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On the Trail to Atlantis
Bifurcati writes "Scientists claim to have found the lost city of Atlantis, off the coast of Cyprus. They apparently have used sonar to detect the sunken landmass, and even identify geographical features. They seem confident, but all the same, I wouldn't go buying Atlantian artifacts on Ebay just yet."
Oooh... it was bugging me, so I looked some more; this isn't from the documentary but I'm pretty sure they're talking about the same place:
http://www.aarp.org/destinations/Articles/a2002-05 -22-destinations_santorini.html
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Article from the Guardian with more details
Personally, I don't see this turning into much. Claims like this have been made before, without much coming of it. The details are short, which is generally not a good sign for something like this.
That's scary.
Atlantis is nothing more then the combination of 2 events.
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i .h tm.
1) The explosion of the volcano on the greek island Santorini, which sunk part of that island
2) The end of the Minoan civilization
http://visibleearth.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/viewrecord
Quote:
" The eruption of Santorini in 1650 B.C. was one of the largest in the last 10,000 years...The eruption probably caused the end of the Minoan civilization on the island of Crete, and may be the source of the myth of Atlantis."
and
http://www.decadevolcano.net/santorini/santorin
-- TRUST ME! I KNOW WHAT I'M DOING!
Undeniably, the Theran eruption was catastrophic (something like Krakatoa), and around about 1600BC. On Crete, the tidal surge shifted huge stone blocks on the coast. However, the decline of Minoan civilisation is difficult to date (and the source of notoriously vigorous debate amongst archaeologists). The Theran eruption is not generally considered to have marked the catastrophic end of the Minoans. Makes a good Discovery channel story though.
Atlantis was a didactic figure composed by Plato in order to contrast the civic values of Athens. It's hard to imagine that Plato didn't have his tongue in his cheek when he claimed to have the story third hand from some guy who knew some guy who had heard the story in exotic Egypt.
Hope Mr Sarmast enjoys his boat ride.
Atlantis was mentioned by more than Plato. It was in Herodotus' writings as well, and he claimed the Egyptians recorded its existence (he studied in Egypt). Among the description given was that it was populated by pygmy elephants. Surprise, surprise, but the remains of pygmy elephants have been discovered on several Cycladean islands.
The island in the Mediterranean (and, btw, Cyprus is an island in the Mediterranean) that an earlier poster referred to is the modern island of Santorini.
Santorini/Fira was part of the Minoan civilization. The volcanoic eruption there that buried the city on the island and likely destroyed the Minoan civilization was far larger than Krakatoa, in fact one of the largest eruptions ever. The Minoans were contemporaries of the ancient Egyptians, and had a marvelous culture. They had little in the way of barriers or fortifications or, as far as we can tell today, much of a military presence. Of course it's hard to be sure, but they seemed to have focused mostly on trade, and their the remains of their language Linear B as found on tablets seems to have been used for inventory records and transactions. They had lively and beautiful arts, their women went around with bustiers showing off their uncovered breasts, and they had bull-dancers who, instead of slaughtering a bull with shaven horns by wearing him down with picodrs and men on armored horses with spears before allowing the 'brave' torero into the ring, performed gymnastics over and on top of the wild bulls. They also had indoor plumbing, including toilets.
What Atlantis is represented as today is a myth. That doesn't mean it wasn't originally routed in what most people at the time would have found to be a balmy paradise.
As I was writing this I found a good general overview site for Alantis which is a lot more readable than the wikipedia link. Atlantis Info Apparently the website was listed as one of the 50 best science sites by pop sci magazine, so despite it's conspiracy theory-esque look, it seems to be a credible source.
The sending of this message pretty much inconveniences everyone involved.
A self-styled "scientist" (not scientists) claims to think he might know where Atlantis is, and is about to start looking. That's not the same thing as having found it. The English gramtical construct "believes Atlantis found off Cyprus" means that he thinks it will be found there - ie, he thinks it's there - not that he has already found it.
The article is a whole 5 sentences, and is very clear.
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The reason is that since the seas around the area are full of ancient artifacts, the Greek government would like to avoid everyone diving in and getting a piece of the action. Licenced archaeologists are able to do research, however.
Mother is the best bet and don't let Satan draw you too fast.
After being to the site of Akrotiri, I have to say: The town of Akrotiri has been destroyed by the volcano several times and rebuilt again and again. Curiously the last findings show wellpreserved walls with beautiful paintings, large storage areas with amphores filled with crops, but no money, no jewels, no dead men and only a small amount of tools. All the buildings are about the same age and have been buried only a few years after they were built. All this is nice for the tourists, but rather disappointing for the archaeologists, because money is a quite good base to set up a timeline and find out about trading routes, and tools are some of the most important things to tell about the niveau of knowledge in a society and to determine cultural roots and relations to other cultures.
So the theory goes this: When Akrotiri finally was covered by the volcanic outbreak in 1600 BC, the really big bang that destroyed the island was already history, and the people were already in progress to rebuilt it, thus all buildings are about the same age. It was not inhabited anymore. It was a ghost town, where the inhabitants went away before the next outbreak which seemed to be near, taking with them only the things they could carry: Tools, money, jewels, and the animals which could walk on their own. It seems that the last outbreak of the volcano had told them a lesson, and the people of Akrotiri were prepared.
So if Thera/Santorini was the site of the legendary Atlantis, then all the ancient wisdom the Atlanteans possessed hasn't been lost, but spread around by the people fleeing Akrotiri. So either Thera wasn't Atlantis at all, or the famous Atlantean wisdom wasn't lost by the destroying of their home, but it influenced stronger than before the surrounding settlements and ancient towns.
Yeah, an awful lot of people back then were made to look very silly when Schliemann found the Tell that is reckoned to have been Troy (it might not have been though, there is no way to know for sure until we find the fuck off great big "Welcome to Troy" sign in the outskirts, which is unlikely to happen, given the techniques of Schliemann and those that followed him[1]). The tale of Atlantis does seem to be partly based on fact and partly allegorical, so there is some basis to the tale, as Plato got the tale from Aristotle, IIRC, who got the story from the Egyptian records. However Plato's Atlantis probably bears as much similarity to the "real" Atlantis as More's Utopia or Butler's Erewhon have to any real world location. The Santorini Hypothesis seems, to me, to be the most likely hypothesis, being the straw that broke the camels back and finally destabilised the trading circle of Mycenae, Minos, the Egytians and the Hittites. Given that the Minoans had been in decline for a long time before hand the eruption probably managed to finish off what remnants were left, and the loss of this trading partner dealt a fatal blow to the Myceneans(thus starting the Greek Dark Ages) and the Hittites. The Egyptians, being the only one of these civilisations to avoid a decline and survive until classical times, and also being anal retentive records keepers, would have recorded these events. Given that the Santorini event would have sent waves all the way to the Egyptian Mediterranean coast, it is not inconceivable that they would have conflated the freak waves with the sudden breakdown of their trading network, thus a civilisation sinking beneath the waves. Plato's Atlantis was pretty much made up, and the reason that he located it in the Atlantic rather than the Med is because, to the Greeks and even the Romans, the Atlantic was the edge of the world, so halfway between this world and the next, a suitable setting for the unlikeliest things to occur (see many Roman quotes about their then new colony of Britannia), so any "evidence" contained in Platos account of Atlantis is tenuous at best, as he was not telling a story to entertain and tell of the great deed of the Heroes of Old, as Homer was (oral traditions and epics such as that often have some basis in fact, such as the Irish epics and the Epic of Gilgamesh), he was telling the story to make a philosophical point, just like the rest of his dialogues. Oh, and to the spods who ask why it is called Atlantis if it was not in the Atlantic, its simple, the ocean was named for the place in the story rather than the other way round. I, personally, suspect that Sarmast is either another Von Daniken (a scummy chancer fleecing the fuckwits) or Berlitz(who is so full of shit that its surprising he hasn't had a rectal prolapse), but, without reading his Book(why no peer reviewed scientific paper I wonder, Schliemann submitted his shit for review, even though most people thought he was nuts), I couldn't conclusively try to blow him out of the water.
I don't believe it: Atlantis was predicted to be found in 2012!
And people have searched for it and failed for centuries. Maybe there's a lesson to be learned from that ;-)
"Scientists claim to have found the lost city of Atlantis, off the coast of Cyprus"
I thought that the popular theory was that Atlantis was actually in Antarctica. Antarctica once had a tropical climate, and there are remains of tropical rainforests there today.
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You also said:
Plato didn't say they were pygmy elephants, just elephants.Yeah, an awful lot of people back then were made to look very silly when Schliemann found the Tell that is reckoned to have been Troy (it might not have been though, there is no way to know for sure until we find the fuck off great big "Welcome to Troy" sign in the outskirts, which is unlikely to happen, given the techniques of Schliemann and those that followed him[1]).
The tale of Atlantis does seem to be partly based on fact and partly allegorical, so there is some basis to the tale, as Plato got the tale from Socrates[1], IIRC, who got the story from the Egyptian records. However Plato's Atlantis probably bears as much similarity to the "real" Atlantis as More's Utopia or Butler's Erewhon have to any real world location.
The Santorini Hypothesis seems, to me, to be the most likely hypothesis, being the straw that broke the camels back and finally destabilised the trading circle of Mycenae, Minos, the Egytians and the Hittites. Given that the Minoans had been in decline for a long time before hand the eruption probably managed to finish off what remnants were left, and the loss of this trading partner dealt a fatal blow to the Myceneans(thus starting the Greek Dark Ages) and the Hittites.
The Egyptians, being the only one of these civilisations to avoid a decline and survive until classical times, and also being anal retentive records keepers, would have recorded these events. Given that the Santorini event would have sent waves all the way to the Egyptian Mediterranean coast, it is not inconceivable that they would have conflated the freak waves with the sudden breakdown of their trading network, thus a civilisation sinking beneath the waves.
Plato's Atlantis was pretty much made up, and the reason that he located it in the Atlantic rather than the Med is because, to the Greeks and even the Romans, the Atlantic was the edge of the world, so halfway between this world and the next, a suitable setting for the unlikeliest things to occur (see many Roman quotes about their then new colony of Britannia).
So any "evidence" contained in Plato's account of Atlantis is tenuous at best, as he was not telling a story to entertain and tell of the great deed of the Heroes of Old, as Homer was (oral traditions and epics such as that often have some basis in fact, such as the Irish epics and the Epic of Gilgamesh), he was telling the story to make a philosophical point, just like the rest of his dialogues.
Oh, and to the spods who ask why it is called Atlantis if it was not in the Atlantic, its simple, the ocean was named for the place in the story rather than the other way round.
I, personally, suspect that Sarmast is either another Von Daniken (a scummy chancer fleecing the fuckwits) or Berlitz(who is so full of shit that its surprising he hasn't had a rectal prolapse), but, without reading his Book(why no peer reviewed scientific paper I wonder, Schliemann submitted his shit for review, even though most people thought he was nuts), I couldn't conclusively try to blow him out of the water.
[1] Not, as I said before Aristotle, I always get those two mixed up for some reason
The two dialogs of Plato's which describe Atlantis are the Timeaeus and Critias. It is on-line at: Atlantis
The Timeaeus only refers to Atlantis in two paragraphs. The Critias has a longer description, but it ends in the middle of the dialogue.
You can draw your own conclusions.
Indeed. Having done some digging on this, the Mayans apparently had an incredibly stupid calendar system. Instead of using the concept of "zero as a placeholder" to get infinite years (which I believe they had discovered), they just kept adding more "layers" (like our days/weeks/months/years) on top. The uppermost cycle is only the uppermost because their civilization collapsed before they got to wrap the counter and add another layer on top.
There's a detailed discussion of the Piri Reis map here which shows these claims are almost certainly false.
Blasphemy! It's "MacGyver" NOT "McGyver".
;)
Arrrrrrh!
*rips out hair*
best.show.ever
Okay, I studied Greek Archaeology in Athens for a semester. The current top contender for the Atlantis place is the island of Thera now called Santorini. The place blew up due to a volcanic eruption around the time of the Minoan civilization (around 1500 BCE). The town of Akrotiri on the island was completely buried in volcanic ash and a formerly round large isalnd turned into a cresent remnant. Most valuable items had been removed and few remains were found, so it seems that people had time to get away (unlike Pompei).
Currently Santorini is an overly touristy destination with fabulous views over the flooded caldera of the volcano. Said volcano is still active and there was a large earthquake in the 1950's.
Anyway, both articles (actually really just news teasers) are VERY light on details. Why does the Cyprus location scream out Atlantis? Is the any evidence of manmade artifacts? City structures? What does a "sunken" land mass mean?
In the fine tradtion of Heinrich Schleiman (sp) discover of the Tomb of Atreus and the Lion Gate at Mycenae, I think this "scientist" is trying to hype his research into getting better funding/research money. But hey, maybe he has found it. We'll see.
Here it is: http://www.discoveryatlantis.com/. The story submitter's links sucked. The first was only one paragraph and misspelled Sarmast's last name, the second was hardly better. The wiki reference was ok for background info. Anyway, here's the press release that started it all, http://www.discoveryofatlantis.com/800/press.htm, and from there are links to some actual bathymetric maps, etc., of the region: sea level lower 1.6 km, 3D seafloor, and others.
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