CHARACTERS ON TWO ANCIENT AMERICAN CYLINDER STAMPS AND ON THE ANTHON TRANSCRIPT COMPARE FAVORABLY

One of the few systematic studies of the "caractors" of the "Anthon Transcript," as it was known a decade ago, was published by Carl Hugh Jones in 1970 as "The 'Anthon Transcript' and Two Mesoamerican Cylinder Seals." His paper appeared in the Newsletter of the Society for Early Historical Archaeology and is now available as a F.A.R.M.S. Reprint. The author is a museum professional with the Nebraska State Historical Society.

This paper tabulates the recurring marks on the Anthon Transcript according to a numbering system keyed to numbered lines and characters. For example, one learns immediately that the mark that looks something like a large numeral "two" occurs six times on four different lines. Repeated occurrences of series of marks are also tabulated. Serious decipherment attempts will benefit from this systematic labeling and counting.

In addition, the author shows that many similar marks or signs are found on a roller stamp discovered at La Venta, Tabasco, Mexico, and another found at Tlatilco, Mexico. Both stamps date to before the time of Christ and had already been published in the professional literature. Ten signs on the first roller and 28 on the second are compared with the Anthon document. Although the general style of these sets of markings varies, the conclusion reached by Jones is that individual equivalents to all the La Venta signs are visible in the Transcript and that the Tlatilco stamp can even be said to be "an archaeological example of the type of script represented in the Anthon Transcript."