The originally-posted link is dead. The current Acambaro figurines webpage at that site is at:
http://www.ldi5.com/archeo/acambaro.php
English translation via Google:
In 1923, Waldemar Julsrud, a trader of German origin, and "padre" Fray José Marie Martinez discovered the archaeological site of Chupicuaro dating from the pre-classical era and containing vases, bowls and figurines from the oldest culture known Indian, named after the site and dating back to 1000 BC, (earlier than the Indian Tarascans, the oldest known Indian culture at that time).
This "classic" discovery did not raise any controversy other than his paternity disputed by a rival collector.
A few years later, in July 1944, 69-year-old Waldemar Julsrud made a resounding discovery in Acambaro, a small Mexican town located less than 300 km northwest of Mexico City, in the province of Guanajuato.
As he was strolling along a ditch near the bull hill, along with one of his employees, a farmer named Odilon Tinajero, his attention was drawn to a piece of ceramic emerging from the ground. It was a terracotta figurine of a style that was unknown to him.
He asked his employee to dig and bring back all the similar parts he could find. Tinajero appeared a few days later with a wheelbarrow filled with these artifacts. Julsrud was stunned by the style and diversity of the figures. He spent a bargain with his employee: he would pay him 1 peso for all the figurines reported but nothing for those damaged, he still had to give (and he kept).
His aim was not to encourage his farmer to make it (he would not have had the time or the art anyway and the price was too low for a possible fabrication) but to force him to search with the more extreme precaution.
The figurines were discovered in groups of 20 to 40 inside wells at a depth of about 1m 20 to 1m 80.
They were not funerary wells, we only found 6 skulls during the excavations. It seems, it is at least the hypothesis emitted by Mr. Julsrud, that they were hastily buried to protect them from the looting of the first Spanish settlers.
These are more than 33 500 (!!!) ceramic objects (in a very large majority), stone, jade and obsidian have been found. They are all unique, none are duplicated. They vary in size from a few centimeters to less than one meter. Different types of clay were used (their study would be a valuable indication of their provenance), but all were made by the method of "open fire" (the manufacture of fake would not have gone unnoticed by the smoke released and the large quantities of wood - expensive and expensive in this region - necessary.
In spite of their great diversity, they can be grouped, by their design, hundreds or even thousands, as coming from different cultures.
Like Dr. Cabrera (who died in December 2001), Curator of the Ica Stones, Mr. Julsrud never traded his discovery. Their goal was scientific and their desire to protect an inheritance that they considered unique for humanity has never been faulted. It is always with pleasure that they showed their pieces to those who wanted it and they never stopped fighting for the scientists interested in their discovery and come to judge on the spot ... Lost pain ... Why ?
One of the main reasons (see history and argument) of the rejection of this discovery is the representations of these figurines.
They represent among others, dinosaurs, unknown animals, reptiles, some with avian traits; some seem to indicate a form of domestication of small reptiles and small dinosaurs, great apes, others clearly show zoophile acts with reptiles, finally, many represent unknown deities, everyday life and its usual objects (pipes, instruments of music, etc ..) ...
(see some examples of these figurines)
Men with dinosaurs? Everyone knows that it's impossible!
One man, a heretic of course, made the effort to be interested in this discovery: Charles Hapgood, professor of history and anthropology at the University of New Hampshire (see his work on ancient maps). He was there to investigate, meet and question the protagonists of this story. From his trip, he brought back some samples in order to analyze them according to the most modern and recent methods of the time (at the end of the 60s).
The (carbon-14) measurements given in 1968 by the New Jersey Laboratory of Isotopes Inc. ranged from 1,110 BC. J.C. at 4,530 BC J.C.!
In 1972, the thermoluminescence dating recorded by the University of Pennsylvania on 2 figures was 2500 years BC. J.C.!
It will thus be necessary that one day, the detractors of Glozel (1924) and Acambaro (1944) explain to us how one can manufacture forgery which will pass the rigorous scientific tests of dating (thermoluminescence and Carbon 14) which were unknown at the time of their discovery!
Some of these figurines are now visible to everyone in the Acambaro Museum.
Until the scientists deign to take an interest in it ... We can always dream ...
