The Skeleton in Armor

Last updated

The Skeleton in Armor is the name given to a skeleton associated with metal, bark and cloth artifacts which was unearthed in Fall River, Massachusetts in 1832. The skeleton was subsequently destroyed in a fire in 1843. It is also the name of a poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.

Contents

sketch of The Skeleton in Armor Skeleton in armor.jpg
sketch of The Skeleton in Armor

Discovery and description

A contemporary account of the skeleton's discovery and general appearance was written by a Dr. Phineas W. Leland in 1843, soon after the artifact's destruction. The text of the description was as follows:

Among the curiosities of peculiar interest (in the cabinets of the Fall River Athenaeum) was the entire skeleton of a man, about which antiquarians in the old as well as the new world had speculated much. The skeleton was found in the year 1832 in a sand- or grave-bank a little east of the Unitarian meetinghouse by some persons while digging away and removing a portion of the bank. (On or very near the site now occupied by the "Gas-Works", corner of Hartwell and Fifth Streets). The skeleton was found near the surface in a sitting posture, the legbones doubled upon the thigh-bones, and the thighs brought up nearly parallel with the body. It was quite perfect, and stood remarkably well the test of exposure. Covering the sternum was a triangular plate of brass somewhat corroded by time, and around the body was a broad belt made of small brass tubes four or five inches in length about the size of a pipestem placed parallel and close to each other. Arrowheads made of copper or brass were also found in the grave with the skeleton. That these were the remains of an Indian seemed to be very generally conceded; the configuration of the skull, the position in which the skeleton was found, and the additional fact that parts of other skeletons were found near the same place renders it nearly certain that these were the bones of an Indian.

Another description of the artifact written by John Stark, a lawyer in Galena, Illinois appeared in the 1837 volume of the American Magazine of Useful and Entertaining Knowledge : [1]

These remains were found in the town of Fall River, in Bristol County, Mass., about eighteen months since. In digging down a hill near the village, a large mass of earth slid off, leaving in the bank and partially uncovered a human skull, which, on examination, was found to belong to a body buried in a sitting posture, the head being about one foot below what had been for many years the surface of the ground. The surrounding earth was carefully removed and the body found to be enwrapped in a covering of coarse bark of a dark color. Within this envelope were found the remains of another of coarse cloth, made of fine bark and about the texture of a Manilla coffee-bag. On the breast was a plate of brass, thirteen inches long, six broad at the upper end and five at the lower. This plate appears to have been cast, and is from one-eighth to three thirty-seconds of an inch in thickness. It is so much corroded that whether or not anything was ever engraved upon it has not yet been ascertained. It is oval in form, the edges being irregular, apparently made so by corrosion.

Below the breastplate, and entirely encircling the body, was a belt composed of brass tubes,each four and a half inches in length and three-sixteenths of an inch in diameter, arranged longitudinally and close together, the length of the tube being the width of the belt. The tubes are of thin brass, cast upon hollow reeds, and were fastened together by pieces of sinew. This belt was so placed as to protect the lower parts of the body below the breastplate. The arrows are of brass, thin, flat, and triangular in shape, with a round hole cut through near the base. The shaft was fastened to the head by inserting the latter in an opening at the end of the wood, and then tying it with a sinew through the round hole, a mode of constructing the weapon never practiced by the Indians, not even with their arrows of thin shell. Parts of the shaft still remain attached to some of them. When first discovered the arrows were in a sort of quiver of bark, which fell in pieces when exposed to the air.

The skull is much decayed, but the teeth are sound and apparently of a young man. The pelvis is much decayed and the smaller bones of the lower extremities are gone.

The integuments of the right knee, for four or five inches above and below, are in good preservation, apparently the size and shape of life, although quite black.

Considerable flesh is still preserved on the hands and arms, but more on the shoulders and elbows. On the back under the belt, and for two inches above and below, the skin and flesh are in good preservation, and have the appearance of being tanned. The chest is much compressed, but the upper viscera are probably entire. The arms are bent up, not crossed, so that the hands turned inwards touch the shoulders. The stature is about five and a half feet. Much of the exterior envelope was decayed, and the inner one appeared to be preserved only where it had been in contact with the brass.

The preservation of this body may be the result of some embalming process, and this hypothesis is strengthened by the fact that the skin has the appearance of having been tanned, or it may be the accidental result of the action of the salts of the brass I during oxidation, and this latter hypothesis is supported by the fact that the skin and flesh have been preserved only where they have been in contact with or quite near the brass, or we may account for the preservation of the whole by supposing the presence of salt peter in the soil at the time of the deposit. In either way, the preservation of the remains is fully accounted for, and upon known chemical principles.

That the body was not one of the Indians we think needs no argument. We have seen some of the drawings taken from the sculptures found at Palenque, and in those the figures are represented with the breastplates, although smaller than the plate found at Fall River. On the figures at Palenque the bracelets and anklets seem to be of a manufacture precisely similar to the belt of tubes just described.

If the body found at Fall River be one of the Asiatic race, who transiently settled in Central America, and afterwards went to Mexico and founded those cities, in exploring the ruins of which such astonishing discoveries have recently been made, then we may well suppose also that it is one of the race whose exploits have, although without a date and almost without a certain name, been immortalized by Homer. Of the great race who founded cities and empires in their eastward march, and are finally lost in South America, the Romans seem to have had a glimmering tradition in the story of Evander.

But we rather incline to the belief that the remains found at Fall River belonged to the crew of a Phoenician vessel. The spot where they were found is on the sea-coast, and in the immediate neighborhood of Dighton Rock, famed for its hieroglyphic inscriptions, of which no sufficient explanation has yet been given, alla near which rock brazen vessels have been found. If this latter hypothesis be adopted, a part of it is that these mariners, the unwilling and unfortunate discoverers of a new world, lived some time after they landed, and having written their names, perhaps their epitaphs, upon the rock at Dighton, died, and were buried by the natives. [2]

Loss

The skeleton was moved to the Fall River Athenaeum, a library, where it was displayed in a glass-covered case, along with the arrow tips. [3] The Athenaeum, along with much of the village of Fall River, was destroyed in the "Great Fire" of July 2, 1843. [4]

Identity

Native American

As stated in the Leland article cited above, the majority opinion of the find at the time was that it represented a Native American chief. Given Fall River's location, this could have been a member of the Narragansett or Wampanoag tribe.

Besides the other brass arrowheads mentioned above, at least one identical breastplate has been found, and it is known that traders sold the Indians brass kettles from which they made arrowheads. [5] Arrowheads described as "precisely similar" were used by the Iroquois in the 17th century. [6]

Phoenician, Carthaginian, or Egyptian

As the Stark article reproduced above indicates, there was at least one commentator who suggested a much different origin for the artifact. The idea that Phoenicians, Carthaginians, or Egyptians had at some time in the past discovered North America and explored or colonized it was somewhat popular at the time of the find, and occasionally used to explain feats such as the construction of Chichen Itza which many contemporary antiquarians could not believe were actually constructed by Mesoamerican civilizations. This notion has fallen into disfavor and is usually classed as pseudohistory, though there is a small minority of authors who continue to advance such beliefs.

Phoenicians and later Carthaginians routinely navigated the coasts of the northeastern Atlantic and presumably their trading vessels, blown off course in a storm, could have reached North America. Such accidental one-way contact, as intimated in the last paragraph of Stark's report, could account for the presence of bronze artefacts as well as being compatible with the lack of evidence for a regular settlement, and the absence of indications in Native American oral history (as such shipwrecks would be few in number and just a local curiosity, soon to be forgotten).

But regardless the theoretical possibility of isolated Atlantic crossings in antiquity, the reported state of preservation of the body - interred in moist soil - essentially rules out an age of more than a few centuries. Even mummified corpses would rapidly decompose under such conditions.

Early colonist or explorer

Because the artifact has been destroyed, there is no way of scientifically dating the remains. Although the style of armor described as being found with the skeleton certainly does not sound similar to anything worn by early European colonists who settled the area, the possibility that the skeleton belonged to some early settler cannot be entirely discounted.

Fraud

Finally, there is the possibility that the artifact was a deliberate forgery or a practical joke, although there is no clear motive as to why someone would create such a forgery at that time.[ citation needed ]

Longfellow's poem

Cover page for an 1877 edition of Longfellow's "Skeleton in Armor" SkeletonInArmor1877.jpg
Cover page for an 1877 edition of Longfellow's "Skeleton in Armor"

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow was evidently familiar with the artifact's discovery. Unlike the authors of the articles reproduced above, Longfellow apparently considered that the artifact was Norse in origin; Longfellow was familiar with the writings of Carl Christian Rafn on the subject of Norse colonization of the Americas. Whether or not Longfellow concluded that this was a genuine Norse artifact is unknown. Nevertheless, he did immortalize the discovery in the poem "The Skeleton in Armor". The poem was first published in Lewis Gaylord Clark's The Knickerbocker in 1841. [7] In the poem, Longfellow also refers to the Old Stone Mill in Touro Park in Newport, Rhode Island, also known as the Newport Tower. Some suggest that the stone structure dates back to the Viking exploration of North America, though it is more likely it was built in the seventeenth century during the time of Governor Benedict Arnold. [8]

Commemoration

In 1903, Fall River placed a bronze tablet on a brick building on Hartwell and Fifth Street to commemorate the finding of the skeleton at that location.

The tablet was 24x20 inches and read: "A Skeleton In Armor was found near this spot by Hannah Borden Cook In the month of May A D 1831 This Tablet was placed here by the Women's Educational and Industrial Society of Fall River Mass May 27th A D 1903". [9]

The tablet was stolen in 2018 by metal thieves but was recovered and repositioned in a more secure spot. [10]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ward's Point</span> United States historic place

Ward's Point is the southernmost point in the U.S. state of New York and lies within Tottenville, Staten Island, New York City. It is located at the mouth of Arthur Kill, across from Perth Amboy, New Jersey, at the head of Raritan Bay. The site is part of modern-day Conference House Park.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Arrowhead</span> Sharpened tip of an arrow

An arrowhead or point is the usually sharpened and hardened tip of an arrow, which contributes a majority of the projectile mass and is responsible for impacting and penetrating a target, as well as to fulfill some special purposes such as signaling.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Adena culture</span> Pre-Columbian Native American culture

The Adena culture was a Pre-Columbian Native American culture that existed from 500 BCE to 100 CE, in a time known as the Early Woodland period. The Adena culture refers to what were probably a number of related Native American societies sharing a burial complex and ceremonial system. The Adena culture was centered on the location of the modern state of Ohio, but also extended into contiguous areas of northern Kentucky, eastern Indiana, West Virginia, and parts of extreme western Pennsylvania.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Scale armour</span> Type of protective gear made from small, overlapping plates of metal or similar durable material

Scale armour is an early form of armour consisting of many individual small armour scales (plates) of various shapes attached to each other and to a backing of cloth or leather in overlapping rows. Scale armour was worn by warriors of many different cultures as well as their horses. The material used to make the scales varied and included bronze, iron, steel, rawhide, leather, cuir bouilli, seeds, horn, or pangolin scales. The variations are primarily the result of material availability.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Windover Archeological Site</span> Place in Florida listed on National Register of Historic Places

The Windover Archeological Site is a Middle Archaic archaeological site and National Historic Landmark in Brevard County near Titusville, Florida, United States on the central east coast of the state. Windover is a muck pond where skeletal remains of 168 individuals were found buried in the peat at the bottom of the pond. The skeletons were well preserved because of the peat. In addition, remarkably well-preserved brain tissue has been recovered from 91 skulls from the site. DNA from the brain tissue has been sequenced. The collection of human skeletal remains and artifacts recovered from Windover Pond represent among the largest finds of each type from the Archaic Period. It is considered one of the most important archeological sites ever excavated.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Criel Mound</span> United States historic place

The Criel Mound, also known as the South Charleston Mound, is a Native American burial mound located in South Charleston, West Virginia. It is one of the few surviving mounds of the Kanawha Valley Mounds that were probably built in the Woodland period after 500 B.C. The mound was built by the Adena culture, probably around 250–150 BC, and lay equidistant between two “sacred circles”, earthwork enclosures each 556 feet (169 m) in diameter. It was originally 33 feet (10 m) high and 173 feet (53 m) in diameter at the base, making it the second-largest such burial mound in the state of West Virginia. This archaeological site is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Davenport Tablets</span> Three inscribed slate tables found in the United States in the 1870s

The Davenport Tablets are three inscribed slate tablets found in mounds near Davenport, Iowa on January 10, 1877, and January 30, 1878. If these tablets were real, they would have been proof for the argument that the people who built the Native American mounds, called the Mound Builders were built by an ancient race of settlers. The Davenport Tablets were originally considered authentic, though opinion shifted after 1885 and they are now considered a hoax.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jamestown Rediscovery</span>

Jamestown Rediscovery is an archaeological project of Preservation Virginia investigating the remains of the original English settlement at Jamestown established in the Virginia Colony in North America beginning on May 14, 1607.

The Bat Creek inscription is an inscribed stone tablet found by John W. Emmert on February 14, 1889. Emmert claimed to have found the tablet in Tipton Mound 3 during an excavation of Hopewell mounds in Loudon County, Tennessee. This excavation was part of a larger series of excavations that aimed to clarify the controversy regarding who is responsible for building the various mounds found in the Eastern United States.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mummy Cave</span> United States historic place

Mummy Cave is a rock shelter and archeological site in Park County, Wyoming, United States, near the eastern entrance to Yellowstone National Park. The site is adjacent to the concurrent U.S. Routes 14/16/20, on the left bank of the North Fork of the Shoshone River at an altitude of 6,310 feet (1,920 m) in Shoshone National Forest.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Etowah plates</span>

The Etowah plates, including the Rogan Plates, are a collection of Mississippian copper plates discovered in Mound C at the Etowah Indian Mounds near Cartersville, Georgia. Many of the plates display iconography that archaeologists have classified as part of the Southeastern Ceremonial Complex (S.E.C.C.), specifically "Birdman" imagery associated with warriors and the priestly elite. The plates are a combination of foreign imports and local items manufactured in emulation of the imported style. The designs of the Rogan plates are in the Classic Braden style from the American Bottom area. It is generally thought that some of the plates were manufactured at Cahokia before ending up at sites in the Southeast.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Freel Farm Mound Site</span>

The Freel Farm Mound Site (40AN22) is an archaeological site and burial mound of the Late Woodland period located on the Oak Ridge Reservation in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. The site was excavated in 1934 as part of the Norris Basin Survey by the Tennessee Valley Authority using labor from the Civil Works Administration under the supervision of T.M.N. Lewis. Important finds of the excavation include 17 burials and a few artifacts. The artifacts and records from the fieldwork are held by the McClung Museum in Knoxville, Tennessee.

The Freel Farm Mound Site (40AN22) is an archaeological site and burial mound of the Woodland cultural period located on the Oak Ridge Reservation in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. The site was excavated in 1934 as part of the Norris Basin Survey by the Tennessee Valley Authority using labor from the Civil Works Administration under the supervision of T.M.N. Lewis. Important finds of the excavation include 17 burials and a few artifacts. The artifacts and records from the fieldwork are held by the McClung Museum in Knoxville, Tennessee.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dumaw Creek Site</span> Archaeological site in Michigan, United States

The Dumaw Creek Site is an archaeological site designated 20OA5, located along Dumaw Creek northeast of Pentwater, Michigan, that was the location of a 17th-century village and cemetery. It is one of the youngest pre-historic sites in Michigan, dating to the terminal Late Woodland Period just prior to European contact. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1972.

Burrows Cave is the name given to an alleged cave site in Southern Illinois reputedly discovered by Russell E. Burrows in 1982. Burrows says it contained a number of ancient artifacts. Through the many inconsistencies of Russell E. Burrows' story, discovery and findings, the cave is considered a hoax by archaeologists and anthropologists.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Conservation and restoration of human remains</span>

The conservation and restoration of human remains involves the long-term preservation and care of human remains in various forms which exist within museum collections. This category can include bones and soft tissues as well as ashes, hair, and teeth. Given the organic nature of the human body, special steps must be taken to halt the deterioration process and maintain the integrity of the remains in their current state. These types of museum artifacts have great merit as tools for education and scientific research, yet also have unique challenges from a cultural and ethical standpoint. Conservation of human remains within museum collections is most often undertaken by a conservator-restorer or archaeologist. Other specialists related to this area of conservation include osteologists and taxidermists.

The Palos site (Ck-26) is located on the Cal-Sag Canal in Cook County, Illinois, United States, near the city of Chicago. It is classified as a Protohistoric to early Historic site with Upper Mississippian affiliation.

The Fisher Mound Group is a group of burial mounds with an associated village site located on the DesPlaines River near its convergence with the Kankakee River where they combine to form the Illinois River, in Will County, Illinois, about 60 miles southwest of Chicago. It is a multi-component stratified site representing several Prehistoric Upper Mississippian occupations as well as minor Late Woodland and Early Historic components.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Phoenician arrowheads</span> Phoenician inscribed bronze arrowheads

The Phoenician arrowheads or Phoenician javelin heads are a well-known group of almost 70 Phoenician inscribed bronze arrowheads from the 11th century BC onwards.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Borum Eshøj Family</span>

The Family from Borum Eshøj are a group of three mummies found in a barrow near Borum, Denmark. In 1871 parts of the mound were being removed and the first grave was found. In it lay the body of an elderly woman. During a more extensive excavation in 1875 two coffins were found containing the remains of two men. Encased in oak-wood coffins dating to the Bronze Age, they are believed to be a family unit. They are now housed in the National Museum of Denmark, alongside the coffins and artifacts buried with them.

References

  1. Nathaniel, Hawthorne, ed. (1837). "Antiquities of North America by John Stark". American Magazine of Useful and Entertaining Knowledge. 3. Retrieved 16 October 2013.
  2. All of this is from F.W. Putnam, Notes & News, American Anthropologist, New Series, Vol. 3, No. 2 (Apr. - Jun., 1901), pp. 387-396
  3. "Erects Bronze Tablet". The Topeka State Journal. 13 August 1903. p. 2. Retrieved 3 February 2020 via newspapers.com.
  4. "Early Local History". Fall River Daily Evening News. February 4, 1893. p. 5. Retrieved 14 February 2020 via Newspapers.com.
  5. Haynes, Henry W. "The Skeleton in Armor" Science, Vol. 17, No. 416 (Jan. 23, 1891), pp. 50-51 JSTOR   1767398
  6. William M Beauchamp, "Metallic Ornaments of the New York Indian" Bulletin 73, December 1903, New York State Museum archive.org
  7. Miller, Perry. The Raven and the Whale: The War of Words and Wits in the Era of Poe and Melville. New York: Harvest Book, 1956: 14.
  8. Ehrlich, Eugene and Gorton Carruth. The Oxford Illustrated Literary Guide to the United States. New York: Oxford University Press, 1982: 71. ISBN   0-19-503186-5
  9. "Tablet Placed". Fall River Daily Evening News. May 28, 1903. p. 3. Retrieved 3 February 2020 via Newspapers.com.
  10. Kevin P. O’Connor (Apr 22, 2019). "Fall River Wonders: What happened to the plaque for the skeleton in armor?". The Herald News. Fall River, MA. Retrieved 3 February 2020.