Joliet and Marquette vs. the Piasa Bird(s)

[Story]

From the dark recesses of history comes a legend so amazing and terrifying, it’s astonishing that more people don’t know of its existence.

If you live in the St. Louis area, chances are you are familiar with the legend; or may have heard bits and pieces of it here and there. As historians and scientists dig deeper into this legend, more becomes known about a monster from the past that called the St. Louis region its home, and may still call it home today.

Upon exploring the Mississippi River in 1673, Louis Joliet and Father Jacques Marquette noticed the strange likeness of a creature painted and sculpted on the side of the bluffs. The creature was described as “a large creature with horns like a deer, red eyes, a beard like a tiger, a face like a man, body covered with green, red, and black scales and a tail so long it passed around the body, over the head, and between the legs.” The painting depicted a dark secret that, up until now, only the Illinois Indians had known.
[url] http://www.failedsuccess.com/index.php?/weblog/comments/piasa_bird_legend[/url]

 

[bnail]

Story, No Offense to you, but that's absolute bunk. I couldn't even continue reading it. what's happened here, IMO, is that the local (white) population took an existing legend/myth, and fabricated some inane outlandish tale around it.
Marquette nver goes any farther than describing the image in his journal.
He never evens calls it by name!
Read this: Jesuit relations
Here's the quote: "While Skirting some rocks, which by Their height and Length inspired awe, We saw upon one of them two painted monsters which at first made Us afraid, and upon Which the boldest savages dare not Long rest their eyes. They are as large As a calf; they have Horns on their heads Like those of deer, a horrible look, red eyes, a beard Like a tiger’s, a face [Page 139] somewhat like a man’s, a body Covered with scales, and so Long A tail that it winds all around the Body, passing above the head and going back between the legs, ending in a Fish’s tail. Green, red, and black are the three Colors composing the Picture. Moreover, these 2 monsters are so well painted that we cannot believe that any savage is their author; for good painters in france would find it difficult to paint so well, ”” and, besides, they are so high up on the rock that it is difficult to reach that place Conveniently to paint them. Here is approximately The shape of these monsters, As we have faithfully Copied It."
And here's the footnote: [33] (p. 141). ”” Parkman says (La Salle, p. 59, note 1): “The rock where these figures were painted is immediately above the city of Alton [Ill.]. The tradition of their existence remains, although they are entirely effaced by time. In 1867, when I passed the place, a part of the rock had been quarried away.” But Amos Stoddard observes, in Sketches of Louisiana (Phila., 1812), p. 17: “What they [Joliet and Marquette] call Painted Monsters on the side of a high perpendicular rock, apparently inaccessible to man, between the Missouri and Illinois, and known to the moderns by the name of Piesa, still remain in a good state of preservation.” Parkman mentions (ut supra) a map made for the intendant Duchesneau, soon after Marquette’s voyage, (”˜which is decorated with the portrait of one “of the monsters,” answering to Marquette’s description, and probably copied from his drawing.”

Alton, I feel, has fabricated much of this legand to facilitate the tourist industry. the image has been painted over so many times, I don't believe the present image is even in the original location.

 

It doesn't look like any native paintings or stained petriglyphs that I have ever seen. Makes one wonder what those Frenchies were drinking.

 

[Story]

Story, No Offense to you, but that's absolute bunk.

No skin off my backside what you believe or not.
However, there was *something* to the tale that Joliet & Marquette recorded.

So what was it?

 

[bnail]

It doesn't look like any native paintings or stained petriglyphs that I have ever seen. Makes one wonder what those Frenchies were drinking.

The image is actually quite well documented and, if I'm not mistaken, Marquette was the first to document it. He remarked how vibrantly it was colored, and he included a sketch of it in his journal. I spoke with the site archeologist at Kohokia about it, and he said that it wasn't the only one either, that others have been found in the region, but he didn't elaborate.

 

[bnail]

Marquette never recorded a legand about the image; IMO, that's the fabricated part. There's certainly a story behind the image otherwise no one would've went to such great pains putting it on that cliff face, I just doubt the "legand" that accompanies the website. Read Marquette's account, the entire journey from his mission in St. Ignace, Michigan to the Arkansas river, and back to Green Bay up through Kaskaskia is well recorded by him. This portion of his journal is published by the Michigan historical center and is currently still available (it often goes out of print).
Like I said, I wasn't disputing you, you didn't make the claim, you merely reported it. But these "legands" abound in communities. I read an account of the discovery of "the" long lost Marquette epedition frenchman whose remains were found mumified in a hollow log and his fringed buckskins were still in tact! There was so much wrong with that story I thought it was a joke; suffice it to say that there was no one who ever disapeared from that expedition, everyone who went down came back again!
There's an interesting book dealing with local histories by a rather leftist historian called Lies on the Landscape the author's name escapes me, but it deals with local myth being told as history.

 

[Story]

Like I said, I wasn't disputing you, you didn't make the claim, you merely reported it. But these "legands" abound in communities.

I know, but I posted it to see what spun out.

The reality behind our pre- recorded history is worth speculating about - *what* caused the local Indians to try to mark the tale for posterity?

And if we want to toss in a teaspoon of cryptozoology, there's quite a number of tales about these large and hungry creatures. Remind ya of the legend of Saint George (a 3rd Century Roman soldier, IIRC) and the 'Dragon'?

 

[bnail]

And if we want to toss in a teaspoon of cryptozoology, there's quite a number of tales about these large and hungry creatures. Remind ya of the legend of Saint George (a 3rd Century Roman soldier, IIRC) and the 'Dragon'?

I find it interesting that so many cultures have the dragon in their mythology. I've often wondered if the dragon's presence in Europe predate the Mongal hordes or Marco Polo.
The Piasa bird has fascinated me for years (ever since I first read Marquette's account. I believe I have a brochure floating around somewhere from Alton about the bird, but for the life of me, I couldn't say just where it is now.
I've often wondered is the image's presence so close to the river isn't connected to the Underwater Panther or the Thunderbird, or both.
you've rekindled an old obsession Story, thanks alot!:cursing: It's not as if I don't have enough to research to do! :winking:

 

[Story]

you've rekindled an old obsession Story, thanks alot!:cursing: It's not as if I don't have enough to research to do! :winking:

Glad I could act as Satan's cabanna boy.
Can a real Watoga/Outoga be documented, outside of Russel's account?

Using Occam's Razor, the 'most likely' reason for the cliff paintings could have been a way for some local Illini to scare away any of their nosier neighbors from the caves in those bluffs.

Or Watoga/Ouatoga and his braves just went up against a pair of big-@ss eagles or crocodiles (two monsters originally painted on the cliffs, right?).

However, I think alot of history is scrubbed even as it's recorded. Possibly due to lack of space, where an explorer needs to hit the most important parts. Plus, French Catholics and their priests were weird about what was considered 'acceptable'. Can't have any heresy getting into print, it only encourages those accursed Protestants. :winking:

 

[hawkeye1755]

I know that animal.
It's an Wolpertinger.It lives in the Bavarian Mountains.

:rotf: :rotf:

 

[dlemaster]

I'm not going to pretend I know anything about the images but my first reaction upon seeing the third image down was how much it looked like the underwater monsters I've seen depicted in Eastern Indian quill work. There are several pouches illustrated in a book published in the 1980s. The name of the book is something like Bo Jou Neegee.
I have copy at home.
The quill worked animals on the pouches is complete with the horns and a long tail but lacks the wings and beard
Does anyone else familiar with those pouches see the similarity?

Regards, Dave

 

[Story]

Dino-Era Fossils Inspired Monster Myths, Author Says
John Roach
National Geographic News
June 17, 2005

According to the Lakota, or Sioux, Indians' "Water Monsters of the Badlands" legend, the rugged and eroded lands of southwestern South Dakota were the stage for an epic battle between water spirits and thunder and lightning spirits.

The water sprits were embodied by giant water monsters known as the Unktehi. Thunder and lighting spirits took the form of thunderbirds known as Wakinyan.

In the battle myth the Wakinyan torched the Badlands forest and plains with thunderbolts. An inland sea boiled and dried, and the Unktehi burned. Only the dried bones of the Unktehi and Wakinyan remained.

Today paleontologists know the Badlands are full of bones of mosasaurs (giant marine reptiles that plied an inland sea there during the Cretaceous period) and pterosaurs (giant flying reptiles). The Cretaceous is the geologic period spanning from 144 to 65 million years ago.

Adrienne Mayor is an author and independent scholar in Princeton, New Jersey. She says the "Water Monsters of the Badlands" legend was inspired in part by these fossils, which the Lakota undoubtedly encountered in their travels.

More at -[url] http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2005/06/0617_050617_monsters.html[/url]