In the 15th century, Europeans landed on one of the coasts of the Canary Islands. They expected to meet Africans here, but they saw tall, fair-skinned people with gray-blue eyes and red and blonde hair. Later it turned out that the local population, on the one hand, has cultural traditions, in many respects similar to some European ones. On the other hand, their life cannot be called civilized. And if we add here their absolute inability to build ships, then an assumption arises - maybe these are the descendants of some developed civilization who survived the catastrophe and decided not to try to curb the sea anymore. A civilization such as Atlantis.
For the first time, Europeans appeared on one of the islands of the archipelago in 1360. Some of them were taken prisoner by local residents. However, the Guanches treated the prisoners quite kindly. In addition, they did not have any firearms or at least some metal weapons. Although they were quite adept at handling their blade-sharp weapons made of volcanic stone.
Thorough conquest of the islands began a little later - in 1402. It was a merciless struggle that has been fought for almost a hundred years. From the 20,000 natives at the time of their complete conquest, very few representatives remained, who, moreover, very quickly assimilated with the Europeans who settled on the islands.
Now it is customary to call the indigenous population of all the Carnar Islands by the name of the Guanches. However, they were still different tribes, they even differed in some cultural traditions. So, for example, on one of the islands monogamy was adopted as the norm, while on the other - polygamy, and on the third - polyandry. There were also differences in the systems of community governance, languages and beliefs. The Guanches lived on the now most famous island - Tenerife. The very word "guanches" is translated as "children of the volcano." There is also one ancient legend about this, according to which the first inhabitants of the island descended from the mountain-volcano.
As a rule, the inhabitants of the islands chose suitable caves as their habitation. But on some islands, people built stone houses for themselves. Writings were found on the walls of the caves. But researchers believe that the locals were not at that level of development to create their own writing. Most likely, the writing appeared here even before the appearance of the Guanches. It was not possible to decipher them due to the insufficient number of samples found. What scientists were able to figure out is the similarity of the Canarian writing samples with the Phoenician, Numidian and Old Libyan writing.
Further, they found out that some of the rites of the Guanches are similar to Babylonian, the method of mummification is Peruvian, crafts are ancient Greek, and the pyramids found are Egyptian. Quite recently, scientists, when studying the blood group of Canary mummies, found that their longtime relatives lived in northwestern Europe.
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Here the language of the Guanches is not similar to any other known at the moment. The inhabitants of the islands communicated by means of whistles, which could be transmitted over very long distances - up to 50 kilometers. When people were nearby, they talked, barely moving their lips, and practically without making any sounds. Among the modern inhabitants of the Canary Islands, you can still find people who know the language of their ancestors.
Another mystery of the Guanches is the fact that they did not use sea traffic at all - even with the nearby islands. There is a version that because of the once-severe catastrophe associated with the water element experienced by their ancestors, fear of the ocean remained in the memory of the tribes. In this regard, Atlantis is often remembered, and the Guanches are called the shepherds of the Atlanteans, who managed to escape from the sinking mainland. Perhaps this explains the fact that goats, sheep, pigs and dogs appeared from somewhere among the local population. And also their look completely unlike other African tribes.