An A-Z Guide To The Search For Plato's Atlantis

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    October 2024 Hi to everyone I’m taking a break during the first two weeks of October, so there will be minimal activity on the site apart from the ongoing project of replacing broken links. Back Soon, Tony     September 2023. Hi Atlantipedes, At present I am in Sardinia for a short visit. Later we […]Read More »
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Alf Bajocco

Bajocco, Alf *

Alf Bajocco, an Italian expert on North Africa, published a paper in 1965 entitled The Early Inhabitants of the Canary Islands(a), in which he discussed the possibility that the earliest inhabitants of the archipelago had a Berber origin, who in turn had been descendants of the Atlanteans. Nearly half a century later the Berber connection was confirmed by genetic analysis(b). Bajocco claimed that the following dramatic climate changes in North Africa some of the Berbers migrated westward as far as the Canaries, while others went eastward settling in the Nile Valley.

In the 1960’s Bajocco speculated(d) on the ‘probability’ of Etruscan voyages to South America, citing the opinions of the Italian, Dr. Mario Gattoni Cellini, who claimed to have identified linguistic and other cultural similarities between the Etruscans and ‘Carib Shamanism’. Cellini’s speculations went so far as to suggest that the Aymara came from Crete and the Maya are akin to Sardinians!

In 1987, Bajocco published an article(c) in the Belgian journal Kadath comparing the ‘Bimini Wall’ with underwater features discovered off Lanzarote in the Canaries by Pippo Cappellano.

 

(a) The Early Inhabitants of the Canary Islands | Agraw.com *

(b) https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/10/091021115147.htm

(c) https://www.science-frontiers.com/sf058/sf058a02.htm

(d) Egerton Sykes’ Atlantis Vol 19.1 Feb/Mar 1966 p.3

Identity of the Atlanteans *

The Identity of the Atlanteans has produced a range of speculative suggestions nearly as extensive as that of the proposed locations for Plato’s lost island. However, it is highly probable that we already know who the Atlanteans were, but under a different name.

The list below includes some of the more popular suggestions and as such is not necessarily exhaustive. While researchers have proposed particular locations for Atlantis, not all have identified an archaeologically identified culture to go with their chosen location. The problem is that most of the places suggested have endured successive invasions over the millennia by different peoples.

It would seem therefore that the most fruitful approach to solving the problem of identifying the Atlanteans would be to first focus on trying to determine the date of the demise of Atlantis. This should reduce the number of possible candidates, making it easier to identify the Atlanteans.

A final point to consider is that the historical Atlanteans were a military alliance, and as such may have included more than one or none of those listed here. The mythological Atlanteans, who included the five sets of male twins and their successors would be expected to share a common culture, whereas military coalitions are frequently more disparate.

 

Basques: William Lewy d’Abartiague, Edward Taylor Fletcher

Berbers: Alberto Arecchi, Alf Bajocco, Ulrich Hofmann, Jacques Gossart, Ibn Khaldun

British: William Comyns Beaumont, E. J. de Meester, Donald Ingram, George H. Cooper, Anthony Roberts, Paul Dunbavin.

Cro-Magnons: R. Cedric Leonard, Theosophists, Georges Poisson, Robert B. Stacy-Judd,  Kurt Bilau, Louis Charpentier

Etruscans: Richard W. Welch, Frank Joseph  *

Guanches: B. L. Bogaevsky, Bory de Saint Vincent, Boris F. Dobrynin, Eugène Pégot-Ogier

Irish: Ulf Erlingsson, George H. Cooper, John Whitehurst, Thomas Dietrich, Padraig A. Ó Síocháin, Lewis Spence,

Maltese: Anton Mifsud, Francis Xavier Aloisio, Kevin Falzon, Bibischok, Joseph Bosco, David Calvert-Orange, Giorgio Grongnet de Vasse, Albert Nikas, Joseph S. Ellul, Francis Galea, Tammam Kisrawi, Charles Savona-Ventura, Hubert Zeitlmair. 

Maya: Robert B. Stacy-Judd, Charles Gates Dawes, Colin Wilson, Adrian Gilbert, L. M. Hosea, Augustus le Plongeon, Teobert Maler, Joachim Rittstieg, Lewis Spence, Edward Herbert Thompson, Jean-Frédérick de Waldeck,

Megalith Builders: Lucien Gerardin, Paolo Marini, Sylvain Tristan, Jean Deruelle, Alan Butler, Alfred deGrazia, Helmut Tributsch, Hank Harrison, Walter Schilling, Robert Temple, Manuel Vega

Minoans: K.T. Frost, James Baikie, Walter Leaf, Edwin Balch, Donald A. Mackenzie, Ralph Magoffin, Spyridon Marinatos, Georges Poisson, Wilhelm Brandenstein, A. Galanopoulos, J. G. Bennett, Rhys Carpenter, P.B.S. Andrews, Edward Bacon, Willy Ley, J.V. Luce, James W. Mavor, Henry M. Eichner, Prince Michael of Greece, Nicholas Platon, N.W. Tschoegl, Richard Mooney, Rupert Furneaux, Martin Ebon, Francis Hitching, Charles Pellegrino, Rodney Castleden, Graham Phillips, Jacques Lebeau, Luana Monte, Fredrik Bruins, Gavin Menzies, Lee R. Kerr, Daniel P. Buckley.

Persians: August Hunt, Pierre-André Latreille, William Henry Babcock, Hans Diller.

Phoenicians: Jonas Bergman, Robert Prutz,

Sardinians: Paolo Valente Poddighe, Robert Paul Ishoy, Sergio Frau, Mario Tozzi, Diego Silvio Novo, Antonio Usai, Giuseppe Mura.

Sicilians: Phyllis Young Forsyth, Thorwald C. Franke, Axel Hausmann,  Peter Jakubowski, Alfred E. Schmeck, M. Rapisarda,

Swedes: Johannes Bureus, Olaf Rudbeck

Sea Peoples: Wilhelm Christ, Jürgen Spanuth, Spyridon Marinatos, Rainer W. Kühne, John V. Luce, Theodor Gomperz, Herwig Görgemanns , Tony O’ConnellSean Welsh, Thorwald C. Franke, Werner Wickboldt.

Trojans: Eberhard Zangger, Erich von Däniken?

Etruscans *

The Etruscans were an ancient people of Etruria (now Tuscany) in Italy. They occupied an area somewhere between Rome and Florence Etruscan mapfrom the 8th century BC until incorporated in the Roman Empire in the 2nd century BC. They do not appear to have been particularly expansionist as the only Etruscan settlement on Sardinia, which was not discovered until our 21st century, on the Tavolara isle off the coast near Olbia(o).

It is thought that they originally came from Asia Minor before 800 BC, a suggestion that originated with Herodotus. This view has been given recent (2007) support by the results of DNA studies carried out at Pavia University. Another study of Etruscan mtDNA estimated “that the genetic links between Tuscany and Anatolia date back to at least 5,000 years ago, strongly suggesting that the Etruscan culture developed locally, and not as an immediate consequence of immigration from the Eastern Mediterranean shores.” (e).

Stefan Anitei who supports an Anatolian, or more specifically a Lydian, origin for the Etruscans, cited A recent (2007) DNA analysis showed that (the Bos Taurus) cattle in central Italy seem indeed to have originated in modern Turkey and the Middle East. As there is no link between these cattle and others from other European regions, they must have entered the peninsula by sea.” (n).

However, a study published in 2022 has challenged the idea of an Anatolian origin for the Etruscans, instead, it claims that they were “actually descended from pastoralists (sheep herders) who moved into the region from the steppes during the late Neolithic and Bronze Age from approximately 6,000 BC to 3,500 BC.”(v) 

Some decades ago Professor Licinio Glori also supported an eastern Mediterranean origin for the Etruscans(i). However, he has also claimed a common origin for the peoples of the Americas and Europe, including Etruscans, without identifying this shared ancestry(j).

It has also been suggested that the Etruscan culture has shown distinctive Indian influences.(l)

Until their written language can be translated there will remain an air of mystery about them. Even then because of the paucity of material available in their language, it is probable that little will be gleaned from it. Mark Cartwright’s excellent site has further information on the Etruscan script(k) and many articles on different aspects of Etruscan culture. A 2016 report(h) revealed the discovery of a stele that has at least 70 legible Etruscan letters and punctuation marks on it. Hopefully, this find will help to advance the translation of this language.

The site of the ancient city of Chiusi has been assumed by some to be the location of Clusium, the capital of the Etruscan king, Lars Porsena. This suggestion is based on the fact that the two names mean the same, namely ‘closed’. However, Giuseppe Centauro believes that he found the real Clusium near Florence where he identified two concentric walls about 10 miles in circumference. The extensive walls have resonance with Plato’s description of Atlantis. If he is correct, Clusium may at one time have been the biggest city in Italy(f). Centauro is currently seeking permission to excavate there.

At Orvieto, nearly 100km north of Rome, Professor Simonetta Stopponi is investigating the possible location of the Fanum Voltumnae, where the leaders of the Etruscan city-states met every year to discuss policy. This meeting has also got echoes of the regular meeting of the kings of the Atlantean federation.

It is worth highlighting that Tyrrhenia, the Greek name for Etruria, is one of the few places whose location is not disputed and is mentioned by Plato as bordering (Critias 114c & Timaeus 25b) Atlantean territory. It is, therefore, reasonable to expect that south of Etruria on mainland Italy some remnants of Atlantis may yet be identified.

In his recent book[630] Richard W. Welch is quite happy to designate the Etruscans as “the last Atlanteans of which we have much knowledge”. Frank Joseph echoed the same idea, writing that “the Etruscans were themselves nothing more than the late Atlanteans who colonised western Italy, so their surviving material culture offers us a glimpse of Atlantis at its cultural height.”[636.21]

In 1962, the French linguist, Maurice Guignard, claimed[1109] to have deciphered the Etruscan language and also suggested that the Etruscans might have come from Atlantis. Such comments conflict with Plato’s account, which locates the territory of the Atlanteans separate from and further south than that of the Etruscans. 

Confusing matters is a 2006 report from researchers at Stanford University, using “novel statistical computer modelling to simulate demographic processes affecting the population of Tuscany over a 2,500-year time span. Rigorous tests used by the researchers have ruled out a genetic link between ancient Etruscans, the early inhabitants of central Italy, and the region’s modern-day residents.(s)

Recently, a study(t) by a team of scholars from Germany, Italy, the USA, Denmark and the UK, published in 2021 shows that the Etruscans, “were closely related to their italic neighbors, and reveal major genetic transformations associated with historical events.”   However, they also note that “the persistence of a non-Indo-European Etruscan language is an intriguing and still unexplained phenomenon that will require further archaeological, historical, linguistic and genetic investigation.”

The late Steven Sora suggested [0395] that the Etruscans were refugees from their original homeland in Iberia, where he also located Troy/Atlantis. He specified Lisbon, Setubal and Troia, all in modern Portugal, as Trojan/Atlantean territory, conflating the Trojan and Atlantean wars!

The internet offers a valuable site(a) giving a good overview of the Etruscans including a valuable bibliography and collection of related web links.

Another mystery relating to the Etruscans concerns an Egyptian mummy, which was bought in Alexandria and brought to Europe in the mid-19th century. When it was eventually unwrapped Etruscan writing was discovered on the linen!(q)(r)

Professor Natalia Rosi de Tariffi (1907-?), Italian by birth, but lived in Venezuela, has highlighted the many similarities between the Etruscan language and that of Quechua and Aymara spoken in the Andes of South America. In her well-regarded 1969 book, America cuarta dimension [1927] she proposed the migration of the Etruscans FROM America TO Europe.

The controversial Italian researcher, Dr Mario Gattoni Celli, writing in the 1960s proposed that the Etruscans had voyaged to South America, basing his opinion on linguistic and other cultural similarities. This view is apparently supported by Diodorus Siculus (History, Book V, 19+) who refers to the ‘Tyrrhenians’ setting up a colony on an island, with navigable rivers, at a great distance from the inhabited world(c). Adding some confusion to this is the claim that Old World languages had migrated FROM the Americas!!(d) Alf Bajocco wrote a piece in Sykes’ Atlantis magazine on Celli’s ideas(c).

The most exotic suggestion regarding the Etruscans comes from Xavier Séguin who has claimed that they share a common ancestry with the Yoruba of West Africa, as both originated in Atlantis(m)! Séguin quotes the work of Leo Frobenius in support of this contention, highlighting the significance of the number sixteen in both cultures.

Caleb Howells has written an interesting paper on the gradual fall of the Etruscan civilisation that ended with attacks from the Romans in the south and the Celts in the north(w).

(a) https://web.archive.org/web/20190831235749/https://www.mysteriousetruscans.com/

(c) Atlantis, Vol 19. No.1, Feb/Mar 1966

(d) https://web.archive.org/web/20181218003239/http://www.ancient-mysteries-explained.com/language-mysteries.htmlOr See Archive 2607

(e) Origins and Evolution of the Etruscans’ mtDNA (archive.org)

(f) http://archives.dailynews.lk/2004/11/23/fea05.html

(g) https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn11174-on-the-origin-of-the-etruscan-civilisation/

(h) https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2016/03/160329112847.htm?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+sciencedaily%2Ffossils_ruins%2Fancient_civilizations+%28Ancient+Civilizations+News+–+ScienceDaily%29

(i) St. Petersburg Times. Nov. 25 1957

(j) https://www.inmysteriam.fr/anciennes-civilisations-du-nord/similitudes-entre-les-peuples-precolombiens-et-le-peuple-etrusque.html  (French)

(k) https://www.ancient.eu/Etruscan_Language/

(l) https://vediccafe.blogspot.ie/2014/05/the-ramayana-in-roots-of-pre-christian.html

(m) https://eden-saga.com/en/survivors-from-atlantis-frobenius-sixteen-gods-oracle-of-fa.html

(n) https://news.softpedia.com/news/Where-Did-the-Etruscans-Originated-54317.shtml

(o) Etruscan settlement found in Sardinia for first time – Culture – ANSAMed.it (archive.org) 

(p) Atlantis, Vol.19, No.3, May/June 1966

(q) https://web.archive.org/web/20160329142153/http://www.dacia.org/history/gara_e.html

(r) http://www.maravot.com/Translation_Zagreb_Mummy.html

(s) Ancient Etruscans Unlikely Ancestors Of Modern Tuscans, Statistical Testing Reveals | ScienceDaily *

(t) The origin and legacy of the Etruscans: A new study reports genome-wide data of ancient Italian individuals to trace the origins of the Etruscans and their contribution to later populations — ScienceDaily 

(u) Atlantis Rising magazine  #48  At – PDF Archive  

(v) https://greekreporter.com/2022/08/13/dna-study-finds-etruscans-originated-steppes/ 

(w) https://www.thecollector.com/fall-of-the-etruscans/