Posted on 08/07/2004 4:04:01 AM PDT by scouse
Ireland Is Lost Island of Atlantis, Says Scientist
Fri August 06, 2004 11:52 AM ET
By Kevin Smith
DUBLIN (Reuters) - Atlantis, the legendary island nation over whose existence controversy has raged for thousands of years, was actually Ireland, according to a new theory by a Swedish scientist.
Atlantis, the Greek philosopher Plato wrote in 360 BC, was an island in the Atlantic Ocean where an advanced civilization developed some 11,500 years ago until it was hit by a cataclysmic natural disaster and sank beneath the waves.
Geographer Ulf Erlingsson, whose book explaining his theory will be published next month, says the measurements, geography, and landscape of Atlantis as described by Plato match Ireland almost exactly.
"I am amazed no one has come up with this before, it's incredible," he told Reuters.
"Just like Atlantis, Ireland is 300 miles long, 200 miles wide, and widest across the middle. They both have a central plain surrounded by mountains.
"I've looked at geographical data from the rest of the world and of the 50 largest islands there is only one that has a plain in the middle -- Ireland."
Erlingsson believes the idea that Atlantis sank came from the fate of Dogger Bank, an isolated shoal in the North Sea, about 60 miles off the northeastern coast of England, which sank after being hit by a huge floodwave around 6,100 BC.
"I suspect that myth came from Ireland and it derives from Dogger Bank. I think the memory of Dogger Bank was probably preserved in Ireland for around 3,000 years and became mixed up with the story of Atlantis," he said.
Erlingsson links the boundaries of the Atlantic Empire, as outlined by Plato, with the geographic distribution of megalithic monuments in Europe and Northern Africa, matching Atlantis' temples with well-known burial sites at Newgrange and Knowth, north of Dublin, which pre-date the pyramids.
His book, "Atlantis from a Geographer's Perspective: Mapping the Fairy Land," calculates the probability Plato would have had access to geographical data about Ireland as 99.98 percent.
Previous theories about Atlantis have suggested it may have been around the Azores islands 900 miles west of the Portuguese coast, or in the Aegean sea. Others locate it solely in the long-decayed brain of Plato.
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I suppose the Sidhe would be memories of an advanced people, then, transmogrified into faeries.
Scientific PING!
from Irish Stew to Atlantis Stew!! Sounds much better!!
This has to be one of the more astonishing assertions made about Ireland. While the land has many charming features, being part of a larger land that "sank beneath the sea" is embellishing just a little. It is easier to believe that the Azore Islands may be the remnants of mountain tops that towered above that disappeared land, as both the location (beyond the Strait of Gibralter) and the warm-water access to a sea-based nation make them more plausible.
Ireland would have been much too cold 11,500 years ago (possibly still was glaciated). And the sea level was probably much lower than it now is.
So the Atlanteans were all drunk poets?
Bump!
Uh... Atlantis sank beneath the waves. Ireland's still here.
Ping!
It's official. Now every island in the world has been claimed to be Atlantis.
they say the Irish discovered civilization. then they discovered whiskey and forgot where they put it.
(ive always loved that quote)
Geographer Ulf Erlingsson calculations made me curious. How does one conclude 99.98 percent is scientific certainty? Wouldn't a calculation of 100% or greater represent greater, if not absolute, scientific certainty?
I used a little mathematical formula to help me answer this question:
If: A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
is represented as:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26.
Then:
B-U-L-L-S-H-I-T
2+21+12+12+19+8+9+20 = 103%
calculates to a more definitive degree of 103% percent that Ulf Erlingsson is not correct.
Furthermore, I have concluded Ireland is more likely the lost Island of England.
"Uh... Atlantis sank beneath the waves. Ireland's still here."
LOL, you noticed that too.
I was rooting for Cuba to be what's left of Altantis. Then there was a possibility that the rest might sink.
Maybe Ireland could be a piece of Atlantis that didn't sink?
Considering Plato didn't even read the original text first hand, but from a friend of a friend's father so to speak from Egypt, it is likely there is a fair embelishment to the story.
By far the most likely root for the basic legend is the island of Santorini which which at the time was the main trading post for the Minoan civilisation. This island was quite literally blown asunder by what was probaly the largest volcanic eruption in the history of civilised man..Thera.
Certainly Crete would have been in the path of the tsunami, which may or may not have completly knocked out the already waining Minoan civilisation, but it certainly didn't help. Likewise the eruption would also be a plausable explanation for some of the plagues of Egypt occurances (great darkness, Plume of smoke and fire, hail (pummice stones?)etc..)
Certianly one can hardly imagine such an abviously cataclysmic event going unrecorded in some for or other by what were after all literate people.
http://www.mystae.com/restricted/streams/thera/thera.html
Artifacts anyone? There seems to be a stunning lack of the correct type. I hope the researcher didn't use a grant to come up with this.
Ireland's still here.
And this is a good thing. NO WAIT make that a VERY good thing!
Scientific PFFFFFFT. Ireland is the lost land of the bitter FR poster. I could name names, but I'd be banned post-haste....
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