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Chicken Bones Suggest Polynesians Found Americas Before Columbus
livescience.com ^ | 04 June 2007 | Heather Whipps

Posted on 09/16/2009 1:07:41 PM PDT by Nikas777

Chicken Bones Suggest Polynesians Found Americas Before Columbus

By Heather Whipps, Special to LiveScience

Which came first–the chicken or the European?

Popular history, and a familiar rhyme about Christopher Columbus, holds that Europeans made contact with the Americas in 1492, with some arguing that the explorer and his crew were the first outsiders to reach the New World.

But chicken bones recently unearthed on the coast of Chile—dating prior to Columbus’ “discovery” of America and resembling the DNA of a fowl species native to Polynesia—may challenge that notion, researchers say.

“Chickens could not have gotten to South America on their own—they had to be taken by humans,” said anthropologist Lisa Matisoo-Smith from the University of Auckland, New Zealand.

Polynesians made contact with the west coast of South America as much as a century before any Spanish conquistadors, her findings imply.

(Excerpt) Read more at livescience.com ...


TOPICS: History; Science
KEYWORDS: 1492; ageofsail; agriculture; aintnobodyherebutus; animalhusbandry; chickens; columbus; columbusday; dietandcuisine; emptydna; godsgravesglyphs; helixmakemineadouble; mtdna; polynesians; poultry; science
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To: Nikas777

Sorry...I am so out of step!


21 posted on 09/16/2009 1:18:30 PM PDT by LottieDah (If only those who speak so eloquently on the rights of animals would do so on behalf the unborn)
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To: Nikas777

Yes, but were they FRIED chicken bones?

Maybe the ....

No. Better not finish that thought.


22 posted on 09/16/2009 1:19:06 PM PDT by Responsibility2nd (I am Legend)
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To: Nikas777

Columbus didn’t “find” crap.


23 posted on 09/16/2009 1:19:10 PM PDT by gdani (I just want to be left on this block of ice...)
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To: Nikas777

Perhaps it was African slaves.


24 posted on 09/16/2009 1:20:47 PM PDT by bboop (Tar and feathers -- good back then, good now)
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To: Nikas777

“Chickens could not have gotten to South America on their own”

The Vikings brought them


25 posted on 09/16/2009 1:20:54 PM PDT by Lurkina.n.Learnin
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To: SWAMPSNIPER

Go to Hawaii, the island is riddled with wild Chickens, the joke is that the Chicken is the state bird.

A wild turkey and a domestic turkey differ primarily in intelligence. Wild Turkeys are smart and cautious. Domesticated turkeys are about as stupid as a really smart Liberal.

But, all else aside, no Chicken - wild or tame - has the body mass to wing ratio for any significant flights. You will never see the Great Chicken Migration of 2009, Chickens are just not built to fly. Far too much mass.


26 posted on 09/16/2009 1:21:44 PM PDT by Hodar (Who needs laws .... when this "feels" so right?)
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To: US Navy Vet

Turkeys can’t fly? I best not shove them out of a helicopter then.


27 posted on 09/16/2009 1:22:24 PM PDT by Nikas777 (En touto nika, "In this, be victorious")
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To: Nikas777
They have other evidence of Polynesian contact, various earlier European contact, Vikings, perhaps Japanese fishermen, Oceanic people related to the Australians, the occasional African and accounts of Chinese contact. It seems that people have been bumping into the Americas for some time. Columbus just gets the credit.
28 posted on 09/16/2009 1:23:19 PM PDT by dog breath
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To: Nikas777

“Chicken Bones Suggest Polynesians Found Americas Before Columbus”

Or chickens found Polynesia before Captain Cook.

(OK, I said that for some yuks...)


29 posted on 09/16/2009 1:23:35 PM PDT by VOA
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To: Hodar

“What is the in-flight airspeed of an unladen Chicken?”

Which came first the unladen Chicken or the unladen egg?


30 posted on 09/16/2009 1:24:40 PM PDT by Lurkina.n.Learnin
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To: Nikas777

“Native American” is so readily confused with “Naive American”.


31 posted on 09/16/2009 1:24:57 PM PDT by muawiyah
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To: Nikas777

A chicken walks into a bar founded by Polynesians that just happen to be open on Columbus Day...


32 posted on 09/16/2009 1:25:19 PM PDT by Altura Ct.
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To: Hodar

I’ve had yard chickens that did pretty good. My neighbor raised peacocks and those suckers were scary, they couldn’t turn very well. You just had to duck!


33 posted on 09/16/2009 1:25:48 PM PDT by SWAMPSNIPER (THE SECOND AMENDMENT, A MATTER OF FACT, NOT A MATTER OF OPINION)
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To: SWAMPSNIPER

How high did they get? Flying across the yard at a height of 3 to 5 ft ain’t gonna cut it.

When you start seeing flocks of Chickens at 10,000 ft heading south - let me know and I’ll microwave up a big batch of crow.


34 posted on 09/16/2009 1:28:10 PM PDT by Hodar (Who needs laws .... when this "feels" so right?)
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To: Nikas777

There is little doubt that Columbus was the first to find America.. however that’s not even the point. None of these other pre columbus cultures that evidence suggest found the continent successfully colonized it.

They all failed in their attempts to colonize or left. The European discovery of America by Columbus lead to the Americas we have today.

The Chinese or polynesians finding it prior had no lasting impact.

So, for historical purposes one can argue Columbus may not have been the first to discover the continents, but he’s the one that matters long term.


35 posted on 09/16/2009 1:29:32 PM PDT by HamiltonJay
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To: Nikas777

who cares? columbus was the first guy with guns to ‘discover’ america. and those are the people who write history.


36 posted on 09/16/2009 1:30:39 PM PDT by thefactor (yes, as a matter of fact, i DID only read the excerpt)
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To: mnehring
Everyone (not really) found the Americas before Columbus. His was just a major milestone in history when the ‘discovery’ was used on a mass scale.

Agreed. One could argue that Columbus's 1492 voyage marked the beginning of sustained nation-state sponsored discovery and exploitation of the results of those discoveries. Anything before that (the Vikings, the Polynesians, the Basque fishing fleets on the Grand Banks, the Chinese, if that happened) lacked long lasting settlement and associated cultural impact on peoples in both the Americas and Eurasia.

I think Columbus's voyages also have importance because they are fairly bright line marker for the ascendancy of Europe on the world stage.

37 posted on 09/16/2009 1:31:38 PM PDT by hc87
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To: dog breath
The basic idea is that lots of folks got to the Americas one way or the other but almost no one made the trip back home, or none who made the trip bothered to tell anyone about it, or a variety of other reasons.

There are some very good reasons why this is so ~ sea currents are the big one, PLUS, the problem of icebergs in the North Atlantic combined with the incidence of Hurricanes in the Caribbean and along the Gulf Stream, leave only a very narrow window of opportunity to return.

Columbus figured out when to go and when to come back ~ and told folks about it. So he gets all the credit.

38 posted on 09/16/2009 1:31:59 PM PDT by muawiyah
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To: HamiltonJay
BTW, if you know American Indian sign language you can successfully decipher Shang Dynasty characters.

Take a good look at different Indians ~ the Chinese made it to America, stayed here, thrived, built their own civilizations, end of story ~ until whites and blacks took over circa 1550 or thereabouts as they moved in off the islands they settled first.

39 posted on 09/16/2009 1:35:01 PM PDT by muawiyah
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To: Hodar

I’ve seen them 30 feet up in the pines. I told a friend he could get some eggs, I came home and my rooster had him cornered in the chicken house. The guy was 6 foot plus and over 200 pounds but Red was strutting back and forth ready to kick butt, LOL


40 posted on 09/16/2009 1:40:15 PM PDT by SWAMPSNIPER (THE SECOND AMENDMENT, A MATTER OF FACT, NOT A MATTER OF OPINION)
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