Tournefort, Joseph Pitton de

Joseph Pitton de Tournefort (1656-1708) sometimes referred to as “the Father of Botany”, strayed from his chosen field when he suggested that Atlantis had been located in the Atlantic and that following an earthquake in the Mediterranean, the level of that sea rose causing an outflow into the Atlantic that swamped Atlantis. Sprague de Camp states that Tournefort got his idea from the Greek writer Strato of Lampsacus (c. 250 BC), who declared that the Black Sea had joined the Mediterranean when it overflowed into it and in a similar fashion the Mediterranean had joined the Atlantic.

Stel Pavlou (Atlantipedia.com) has traced Tournefort’s comments to the posthumously published Relation d’un voyage du Levant^[1467] published in sets of two and three volumes. Kessinger has published a facsimile copy of volume 3 and the original French can also be read or downloaded from the Internet^(a). An English translation was reportedly published in 1718.