Back to the Canary Islanders - their Origin

[djoser-xyyman]

The peopling of the Canaries: new data and new hypotheses Roger Blench

ABSTRACT
Although the Canary Archipelago was known to classical authors, the date and manner of its peopling
remains highly controversial. Remarkably, when the first maritime explorations from the Mediterranean
reach the islands, they were still in the Neolithic. Despite extensive evidence for contact, metal technology
was never transferred. Even more remarkably, the inhabitants, the Guanche, had no seagoing tradition,
despite the evidence for inter-island cultural transfers. A lack of radiocarbon dates has meant that the
chronology of the settlement of the Canaries has remained controversial, with wild guesses circulating in the
literature. The genocide of the Guanche in the eighteenth century remains an unacknowledged moral stain
on European colonial traditions.
The paper reviews the classical accounts, and the records of first contact from 1312 onwards. Linguistics
points strongly to a connection with the Berbers of the Maghreb, although the extermination of the
inhabitants before their language was properly recorded, makes this uncertain. Some types of cultural
evidence, such as the granaries with door locks on Gran Canaria, point to Berber contact. However, other
practices, such as mummification, log-coffins, body stamps and terracotta images of deities seem highly
idiosyncratic. Although the Guanche practised minimalist agriculture from ca. 300 AD onwards, with barley,
wheat, goats, sheep and pigs, some islands had reverted to foraging by the medieval era. Recent aDNA work
has confirmed the North African connection but the results remain frustratingly unspecific.

[djoser-xyyman]

I have always wondering what is the difference between the Berbers and North Africans. Now I know

[djoser-xyyman]

7.2 Epigraphy and rock inscriptions
One of the most surprising aspects of the Canaries archaeology is the presence of rock inscriptions in five of
the seven islands (Vycichl 2003). Only Gomera and Tenerife lack engraved epigraphy. The basic alphabet is
the Libyco-Berber or Numidian script which occurs across the Maghreb. Although the first inscriptions
occur in the 3rd century BC and continue through to the 3rd century AD, almost all texts are disappointingly
short, hence the limited contribution of epigraphy to Berber history (Le Quellec 2011). Vycichl points out
that the epigraphy of the Canaries can be divided into two phases, an early style which is hard to decipher
but which shows parallels with the inscriptions in Morocco, and a later phase, which shows familiarity with
Latin script.

7.3 Berber relexification of Old North African?
Whether there was another language used at first in the Canaries, many Guanche words can be compared to
Berber, including the numerals and most of those related to subsistence (§7). Similarly, agriculture appears
to be introduced later than first settlement (§4.1). Could it be that the first population transported to the
Canaries were non-Berbers, and that a second wave brought new script practices, agriculture and overwrote
or relexified much of the original language with Berber?

quote:
"An intriguing piece of confirmation is that of the names for individual fish species in Guanche recorded in
Wölfel (1965) turn out to be borrowings from Spanish or Portuguese."...hmmmmm. Ancient connection

[djoser-xyyman]

10.5 Mummification
Mummification was famously practised in Ancient Egypt and in scattered locations across
the world. However, it was not known in any of the source areas where the Guanche presumably
originated. Nonetheless Guanche mummies were found on Gran Canaria, Hierro, Tenerife and La
Palma (Photo 12). This indicates it was introduced early, when inter-island contact was
still vibrant. The internal organs of the corpses were not removed, unlike Egypt, hence it is not
thought to be a direct borrowing. Regrettably, the discovery of mummies stimulated a ‘gold rush’ in the 19th century and many tumuli were dismantled in the
search for mummies which were carried off to institutes around Europe.