[Maursault]

> If taken as a historical account, it tells of an unprecedented impact, conflagration and deluge within a millennium of the YDIE.

More likely, Timeaus describes the destruction of Santorini, c.1600BC (we can't trust Plato's dating, just that it occurred in the distant past). Plato's "Pillars of Heracles" would have been describing a place other than Gibraltar, (the earliest reference of which is 600BC in Peisander's Heracleia (fixing the number of Hercules labors at twelve), yet the Greeks were unaware of the Atlantic Ocean until the voyages of Pytheas ~330BC, during Plato's lifetime, suggesting another location for the Pillars). The destruction of Santorini also neatly explains the Ten Plagues of Egypt described in Exodus.

[1] https://greekreporter.com/2022/05/10/new-findings-on-santori...

[pmayrgundter]

Yeah, but if you discard the time and the place from stories you can make them fit anywhere.

I doubt the Greeks were so ignorant of history that they'd mistake the meaning of 9000 years for 1000 years (Solon was ~5-600BC). We had no trouble maintaining their histories using similar practices since, over 2500 years, and we would hardly mistake that for say 250 years.

But the Greeks were surely aware of the Atlantic Ocean and meant the same Straight as we mean by Gibraltar[1]. The Timaeus calls it "Ἀτλαντικοῦ πελάγους"[2] or Atlantic Sea, and the Phoenicians[1.1] were well settled West of the Straight much earlier than your literary reference:

"The new [Phoenician] chronology suggests an Atlantic exploration period, during the tenth century B.C., followed by later ninth century colonization. Gades (Cadiz) was founded west of the Strait."[3][4]

[1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pillars_of_Hercules [1.1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pillars_of_Hercules#Phoenician... [2]http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%... [3]https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/ccr/vol78/iss78/4/ [4]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoenicia#Genetic%20studies

[osiris-with-ED]

How would you explain the presence of landmasses corresponding to the Atlantis myth that can be found in the Azores plateau? Additionally, the legend itself was recovered from Egypt, so whether or not the Greeks had knowledge of the Atlantic would have no bearing on if the Egyptians (or, more importantly, the people who were their progenitors) had this knowledge.

[Maursault]

> How would you explain the presence of landmasses corresponding to the Atlantis myth that can be found in the Azores plateau?

Simply, they do not correspond. The Azores were discovered in the 14th Century, and there is no archeological evidence of any settlement or even an ancient advanced civilization prior to the Portuguese settlers. Also, there is no evidence in the Azores of any ancient catastrophe.

The mistake is in assuming that in 300BC, Gibraltar was known as the Pillars of Heracles. Except that it wasn't. Another place, very close to Greece, was known as the Pillars of Heracles. Stop looking in the Atlantic.

And please look at a satellite image of Thera/Santorini and compare to Plato's description (ignoring his obviously ridiculous continent-sized scales). After the catastrophe, Santorini looks like the description of Atlantis before the catastrophe.

Following the broad strokes, a catastrophe destroyed a civilization, which could and most likely describes the Minoan civilization that was destroyed in a catastrophe, namely, the destruction of Santorini.

[simonh]

There are many dozens of theorised locations for Atlantis, tye Azores is only one and not a particularly compelling one over any of the others IMHO.

The Egyptians at that period and before were far, far worse sailors and navigators than the Greeks, or pretty much anyone else. I really wouldn’t trust anything they would say about distant geography or navigation.

[ncmncm]

An Egyptian expedition sailed all the way around Africa, starting at the Red Sea and returning via the South Atlantic, taking three years. They reported the sun on their right as they rounded the Cape, which was taken as proof of fabrication, to the ancients.

Egyptians achieved a great many impressive things, over millennia, the overwhelming majority of which we have little or no record of.

[simonh]

That was a Phoenician expedition recorded by the Egyptians.

[ncmncm]

I am corrected. ISTR the expedition was funded or instigated by a pharaoh, but could be hallucinating.

A whole mess of authentic Egyptian hieroglyphs were found carved in rock faces in Australia, a few decades back. They were recently examined and translated by an expert in ancient Egyptian language. They turn out to describe the disastrous end of a big expedition a bit over 2000 years ago. Some of the symbols used entered dictionaries only a few years ago, so they are unquestionably authentic.