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Native Hawaiians and Native Americans
Part One

In a previous post, "On the Trail of Spider Woman," we suggested that petroglyphs in Arizona and Utah with female goddess symbolism and birthing ceremonies were connected with the Hohokam ("Sea Peoples") and other Indians who followed in their wake, corresponding to archeology and anthropology's Basketmaker Culture. In this and a series of posts over the next few months, we will show pictures of “emergence” petroglyphs from Hawaii, New Guinea, California, Hopi, Zuni, Pima, Papago, Fremont, Zuni, Mimbres, Palavayu and Eastern Woodlands cultural sites that support our thesis. We believe them to be the footsteps and stepping stones of female haplogroup B and its associated lineages.

Mitochondrial Haplogroup B does not have as its dissemination center Mongolia or Siberia or Central Asia but Southeast Asia, specifically Taiwan and Indonesia, and is characteristic, in contrast with Indian groups emphasizing A, C and D, of the Pueblo Indians and some Southeastern Indians such as the Cherokee and Chickasaw and Choctaw. It entered the Americas in successive waves, some of them seaborne, over many millennia.

The first picture comes from the western coast of the island of Hawaii. It is considered one of the oldest religious shrines in the Hawaiian Islands. It shows a stick figure carved into a rock set in the ground. As we will see, this is a typical "emergence" figure marking the arrival of a people in a new phase of existence. The symbolism is of a female mother figure giving birth, her progeny here depicted by the taillike extension coming from between her legs. There are thousands of variations of this tribal or clan mother iconography scattered over Asia and the Americas (but not apparently found in Europe or Africa).

The Hawaiians considered the western coast of the Big Island their place of emergence. According to their legends, their people came from the sea from the southwest and were noted for their ability to twist plants and fibers into ropes. Their capital was hence called Hilo (twisted, plaited). On account of their subtlety in these arts they adopted the hula (twist) dance as their national dance. Its original purpose was as a fertility ritual to increase population. (Johannes C. Andersen, Myths and Legends of the Polynesians, Tokyo:  Tuttle, 1969.) The main song sung during the enactment of the hula was called The Water of Kane, or Waters of Life.

The Hawaiian Mother symbol illustrated above seems to be connected with a certain clan. As is often the case, the head of the female figure is differentiated to show which clan. This one has horns and could represent a dragonfly. This insect recurs in American Indian petroglyphs where it is associated with the Water Clan and fertility rites. To "read" the Hawaiian petroglyph properly we might say, "Here is the spot where the Head Mother of the Water Clan emerged and gave birth to her people." It is likely (although no legends are preserved regarding its use) that women made offerings here to become fertile, attract husbands and be delivered of healthy children. In similar ceremonial sites, such figures mark an actual birthing stone where women squatted to give birth, attended by midwives and clan mothers.

Native American Parallels

To show the physical resemblance of the Hawaiian design to American Indian symbols we will reproduce  thumbprints below from different traditions. They will be linked together and explicated in subsequent posts in this series.

"Lizard Woman" petroglyphs from Arizona/Utah.

And Now in the Cherokee...

Haplogroup N1a became prominent in genetics literature when Wolfgang Haak et al.'s studies on 7500 year old skeletons in Central Europe revealed that 25% of the Neolithic European population might have belonged to this lineage. The skeletons were found to be members of the Linear Pottery Culture (LBK ware) which is credited with being the first farming culture in Central Europe.

7,000 Year-Old Linearbandkeramik (LBK ware) from Stone Age Germany.

The study was a major development in the debate on the origin of European populations, since Haak et al. argued that "The discovery of mitochondrial type N1a in Central European Neolithic skeletons at a high frequency enabled us to answer the question of whether the modern population is maternally descended from the early farmers instead of addressing the traditional question of the origin of early European farmers."

1. Demic diffusion (in which farming is brought by farmers), for example Renfrew's NDT - Anatolian hypothesis
2. Cultural diffusion (in which farming is spread by the passage of ideas), which is the assumption in Alinei's Paleolithic Continuity Theory.

The study's authors concluded: "Our finding lends weight to a proposed Paleolithic ancestry for modern Europeans."

N currently appears in only .18%-.2% of regional populations. It is widely distributed throughout Eurasia and Northern Africa and is divided into the European, Central Asian, and African/South Asian branches based on specific genetic markers. Exact origins and migration patterns of this haplogroup are still unknown and a subject of some debate.

Although not one of the classic Native American lineages (A, B, C, D, and X -- Schurr), N has been identified in the ancient Southwest in the Fremont Culture centered in Utah. It is one of the Middle Eastern lineages that appear in the Cherokee and other Indians; see DNA Consultants Blog, “Anomalous Mitochondrial DNA Lineages in the Cherokee”. Most investigators attribute this phenomenon to recent European admixture. But such haplotypes  if only instanced in North America without exact Old World matches could just as well be considered Native American.

It has been suggested that N is also characteristic of the Sea Peoples, who may have traveled to the American Southwest in antiquity.

Cherokee or Saponi Wedding Dish from Southwest Virginia in author's possession is glazed black, the color of the Earth Mother, and marked with the "tri-line" signifying the Triple Goddess's power of increase and plenty and rule over all life. The style of pottery is similar to Linearbandkeramik (LBK) ware. This is the female dish of a matched pair. The slightly larger male dish is marked with four lines on each handle. They were used to share food in a wedding or bonding ceremony.