The First Americans’ New World Roots – A Forgotten Question Reconsidered

The Author: Helga Gemegah studied Sinology as well as Ancient American Studies at the Archaeological Institute of the University of Hamburg. She concluded her doctoral thesis at the University of Bremen in Romance Studies about José de Acosta’s idea of origin. She has contributed various publications and congress presentations about questions regarding the peopling of the Americas and lectured at the University of Hamburg’s Meso-American Studies.

lt;i>Contents: The development of ideas of origin during the 16th century - Spanish political, religious and cartographic world views as motives for the development of ideas of origin - America: A continent without life? - Van den Putte's misleading world map: Mongolia, India, Tibet and China as part of North America - José de Acosta's and Juan Gonzalez de Mendoza's conjectures - The reception of ideas of origin - Alexander von Humboldt's criticism of Spanish cartography - The impact of ideas of origin on science - The role of the 17th International Congress of Americanists 1910 in the history of science - The peopling of Asia as seen by Davidson Black and Ales Hrdlicka - The reception of Spanish ideas of origin in the 20th century - Reconsidering comparisons of Asian and American populations with regard to cultural material, genetics and linguistics and their dependence on 16th century assumptions - Thomas Jefferson's doubts about comparisons between Asian and American languages - The peopling of the Americas as seen by James F. Cooper, Karl May and C.W. Ceram.