The Real Story of Hitler in Argentina...

Ancient cities hidden in the jungles of South America or spending the rest of eternity on the ocean floor – lost civilizations have fascinated mankind since the days of Plato. Spanish gold, precious stones, and priceless sculptures keep treasure hunters funded, if the movies are to be believed, and every discovery of a pottery shard or the ruins of a temple is making an archaeologist’s dream come true while causing endless delays for commuters and construction crews who really just want to finish that highway they’ve been working on for the last 10 years.

The dream of utopian cities filled with advanced technology and superior beings have been with us for centuries. However, as the New World lost its shine, and the world just became smaller, undiscovered lands and civilizations became harder to find. Instead, mankind turned to the stars to find their ideal civilization on planets yet to be discovered – but give the Enterprise a chance, they’ll get there – or a past so distant, any trace of its existence has long disappeared. One such place is the fabled lost city of Atlantis.

We’ve all heard the tales of Atlantis. Some stories claim the Atlanteans were alien, arrivals from the Lyrian star system around 50 000 years ago. They had advanced technology and lived for 800 years. There was a war, Atlantis was destroyed, and the survivors fled to Agartha.

Noah was an Atlantean, for those of you who didn’t know. Others believe that Atlantis was the original Garden of Eden and the Atlanteans were angles. Atlantis was a space ship that crashed into the planet. The Atlanteans had supernatural abilities to control the weather.

And if you ever feel like you don’t quite belong – don’t worry about it, you’re probably a descendent of Atlantis or a reincarnated Atlantean. In fact, there are so many conspiracy theories about Atlantis, we would need to dedicate and entire channel to Atlantis to get cover all of them.

However, after some reading on the subject, I despaired for the future of mankind so, if you want to learn more about Atlantis conspiracies, I fear you’ll need to do it in your own time. Instead, I started wondering – what is the real story of Atlantis and is there any fact to be found in the fiction? Sunken cities are nothing new – the rising sea levels of the last few thousand years and human intervention have left many a city under hundreds of meters of water, some so well preserved that they became tourist destinations, bringing in money long after their demise. So, today, we’ll explore the lost city of Atlantis and determine, once and for all, whether there is any truth to the tale.

The story of Atlantis

The story of Atlantis was written by Greek philosopher Plato, who lived from around 428 – 348 BCE. We don’t know much about Plato’s early life, but we do know that he was born into a wealthy and politically active family which is why he had the luxury of being a philosopher as opposed to being a farmer or a tradesman.

Plato was of the opinion that few people would be able to follow a philosophical argument to its conclusion, but most people enjoy stories, so he used stories to express his philosophical ideas. Two devices come up a lot: Plato often use dialogues in his writing, most involving Socrates, and many of his stories use myths – either existing myths or, if there wasn’t one available to suit whatever he was talking about, he would simply create his own. This is a fairly important detail that many Atlantis believers overlook.

Everything we know about Atlantis comes from two dialogues, the Timaues and the Critias, written by Plato around 360 BCE. Most scholars agree that it was supposed to be a trilogy, but the final dialogue was never written – why it wasn’t finished is a mystery. The dialogues are presented as a conversation between four people: Socrates, a philosopher of note, Timaues, Critias, and Hermocrates, a general from Syracuse.

It’s doubtful this conversation ever happened, so the dialogues are fiction, but all the participants, except for Timaues, were real people. It’s entirely possible that Timaues was real, but there doesn’t seem to be any record of him. Critias was related to Plato, but he had a bit of a sordid history.

He was the ringleader of the Thirty Tyrants, a pro-Spartan group that took control of Athens after Sparta defeated Athens in the Peloponnesian War in 404 BCE. I’m not going to go into detail about this; suffice to say they were called the Thirty Tyrants for a reason. In 403 BCE, Critias was killed.

The fact that Critias, a statesman with great potential, who was corrupted by greed and finally killed in an uprising, tells the story of Atlantis is definitely not a coincidence.

According to the dialogues, the story of Atlantis was told to Solon, an Athenian statesman and poet, by Egyptian priests in Sais during his visit to Egypt. Solon then passed the story to Dropides, the great-grandfather of Critias, and the story was passed from one generation to the next until Critias shared the story in the dialogue written by Plato. Solon was a real person; however, none of his surviving works mention Atlantis. Critias insists a few times that the story he’s about to tell is completely true, and many Atlantis believers claim that the story is true because Plato said it was.

However, Plato said no such thing. The character, Critias, was the one who said it.

The tale begins with Solon’s visit to Egypt, where the priests inform him that the Greeks know very little about their own history and have long forgotten one of the most remarkable events: the Athenian defeat of the Empire of Atlantis, around 9000 years before.

Beyond the Pillars of Hercules, out in the Atlantic Ocean, was an island, the size of Libya and Asia combined. When the gods divided the earth among them, Poseidon was given the island of Atlantis. The idea was that the gods would mould and guide mankind, but we all know how that turned out.

Anyway, Poseidon fell in love with a mortal woman, Cleito, and the two had five pairs of twin sons. In order to make the hill that was home to Cleito secure and to keep her safe, Poseidon created a separate island by breaking off the hill from the rest of the incredibly large island, creating concentric circles of sea and land around this acropolis. Since boatbuilding and sailing wasn’t a thing yet, these channels were impassable, for the time being anyway.

Eventually, the citizens of Atlantis would build bridges and roads as well as channels to allow ships from the great Atlantic to reach the centre island, but I’m guessing by then Cleito wasn’t around to need protection anymore. Being a god though, Poseidon enjoyed his comforts so, on this acropolis of theirs, he created two springs – one warm and one cold.

Once all those pairs of twins were grown, Poseidon divided the island into ten portions. The eldest son, Atlas, was made King while the rest of the sons all served as Princes, each ruling a portion of the island. For many generations, the descendants of the princes ruled not only Atlantis, but other islands and lands in the Mediterranean that they also conquered – as far away as Italy and Egypt.

Atlantis was an Empire of such wealth that had never been seen before and would never be seen again. The island was fruitful providing everything the inhabitants needed – food, perfumes, timber, and precious metals, among them a metal called orichalcum, or mountain copper, a metal that couldn’t be mined anywhere else. The island was also able to support an abundance of rare and exotic wildlife, even herds of elephants. The ancient world really had a thing for elephants.

Of course, all these resources meant that they were a mercantile power to be reckoned with. To top that off, just to make sure that no-one came to mess with their bounty, they had a well-trained and well-equipped army.

The city was breath-taking to behold. Buildings were built with stones of white, black, and red – some in a single colour and others with detailed patterns. The outer wall of the city was covered in brass, the inner circle of the city was covered with tin, and the acropolis itself was covered with mountain copper that gleamed like fire.

In the centre of the acropolis was a temple to Poseidon and Cleito. The exterior of the temple was covered in silver, except the roof spires – those were covered in gold. Inside, the roof had the appearance of ivory, with patterns of gold, silver, and mountain copper.

The remainder of the walls, floors, and pillars that weren’t already covered with something was covered with mountain copper. The temple also contained a golden statue of Poseidon, tall enough to reach the roof, on a chariot driven by six winged steeds and surrounded by 100 Nereids on dolphins. Around the temple were golden statues of the ten princes, their wives, and a whole lot of descendants.

In short, when the sun set, you could probably see the reflection from the moon.

Throughout the city, the people of Atlantis lived in wealth and comfort. They had access to springs, baths, temples, a racecourse, and gardens, chief among these the sacred grove to Poseidon. The city itself was surrounded by a plain which was then circled with mountains. Manmade rivers and channels irrigated farmlands and allowed for the transport of fresh produce and timber to the city. And have no fear – the people in the country-side lived in as much wealth and comfort as those in the city.

Initially, all was well. The people of Atlantis were noble, gentle, and wise. Despite their enormous wealth, they weren’t greedy or materialistic. However, as the demi-god blood got thinned by mortals, things began to change.

The rulers of Atlantis became ambitious and wished to hoard more wealth and more power – the society as a whole became morally corrupt. Zeus saw this moral decay and decided to punish the people of Atlantis. He called the gods together and he said… Well, we don’t know what Zeus had to say on the matter because Plato never finished the Critias.

However, Plato did give us an outline of the story in the Timaues, so we know that the city of Atlantis was trying to conquer all of the Mediterranean. However, the city-state of Athens rose up against Atlantis. Fighting alone, without allies, Athens single-handedly defeated the mighty Empire of Atlantis, freeing the people already conquered and enslaved. Following the victory, earthquakes and floods struck – the mighty warriors of Athens disappeared into the earth, and the glorious Empire of Atlantis sank beneath the waves.

I’m guessing Zeus had something to do with that.

Atlantis in antiquity

There’s no mention of Atlantis anywhere in pre-historic record prior to Plato’s dialogues. Now, I’m sure there are some folk who would like to argue this point and, sure, if you look through history, you’re going to find stories of lost cities and great floods, Noah’s ark comes to mind, but the city of Atlantis is mentioned for the first time by Plato 9000 years after its supposed destruction. There’s no indication that Plato drew on earlier literature and myth for the tale of Atlantis – at least, not consciously.

Writers pick up ideas in the strangest places sometimes but that’s a story for another time. There are a few historical events that could’ve influenced Plato significantly, but we’ll get back to that in a bit.

Only a few writers after Plato, back in the time we call antiquity, seemed to think Atlantis was based on something real. A few mention islands that existed at some point: Aristotle mentions Antilia, Marcellus mentions an island dedicated to Poseidon – some writers refer to it as Poseidonis. Very original, I know.

Diodorus Siculus claimed that the Phoenicians and Etruscans were aware of a big island just outside the Pillars of Hercules that was very lush and fruitful with mountains, rivers, and forests. According to Pliny the Elder, who seems to have had an opinion on everything, this island was located 12 000 km (7400 miles) from Cadiz. Crantor was a philosopher in Plato’s academy who wrote a commentary on Timaeus and believed the story was true and claimed to have seen the pillars in Egypt that contained the story of Atlantis, and Greek biographer Plutarch pointed out that Solon was a real person and he originally intended to document the story after it was told to him and just never got around to it.

Apparently, Solon had spent time with Psenophis of Heliopolis and Sonkhis of Sais, two learned priests in Egypt, and he had heard the story from them. The Greek festival of Pallas Athene, the Panathenaea, celebrates the goddess for saving the city from the nation of Poseidon. Apparently, this cult had been around since at least 125 years before Plato, so the story was already doing the rounds by the time he came along; however, this island is not called Atlantis.

There are a few more examples, but the themes remain fairly similar, and while sources range from the Phoenicians to the druids, it doesn’t appear that anyone hopped a boat to go and find this elusive island.

The story pops up here and there from antiquity, but for the most part, no-one seemed to consider Atlantis to have been a real place. During the Renaissance, both Francis Bacon and Thomas More drew some inspiration from Plato’s tale of Atlantis for their own writing describing utopian societies in the New World, New Atlantis and Utopia, but neither claimed the tale of Atlantis was true. So, if the writers of the past, from Plato all the way through the Renaissance, considered the story of Atlantis to be only that – a story – where does our current idea of Atlantis come from? Well, Simon, I’m glad you asked.

Modern Atlantis

In the early 1800s, there were a few writers who considered Atlantis to be fact; Brasseur de Bourbourg, a French scholar, was among a few who suggested some relationship between Atlantis and Mesoamerica. They laid the groundwork for what was to follow by making that claim we know so well: it was impossible that the native peoples of Mexico and the Americas were responsible for the beautiful art and impressive architecture that dotted the landscape. Instead, it made far more sense that these places were colonies of Atlantis.

Apparently, creating a fictional city and ascribing all the art, architecture, and rich mythology of the region to a people that never existed made more sense than just accepting that it was created by, you know, the non-white, non-European, and non-Christian people that lived there. However, the idea of Atlantis that we have today really got started with one man and that man was Ignatius Donnelly.

In 1882, Ignatius Donnelly, a Philadelphia lawyer turned politician, published his masterpiece: Atlantis: The Antediluvian World. Donnelly was of the opinion that Atlantis had been a real place, not just a myth, and Atlantis’ Neolithic culture was the origin of all ancient civilizations. Of course, only a few select nations in the world were descended of this mighty Atlantis.

Donnelly used a lot of “proof” for this hypothesis. He claimed that the Egyptian and Peruvian mythology was the original religion of Atlantis, he claimed that shared traits in various cultures and the fact that many cultures around the world have similar stories regarding floods and earthquakes could only mean that they share the same ancestral memories. Of course, it could just be that every place with a river, a dam, a sea or settled on a tectonic plate have experienced flooding and earthquakes, but what a boring explanation that is.

The immigrants from Atlantis spread over Europe, Africa, and the Americas. The first Atlantean colony was probably Egypt, and the Phoenician alphabet, the precursor to most European alphabets, were, itself derived from the Atlantis alphabet. There’re about 240 pages more of this, but I’m sure you get the idea.

Of course, once Donnelly started spouting his theories, many decided to jump on the bandwagon and started spreading their own theories. One of these was Madam Blavatsky. If the episode on Agartha is out yet, you’ll recognize the name.

Blavatsky was the founder of the Theosophical society and wrote a book of her own, Secret Doctrine, where she added some esotericism and spiritualism to Donnelly’s crackpot ideas. She depicted the Atlanteans as heroes which, if you read Plato’s version of the story, is the exact opposite of what they actually were – they were the enemies of Greece and morally corrupt. Blavatsky claimed that the Atlanteans were the fourth root race, the Lemurians being the third, and were the ancestors to the fifth and most superior of races – yes, you know where this is going – the Aryan race.

The Third and Fourth root races were full of Cosmic Consciousness, an idea popular with the New Age movement later on.

So, now that we’ve mentioned the Aryan race, you know who’s next. In the 1930s, Heinrich Himmler and Herman Wirth founded the Institute for the Study of Atlantis. Apparently, Himmler was a firm believer in whatever nonsense Blavatsky spouted about the fabled Atlantis; we already know the Reich was obsessed with all things occult, so it’s no surprise that they believed in Atlantis.

While Blavatsky certainly was a strong influence, there were other inspirations for the madness. One such person was Jorg Lanz von Liebenfels who championed Ariosophy, the wisdom of the Aryans, and prophesized the revival of the lost Aryan civilization made up of Nordic “god men”. He wrote about these “god men” in a magazine called Ostara which made its way into the hands of a young Hitler in 1909. In these stories, muscular Aryans defended scantily dressed, blonde damsels in distress from terrifying “ape men” doing whatever ape men do.

In the early 20th century, the Nazi party needed some way to establish their own superiority to justify what they were doing. They decided that rooting themselves in ancient mythology of superior beings was the best plan, so they went about shamelessly appropriating any and every myth to help them in this quest. In order to prove the Aryan myth as true, and the Aryan race as superior, they needed to find the true history and peoples of the original Atlantis.

Among the many myths and religions appropriated by the Nazis was Hindu mythology which, they believed, pointed to hidden societies of ancient Atlantean “secret masters” hidden in India and Tibet. They never found these hidden societies, probably because these societies didn’t want anything to do with them and realized being associated with these loons would be a PR disaster. However, Himmler wasn’t deterred and, in 1938, sent an expedition under the leadership of Ernst Schafer, explorer and zoologist, to the Himalayas.

Inspired by the work of Ferdinand Ossendowski and the ideas of Herman Wirth, who claimed the reason for similar looking symbols in different cultures across the world can be explained by the survivors of Atlantis fleeing to higher places, the expedition was headed to Tibet to find these Atlantean descendants. After some highly scientific research involving measuring people’s heads and comparing facial features to a list of Aryan features, they came to the conclusion that Tibetans were the descendants of Atlantis. Whether the scientists involved really believed this, or whether they told Himmler whatever he wanted to hear so they could go back to actual science, we’ll never know.

Himmler, upon learning this, came to the conclusion that the master race had become weaker due to inbreeding with the locals and needed to be purified – a rather terrifying thought in a Nazi. However, Tibet wasn’t the only home of the Atlanteans. Another archaeologist, Edmund Kiss, believed in the World Ice Theory that claimed the earth collided with the moon at some point and the cataclysm that followed destroyed Atlantis and led to an Ice Age.

The Atlanteans, once again deciding that higher is better, fled to the Andes, and Tiwanaku, in Bolivia, was, in fact, Atlantis. Apparently, Kiss’ work was received very enthusiastically back home and published in party newspapers and youth publications. However, when WWII kicked off, his planned expedition to Bolivia to prove his theory was cancelled – because, you know, wars will do that.

Another big name in the search for Atlantis is Heinrich Schliemann, a German businessman, who was fascinated by the epics of Homer which described an ancient Greek civilization prior to Plato. At the time, the Iliad and the Odyssey were viewed as fiction. However, Schliemann had a different opinion.

He was convinced these stories were based on actual historical events and mythology might contain a grain of truth, so he decided to prove this theory. In 1871, in northwest Turkey, he actually found something: ancient Troy. Or rather, he found the ancient city of Hisarlik, today accepted as ancient Troy.

Whether the Trojan horse was real or how much Homer embellished in his account of the war on Troy is still unclear, but Schliemann was proven right – there was some fact in the fiction. Schliemann himself never set out to find Atlantis, he was too preoccupied with his beloved Troy, but if Troy existed, believers claim, maybe Atlantis did as well.

In 1930, well-known medium and spiritualist Edgar Cayce, founder of the Association for Research and Enlightenment, joined the ranks of Atlantis believers. He claimed that he had a psychic connection with the Akashic Records, a collection of all universal events, thoughts, words, and emotions that happened or will happen. He could see detailed images of Atlantis and its inhabitants, and he gave psychic readings to people who he claimed had lived past lives in Atlantis.

He also added some extra elements of the supernatural – Atlantis was a highly evolved civilization with ships and aircraft, an impressive feat 9000 years before Plato. These craft were powered by an enigmatic energy crystal. However, instead of the Mediterranean, Cayce claimed that Atlantis stretched all the way from the Gulf of Mexico to Gibraltar and was destroyed around 10 000 BCE in some catastrophic event.

To this day, the Association for Research and Enlightenment is continuing the search for Atlantis and claims that the Bimini road is part of Atlantis.

The rest of the 20th century and well into the 21st saw a library’s worth of books, articles, and papers published on Atlantis ranging from an attempt at pure science to supernatural explanations so fantastical, the authors should consider careers as fantasy novelists. They’ll make a fortune. The myth of Atlantis also got wrapped up in other myths of lost continents such as Lemuria and Mu, conspiracy theories about Agartha, and even showed up in one or two stories about Noah.

Well over 100 years after Donnelly first set imaginations ablaze, the search for Atlantis is still on-going. The stories that make the papers these days don’t focus too much on the supernatural elements; however, a lot of money is made by a lot of people from a story about a city that never existed.

Where is Atlantis?

The majority of scholars and academics are of the opinion that the story of Atlantis is allegorical, not historical, and the city never existed. However, some have theorized that either Atlantis was a real place or, if Atlantis wasn’t real, then the story was definitely based on a real place. Cataclysmic natural disasters have been around since long before mankind made their way out of the mud, and floods and earthquakes weren’t uncommon in ancient Greece. However, since there’s no landmass just beyond the Strait of Gibraltar the size of Libya and Asia combined, odds are, if Atlantis existed, it wasn’t quite where Plato claimed it was.

The world of the Ancient Greeks ended at the Pillars of Hercules – everything beyond that was unknown. So, is the real Atlantis out there somewhere, or was the story of Atlantis based on events closer to home? Let’s find out.

Santorini

A popular theory that comes up repeatedly is the volcanic eruption on the island of Thera, better known today as Santorini. Some proponents claim that Santorini, or the nearby Crete, was Atlantis, but others lean more towards the idea that the eruption on Santorini inspired the story but wasn’t the actual Atlantis since that’s a fictional place.

Our story begins on the neighbouring island of Crete – home to what many believed to be Europe’s first great civilization: The Minoans. Archaeological excavations have discovered a sophisticated society that built palaces, constructed roads, and developed Europe’s first written language: Linear A. Preserved in the ash, much like the city of Pompeii many years later, archaeologists discovered homes three to four stories high, impressive pieces of art, and frescoes with bright colours, depicting flowers and exotic animals.

The Minoans had highly developed agricultural practices, and based on some artifacts, probably had cultural and commercial relations with most other cultures in the Mediterranean. Some have suggested that the Minoans might’ve had a powerful navy that dominated the eastern Mediterranean, possibly collecting a form of tax from surrounding lands, but there’s nothing to prove that. Rather, it was a society that gave women equal status to men, highly sophisticated, and most likely peaceful.

This brings us to eruption day on Santorini, about 100 km (70 miles) northeast of Crete, around 1500 – 1450 BCE. An earthquake hit the island of Santorini leading the volcano in the centre of the island to do what volcanoes do best – throw a temper tantrum - that sent rock, ash, and gas into the atmosphere. Of course, a tsunami followed, wiping out the Minoan palaces and cities along the coast of Crete.

Animals, many people’s livelihood, were killed in the disaster, vegetation was destroyed, and irrigation canals were choked with ash. This sudden reversal of fortune was the beginning of the end for the Minoan civilization as, what was left, was suddenly vulnerable to invaders from the Greek mainland.

According to Plato, Atlantis disappeared within a night and a day, so basically instantly. There are only a few geological processes that can cause something like this, and cataclysmic volcanoes are one of them. After the molten rock that accumulated just below the surface had thrown itself violently into the air with all the dramatic flair of a Shakespearean actor, the magma chamber, especially if it’s very large or close to the surface, can’t support its own weight anymore and collapses.

In the case of Santorini, it left a large hole that filled up with water. Originally, the island of Santorini was approximately circular but today all that’s left is a thin arc of island fragments.

Scientists have compared the Santorini eruption with one we’re slightly more familiar with: the eruption on the island of Krakatoa in 1883. A tsunami, 36m (120 feet) high, hit the neighbouring island and killed around 36 000 people. For three days after Krakatoa blew its top, the sky was dark with ash and the explosion was heard 4800 km (3000 miles) away, and ash from Krakatoa was hurled almost 80 km (50 miles) up in the air. According to the smart people, the eruption of Santorini was four times as powerful as the eruption of Krakatoa.

Let that sink in for a minute. The resulting tsunami probably travelled over a mile inland decimating cities and laying waste to the countryside as it went. The Minoan fleet would’ve sunk almost instantly. In a matter of hours, probably about a day and a night, the sophisticated Minoan Civilization was drastically reduced.

There are a number of similarities between the Minoan culture and the culture of Atlantis described by Plato – in both cultures, women had high political status, both cultures started out peacefully, though that changed in the case of Atlantis, and both enjoyed the unusual sport of “bull leaping”. For those unfamiliar with this, instead of fighting a bull with spears, unarmed men had to wrestle and jump over a bull. Apparently the bulls on Crete had a better time than their future descendants in Spain.

Plato dropped Atlantis in the Atlantic somewhere. However, based on what we know about the topography of the Atlantic, this would’ve been basically impossible. Another detail is that Atlantis was at war with everyone and their canary. The logistics of waging multiple wars over such a distance would be a nightmare, so it would make sense that Atlantis was much closer – perhaps even in the Mediterranean.

However, there’re people who firmly believe that Crete and the Minoans civilization weren’t simply inspiration – it was Atlantis. There are some problems with this though. Plato clearly states that Atlantis lies in the Atlantic Ocean beyond the Straits of Gibraltar, but Santorini is in the Mediterranean.

Atlantis also disappeared 9000 years prior to the story being told; the Santorini eruption was more recent than that. However, according to seismologist A.G. Galanopoulos, this can easily be explained.

It’s possible that during the translation from Egyptian to Greek, the symbol for 100 was mistaken with the symbol for 1000. This would mean that the destruction of Atlantis happened 900 years before Plato, not 9000, which would place the destruction of Atlantis around 1300 BCE. The eruption at Santorini is estimated to have occurred between 1400 BCE and 1500 BCE, but, honestly, when dating events that happened that long ago, it’s difficult to be exact.

In the dialogue of Critias, Plato gives very exact measurements for Atlantis. If we change that by a factor of 10, the city of Atlantis fits nicely into the Plain of Messara where Minoan sites have been excavated. Galanopoulos is also of the opinion that the royal city of Atlantis wasn’t on Crete but on Santorini as Crete and Santorini were both just a part of the Atlantean Empire.

If you consider the dialogues, this does make sense as Plato describes islands leading up to a continent. If this is the case though, the capital of Atlantis would’ve been obliterated by the blast. Some excavations have uncovered ruins on Santorini that are similar to the Minoan ruins found on Crete, so perhaps there’s something to this story after all.

On top of the date and location not matching up to the tale of Atlantis, there are records that Pharaoh Amenhotep III sent an emissary to visit the cities surrounding Crete shortly after Santorini threw its fit that is supposed to have destroyed the area, but the emissary found the towns occupied. However, we know the Minoans survived the eruption; they were still around after that for a while but in a much diminished capacity, so these reports agree with what we know. But, if this was Plato’s Atlantis, it should’ve been completely destroyed with no sign of civilization left.

An eruption this size would’ve affected the entire eastern Mediterranean to some degree. It probably made a pretty big impression on the people living through it. Things that make enough of an impression tend to live on in legends and tales told around campfires. Eventually, the legends could’ve reached Plato who then based the city of Atlantis on what he might’ve considered a fable.

To me, this seems like a pretty reasonable conclusion. Today, Santorini is a tourist hot-spot and the picture of a Mediterranean paradise. Of course, the volcano is still active and had a minor eruption around 1956, but don’t worry, you should be just fine.

Off the coast of Spain

The Doñana National Park is a nature reserve in Las Marismas, where the Guadalquivir River flows into the Atlantic in Andalucía, Southern Spain. It’s a huge park, covering 543 square kilometres. While most scientists get excited over the park’s unique biodiversity, it’s popular with Atlantis believers as well – it’s been considered to be the home of Atlantis for decades. Many an exploration party have done scans and made sensational claims but, at the time of writing this, the scientific community, relying on facts rather than wishful thinking, remains unconvinced.

Shocking, I know.

However, while claims of Atlantis have been unfounded so far, it doesn’t mean there’s nothing there; after all, Atlantis is hardly the only ancient civilization in history, and Spain was a maritime trading hotspot way back. Based on archaeological exploration and an analysis of pollens and microscopic remains in the area’s sediment, there were definitely people living in Doñana National Park as far back as 5000 years ago. Scientists agree that there was a civilization there, and it was most likely Greek or Roman.

This is backed up by that fact that nearby settlements all have similar characteristics, so it’s not a stretch to believe they were all linked at one stage. While some scientists are also of the opinion that the entire area was once a large, inland sea, the park was above sea level in the Neolithic and Copper ages.

The nearby city of Cadiz is also one of the oldest cities in Western Europe. It was probably built by the Phoenicians around 700 BCE, but some believe the city might’ve been around since 1100 BCE. Of course, back then, the city was known as Gades. And this makes Atlantis believers all giddy. You see, one of the princes of Atlantis, Gaderius, was given the far eastern side of Atlantis to rule. According to this story, Cadiz, or back then Gades, was named after the prince of Atlantis.

There’ve been many claims about Tartessos being Atlantis and, more recently, German physicist, Dr Rainer Kühne, agreed. Kühne believes that the Iron Age city Tartessos in Southern Spain, part of the Doñana National Park today, was, in fact, the biblical Tarshish and the model for the city of Atlantis. Using satellite images of the area, Dr Kühne discovered features that match Plato’s description.

Two rectangular structures, surrounded by what appears to be concentric circles could be the temples to Cleito and Poseidon built on the great acropolis in the middle of Atlantis. However, the structures are a little bigger than Plato’s description, so it’s not an exact match. Dr Kühne is of the opinion that the ancient unit of measurement, the stadia, might’ve been bigger than we currently accept it to be.

The plain described by Plato could be the plain that stretches from Spain’s southern coast all the way to the city of Seville, and the mountains Plato describes could, in fact, be the Sierra Morena and Sierra Nevada ranges. The mines, especially in the Sierra Morena range, are rich in copper and Atlantis, according to Plato, was rich in minerals, especially mountain copper. Furthermore, Dr Kühne is of the opinion that the war Atlantis was waging against, well, basically everyone, resembles attacks on Egypt, Cyprus, and Levant, all in the Mediterranean, around the 13th century BCE by the mysterious Sea Peoples.

However, while there are some conflicting reports here, Dr Kühne doesn’t appear to believe that this is the actual Atlantis, rather this settlement served as the inspiration for Atlantis.

Dr Kühne is not the first to spot what could be the remains of Atlantis though. Werner Wickboldt, lecturer and Atlantis enthusiast, came across the site when he noticed the rectangles and circles while studying photos of the Mediterranean in search of his beloved, if somewhat lost, city. He’s also of the opinion that the world “island” in the tale of Plato might be a mistranslation of the word “coastline” back when the story was translated from Egyptian to Greek. The theme of mistranslation is a common one in the search for Atlantis.

Another scientist digging around the Doñana National Park, Richard Freund, has no problem making sensational claims about finding lost cities. In 2009 and 2010, with the use of radar technology, digital mapping, and satellite imagery, an international team of archaeologists and geologists came across signs of a ringed city with canals, similar to Atlantis as described by our favourite philosopher. The site might be as old as 4000 years.

According to geological studies, at some stage, the marsh was a bay and connected to the Atlantic, and there’s evidence that tsunamis devastated the area for centuries. According to Freund, one of these tsunamis destroyed the city. He feels that the city of Tartessos, rather than being the inspiration for Atlantis is actually Atlantis.

After the city’s destruction, those who survived fled inland. Freund claimed to have found a number of memorial sites and cities, supposedly built by the survivors, in Spain. It was these memorial cities that first convinced Freund that Atlantis was in Spain.

I couldn’t find much about these memorial sites or cities though. There’s no way to prove, without a doubt, that Atlantis have been found; however, Freund is convinced the giant structures must come from some ancient civilization that had the ability to work large stones.

The location of the site near the Straits of Gibraltar, north of Cadiz, fits with Plato’s description of the location of Atlantis. Apparently, Plato stated that Atlantis faced the city called Gadara, the ancient name for Cadiz; I don’t recall this detail of the story, but ok then. Finally, recently discovered ruins, around 2800 years old, contains an image carved in stone of what appears to be an Atlantean warrior guarding the entrance to the lost, multi-ringed city. I have no idea how they know the warrior is Atlantean instead of say Spartan or any other number of warlike civilizations that’s been around in the past, but I’m sure they have their reasons.

Around 2018, yet another group arrived to find Atlantis. Merlin Burrows, a private company, uses historical records and satellite data to find archaeological sites. Using Plato’s description of Atlantis, and another text they’re unwilling to name which just throws the entire expedition in question, the team came to the very unsurprising conclusion that Plato’s account wasn’t just fiction – it was based on fact.

The CEO promised that this unknown text will be submitted for fair evaluation in due time, but it doesn’t appear that this has happened yet. Based on the description of the location of Atlantis, in front of the Pillars of Hercules, the scientists decided that Atlantis had to be on the Spanish coast, near the Strait of Gibraltar.

The site, spreading over 160 km (100 miles) from the Atlantic to the Mediterranean apparently saw its demise around 10 000 years ago at the end of the last Ice Age. According to the team, there were also signs of a tsunami, powerful enough to wipe out a city as far as 96 km (60 miles) inland, which is what happened to this particular city. I’m a bit sceptical about that; to my knowledge, mega-tsunamis only travel around 20km (12 miles) inland, but maybe tsunamis were bigger back then.

In the centre of a line of coastal cities was a sea containing multiples islands, some of them man-made. The main complex consists of two, distinct individual multi-island platforms, one offset from the other so the view is unobstructed to all the surrounding islands. It’s a completely unique configuration and nothing in the world resembles it.

Apparently, it also matches Plato’s descriptions exactly. Once again, I don’t recall seeing anything about offset islands, but maybe I missed that bit too.

Using Landsat 5 and Landsat 8, which also provides information for Google maps, the team claimed to have found structures – one structure could possibly be a sea wall. The team also found large circles they concluded were possibly the bases of ancient towers, ruins of what they claimed to be the temple of Poseidon, as well as a greenish-blue patina covering some of the ruins which, according to laboratory analysis, is a combination of metals. The team also collected samples of cement and sent it to a laboratory in Modena, Italy, to get tested.

According to the results, the samples were 10 000 and 12 000 years old, older than both the Roman and Greek civilizations, and more advanced. According to Tim Akers, the head of research at Merlin Burrows, the Atlanteans were so advanced, they used metalwork and cement that had never been seen before, and the laboratory analysis supports the idea of advanced metallurgy and cement.

However, not everyone is as excited about these finds. According to researcher Jose Villerias Robles, if the cement really is 10 000 to 12 000 years old, the samples would place the city in Palaeolithic and post-Palaeolithic times – the time of hunter-gatherer societies, well before anyone thought to build cities and engage in agriculture, cattle-breeding, and maritime trade. On top of that, Merlin Burrows was unwilling to state which tests were used to test the cement, and, instead of submitting their findings for peer review by fellow scientists, they skipped ahead and immediately announced their findings through a press release and started work on a documentary.

So, once again, the idea of Tartessos influencing Plato and perhaps acting as the inspiration for Atlantis isn’t out of the realm of possibility. However, in my humble opinion, Atlantis is not on the Spanish coast.

Helike and the earthquake wars

This isn’t just a city – rather it’s a combination of factors but, in my opinion, it’s the most likely source for inspiration for Atlantis, assuming that Plato was inspired by something. Archaeologists started looking for Helike as early as the 1950s, but the first ruin of real importance was only found in 1995, and excavations only really began in 2000. Since excavations and research is still ongoing, we don’t know as much about Helike as we know about Santorini or Spain.

Between 469 – 464 BCE, a major earthquake hit Sparta. Earthquakes were quite frequent in ancient Greece and often had political repercussions. The quake caught the Spartans completely unaware and killed more than 20 000 people.

This immediately caused internal and external uprisings against Sparta by all the peoples it had subjugated and, finally, led to a war between Sparta and its neighbours. Athens offered assistance but Sparta refused; this led to some hostilities between the two city-states that culminated in the Peloponnesian Wars, a 25 year long bloody civil war between Athens and Sparta, starting around 431 BCE.

In the summer of 426 BCE, a major earthquake hit north of Athens. A Spartan army, camped about 100 km (62 miles) west of Athens was getting ready to attack, but they were forced to retreat. The destruction wreaked by the resulting tsunamis was disastrous for Athens. Buildings collapsed and thousands of people died.

An island called Atlante, home to an Athenian fort, was destroyed. Athens was already experiencing epidemics and war, so this was a near crippling blow. The Peloponnesian Wars finally ended around 404 BCE, but a formal peace-treaty was only signed in 387 BCE. However, in 373 BCE, another violent earthquake, accompanied by a tsunami, destroyed the city of Helike on the southern shores of the Gulf of Corinth.

Helike was the capital of the Achaean League, a confederation of city-states, and revered as the centre for the worship of Poseidon. The grove of Poseidon – if that rings a bell, it should, as Atlantis also had a renowned sacred grove to Poseidon, was second only to the oracle of Delphi when it came to sanctuaries. Helike was a flourishing city and, unlike some of its neighbours, yes Athens and Sparta, we’re looking at you, it was dedicated to promoting peace and harmony with its neighbouring city-states.

So, in 373 BCE, an earthquake hit the city, destroying every building right down to its very foundations. A tsunami flooded inland. It drowned the city and covered the grove of Poseidon until nothing could be seen but the tops of the trees. Apparently, Poseidon decided to drop in and take a look at his grove up close – real close.

When the wave retreated back to the sea, it dragged the city and all of its inhabitants with it into the depths. At the time, it was believed that the city was punished by Poseidon for defiling his sanctuary.

Now, Plato was born around 427 BCE, so he would’ve been in his mid-50s when Helike was lost, in a single day and night, due to the wrath of a god. The dialogues were written in 360 BCE, so a mere 13 years after the disaster. Sure, Helike was nowhere near the size of Atlantis described in the dialogues, nor was it out in the Atlantic; it was practically on Plato’s doorstep. However, if you combine the sinking of Helike with the war against Sparta and you toss in the loss of an island fort called Atlante, a year after Plato was born, I think you have the seeds for the story of Atlantis.

Some other locations

These are just the three places that I think might’ve influenced Plato. However, if you close your eyes, spin a globe, and point, odds are, someone has claimed it to be the final resting place of Atlantis. While Santorini, Helike, and even Tartessos in Spain seem somewhat plausible as the inspiration for Atlantis, many other claims are a little absurd.

Antarctica was, apparently, at one point nice and temperate, but, once it moved to its current position due to tectonic shifting, the Atlanteans were forced to leave. Ireland matches Plato’s description of Atlantis, so they say. The Yonaguni monument discovered in the 1980s off the coast of Japan’s southern Ryukyu Islands have been mentioned in Atlantis circles.

The Eye of the Sahara, or the Richat structure, is an impressive natural rock formation that’s so big, it can only be seen from space. However, it consists of concentric circles, and someone stumbled across rock paintings and the remains of elephants, so it must be Atlantis. Apparently no-one expects to find elephants in Africa.

What was the ancient people’s fascination with elephants? The Bimini road, the Bermuda Triangle, the Canary Islands, the Azores, off the coast of Cuba, Troy, the Black Sea Flood, the list for possible Atlantis sites goes on and on.

That time Google earth found Atlantis

However, human beings aren’t the only ones finding the lost city of Atlantis – Google Maps also got in on the fun when, in 2009, Aeronautical Engineer, Bernie Bamford discovered Atlantis. Bamford was just chilling in front of his computer, playing around with Google Ocean, you know, Google Maps for the Ocean, when he made his amazing discovery. Not bad for a day’s work.

According to Bamford, he spotted a network of criss-cross lines, around 990 km (620 miles) off the coast of North West Africa, near the Canary Islands, on the floor of the Atlantic Ocean. He described the area to be about the size of Wales which, apparently, is a standard measurement in the UK – everything is about the size of Wales – is this the case Simon? Of course, much excitement ensued.

However, Google was quick to rain on everyone’s parade. In a statement, Google explained that the grid pattern was, in fact, an artefact of the process used to collect data about the ocean floor. Oceanographers use sonar to map the ocean floor. The sound travels through the water, bounces off the seafloor, and travels back to the ship.

This process creates a sound “image” of peaks and valleys on the ocean floor. Online mapping tools take different sonar surveys created by different agencies and stitch them together, piling them up on top of each other in layers. Together, these maps provide a picture of the ocean floor. However, some areas have been mapped in more detail than others.

The grid pattern you see on online mapping tools is two or three different maps layered on top of each other.

Then, in 2012, Google just spoiled everyone’s fun when Google Earth released a major update and everyone’s favourite city, that wasn’t, disappeared yet again. Now, all this excitement was 10 years ago, so I imagine many updates have followed since but, for just a brief moment in time, Google Maps was so effective, it found Atlantis!

Of course, the conspiracy theorists couldn’t let it go and theories abound of Google now covering up the discovery of Atlantis, despite leaving the criss-cross grid up for three years. Apparently, the Illuminati is up to something beneath the seas northwest of Africa and governments of multiple nations are all working together to cover it up. To the conspiracy theorists’ credit though, it doesn’t seem as if this particular theory is supported all that much, so there might be hope for mankind after all.

Just because we haven’t found doesn’t meant it isn’t real

So, we haven’t been able to pinpoint an exact location for Atlantis yet, but some people maintain that Atlantis was real, there are other ways to prove it, and eventually, Atlantis will be found. So let’s consider some of these pieces of proof.

The Younger Dryas period keeps popping up in all tales Atlantis. So, what exactly was it? We don’t know what started the Younger Dryas.

There’ve been a lot of theories, many involving comets, but we do know that, for some reason, around 12 800 years ago, towards the end of the last Ice Age, something disastrous happened. Whatever this disaster was, it led to extreme cooling, especially in the northern hemisphere, returning some parts of the world to glacial conditions. Essentially, it pushed back the end of the Ice Age a little bit.

Then, around 1200 years later, another catastrophic thing happened – we don’t know what this was either. This caused the Meltwater Pulse B. Once again, many theories blame comets or a massive solar flare.

Regardless of the cause, the consequence was the melting of the remaining ice sheets, around 11600 years ago, that ended the Younger Dryas and raised sea levels around the globe. Many coastal settlements were covered in as much as 120 m (400 feet) of water.

From an evolutionary perspective, humans living around 11 700 years ago, during the Younger Dryas period at the end of the last Ice Age, would’ve been on pretty much the same anatomical and physiological level that we are now. In the history of the world, this is actually fairly recent which might explain the number of myths dealing with the devastating floods found in every culture – the sinking of Atlantis, the Epic of Gilgamesh, and the story of Noah’s ark, to name a few. So, while there’s no proof that Atlantis was among those coastal civilizations that was destroyed in this disaster, if Atlantis did exist, the Meltwater Pulse B event could explain how it managed to sink perhaps not within a single night and day, but definitely in a fairly short period of time. This timeline of events matches up, very roughly, with Plato’s Atlantis.

Then there’s the shipwreck. I’ll be honest, I get excited about ye olde shipwrecks probably because I’m a writer and lost treasures and shipwrecks tend to go hand in hand. In 2017, off the coast of Sicily, near the city of Gela, a new expedition to a 2600 year old shipwreck, dating to around 600 BCE, found 47 ingots of orichalcum, that rare alloy apparently smelted on the island of Atlantis.

An earlier expedition, back in 2015, recovered 39 ingots of the metal as well as two Corinthian helmets. The ingots found on the shipwreck were made from zinc, charcoal, and copper. However, the orichalcum from Atlantis was apparently made of copper, gold, and silver.

I’m fairly sure when I read the story orichalcum was mountain copper mined in Atlantis, not an alloy of different metals, but, I don’t understand metallurgy, so I might be mistaken. Either way, the metal found in the shipwreck has a red tone which does match up with the description of the mountain copper used to cover every surface of the temple to Poseidon and Cleito that wasn’t already covered in gold, silver, or ivory. Orichalcum was described as gleaming like fire, so at least we’ve got one detail right.

A big criticism to the story of Atlantis, according to smart people, is the idea of an entire continent simply going missing. Many are of the firm opinion that something like that isn’t possible. Well, you might be wrong. Cities go missing all the time, and continents can, and have, gone missing as well.

Admittedly, not in a single day and night, but if we consider Atlantis as being inspired by something that happened, rather than a literal city that sank, we don’t need to rely on a single day and night for the great vanishing to occur.

In the time our planet has been hurtling around the sun, not just one, but multiple continents have gone missing. So, how exactly do you lose a continent? In the case of Greater Adria, I’m picturing it as sibling rivalry gone very wrong.

Around 140 million years ago, Greater Adria and Europe began to collide. Greater Adria sadly lost the match and, in the process, got bulldozed by Europe, and finally sank beneath what is today Italy, Greece, and the Baltics – apparently colonialism is older than we realize. Geologist Douwe van Hinsbergen published his research in the journal of Gondwana research claiming that Greater Adria is roughly the size and shape of Greenland.

Of course, Greater Adria isn’t the only continent to go missing. Two other continents we’ve lost are Zealandia, of which only the islands of New Zealand and New Caledonia remain, and Mauritia, a lost continent under the island of Mauritius that possibly made up part of Madagascar and India. Analysis of ancient rock suggests that almost all of earth’s earliest continents have disappeared by now.

So, sorry sceptics, but it’s entirely possible for a continent to sink.

Finally, many people also use the reference to an advanced civilization to say that Atlantis wasn’t real. However, the idea of a society that was technologically advanced for its day is not that far-fetched. Ancient peoples were often far more advanced than we give them credit for.

Now, I’m not talking about precise machinery building the city or technology that appears advanced according to today’s standards, but consider something like the aqueducts of Rome, the pyramids in Egypt, the Baghdad battery, or the Antikythera Mechanism; a device dating back around 2000 years probably used to determine the position of planets and stars for navigation. Our ancestors knew more about technology than we sometimes realize. So while Atlantis didn’t have flying machines, a society that appears advanced when compared to their neighbours isn’t entirely impossible.

Why Atlantis probably wasn’t real

As romantic as the idea of Atlantis is, it wasn’t real. I’m sorry to break this to you, but there’s more proof that Atlantis never existed than proof that it was real.

Our first clue lies with Plato himself. Plato was, first and foremost, a philosopher, not an historian. The story of Atlantis is, at its core, a device to illustrate a moral argument.

Modern Atlantis enthusiasts often forget the point of the story – Athens defeating Atlantis. In the story, Athens is considered the ideal city inhabited by the ideal citizen. Atlantis, on the other hand, is a proud, impious people – the exact opposite of our god-fearing idealized version of Athens.

On top of that, Atlantis is described as powerful and advanced; an Empire that’s conquered multiple nations all across the Mediterranean. However, Athens, standing alone, still manages to defeat this mighty Empire and free all the lands from her slavery against incredible odds. Athens, not Atlantis, is the real hero.

In the end, after being defeated by the Athenians, Atlantis is destroyed by the gods for their hubris and general moral decay.

Most of Plato’s tale is obviously fiction. The god Poseidon isn’t real; the exact conversation penned down in the dialogues probably didn’t happen; even one of the participants in the dialogue wasn’t a real person. As for the non-fictional elements, the story doesn’t contain anything Plato couldn’t have gotten the idea for in his own time: the Persian invasion of 480 BCE where the Greek city states, with Athens being the most prominent, defeated a powerful army and freed others from Persian oppression.

In fact, the idea that the Persians were defeated due to their own hubris was accepted in Plato’s time. Then there was the earthquake and tsunami that shook Greece and destroyed the city of Helike in 373 BCE, the city plan of Atlantis shares some similarities with Babylon, and rather advanced harbour works were happening in Syracuse. According to one classical scholar, Rodney Castleden, the government and political set-up of Atlantis are very similar to Syracuse in Sicily, which Plato visited.

However, his experience in Syracuse wasn’t great; Plato and the ruling tyrant didn’t get along, so it’s not surprising that Plato would use it to model the aggressor in his tale. The reference to Mountain Copper, or orichalcum, is the only thing that Plato probably made up. If you take the time to read the actual story, many of the Atlantis theories don’t hold up – Atlantis was sophisticated and powerful, yes, but Plato doesn’t describe any technology that wasn’t around in his day.

Plato places his story in the Greek equivalent of “once upon a time in a galaxy far away”: 9000 years in the past and beyond the Pillars of Hercules, so well beyond the familiar Hellenic world of his time. This means the story takes place thousands of years before Athens was even founded; no empire or army existed yet. By placing events so far in a past that can’t exactly be either proven or disproven, Plato is creating a separate reality.

Referring to Solon, a well-known historical figure in Plato’s day, lends a little more credibility to his story. The fact that Solon heard the story in Egypt, a place with an even longer historical memory than Greece and considered to possess all kinds of arcane knowledge already forgotten by outsiders, adds an extra layer of credibility. Plato is creating a story that seems credible in order to get his message across.

Plato also mentions that, back in the days of Atlantis, the Atlantic was navigable. However, in Plato’s day, the Atlantic has become inaccessible, so Atlantis is a faraway place that no longer exists and can’t be reached. Finally, Atlantis isn’t the only city destroyed.

Athens too loses their warlike men who sink into the earth. Atlantis is being punished for their wickedness, but what did the Athenians do wrong? Well, nothing.

This is just a device Plato uses to create a clear distinction between the mythical past when a group of warriors could defeat an empire the size of Atlantis, and the here and now. By destroying both groups, the story is placed in a definite “before” time. Plato is creating a myth.

The one and only original source for the story of Atlantis is the dialogues written by Plato 9000 years after Atlantis’ destruction. There’s nothing to suggest that Plato was using pre-classical mythology or history for his inspiration. Do you know what I call a highly advanced civilization, conquering half the world, suddenly sinking into the ocean in a single day and a night?

Memorable. Someone would’ve made a note of it somewhere – yet nothing like that has ever been found. And ancient Athens is not the only missing piece.

There’s no record of a prehistoric Athens 9000 years before Plato. Greece is one very thoroughly excavated country – if there had been any remains of a city that long ago, it would’ve been found by now. Atlantis was supposed to be a maritime merchant of note, yet there are no trade records of Atlantis trading with anyone, and the records used by the Egyptian priests in Sais have never been found.

Critias mentions that he had the whole story at home in an old manuscript – a very popular literary device, just saying – yet no trace of this manuscript had ever been found either; a city that size would’ve left something in written records for us to find.

Plato described Atlantis as an island larger than Libya and Asia combined – that’s a pretty large landmass. As we’ve seen, continents can go missing; however, we’ve found Greater Adria, so they don’t stay missing forever. There are also plate tectonics to consider.

In the before times, we had only one super-continent, Pangaea, which then broke apart and separated. If you look at a map, you’ll notice that the coasts of Africa and Europe line up pretty well with the coasts of North and South America – if there was an extra continent the size of Libya and Asia combined, where did it fit into the puzzle? It’s true that the ocean is very deep and we’ve only explored very little of it so far, but if you consider all the lost cities, civilizations, and even continents we’ve found, not to mention all the resources that’s been spent by amateur archaeologists looking for Atlantis, someone should’ve found something conclusive by now.

Yet, despite people’s best efforts, Atlantis is still missing.

Mystics like Blavatsky and Donnelly pointed out all the similarities that would prove an Egyptian-Mayan connection but, conveniently, ignored the many differences. The Mayan Calendar looks very different to the Egyptian one and if Atlantis did colonize both Mexico and Egypt, you’d expect the two places to have more food plants and domestic animals in common. The Mayans also didn’t have the plough or the wheel.

Surely, if you were off colonizing places, you’d import some of your amazing technology. On top of all that, the Mayan civilization only rose around the beginning of the Christian era – by that time, Egypt was thousands of years old. Comparing languages doesn’t help either.

The sound combinations humans are capable of aren’t infinite, so it’s not surprising that different languages have similar sounding words that, occasionally, have a similar meaning. However, if two languages are related, they should have a large number of words with similar sounds and meanings, not just two or three. Many Atlantis believers also claim that Old World languages have been found in the Americas.

However, for some strange reason, they never say where exactly these finds were made and, if they do and a proper investigation ensues, it usually turns out to be something completely different.

At the end of the day, every single location discovered so far is an “almost exact match” or, in very optimistic cases, “an exact match” to Atlantis. However, in every instance, facts had to be adjusted or ignored in order for the discovery to fit. Dates have to change by a factor of 10, the location has to change from the Atlantic to the Mediterranean, the Pacific, or the Sahara, a single day and night has to be interpreted as a longer period of time, and the stadia used as a measurement by ancient Greece might not quite be the length we think it is. People keep using the words “exact match”.

But, in the words of one of my favourite movie characters of all time: You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.

Conclusion

It’s entirely possible that the story of Atlantis was inspired by actual events. We’ve looked at quite a lot of possible events in historical record that could’ve been the inspiration and anyone who’s ever had to sit through a fishing tale knows that human nature is to exaggerate. Every time the story is told the fish, or in this case the catastrophic event, becomes bigger and bigger until our fisherman single-handedly caught a small whale and a large, highly sophisticated and technologically advanced society disappeared beneath the ocean waves in a mere night and a day.

The idea of a lost city is very romantic and it’s not entirely far-fetched – there are plenty of sunken cities, like Thonis-Heracleion discovered in Egypt in the early 2000s, which yielded treasures to give us an insight into what the world was like before. Unfortunately, finds like these get very little news coverage outside of academic circles; however, slap the word Atlantis on an archaeological find and you have reporters beating down your door and your find is on the front page of every newspaper, documentary crews are lining up for the rights to make your story, and the funding is streaming in.

The fact is the Atlantis of Plato has never been lost; it’s still where it has always been, in the works of Plato. The Atlantis of Donnelly, the one everyone is looking for, never existed at all. By chasing this mythological Atlantis, we’re completely missing the point of Plato’s tale.

We’re assigning god-like qualities to a morally corrupt society that was wiped off the face of the planet by the gods for considering themselves to be above the laws of their gods. It wasn’t an enlightened society, it wasn’t a golden age or something we should be aspiring to – it was pretty much what we have today, just smaller and with better ocean views, fresh air, and, apparently, elephants frolicking all over the place. We should not be trying to recapture the magic that was Atlantis – we should see it as the warning it was meant to be and rather strive to do better.

Frequently Asked Questions

Who wrote the story of Atlantis?

The story of Atlantis was written by Greek philosopher Plato, who lived from around 428 – 348 BCE.

What is the origin of the story of Atlantis?

Everything we know about Atlantis comes from two dialogues, the Timaues and the Critias, written by Plato around 360 BCE.

What is the significance of the character Critias in the story of Atlantis?

Critias was related to Plato, but he had a bit of a sordid history. He was the ringleader of the Thirty Tyrants, a pro-Spartan group that took control of Athens after Sparta defeated Athens in the Peloponnesian War in 404 BCE.

What is the mythological background of Atlantis according to Plato?

According to the dialogues, the story of Atlantis was told to Solon, an Athenian statesman and poet, by Egyptian priests in Sais during his visit to Egypt. Solon then passed the story to Dropides, the great-grandfather of Critias, and the story was passed from one generation to the next until Critias shared the story in the dialogue written by Plato.

What is the description of Atlantis as given by Plato?

Beyond the Pillars of Hercules, out in the Atlantic Ocean, was an island, the size of Libya and Asia combined. The island was fruitful providing everything the inhabitants needed – food, perfumes, timber, and precious metals, among them a metal called orichalcum, or mountain copper, a metal that couldn’t be mined anywhere else.

What is the significance of the city of Helike in relation to the story of Atlantis?

In 373 BCE, another violent earthquake, accompanied by a tsunami, destroyed the city of Helike on the southern shores of the Gulf of Corinth. Helike was the capital of the Achaean League, a confederation of city-states, and revered as the centre for the worship of Poseidon.

What is the significance of the Younger Dryas period in relation to the story of Atlantis?

The Younger Dryas period is mentioned in all tales of Atlantis. Around 12,800 years ago, towards the end of the last Ice Age, something disastrous happened. Whatever this disaster was, it led to extreme cooling, especially in the northern hemisphere, returning some parts of the world to glacial conditions.

What is the significance of the shipwreck off the coast of Sicily in relation to the story of Atlantis?

In 2017, off the coast of Sicily, near the city of Gela, a new expedition to a 2600 year old shipwreck, dating to around 600 BCE, found 47 ingots of orichalcum, that rare alloy apparently smelted on the island of Atlantis.

What is the significance of the city of Tartessos in relation to the story of Atlantis?

The nearby city of Cadiz is also one of the oldest cities in Western Europe. It was probably built by the Phoenicians around 700 BCE, but some believe the city might’ve been around since 1100 BCE. Of course, back then, the city was known as Gades. And this makes Atlantis believers all giddy. You see, one of the princes of Atlantis, Gaderius, was given the far eastern side of Atlantis to rule.

What is the significance of the volcanic eruption on the island of Thera in relation to the story of Atlantis?

A popular theory that comes up repeatedly is the volcanic eruption on the island of Thera, better known today as Santorini. Some proponents claim that Santorini, or the nearby Crete, was Atlantis, but others lean more towards the idea that the eruption on Santorini inspired the story but wasn’t the actual Atlantis since that’s a fictional place.

Sources

• Original Decoding the Unknown video: The Real Story of Hitler in Argentina…
• Hero image source by Pambelle12 / openverse, by.