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

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    NEWS October 2024

    OCTOBER 2024 The recent cyber attack on the Internet Archive is deplorable and can be reasonably compared with the repeated burning of the Great Library of Alexandria. I have used the Wayback Machine extensively, but, until the full extent of the permanent damage is clear, I am unable to assess its effect on Atlantipedia. At […]Read More »
  • Joining The Dots

    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 »
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Brasseur de Bourbourg

Ten Lost Tribes of Israel

The Ten Lost Tribes of Israel is a reference to the ten of the twelve tribes deported from the Kingdom of Israel after its conquest by Assyria in 722 BC. It has been pointed out that the Hebrew Bible has relatively little to say on the matter.

In 1865, Brasseur de Bourbourg discovered some of Bishop Diego de Landa‘s lost documents. He studied the thoroughly flawed interpretation of Mayan hieroglyphics by de Landa, produced in the 16th century and proceeded to develop his own faulty translation.

Nigel Davies has revealed [1635]  that Brasseur, as well as Lord Kingsborough (1795-1829), concluded that the native Americans were the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel. Kingsborough spent a £40,000 fortune publishing The Antiquities of Mexico in nine huge volumes, an extravagance that landed him in a Dublin debtors’ prison for non-payment of bills relating to publication costs and sadly, he died there.

The variety of identifications put forward for some or all of these groups is quite remarkable, ranging from the reasonable to the ridiculous. At one end of that spectrum, the view “is that the “lost tribes of Israel” were never really lost. Many of the Jews who remained in the land after the Assyrian conquest re-united with Judah in the south (2 Chronicles 34:6–9). Assyria was later conquered by Babylon, who went on to invade the Southern Kingdom of Israel, deporting the two remaining tribes: Judah and Benjamin (2 Kings 25:21). Remnants of the northern tribes would have thus been part of the Babylonian deportations. Seventy years later, when King Cyrus allowed the Israelites to return to Israel (Ezra 1), many (from all twelve tribes) returned to Israel to rebuild their homeland.” (a)

At the other end is the entertaining idea that the Lost Tribes inhabit the interior of a Hollow Earth, which is defended by flying saucers!(b)

Another unexpected claim, with a tenuous Atlantis connection, comes from “Dierk Lange(a), Prof. Dr Emeritus, of Bayreuth University in Germany, who has performed extensive research concerning many West African groups and their origins in the Near East. In the abstract to one of his many essays, “Dierk Lange: Origin of the Yoruba and “The Lost Tribes of Israel”,” Dierk confirms the traditions of a Levantine (Israelite) origin of the Yoruba Nigerians.”(d)(e)

Nearly as extreme is the attempt to link the Lost Tribes and Atlantis, a combination that would not normally leap to mind. However, some have attempted to justify such a linkage in spite of the contradictions between Plato’s story and the details of this minority opinion.

This alleged relationship between Atlantis and Israel points out that the Biblical patriarch Jacob who had twelve sons, excluded two of them, Levi and Simeon. Jacob is then presented as having been Poseidon with the ten remaining sons ruling Atlantis. One of Jacob’s sons, Gad, is assumed to have been Gadeiros, one of the ten sons of Poseidon. After that, no further parallels are offered to connect Jacob’s other sons with the remainder of Poseidon’s offspring.

In Britain, Richard Brothers (1757–1823), a retired naval officer and a radical Calvinist, revealed himself as a prophet of the lost tribes in 1794 in London. The fact that he was writing from the confinement of Fisher Mad-House, Islington, did not deter many from following him and producing the doctrine of Anglo-Israelism: a fiercely nationalist theology based on the idea that the British Isles were the home of the lost tribes.” (c)

>A 2016 paper by Prof. W.A Liebenberg begins the Introduction(g)  with Dolmens and Megalithic Monuments originated in Ancient Israel. The prophet Jeremiah (31:21) is instructed to make it clear that the Ten Tribes will construct a trail of Megalithic Monuments from their homeland Israel to their places of deportation and further migration into the nations, and evidence of this path will be a vivid reminder of their forefathers and will also enable them to return. Such a trail undoubtedly exists and is embedded in the earth’s crust! It is the Trail of the Dolmens from the Middle East to the various nations.”

To suggest that the megaliths mark the tribal dispersal routes is to my mind utter nonsense. Judging by the number of megaliths spread throughout the world there should be thousands of ‘lost tribes’, not to mention that the lost tribes disappeared in the 8th century BC, even though the megaliths are scientifically dated to the 5th millennium BC!<

Also See: Agartha, Baer, Baucum, Bible, Davidiy, Eurenius, Olivier, Salverda and Wauchope.

(a) https://www.gotquestions.org/lost-tribes-Israel.html

(b) https://www.ourhollowearth.com/ourhollo/index.html

(c) The Lost Tribes of Israel (archive.org)

(d) The Bantu Branch of ‘Africans’ are Hebrew Israelites PART I of II – Aria Nasi Research 

(e) The Bantu Branch of ‘Africans’ are Hebrew Israelites PART II of II – Aria Nasi Research 

(f) http://www.dierklange.com 

(g) https://www.academia.edu/30702086/A_Historical_Research_of_the_Ten_Tribes_Scattered_Into_the_Nations_Part_10   *

Landa, Diego de

Diego de Landa (1524- 1579) was the Franciscan bishop of Yucatán who played a significant part in promoting the idea that the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel had migrated to the Americas, citing local Mayan legends that their ancestors had come from the East, aided by divine intervention! Others, such as Brasseur de Bourbourg, seized on this idea and expanded it to link the Maya with Atlantis.

Landa was ‘a nasty piece of work’, showing great cruelty towards the indigenous people and little respect for their culture.>He was responsible for the burning of nearly all of the written documents of the Maya, leaving us only three complete books from before the Spanish invasion.<He is also considered to have produced a truly dreadful decipherment of the Maya script,>in no small way the result of his incorrect belief that the script was based on an alphabet. Shortly after his death his papers were lost and remained so until 1862 when some of them were found by Brasseur de Bourbourg in the archives at the Royal Academy of History in Madrid. Brasseur attempted to build on the translation work of de Landa but also failed. Nevertheless, he announced that the Maya had originally come to Yucatán from Atlantis.

A subsequent attempt by Augustus le Plongeon to decrypt the script was also unsuccessful, but it did not deter him from uniquely claiming that Atlantis had been a colony of the Maya. Regarding the script today (2021), over 90 per cent of the Maya texts can now be read with reasonable accuracy(a).<

(a) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maya_script *

 

Fontaine, Edward

Fontaine EdRev. Edward Fontaine (1814-1884) was a minister in the Methodist Episcopal Church, a politician and the author of How the World was Peopled[1277] in which he favoured the opinions of Brasseur de Bourbourg, who had identified the land of the Toltecs, in Central America, as the home of Atlantis, citing a comparison of Plato’s description of Atlantis with that of the mythical kingdom of Xibalba, similar to Donnelly’s later suggestion.

Fontaine adds quotations from classical writers as well as Humboldt in support of this Toltec theory[p.136-140]. However, most of the ideas in the book are now long outdated.

Churchward, Jack E.

Jack E. Churchward is the great-grandson of James Churchward, the creator jack e. churchward_pictof Mu. In 2011 Jack republished what he describes as the definitive edition[773] of  James’ 1926 The Lost Continent of Mu which includes a new index and added appendices. It is still just the concoction of a fertile mind. My scepticism and that of many others is reflected in a recent blog from Dale Drinnon(a).

>For the record, Jack is quite sceptical of his great-grandfather’s theories and has republished some of the earlier material in order “for the reader to evaluate the basis of his argument,”<

Jack has also a promotional website(b), where he candidly wrote(c) that “the Troano Manuscript, as a reference for the sinking of Mu, must be removed from the list, if there is to be any legitimacy accorded to an evaluation of Churchward’s theories on Mu.” Jack was highlighting the unreliability of James’ translation of the Troano Manuscript, influenced as it was by the earlier seriously flawed attempts by Bishop Diego De Landa (1524-1579), Brasseur de Bourbourg and LePlongeon. Jason Colavito has added further comments(d) regarding Jack’s blog.

Jack continued to explore his great-grandfather’s misguided ideas with the publication of The Stone Tablets of Mu [1577] in August 2018.

>In 2019, Jack published Crossing the Sands of Time: An Examination of the History and Legends of the Great Uighur Empire [1778].  We are told that “This book was motivated by the author’s interaction with Uyghur scholars and the marked difference between the real history and that espoused by his great-grandfather, James Churchward. During the research, other theories surfaced and are addressed as well. Included are appendices containing all the elder Churchward’s mentions of the Uighurs allowing the reader to judge for themselves the veracity of his pronouncements.”<

(a) See: https://web.archive.org/web/20170116000445/https://frontiers-of-anthropology.blogspot.com/2011/10/lifting-veil-on-lost-continent-of-mu.html

(b) https://www.my-mu.com/bstore.html

(c) https://blog.my-mu.com/?p=2272

(d) https://www.jasoncolavito.com/blog/the-weird-case-of-atlantis-mu-in-the-madrid-codex

 

Manzi, Michel

Michel Manzi (1849-1915) was a close friend of the celebrated painter Edgar Degas. With regard to Atlantis he followed the ideas of Ignatius Donnelly and the Theosophist, Scott-Elliot, and is sometimes referred to as an occultist. He was also influenced by the work of Abbé Brasseur de Bourbourg. It was not until a few years after his death, in 1922, that his book, Le Livre de l’Atlantide[731] (The Book of Atlantis) was published and is now available online(a).

After reading a translation of chapter five(b), I can confidently denounce this book as a collection of nonsense, heavily influenced by Blavatsky‘s drivel, with references to atlantean flying machines and vril power.

(a) https://fr.wikisource.org/wiki/Le_Livre_de_l%E2%80%99Atlantide/Les_preuves_scientifiques (French)

(b) https://fr.wikisource.org/wiki/Le_Livre_de_l’Atlantide/La_civilisation_des_Atlantes

Pole Shift *

Pole Shift is a term used to describe a range of theories that includes an alteration to or even the complete reversal of the magnetic poles, a change to the axis of rotation of the entire planet as well as a possible sudden movement of the outer crust of the Earth relative to its axis.

The magnetic poles are always on the move and well documented, while their complete reversal is a much slower process, previous reversals have left us with geological ‘fingerprints’. It is suggested that another reversal is imminent, while some ‘prophets of doom’ have nominated late 2013 for the event, with dire consequences for mankind(f).

The latest data shows drift of about 40 miles a year, with a recent movement of 161 miles in just six months, creating navigation problems and the re-designation of airport runways which are named after their compass orientation(i).

Jason Colavito has unearthed an early reference to some form of an axial pole shift, proposed as early 1883 in a book [1595] by the somewhat eccentric Australian, John Wood Beilby (1818-1903)(q). However, according to Colavito, there was an even earlier reference to a Pole Shift by Brasseur de Bourbourg in his Historical Chronology of the Mexicans of 1873(r). He also linked this event to the destruction of Atlantis(n). However, it seems that Robert Hooke controversially suggested the idea of pole shift as early as the seventeenth century(z).

David Hatcher Childress recently (2023) offered another 19th-century reference to pole shift when he wrote that “About 1885, (James)Churchward found his way to Siberia and the valley of the Lena River. He was now looking for evidence of ancient cataclysms, which, if it could be found, would lend credence to the idea that an ancient, advanced civilization such as Mu could disappear. Churchward wanted to see the piles of mammoth bones and tusks washed up in tidal waves on the Lackoff Islands (The Islands of Bones) just beyond the mouth of the Lena. He was convinced by these giant piles of ivory and bones that a ‘pole shift’ phenomenon had occurred in the past, where the earth’s crust slipped several degrees toward the equator causing massive tidal waves to wash over portions of the earth and ultimately cause the sinking of entire continents such as Mu.” (y).

The suggestion that an ancient axial pole shift was the consequence of plate tectonics has been disputed by William Sager & Anthony Koppers of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography. Although conceding that plate tectonics may have played a part they describe the 16-21 degree change, 84 million years ago as “an odd event.”(t)

The idea of wandering (magnetic) Poles was first proposed by the German priest Damian Kreichgauer(1859-1940)(g) in 1902[513], although at the time he found little support for the concept. The late Terrence Aym was of the opinion(l) that a magnetic pole reversal was a sign that the next Ice Age was beginning! Today, NASA provides us with a more sober view of the phenomenon of magnetic pole shifts(k).

Another theory suggests that a severe reduction in sunspot activity may herald the imminent return of another ‘little ice age’ such as was experienced in the 17th century and known as the Maunder Minimum. During that period only 50 sunspots were recorded instead of the usual 40-50 thousand(w). NASA has denied that there is any such impending cooling and that the possible effect of any reduced solar activity would be more than offset by the warming caused by human activity(x).

There are a number of variations on the basic concept of an axial change and an array of suggestions for the date of the last displacement. Generally speaking, the mechanism required to cause such a catastrophe is believed to be an impact by or close encounter with a large asteroid or comet. The continuing discovery of huge impact craters around the globe reinforces this possibility. However, recent studies have identified other processes that may have led to polar changes in the past(e).

The suggestion of an Antarctic location for Atlantis, as proposed by Rose and Rand Flem-Ath[062], is totally dependent on a pole shift. The Flem-Aths have interpreted the characteristics of our present icecaps as strong evidence for a number of previous pole shifts. This idea was inspired by the work of Charles Hapgood[369], who was convinced by such evidence as the Piri Reis Map and other ancient maps that seemed to indicate the existence of an Ice Age civilisation now partly covered by the Antarctic icecap. Hapgood has noted[1494.71] that in the 1950’s Karl A. Pauly[1496 and George W. Bain[1498 also supported a form of crustal shift, the former building on the work of A. S. Eddington[1497 of some decades earlier.

Nevertheless, a more critical look at Hapgood’s theory reveals a number of flaws(s), which should be considered in the light of the fact that Hapgood was a professor of history and not a geologist and Graham Hancock, who heavily endorsed Hapgood’s ideas is neither.

‘Project Atlantis’ is the title of an assignment(p) given to first-year geology students at Malaspina University-College in British Columbia. It was set by lecturer Professor Steven Earle with the intention of developing the critical thinking of his students. The objective of the task is to investigate the Crustal Displacement theory of the Flem-Aths, whose ‘Atlantis in the Antarctic’ hypothesis is totally dependent on the occurrence of a pole shift resulting from some form of earth crustal displacement. Kyle Bennett has written a book and a number of papers on the subject.

Pole Shift [0795] by John White, frequently associates the destruction of Atlantis with a pole shift and anticipates another one in the near future, but unfortunately, most of the ‘evidence’ he offers in support of this contention comes from psychic sources, which cannot be accepted as reliable. However, it seems that some years later White completely revised his opinions according to a 1996 report(m).

Although the majority opinion is that pole shifts occurred as a result of encounters with extraterrestrial bodies, Hapgood contended that only the outer crust of the earth shifted and that this was the result of a build-up of ice at the Poles causing instability. However, it has since been calculated that the polar ice constitutes such a small percentage of the mass of the crust that it could not possibly have caused the slippage proposed by Hapgood. This idea and others are discussed on the Pole Shift Forum(o).

Another researcher, S.F.Wells, was prompted by Flem-Ath’s work to examine the Avebury stone circle to see if there was any evidence of a pole shift there. To his surprise, he did discover at Avebury and at other ancient monuments in the locality clear evidence of a pole change of up to 30° in the past. In 2003, he wrote a paper outlining his observations(c).

Flavio Barbiero has written a paper proposing that an impact with an asteroid as small as half a kilometre in diameter could result in a rapid pole shift(aa).

A number of facts are proposed to support the idea of a pole shift. One of the most popular is the extermination of the mammoth, which once again was central to a recent book by Charles Ginenthal, The Extinction of the Mammoth [0514]+, which dates the last pole shift to around 1500 BC. Perhaps the most impressive evidence came from Sweden in November 2009(b) when settlements dating to 9000 BC were discovered in the north of the country in a region that according to accepted theory should have been covered by ice at that time.

Wolter Smit points out that the orientation of some Mayan Temples is apparently out by around 17 degrees from what would be expected. A structural feature at the 4,000-year-old temple of Saar in Bahrain is believed to have been used to record the summer solstice is now out by 10 degrees. Similar anomalies were noted by G.F. Dodwell during his study of ancient gnomons. A further indication that our present knowledge of polar changes may be flawed is highlighted by the fact that on April 15th 136 BC we have a record of an eclipse that completely darkened Babylon that should have had its zone of totality over the Balearic Islands in the Western Mediterranean. This is a difference of nearly 50 degrees and implies that either the Earth has slowed or the polar axis has shifted.

The idea that Pole Shift(s) can be linked to the location and orientation of many ancient sites is explored by Mark Carlotto in his new book, Before Atlantis [1600].

Amy Smith also claims that the Earth ‘tilted’ around 10,000 BC(d) referring to two ancient quotations that may support the reality of this Pole Shift – one from Plato (Tim.22d) and the other from the Book of Enoch/Noah (65.1).

The Hutton Commentaries(a) contain many articles relating to an impending pole shift based on the readings of Edgar Cayce.

In October 2004, Alexander Chechelnitsky, a Russian astrophysicist claimed that Atlantis was located in the Yukon River valley in Alaska[515]. This, he believes, was the result of a pole shift although he admits that scientific evidence is lacking for this theory!

A recent overview of the Pole Shift theory was published in July 2014(h).

[0514]+ Available online: Free Electric Universe theory ebooks and related research papers (archive.org) 

(a) Hutton Commentaries – Archives 

(b) https://web.archive.org/web/20091130170746/https://www.thelocal.se/23546/20091129/

(c)  https://grahamhancock.com/wellssf1/

(d) https://www.angelfire.com/ar/josephus/Atlantis.html#Support

(e) See Archive 3029

(f) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ztaWff0TtHU

(g) https://www.friendsofscience.org/assets/documents/Arrhenius%201906,%20final.pdf

(h) Antartica, Atlantis, and the Earth crustal displacement theory | CanadaNewsLibre (archive.org)

(i) See {2268} 

(j) https://endtimesand2019.wordpress.com/my-newest-magazine-article-pole-shifts/

(k) https://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/2012-poleReversal.html

(l) https://www.sott.net/article/223364-The-Beginning-of-Ice-Age-Magnetic-polar-shifts-causing-massive-global-superstorms

(m) NHNE: Pole Shift Torpedoed by Author (archive.org) 

(n) https://www.jasoncolavito.com/blog/greek-sculptors-in-ancient-china-plus-a-very-early-claim-for-a-pole-shift-destroying-atlantis

(o) https://www.poleshift.org/index.html

(p) See: https://web.archive.org/web/20080705100438/https://www.nagt.org/files/nagt/jge/abstracts/Earle_v51n3p290.pdf

(q) https://www.jasoncolavito.com/blog/the-forgotten-nineteenth-century-pole-shift-claim-and-its-connection-the-great-pyramid-of-egypt

(r) https://www.jasoncolavito.com/historical-chronology-of-the-mexicans.html

(s) https://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/ciencia/ciencia_earthchanges33.htm

(t) https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2000/01/000125053438.htm

(u) https://www.christianhospitality.org/resources/pole-shift.pdf

(v) https://en.was-this-atlantis.info/deplacer-poles.html

(w) https://q-mag.org/a-new-little-ice-age-by-2030.html

(x) https://climate.nasa.gov/ask-nasa-climate/2953/there-is-no-impending-mini-ice-age/ 

(y) https://www.ancientoriginsunleashed.com/p/quest-for-mu-200000-year-old-sunken?publication_id=1035345&post_id=135365655&isFreemail=true 

(z) https://articles.adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-iarticle_query?2004JRASC..98..183B&defaultprint=YES&page_ind=1&filetype=.pdf 

(aa) https://grahamhancock.com/barbierof1/  *

Maya

The Maya of ancient Mexico and Guatemala have generated much controversy regarding their origins(w).  Recent studies indicate that the story of the development of this remarkable civilisation may be more complex than previously thought(k). The demise of the Mayan culture (800-950 AD) has now been definitively shown to be the result of persistent drought, particularly in the southern lowlands(o).

maya_map

Maya Area of Occupation

Nevertheless, a recent (Sept.2021) article(ac) with contributions from several authorities, highlights the complexity referred to above, while one area might be collapsing another could be flourishing – “A number of Maya cities rose and fell at different times, some within that 800 to 1000 time period, and some afterwards, according to scholars. For example, while areas in southern Mesoamerica, such as Tikal in what is now Guatemala, declined in the eighth and ninth centuries due to environmental problems and political turmoil, populations rose in other areas, such as Chichén Itzá, in what is now the Mexican Yucatán Peninsula,”  and “When Chichén Itzá declined, largely because of a lengthy drought during the 11th century, another Yucatán Peninsula city, called Mayapán, started to thrive.”

“We should always remember, the last Maya state, Nojpetén, fell only in 1697 — pretty recent,” said Guy Middleton, a visiting fellow at the School of History, Classics and Archaeology at Newcastle University in the U.K. “It is really important to get the message out there that though classic Maya cities and states did collapse, and culture did transform, the Maya in no way disappeared,” said Middleton, adding that “we should pay attention to the story, the state and status of the Maya descendent population in Mesoamerica now.” 

The commonly held idea, that the Maya were destroyed by drought is now disputed(ah).

The Maya of Central America today are estimated to number seven million.

Inevitably the Maya have been linked with Atlantis by some writers such as Lewis Spence and E.H. Thompson who claimed that the Maya were descendants of Atlanteans. The maverick, Augustus Le Plongeon, was alone in identifying Atlantis as a colony of the Maya and that their language was in fact Greek!   Others, such as Jean-Frédérick Waldeck, included an Egyptian linkage as well.

Richard Cassaro has published a fascinating collection of parallels between the Mayan and Egyptian cultures on Graham Hancock’s website (ag).

The controversial American politician Charles Gates Dawes was convinced that there had been a connection between Atlantis and the Maya.

Joachim Rittstieg claimed that the Maya and the Vikings had contact for nearly 500 years (754-1224 AD)(ae).

However, trumping all that is a recent claim that the Maya had contact with extraterrestrials and that a documentary providing evidence is planned(b). In a similar vein is the latest English language publication from Erich von Däniken entitled: Astronaut Gods of the Maya[1422].  Semir Osmanagic, of Bosnian pyramid fame, added a twist to this proposed linkage when he claimed[0519]  that the Maya had come from Atlantis, which in turn had been founded by visitors from the Pleiades!

For some comic relief, I can suggest a 1976 book[833] by brothers Eric & Craig Umland which ‘reveals’ that the Maya ‘are remnants of space explorers whose attempts to colonise our solar system went awry more than 40,000 years ago.’ Nearly every page is full of hilarious nonsense and nearly worth the £0.01 currently quoted on Amazon.co.uk. A website(i) dealing with ‘unreason’ uses extracts from the Umlands as good examples! If you wish to read about the Maya in Antarctica, the Canaries as well as the Moon, this is the book for you.

July 2012 saw a report(j) on the discovery of the largest Mayan manmade dam at Tikal in Guatemala, which was 33ft high and 260ft long and included sand filters.

The Maya had a sophisticated writing system that occupied the attention of some 19th-century writers including Abbe Brasseur de Bourbourg and Le Plongeon. Unfortunately, de Bourbourg followed the work of the 16th-century bishop of Yucatán, Diego de Landa whose interpretation was seriously erroneous. It was Constantine Rafinesque who partially deciphered some of the Mayan numerals in 1832. 

A report in 2013(l) indicated that substantial progress has been made in the decipherment of any outstanding difficulties in the translation of the Mayan script through Internet cooperation.

July 2012 saw a report(j) on the discovery of the largest Mayan man-made dam at Tikal in Guatemala, which was 33ft high and 260ft long and included sand filters. Ten years later, it was discovered that the Maya had also the ability to engineer a water fountain in their city of Palenque(v) and had advanced water management systems(z). A recent BBC article(ab) took an in-depth look at the remarkable hydrological capabilities of the Maya.

Since Tikal was first seen by a European, probably in 1696, it became recognised as Guatemala’s largest archaeological site. In 2021 the use of lidar revealed that the city was four times more extensive than previous thought. The March 2024 edition of National Geographic has an article highlighting the wonderful discoveries regarding the sophisticated society of the Maya revealed by lidar. Unfortunately, looting continues to be a serious problem compounded by a lack of funds to properly exploit the tourism potential of places such as Tikal.

In 2020, the largest and oldest Mayan monument in Mexico was identified. It is in the form of a ceremonial platform that is between 33 and 50 feet tall and is nearly a mile long(x). The structure, dated to around 3,000 years ago and was discovered with the help of LIDAR in the state of Tabasco.

James O’Kon, an engineer, has investigated Mayan technology for decades, including the discovery of a suspension bridge at the ancient Mayan city of Yaxchilan in Mexico in 1995, which is believed to be the longest bridge of the ancient world(r). This and other aspects of Mayan technology he explores in his book, The Lost Secrets of Maya Technology[1490]

One of those technological secrets was the unusual acoustics found at Mayan sites, particularly Chichen Itza(ad). In 1931 Leopold Stokowski, the renowned conductor, spent four days at the site to determine the acoustic principles that could be applied to an open-air concert theatre he was designing. He failed to learn the secret.

More recently, Lorraine Stobbart has written Utopia: Fact or Fiction[0476], which suggests that the ‘Utopia’ of Sir Thomas More was inspired by the Mayan culture although his text was written before Mexico was ‘officially’ discovered. Stobbart recently revealed that she is now revising her views.

However, a more serious claim relates to the idea that Mayan inscriptions revealed that a global catastrophe was to occur in 2012. This nonsense(g) turned into a minor publishing industry.  Some even tried to link this daft idea to Atlantis. Fortunately, May 2012 saw evidence from excavations in Guatemala that shows the Mayan calendar extending well beyond 2012(h).

The Mayan calendar has provoked speculation and controversy ever since its discovery. Its origins are obscure, but one interpretation is that the world we live in was created on this day in 3114 B.C. A quite different view was proposed over seventy years ago by Georg Hinzpeter of the German Hoerbiger Society who claimed that our Moon was captured by the Earth in June of 8498 BC and that it became the zero date for the Maya.(y)

Aloys Eiling, the German researcher, commented on the accuracy of the Mayan calendar “The Mayan calendar even surpasses the precision of the Gregorian calendar in use today. Not only did the Mayan calendar measure the duration of the Earth’s orbit around the sun more accurately than our current calendar, but the Maya gave an even more precise value for the average duration of the Moon’s orbit around Earth. The precision achieved is all the more remarkable as the Moon in deserts or regions with clear skies may have played an important role in everyday life as a nightly source of light. But of what use is its dull light in the rainforest or cloudy regions of the world?”(af)

>>The accuracy of the Mayan calendar is such that it loses just one day in 6,000 years(ap).<<

In 2012, it was reported that Mike Baillie, the renowned dendrochronologist, had discovered a correlation between ice core chemistry spikes and the Mayan Long Count Calendar(al)(m).

The late David H. Kelley, a Harvard-educated archaeologist and epigrapher at Canada’s University of Calgary, had been investigating ancient links between Asia and pre-Columbian America. In that regard, he published a paper outlining similarities between the Mayan and ancient Chinese calendars that were too numerous to be explained by independent development(p). A more sceptical view is offered(an)by Jason Colavito, who traces the idea back to Alexander von Humboldt(q).

In a paper entitled On the Mayan Chronology(ao), Emilio Spedicato offers several ideas regarding ancient Meso-American chronologies. For example, he proposes that the large numbers used by the Maya and Toltecs record days rather than years. Many of his ideas stem from the work of Immanuel Velikovsky, John Ackerman and the Tollmans.

The work of Teobert Maler at the end of the 19th century was invaluable in the advancement of Mayan studies. Subsequent researchers have seized upon his discovery of a frieze at Tikal, which he interpreted as a depiction of the destruction of Atlantis, as evidence of the existence of Atlantis in the Atlantic.  Apart from Maler’s conjectural ideas, no tangible link has been found between the Maya and Atlantis apart from the use in their glyphs of elephants, an animal that features in Plato’s narrative.

The authenticity of the photo of the frieze has been called into question by Jason Colavito and his related blog(n) is worthy of consideration.

 Otto Muck overstated it somewhat when he wrote “If Atlantis had not existed there would be no way of explaining the origins of the Maya civilisation”[098.243]

In late 2011 controversy erupted when it was claimed that the Itza Maya had migrated to North America, more specifically Georgia(c). It was also suggested that earthen pyramids in Georgia and Florida can be attributed to the Maya(e). Richard Thornton led the charge with this claim, which understandably generated considerable controversy. This led to a frosty exchange between Thornton and Jason Colavito(ai).

Among their other accomplishments is the claim that the Maya were capable of predicting meteor showers(s).

Gene Matlock, the well-known advocate of Atlantis in Mexico, is certain that the Maya were originally Tamils from Sri Lanka(a) and Sumerians!

Kurt Schildmann’s 2003 book [1759],  was reviewed by Dr Horst Friedrich who commented that “One of the provisional results of Schildmann’s decipherment of the Maya script, and study of the Maya language, is the rather sensational discovery that words from several Old World languages (Sumerian, Accadian, Indo-Iranian, Phoenician, Hebrew and Basque) have somehow found their way into the Maya language.”(aa) I’m sure this will be disputed!

A recent article(f) gives an interesting firsthand account of encountering the important Mayan city of Calakmul deep in the Yucatan jungle. Potentially even more important are recent LiDAR surveys carried out in Guatemala that have revealed an astounding number of previously unidentified Mayan structures. The number of additional Mayan sites identified through the use of LiDAR continues to grow at an incredible rate(u). It was estimated in 2022 that “researchers using laser technology have located nearly 1,000 previously unknown Maya settlements in Guatemala – the sites include ceremonial centers, sporting facilities, roads, and reservoirs(ak).

In June 2023, it was announced that once again that LiDAR had enabled another forgotten Mayan city to be located in the Yucatan(aj).

Muddying the waters further is an Islamic site that claims that the Maya were Atlantean(m).

(a) https://viewzone2.com/ancientturksx.html

(b) Mayan Filmmaker Offers Photo as Proof of Aliens, Says Hawking Agrees (Exclusive) (archive.org) 

(c) http://www.billdawers.com/2011/12/22/is-there-an-1100-year-old-mayan-site-in-north-georgia/ 

(e) http://www.mayainamerica.com/2012/01/pyramids-in-florida-and-georgia.html

(f) https://travel4wildlife.com/deep-jungle-puerta-calakmul-mexico/#.U5K8MpAU9to

(g) https://web.archive.org/web/20140811054919/https://2012hoax.wikidot.com/oldstart

(h) https://www.christianpost.com/news/earliest-mayan-mural-contradicts-dec-21-2012-doomsday-74788/

(i) https://web.archive.org/web/20200925184903/https://www.jfk-online.com/exploring.html

(j) https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/07/120716191443.htm?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+sciencedaily%2Ffossils_ruins%2Fancient_civilizations+%28ScienceDaily%3A+Fossils+%26+Ruins+News+–+Ancient+Civilizations%29

(k) https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/04/130425142343.htm

(l) https://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2013/may/28/maya-script-glyph-language-decoding?INTCMP=SRCH

(m) https://mashiyah.blogspot.ie/ (offline 1/8/14)

(n) https://www.jasoncolavito.com/1/post/2014/02/did-the-maya-depict-the-end-of-atlantis-at-tikal.html

(o) https://popular-archaeology.com/issue/spring-2015/article/new-findings-on-drought-and-the-ancient-maya-collapse

(p) https://www.ancient-origins.net/news-history-archaeology/mayan-calendar-similar-ancient-chinese-early-contact-006612

(q) https://www.jasoncolavito.com/blog/newly-published-articles-claim-mexican-calendar-derives-from-chinese-original

(r) The Lost Secrets of Maya Technology (archive.org)

(s)  Ancient Maya May Have Foreseen Meteor Showers – Eos *

(t) https://arstechnica.com/science/2018/02/lasers-shed-some-light-on-the-maya-snake-kingdom/

(u) https://news.artnet.com/art-world/technology-transforming-mayan-archaeology-1558456

(v) https://content.usatoday.com/communities/sciencefair/post/2010/03/maya-pyramid-plumbing-unearthed-by-archaeologists/1#.Xm-Nb2BFBVc (link broken) 

(w) Mexico and atlantis | Truth Control (archive.org)

(x)  https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/largest-and-oldest-maya-structure-found-mexico-lidar-180975037/

(y) Atlantean Research, Vol 3, No.1, May, 1950

(z) Maya Water System Discoveries Show the Ancient Civilization in a New Light | Discover Magazine

(aa)  https://www.migration-diffusion.info/books.php

(ab) The Maya’s ingenious secret to survival – BBC Travel

(ac) https://www.livescience.com/why-maya-civilization-collapsed.html

(ad) https://www.nature.com/articles/news041213-5

(ae) http://atlantisorschung.de/index.php?title=Joachim_Rittstieg 

(af) https://grahamhancock.com/eilinga3/ 

(ag) The Ancient Egyptians and Mayans: Ten Unexplained Parallels – Graham Hancock Official Website 

(ah)  Ancient Maya lessons on surviving drought: Huge variety of plant foods made their starvation unlikely — ScienceDaily 

(ai) Richard Thornton and the “Maya” of Georgia – JASON COLAVITO

(aj) https://www.livescience.com/archaeology/lost-maya-city-discovered-deep-in-the-jungles-of-mexico 

(ak) https://news.artnet.com/art-world/guatemala-mirador-calakmul-karst-basin-lidar-maya-settlements-2235254

(al) Mayan Match: Baillie discovers correlation between ice core chemistry spikes and Mayan Long Count Calendar – The Cosmic Tusk

(am) Microsoft Word – Science Brevia paper.doc (cosmictusk.com)

(an) Atlantis, Mu, and the Maya – JASON COLAVITO *

(ao) ON THE MAYAN CHRONOLOGY – Ruggero Marino – Cristoforo Colombo *

(ap) Celestial and Mathematical Precision in Ancient Architecture (redicecreations.com) *

Linguistic Connections (t)

Linguistic Connections have been frequently advanced between Europe and the Americas as evidence of either an ancient sea link between the two or an intermediate landmass, Atlantis. Some of these supposed connections have been demonstrated as being totally without substance and merely coincidences resulting from the limited number of sounds that can be produced by human speech. Unfortunately, many of these purported links are still referred to in some books and even more frequently on websites, as credible evidence for the existence of Atlantis. Quite frankly the whole matter of similarities between languages is a complete red herring in the search for Atlantis. While it is perfectly possible that prehistoric Europeans and Africans travelled to the Americas and brought their languages with them, it does nothing to prove that Plato’s Atlantis existed.

The Basques, frequently linked with Atlantis, call their language, Euskara, which is a seemingly unique tongue, unrelated to any Indo-European speech. Strangely, Euskara shares some affinity with Finno-Urgic Patumnili (allegedly spoken in ancient Troy), Etruscan (belonging to the pre-Roman civilizers of western Italy, traditionally descended from the Trojans), Guanche (spoken by the early, supposedly Atlantean, inhabitants of the Canary Islands) and Nahuatl, the language of the Aztecs. These long-dead languages are themselves only very imperfectly understood today but the fact that Basque Euskara contains legitimate cognates with the languages of four arguably Atlantean peoples may not be without significance.

To add further confusion, in the middle of the last century, Dr. Yoshitomi drew attention to similarities between the Basque and Japanese languages.

Following the work of Dr. Pierre L. Collignon, Egerton Sykes supported the view that a number of North American place names have a possible Egyptian origin.

Tennessee – Ta-N-Ese meaning ‘Land of Isis’

Kentucky/Quantuck named after the Egyptian Anubis

Missouri – Mesu-Ra meaning ‘Children of the Sun’

Kansas/Arkansas named after the Third Great God of Thebes

Massachusettes –Mesu-Tchesert refers to ‘Children of the Red One’

Niagara – Nga-Ra equates with ‘Bull of Ra’, bull being another title of the Nile.

All that can be said to readers is to tread warily and generally speaking take all that is read on this subject with a grain of proverbial salt. Nevertheless, those interested in recent developments in language studies the website below(a) should be of interest.

Also See: Augustus le Plongeon, Brasseur de Bourbourg, Ignatius Donnelly

(a) https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/09/120920135321.htm

le Plongeon, Augustus

Augustus le Plongeon (1826-1909) was born on Jersey in the Channel leplongeonIslands. He was a professional photographer and amateur archaeologist, who was an enthusiastic follower of Ignatius Donnelly’s idea that the alphabets of the Old and New Worlds were derived from a common Phoenician root via Atlantis. He also attempted to build on the efforts of Diego deLanda and Brasseur de Bourbourg to decipher the Mayan hieroglyphics. Both Donnelly’s efforts to link Latin with Mayan glyphs and deLanda’s attempt to identify the Mayan alphabet bore little fruit, reminiscent of Kircher’s equally futile struggle with Egyptian hieroglyphics.

Le Plongeon with comparable wasted dedication, attempted to convince the world that the Mayan language was in fact Greek. It would have been easier to prove that chalk is cheese. His attachment to the Mayan civilisation also inspired him to claim that they were the founders of the culture of Ancient Egypt via a trip westward through Asia and on to the Mediterranean. When it was eventually demonstrated that the Mayan culture was considerably younger than that of ancient Egypt, le Plongeon refused to relinquish his absurd ideas and continued to claim that the Maya were the oldest people on the planet(e).

Le Plongeon was alone in suggesting that Atlantis was a colony of the Maya.

He was also the creator of numerous other bizarre notions regarding such matters as Mu[439] and the last words of Christ. Incidentally, like Abbe Charles Etienne Brasseur de Bourbourg, Le Plongeon equated Mu with Plato’s Atlantis(e).  He was convinced that the Mayan inscriptions on the pyramid of Xochicalco told the story of the destruction of Atlantis. It is remarkable that the author of such outlandish notions is quoted so frequently today, since few accept that he has contributed much to the advancement of knowledge. Jörg Dendl offers an extensive critique, in German, of Le Plongeon’s views(c) and worth a read.

Robert Schoch has suggested(a) that Le Plongeon, himself a freemason, had another agenda, namely, to establish links between freemasonry and the ancient Maya. A potted biography of Le Plongeon on the Internet(b) is also to be recommended.

Le Plongeon’s Vestiges of the Maya is available online(d).

(a)  https://web.archive.org/web/20050530100238/https://www.robertschoch.net/articles/westernsphinx.pdf

(b) See: https://web.archive.org/web/20180801075410/https://maya.csueastbay.edu/archaeoplanet/LgdPage/LepKehoe.htm*

(c) https://www.dendlon.de/Atlantis.html

(d)  https://www.gutenberg.org/files/30752/30752-h/30752-h.htm

(e) https://trove.nla.gov.au/ndp/del/article/153629196?searchTerm=Atlantis discovered&searchLimits=sortby=dateAsc

Joseph, Frank *

Frank Joseph (1944- ) or more correctly Francis Joseph Collin, was born in Chicago. His father was Max Simon Cohen, who is said to have spent time in Dachau concentration camp. Incredibly, in the late seventies, Frank Joseph was the leader of the American Nazi Party. In 1981, Joseph was arrested and convicted of molesting young boys. He was released after serving three of a seven-year sentence (a)(b).

Since his release, he has established himself as an author, writing a Frank Josephnumber of books on Atlantis and Diffusionism[102108]. In them, he has emphasised at length the enormous quantities of copper mined in ancient times in North America that he maintains were brought to Europe to feed the demand there, for bronze making. He maintains that this is clear evidence of trading contacts between the Old and New Worlds in prehistoric times. Among his more unusual claims are that Noah was an Atlantean and that the Trojan War was just part of the conflict with the Sea Peoples.

One of Joseph’s early books, Edgar Cayce’s Atlantis and Lemuria[106], was heavily criticised in some quarters(e) including an accusation of including in the book a ‘heavily retouched’ photo of the underwater Yonaguni site.

In Joseph’s The Destruction of Atlantis, he dates that event to 1198 BC(o) quoting such sources as the Ipuwer Papyrus and temple inscriptions at Medinet Habu.

He then claims that eight years later the Atlanteans re-emerged as the Meshwesh, one of the Sea Peoples, attacked Egypt and were defeated by Ramses III [1535]. The authoritative D’Amato & Salimbeti have identified the Meshwesh as possibly being a tribe related to the Libyans [1152.8].

The author concurs with others that the catastrophe was triggered by an impact from a comet/asteroid in the region of the Mid Atlantic Ridge. Joseph supports an Atlantis located in the Atlantic of which the Canary Islands and Azores(g) are among its remnants. He draws attention to the fact that The Laws by Plato also refers to the ‘Great Deluge’. In the same book, Joseph returns to his hobbyhorse of the huge amounts of copper that were mined in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula in prehistoric times. He is convinced that Atlanteans carried out this massive extraction and transported it to the east to feed the emerging Bronze Age. This book is useful for someone coming to the subject for the first time but it contains little that new and is really just a reworking of existing material.

His next offering, The Atlantis Encyclopedia, was promoted as an encyclopaedia of Atlantis-related references, yet it omits any mention of many of the leading theories and their promoters, which is not what you would expect from such a reference work on the subject. It also suffers from an overabundance of references to Native American mythologies, which at best have only the shakiest connection with Plato’s Atlantis.

Although The Atlantis Encyclopedia was published in 2005, it was only recently (July 2022) that Thorwald C. Franke, in his newsletter #197(r), applied his very sharp scalpel to the contents of the book. Franke points out a number of errors, but reserves his most detailed criticism for Joseph’s entry relating to the ‘Third Reich’. Franke’s conclusion is that Joseph has produced ‘a really bad book’. When Franke’s comments are combined with the many errors that I have listed below, it is obvious that Frank Joseph is a most unreliable source of information regarding Atlantis.

He followed this with Survivors of Atlantis, a sequel to The Destruction of Atlantis, which focuses on four global catastrophes linked to the cyclical return of a comet, that led to the destruction of Atlantis and the subsequent dispersal of its survivors and their influence on the cultures of their adopted homelands. As usual, he returns to the mystery of the Michigan copper mines but covers a wide range of global prehistory speculating on possible links with Atlantis. Unlike its prequel, ‘Survivors’ does not include an index.

For a number of years, Joseph was editor-in-chief of Ancient American magazine(c), owned by Wayne May, a Mormon, whose church has a vested interest in demonstrating the existence of early, advanced pre-Columbian peoples in America. A one-hour lecture given by Joseph in 1997 is available on YouTube(h), in which he outlines a number of very early pre-Columbian contacts between West Africa, particularly Mali and the Americas that led to the giant stone heads being carved by the Olmecs.

In 2008, Joseph published Unearthing Ancient America in which he revisits the pre-Columbian remains of North America. As usual, he denounces orthodox archaeologists as a means to bolster his own extreme ideas. For example “Louisiana’s Poverty Point, the ‘oldest city in North America’, is a dead-ringer for Plato’s description of Atlantis…[108.178]

With his book The Opening of the Ark of the Covenant[670] Joseph moved into slightly different territory, linking the Ark with Atlantis and the Templars. Joseph co-authored this book with Laura Beaudoin who claims to be a descendant of the founder of the Knights Templar in Jerusalem.

Not one to miss an opportunity, the prolific Mr Joseph then jumped on the 2012 bandwagon with the publication of Atlantis and 2012[694]. As the world did not end, Joseph revised this book and republished it as Atlantis and the Coming Ice Age[1074] in 2015. An excerpt is available online(i).

April 2012 saw Joseph as editor of Lost Worlds of Ancient America[824]  which is an anthology of articles describing various pre-Columbian visitors from both east and west. It also includes a suggestion that the Bahamas had a landmass to match Plato’s description of Atlantis. Jason Colavito, a well-known sceptic, has written an extensive and highly critical review(f) of this collection of articles culled from the Ancient American magazine.   While the book has little to do with Atlantis, Colavito’s comments cast doubts on Joseph’s credibility as well as that of the other contributors.

Before Atlantis[1459]  was published by Joseph in 2013, in it he focuses on the ‘aquatic ape theory’(k) and the existence of ‘pre-human cultures’ going back 20 million years. Atlantis plays a minor part in this offering and it is probable that it is only in the title to assist sales! In May 2017, we have a report(l) of pre-human remains dated 7.2 million years ago being discovered in the Balkans. How Joseph can apply the term ‘culture’ to such primitive creatures is hard to understand.

In 2016, Joseph published Our Dolphin Ancestors [1871] in which he reveals that we and dolphins are both descended from the aquatic ape! For good measure, he “explores the ‘connections’ between dolphins and Atlantis and Lemuria.”

Joseph frequently touches on the subject of Lemuria and in 2006 published The Lost Civilisation of Lemuria [107] which was devoted to it. Leaving aside that Joseph equates Lemuria with Mu and that both names are inventions from Philip Sclater and Brasseur de Bourbourg respectively, the advertising blurb for his book tells us that “Joseph painstakingly re-creates a picture of this civilization in which people lived in rare harmony and possessed a sophisticated technology that allowed them to harness the weather, defy gravity, and conduct genetic investigations far beyond what is possible today.” This is reminiscent of some of the b.s.produced by Blavatsky and Cayce, among others.

Joseph then followed ‘Lost Worlds’ with Lost Colonies of Ancient America in 2014[1124], receiving rave reviews on Amazon, while Bradley T. Lepper(j) cites Larry Zimmermann(n), an archaeologist from Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis, who offered a different view in the July/Oct 2015 edition of American Antiquity.

In 2014, Joseph republished Atlantis and Other Lost Worlds[636] as a paperback and a Kindle book. which is just a recycling of some of his earlier material and adds nothing of value. His reliance on speculation rather than evidence has not diminished. While his conjecture is bad enough, his misquoting of Plato is unforgivable. One example is his claim that Atlantis had 14,400 naval personnel, for 1,200 ships, which would mean that each ship had only a crew of 12! The only ships mentioned by Plato were triremes, which had a crew of 200(m). What Plato actually said (Critias 119a-b) was that in time of war each of the managers of the 60,000 allotments on the plain of Atlantis, had to supply four men for naval duty, which amounts to a total of 240,000 and matches the number of men required for 1200 triremes. This is just one of a number of similar errors in that passage. However, the same book also sets a record for the number of mistakes that Joseph managed to squeeze into a single sentence. At this point, I decided to look back at all my references to Joseph’s work and was shocked to find that he has been consistently guilty of at least sloppy research, if not dishonesty, and for me, must therefore be considered unreliable.

I was recently perusing the Kindle version of Atlantis and Other Lost Worlds and discovered a number of obvious inaccuracies. For example, Joseph refers to G.R.Corli as a French astronomer, whereas in fact his name was Carli and he was born in Capodistria, formerly Italian, but now part of Slovenia (loc.2511). Joseph claims that Carli believed that a fragment of a comet had hit the Earth, when, in fact, he had only postulated that a close encounter with a comet had occurred.

He added a ‘d’ to Edgerton Sykes name (loc. 2543, 3573) and removed the ‘e’ from that of Arthur C. Clarke (loc.2783). In an article in Atlantis Rising magazine #35(p), he retained the ‘d’ in Sykes’ name and described Hanns Hörbiger as a physicist when he was a mining engineer by profession. He also recycled his errors relating to Giovanni Rinaldo Carli mentioned above. Still, on the first page of the article, he claimed that meteorites were not recognised by the scientific establishment when Ignatius Donnelly wrote Ragnarok in 1884, when, according to Smithsonian magazine, meteorites were discussed much earlier, in 1803(q). 

His section on the Atlantean Army and population(loc.312) is full of numerical errors. He has the whole population of Atlantis at over one million, whereas Plato tells us that on their own, the Atlantean armed forces totalled around a million, including 480,000 foot -soldiers, 120,000 horsemen, 160,000 manning the 10,000 heavy chariots and 60,000 light chariots, and 240,000 sailors. From this, Otto Muck extrapolated a total population of between 20 and 40 million for Atlantis. Joseph proposes that the 1,200 Atlantean ships were serviced and manned by 14,400 men (just twelve each). However, the triremes referred to by Plato, each required a crew of 140 rowers!

Joseph ends the book with a Bibliography, but heads it Biography!

This book was clearly not proofread and its research was slipshod. Unfortunately, this does not appear to have been an isolated example. I therefore decided to review all Atlantipedia entries that referred to Frank Joseph.

Amber is not exclusive to the Baltic and can be found in the Americas, Lebanon, Siberia, Australia and Japan. A highly prized blue amber is to be found in the Dominican Republic. Frank Joseph in an effort to support his speculations regarding mythical Electra claims[0636.109] that the Atlantic islands of the Azores, Madeira and the Canaries are one of the two major sources of amber. This is blatantly untrue, as revealed in a comprehensive website(a) by Susie Ward Aber, a mineralogist at Emporia State University, Kansas. Amber sources worldwide are listed, but nothing in the Atlantic. Mr Joseph has, once again, some explaining to do.

However, there is also another trend becoming more obvious, which is that there are an increasing number of instances, particularly on the internet, of the Ark of the Covenant being linked to Atlantis. There is, of course, no evidence ever offered to support such speculation. One of the most recent of these is Opening the Ark of the Covenant, co-authored by the inventive Frank Joseph, where he traces the Ark back to Atlantis. There are probably few people that don’t accept that the Ark had been a real artefact, while many doubt the reality of Atlantis. It is possible that by linking the two, the authors hope to achieve credibility transference from one to the other!

In his Atlantis Encyclopedia, Frank Joseph has suggested[104.33] that Atalya or Atalia was, through time, transformed into Italy, adding that Atalia means ‘Land of Atlas’. This entry has been copied on a number of websites. However, the etymology of ‘Italy’ is not clear, but the most common proposal is that  “Latin Italia may derive from Oscan víteliú, meaning “[land] of young cattle” (from Latin vitulus “calf”, Umbrian vitlu), via Greek transmission (evidenced in the loss of initial digamma). The bull was a symbol of the southern Italic tribes”. In passing, I should mention that Plato tells us that the Atlanteans who controlled southern Italy as far as Tyrrhenia also had a bull cult.

The following excerpt from a paper entitled Atlantis and the Great Pyramid from the July/August 2006 edition of Atlantis Rising magazine. “They (the Egyptians) somehow foresaw some inevitable celestial catastrophe with a potential for extraordinary destructiveness. As the object’s orbit began to noticeably decay, ground observers concluded that an impact with our planet was unavoidable, and began to prepare for the event by constructing a device that would bolster earth’s ionosphere, thereby deflecting the course of the falling object. The pyramid builders erected their geo-transducer because they understood that the earth was periodically endangered by recurring cycles of celestial bombardments. The Great Pyramid was built to guard against future collisions from outer space.”

The Balearic Islands of the Western Mediterranean were not occupied until around 2200 BC. Although the two larger islands of Majorca and Minorca have many megalithic monuments, principally taulas and talayots, they have not, so far, been part of any Atlantis location theory. The only mention that I can find is the unsubstantiated claim by Frank Joseph[0104.66] that the early settlers were invaders from Atlantis.

Frank Joseph erroneously claims[0108.117] that the only known ‘Cerne’ was Cerne Abbas in England, the site of the famous naked giant carved into the chalk. There is certainly no suggestion of any Amazon invasion there and the physique of the giant was certainly never matched by even the most butch Amazon. There is also the island of Cerne off the west coast of Africa and mentioned in the voyage of Hanno. Furthermore, Cerne is mentioned by Diodorus Siculus (iii.54) and is considered by some to be the Tunisian island of Kerkennah. Clearly, there was more than one Cerne known in our ancient past and so, not for the first time, Joseph is blatantly wrong.

Joseph also proposed that copper was the foundation for the wealth of Atlantis. He is convinced that there is evidence of extensive copper mining activities in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula around 1000 BC. He refers to these miners as Atlanteans[0102] and maintains that the extracted copper was brought to the Mediterranean, as he claims that there is no trace of it in North America. Joseph offers no real evidence.

Frank Joseph incorrectly claimed in the July/August 2011 issue of Atlantis Rising magazine that DeCamp “formerly a staunch disbeliever in Atlantis, was later convinced it did indeed exist in south-coastal Iberia.”  No evidence was offered for this wild claim.

Frank Joseph echoed others with the idea 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 is cultural height.”[0636.21]  This is an odd claim as Plato twice, unambiguously, placed Tuscany (Tyrhennia) beyond Atlantean control (Tim.25b & Crit.114c).

Evaemon (Euaemon) is the name of one of the fourth pair (with Ampheres) of twins who became the first kings of Atlantis. Frank Joseph[0104] identifies Euaemon with the ‘pre-Celtic’ king of Ireland, Eremon! This is somewhat incorrect as the Milesians are generally accepted as having been Celtic, with Eremon being one of eight Milesian brothers who invaded Ireland from Spain and defeated the Tuatha dé Danaan.

I found more of Joseph’s entries relating to Ireland that were, for me, particularly annoying. The first was his entry in his Encyclopedia for ‘crannóg’ where he attempts to link it with a sunken city. Crannógs are small artificial islands built in lakes for defensive purposes. When abandoned they usually became covered in small trees. The word is derived from the Irish word crann which means a tree, while óg means young or small. There are many such crannógs to be found among the numerous lakes of County Leitrim where I live. My second gripe is the entry ‘Tir-nan-Og’, which should in fact be ‘Tir na nÓg’ which means Land of Youth, implying land of perpetual youth. There is no connection with Og or Ogygia. I respectfully suggest that Frank Joseph and anyone else should tread more warily when trying to link similar-sounding words from different languages.

Frank Joseph has related speculative ideas claiming that “the early date for New Grange, its circular construction, sophisticated solar orientation and mythic tradition all point to Atlantean origins.” [0636.70] A nonsensical conclusion based on nothing but his fertile imagination

Frank Joseph erroneously claims that Plato could not have been influenced by the Helike disaster, because according to Joseph the Atlantis dialogues were written 25 years before the obliteration of Helike[1074.14], when in fact Plato wrote his last dialogues about 25 years after the demise of Helike.

Lemmings are small rodents that primarily live in northern regions. Early zoologists and the more gullible readers assumed that the creatures have been seen committing mass suicide in an attempt to find their ancient homeland, Atlantis. Unfortunately, Frank Joseph[0102.51], among others, has chosen to perpetuate this canard. It should be obvious that if Atlantis had been destroyed 12,000 years ago, as Joseph claims, the lemmings should have all died out millennia ago due to their alleged destructive homing instinct.

Frank Joseph links the destruction of ‘Lemuria’ with the Plagues of Egypt [0106][0107]!

Frank Joseph contends[0636.42] that the Phaistos Disk was ‘a sophisticated astrological chart’ and ‘is an example of Atlantean Bronze Age technology’.

Frank Joseph contends that conflict between the Egyptians and the Sea Peoples was part of the Trojan War[0108.11] and has identified the Meshwesh, one of the Sea Peoples, as Atlantean [1535].

Christopher Volpe records that in 1906, Alexander Strath-Gordon founded the Atlantean Research Society, in East Orange, New Jersey. This date conflicts with the foundation date of 1928 proposed by Frank Joseph. A book published by Strath-Gordon in 1934 confirms the 1906 date on its cover and records him as the founder and life president of the Atlantean Research Society.

In view of all of the above, it is more than reasonable to classify Frank Joseph as unreliable.

(a) https://web.archive.org/web/20190127004837/https://www.flavinscorner.com/collin.htm

(b) https://web.archive.org/web/20100612064814/https://www.robertghostwolf.com/kimball.htm

(c) Ancient American Magazine (archive.org) *

(e) https://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/atlantida_mu/esp_lemuria_4.htm

(f) https://www.jasoncolavito.com/1/post/2012/05/the-los-angeles-monolith-frank-josephs-archaeology-by-hearsay.html   (and subsequent blogs)

(g) https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCgEgzGsc9DOpnLlIP5Q8DAQ

(h) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F7n7kPnuZUY

(i) Archive 2627   

(j)   https://web.archive.org/web/20161204161137/http:/www.dispatch.com/content/stories/science/2015/09/20/01-book-about-americas-discovery-gets-it-all-wrong.html or See: Archive 2694

(k) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aquatic_ape_hypothesis

(l) https://popular-archaeology.com/issue/spring-2017/article/scientists-find-7-2-million-year-old-pre-human-remains-in-the-Balkans

(m) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trireme#Crew

(n) https://www.academia.edu/15087000/Book_Review_Lost_Colonies_of_Ancient_America-A_Comprehensive_Guide_to_the_Precolumbian_Visitors_Who_Really_Discovered_America

(o) https://www.newdawnmagazine.com/articles/eternal-atlantis

(p) Atlantis Rising magazine #35   http://pdfarchive.info/index.php?pages/At 

(q) https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/1803-rain-rocks-helped-establish-existence-meteorites-180963017/ 

(r) Review of: Frank Joseph, The Atlantis Encyclopedia – Atlantis-Scout