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essay Atlantis – the Lost Land or Lost Illusions?
Introduction有很多苦难的发现,在世界上。人们在他们的客人,人生的意义难以解释的事物和转向神秘的故事。亚特兰提斯城中一个颇有争议的问题,我们的时间。亚特兰提斯是一失落之城柏拉图描述的在他的作品中。柏拉图奉献他的对话框两卷描述这个神秘的土地。所以,我们的大部分信息得到了Atlantians柏拉图的著作。柏拉图描述的亚特兰蒂斯居住着一种神秘的生物。土地表面他还表示,这片土地已经被冲断了食物。没有准确信息的人居住的地方,亚特兰提斯。柏拉图名叫赫拉克斯支柱相对应的现代海峡直布罗陀。“因为这是有关如何在我们的记录从前有一天,你的国家保持课程强大的主人,从遥远的愿景是在亚特兰提斯的海洋,攻击整个不逊推进欧洲,亚洲的一顿饭。大海有当时通航,因为前面你亲口希腊人的电话,正如你所说的,“大力神)的柱子,”(即大力神)在那里躺着一个岛屿,比利比亚和亚洲在一起,那么就可能旅客的时间过的其他岛屿去、并众海岛所剩下的整个大陆的作品。“(柏拉图,278)
没有这个消失的文明的实物证据和一些研究还发现了名字不同的地方,如玻利维亚,佛罗里达海岸、希腊、地中海、中美洲、中国海洋甚至非洲。亚特兰蒂斯的故事,就像一个被认为是美丽的神话,直到最近,当在1980年代对这个话题感兴趣的是有争议的书,提出由德天Donelly。他的书名叫亚特蓝提斯岛,在上古世界的历史描述洪水从埃及到墨西哥和证明了亚特兰提斯的存在。这本书就成了畅销书而引发的社会大共鸣。之后不久,其他的书的数量研究这个话题写的。争论的存在不削弱的亚特兰提斯城市直到现在。主要的争议是围绕三个核心概念。,他们相信在这个世界上存在消失的城市相信柏拉图的著作,认为他是真正的均匀,描述发生在他的书。另一组与研究的读者相信事实柏拉图所只有部分真实,他的故事,讲的是亚特兰提斯是一个美丽的故事,作者结合实际情况,虽然。第三组的研究不相信在这个世界上存在的亚特兰提斯认为它是在所有的对象pseudo-researches的猜测。所有三个概念有很多追随者,每一个人的信徒给大量的证据来支持他们的论文。
亚特兰提斯的理由反对的存在
2000多年来,亚特兰蒂斯是只是一个神话,并且只能在1800年代开始,科学家注意力转向这个神秘的故事,决定做一个研究人员的数量。伊格内修斯写了一本书,名叫亚特蓝提斯岛,旧式的世界,在那里他研究了所有的事实与亚特兰蒂斯(唐奈利吧)。然后,很多其它的书致力于这一主题的出现,但即使现在尽管假设没有人能证明和调查的存在或不赞成亚特兰提斯岛。
有很多的论点,让我们有一些怀疑存在的亚特兰提斯岛。第一个论据仍然是没有人能说出确切的名字亚特兰提斯岛的位置上。一些科学家寻找亚特蓝提斯岛的地中海,其他人声称它曾经是在领土的非洲和欧洲和美洲。第三组的否认所有这些观点,并且认为它可能存在于南极洲或南美洲。一些科学家相信航天飞机将只在爱琴海,圣多里尼的岛上。就象我们所看到的,没有一个共同的意见,因为在没有实际证明它的存在。这种不同的看法可能只是迷惑人的位置而不是一个重点支持的亚特兰提斯的存在。#p#分页标题#e#
第一次提到我们相遇在亚特兰蒂斯的两个柏拉图著作:《提马亚斯》和Critia。这些作品在柏拉图出许多信息是相当困难的亚特兰蒂斯的证明,这也就是为什么人们都倾向于这样一个事实,即它更多的神话的消失的文明而非真实的历史。柏拉图的叙述是错综复杂的,无人能解释它彻底及准确。兰德Flem-Ath图书馆员认为根据柏拉图的亚特兰蒂斯沉没的土地上,Eberhard桑戈、瑞士考古学家相信,在亚特兰提斯岛柏拉图意味着古特洛伊。
柏拉图的著作很美丽的故事关于财富和知识的一种神秘的土地亚特兰提斯岛。它既有优点也有缺点。以亚里士多德为例,说柏拉图做了存在的亚特兰提斯岛。这个观点已被接受,通过大量的科学家研究这一难题。
那些,声称镇位于亚特兰蒂斯在亚特兰提斯的地方海洋可能忘记柏拉图的言”和一个严重的白天与黑夜降临他们时,全身被你的勇士,必死在地上,亚特兰提斯岛这样是被海水吞没,消失了,为什么还在那个点的海洋,现在已经成为不可测的,被堵泥创造鱼群的岛上,因为它平静下来。“(柏拉图,245)。
There are a lot of uncovered miseries in the world. People in their guest for meaning of life turn to unexplainable things and mystical stories. The city of Atlantis is one of the controversial issues of our Essay time. Atlantis is a lost city described by Plato in his works. Plato dedicated two volumes of his dialogs to the description of this mystical land. So, most of our information about the Atlantians we get from the Plato’s writings. Plato described Atlantis as a mystical land inhabited by superficial creatures. He also stated that this land had been swept away by the food. There is no exact information about the place where Atlantis people lived. Plato named the Pillars of Hercules, which correspond to the modern Strait of Gibraltar. “For it is related in our records how once upon a time your State stayed the course of a mighty host, which, starting from a distant point in the Atlantis ocean, was insolently advancing to attack the whole of Europe, and Asia to boot. For the ocean there was at that time navigable; for in front of the mouth which you Greeks call, as you say, 'the pillars of Heracles,' (i.e., Hercules) there lay an island which was larger than Libya and Asia together; and it was possible for the travellers of that time to cross from it to the other islands, and from the islands to the whole of the continent.” (Plato, 278)
No physical evidence of this lost civilization was found yet and some researches name different places, such as Bolivia, Florida coast, Greece, the Mediterranean sea, Central America, the China Sea or even Africa. The story about Atlantis was regarded rather like a beautiful myth until the recent time, when in 1980s the interest to this topic was raised by the controversial book by Ignatius Donelly. His book called Atlantis, the Antediluvian World described the history of flood from Egypt to Mexico and gave evidence of the Atlantis existence. The book became a bestseller and provoked loud resonance in the society. Soon after the number of other books researching this topic was written. Debates about the existence of the city of Atlantis don’t weaken till nowadays. The main dispute is centered around three core concepts. Those, who believe in the existence of the lost city believe in Plato’s writings and think that he’s described real even and place in his books. Other group of researches and readers believe that the facts given by Plato are only partially true and that his story about Atlantis is a beautiful tale, based on some real facts, though. The third group of researches does not believe in the existence of Atlantis at all considering it to be the object of speculation of pseudo-researches. All three concepts have a lot of followers and the adherents of each one give a lot of proofs to support their thesis.#p#分页标题#e#
The Reasons Against Atlantis’ Existence
For more than 2000 years Atlantis was just a myth and only in 1800s scientists paid their attention to this mystical story and decided to make a number of researchers. Ignatius Donnelly wrote a book called Atlantis, the Antediluvian World, where he investigated all facts connected with Atlantis (Donnelly). Then, a lot of other book devoted to this theme appeared but even now despite all hypothesis and investigations no one can prove or disapprove the existence of Atlantis.
There are a lot of arguments that make us have some doubts about the existence of Atlantis. The first argument is that still no person can name the exact name of Atlantis’s location. Some scientists look for Atlantis in the Mediterranean Sea, others claim that it used to be on the territory of Africa and Europe, and America. The third group denies all these points of view and insists that it could exist in Antarctica or South America. Some scientists are sure that Atlantis could be only in the Aegean Sea, on the Island of Santorini. As we can see, there is not one common opinion because there is no actual prove of its existence. Such variety of opinions about its location may just confuse people and it isn’t a point in support of Atlantis’s existence.
The first mentions of Atlantis we meet in two Plato’s works: the Timaeus and the Critia. In these works Plato gives a lot of information about Atlantis that is rather difficult to prove and that’s why people incline to the fact that it’s more the myth of the lost civilization than real history. Plato’s narration is intricate and no one is able to interpret it thoroughly and precisely. Librarian Rand Flem-Ath thinks that according to Plato Atlantis is the sunk land; Eberhard Zangger, Swiss archeologist, believes that under Atlantis Plato meant ancient Troy.
Plato’s works are beautiful stories about riches and knowledge of a mythical land Atlantis. It has both advantages and disadvantages. Aristotle, for example, said that Plato had just made the existence of Atlantis up. This point of view has been accepted by a lot of scientists who investigated this knotty problem.
Those, who state that the town of Atlantis was situated somewhere in the Atlantis Ocean probably forget about Plato’s words “and one grievous day and night befell them, when the whole body of your warriors was swallowed up by the earth, and the island of Atlantis in like manner was swallowed up by the sea and vanished; wherefore also the ocean at that spot has now become impassable and unsearchable, being blocked up by the shoal mud which the island created as it settled down.“ (Plato, 245).
According to Plato Atlantis was a land west of Gibraltar that sunk because of great earthquakes more than 9,000 years before Plato wrote his books. There is an opinion that is widespread enough that Atlantis was an allegory used to express a moral message for further generations. In such a way he depicts ideal society, which may one day exist on our planet. Some researches regard his depiction of Atlantis as a continuation of his Politea and thus Atlantis is just an illustration of an ideal state, which didn’t exist in reality. A group of scientists who seriously investigated Plato’s works insist on the fact that Plato chose such kind of narration to express his ideas vividly. The main argument that Plato was not telling about true events is the fact that nobody in Greece had mentioned a battle between Athens and Atlantis although all memorable events were thoroughly fixed by historians. According to Plato the battle was in the 8th or 9th millenium B.C and it’s clear that in those times Athens was inhabited by primitive people or wasn’t inhabited at all and it’s another prove that Plato didn’t describe real historical events. His stories are aimed to give us moral lessons. Despite these facts Plato is often thought to be the main source for the existence of Atlantis.#p#分页标题#e#
Atlantis is described as a land of high level of development of civilization and technology. People mention about nuclear bombs and other extraordinary achievements that inhabitants of Atlantis used. If it all had been the truth, we would already have found at least one fact in support of it. For example, usage of nuclear bombs couldn’t leave no remains in the environment.
We know from the history how experience was transported from one neighboring civilization to another; they just couldn’t help influencing one on the another. Hypothetically, the neighboring inhabitants of the Atlanteans were the Egyptians and Mesoamericans but no of these civilizations had reached such level of development.
Till now there is no evidence about archeological or geological location of Atlantis and although thousand of people believe in the existence of Atlantis, their belief is based more on guesses than on facts.
Those, who keep middle position and believe that some facts about the city of Atlantis could have real ground state that the theory, proposed by the famous Greek archeologist Angelos Galanopoulos is the most reliable one. In the end of the 1960s after the number of researches he put forward the theory that a massive volcano eruption, which happened around 1500 BC, has broken apart the Santorini island in the Mediterranean sea. This wiped out the part of civilization on the Greek islands and big regions of Greece. Galanopoulos stated that this disaster resulted the sunk of Atlantis. This theory has two counterparts. First of all the dates mentioned by Angelos do not adjust with the Eyptian symbols found in manuscripts. Second inconsistency is in the place of Atlantis existence. Plato was very exact naming the place somewhere close to Pillars of Hercules (The Straight of Gibraltar) while Galanopoulos distinguished the place somewhere close to modern Greece.
The Proofs of the Existence of the City of Atlantis
The problem of Atlantis existence occupies the minds of people of different occupations and from different countries. Thus, the problem was treated from different side and those, who want to find the proof of Atlantis existence can turn to such fields of knowledge, as history, philosophy, religion, geology, oceanography and mythology.
Berlitz, Lewis Spence, Donnelly, L. Sprague De Camp, Edgerton Sykes, Flem-Ath, Otto Muck and J.V. Luce are among the most prominent specialists, who made researches trying to prove the existence of Atlantis. The interesting fact is that all the researches mentioned above started their search with the purpose to prove that Atlantis didn’t exist and turned to opposing opinion after finding arguments of its existence.
The evidence of believers in Atlantis existence can differ a lot because different scholars and researchers try to persuade the audience that the lost city existed exactly in their countries. Thus, arguments can differ a lot.
Those who do not believe in credibility of Plato’s writings state that the story is a myth invited by Plato as it is not mentioned in any other literary sources. This information is no true, though. There are a lot of other authors, who talk about the city of Atlantis. It is necessary to mention that they all wrote after Plato and there are absolutely no references in any literature before his writings. At least, no name Atlantis is used. So, Plato was the first one to describe mystical lost land in his two books of dialogs, the Timeaus and the Critias. He describes Atlantians as mighty and powerful nation, who “of the lands here within the Straits they ruled over Libya as far as Egypt, and over Europe as far as Tuscany. So this host, being all gathered together, made an attempt one time to enslave by one single onslaught both your country and ours and the whole of the territory within the Straits.” (Plato, 296) Plato gave detailed description of the customs, rites, way of life of the citizens of Atlantis. He gave the detailed history of the Atlantis, its development and decline.#p#分页标题#e#
Researches have found more mentions about the city of Atlantis in the woks of other ancient philosophers. For example, Herodotus in his History mentions the land called Atlantis."184. From the Garmantians at a distance again of ten days' journey there is another hill of salt and spring of water, and men dwell round it called Atarantians, who alone of all men about whom we know are nameless; for while all taken together have the name Atarantians, each separate man of them has no name given to him. These utter curses against the Sun when he is at his height, and moreover revile him with all manner of foul terms, because he oppresses them by his burning heat, both themselves and their land.” (Herodotus, 158) Such historians, as Diodorus, Kantor, Plutarch, also mention about the lost continent in their writings.
Aelianus Claudius, the Roman scholar and philosopher, also mentions about Atalantics in his work Various History. He described the nature of the city of Atlantis and strange customs and traditions of local inhabitants.
Not only ancient Greek and Roman texts mention about the city of Atlantis. Ancient Aztecs and Mayan texts also tell about the mysterious land called Atlantis. The mentions about Atlantis can be found in Chilam Balam, Dresden Codex, Popuhl Vuh, Troano Manuscript and Codex Cortesianus. Some researches state that the Oera Linda Book, which is considered to be among the oldest manuscripts of the world, also contains the information about Atlantis.
In addition, we can find some resemblance in the cultural prophecy of Maya, Aztecs, Egypt and Atlantis as it was depicted by Plato. Some researchers believe it to be the proof of the common origin of this countries and thus the existence of Atlantis.
Written sources are not the only evidence of Atlantis existence. We can find proves in the mythological systems of different people all over the world. Almost in all religions there is depiction of gods or superior creatures, which resemble the depiction of Atlantiaens, give by Pluto. Different races used different name to describe this nation of giants, but we will understand that they all look alike to Atlantiaens. In addition, stories about the Great Flood, which demolished the “mankind» and Golden Age are presented in the most of the world religions.
It’s necessary to underline that Plato’s descriptions of Atlantis contained nothing mystical or unearthly. He described rich country with tall, friendly and clever people. All other mystical details about the supernatural abilities and unreal creatures were made up much later.
Those, who do not believe in Atlantis existence, put forward the argument that no ruins or some material evidence of Atlantis existence was found yet. As it was told by Plato, Atlantis has sunk and it is difficult to look for any remains under the water, especially taking into account great water surface and doubts about the geographical location of the lost land. There are circumstantial evidences, though. There were found ruins and remains of human life dated more than 6000 BC. This is much older than any dates of human civilization appearance, named before. This means that new facts can appear about Atlantis.#p#分页标题#e#
Conclusion
The question about the existence of Atlantis is still open. There are a lot of arguments given by both sides. Plato’s works are still the main evidence of Atlantis existence. Unfortunately, very often scientists who don’t believe in the existence of Atlantis sweep away new information and convincing arguments in order not to lose their authority. With the flow of time new and new evidence, which prove the existence of Atlantis are discovered. Hopefully, in the nearest future mankind will grow to such a level that will be able to discover the truth about Atlantis and other miracles of the world.
Contents
Introduction
The Reasons Against Atlantis’ Existence
The Proofs of the Existence of the City of Atlantis
Conclusion
References
Rudolph Schuller, Charles Schuchert Geographical Review, Vol. 3, No. 1 (Jan., 1917) , pp. 61-66
Plato: Timaeus and Critias, Desmond Lee (translator) (Harmondsworth 1965) pp. 34-38, 129-43.
Herodotus. The Histories. Translated by Aubrey De Selincourt. London: Penguin Books Ltd., 1954. Revision, London: Penguin Books Ltd., 1996.
Donnelly, Ignatius, Atlantis ed. Egerton Sykes. New York, 1949.
Spence, Lewis, The History of Atlantis. New York, 1968.
Donnelly, Ignatius, Atlantis ed. Egerton Sykes. New York, 1949.
Cayce, Edgar Evans, Edgar Cayce on Atlantis. New York, 1968.
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