Harald A.T. Reiche, (1922-1994) was born in Germany and studied in Switzerland before arriving in the United States. He received a BA degree in classics from Harvard in 1943, an MA in 1944 and a PhD in 1955. He was a professor of classics and philosophy at M.I.T from 1955 to 1991. His principal interest was Greek cosmology and astronomy, subjects on which he lectured and wrote extensively. Reiche offered an astronomical interpretation of the Atlantis story, based on precession*; a concept discussed at length[524] by Santillana and Dechend who were colleagues of Reiche at M.I.T. Their view is that “myths were vehicles for memorising and transmitting certain kinds of astronomical and cosmological information”.
In a paper[525], some years ago, Reiche suggested that Plato’s description of the city of Atlantis mirrors “features of the southern circumpolar sky”. Understandably, this quote has been gratefully seized upon by the Flem-Aths to bolster their Atlantis in Antarctica theory.
*Precession is the name given to the astronomical feature whereby the gradual change in the direction of the Earth’s axis of rotation, producing a shifting of constellations around the celestial sphere.
