Acambaro figures
Encyclopedia
The Acámbaro Figures are several thousand small ceramic figurines allegedly found in July 1944 in Acámbaro
, Guanajuato
, Mexico
, by Waldemar Julsrud.
The figurines are said by some to resemble dinosaur
s and are sometimes cited as anachronism
s. Some young-Earth creationists have adduced the existence of figurines as credible evidence for the coexistence of dinosaurs and humans, in an attempt to cast doubt on scientific dating methods and potentially offer support for a literal interpretation of the Bible
.
However, there is no reliable evidence for the validity of the Acámbaro figures as actual ancient artifacts
; they are accepted by no credible scholar of archaeology
or paleontology
, and the motives of many who support them are questionable.
and major proponent of the figures, Julsrud stumbled upon the figures while riding his horse and hired a local farmer to dig up the remaining figures, paying him for each figure he brought back. Eventually, the farmer and his assistants brought him over 32,000 figures which included representations of everything from the supposed dinosaurs to peoples from all over the world including Egyptians
, Sumer
ians, and “bearded Caucasians
.”
The figures attracted little attention from scholars and scientists, and when Julsrud began to assert that they were accurate representations of dinosaurs created by an ancient society, he only alienated himself further from serious scientific investigation. Tabloids and popular media sources covered the story however, and the figures steadily became somewhat famous.
Archaeologist Charles C. Di Peso
was working for the Amerind Foundation
, an anthropological organization dedicated to preserving Native American
culture. Di Peso examined the figures and determined that they were not authentic, and had instead been produced by local modern-day farmers.
Julsrud quickly gained supporters of the figures' authenticity. Some of these have tried to argue against Di Peso's investigation. Charles Hapgood
, pioneer of pole shift theory
, became one of the figures most high profile and devout supporters. Other supporters included Earle Stanley Gardner, the prolific novelist and creator of the character Perry Mason
, who came to Julsrud’s defense claiming that the 32,000 figures could not possibly have been produced by a single person or group of people. This was in defense against accusations that the figures were a hoax
played on Julsrud.
The figures continue to draw attention in the present day. They have been cited in some pseudoscientific
books such as Atlantis Rising by David Lewis, and Don Patten, another young-Earth creationist
, has emerged as their staunchest supporter. He has proposed some new lines of evidence, including the figure’s resemblance to the dinosaurs depicted in Robert Bakker
’s book, Dinosaur Heresies.
The sheer number of perfect figures found is argued as evidence for a hoax. Over 32,000 figures were found, and all of them in perfect condition except for a few that were cleanly broken, perhaps to create the illusion of antiquity. If these were authentic antiquities, they would not be preserved with such perfection in such an inhospitable environment. Pottery is almost always uncovered as fragments called sherd
s; nowhere have 32,000 unblemished ceramics been uncovered with none of them in fragments and all of them in perfect condition (cleanly broken in two does not count as fragmentation).
, or TL dating, and the earliest results, done when TL dating was in its infancy, suggested a date around 2500 BCE, later work showed these dates to be artificially old. For example, Gary W. Carriveau and Mark C. Han attempted to date 20 different Acámbaro Figures using thermoluminescence dating
. They found that the figures had been fired at temperatures between 450°C and 650°C, which contradicted claims that these figures had been fired at temperature too low for them to be accurately dated. However, all of the samples failed the "plateau test," which indicated that dates obtained for the Acámbaro Figures using standard high temperature thermoluminescence dating techniques are unreliable and lack any chronological significance. Based on the degree of signal regeneration found in remeasured samples, they estimated that the figures tested had been fired approximately 30 years prior to 1969.
Acámbaro
Acámbaro is a city and municipality in the southeastern corner of the Mexican state of Guanajuato, on the banks of the Lerma River, and the oldest of the 46 municipalities of Guanajuato. Acámbaro is noted as a major railway junction, a local transport hub, and the origin of the nationally famous...
, Guanajuato
Guanajuato
Guanajuato officially Estado Libre y Soberano de Guanajuato is one of the 31 states which, with the Federal District, comprise the 32 Federal Entities of Mexico. It is divided in 46 municipalities and its capital city is Guanajuato....
, Mexico
Mexico
The United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...
, by Waldemar Julsrud.
The figurines are said by some to resemble dinosaur
Dinosaur
Dinosaurs are a diverse group of animals of the clade and superorder Dinosauria. They were the dominant terrestrial vertebrates for over 160 million years, from the late Triassic period until the end of the Cretaceous , when the Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event led to the extinction of...
s and are sometimes cited as anachronism
Anachronism
An anachronism—from the Greek ανά and χρόνος — is an inconsistency in some chronological arrangement, especially a chronological misplacing of persons, events, objects, or customs in regard to each other...
s. Some young-Earth creationists have adduced the existence of figurines as credible evidence for the coexistence of dinosaurs and humans, in an attempt to cast doubt on scientific dating methods and potentially offer support for a literal interpretation of the Bible
Bible
The Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...
.
However, there is no reliable evidence for the validity of the Acámbaro figures as actual ancient artifacts
Artifact (archaeology)
An artifact or artefact is "something made or given shape by man, such as a tool or a work of art, esp an object of archaeological interest"...
; they are accepted by no credible scholar of archaeology
Archaeology
Archaeology, or archeology , is the study of human society, primarily through the recovery and analysis of the material culture and environmental data that they have left behind, which includes artifacts, architecture, biofacts and cultural landscapes...
or paleontology
Paleontology
Paleontology "old, ancient", ὄν, ὀντ- "being, creature", and λόγος "speech, thought") is the study of prehistoric life. It includes the study of fossils to determine organisms' evolution and interactions with each other and their environments...
, and the motives of many who support them are questionable.
History
The Acámbaro Figures were uncovered by a German immigrant and hardware merchant named Waldemar Julsrud. According to Dennis Swift, a young-Earth creationistYoung Earth creationism
Young Earth creationism is the religious belief that Heavens, Earth, and all life on Earth were created by direct acts of the Abrahamic God during a relatively short period, sometime between 5,700 and 10,000 years ago...
and major proponent of the figures, Julsrud stumbled upon the figures while riding his horse and hired a local farmer to dig up the remaining figures, paying him for each figure he brought back. Eventually, the farmer and his assistants brought him over 32,000 figures which included representations of everything from the supposed dinosaurs to peoples from all over the world including Egyptians
Egyptians
Egyptians are nation an ethnic group made up of Mediterranean North Africans, the indigenous people of Egypt.Egyptian identity is closely tied to geography. The population of Egypt is concentrated in the lower Nile Valley, the small strip of cultivable land stretching from the First Cataract to...
, Sumer
Sumer
Sumer was a civilization and historical region in southern Mesopotamia, modern Iraq during the Chalcolithic and Early Bronze Age....
ians, and “bearded Caucasians
Caucasian race
The term Caucasian race has been used to denote the general physical type of some or all of the populations of Europe, North Africa, the Horn of Africa, Western Asia , Central Asia and South Asia...
.”
The figures attracted little attention from scholars and scientists, and when Julsrud began to assert that they were accurate representations of dinosaurs created by an ancient society, he only alienated himself further from serious scientific investigation. Tabloids and popular media sources covered the story however, and the figures steadily became somewhat famous.
Archaeologist Charles C. Di Peso
Charles C. Di Peso
Charles Corradino Di Peso was an American archaeologist. He is known for his research in Northern Mexico and the American Southwest.- Biography :...
was working for the Amerind Foundation
Amerind Foundation
The Amerind Foundation is museum and research facility dedicated to the preservation and interpretation of Native American cultures and their histories...
, an anthropological organization dedicated to preserving Native American
Indigenous peoples of the Americas
The indigenous peoples of the Americas are the pre-Columbian inhabitants of North and South America, their descendants and other ethnic groups who are identified with those peoples. Indigenous peoples are known in Canada as Aboriginal peoples, and in the United States as Native Americans...
culture. Di Peso examined the figures and determined that they were not authentic, and had instead been produced by local modern-day farmers.
He concluded that the figurines were indeed fakes: their surfaces displayed no signs of age; no dirt was packed into their crevices; and though some figurines were broken, no pieces were missing and no broken surfaces were worn. Furthermore, the excavation’s stratigraphy clearly showed that the artifacts were placed in a recently dug hole filled with a mixture of the surrounding archaeological layers. DiPeso also learned that a local family had been making and selling these figurines to Julsrud for a peso apiece since 1944, presumably inspired by films shown at Acámbaro’s cinema, locally available comic books and newspapers, and accessible day trips to Mexico City’s Museo Nacional.
Julsrud quickly gained supporters of the figures' authenticity. Some of these have tried to argue against Di Peso's investigation. Charles Hapgood
Charles Hapgood
Charles Hutchins Hapgood was an American college professor and author who became one of the best known advocates of a pseudo-historical claim of a rapid and recent pole shift with catastrophic results.-Biography:...
, pioneer of pole shift theory
Pole shift theory
The cataclysmic pole shift hypothesis suggests that there have been geologically rapid shifts in the relative positions of the modern-day geographic locations of the poles and the axis of rotation of the Earth, creating calamities such as floods and tectonic events.No form of the hypothesis is...
, became one of the figures most high profile and devout supporters. Other supporters included Earle Stanley Gardner, the prolific novelist and creator of the character Perry Mason
Perry Mason
Perry Mason is a fictional character, a defense attorney who was the main character in works of detective fiction authored by Erle Stanley Gardner. Perry Mason was featured in more than 80 novels and short stories, most of which had a plot involving his client's murder trial...
, who came to Julsrud’s defense claiming that the 32,000 figures could not possibly have been produced by a single person or group of people. This was in defense against accusations that the figures were a hoax
Hoax
A hoax is a deliberately fabricated falsehood made to masquerade as truth. It is distinguishable from errors in observation or judgment, or rumors, urban legends, pseudosciences or April Fools' Day events that are passed along in good faith by believers or as jokes.-Definition:The British...
played on Julsrud.
The figures continue to draw attention in the present day. They have been cited in some pseudoscientific
Pseudoscience
Pseudoscience is a claim, belief, or practice which is presented as scientific, but which does not adhere to a valid scientific method, lacks supporting evidence or plausibility, cannot be reliably tested, or otherwise lacks scientific status...
books such as Atlantis Rising by David Lewis, and Don Patten, another young-Earth creationist
Young Earth creationism
Young Earth creationism is the religious belief that Heavens, Earth, and all life on Earth were created by direct acts of the Abrahamic God during a relatively short period, sometime between 5,700 and 10,000 years ago...
, has emerged as their staunchest supporter. He has proposed some new lines of evidence, including the figure’s resemblance to the dinosaurs depicted in Robert Bakker
Robert T. Bakker
Robert T. Bakker is an American paleontologist who helped reshape modern theories about dinosaurs, particularly by adding support to the theory that some dinosaurs were endothermic...
’s book, Dinosaur Heresies.
Evidence of a hoax
The very circumstances from which the figures first appeared are cited as dubious. Julsrud claims that he paid the farmers for every figure they brought him, which would have given the farmers motive to create their own figures and disguise them as ancient artifacts. Di Peso observed that the surfaces of the figures were practically brand new and lacked any of the typical features that would be characteristic of pottery having been in the ground for at least 1500 years. For example, he noted that they lacked the surface scratches, marring, and patina that prehistoric pottery acquires in this part of Mexico from lying buried in the rocky soils and middens. Di Peso observed the diggers repeatedly broke many authentic artifacts while digging for the figures, yet none of the figures themselves displayed any marks of damage. He also observed that the Acámbaro figures were found only in loose, black dirt that filled pits that had been recently dug down into prehistoric midden deposits and underlying sterile red earth and later refilled. The dirt filling these pits contained fragments of fresh manure. He also noted that the figures that he witnessed being dug up were filled with clods of loosely packed dirt that exhibited well-preserved fingerprints.The sheer number of perfect figures found is argued as evidence for a hoax. Over 32,000 figures were found, and all of them in perfect condition except for a few that were cleanly broken, perhaps to create the illusion of antiquity. If these were authentic antiquities, they would not be preserved with such perfection in such an inhospitable environment. Pottery is almost always uncovered as fragments called sherd
Sherd
In archaeology, a sherd is commonly a historic or prehistoric fragment of pottery, although the term is occasionally used to refer to fragments of stone and glass vessels as well....
s; nowhere have 32,000 unblemished ceramics been uncovered with none of them in fragments and all of them in perfect condition (cleanly broken in two does not count as fragmentation).
Dating
Although attempts have been made to date these figures using ThermoluminescenceThermoluminescence
Thermoluminescence is a form of luminescence that is exhibited by certain crystalline materials, such as some minerals, when previously absorbed energy from electromagnetic radiation or other ionizing radiation is re-emitted as light upon heating of the material...
, or TL dating, and the earliest results, done when TL dating was in its infancy, suggested a date around 2500 BCE, later work showed these dates to be artificially old. For example, Gary W. Carriveau and Mark C. Han attempted to date 20 different Acámbaro Figures using thermoluminescence dating
Thermoluminescence dating
Thermoluminescence dating is the determination, by means of measuring the accumulated radiation dose, of the time elapsed since material containing crystalline minerals was either heated or exposed to sunlight...
. They found that the figures had been fired at temperatures between 450°C and 650°C, which contradicted claims that these figures had been fired at temperature too low for them to be accurately dated. However, all of the samples failed the "plateau test," which indicated that dates obtained for the Acámbaro Figures using standard high temperature thermoluminescence dating techniques are unreliable and lack any chronological significance. Based on the degree of signal regeneration found in remeasured samples, they estimated that the figures tested had been fired approximately 30 years prior to 1969.
External links
- Ironskeptic.com explanation of the figures
- Municipality of Acámbaro official page on the figures and the Julsrud museum.