Back in the mid 1950's an anthropologist colleague of mine, just out of college, was hired by the LDS Church to supervise a dig in Chaipa del Corzo, in Mexico. The Mormons have this theory that some of the American Indians are descended from the Lost Tribes of Israel (the ones that vanished during the Babylonian Captivity), who came to the Americas and settled in, but eventually the more pious among them were outnumbered by the more sinful members, who were polluted by other Indians, and eventually perished, leaving behind only the gold plates that Joseph Smith allegedly found with the help of the angel Moroni.
The LDS are always seeking to prove this rather farfetched theory to the scientific world, and hired my colleague to supewrvise the dig, rather than someone from BYU that would not be considered a credible source to the "Gentile" or non-Mormon world. Eventually they dug up some cylinder seals, which are pieces of pottery that have glyphs pressed into them which will leave a seal in wax or fresh clay with the name of the authority, author or priest. Cylinder seals are pretty common in societies in India, Egypt, Mesopotamia and Mesoamerica, but some authority mentioned that some of the characters pressed into one or two of the cylinders resembled cuneiform writing, such as one sees in Mesopotamia. The sponsors in Salt Lake went ape, and offered my friend a huge amount to bribe the locals to dig up more stuff at the site of the oldest pyramid, which was unfortunately directly under a the main church, built in the late 1500's, one of the oldest in the area.By then, he had married the oldest daughter of the Mayor and head PRI (Partido REvolucionario Institutional) boss, which gave him a lot of power as a respected anthropologist and authority
My friend was convinced that the resemblance of the images on the seals was a coincidence, and refused to destroy the colonial chuch to prove what he was by then convinced was a bogus theory. So far as I know, the Chaipa del Corzo Church is still, intact, sitting atop the remains of a 13th century pyramid.