Finding Atlantis
Since the time of the ancient Greeks, the mystery of Atlantis has not ceased to excite mankind. The eternal question has been around for 2500 years.
For the first time, the great ancient Greek philosopher Plato wrote about Atlantis, and today's researchers and seekers of the sunken island rely on his writings. Everything that Plato knew about the mysterious Atlantis is told in his two dialogues "Critias" and "Timaeus". In them, Plato's ancestor Critias recalled the conversations of the ancient Greek sage Solon with an unnamed priest from Egypt. The conversation took place in the 6th century BC. The Egyptian reported, referring to the sacred Egyptian texts, about the great country Atlantis that existed behind the Pillars of Hercules, and died in a terrible catastrophe.
“… There was an island that lay in front of that strait, which in your language is called the Pillars of Hercules. This island was larger than Libya and Asia taken together … On this island, called Atlantis, a great and amazing alliance of kings appeared, whose power extended over the entire island … they took possession of Libya up to Egypt and Europe up to Tyrrenia … But later when the time came for unprecedented earthquakes and floods … Atlantis disappeared, sank into the abyss. After that, the sea in those places has become to this day unnavigable and inaccessible due to the shallowing caused by the huge amount of silt left behind by the settled island (Timaeus).
“9000 years ago there was a war between those peoples who lived on the other side of the Pillars of Hercules, and all those who lived on this side … At the head of the latter was our state (that is, Athens), and at the head of the former were the kings of the island of Atlantis; as we have already mentioned, it was once an island larger than Libya and Asia, but now it collapsed due to earthquakes and turned into an impenetrable silt that blocks the way for sailors "(" Critias ").
Since ancient times, supporters and opponents of the existence of Atlantis have appeared. The hypothesis was supported by Pliny the Elder and Diodorus Siculus, the opponents were Aristotle and the geographer Strabo. The controversy continues today - the number of published works about Atlantis exceeds 5000, and there are more than 10,000 versions about where Atlantis is. To this must be added a lot of occult-theosophical speculations on the topic of Atlantis, and a large number of "studies" by amateurs- " Atlantologists ", whose activity, as A. Goreslavsky wrote," did more harm than good, because through their efforts the most interesting problem of ancient civilization has completely passed into the category of scientific curiosities."
As soon as the "experts on Atlantis" were swaggering: attributing to all the peoples of the world origin from the Atlanteans, they called them space aliens, considered the Atlanteans "ancient Rus", endowed them with some incredible wisdom and "secret knowledge", etc. Well, “Unfortunate people! - can be repeated after the Marquis de Custine. "They need to be delusional to be happy."
By the way, Plato called Atlantis an island, and it does not follow from his texts that it was a whole continent. It is also absolutely obvious from Plato's text that the civilization of Atlantis is the same archaic civilization of the Bronze Age as the civilizations of Ancient Egypt, Hittites, Mycenae, the Indus Valley, Mesopotamia. The Atlanteans had kings and priests, they made sacrifices to the pagan gods, fought wars, their army was armed with spears. The Atlanteans were engaged in irrigation of fields with the help of canals, they were engaged in the construction of sea vessels, they processed metals: copper, tin, bronze, gold and silver. On a large scale, they probably did not use iron. At least Plato did not mention him. Therefore, inventions about a certain "highly developed" civilization of the Atlanteans can only evoke sympathy.
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It is also doubtful that Atlantis could have existed in 9,000 BC. It was noted long ago and rightly that at that time “there were no Egyptians who could leave records of these events, nor Greeks who allegedly performed their feats”. The first traces of Neolithic culture in Lower Egypt date back to about the 5th millennium BC, and the peoples who spoke Greek appeared in Greece only in the 2nd millennium BC. It turns out that the Atlanteans simply could not in 9600 BC. to fight with the Greeks, since the Greeks did not exist yet. The entire set of facts that are given in Plato's story does not allow us to attribute the time of the Atlantean civilization beyond the 2nd millennium BC.
In accordance with Plato's instructions, Atlantis was placed behind the Pillars of Hercules - the Strait of Gibraltar, in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. Small archipelagos - Azores, Canary and Bahamas - were called the remains of a sunken continent.
• An event in 1898 made a lot of noise when, during the laying of a telegraph cable between Europe and the United States, a French ship 560 miles north of the Azores lifted a rock from the ocean floor, which when checked turned out to be a piece of glassy volcanic lava. Such lava can only form on land at atmospheric pressure. By the method of radiocarbon analysis, it was established that the eruption of a mysterious volcano took place approximately 13,000 years BC. But apart from lava, nothing else was found in this place.
• 1979 - the Soviet research ship “Moscow University” took a number of photographs of the Ampere seamount. The remains of some artificial structures were captured on them. But this secret remained unsolved. In addition, serious doubts arose about the correctness of the interpretation of the images in the photographs - most likely, it could be the natural topography of the seabed.
• After the discovery of America, it was assumed that this continent is the legendary Atlantis. Such a hypothesis, in particular, was made by Francis Bacon.
• H. Schulten in 1922 came up with the idea that Atlantis should be understood as the city of seafarers, known in ancient times, Tartessus, located in Spain, at the mouth of the Guadalquivir River, and which sank under water about 500 BC.
• In the 30s, XX century, A. Herrmann suggested that Atlantis was on the territory of modern Tunisia and was covered with the sands of the Sahara.
• A scientist from France F. Gidon put forward a hypothesis that the legend of Atlantis tells the story of the sinking into the sea of the northwestern French coast. 1997 - this assumption was revived and developed by a Russian scientist, member of the Geographical Society V. Kudryavtsev, who expressed a hypothesis that as a result of this event the so-called Celtic shelf was flooded - the bottom of the modern North Sea between France and South England. This shelf is shallow and has some semblance of a submerged coastline.
Almost in the center of this flooded area is the Little Sol Bank - a notable underwater hill, on which, according to Kudryavtsev, the capital of Atlantis was located: "a city located on a hill with a precipice towards the sea." True, according to Kudryavtsev's hypothesis, Atlantis is not an island, but a part of the European continent, but the author of the study believes that there were no separate words in the ancient Egyptian language to convey the concepts of "land" and "island".
At the end of the ice age, as a result of the rise in ocean level, a significant area in western Europe was under water, on which Atlantis was located, which was the center of a highly developed culture. Attempts to link the death of Atlantis with the rise in the level of the World Ocean after the melting of glaciers have always met with serious objections. It is believed that this increase was gradual and occurred at different rates over several thousand years.
Critics of this hypothesis assured that the flooding associated with this increase could not match the catastrophic nature described by Plato: "Atlantis died … in one terrible day and one night."
But Plato says: "Then … there were earthquakes and floods of extraordinary destructive power, and in one terrible day and one night all your soldiers were swallowed up by the earth, and the island of Atlantis was also swallowed up by the sea and disappeared." The plural mention of the earthquakes and floods accompanying the catastrophe shows that the catastrophe did not occur in one day.
• 1988 - American paleoglaciologist H. Heinrich published data that were obtained from the study of bottom sediments in the North Atlantic, which indicated that at least six times during the last ice age there were large-scale rapid ice disappearance into the ocean from the territory of present-day Canada. Judging by what is said about many millions of cubic kilometers of ice, such events could not but lead to a noticeable rise in ocean levels.
• 1953 - German pastor J. Spanut put forward a version that Atlantis was in the Baltic Sea, near the island of Helgoland. He based his assumption on the fact that in this place at a depth of eight meters, in the highest part of the Steingrund ridge, the remains of a destroyed settlement were found.
• The version that Atlantis is Antarctica was recently put forward by Rand Flem-Ath from America. He drew attention to Plato's phrase that from Atlantis “it was easy to move to other islands, and from them - to the entire opposite continent, which borders the true ocean. After all, the sea on this side of the Strait of Gibraltar is only a bay with a narrow passage into it. Flem-At made the assumption that Plato's Atlantis was in Antarctica. And he made an argument in favor of his assumption. Comparison of the configuration of the legendary island with the outlines of Antarctica, according to Flem-Ata, shows their striking similarity. And although on the ancient Egyptian map Atlantis is placed in the Atlantic Ocean, Flem-At believes that this is a mistake, which Plato also believed.
Traditionally, Antarctica is believed to have been covered with ice for the past 50 million years. However, in 90 of the XX century, geologists found the remains of trees frozen into the ice, 2-3 million years old. And on the famous Piri Reis map, compiled in 1513, Antarctica is depicted without ice. On the map of Orontius Finney, compiled in 1531, mountain ranges and rivers are indicated on Antarctica. Thus, it is possible that Antarctica in the memory of mankind was ice-free. And the catastrophe that happened with Atlantis-Antarctica was the same catastrophe when the earth's poles shifted.
• More substantiated today is the version that the metropolis of Atlantis was the island of Santorini in the Aegean Sea, and the civilization of Atlantis is identified with the Cretan-Minoan civilization. True, like everyone else, this hypothesis has some stretching, but it is confirmed by numerous data from archeology, history and geophysics.
• 1780 - The hypothesis that Atlantis was located in the Eastern Mediterranean was first expressed by Bortolli from Italy.
• At the end of the 19th century, excavations by scientists from France drew attention to the island of Santorini. The central part of Santorini was submerged many years ago, and the remains of it today are three islands - Thira, Thirassia and Aspronisi. Archaeological finds indicated that a fairly high culture once flourished here. The inhabitants of Santorini knew the system of measures and the system of calculation, they mined lime and were engaged in the construction of complex vaulted structures, painted the walls with frescoes. They successfully developed agriculture, weaving, and pottery.
Santorini may have been one of the centers of the Cretan-Minoan civilization. About 1500 BC this civilization was at its peak. The inhabitants of Crete early mastered the processing of metals and began to trade in them. Crete is believed to have been the first major European metalworking center. The methods of farming in Crete and in Atlantis described by Plato practically coincide. There are many other coincidences - in the political structure, social and cultural life.
The capital of the Cretan-Minoan state was Knossos - the "Great City", glorified by Homer. The Cretan fleet dominated the sea, and extensive trade and numerous wars contributed to the strengthening of the state. Around 1580-1500 BC Aegeus, king of Athens, was defeated by the Cretan king Minos, and Athens was forced to pay tribute to Crete. But suddenly the Cretan civilization ceased to exist …
• 1972 - L. Figuy suggested that the legendary Atlantis is an island in the Aegean archipelago, sunk as a result of a geological catastrophe. This island could only be Santorini, part of which sank into the sea, and the rest was covered with a thick layer of volcanic pumice.
• 1909, January 19 - K. Frost published in the London Times his version that Plato's story about Atlantis is a literary and philosophical story about the death of the Cretan-Minoan civilization. Further excavations and research have shown that around 1520 BC. a volcano explosion occurred on Santorini, as a result of which the central part of the island was destroyed and flooded. The explosion caused catastrophic consequences throughout the Mediterranean. The Minoan state suffered the most. Villages and fields were buried under volcanic ash and slag, dozens of cities were washed into the sea by a giant tsunami …
But what about the date of the death of Atlantis - 9,000 years ago from the date of Solon's conversation with the Egyptian priests? If we take 1,500 BC as the date of the catastrophe, it turns out that the destruction of Atlantis took place not 9,000, but 900 years ago. Such an error, according to the researchers, could appear due to the difference in the systems of calculation used in Egypt and Greece.
So what is the secret of Atlantis revealed? Most likely, no one will dare to approve this. Although the "Crete-Minoan" version explains almost everything Plato said, questions still remain. And along with them the mystery remains …