Was Britain Known as the Island of Syria? (6 March, 2014, 4 Adar-2, 5774)
The Value of Alan Wilson as an Historian in Ten Tribe Matters and in General.
Contents:
1. Introduction
2. Wilson and Ten Tribes Research
3. Other Historical Points raised by Wilson.
4. Academic Blindness, Self-Interest, and Prejudices against the Truth.
5. An Inaccurate Historical Anecdote and Evident Anti-Semitism.
6. Conclusion.
7. The Island of Syria, the Phoenicians, and the TTs.
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1. Introduction
A correspondent of ours, researcher Mark Williams, sent us a link to a YouTube talk by Alan Wilson.
Re
Alan Wilson Historian - The Real History of Britain
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8GOcttn4VwE&feature=youtu.be
Duration: 1.31.41 minutes.
Mark Williams sent the same link to OvadYah Avrahami who asked for our opinion about it.
Alan Wilson gives a long rambling talk like all the works of this group in whom we should include Baram Blackett.
We have a few of their books in our library.
Wilson talks about King Arthur and various historical considerations that do not concern us.
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2. Wilson and Ten Tribes Research
Points raised by Wilson that possibly concern the Ten Tribes include:
Ancient histories of England and Wales, says Wilson, say that the first migration to Wales took place ca. 1500 BCE. Albyne was sent from Syria.
Albyne was the son of Diocletian. Lebanor was the enemy and son-in-law of Albyne. Diocletian ruled over 33 provinces. He appointed some of his daughters to rule over some the provinces.
Leonward Wooley 1932-34 excavated the site of Ur.
Woolley found texts mentioning Dungi of Ur. Dungi equals Diocletian in the British account. Dungi also had 33 provinces while some of his daughters ruled over some of his provinces. Dungo was attacked by Libanor King of the Hittites who married one of his daughters. Dungi in these matters parallels Diocletian.
The Ealde Cyrcenas [pronounced "Sirsenas"] were listed amongst the invaders of Wales. Wilson equates the Ealde Cyrcenas with the Old (i.e. Ancient) Syrians..
The name Surrey (a county in Southeast England) he says is a form of the name Syria.
Homer in Odysseus mentions the large Island of Syria in the western Ocean: Homer, Wilson implies, may have been referring to Britain.
[We too once explored this possibility. The problem is that Homer does not place Syria in the Western Ocean. He appears to intend an isle near Sicily. The island of Phaecia in the story of Odysseus however may indeed refer to Britain as we may discuss in a separate article. His other points about ALBYNE leading a migration from Syria to Wales etc may be of value if relevant sources are given. ]
Brutus arrived in Britian in 500 BCE after the fall of Troy in the time of Aeneas his grandfather. Therefore the fall of Troy was ca. 650 BCe.
The Greeks for the fall of Troy gave dates between 1335-1134 BCE.
The Romans (Horace and Virgil) dated the Trojan War to 650 BCE similarly to Josephus who dated it at ca. 700 BCE.
The Franks traced their ancestry to Antenor who was at the fall of Troy which they believed occurred in ca. 650 BCE.
Wilson stresses the existence of what he calls the Old British Coelbrun alphabet.
This is considered a forgery from 1800 but Wilson quotes evidence showing it to be genuine.
He quotes sources saying the Coelbrun alphabet is identical with Etruscan, Raetian (Swiss), and Pelagian alphabets.
He quotes a claim that the Coelbrun alphabet was used by Ancient Hebrews and by Amerindians along the east coast of the USA.
Wilson identifies the Holy Grail, in the story of King Arthur, with the Ten Commandments inside the Ark of the Covenant.
Welsh Legend speaks of a wooden box guarded by two man-eating crows whom Wilson equate to the cherubim on top of the ark.
Wilson describes briefly how he and his friends searched for the Holy Ark in south Wales. They believe they have located its position in an underground area that still needs to be excavated.
This implies strongly that it is assumed that Descendants of Israel were there but Wilson does not dwell on the matter.
Professor Sir John Morris Jones in 1896 said that the Ancient Welsh language was Egyptian.
The Ten Tribes were in Asia Minor (present-day Turkey, also known as Anatolia), and in Syria.
Wilson implies that part of the Ancient Welsh also came from those areas BUT he does not given any details.
Some of the inscriptions (now in the British Musuem) found by Sir Austin Layard at Nineveh, the capital of Assyria were in the Old British Coelbrun alphabet.
[The problem with this is that, apart from Wilson, we seem to lack corroborating sources about it.]
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3. Other Historical Points raised by Wilson.
A comet in 562 struck Britain and Ireland and prepared the way for the Anglo-Saxon invasions by wiping out most of the British population.
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4. Academic Blindness, Self-Interest, and Prejudices against the Truth.
Wilson at length denigrates the academic establishment and accuses them of hiding their eyes from the reality of historical records that he and his friends have merited to come across.
He complains of prejudice from the English against the Welsh language and Welsh History.
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5. An Inaccurate Historical Anecdote and Evident Anti-Semitism.
Towards the end of the talk, Wilson tells of an Israeli PM (whose name he does not remember) who got murdered.
In his youth, says Wilson, this Israeli PM had been in the Stern Gang. Their speciality was to kidnap British soldiers, hold them as hostage, never let them go but rather kill them.
When this Israeli PM was assassinated, British MP after MP in the House of Commons got up and said how sad they were that this Israeli PM had been killed. This was despite the fact that he had murdered British soldiers. At the time Jewish MPs also got up and spoke at length in Yiddish.
Wilson comments that its OK to speak Jewish in the House of Commons but you cannot speak Welsh.
This is Mistaken History.
It indicates a prejudicial willingness to believe bad things about Jews and Israelis. Wilson is confused on this issue.
He has confused Yitschak Rabin with Yitschak Shamir and conflated them both, as well as throwing in something pertaining to Menachem Begin.
Perhaps this is what he had been told and never bothered to check?
The Israeli PM who was murdered is Yitschak Rabin (1922-1995). In his youth Rabin would have been against the Stern Gang. The Stern Gang was otherwise known as the Lechi. Rabin had been in command of Hagana forces who in 1948 fired at the Altalena ship and killed members of the Irgun. The ideology of the Lechi was similar to that of the Irgun, though the Lechi was more extreme.
The Irgun commander on the Altalena was Menachem Begin (1913-1992).
The Lechi (i.e. Stern Gang) engaged in assassinations but not kidnapping. Kidnapping was done on one or two occasions by the Irgun which Menachem Begin later led. [British Police in Palestine kidnapped and beat to death a Jewish 16 year old. There is a plaque in his memory close to where I now reside.] Begin did become PM of Israel (1977-1983).
Yitschak Shamir (1915-2012) had been one of the commanders of the Lechi. He later became Israeli PM (1983-1992) but was not murdered.
Wilson has taken matters concerning Rabin, Shamir, and Begin and conflated them all into one.
This happens a lot in accounts of Ancient History but there is need for it concerning recent events.
To sum up:
Yitschak Rabin was the Israeli PM who got murdered.
Yitschak Shamir was the Israeli PM who had headed the Stern Gang or Lechi.
Menachem Begin was the Israeli PM whose group had engaged in kidnapping.
These are three different people.
As for the claim by Wilson about Jewish MPs making speeches in Yiddish:
I personally doubt very, very much that any speech, of any kind, was ever heard in Yiddish in the British House of Commons. There is no reason for such a speech ever to have been requested even if it were to be allowed. The Jewish MPs would not want to do it. There are however Jewish MPs in the British House of Commons. Some Jews do speak Yiddish. Wilson may have added these facts together and reached his own conclusions?
This is how Urban legends and anti-Jewish prejudices begin, in falsehood.
If any such speech really had been made so recently (i.e. in 1995) then somebody (other than Alan Wilson), somewhere, would have mentioned it.
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6. Conclusion.
The talk and books produced by Wilson may contain some informational leads. We are familiar with a few of the sources he mentions and they do exist.
Everything needs checking however and some of it may well be mistaken and misleading.
Wilson seems to place a premium on matters that do not concern the Ten Tribes.
This is the way things go.
Wilson and company have value in that they may well come across or point to information pertinent to Ten Tribes studies.
Their activities also serve to arouse interest in the study of history in general.
They also point to faults in the conventional academic approach and encourage original lines of inquiry.
On the other hand Wilson is also liable to feed us red herrings and lead us on a wild goose chase. If Wilson makes more boo-boos like he did in the case of the Israeli PM then he is liable to bring non-conventional historians into even greater disrepute than they already enjoy at present.
7. The Island of Syria, the Phoenicians, and the TTs.
Wilson mentioned the Island of Syria recalled by Homer. The Odyssey places this island in the region of Otygia meaning near Sicily but Wilson implied it meant Britain. This reminded us of some rather cursory research we once did on the subject of the Phaeacians who are also mentioned in the Odyssey. We have now decided that despite our uncertainty on the matter it is worth presenting the possibilities in the form of an article. God willing this will be ready soon.
See:
"Brit-Am Now"- 436. #1. Question on Phocia (Ionian Greece) and Phaeacia (Britain)?
http://www.britam.org/now/now436.html
The Lost Ten Tribes merged with the people of Gomer otherwise known as the Cimmerians. They moved to the West. Welsh tradition links their ancestors to Gomer and the Cimmerians. The Welsh Language derives in part from Hebrew, so does Irish.
See:
Hesperides part 2. British Hebrews and the West
Duration: 13.19 minutes