Did the Mayans come from China?

​

The Mayans in America, who created one of the world's ancient civilizations, may have been a family with the Chinese five thousand years ago. It is generally accepted that between 40,000 and 20,000 years ago, due to the impact of the fourth season of glaciers, the sea level of the Bering Strait dropped and the sea water froze, becoming a channel connecting Asia and America. Entering the Americas from Asia through the Bering Strait. In terms of race, American Indians belong to a branch of the Mongolian race. From an intuitive point of view, many Indians look like Chinese people. Most Indians have the characteristics of yellow races: black hair and Straight, yellow skin, spade-shaped incisors, and bluish birthmarks on the buttocks of babies born that are absent in whites and blacks. In terms of blood, scientists have also found evidence that Indians and Chinese belong to the same species.

 

For a long time, many people believed that the source of the Mayan civilization was the ancient Chinese civilization, and the relationship between the two was cultural transmission. The theory of "Fusang Kingdom" was first put forward, mainly based on the story in "Liang Shu" about the Chinese monk Huishen who traveled across the ocean to "Fusang Kingdom" in the fifth century, and believed that "Fusang" was Mexico. Later, there was "the theory of Yin people crossing to the east", which means that the Chinese in the Shang Dynasty crossed the Pacific Ocean and brought civilization to the Americas. Famous anthropologist and Professor Zhang Guangzhi from Harvard University once put forward a hypothesis of "Maya-Chinese cultural continuum", arguing that the Mayan civilization and ancient Chinese civilization were the result of the development of descendants of the same ancestor in different times and in different places. Some people believe that the Mayan custom of worshiping the serpentine god originated in the Shang Dynasty in China 4,000 years ago, and the embossed patterns on the bronze sacrificial vessels of the Shang Dynasty are very similar to the mask of the Mayan serpentine god. Unfortunately, the above statement has not been clearly confirmed by archaeology so far.

 

The Shang Army and the Olmecs

　　

After the arrival of the Europeans, the population of the original inhabitants of the Americas declined sharply due to disease and massacres, and the culture created by the Americans was also destroyed. So for a long time, people couldn't figure out where the Native Americans came from. Chinese scholars proposed that the Yin people of China had arrived in America in 1200 BC. This view was initially dismissed as "Fantasy". Today, however, more and more evidence supports this hypothesis.

​

In the last years of the Yin and Shang Dynasties (about 1066 BC, the eleventh year of King Wu of Zhou), the Zhou army made a surprise attack on Chaoge, the capital of Yin. Why did a Yin Shang, which was much stronger than Zhou, die in Zhou? After studying this period of history, historians found that the army of the Shang Dynasty was fighting in Shandong at that time, and won the victory. The whole country was immersed in celebration. Among them, they did not guard against Zhou's army attacking from behind, which eventually led to a fatal disaster. It is not surprising that this kind of extreme joy and sorrow has happened from time to time in history. The strange thing is, after the demise of the Yin and Shang Dynasties, where did the army that originally conquered Shandong go?

​

According to historical records, there are more than 250,000 Yin Shang troops in Shandong. They neither returned to the army to fight to the death with the Zhou army, nor established a new country in Shandong, but suddenly disappeared without a trace. up. The history books of later generations never talked about this matter, as if they never existed in the world. Where did they go? Some scholars speculate that they traveled across the ocean to Central America. In fact, this is indeed very possible.

 

First, the Chinese at that time already had a wealth of overseas knowledge. It is said in the "Da Huang Dong Jing" in "Shan Hai Jing": Overseas, there are Fusang and Dagu Xianchi, which are the seat of Shaohao Xihe Kingdom. That is to say, people in ancient China knew for a long time that there were other worlds in distant places overseas. "Hanshu Dongyi Biography": "Wo Kingdom is more than 4,000 miles east, there is Naked Country, and to the southeast of Naked Country is Black Tooth Country, which can be reached by boat within a year." Black Tooth Country is a descendant of Shaowu, in Central America. The records in "Hanshu" prove that sailing to America was already feasible in the Han Dynasty. "Liezi·Tang Wen": "In the east of the Bohai Sea, I don't know how many millions of miles away, there is a big ravine, but it is actually a bottomless valley, and there is no bottom below it. It is called Guixu." Dagu, Tanggu in Central America , east of the Bohai Sea, indicating that the Chinese knew the location of Central America during the Warring States Period. This can only be done on the basis of understanding the shape of the earth and having the practice of sailing. Going back a few centuries, it is also possible for the Chinese to sail across the Americas.

 

Due to the Earth's rotation, there is a west-to-east current in the Pacific Ocean between Asia and North America: the North Pacific Current. Human beings were able to sail and fish at sea 6,000 years ago. At that time, it was very common for people on the eastern coast of China to go to sea. of. Cultural relics related to China all over the Americas are distributed along the Pacific coast, which is the result of sailing across the Pacific Ocean. Copper coins, writings, and statues from the Qin and Han Dynasties in various parts of the Americas also show that Chinese people did not go to America alone at that time.

 

Second, shortly after the disappearance of these Yin people, an Olmec culture with Asian characteristics suddenly emerged in Mexico and Central America. This "coincidence" is likely to be due to some connection between the two. Many of the unearthed cultural relics from the Olmec period found in the Americas are prominently characterized by the Shang culture.

 

More than 300 symbols similar to ancient Chinese characters have been collected from the Olmec civilization and its neighboring cultures. These symbols have been identified by archaeologists and paleographers, and they believe that they are strikingly similar to oracle bone inscriptions in China 3,000 years ago. They also said that if the symbols were found in Chinese archaeological sites, they would definitely be considered to be oracle bone inscriptions from the Shang and Zhou Dynasties of China. Some scholars believe that these Olmec symbols similar to oracle bone inscriptions not only include agricultural characters, such as grain, field, wood, sky, sun, rain, water, saplings, etc., but also ritual and witchcraft characters. It is very similar to symbols such as celestial stems and earthly branches, numbers and hexagram paintings in ancient China.

 

In the Olmec cultural site in La Venta, Indians also found the custom of worshiping tigers. False axes unearthed on the Pacific coast of Mexico are identical to jade kui from the Shang Dynasty. The drainage channels of the Indians also embody Dayu's thoughts on water control. The mound culture of the Indians is obviously a custom of the Shang Dynasty, so this custom in America is obviously an extension of Chinese culture.

 

In addition, the pottery, jade, stone carvings and religious ceremonies of the Olmec civilization are very similar to the Shang and Zhou civilizations in China. The pottery unearthed in Mesoamerica has the same shapes, decorative symbols, drawing techniques, and hollowing methods as ancient Chinese pottery and pottery-making techniques. The jade worship in the Olmec civilization, the various decorations on the stone tools, and the divine emblems, totems and symbols on the jade are very similar to those in the pre-Qin period in China. In Olmec witchcraft, there are also Chinese concepts such as knotting and keeping track of events, the sky is round and the earth is round, and the four colors are square. Like the ancient Chinese, the Olmecs used cinnabar to offer sacrifices, used jade to pray for rain, used animal heads and human amulets as symbols of gods, worshiped their ancestors in shrines, temples, and altars, set up tablets with jade kui, and built mausoleums and tombs. . The Olmec's method of sacrificing their lives to worship their ancestors is exactly the same as that of the Shang and Zhou dynasties in China.

 

There are many similarities and even similarities between Indian culture and ancient Chinese culture: for example, Lingtai culture, Qiudun culture, jade burial customs, and legends about Tiangou eating the moon, similar flood stories, and common dragons. Culture and Feathered Snake Culture, common Taiji Diagram, Taotie and Yunlei decorations, similar sedan chair travel and killing games, the same healing methods of herbs and bone needles, the same seven-hole flute and musical pentatonic scale , Even the folk remedies of drinking children's urine to keep healthy and eating tadpoles to fight fire are the same.

 

Harvard University scholar Ekholm proposed that before Columbus arrived in the Americas, Asian immigrants and explorers arrived in the Americas, making religion, art, astronomy, and architecture in the New World flourish, forming the first civilized society in American history. American civilization may have originated in the Bronze Age Shang Dynasty, because both have similar artistic style and religious consciousness at the same time. Smithsonian Museum archaeologist McGrath, after comparing pottery found in Ecuador with ancient Japanese pottery, believes that as early as 5,000 years ago, ancient Asian residents had cultural exchanges with American civilization through sea transportation.

 

"Ancient humans viewed the ocean as a highway, not a barrier," she said.

 

Therefore, when King Zhou of Shang was defeated and self-immolated, and the Shang Dynasty perished, the officers and soldiers of the Shang Dynasty who stayed in Shandong probably escaped from the East China Sea, passed through Japan, crossed the Pacific Ocean, and arrived at the coast of Mexico, bringing agricultural irrigation technology and astronomy to the local people. Geographical knowledge developed into the first American civilization "Olmec Civilization". In fact, some people in Mexico today admit that they are descendants of the Yin people in China.

 

Mayan and Chinese

 

There is an obvious corresponding relationship between Maya and Chinese, which also proves that the Maya and Chinese are inextricably linked.

 

The basic vocabulary shared by Mayan and Chinese is provided to calculate the time when Mayan and Chinese were separated. Linguists use a table of 100 basic words and find out the proportion of words that are common to both languages in the 100 words to determine when the two languages separated. The common words between Mayan and Chinese accounted for 26 of the 100 basic words, minus 4 that may be similar by chance, and there are 22 common words between the two languages. According to statistical probability, if there are 22 common words in the two languages, the time of separation is about 5,000 years ago, which is the time when the Mayans and Chinese separated. This time is very consistent with the existing research results of linguistics, archaeology, anthropology and history: first, the original Mayan language began to diverge into the current Mayan dialects 4600 years ago; second, the earliest pottery discovered in the Mayan area Manufactured 4,500 years ago, it is quite mature; 3, ancient Mayan documents set the beginning of history and calendar at 3113 BC, which is about 5,000 years ago; 4, the academic circles believe that the Mayans were the latest from Asia to American. The latest time when ancient Asians came to America was 5,000 years ago; fifth, the Mayans said that their ancestors came from the west or by boat from the north. The general direction from China to the Americas is from west to east. If you take a boat along the Pacific Ocean along Japan, the Thousand Islands, and the Aleutian Islands, and then go south along the American coast to reach Central America, you will come by boat from the north.

 

The phonetics and grammar of Maya and Chinese have some other common features, such as monophonic roots and lack of morphological changes. A comprehensive language correspondence indicates that the two languages are indeed related.

 

similar way of thinking

 

The kinship between the Maya and the Chinese, in addition to language evidence, also has a lot of evidence in the way of thinking. The common features of the basic way of thinking of the Mayans and Chinese reflect the unity of man and nature, and the unity of nature and society. In terms of social development, the Mayans believed that prosperity, peace, prosperity and decline, war and poverty were cyclical alternations. And this has a certain relationship with the astronomical and calendar calculations of the Mayans. They believed that there was a cycle of misfortune and blessing every 20 years in 13 calendars. For example, the abandonment of the city of Chichen Itza and the hegemony of the city-state of Mayapan, as well as the decline of the city of Mayapan and the conquest of the Spanish, all show this cycle of rise and fall of the calendar. This view of history is very consistent with the ancient Chinese view of history.

 

The basic outlook on life of the Mayans can be summed up as "don't overdo everything", which is very consistent with the dominant philosophy of life in ancient China, "the golden mean". Under the guidance of this kind of thinking, the Mayans respected the natural environment very much and hunted very restrainedly. First, they did not want to kill innocent animals indiscriminately. Second, they wanted to leave opportunities for other hunters to forage. Before farming and burning forests, sacrifices should be made to pray for the forgiveness and protection of the gods. At the same time, the cultivated land should be measured according to the needs of the population, so as to ensure food consumption without excessive production and damage to nature. Therefore, the way of life pursued by the Mayans is the harmony between man and man, and the harmony between man and nature.

 

The Maya's idea of the unity of man and nature is manifested in all aspects of life, and many of them are the same as the Chinese. The Mayans called the poet "A Feng", and poetry is equal to the wind; the folk songs of various places in China's earliest poem "Book of Songs" are also called wind. In the language of the Mayans, flowers can mean natural flowers, and they can also refer to people's lust and lust, which is the same as that of the Chinese. The symbolic meanings of colors believed by the Mayans are also consistent with those of the Chinese: red symbolizes power, yellow symbolizes auspiciousness, and white symbolizes inauthenticity, so Baifu is equal to the Chinese uncle, and Baimu is equal to the Chinese aunt. In ancient China, milk was called valley, while the Mayans called corn milk milk and corn cobs "breast milk". What is more special is that the ancient Chinese called the year "Zai", which originated before the Xia Dynasty. This concept of time is the same as that of the Mayans: the Mayans believed that each year was carried by a kind of god, one after another. Therefore, the year and the load are closely related, and a year is also a god's load.

 

Similar Jade Stones

 

From 30,000 to 7,000 years ago, there was a microlithic distribution zone from North China to Canada, which has been studied in depth by scientists and paleoanthropologists. The study found that this microlithic distribution belt started from Gansu, Ningxia, and Shanxi regions in China 30,000 years ago, and spread throughout the Mongolian grasslands, the Northeast Plains of China, Northeast Asia, Alaska, and southern Canada. The age of Zhiyu in Shanxi is 28,900-13,700 years ago, the age of Jiuketai in East Siberia is 22,000-10,000 years ago, the age of Novka in Us is 20,000-10,000 years ago, Shirataki in Japan is 17,000 years ago, and the age of Alaska It is about 9800 years ago, and the age of British Columbia is about 7000 years ago. The absolute age decline of these microliths is also a continuous lineage, which is a complete continuous lineage.

 

Microliths are highly specialized tools that could not have been independently created by humans in two places at the same time. They spread to the vast polar regions, pass through North Asia and North America from the northeast, and are distributed between 90 degrees east longitude to 140 degrees west longitude and 40 degrees to 65 degrees north latitude. Because this tradition was first discovered in North China, it is also Known as the "North China Microlithic Tradition". According to the current discoveries, the microlithic culture reached the Fairbanks-Highline Lake area in Alaska more than 11,000 years ago, and then distributed southward. —The starting point and source of intercontinental cultural communication.

 

The earliest and most important cultural site of the Olmec culture is the La Venta site. A group of jade wares were discovered at this site, with the words "Nong", "Xin" and "Nv Rong" engraved on them in the oracle bone script of the Yin Dynasty. The international academic circles named them "Yugui" because it has a slight arc on the top and belongs to the "Wangui" of the Taihao Fuxi clan of the Dongyi nationality; The ancient characters are engraved with the name and genealogy of the ancestors of the Yin and Shang, so they are also called "the tablet of the god of Yugui", and the 16 jade statues are the ancestors of the Olmecs - the Yin merchants. The writing on the four pieces of jade kui has been deciphered, and it is confirmed that it is the writing of the Shang Dynasty.

​

similar customs

 

The kinship between the Maya and the Chinese is not only manifested in language and ways of thinking, but also in customs and habits. Research on this aspect can sometimes promote the study of ancient Chinese culture. For example, in ancient Chinese divination, if a person was said to have an "odd number", it was considered unlucky. When Emperor Wu of the Han fought against the Xiongnu, he did not use the famous general Li Guang, because the result of divination for Li Guang was "odd", which was unlucky. As for how to do divination, it has been lost in China. The Mayan divination also has the same statement: even numbers are good, odd numbers are bad, and the specific practice is preserved. The Mayans used a pile of corn kernels, first randomly took some out and put them aside, and then counted them four by four. If the total number of these four groups is an odd number, and the rest is also an odd number, that is, three or one corn, it is fierce; if both are even, it is lucky; An even number is indefinite. The Mayans and the Chinese not only agree on the saying that even numbers are good and odd numbers are bad, but they even call the fortune-tellers the same. In ancient China, such people were called "Japanese people", and the Mayans called them "ahkin".  "ah" is equivalent to "A" in Chinese, and "kin" is the sun in Mayan, the day. So "ahkin" is "Ari", which is changed to "Ahkin", which means "Japanese". This very specific commonality would not be possible if the Mayans and Chinese were not related. When it comes to divination, the Mayans and the Chinese have something else in common. In ancient China, there was a method of divination for lost things or people, called Yuanguang. People let innocent children look in the mirror, and it is said that they can see where the lost things or people are. The Mayans also have this habit. If they lose something, they let the children look in a transparent spar and tell what they see.

 

The Mayans and Chinese also have common characteristics in the form of recreational activities. Like the Chinese folk, the Mayans often played rope games. There is a game in China called chicken claw buckle, and the Mayans also played chicken claw buckle, and the name is called chicken claw buckle. Both ends of the rope are tied together, then turned over and over again, and finally three interlocking buckles are wound in the middle, like chicken feet. The Mayans, like the Chinese, also played dice. They are called playing corn, because they use four corns as dice, all of which are dyed black on one side. If you roll two or four black sides, you win. In ancient China, the number of dice was not fixed, but six dice could be used, one side of which was dyed red, and four red sides were thrown to win. Concubine Yang Guifei and Tang Minghuang played in this way, and the gameplay is very similar to that of the Mayans.

 

The Mayans were also very particular about the difference between men and women. When eating, men and women do not eat together. The man always eats first, the man finishes, and the woman eats. When walking, if a man and a woman meet on the road, the woman should avoid the side of the road, bow her head and wait for the man to pass, and then the woman will go. What's more interesting is that a couple can't walk side by side when walking, but the man is in front and the woman is behind, keeping a certain distance. In ancient Mayan society, men were superior to women, and some taboos were also manifested: women should not let men see when they give birth or menstruate, otherwise they will be unlucky. Moreover, women must maintain chastity, and adultery between men and women is punishable by death.

 

It can be seen that the etiquette and customs of ancient Mayan society were exactly the same as those of ancient China.

 

The common features of the customs of the Mayans and Chinese are many aspects, such as interpretation of dreams: a person dreams of losing teeth means that a relative will die. Of course, these are the common customs of the ancient Mayans and Chinese. Although they belong to superstition, their special corresponding characteristics are worth noting. In terms of basic necessities of life, the Mayans and the Chinese also have many similarities. In terms of eating, both Mayans and Chinese eat with bowls, unlike Europeans and Americans who use plates. In addition, the Mayans ate not on the table, but on mats. The same is true of Chinese people in ancient times. Otherwise, how could eating be called a banquet? The Mayans ate on mats, which is related to their living and lifestyle. They do not sleep on beds or sit on chairs, but on mats, just like the ancient Chinese. When it comes to sitting, the ancient Mayans divided into two ways: sitting on the crouch and sitting on the knees. The sitting on the knees is the same as the sitting on the knees in ancient China. In ancient China, high-status people sat squatting, while low-status people sat on their knees, and the Mayans did the same. Because men are superior to women, women are used to kneeling.

 

The construction method of the Mayan houses is the same as that of the Chinese houses in the past. They are all post-beam structures. First, four pillars are erected, and the pillars are supported by beams. Common people's houses are mud or thatched houses, while noble houses are stone buildings. In addition, the ancient Maya's country was a city-state, the highest leader lived in the center of the city, and the nobles, merchants, handicraftsmen, farmers, and slaves lived outward in sequence. The lowest-ranked people live farthest from the city center, much like the imperial capitals of China's past.

 

In terms of clothing and behavior, the ancient Mayans and Chinese also have common characteristics. The clothes that Chinese people wore in ancient times were a piece of square cloth called Baofang, or gown. The gown is a bag, covering the upper body from back to front, with a button on the front chest or one side. The top of the Maya is also such a piece of cloth, called pati, and its name is also similar to the Chinese robe.

 

The lower garments of Maya men were also loincloths, divided into banners. The lower garments of ancient Chinese men were also loincloths, called Chang. The earliest character for "Chang" is "Shang", which is a pictographic character. The Mayans called the loincloth ex, and x sounds like sh, which has the same consonant sound as the Chinese word "shang".

 

The Mayans paid great attention to road building. Their roads are very similar to the roads of the Zhou Dynasty mentioned in the "Book of Songs", like a whetstone placed on the ground, flat and straight, and built much higher than the ground. In addition, on the roads in ancient China, there were residences for passers-by at certain distances, called "lus". The roads of the Mayans also have dwellings at certain distances, called lub, which is very similar to the Chinese "Lu" in pronunciation.

 

The ancient Maya and Chinese also have common features in burial customs, especially children's burial: one is to use urn coffins, and the other is to drill small holes in the upper part or cover of urn coffins.

 

Sometimes the Mayans would use a part of the mother's finger to bury the child. This naturally reminds us of a saying that we Chinese often describe maternal love: it hurts to bite any one of the ten fingers. It is likely that this means that the Chinese also had the custom of biting off the fingers of their mothers and burying their dead children with them in ancient times, just like the Mayans.

​

similar religion

 

Religiously, the Mayan culture also had the same things as ancient China. The Chinese have long had the saying of heaven and hell, and believe that heaven is beautiful, and hell is a spiritual world that punishes the wicked. There are similar sayings about heaven and hell among the Mayans. People in ancient China had the idea of nature worship. They worshiped all natural phenomena or natural forces with great power as gods, such as Feng Po, Lei Gong, Dragon King, Mountain God, etc., and the Mayans were typical nature worshipers. Not only that, but even the images in many Mayan sculptures and paintings are very similar to the masks of many Chinese gods. For example, the images in Mayan and Indian murals or sculptures are almost in line with Guizhou Nuo opera masks. The images of some gods in the Mayan culture are completely renditions of ancient Chinese evil spirits, such as the Four King Kongs and Hades Judge, etc., can all be found in the Mayan culture.

 

(Excerpt from Su Xiao's "Maya Legend and the Future of Humanity", Central Compilation Press, 2017)