On the medieval maps of Fra Mauro and Piri Reis, near Ceylon (Sri Lanka), located at the southern tip of Hindustan, there is another large island called Taprobana. This land is several times larger than Sri Lanka. At the same time, there is no island in the ocean today that could be mistaken for the mysterious Taprobana.
Ancient authors knew about the existence of a large land mass lying to the south of India. So, Pomponius Mela writes that it is not known exactly whether this is an island or "the beginning of another world." Pliny reports that in Taproban, shadows are cast to the south, and the sun is moving in the other direction. So the mysterious land was in the southern hemisphere!
You can also cite the information of Marco Polo. True, he mentioned only Ceylon, but at the same time described it as the largest island in the world, giving dimensions several times larger than the real ones, while claiming that in antiquity it was even more extensive.
Preserved information about the second earth near Ceylon and in the surviving almost unchanged Buddhist "models of the world" (mandalas). At the same time, the mysterious island is called Saran-dvipa, which is very similar to the ancient Arabic name of Sri Lanka - Serendiba. By the way, Ceylon itself began to be called Sri Lanka relatively recently. But the name "Lanka" is already contained in the "Ramayana", which tells about the events that took place more than three thousand years ago. Including about the conquest of Lanka by the god Rama.
Long before the arrival of the Indo-European conquerors, the Aryans, to Hindustan, peoples who spoke Dravidian languages lived here. But the Dravidians were not the original inhabitants of India. They came to this country a couple of thousand years before the Aryans. Most likely, it was the Dravids who created the first civilization in the Indus Valley, which is now called so - proto-Indian.
But another mystery is connected with the Dravidians. This large people, who inhabited the whole subcontinent, came from completely out of nowhere and has no close relatives anywhere else on Earth (in this they are similar to the Sumerians). The Dravids are very distantly related to both the Indo-Europeans and the Ural-Altaians, but this is a very gray antiquity, about 10-12 thousand years ago. or even more. But by the time they came to India, they were already a completely separate ethnic group.
The most interesting thing is that their resettlement took place, apparently, from south to north. So where did they come from? With the disappeared Taprobana? By the way, Tamils, who inhabit the very South of India and Ceylon, have legends about the “great exodus” led by the god Shiva. Mentioned in their mythology and about the land sunk in the ocean.
The Babylonian priest Berossus during the time of Alexander the Great wrote about the ancient deity Oanne, who came to people directly from the depths of the sea. God, who looked like a large fish covered with scales, taught people many crafts, writing, agriculture.
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By the way, it is interesting that among the Phoenicians who lived on the shores of the Mediterranean Sea in the region of modern Lebanon and Palestine, the god Dagon, who had a fish-like lower body, was "responsible" for agriculture (this made him look like mermaids). Some researchers associate Oanna with one of the three main gods of Sumer - the lord of the underworld and waters, the god of fertility Ea, or Enki. It was Enki, according to the ideas of the ancient Sumerians, who taught people crafts, he also advised the local prototype of the biblical Noah to build an ark before the Flood.
There is a point of view that Ea was inherited by the Sumerians from the Ubaid people who lived in southern Mesopotamia even earlier. This people is associated with other ancient inhabitants of these lands, the Elamites. There is one more point worth noting here. There is a point of view that the Elamite language is closest to the Dravidian language. So, for example, many Sumerian cities in the name contained the particle "Ur". These are Nippur, Uruk and “just” Ur. At the same time in some Dravidian languages "ur" means "village". Of course, this may be a simple coincidence, and the connection of the Proto-Sumerians and Elamites with the Dravidians today is only one of the hypotheses. But what is known for sure - the Ubaid people began the development of the territory of Mesopotamia from the southern coast and river mouths. Moreover, they were initially good sailors.
Another thread from the mysterious southern land stretches to Egypt. In the rock carvings that have come down to us, one can find drawings of ships that were not used by the Egyptians. They are flat-bottomed vessels with a steeply curved stern and bow. Similar ships, according to the news of the Sumerians, visited Mesopotamia. At the same time, they sailed from the southern island, which was called Dilmun. Where exactly this island was located is unknown to us. But that's not all. The same ships, it turns out, are depicted on seals related to the proto-Indian culture! There are too many coincidences, don't you think?
There are other reasons for the existence of a large land in the Indian Ocean. This is the similarity of the geological structure of India and South Africa, and the analogy in the flora and fauna of Madagascar and Asia. But in this case we are not at all interested. After all, both the geological structure and the similarity of the animal and plant world could well have survived with the disappearance of "Lemuria" millions, or at least hundreds of thousands of years ago. Of course, in this case, this country would have very few chances to get on the maps of Piri Reis and Fra Mauro.
So why did Taprobana disappear? Of course, it could be an earthquake or some other natural disaster. But here the epic and sacred books of the Indians are of particular interest. Thus, the "Ramayana" testifies to the use of "heavenly weapons", "fiery chariots", etc. in wars in the south. Some of the descriptions are suspiciously reminiscent of missile and bomb attacks, including nuclear strikes. A well-known example is Mohenjo-Daro, which bears traces of a possible atomic explosion. And in Madagascar, there is an increased background radiation.
And the similar legends and the history of settlement among different peoples, first of all, the Dravids and Ubaid people, make one think about it. Still, it can hardly be called typical settlement of the territory from south to north, given that the sea lies in the south and there is no big land. And it is possible that the gods Oanna and Dagon really once long ago taught the crafts, agriculture and writing of the aborigines of the wild planet, on which their wrecked spaceship splashed down.
