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This article claims some strange, unlikely things about the ancestry of the research chemist, Dr. William Conan Davis, and his brother, famous actor Ossie Davis (both African-Americans).
For one thing - Sioux indians live in South Dakota and Montana. So, how or why would a Sioux have possibly traveled to settle in a remote rural area of southern Georgia - clear across the country - around the turn of the 20th century?
and secondly --- 100% of American slaves came from the west coast of Africa. So, how could someone in very rural southern Georgia be descended from Ethiopian Jews, (eastern Africa) and be able to "read Hebrew but not English"? Sounds bizarre.
I e-mailed Dr. Henry Louis Gates, the scholar and TV host of PBS "Finding your Roots" about this, some months ago, thinking he would be interested - as an African-American, but never got a reply.
Just curious.
Last edited by slowlane3; 09-30-2020 at 09:50 PM..
It's not like Native Americans have to live on reservations - they can live anywhere in the US. And not all African Americans are descended from slaves.
If you really want to know more about it, why don't you research his tree? Looks like someone started to on FamilySearch, but didn't get far - you could pick up where they left off: https://www.familysearch.org/tree/pe...tails/LTC4-7TY
I wouldn't count on a celebrity like Henry Louis Gate Jr to dig into this if it's not a part of his job as either a professor or TV show host.
Just looking into it a little bit myself, I did immediately notice that his mother's maiden name is Cooper, but it claims his maternal grandfather was Jonnas Franklin, not Cooper? Records for Laura say her father was Sam Cooper, so I don't know who Jonnas Franklin is supposed to be, unless maybe Sam was her adopted/step father?
This article claims some strange, unlikely things about the ancestry of the research chemist, Dr. William Conan Davis, and his brother, famous actor Ossie Davis (both African-Americans).
For one thing - Sioux indians live in South Dakota and Montana. So, how or why would a Sioux have possibly traveled to settle in a remote rural area of southern Georgia - clear across the country - around the turn of the 20th century?
and secondly --- 100% of American slaves came from the west coast of Africa. So, how could someone in very rural southern Georgia be descended from Ethiopian Jews, (eastern Africa) and be able to "read Hebrew but not English"? Sounds bizarre.
I e-mailed Dr. Henry Louis Gates, the scholar and TV host of PBS "Finding your Roots" about this, some months ago, thinking he would be interested - as an African-American, but never got a reply.
Just curious.
Well a small percentage of slaves did in fact come from East Africa, Henry Louis Gates Jr. himself in fact has written about this. In fact he wrote a response to my very question about possible East African DNA (likely just distant traces within West African DNA) to my very own question.
There is a lot of mystery surrounding Kince Davis' Ethiopian heritage. While Ethiopian Jews do speak Semitic languages like Tigrinya and Amharic, the Hebrew language was not used or taught in Ethiopia until the 1950s, (the liturgical language of Ethiopian Jews is also not Hebrew, but a South Semitic language related to Tigrinya called Ge'ez), and the only population of Ethiopian Jews that speaks Hebrew as a primary language today are those who have settled in Israel.
I wonder if Kince Davis wasn't influenced by the emergence in the late 1800s of the Black Hebrew Israelite movement founded by Frank Cherry and William Saunders Crowdy both of whom claimed that African Americans are descendants of the Hebrews in the Bible. Frank Cherry founded the Church of the Living God, the Pillar Ground of Truth for All Nations in 1886, and Crowdy founded the Church of God and Saints of Christ in 1896. Both of these groups adopted Judaic practices, vestments, and rituals, including the use of Hebrew as a liturgical language.
As for the Sioux connection, there is a Santee tribe in South Carolina which spoke Catawba, which along with Cherokee and Iroquois languges are part of the Macro-Siouxan language family which extended from what are now the Prairie provinces of Canada, across the Great Lakes, and south all the way to the Carolinas. Though we call the language family Macro-Siouxan, the two tribes, Lakota/Oglala Sioux of the northern Plains and the Catawba speakers of South Carolina were very distantly related having split several centuries earlier in a migration event leading to the development of several distinct, but ultimately related, cultures including the aformentioned Cherokee and Iroquois.
Of course, I'm very aware that a few million African-Americans immigrated in recent times especially from Ethiopia, Nigeria, Somalia, and the Caribbean
region. Even the venerated actor, producer, and bon vivant Peter Ustinov had 1/8 or 1/16 Ethiopian ancestry.
But I can't imagine that Ethiopians would have immigrated to America in the earlier timeframe indicated in the Davis family article. And it's hardly possible they would have known written Hebrew.
Of course, I'm very aware that a few million African-Americans immigrated in recent times especially from Ethiopia, Nigeria, Somalia, and the Caribbean
region. Even the venerated actor, producer, and bon vivant Peter Ustinov had 1/8 or 1/16 Ethiopian ancestry.
But I can't imagine that Ethiopians would have immigrated to America in the earlier timeframe indicated in the Davis family article. And it's hardly possible they would have known written Hebrew.
Well... there is a theory that the Ark of the Covenant is in Ethiopia. If that is true, that would solve the Hebrew thing.
Well... there is a theory that the Ark of the Covenant is in Ethiopia. If that is true, that would solve the Hebrew thing.
It's more than that (although yes, there is that interesting little tidbit). There have long been Jews in Ethiopia, going back to ancient times. They were separated from the rest of Judaism as evidenced by their lacking in some of the Talmudic writings common to most of Judaism. I remember reading about it when a group of them were flown to Israel to relocate. I remembered that the term for them is "the Falashas", although according to this, that is derogatory.
Well... there is a theory that the Ark of the Covenant is in Ethiopia. If that is true, that would solve the Hebrew thing.
It is not that the Ethiopians were unaware of Hebrew, it is just that they didn't speak it as their colloquial language, and even the liturgical language of Ethiopian Jews was not Hebrew. Plus, if you even open the Ark your whole head melts.
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