{"id":839,"date":"2010-03-15T07:19:09","date_gmt":"2010-03-15T07:19:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/?p=839"},"modified":"2026-02-08T16:57:39","modified_gmt":"2026-02-08T16:57:39","slug":"fortia-durban","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/fortia-durban\/","title":{"rendered":"Fortia d’Urban"},"content":{"rendered":"

Marquis Agricol Joseph Fran\u00e7ois de <\/strong>F<\/strong>ortia d’Urban <\/strong>(1756-1843) <\/strong>was a wealthy French mathematician and archaeologist. He was a member of several academies in western Europe. \"\"<\/a>He wrote a\u00a0paper identifying Gozo, in the Maltese archipelago, as Ogygia<\/a>, the abode of Homer\u2019s Calypso. In a massive 10-volume work, Histoire ancienne du globe terrestre<\/em>[1314<\/a>]<\/sup>, <\/em>volume 9 has an essay that links the floods of Noah<\/a> and Ogyges with the sinking of Atlantis.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Fortia d\u2019Urban was a contemporary of Grongnet de Vasse<\/a>, another early champion of a Maltese Atlantis. They met in Rome and later corresponded on the subject.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

In October 2021, Laura Tabone published a paper on the Ancient Origins<\/em> website that offered some interesting background information about the life of de Vass\u00e9. Tabone refers to accusations that Grongnet was involved in a hoax to support his Atlantis theory, but concluded that “<\/em>It\u2019s not known why Grognet would have involved himself in such a complex hoax. As a former abb\u00e9 and the designer of a grand Catholic church, it seems rather incongruous that he should behave in such a way. His ideological persuasions under Napol\u00e9on also make it seem as though his character was one of principle.”<\/em>(b)<\/sup><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Controversy has arisen regarding Eumelos of Cyrene<\/a>, in which Fortia d’Urban and Grongnet de Vass\u00e9 were implicated. A claim of hoax was made by Thorwald C. Franke<\/a> in a paper on his website(a)<\/span><\/sup>, <\/b>as did Jason Colavito<\/a>(f)<\/span><\/sup>. Anton Mifsud<\/a> wrote a rebuttal(e)<\/sup> in which he pointed out errors of fact in Franke’s original article, which have not been responded to. Instead, Franke has, most unsatisfactorily, just left it to readers to decide on the truth! Some will see this as a ‘cop-out’!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Nevertheless, in August 2024, Franke resuscitated the debate with a claim that his view of de Vass\u00e9 had received some endorsement from Professor Ingrid D. Rowland of the Department of History at the University of Notre Dame of Indiana in a three-year-old book(c)<\/sup>.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

This induced Mifsud to produce an even more detailed defence of de Vass\u00e9(d)<\/sup>.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

(a)<\/sup> https:\/\/www.atlantis-scout.de\/atlantis-malta-hoax.htm<\/a><\/p>\n

(b)<\/sup> Maltese Architect\u2019s Obsessive Lifelong Quest to Find Atlantis | Ancient Origins (ancient-origins.net)<\/a>
\n<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

(c)<\/sup> https:\/\/www.academia.edu\/122913157\/The_Atlantic_Visions_of_Giorgio_Grognet_de_Vass%C3%A9_1774_1862_Maltese_Forger_Architect_and_Antiquarian<\/a><\/p>\n

(d)<\/sup> https:\/\/www.academia.edu\/125030941\/GIORGIO_GROGNET_DE_VASSE_forger_or_victim\u00a0<\/a>
\n<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

(e)<\/sup> https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/document-010114b\/<\/a> or (Archive 5145<\/a>) <\/span><\/p>\n

(f) <\/sup>Eumalos on Atlantis (Hoax) – JASON COLAVITO<\/a>\u00a0<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Marquis Agricol Joseph Fran\u00e7ois de Fortia d’Urban (1756-1843) was a wealthy French mathematician and archaeologist. He was a member of several academies in western Europe. He wrote a\u00a0paper identifying Gozo, in the Maltese archipelago, as Ogygia, the abode of Homer\u2019s Calypso. In a massive 10-volume work, Histoire ancienne du globe terrestre[1314], volume 9 has an […]<\/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":[200,2173,960,4972,64,4973,123,8018,1266,8020,12,107,65,8019,692],"class_list":["post-839","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-anton-mifsud","tag-calypso","tag-eumelos-of-cyrene","tag-fortia-durban","tag-gozo","tag-grongnet-de-vasse","tag-homer","tag-ingrid-d-rowland","tag-jason-colavito","tag-laura-tabone","tag-malta","tag-noah","tag-ogygia","tag-thorwad-c-franke","tag-thorwald-c-franke"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/839","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=839"}],"version-history":[{"count":21,"href":"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/839\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":66389,"href":"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/839\/revisions\/66389"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=839"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=839"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=839"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}