archivist Brian Smith has put the Sinclair story into a factual perspective, and more than a century ago an American scholar showed quite satisfactorily that the Zeni map and letters are spurious (Frederic W Lucas, The Annals of the Voyages of the Brothers Nicolo and Antonio Zeno in the North Atlantic about the End of the Fourteenth Century and the Claim Founded thereon to a Venetian Discovery of America, 1898).

However this doesn’t stop Tim Wallace Murphy in his 2004 book “ to claim in contrast that Zeni map has been “officially approved”. But as F. W. Lucas already clearly showed Zeno was simply one of the most blatant and successful hoaxers in the history of the art.  Of the 26 Greenland place-names on his map, 25 appear on earlier maps. The exception is the name of the monastery that Nicolò Zeno allegedly found . Zeno gives it the name of a saint who never existed, its name? St Thomas Zenobius!

But Zeno's text is the source, for the fable that Henry Sinclair was an explorer. Of course, Zeno didn't claim that Henry Sinclair sailed to America. He had never heard of Henry Sinclair. Zeno said that someone called Zichmni, who lived on an imaginary island, sailed to Greenland. Similarly, no Scottish or Italian document of the fourteenth or later centuries suggests that Henry Sinclair or the Zenos ever essayed any such voyage. In fact, the only two real people in Zeno's book, its heroes, were in Venice at the time that Zeno said they were travelling and dying in the north; and Henry Sinclair was waging war and dying in Scotland and/or Orkney at the same time.(1)

The second major source “Templars in America” (2004) uses for its truth claims is the research of Charles Leland who during the 19th century wrote  witches and local folklore.

And when Frederick J. Pohl also quoted as a source in “Templars in America” (2004)   purports to have proven that an American Indian named Kluskap was really the fourteenth century  nobleman Henry Sinclair who over wintered in Nova Scotia, this in is based on the interpretation by Charles Godfrey Leland 1880’s claim that the Indians in North.America were visited by the Vikings.

The essence of Leland's idea is that “Indian” tradition, specially what he called "Algonquin" tradition, was "steeped and penetrated with the old Norse spirit.” (Leland, Charles Godfrey. "The Mythology, Legends, and Folk-Lore of the Algonquians," published in the “Atlantic Monthly” called, "The Edda among the Algonquin Indians." vol. 54, August, 1884, 222-34. This is reprinted in Clements, Native American Folklore, 129-54.)

In "The Edda among the Algonquin Indians," Leland continues to quote twenty-seven references to the “Norse” Algonquin connection and he concludes the Atlantic Monthly essay with the claim that the Finnish epic, the Kalevala, shares less with the Edda than do the legends (of the American) Indians he has presented to the public.To know what that means, see a modern interpretation of the Kalewalla : “The Lord of the Rings.“ (Editorial today)

What is the larger context so we can at least understand, the origins of the assumption that could lead to such erroneous notion maintained today, about this never existing, “Prince” Henry Sinclair voyage to the New World” ?

First of all the “Prince” claim is concocted and only serves the pride of some real, but often also self advocated “family” members of the “Sinclair Clan.” Instead some of the real direct descendants of Henry Sinclair I have been in contact with are appalled by the inventions surrounding their true family history and Rosslyn Chapel. Denying anything special is buried there except for graves of former Sinclair family members; end of myth regarding Grails, Holy Rods, the head of “Sinclair blood relative Jesus Christ” a blue print of the “Temple of Salomon” and so on.

Leland heavily promoted the Kluskap also spelled Goolscap, twin story, but by shifting this story to the centre of Abenaki and Micmac story traditions, Frederick J. Pohl purports to prove that Kluskap was really a fourteenth century Orkney nobleman named Henry Sinclair who over wintered in Nova Scotia.

But the purpose of this particular SESN article today is to look at what in fact is the larger context of Leland’s misconception, the origin of the assumption that led to his erroneous notions. A “Prince” Henry Sinclair voyage to the New World surely  never existed.

Twenty years ago Robert Berkhofer identified the two aspects of the "Indian" stereotype:

“In a certain sense, for five hundred years Indian people have competed against a fantasy over which they have had no control. They are compared with beings who never really were, yet the stereotype is taken for truth."

One is that The lofty goal of converting the pagan natives to Christianity featured prominently in all early discourse about the reasons for supporting settlements in the New World. King Charles asserted in 1628 that the conversion of the natives was "the principal of this plantation," and the original charter granted to Massachusetts charged the governor and company to 'wynn an d incite the Natives ... [to] the only true God and Saviour of Mankinde."(1)

Some, like John Eliot, took this charge in earnest and sought to strike a blow against Satan by converting his former associates to the true faith. On the whole, however, the time and energies expended by the Protestant settlers to convert the Native Americans proved largely wasted, and such efforts gradually waned over time. After all, unlike the Catholic French who equated conversions with nominal doctrinal understanding accompanied by outward participation in the sacraments, the Protestants identified conversion with the acceptance of complex theological ideas and a public narration of one's personal experience of grace. Cultural and linguistic barriers made it nearly impossible for Native Americans to comply with these stringent proofs of conversion, and P uritan energies were consequently redirected to more pressing circumstances. Even as early as the 1640s, a correspondent of John Winthrop's listed conversion of the natives a distant seventh on his list of reasons that God had brought his people to New England.

The Puritans' proclivity for demonising their enemies served an even more important ideological function when it became necessary to murder the Native Americans wholesale. For a community that had conceived of itself as dedicated to the gospel of love, the wide scale slaughter of Indians posed serious questions about the Puritans' character and moral resolve. Knowing that their adversaries were in league with Satan helped ease the consciences of God's chosen people. Within weeks of arriving on the shores of Plymouth, the Pilgrims had been forced of necessity to raid Indian storage bins for corn and nativ e crafts. Violent skirmishes broke out from time to time, leading up to the Pequot War of 1637 in which the Puritans killed more than five hundred native men, women, and children in a single battle. By the outbreak of King Philip's War in the 1670s, there could be no more mistaking the fact that the interests of the Native Americans and the European settlers were inalterably opposed. The quest for survival robbed the colonists of many of their lofty moral principles and brought home the realization that, in a barren wilderness, might makes right.

In the face of such realities, the colonists gradually abandoned their original plans to Christianise the Indians and instead formulated a doctrine of holy war, which called for the obliteration of Satan's allies from the earth. Samuel Nowell, for example, explicitly interpreted the outbreak of King Philip's War as a preparation for Armageddon. He divined that "God in his providence keeps some Nations and people un-subdued, as he did with Israel of old ... he kept some people un-subdued on purpose to teach Israel War."(2)

The cosmic significance of the Native Americans, then, was to arouse the Puritans' combativeness on the eve of the final battle with Satan: "When God intended the Canaanites to be destroyed, he did forbid Israel to marry with them: they were to be thorns to them, and Israel was to root them out."(3)

The Native Americans were no longer hapless souls who needed only the Gospel to find their way to civility. They had instead become demons who had to be defeated if progress were to be made in fulfilling God's errand.

Even in 1856 Schoolcraft in his ‘The Myth of Hiawatha and Other Oral Legends”, describes "Indians," as not part of the "Indo-Germanic family" of what would for a time be called Aryans, were characterized by powerlessness, strange stories, and mental disabilities. For Schoolcraft, "Indians" and the Teutonic Norse were "antagonistically" "types of the human race"; examples of the "alpha and omega of the ethnological chain."

But coming to the second stereotype, also going back to around 1613 the English missionary, Alexander Whitaker, who had to convince his "funding agencies" that the "Indian" was "savage" enough to need saving, yet human enough to warrant saving. He had to establish both the need for and capability of conversion. Thus in a pamphlet he portrayed "Indians" as liars, deceivers, cannibals, in cahoots with the devil on one hand; and, on the other hand, as crafty, of good government, industrious, and with laws. (This pamphlet is quoted in Robert F Berkhofer, The White Man's Indian: Images of the American Indian from Columbus to the Present, 1978, p 19-20.)

Both disparaging and approving uses of the "Indian" stereotype have histories far more complex and subtle than appear here. But I want to point out here is that the "Indian" stereotype with its prominent characteristics and its dual use is a motif in a story cherished by hegemonic popular culture. It is first and still foremost a story that speaks to not-Native values and needs.

Leland, notes in his diary that of all the considerable material he read during his senior year, two works, one by Schelling, the other by Fichte two Germans, drew his greatest interest. (cited in Ralph Smith, Charles Godfrey Leland, p.41. And also Margery Fee. Fee, "Romantic Nationalism and the Image of Native People in Contemporary English-Canadian Literature," She explores the relation of the image of the Native, romanticism, and nationalism in contemporary English-Canadian literature).

Fichte as is known wrote of the highest individual freedom was the freedom found through group integration. This group was defined in the terms of the Volk, people had to be integrated with the national memories of the Volk.

Next Leland even moved to Munich/Germany, and wrote he was completely enamoured of Germany. He attributed his good health to his German activities. He was, he thought, speaking, smoking, eating, drinking and waltzing like a German. In the remaining time that he was in Europe, he compared all the places he visited with Germany, and nothing, in his estimation, ever equalled it. (idem, Ralph Smith, p. 119,121,123,124,132,144.)

In his own story Leland upon returning back to North .America, gave himself the role of intermediary between "White" and "Indian," between "his own people" and the Others. As Ralph Smith describes Leland was vehemently anti-immigrant ( idem, p. 274, 276). "Whites," "his own people," did not include all European-Americans.

Leland is clear that his "civilised readers" needed help understanding his "Indian" stories. It was just this help that Leland understood himself to be providing.

Next the German immigrant to Canada at the end of WWII, Pohl re-imported Leland's idea by that time having become popular in German Volkish the idea. In the early 20th century such esotericists as the Ostara publisher Jorg Lanz von Liebenfels and his New Templar Organisation (ONT) interpreted Leland to mean what Frederick J. Pohl t hen helped to formulate in his book "Prince Henry Sinclair: His expedition to the New World in 1398"

Yet even a Californian researcher  Karen Ralls  ends her 2003 book about the Knights Templar and The Grail” (Knights Templar by the way had never anything to do with a ‘Grail”)on page 202 with the conclusion that Rosslyn Chapel (build during the time “Prince” Henry would have traveled “three” times back and forth to the US before Columbus did) as a "book in stone." And states;

"Historian Frederick Pohl in Prince Henry Sinclair, describes the Westford knight carving. Armorial scholars say that the basinet is of a form that was in fashion for only twenty five years, from 1375 to 1400. This is obviously before Columbus voyage in 1492." (!)

David K. Schafer, Curatorial Assistant for Archaeology at Harvard's Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, has conducted a survey which is published in the 2003 Massachusetts Archaeological Society Bulletin where points out :

The engraving on the bedrock in Westford, MA is not :

a depiction of "...a rough life-sized portrayal of a late 14th century knight in full-length surcoat" (Glynn 1957:11).

Nor "....a knight's great sword, a shield and crest, and the knight's face in a bassinet helmet with pendent neckmail of the kind in use in A.D. 1360-1390" (Glynn 1967:14).

Nor should the heraldry which some people claim to see on the shield (since the *only* evidence of the shield that I could distinguish was the one painted in white paint on the bedrock by an unknown artist) be interpreted as a 14th century Scottish coat of arms (Glynn 1967:14; Willard 1958:86).

Nor should the "T-shaped" engraving (which is in fact visible on the bedrock) be thought of as "clearly show(ing) a hand and half-wheel pommel sword of Medieval European vintage" (Willard 1958:61)

Nor should the "T-shaped" engraving be interpreted as "...an early 18th century iron tomahawk of the era between 1700 and 1750...cut in the exposed rock by a Westford settler as a memorial of encounter with the Indians...." (Fowler 1960: 22).

Some things it is:  a roughly globular "T-shaped" engraving on a section of exposed bedrock.

The engraving was made by repetitive punching, most likely with a metal punch (I think Folwer's assertion that is was a "case-hardened iron center punch" dating to the mid-18th century is as fanciful as Glynn's assertion the technique is exactly the same as used by 14th-century blacksmith making armor).

The "sword blade" that extends from the "T" are actually glacial scratches (marks made by rocks dragged along under the moving ice). The surface of the entire bedrock are covered by these parallel marks, and two are located in general proximity to the "T".

There are NO OTHER engravings on the bedrock: weathering of the schist, yes; glacial scratches, yes; undulations along the surface of the bedrock, yes; a nicely painted portrait of the knight and shield, yes; even a nice commemorative marble marker.

Based upon environmental studies, this area would have been a hardwood forest in the 14th century, and given the currently landscape (i.e. a flat area in an upland setting) the flat bedrock would have been buried under 1-3 feet of soil. Erosion of the area may have occurred as early as the colonial period due to tree cutting and subsequent farming. Luckily though, we know that Glynn himself was responsible for removing all the soil and plants to expose the greater portion of bedrock (Glynn 1957:11).

Even though I claim no expertise in 14th-century sea-faring vessels, I question whether Henry Sinclair could have sailed his four ships up "Stony Creek" to this Westford local.

And also is the simple fact that the town historian has evidence that the "T" was made by two local boys in the late-19th century (although, 1. that is his story to tell and will be in the articles, and 2. it doesn't make as good of a story as 14th century Scottish lords)

Leland’s assumption have already long before Pohl’s book, in 1937, been totally demolished by Alfred Bailey who argued conclusively that Leland's theory was untenable "in light of the wider knowledge of North American mythology" of the day. (Bailey, Alfred Goldsworthy. The Conflict of European and Eastern Algonquian Cultures. Toronto,1937, p.157.)

Initially incorporated in Vienna as the “Lumen Club” discussing among others, “Elektrotheologie,” Lanz von Liebenfels New Templar Order (ONT) in 1930, send Hans Fuchs, to Rosslyn Chapel to pay tribute to “Prince” Henry Sinclair who was believed to have “Aryanised” the American Indians. Returning from his voyages, “Prince” Henry was supposed to have build Rosslyn, as a “Grail Chapel.”

But then as mentioned before,  some members of the Sinclair family reported that, earlier forced to leave South Africa, one finds Niven James Sinclair under the Kew Criminals records. And other interested parties bought up land around Guyboro for the tourist flood and rising value to occur thanks to the “Prince” Henry voyage to America myth…

 

1) Alden T. Vaughan, New England Frontier, 1965, p. 2 3 6.

2) Samuel Nowell, quoted in Richard Slotkin, The Fatal Environment: The Myth of the Frontier in the Age of Industrialization,1985, p. 57.

3) Ibid., p. 59.  

 

February 17, 2005: There have been myriad candidate H.Grail cups, but none so far has stood the test of historical analysis. There is the Bruges Grail (Belgium) Nanteos Cup (England), Abbot Suger's Chalice (France) Antioch Chalice (Palestine) Sacro Catino (Genoa) Santo Milagro (Spain). Sien of the foto is Rocco Zingaro holding his version of the H.Grail, and stated on BBC January 3, 2005 that he did not believe the tiny cup found by Graham Phillips is the H.Grail either. Graham Phillips' ideas about an ancestral grail inheritance into the 1850s is not convincing. And though Joseph of Arimathea is said to have brought the Grail to Britain, the water in the Chalice Well Gardens at Glastonbury’s red water  is mundanely explained by the red Iron Oxide minerals in the soil. Then, on February 8, Robert Lomas gave a lecture about “Turning The Hiram Key” to be released this week in the UK:

 

For updates click homepage here