- MD
Sidestep: Patagonian Giants
Stories of giants in the old world (pre 1700's) exist everywhere in the world including NZ which is what our purpose is about.
But the stories in South America intrigue me as all the reports are from European explorers, including a chaplain. Some say the Patagonian giants are simply a mythical race of people, who first began to appear in early European accounts of the then little-known region and coastline of Patagonia. They were supposed to have exceeded at least double normal human height, some accounts giving heights of 12 to 15 feet (3.7 to 4.6 m) or more. Some say the stories were debunked at the end of the 18th century.
However, these are the reports from various early explorers
Ferdinand Magellan expedition. 1520's. The chronicler of Magellan's expedition, wrote of natives twice a normal person's height
Sir Francis Drake. 1579. Ship' chaplain wrote about meeting very tall Patagonians.
Anthonie Knivet, 1590's claimed he had seen dead bodies 12 feet (3.7 m) long in Patagonia.
Also in the 1590s, William Adams, an Englishman aboard a Dutch ship rounding Tierra del Fuego reported a violent encounter between his ship's crew and unnaturally tall natives.
HMS Dolphin. 1766. Rumours they had seen a tribe of 9-foot-tall (2.7 m) natives in Patagonia when they passed by there on their circumnavigation of the globe. However, when a newly edited revised account of the voyage came out in 1773, the Patagonians were recorded as being 6 ft 6 in (1.98 m); very tall, but by no means giants.
Magellan had bestowed on these people the name "Patagão" but he did not further elaborate on his reasons for doing so. The original word would probably be in Magellan's native Portuguese (patagão) or the Spanish of his men (patagón). It is now understood that the etymology refers to a literary character in a Spanish novel of the early 16th century.
One hundred years after Magellan the first detailed account of Sir Francis Drake’s circumnavigation, the author, Drake’s nephew of the same name, wrote:
"Magellane was not altogether deceived, in naming them Giants; for they generally differ from the common sort of men, both in stature, bignes, and strength of body, as also in the hideousnesse of their voice: but yet they are nothing so monstrous, or giantlike as they were reported; there being some English men, as tall, as the highest of any that we could see, but peradventure, the Spaniards did not thinke, that ever any English man would come thither, to reprove them; and thereupon might presume the more boldly to lie: the name Pentagones, Five cubits viz. 7. Foote and halfe, describing the full height (if not some what more) of the highest of them. But this is certaine, that the Spanish cruelties there used [referring to Magellan’s hostage taking], have made them more monstrous, in minde and manners, then they are in body; and more inhospitable, to deale with any strangers, that shall come thereafter."
He reduced the height of the Patagonians from ten feet to seven and a half feet but was obviously more intent on discrediting the Spanish and blaming them for the “monstrosity” of the giants. Ironically, though, he was really confirming the basic facts behind the myth.
****
The height of 7'6" is still tall and while we at Tangatawhenua16 are not full supporters of 10-12 giants we surmised that there were tall races (up to 9') in some remote areas just as remote tribes developed differently elsewhere in the world. Our skeletons are not giants exactly but are going to prove to be a very tall race. We believe that our skeletons will prove to be a minimum of 7'6" because 7' 6" skeletons would not be regarded as shocking enough to hide them away by blocking the entrance by the means employed at our cave we have called Kūwaha Tāwhetaana.
