This has been an unforgetable summer and it's far from being over. The summer solstice found us, my sons and I, in Green River, Utah. We were there as students of archeoastronomy. There were seven of us and two professors.
We were privleged to hike into canyons rarely seen by anyone where pictographs over 2000 years old peered down at us as we stared back in wonderment.
The pictographs that particularly interested us were those that held the same symbols as seen on what is described as the Aztec Calendar which is neither Aztec nor a calendar.
THe great monolithic structure was unearthed in Mexico City, and for lack of any other identification at the time was called the Aztec Calendar. It is actually the Sun Stone. The book of Tonatiuh, the sun. This great book of the sun was created by the Mexica, the people of the sun. The Mexica gave the name to the land that is still called Mexico today.
The Sun Stone is some 12 feet in diameter and weighs 24 tons. Today it is the center of attraction at the Museo De Anthropologia e Historia in Chapultepec Park outside of Mexico City.
What we were studying in Green River, and about those parts, were the origins of the symbols and meanings engraved so beautifully by Mexica on the Sun Stone.
The great book or Sun Stone, tells in part the history of the four migrations of the Native Americans who would utlimately build the great Tenochtitlan, Mexico City today.
The Native Americans had been forced to migrate from the North to the colorful lands of the Nahuatl, or four waters. The land of the four waters is what is known as Utah today. The four waters that converge there are the Colorado, the Green, the San Juan and then again the Colorado as they empty into the Grand Canyon.
The studies that are being made regarding the Sun Stone are the most important discovery in 20th Century America. No one need rewrite any history book on this one. It has already been written for us. We need but study it. It's interpretation plus corroborating evidence found by the professor, Dr. Cecilio Orozco, in Utah in 1990 and 1991 shed needed light on our Native American ancestry.
It appears that the Mexica, the Maya and the Egyptian all used Venus to keep track of their social calendar. For the Mexica, Venus was known as Quetzalcoatl, for the Maya, Venus was known as Kukulcan and for the Egyptian, Venus was known as Phoenix.
The findings at these sites that have information from 2000-plus years ago have great significance for anthropology, religion, philosophy and astronomy.
Unfortunately some of the most fantastic pictographs have suffered over the years from vandalism.
The people who live in this area now are very careful about giving out information regarding the locations of these special sites. We were fortunate enough to find a man who's stated mission in life is to guide people, who have a sincere desire to learn and study, to sites that are fantastic not recorded on any map.
It was quite exciting hiking down into canyons, maneuvering along sheer cliffs and perching in caves up on the sheer canyon walls, listening and wondering, and imagining the thoughts of the Native American artists who also perched there and painted so long ago.
Eventually all good things come to an end and so did this very exciting trip. It did leave me with the desire to return many times and to continue my studies in this area. I was very fortunate to have the company of two of my sons, Bill who is 28 and Joe who is 27, share the same interests in our history and rootedness.
We came to a very meaningful occasion in the life of my son Bill, he was married on the Fourth of July. He and Cynthia, his lovely bride, are now honeymooning in Mexico. I look forward to the continuing excitement and beauty that this summer appears to exude.