{"id":1955,"date":"2010-05-28T21:22:02","date_gmt":"2010-05-28T21:22:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/isles-of-the-blest\/"},"modified":"2026-03-29T09:13:27","modified_gmt":"2026-03-29T08:13:27","slug":"isles-of-the-blest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/isles-of-the-blest\/","title":{"rendered":"Isles of the Blest"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>I<\/strong><strong>sles<\/strong> <strong>of the<\/strong><strong> B<\/strong><strong>lest <\/strong>is a term first mentioned by <a href=\"#Hesiod\">Hesiod<\/a> circa 700 BC and later in the 5<sup>th<\/sup> century BC, a hundred years before Plato, in one of the few fragments we have of a work called <em>A<\/em><em>tlantias<\/em> by <a href=\"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/hellanicus-of-lesbos\/\">Hellanicus of Lesbos<\/a><strong>. <\/strong>The text relates \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/poseidon\/\">Poseidon<\/a> mated with Celaeno, and their son Lycus was settled by his father in the <em>Isles of the Blest<\/em> and made immortal.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/dunbavin-paul\/\">Paul Dunbavin<\/a> has pointed<sup>[<\/sup><a href=\"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/main-bibliography\/d\/\"><sup>099<\/sup><\/a><sup>]<\/sup> out that Pindar the Greek poet again writing in the 5<sup>th<\/sup> century BC, also refers to the Island of the Blest in terms that are indistinguishable from his description of the home of the <a href=\"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/hyperboreans\/\">Hyperboreans<\/a><strong>. <\/strong>Dunbavin has concluded further that Island of the Blest and the Elysian Fields or Elysium are the same place. <a href=\"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/collins-andrew\/\">Andrew Collins<\/a> supports this idea<strong><sup>[<\/sup><\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/main-bibliography\/c\/\"><strong><sup>072<\/sup><\/strong><\/a><strong><sup>]<\/sup><\/strong> and adds the possibility that they may also identical with the Fortunate Isles.<\/p>\n<p>Where Dunbavin concludes that the Isles of the Blest were located in what is now the British Isles, Collins favours them as an early reference to the <a href=\"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/canary-islands\/\">Canaries<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/madeira-2\/\">Madeira<\/a>s or even <a href=\"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/azores\/\">Azores<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/vinci-felice\/\">Felice Vinci<\/a> boldly suggested that the Elysian Fields were situated in Polynesia<sup>(a)<\/sup>!<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><sup>(a)<\/sup> <a href=\"http:\/\/www.athensjournals.gr\/mediterranean\/2023-9-2-1-Vinci.pdf\">www.athensjournals.gr\/mediterranean\/2023-9-2-1-Vinci.pdf<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Isles of the Blest is a term first mentioned by Hesiod circa 700 BC and later in the 5th century BC, a hundred years before Plato, in one of the few fragments we have of a work called Atlantias by Hellanicus of Lesbos. The text relates \u201cPoseidon mated with Celaeno, and their son Lycus was [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[195,29,28,92,3604,2423,1016,280],"class_list":["post-1955","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-andrew-collins","tag-azores","tag-canaries","tag-hyperboreans","tag-isles-of-the-blest","tag-madeiras","tag-paul-dunbavin","tag-poseidon"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1955","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1955"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1955\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":66996,"href":"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1955\/revisions\/66996"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1955"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1955"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1955"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}