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NEWS September 2023
September 2023. Hi Atlantipedes, At present I am in Sardinia for a short visit. Later we move to Sicily and Malta. The trip is purely vacational. Unfortunately, I am writing this in a dreadful apartment, sitting on a bed, with access to just one useable socket and a small Notebook. Consequently, I possibly will not […]Read More »
Joining The Dots
I have now published my new book, Joining The Dots, which offers a fresh look at the Atlantis mystery. I have addressed the critical questions of when, where and who, using Plato’s own words, tempered with some critical thinking and a modicum of common sense.Read More »
red
Hughes, Bettany (t)
Bettany Hughes (1968- ) is a well-known historian with a high media profile. She has presented one major TV documentary on the subject of Atlantis, specifically supporting aspects of the Minoan Hypothesis. This was Atlantis: The Evidence (Timewatch BBC TWO, 2010)(a) and more recently she has been trotted out to promote a new drama series Atlantis (BBC 2013).
She wrote a preview of this BBC series, for The Telegraph(b), which together with her earlier documentary still raises questions for me about her competence to deal with this subject at all. In her article she refers to the Atlantis story as a moral fable, ignoring the fact that not only were the ‘wicked’ Atlanteans destroyed, but so also were the ‘good’ Athenians.
She then alludes to Plato’s mention of the use of red, black and white stone in Atlantis. It is well known that this combination is common in volcanic regions and has been noted at a number of proposed Atlantis sites; The Canaries, Bolivia, Morocco, Azores, Sardinia and southern Spain.
Next, Hughes tries to explain away the navigation hazard described by Plato, identifying it as pumice. Plato clearly describes mud shoals as the barrier. This would be fine, except that Plato also tells us that the hazard still existed in his day, a thousand years after the eruption. It is improbable, to say the least that pumice would have lingered for a millennium!
These miserable attempts to link Thera and Atlantis are bad enough, Hughes does not explain how Plato repeatedly refers to the Atlantean invasion coming from their base in the the west (Tim.25b & Crit 114c), while Thera/Crete is north of Egypt and south of Athens. Where were the Pillars of Heracles and where were the Minoan elephants?
I would expect a professional like Hughes to offer a more comprehensive review of ALL the information provided by Plato and not dismiss whatever conflicts with her opinion as “sheer fantasy”. This picking and choosing from Plato’s text is not good enough without any justification for her selectivity.
(a) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O7bVIq0jNfg
(b) https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/tvandradio/10339254/Atlantis-secrets-of-the-real-lost-city.html
Swastika
The Swastika is a symbol that is said to have a 12,000-year-old history(I) and is occasionally suggested as having an Atlantean link. This is highly improbable as modern research has suggested that it was more likely to have originally represented an ancient cometary display in the sky(c), 
explaining the ubiquity of the symbol around the world. Fernando Coimbra wrote a paper(h)on this subject in 2011.
In 1896, the Smithsonian Institution published an extensive paper by Thomas Wilson (1832-1902), a curator at the U.S. National Museum, demonstrating the global spread of the swastika symbol[1466].
Another site demonstrates the widespread use of the swastika and its variants in commercial iconography(d). In April 2014, a well-illustrated report(k) revealed that a 7,000-year-old piece of pottery with a swastika on it was discovered in Bulgaria.
I recall that my native Dublin had a firm, founded in 1912 by a Mr. Brittain, called the Swastika Laundry, which had their vans liveried in bright red with a white swastika on a black background. The business lasted into the 1960s. However, the use of the swastika in Ireland goes back much further, perhaps to pre-Christian times. St. Brigid, one of Ireland’s patron saints, is generally thought to be a Christianised version of the Celtic goddess Brighid. St.Brigid’s Cross, a popular symbol of the saint found all over Ireland, is considered to be a variant of the swastika. One Indian gentleman was amazed when he encountered a swastika inside the Catholic church at Ballintubber Abbey in Co. Mayo(s).
James Churchward claimed that the swastika was a symbol of his invented civilisation, Mu, while Robert Stacy-Judd speculated[607.243] that it had originated in Atlantis. Others have attempted(e) to link the swastika and its presentation in red, white and black to be in some way connected with Plato’s reference to the colours of the rocks found in Atlantis. In a 1959 article in Sykes’ Atlantis magazine by Arthur Louis Joquel II declared(o) that the swastika had been the symbol of Atlantis! No evidence was offered.
Leaving conjecture aside it can be demonstrated that the swastika was an ancient Hindu symbol and also used in the Indus Valley civilisation(b). In fact, the use of the swastika has now been traced back to circa 10,000 BC. This image is included in the incredibly well-illustrated lecture by Robert M. Chapple, which also includes a large section with many images of swastikas used from early Christian times in Ireland until the present(r).
While Heinrich Schliemann was excavating Troy at Hissarlik, he discovered many hundreds of swastikas throughout the site and was responsible for bringing what had been, until then, a benign symbol back to Germany, where it was later hijacked by the Nazis and came to represent oppression(n).
The long honourable history of the swastika should not be erased because of its abuse at the hands of the Nazis. The residents of Swastika in Ontario, have for decades steadfastly refused to change the name of their community, which has been in use since 1907.
In 1925, the people of Panama’s indigenous province of Guna Yala adopted a flag having a black left-facing swastika, said to represent the four directions and the creation of the world(p). Also in the Americas, Gary A. David has highlighted the use of the swastika in a more benign way by the Hopi of northern Arizona along with its innocent use in other cultures including the Minoans, as well as in 20th century USA(q).
Jacques Gossart wrote a book[341] on the history of the swastika and in Denys Eissart’s now inactive website, L’épopée atlante (The Atlantis Epic) he devoted a page to a discussion on the subject(a). More recently Richard Cassaro has published two articles(f)(g) highlighting the extensive use of the swastika. The articles are well illustrated including some fascinating images. He also attempts, unsuccessfully in my view, to suggest a link between the swastika and Atlantis. A Reclaim the Swastika website(j) is campaigning for the promotion of the swastika as a spiritual symbol as it had been in the past.
A number of large swastika-shaped features have been spotted from the air(m). In 2007 it was announced(t) that “The Navy plans to spend $600,000 for ‘camouflage’ landscaping and rooftop adjustments so that 1960s-era barracks at the Naval Base Coronado near San Diego will no longer look like a Nazi swastika from the air.”
(a) Svastikas (L’épopée atlante) (archive.org)
(b) https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/32/IndusValleySeals.JPG
(h) https://www.academia.edu/2951519/The_astronomical_origins_of_the_swastika_motif
(i) https://www.ancient-origins.net/myths-legends/symbol-swastika-and-its-12000-year-old-history-001312
(j) https://web.archive.org/web/20201108132629/http://reclaimtheswastika.com/
(k) https://atlanteangardens.blogspot.ie/2014/04/7000-year-old-swastika-pottery.html
(l) https://www.ancient-origins.net/myths-legends/symbol-swastika-and-its-12000-year-old-history-001312
(m) https://mysteriousuniverse.org/2016/04/another-giant-swastika-spotted-this-time-near-roswell/
(o) Atlantis, Vol.12, No.3, March/April 1959.
(p) http://www.bbc.com/travel/story/20180813-guna-yala-the-islands-where-women-make-the-rules
>(q) https://www.academia.edu/8661508/The_Four_Arms_of_Destiny_Swastikas_in_the_Hopi_World_and_Beyond
(s) https://deshika.wordpress.com/2009/09/03/a-swastika-in-a-catholic-church/
(t) The New York Times, Sept. 27 2007
Canary Islands *
The Canary Islands are situated in the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Morocco. They were (re)discovered in 1402 by Jean de Béthencourt (1362-1425). He found the fair-skinned Guanches living on some of the islands. He described them as cave dwellers. After overthrowing the local chiefs, de Béthancourt became King of the Canaries under King Henry III of Castile.
However, there has been widespread acceptance of the idea that the Berbers of North Africa established the first populations on the islands. Recently (2019) published DNA studies have reinforced this concept, putting the arrival of the Berbers at around 1000 AD(h).
Pliny the Elder is frequently quoted to provide the etymology of the name, where he claims that it is derived from a species of large dog – canis in Latin – found there in ancient times. This derivation is disputed by the historian and Arabist, Paul Lunde, who prefers the idea that the islands were named after an ancient people who lived on the opposite mainland and who now inhabit north-eastern Nigeria and are known today as the Kanuri. Pliny also records that the islands were uninhabited but had ancient ruined buildings when visited by the Carthaginians. Centuries later they were inhabited by a Berber people known as the Guanches who were finally conquered by the Spanish in the 15th century. When sea levels were lower during the last Ice Age, the land area of the islands would have been more extensive and a possible claimant as the location of some or part of Plato’s empire of Atlantis.
A popular belief is that the Canaries were the location of the Garden of Hesperides referred to in Greek mythology. However, this identification is difficult to substantiate firmly.
Frank Joseph noted[216] how the islands conform in many ways to Plato’s description of Atlantis. Natural hot and cold springs are to be found there, as are red, white and black rock, a combination also observed on the Azores and elsewhere. In the past, the Canaries have been densely forested and also contain rivers and fertile plains that produce a variety of fruit.
In the 2nd century AD, the Greek astronomer and geographer Ptolemy suggested that the prime meridian should be located through the Canaries, then known as the Fortunate Islands.
The earliest suggestion of a connection between the Canaries and Atlantis was proposed by Athanasius Kircher in 1664, referring to the Guanches as the last Atlanteans and the islands as the remains of Plato’s lost land.
Ignatius Donnelly, who did so much to kick-start modern interest in Atlantis, considered that the Canaries, Madeira, the Azores and Cape Verde Islands were its remnants. However, a newspaper report from 1899(g) refers back to a local cleric and historian, José Viera y Claviejo, who proposed around the beginning of the 19th century that the Canaries, the Azores and Madeira were remnants of Atlantis, nearly a century before Donnelly.
Gilbert De Jong is a Dutch landscape designer with an interest in investigating the mysteries of our ancient past. His contention is that Atlantis was located at El Fuerte – in the Canary Islands.
In 1984, Manuel Gómez Márquez also ‘revealed’ the Canaries as the location of Atlantis in a book[0599] using the Piri Reis Map as a source.
One of the more recent proponents of a Canarian location for Atlantis is Charles D. Pfund in his extensive 2011 book, Antediluvian World: The End of the Myth[1079].
A website dealing with a variety of British and World mysteries(d) has a series of papers on Atlantis and reluctantly considers the Canaries as the most likely location of Plato’s lost land.
In 1939 the Ahnenerbe, led by theologian turned archaeologist Otto Huth, planned to visit the Canaries to study Guanche mummies as part of their efforts to find the Aryan homeland and locate Atlantis. However, the outbreak of war postponed the trip, but the Spanish dictator, General Franco, at the behest of his Nazi mentors appointed his archaeologist friend Julio Martinez Santa Olalla to carry out investigations on their behalf.
In 2008, Francisco Gracia Alonso, professor of history at the University of Barcelona published a book revealing the level of cooperation between Franco’s archaeologists and the Nazi Ahnenerbe(c)(k). An article(j) in The Telegraph in the UK, claimed that Spanish fascists “wanted to promote the idea that the Aryan race could be traced to the Canary Islands, amid claims they were all that remained of the lost continent of Atlantis.”
A 2010 book, Nazi Archaeology in the Canary Islands [762] by author and journalist Jaime Rubio Rosales also explores the whole subject of the Spanish links with the Ahnenerbe.
Thor Heyerdahl inspected the pyramids at Guimar and was convinced of their ceremonial use in ancient times(b). Atlantisforschung has a lengthy article about the stepped pyramids of the Canaries, which also refers to stepped pyramids in Sicily and Sardinia(i). The late Philip Coppens also wrote an article(e) on these structures. A 2015 article(f) can now be added to this list.
(b) https://www.travelexplorations.com/guimar-tenerife-the-lost-pyramids-in-europe.4497328-25678.html
(c) www.archaeologybulletin.org/article/download/bha.18102/104 (Link broken) *
(d) https://www.aquiziam.com/where-is-atlantis/ OR See Archive 3028
(e) Archive 2142)
(f) https://www.ancient-origins.net/ancient-places-europe/mystery-guanches-and-pyramids-tenerife-003232
(g) https://trove.nla.gov.au/ndp/del/article/111076350?searchTerm=Atlantis discovered&searchLimits=
(i) Die Schwarzen Pyramiden von Teneriffa – Atlantisforschung.de (atlantisforschung-de.translate.goog) (Eng)
Wells, Gerald *
Gerald Wells is an American researcher who had opted for the western province of El Bayadh in Algeria as the location of Atlantis. 
He uses geomythology to advance the radical idea that Atlantis was destroyed by a ‘tectonic tilting and continental uplift’ at the end of the Younger Dryas.
In another paper(c), Wells offers further geological evidence that Atlantis did not sink, but only appeared to do so, while it actually rose. If so, I wonder how could such an event create muddy shallows (Timaeus 25d) that existed as a navigational hazard even in Plato’s time.
Wells has offered ten important correlations between Plato’s description and the physical evidence available at his chosen site on the western edge of the Sahara. These include an extensive canal system, red, white and black stone, a complex of meteorite craters (Rings of Atlantis) and hydrothermal springs. Wells further contends that Atlantis was known in pre-dynastic Egypt as Bakhu. However, there is a consensus among other scholars that Bakhu was a mount in the EAST, whereas Wells’ Atlantis/Bakhu is in the WEST. Wells’ ideas were presented to the 2008 Atlantis Conference in Athens and are now available on the Internet(a).
Now that he has been granted tax-exemption status in the U.S. he is hoping to raise $250,000 to fund an initial two-week survey. See his new web address(b).
Wells also identified his Algerian Atlantis location as having included the biblical Garden of Eden(e).
Wells has now produced a video(d) in support of his theories. Apart from that, little has been heard from Wells in recent years. In fact, most of the links to his material are now offline apart from(c).
In 2008, Wells was a regular contributor to forums on the atlantisrising.com (now closed down) and the atlantisonline websites.
(a) Atlantis-Bakhu | Wells Research Laboratory (archive.org) * six pages
(b) https://web.archive.org/web/20190128080100/https://www.wrl-inc.org/
(c) https://www.academia.edu/10055298/A_Focus_on_the_Geologic_Sciences_Related_to_Atlantis-Bakhu
(d) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NZmdvhh1jIk