CHAPTER XII.
INTER-CONTINENTAL MOVEMENTS OF BOOK OF MORMON PEOPLE.
The inter-continental movements of the Book of Mormon peoples must next be considered.
Of the movements of the Jaredites and the people of Mulek but little can be learned. The center of Jaredite civilization and national power was in that part of the north continent known to the Nephites as the land Desolation, a country which corresponds, as we have seen, to modern Central America,[[1]] and of which Moron was the capital. From this point the Jaredites evidently colonized in great part the north continent; for it is said in the reign of King Lib that "the whole face of the land northward was covered with inhabitants."[[2]] But this is the widest extent of their colonization, as they confined themselves to occupancy of the north continent, and nothing more than hunting excursions ever carried them into the south continent.
Of the movements of Mulek's colony we have nothing more definite than that having landed first at some point in the south part of the north continent, they afterwards removed into the north part of the south continent—to the valley of the Sidon, and were permanently settled there when they were found by the migrating Nephites under Mosiah I.
As for the movements of the Nephites we have already traced them from Lehi's landing place to the valley of the Sidon, where they joined the people of Zarahemla, the descendants of Mulek's colony, and formed the Nephite-Zarahemla monarchy under Mosiah I.
Hereafter we shall find their movements tending chiefly in two directions: to the southward, and into the north.