In the hope that they would get help in their efforts to escape from Lamanite bondage, King Limhi told Ammon that, in dire distress, he had chosen forty-three of "my people" to go to Zarahemla and seek assistance to that end.
The men Limhi selected became lost in the surrounding wilderness; they did not know the proper way to travel, nor the distance between Lehi-Nephi and Zarahemla. They only knew it was far to the north and traveled for many days in that direction. At last they reached a land "of many waters."
In this land, they found the remains of a great people. There, they discovered the ruins of many buildings. Scattered among the broken arches and displaced columns of a strange architecture they came across the dry bones of great numbers of men who had evidently fallen in battle. The sacred record describes them as, "a people who were as numerous as the hosts of Israel."
To prove to Limhi that the discovery they had made was true, and that their supposition was correct in which they supposed that their brethren in Zarahemla were all destroyed in battle, they brought back with them many relics of these dead people.
Among the proofs of their surmise were many artifacts used by their supposed brethren. They carried back to King Limhi in Lehi-Nephi, copper breastplates which were undamaged by age and were yet sound; they also brought swords whose hilts were decayed and gone, and the blades thereof were corroded with rust.
But, by far, the most important of their finds was a set of twenty-four gold plates, which they brought with them on their return. These gold plates were filled with engravings written in a strange language which no one in King Limhi's domain could translate. Again and again, he sought their interpretation; he felt that in them was hidden a great mystery. The anxiety to learn what this mystery was, greatly induced Limhi to ask Ammon once more, "Canst thou translate?"