Case file · Folklore / legend
The 'Welsh Indians' and the Mandan
In 1796 the Welsh explorer John Evans reached the Mandan villages on the upper Missouri, partly to test the old legend that they descended from Prince Madoc's 12th-century Welsh voyagers; he reported no Welsh speakers.
1796 CE · 47.33, -101.39 · status: legend
The account
The idea persisted. George Catlin, who painted the Mandan in 1832, thought their round boats and pale-eyed people supported it.
The sceptical view
No linguistic, archaeological or genetic evidence supports a Welsh link; the Madoc legend itself is first recorded centuries after Madoc's supposed time.