"A legendary presentation ... the Semitic peoples migrated through South America, crossing the ocean at Behring's Straits, and thence traversing Asia till they arrived in Egypt." -Folklore, 1969
"This extraordinary thesis is supported by still more extraordinary evidence." -The London Quarterly Review, 1904
"There is now no difficulty in believing the forty years' march was a Semitic migration from Peru to South-West Asia." -The Critical Review, 1904
Dr. John Fitzgerald Lee in his 1903 book propounds the theory that the Biblical Exodus is but the legend preserving the main facts of "The Greater Exodus" of the Semitic race from Mexico and Peru, up through North America, across the ice-floes of Behring Strait into Asia.
Certainly this book amply redeems the promise of the preface that "the author has collected together many most interesting, curious, and often really startling facts ". The book collects, from mythology, legend and place-names remarkable footprints of "The Wandering Jew ".
It seems certain Semites refused to trust themselves on the ice of Behring Strait. They remained behind, the main wave of migration sweeping on, while the remnant became henceforth identified with the Native Americans.
Lee traces at length the resemblance of the Pyramids of Egypt with smaller and rougher pyramids found in Mexico, presumably the work of a people of similar but earlier culture.
The writings of Winckler and Humboldt, German scholars and archaeologists, the researches of the Smithsonian Institute at Washington, and writers and travellers from many parts of the world are quoted to show the similarity between the relics of Central American civilisation and that of the ancient Egyptians and Hebrews.
Finally he quotes authorities for saying that a tribe of Jews had lived in Kamschatka ( north-eastern Siberia) from time immemorial but when discovered it was found that while they know the traditional histories of Moses and Joshua, they had never heard of the Kings David and Solomon, Jerusalem, or the Holy Temple.
The author claims to give only a summary of the evidence in support of his theory, but he presents it in impressive sequence throughout the 260 odd pages of the book. He admits that he started to investigate in the belief that the tide of migration was from Asia into America, but his studies convinced him that all the facts pointed the other way.
About the author:
Dr. John Fitzgerald Lee was born 1857, entered Trinity College at Dublin in 1878 at the age of twenty-one and received his B.A. degree in 1886. He was a British army tutor in Rawal Pindi, British India, travelled the world producing occasional journalism and translations; and was the author of books on geography, geopolitics, and military.
