Book of Mormon and Archaeology

Record summary

The Book of Mormon describes migrations, societies, wars, and technologies in an ancient American setting. Some Latter-day Saint writers have attempted to correlate its peoples and places with Mesoamerican or North American archaeology, while mainstream historians and archaeologists generally find no independently verified material or textual confirmation of the narrative as literal ancient history. The topic matters for comparing scripture, oral and written transmission, apologetic interpretation, and archaeological method. Researchers should distinguish religious significance from empirical historical claims.