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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
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 »
Peter James
Howells, Caleb
>>Caleb Howells is a British researcher with a passion for ancient history. He has already published a book about King Arthur [2077] and now offers a new look at the story of Brutus the Trojan King of Britain [2076] in The Trojan Kings of Britain. In addition, he has published numerous articles on a wide range of historical subjects(i). A number of these were produced as a content writer for the Greek Reporter website, where he has recently (2023) endeavoured to revive the ailing Minoan Hypothesis (a)(b).<<
Plato came from Athens, a city frequently damaged by earthquakes, he also spent time in Sicily where he must have been made aware of the continually active volcano, Mount Etna. Consequently, it is reasonable to assume that Plato could distinguish between an earthquake and a volcano, so when he wrote that Thera had been destroyed by an earthquake, that is what he intended to say. Furthermore, his description of the submergence of Atlantis as a result of the ‘quake sound very much like liquefaction frequently associated with such events. The Minoan Hypothesis does not match Plato’s account.
Although I disagree with Howells’ identification of Atlantis as Minoan, I was pleasantly surprised that in a December 2023 article(c) he tackled the question of the Pillars of Herakles which included many of the points already published in Atlantipedia. He notes the use of the phrase as a metaphor, particularly by Pindar who used it “as an expression denoting the outermost limit of something. His use of the phrase ‘beyond that the wise cannot set foot’ indicates that he was not merely talking about athletic limits, but limits in general.” Howells also points out the multiplicity of locations designated as ‘Pillars’ and that more than one location were so called at the same time. Nevertheless, he cannot let go of a possible Minoan connection and so proposed the Gulf of Laconia where the Capes Matapan (Tainaron) and Maleas in the Peloponnese are the two most southerly points of mainland Greece. They had been proposed over forty years ago by Galanopoulos & Bacon [0263] as the ‘Pillars’ when the early Greeks were initially confined to the Aegean Sea and the two promontories were the western limits of their maritime knowledge at that time. Overall, Howells’ article is interesting but unoriginal.
A few days later (12/12/23) he cast doubts on the Capes Matapan and Maleas as the location of the Pillars of Herakles(d). Howells is like a dog with a bone where the Minoan Hypothesis is concerned and by now should be realising the true complexity of the Atlantis story.
Atlantis was destroyed by submergence following an earthquake, not a volcanic eruption. The Minoans were traders not invaders, so if Crete was Atlantis where is there mention of a war between Athens and the Minoans?(See Below) Atlantis was a confederation of some sort, so who were its constituents? Why did Plato not simply name the not-too-distant Cretans as the attackers of Athens and laud the victory of the Athenians?
In late January 2024, Howells expanded his efforts to bolster the Minoan Hypothesis. This time, using some rather convoluted reasoning, he identifies ancient Crete as the Caphtor referred to in the Bible.
This is another contentious issue among historians. The matter is discussed more fully in the Caphtor-Keftiu entry here, where you will find a number of locations identified as Caphtor, including Cyprus, Crete, Cilicia and the Nile Delta. Although currently the most popular would appear to be Crete, Wikipedia seems to favour the Egyptian region of Pelusium(e)!
Cyprus had previously been the most favoured location, about whom Immanuel Velikovsky noted(f) “if Caphtor is not Cyprus, then the Old Tesrament completely omits referenceto this large island close to the Syrian coast.” The Cypriot identification has been endorse by a number of commentators such as John Strange, author of Caphtor/Keftiu: A new Investigation[1052]. I think that with so much controversy surrounding the indentity of the Caphtorim that its possible value as support for the equally controversial Minoan Hypothesis is substantially weakened.
Furthermore, I note that in 2022, Phil Butler published a paper that also suggested identifying the Keftiu as Atlantean.
A number of commentators have supported the idea of Atlantis in the Aegean region. The most convincing, in my opinion, have come from Peter James [047], Eberhard Zangger [483] and more recently Nicholas Costa [2072] , all of whom designated an Anatolian location for Atlantis. They all have their shortcomings but have built stronger cases than Howells for their chosen locations.
>>In September 2024, Howells published a YouTube video complaining about my treatment of his support for the Minoan Hypothesis (MH). To be clear, I bear no ill will towards Caleb, who seems to be an affable individual. For my part, as a grumpy old man, I have become quite intolerant of most of what is written today about Atlantis. The Minoan Hypothesis has developed over the past century, but, in my opinion, has not improved with age. Like most Atlantis theories it aligns with some of the characteristics described by Plato, but never all of them. I shall return to this shortly.
First, Howells was unhappy that I did not seem to give his historical work precedence over his teaching, which was inadvertent and now rectified. His other complaints are more contentious, starting with the war with the Mycenaeans. Until recently, the Minoans were generally considered to have been a peaceful nation. It is only recently that the idea of warlike Minoans have been seriously mooted, led by University of Sheffield archaeologist Barry Molloy(h), but, remains a minority view. My understanding is that the Mycenaeans (Greeks) attacked the Minoans (Atlanteans!), not the other way around as Plato described it. In Howells’ paper investigating Santorini as Atlantis he states “We do not know who the aggressor in this historical war really was.” The same paper(b) suggests that Santorini may have been Atlantis, which, for me, implied that the Temple of Poseidon would have been on the pre-eruption island. Howells, devotes this article to listing the similarities between Santorini and Plato’s Atlantis, but ends without any firm conclusion!
The identification of Caphtor with Crete is generally, but not universally, accepted and is not an issue for me. However, it does highlight how so little in ancient history is clear-cut.
My objections to the MH among other matters include –
>The fact that Plato clearly attributes the destruction of Atlantis to an earthquake and not to an eruption.
>Neither Crete nor Santorini was submerged or created any shipping hazard that lasted until Plato’s time.
>The missing elephants, described by Plato as being “of its nature the largest and most voracious” (Crit. 114e-115a). Certainly, they are not pygmy elephants.
>Where are the mountains situated to the north of the Plain of Atlantis described “as surpassing all that now exists in number magnitude and beauty.”
For me and many others, individually or combined, these facts remove Thera/Crete as a serious contender as the location of Plato’s Atlantis.
Finally, I must insist that I never intentionally set out to misrepresent anybody, I try to offer all sides of a debate, even those I dislike, which is why Atlantipedia includes many thousands of links, allowing readers to decide for themselves. For that reason, I greatly resent being accused of unreliability, when Howells’ real gripe should not be with me but Plato.<<
(a) Was Atlantis’ Temple of Poseidon the Palace of Knossos in Crete? (greekreporter.com)
(b) Was Atlantis a Minoan Civilization on Santorini Island? (greekreporter.com)
(c) https://greekreporter.com/2023/12/07/pillars-hercules-greek-mythology/
(d) https://greekreporter.com/2023/12/12/mythical-atlantis-located/
(f) Ages in Chaos p.210 n.79
(g) The Keftiu: Were They Absorbed and Erased from History? (argophilia.com)
Costa, Nicholas
Nicholas Costa is the author of a number of books on the history of coin-operated devices, so it came as a surprise that he ventured into the world of Greek mythology in his 2023 book, Atlantis, the Amazons and the Birth of Athene [2072]. I have never been very interested in Greek mythology, inhabited as it is by a melange of so many belligerent oversexed characters. However, Costa has taken a euhemeristic approach and will probably raise a few eyebrows, if not hackles with his conclusions.
Costa is convinced that “the bulk of the myths relate to a historically short period of time, basically the period 1550-1184 BC!” This statement certainly drew me in. The author also offers a revised view of the Amazons, who he claims were not an exclusively female tribe. He also refers positively to Peter James’ book, The Sunken Kingdom [047], who expressed similar views regarding the location of Atlantis, also placing it in what is now western Turkey.
I have decided to keep spoilers to a minimum. However, since this site is concerned with Atlantis, I feel obliged to reveal that Costa has identified Ayasuluk Hill, situated just a mile from the site of ancient Ephesus, as the location of the citadel of Atlantis. This book is worth a read for the author’s step-by-step exposition of the importance of ancient Lydia in the history of Atlantis and the region generally. However, as the title of the book indicates it is about much more than just Atlantis.
Although this book clashes with some of my opinions, I still think it is a valuable addition to any Atlantis library. My biggest gripe, already expressed directly to Costa, is the lack of an index, that can be so valuable to researchers. I know that I shall read this book a second time and highly recommend it.
>Thorwald C. Franke published a short review of Costa’s book(a) in his Newsletter #216.<
(a) https://www.atlantis-scout.de/atlantis_newsl_archive.htm *
New Chronology
New Chronology is a term that was coined in the 20th century and applied to two very different schools of chronological revisionism.
One was applied to the theories of Anatoly Fomenko(a), a Russian mathematician, “that challenge the traditional timeline of history, suggesting that events we know as ancient and early medieval actually occurred much later, between 1000 to 1500 AD, and that the construction of ancient history was done in the 17th and 18th centuries.” Nevertheless, he also had prominent supporters, such as Heribert Illig(c) and Gunnar Heinsohn(b) as well as Garry Kasparov the former World Chess Champion(d).
The other application of the term was to describe a possible realignment of the ancient chronologies of the Eastern Mediterranean. More particularly, it refers to the work of David Rohl and Peter James that grew out of the revisionism in Velikovsky‘s Ages in Chaos[039] and the Society for Interdisciplinary Studies (SIS).
There have been many variants of Velikovsky’s proposed revisions, such as those proposed by Emmet Sweeney. The matter remains unsettled to the satisfaction of all. This lack of resolution was referred to in a 2023 paper(e) by Donald Keith Mills, who offered some interesting observations. “I am sympathetic to the need for chronological revision but do not have a preference for any one model. In recent years, my relation to chronological revisionism, both in my role as part of the SIS C&C Review editorial team, and in my articles, has not been to prove or “disprove” chronological revisions, but to identify “errors, inconsistencies, and deficiencies” in the data and/or interpretations on which specific parts of Velikovskian-style revisions are based. It is important to clear the field of misinformation and infeasible interpretations that make it difficult to define what chronological revisions in general, or any revision in particular, may legitimately encompass.“
(b) https://www.q-mag.org/_search.html?req=heinsohn
(c) The Phantom Time Hypothesis • Damn Interesting
Ellefsen, Johan S.
Johan S. Ellefsen is Bolivian by birth and now lives in the United States, where he works as an aviation attorney.
His first book, The Sacred Landscape, deals with the subject of prehistoric art with a focus on the paintings in the Chauvet Cave.
Ellefsen’s earliest contribution to the Atlantis debate, was a paper titled La Atlántida, in Spanish(a}{b). In it, he suggests that “it is very probable that the myth collected information about islands in the Atlantic and combined them into one, which Plato called Atlantis. This compilation It was made, on the one hand, from mythology Greek regarding the Hesperides and Cassiterides islands, and on the other, an important compilation of the Memorie that lasted from Minoan Voyages to these islands, from which Crete was supplied with tin.” He seems to identify a range of influences in Plato’s story ranging from Britain and Ireland to Minoan Crete and Troy.
In Ellefsen’s second book Solon’s Atlantis [1968] he takes a very different approach, offering an array of evidence to “show the provenance of the Atlantis story. Plato did not fabricate it.” The core of his argument concerns “a three-thousand-year-old Egyptian papyrus recounting a story brought from Syria during the reign of Amenhotep II, as well as well as some obscure Greek traditions preserved in the midst of the Arcadian mountains.” Thorwald C. Franke has published a review of Ellefsen’s second book that includes qualified support for its research and presentation although he disagrees with the author’s overall thesis(c).
Many have suggested a source for the Atlantis story beyond Egypt such as Peter James, who, some years ago in The Sunken Kingdom [047.280] expressed certainty that “Solon got the story not from Egypt but from Lydia.”
(a) https://www.estudiosclasicosbolivia.org/IMG/pdf/6_ellefsen-la_atlantida.pdf
(b) Archive 7380 | (atlantipedia.ie) (machine translation to English of (a))
(c)Review of: Johan S. Ellefsen and Ugarit-Atlantis – Atlantis-Scout *
Uluburun Shipwreck
The Uluburun Shipwreck is arguably one of the most important underwater discoveries of the 20th century. It was located in 1982 not very far from the town of Kas in southern Turkey. Eleven consecutive campaigns of three to four months duration took place from 1984 to 1994 totaling 22,413 dives, revealing one of the most spectacular Late Bronze Age assemblages to have emerged from the Mediterranean Sea(a). Because the wreck lay at a depth of 44-61 metres divers could only spend a very limited time 
working on it, hence the large number of dives involved.
Radiocarbon dating techniques and the presence of identifiable pottery types place the date of the wreck as sometime in the late 14th century BCE, probably between 1330 and 1300 BCE.
>Peter James wrote a highly critical paper regarding the dendrochronological dating of the Uluburun shipwreck explaining “why the Uluburun date is dubious in the extreme and how its status as a ‘scientific’ date has gradually unravelled”(e).<
The main cargo of the ship was raw materials. The largest items were copper ingots, 348 of them, totalling 10 tons in weight. These took the form of ‘oxhide’ and circular buns, which refers to the shape they had, forms common in the Bronze Age Mediterranean(b). Isotope analysis revealed the ingots were pure copper and from Cyprus(c). Additionally, the cargo included a ton of tin ingots. These metals were estimated to be enough to make 5,000 bronze swords.
It did not take long before this discovery generated some wild speculation J.S. Wakefield & Reinoud DeJonge proposed that the Uluburun copper had come from the Michigan mines in their book Rocks & Rows, Sailing Routes across the Atlantic and the Copper Trade [760]. The late Gavin Menzies went further and proposed that not only was the Uluburun copper from Michigan but that it had been brought from America by the Minoans identified by him as Atlantean.
Now that exploration of the wreck has finished, scientists are engaged in a study of the amazing array of artefacts salvaged. Articles in 2022 and(d) 2023(f) revealed some of the unexpected discoveries made, including the source of the tin ingots.
(a) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uluburun_shipwreck
(b) https://www.worldhistory.org/Uluburun_Shipwreck/
(c) Isotope analysis reveals origins of Uluburun shipwreck cargo | The Past (the-past.com)
(e) https://www.centuries.co.uk/uluburun.pdf *
(f) https://www.re-thinkingthefuture.com/2023/02/18/a9360-lost-in-time-uluburun-shipwreck/ *
Gilligan, Gary*
Gary Gilligan (1957- ) is a British author who has “studied Egyptology, Astronomy and Geology with an almost obsessive passion. When he first came across the theory of catastrophism, he was intrigued by the possibility that the Solar System had undergone recent upheavals due to cosmic chaos.”
Gilligan is arguably the most radical of the catastrophists and ancient chronology revisionists publishing today. Some of his ideas make those of Velikovsky as well as James and Rohl seem somewhat tame.
Among his many extreme claims are (1) Our Moon was only captured in the first millennium BC(a), (2) The Saharan sands, he claims are extraterrestrial in origin [1365], (3) The ancient year had only 360 days [1385.61] and (4) The ancient Egyptian climate was milder than today as indicated by a red sun, rather than today’s yellow disk!(c)
In a short 2012 paper now republished in October 2022 on the Thunderbolts website Gilligan proposes that the Amazon rainforest is only a few thousand years old. He argues that the Amazon region is today dependent on the 54,000 tons of fine dust received daily from the Sahara and since the Sahara did not exist 6,000 years ago neither did the Amazon rainforest which he says is claimed to be 55 million years old!(d) However, an article from Scientific American (July 7, 2014) also offers an even more recent date for the development of the rainforest, suggesting that “the people of the Amazon from2,500 to 500 years ago were farmers.”(e)
(a) http://www.gks.uk.com/moon-origin-egyptian/
(b) http://www.everythingselectric.com/forum/index.php?topic=347.0 (link broken) *
(d) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amazon_rainforest
(e) https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/amazon-rainforest-is-much-younger-than-commonly-believed/
Ancient Chronology
Ancient Chronology is a subject fraught with difficulties(a) as well as the focus of intense academic debate, particularly over the past half-century.
Archbishop Ussher (1581-1656) calculated the date of creation to have been October 23rd 4004 BC(d). Incredible as it may seem, even today (2019), there are still people prepared to give further consideration to his ideas (c)(e).
Sir Isaac Newton (1642-1727) became the first ‘modern’ revisionist of accepted ancient chronology. His work was heavily criticised and few serious advances were made until the development of Egyptology following Napoleon’s invasion of Egypt at the end of the 18th century.
Difficulties with details of Egyptian dating slowly accumulated, particularly when endeavouring to align it with Greek, Minoan and other Eastern chronologies. The scholarly debates became very public in the middle of the 20th century with the eventual publication of Ages in Chaos by Immanuel Velikovsky and the attempts made to suppress it altogether. The refining of Velikovsky’s theories followed, with important contributions by S. Talbott, Edward Schorr and John Bimson. Some, such as Emmet Sweeney, have accused Velikovsky of being over-dependent on his belief in the inerrancy of biblical chronology.
The Society for Interdisciplinary Studies (SIS)(b) was founded in 1974 and produces regular publications. This was followed a few years later by three important books[229][230][232] by David Rohl and Centuries of Darkness [046] by Peter James, who also wrote The Sunken Kingdom in which he places Atlantis in Turkey. Rohl & James were in agreement on many details, but fell out over the identity of Shishak (was he Ramesses II or III?). However, prior to that, in the early 1980s, they had published a joint paper that gave the world a first look at their New Chronology. Rohl republished it in 2012(v).
On the occasion of the SIS Jubilee Conference in 1999 a paper by P. John Crowe was presented, which gave a valuable insight into historical revisionism before and after Velikovsky(a).
In 2002, Manfred Bietak and Ernst Czerny, both distinguished Egyptologists edited a collection of 45 papers presented at a SCIEM Conference in 2000 highlighting the problems of synchronising the chronologies of civilisations in the Eastern Mediterranean in the 2nd millennium BC(w).
Gunnar Heinsohn (1943-2023) was a Professor Emeritus at the University of Bremen but was also an ardent chronology revisionist,< concerned not just with the dating problems of the ancient world(l) but also with difficulties to be seen in the first millennium of the Common Era(m).
One of the most controversial aspects of Plato’s Atlantis story is the old Egyptian priest’s claim that Atlantis was destroyed 9,000 years before Solon’s visit. He also related that Athens, who fought the Atlanteans, was established one thousand years before the Egyptian state or as is more likely, before the foundation of the city of Sais. Apart from anachronisms in Plato’s narrative, the archaeological evidence completely contradicts the dates seemingly offered by the priests of Sais. It is interesting that most of the chronology revisionist debate centres on the second millennium BC which is arguably the most rational timeframe for the destruction of Atlantis based on the Bronze Age references in Timaeus and Critias, provided they are not just anachronistic embellishments.
I should also mention that while the debates regarding the Bronze Age chronologies rage on, further controversy has arisen regarding claims of duplicated centuries in the first millennium of our era. Leading the charge here are Anatoly Fomenko(k) [1823], Heribert Illig(h)(i)(j) and Gunnar Heinsohn(g). A keen supporter of Fomenko’s work is Garry Kasparov the former World Chess Champion(p). A more critical view of Fomenko’s work is on offer from Stephen Sorensen(s).
Nathaniel Lloyd had written an extensive three-part paper on the history of chronological revisionism(t). This should be read in conjunction with a paper entitled The Glorious Stupidity of Fomenko’s New Chronology(u).
Up to this point, I have outlined some of the problems and theories concerning the accurate alignment of specific events with particular years. A clash of archaeology and accepted history, secular and religious. has generated libraries of debate. However, our problems do not end with the counting of years, but contention has also arisen over the length of the day before the seventh century BC. Evidence is available to show that there was a 360-day year in use around the world in those ancient times.
Some religious sites have proposed that before the Deluge we had a 365-day year, then it changed to 360 days and then reverted to the current 365.2422 days(q). By way of complete contrast Danny Faulkner, a creationist astronomer rejects the idea that the world was created with a 360-day year, although it is a view held by many creationists(r).
William Whiston was one of the first ‘modern’ commentators to conclude that in very ancient times a 360-day year was used(n). More recently, Immanuel Velikovsky devoted a chapter of Worlds in Collision to The Year of 360 Days(o). The Brit-Am movement endorsed Velikovsky’s views in this regard, as does William F. Drankenbring.
(b) Welcome – Society for Interdisciplinary Studies (archive.org)
(d) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ussher_chronology
(e) https://www.academia.edu/36854822/Ussher_Explained_and_Corrected
(f) See (a)
(g) https://www.q-mag.org/_search.html?req=heinsohn
(h) The Phantom Time Hypothesis • Damn Interesting
(i) Did the Early Middle Ages Really Exist? (ecplanet.org)
(j) Jan Beaufort: 30 questions about chronology (cybis.se)
(k) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_chronology_(Fomenko)
(l) THE RESTORATION OF ANCIENT HISTORY (archive.org)
(m) https://www.q-mag.org/_search.html?req=heinsohn
(o) I. Velikovsky, Worlds in Collision, Part 2, Chapter Viii, p.316
(p) Wayback Machine (archive.org)
(q) http://xwalk.ca/360vs365.html
(r) https://www.researchgate.net/publication/265167051_On_the_Caution_about_the_360-Day_Year
(s) Fomenko’s New Chronology – Ctruth
(t) https://www.historicalblindness.com/blogandpodcast//the-chronological-revision-chronicles-part-one-the-fomenko-timeline (new link)
(v) https://davidrohl.blogspot.com/2012/11/
(w) The Synchronisation of Civilisations in the Eastern Mediterranean in the … – Google Books *
Sitchin, Zecharia
Zecharia Sitchin (1920-2010) was born in Russia and grew up in Palestine where he studied ancient Semitic languages and became one of the few to master the reading of the cuneiform writing of the Sumerians. After studying at the London School of Economics he took up a career in journalism. There are some questions regarding his academic credentials that were briefly explored by Frank Dörnenburg(g).
Then Sitchin began to develop his theory of ancient astronauts visiting earth in the past from the planet Nibiru (Planet X) and their colonisation of territory in what is now part of Iraq and the genetic manipulation of humans there. He based his theories on his interpretation of Sumerian cuneiform tablets. He also claimed that Nibiru had an orbit that took it to the outer reaches of the solar system and would return soon.
The late Alan F. Alford was initially an enthusiastic supporter of Sitchin’s ancient astronaut ideas but later recanted(k).
Understandably, his ideas provoked a storm of controversy that lasted until his death and after. For my part, I cannot understand how a race capable of space travel did not teach the Sumerian ancestors a writing system better than cuneiform and a medium better than clay tablets. Furthermore, the idea that the climate of a planet with such an unusual orbit could support the development of an advanced race capable of surviving the consequent extremes of temperature, is something I also find hard to comprehend.
In the late 1990s, the debate raged with many like Willard Van de Bogart who thought that “The work of Zechariah Sitchin is without question the most mind-stretching cosmology to date. Furthermore, it appears unchallengeable academically(t)“ On the other hand Rob Hafernik sums up Sitchin as being “just another nut making a living selling books that treat folks to a tale they want to believe in(u).”
Ian Lawton, the British researcher, wrote a rebuttal of Sitchin’s theories ten years ago(a). Further refutation came from Dörnenburg as well as on the PaleoBabble website(b) of Michael S. Heiser(e), a scholar in the fields of biblical studies and the ancient Near East. Heiser has another website with the blunt title of sitchiniswrong.com, which includes an overview of what he perceives as Sitchin’s errors(l).
Peter James commenting on Sitchin wrote that “He uses the Epic of Creation Enuma Elish as the foundation for his cosmogony, identifying the young god Marduk, who overthrows the older regime of gods and creates the Earth, as the unknown ‘Twelfth Planet’. In order to do this he interprets the Babylonian theogony as a factual account of the birth of the other eleven planets. The Babylonian names for the planets are established beyond a shadow of a doubt—Ishtar was the deity of Venus, Nergal of Mars, and Marduk of Jupiter—and confirmed by hundreds of astronomical/astrological tables and treatises on clay tablets and papyri from the Hellenistic period. Sitchin merrily ignores all this and assigns unwarranted planetary identities to the gods mentioned in the theogony. For example, Apsu, attested as the god of the primeval waters, becomes, of all things, the Sun! Ea, as it suits Sitchin, is sometimes planet Neptune and sometimes a spaceman. And the identity of Ishtar as the planet Venus, a central feature of Mesopotamian religion, is nowhere mentioned in the book—instead Sitchin arbitrarily assigns to Venus another deity from Enuma Elish, and reserves Ishtar for a role as a female astronaut.“(r)
In late 2017 and early 2018, a two-part article(i)(j) by two young researchers, Jason Jarrell and Sarah Farmer added further criticism of Sitchin’s linguistic capabilities. Later in 2018, Jarrell & Farmer published a third follow-up article(s). On March 13th, 2018, Clyde Winters also published on the same website a further refutation of Sitchin’s ‘ancient astronaut’ interpretation of the Sumerian seals.
In 2021, Jarrell & Farmer had their two-part article about the Anunnaki recycled by Ancient Origins(m)(n), in which they again concluded “that rather than making the Anunnaki the equivalent of the “Elohim” who created man in the Book of Genesis; they should more properly be compared to the Nephilim and the fallen angels described in Genesis Chapter 6, 1 Enoch, and other extra-biblical texts.”
Additional scathing criticism came from a Christian website claiming that Sitchin had an agenda coloured by his association with the Masonic Order!
Jason Colavito has also drawn attention(c) to the probability that Sitchin drew on the work of the British Assyriologist, George Smith (1840-1876), but distorted Smith’s conclusions to bolster his own theories.
Sitchin did not address the question of Atlantis directly until 2004 when he devoted a chapter of The Earth Chronicles Expeditions [0963]+, where he considered the Minoan Hypothesis and found it wanting. He did not propose any specific location but suggested that there was a possible transatlantic connection. In the same chapter three, he discusses at some length the Phaistos Disk and a possible association with Atlantis! However, his broader views did find favour with a number of fringe Atlantis commentators such as the late Rob Solarion, Andrews and Zeitlmair.
Another follower of Sitchin, Thomas Ashmore, has suggested that some of the Annunaki ‘gods’ were exiled to Scandinavia where their deeds were preserved in Norse mythology(d). Further support came from William L. Saylor in a series of articles(o).
>>Gene D. Matlock has also endorsed the idea of ancient astronauts genetically manipulating ‘humans’ similar to Sitchin’s claims, explaining, “I must confess that I used to be a fanatical believer in Darwin’s theory of evolution. But my research, which led me to the outer space founders of all gods and religions, has turned me into an Intelligent Design Creationist”(v).<<
Some of Sitchin’s other books such as The Twelfth Planet [1599]+ and Genesis Revisited [1728]+ are available online. In 2015, Sitchin’s niece, Janet Sitchin included some previously unpublished material of her uncle in The Annunaki Chronicles[1238]. A rather negative review(h) was offered by essayist Noel Rooney.
J. Douglas Kenyon, the editor of Atlantis Rising magazine, wrote a review (Issue 5) of Sitchin’s work and its reception by both the public and professionals.
>As of September 2024, Sitchin’s website was still live.(q)<
[1599]+ https://www.academia.edu/36091307/Sitchin_Zecharia_-_The_12th_Planet?swp=rr-rw-wc-28435098
(a) See: https://web.archive.org/web/20150924032217/https://www.ianlawton.com/mesindex.htm
(b) Zechariah Sitchin’s Contribution to PaleoBabble – Dr. Michael Heiser (archive.org)
(c) https://www.jasoncolavito.com/1/post/2012/07/did-george-smith-inspire-zecharia-sitchin.html
(d) Nexus, Dec 2013/Jan 2014, (p.41)
(e) https://www.pdfarchive.info/index.php?pages/He
(g) See Archive 2909
(h) Fortean Times FT342, July 2016 (p.59)
(k) https://www.eridu.co.uk (link broken July 2018)
(l) https://www.sitchiniswrong.com/sitchinerrors.htm
(o) The Gods as Architects (bibliotecapleyades.net)
(q) The Official Web Site of Zecharia Sitchin
(r) Fortean Times No. 27 (Nov. 1978) & SIS Workshop No. 7, vol. 2, no. 2 (Nov. 1979)
(s) Zecharia Sitchin and the Mistranslation of Sumerian Texts | Ancient Origins (ancient-origins.net)
(t) http://www.earthportals.com/Portal_Messenger/sitchin.html
Turkey
Turkey is the preferred location of Atlantis according to authors Peter James and Eberhard Zangger. In his book[047] James asserts that Plato took the idea for Atlantis from the city of Tantalis, which was located in what is today the Province of Manisa in Western Turkey, just north-east of the ancient port of Smyrna (today’s Izmir). Zangger also opts for Turkey but favours ancient Troy as the original Atlantis[483].
Coincidentally, Çatal Hüyük, one of the world’s oldest cities, is located in Turkey just over 200 km south of the capital Ankara. Like Atlantis, Çatal Hüyük also had a bull cult and a Great Mother Goddess reminiscent of ancient Malta. After decades of work, excavations are continuing at the site(a). Mysteriously, this early city of some seven thousand people apparently abandoned their homes around 5600-6000 BC. They were not the only settlement to be abandoned around this period. Cyprus, Palestine and Syria and more famously Jericho all provide evidence of abandonment at the same time.
Ian Wilson has pointed out that following the Younger Dryas mini Ice Age of around 9000 BC a further mini Ice age occurred between 6200 BC and 5800 BC, a period that coincides with this unexplained desertion of Çatal Hüyük and elsewhere.
However exciting Çatal Hüyük may be, its antiquity would appear to have been overshadowed by the discoveries made at Göbekli Tepe where the site has been dated to 9600BC. Also noteworthy is Asikli Höyük which is 1,000 years older than the Çatal Hüyük settlement on the Konya plain and as the earliest village settlement founded in the Cappadocia region, the site is no less important(b).
Although Zangger and James have had little support for their Turkish locations for Atlantis, a more recent attempt to situate Atlantis near the west coast of the Asian landmass of Turkey is offered by an American researcher, Joe Plegge. In 2012 Plegge published Turkish Stonehenge: Göbekli Tepe [1909] in which he claims that the two sites share some similar astronomical features. In his Atlantis paper, he reveals how he also sought to link Göbekli Tepe with Atlantis but found no evidence to support this idea. Plegge accepts Plato’s apparent early date for Atlantis of circa 9600 BC even though by his own admission this date conflicts with Plato’s anachronistic references to metalworking, a one-million-man army, horses and chariots. However, for me, Plegge’s use of Paul Schliemann as a source destroys his credibility as a researcher.
Readers may find it of interest that in April 2019 there were media reports that “researchers compared DNA extracted from Neolithic human remains found across Britain with that of people alive at the same time in Europe. The Neolithic inhabitants were descended from populations originating in Anatolia (modern Turkey) that moved to Iberia before heading north. They reached Britain in about 4,000 BC. Details have been published in the journal Nature Ecology & Evolution. The migration to Britain was just one part of a general, massive expansion of people out of Anatolia in 6,000 BC that introduced farming to Europe.” (d). This has led to the conclusion that Stonehenge was built by descendants of these Anatolian settlers!
(c) (99+) (PDF) Atlantis in the Meander Valley, Turkey | Joe Plegge – Academia.edu
Tantalis (L)
Tantalis is referred to, by Pliny, as the capital of ancient Lydia in western Turkey. It was later known as Magnesium ad Sipylum. Tantalis was apparently named after the legendary King Tantalus, who had remarkable similarities with Atlas; they were both Titans, supported the heavens and had mountains named after them(a). This powerful city was flooded following an earthquake and is now reputed to be located beneath the now dried-up Lake Saloe. Also note that Atlantis is an anagram of Tantalis – coincidence?
British archaeologist Peter James has identified Tantalis as the original Atlantis and that it was located just north east of modern Izmir (Smyrna). James reached this conclusion[047] after a study of classical writers, comparative mythology and local place-names. Unfortunately, there has, as yet, been no archaeological expedition to confirm James’ contention.
Objections to James’ theory are that Tantalis was:
i) not on an island.
ii) not outside the conventional location of the Pillars of Hercules.
iii) too close to Greece (James raises this objection against the Santorini theory).
iv) not a circular city (?).
N.B. Sardis was also known as the capital of Lydia by the early 7th century BC.
(a) “https://www.jstor.org/stable/262536?seq=2#page_scan_tab_contents