See also my update on the lie: The Curse of Oak Island and the Templar Myth
Text Transcript:
The Curse of Oak Island is an interesting and entertaining show. But as I mentioned in an earlier video, the show isn’t always entirely upfront with us. This past week, the show turned from shading the truth to outright lying to us. In the episode, “The Master Plan,” the show resurrected the Zena Halpern map, revealed a few years earlier. The lie was the narration saying the map is dated 1347. The number one thousand three hundred forty seven does appear on the map, but it is not a date.
The writing in French before the number says “le atterrissage,” a noun meaning “the landing.” Under the number a line points not to Oak Island, but to what is now known as Frog Island. The clear meaning is “the landing one thousand three hundred forty seven is here.” What the number signifies is not completely obvious, but if it was a year it would signify that with “année” or the Latin “anno dominus,” especially if the map was made by a religious order such as the Knights Templars. Since everything else on the map is related to directions, the number 1347 must have something to do with navigation, and indeed 1347 is a good approximation of the number of toise (French fathoms) to the mainland, a distance sailors would care about, just as they’d care about the instruction, “ne vous allez ici avec le bateau” or “don’t go here with a boat.” The show blacks out that instruction to preserve the illusion that the number is a date.
Also, there are clear signs on the map indicating a date well after the 1300s. Underneath our number indicating the landing site is “les sud Indien travail très bon,” meaning “the south Indian work very good.” Whatever that means, the word “Indian” connected with North America is clearly 16th century or later. Similar with the dedication of the map “drawn for François La Rochefoucauld, a small glass of apprenticeship.” There are a bunch of François La Rochefoucaulds, all living in the 16th century or later. The show has made the connection with Jean-Baptiste La Rochefoucauld, who led the tragic naval expedition to Nova Scotia in 1746. Events connected to this expedition are possible candidates for the depositor activity on Oak Island, and compatible with verified dates for some artifacts found on the island, a good 399 years after the date falsely attributed to the map.
Is this a map of Oak Island? Possibly. Is it a Templar map? There’s no evidence to support that, nor is there any evidence to support any date on the map, much less a date of 1347. Something big definitely happened on Oak Island prior to 1795, but the audience of The Curse of Oak Island deserve better than to be deliberately mislead.
Why does Frog Island also appear to have a “swamp” feature? Does anyone know that history?
Let’s remember this is “reality” TV, which is a fanciful word for “scripted”. There IS a Mari Vineyards in Traverse City, Michigan, and Marty’s picture IS there on the website.
I also doubt the Knights Templar ever came to North America, and these important religious artifacts would NEVER have been put on a ship back in those days. The ark was likely buried by the Babylonians in Persia and the “grail” was likely just a carpenter’s cup and discarded.
Agreed… The last supper was conducted in the upper room of an unnamed person (a man carrying a jar of water) who Jesus had obviously arranged with previously. A cup was an everyday object and in the stress and grief of the time to follow no one would have even thought of such a thing as a keepsake. Also, I agree with several biblical scholars who feel that scripture proves that the Ark was destroyed by the Babylonians when Jerusalem was sieged and the temple destroyed. Because of the strict nature of how the Ark was to be moved and Jeremiah’s devotion he would not have moved the Ark unless God had instructed him to do so, and if he had it would have been recorded in his account. Jeremiah 3:16 “they will no longer say, ‘The ark of the covenant of Yahweh.’ And it will not come to mind, nor will they remember it, nor will they miss it, nor will it be made again.” If it “will not come to mind” and “nor will it be made again” seems to show that it was to be destroyed in the coming Babylonian siege. Also, scholars attribute Lamentations to Jeremiah in the years following the siege and destruction of the temple. Lamentations 2:1 speaks of the destruction of the temple and says “How, in his anger, the Lord has covered the daughter of Zion in a cloud! He has thrown down from heavens to earth the splendor of Israel, and he has not remembered his footstool in the day of his anger.” The Ark was known as the footstool of God… therefore this verse seems to indicate that it was destroyed along with the temple… Plus, historical artifacts are just that… no material item holds any sort of “mysterious power”.
I believe Zena Halpern’s map was dictated to someone who did not speak proper French. The person may have been sharing verbal history passed down through generations. Or the map was seen somewhere and it was copied from memory. The key: N S E W was probably just guessed and and/or someone forgot to take note of that fact.
Has anyone shown the map to an authentic Acadian? Perhaps take it to SW Louisiana.
Just a few comments, about this hoax, just by looking at the so called French and you see immediately that’s a bullshit .
First of all, it is an “ugly” French, full of mistakes, anglicism etc. An English native who translate word by word and end with stupid sentences a French would never have written
“Le Atterrissage” is totally incorrect, never a French will write that, but “L’atterrissage” (L apostrophe)
“Les sud indiens travail tres bon” ; lol lol, so funny … In french, even 500 years ago, ” Les indiens du sud travaillent très bien”, ou “les indigenes font un tres bon travail”.
“La ancres” . No non no “L’ancre”, or “Les ancres”
“Ne vous allez ici avec le bateau”(you no go here with boat) –>yet so funny 🙂 ” N’allez pas ici avec le bateau”(don’t sail here)
“Le barque” . neither ..; “La barque”
“Cette dessan pour Mr ..” … > “Ce dessin pour Mr”
Etc etc …
Thank you, I appreciate your learned observations. Several others have made similar comments on the video page: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pjJSyl4wJRU
Ce que vous dites est vrai il y a beaucoup de fautes mais le français a énormément évolué en 500 ans .
Il faudrait montrer cela a un linguiste…
That map is a complete and clumsy hoax. It was clearly drawn with some type of modern pen. The lines are to uniform to have been done in the 13 hundreds or even the 17 hundreds.
It could be a good racing of the original which may have been deteriorating.
Came to this page because I’ve been perplexed by the french map presented by Zeena in OI. It’s good to see other individuals have noticed a discrepancy as well. My first reaction to the map with the supposed french writing was that it was not french script of that time period. Anyone who is familiar with script of the said time period knows that it is a bad forgery. She could have at least studied ancient script before manufacturing this!
I agree. Whoever made this map was clumsy in the act of forgery.
She claims that it is not the original, but a copy of the original, which she says was found hidden in another book, but she couldn’t go further to say due to her being surveilled by Spartan ( which she claimed as a special ops group working for foreign governments and the US.
I think that IS not so obvious.
The Map came with the code in the same cover of Book. I would have hidden it in the same place in my Rochefoucauld castel in sarlat-canada ( in France)
The Map IS not pretending being 1347.
It juste may talk about an unboarding on this date.
Actually, about the french text, it looks like a old scotishman of 17th century trying to write in french.. it is full of mistakes but that doesnt prove that its not authentic.
Last point, considering that the Map contains the anchors and more specific hand made structures it must have been done After the templar built these structures .. so the card IS more supposed to date from 1600 or 1700.
Man … i wish i knew what that 1347 means … And if what IS writen IS true …
Has anyone else noticed how the swamp is already filled in on the map, not open to the sea? That tells me it’s not true, too.
Great eye!
I suspect Zenaida drew the map herself, and passed it off in an attempt to make more money off her books
*Zeena. Curse you autocorrect!
Quite likely.
One of the reasons she said it was a templar map is because she claimed the name of Ralph de sudaley is signed on the back. She claimed that the signature has been authenticated by experts. Though she doesn’t say what experts. Sudaley was a known temple. True academics have attested to this. Hmmmm. Who knows? Apparently his brother was one of the men who participated in the assassination of Thomas a Becket.
I would like to hear an expert’s assessment on the physical properties of the map. I have had several experts on the French language comment on the YouTube video page that their assessment is the language used on the map proves it is a modern forgery.
Nope. I m french and i disagree.. the only modern thing i Can see IS that the word atterrissage IS modernly used for airplanes = landing
( terre ~ Land)
But it also could bé an ancient use of that word … Before WE invented the planes . Actually it is vert well done if its not true .. a modern person could not invent or think about use it …
“Though she doesn’t say what experts.”
Yes she does. Page 110 of her book:
“the Onteora Document was inspected by Mr Franco Franzetti, a restorer of ancient documents in the Vatican library and that Mr Franzetti authenticated the signature on the document of Ralp de Sedely”
Funny how one cannot find a single reference to this “expert” outside of Halpern’s mention.
My first language is french and i studied old french too. The text in french on the map it’s inaccurate, worst, it’s fake. It’s like using auto translate app. The map seem to be drawned by a child. I dont know if it’s a bad copy or a forgery. But for me, it’s a hoax.
I agree. The map is nonsense, at best. On the YouTube page for the video version, several people have given detailed critiques of the bad French on the map. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pjJSyl4wJRU
I also noticed the bad french, if Zena said it was signed by Ralph de Sudeley on the back, it means that he’s the author of the drawing and legends, because he was English the bad french makes sense for me.
That the French is bad doesn’t necessarily mean the map is forged, true. Regardless, as a French-language expert pointed out on my YouTube video page https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pjJSyl4wJRU the language used on the map is definitely using words that only appeared centuries after the Knights Templars. Whatever the map is, it is not Templar, which is my biggest complaint.
Ok. Here i agree.
Its younger but it could be a franc-maçon Map .. as they herited of their knowledge