Chapter XII: Location Theories - Part 2 (South America and the Atlantic)

III. Atlantis in South America

The most powerful theory that locates Atlantis in South America is J.M. Allen's theory. Allen's research was shown on Discovery Channel and his work was published as "Atlantis, the Andes Solution".

He first stumbled upon his theory when studying ancient measuring systems. He didn't believe that Atlantis could be an island that sank in one night, so he searched for Atlantis in South America, focusing first on finding a plain as described by Plato.

Allen places Atlantis in the Andes. This shouldn't make us wonder, given that the scientists continue fighting over the Maya and Olmec mystery. The region is so full of question marks, that one more can only help.

His first focus is Altiplano, a plain found in Bolivia. To verify his research, he uses Plato's "Dialogues".

If you remember, Plato mentions a man-made channel used for ships. Allen finds the channel which is indeed man-made and is cutting the plateau in two. The plain has a rectangular shape, as described by Plato. Allen finds a new length for a 'stadia', and the pieces of his puzzle fall correctly into place. Using the new measurements, he traces on his map the place where the wall surrounding the city should be. Afterwards, using the map and the calculations he has made, he looks for the wall on land, and finds ruins of it, just where they should be.

South America is prone to floods and the plain was indeed flooded in 9000 BC. Earthquakes are common also, which leads us to think that a calamity could have struck the area thousands of years ago.

Allen also mentions the number of 'tribes' of Atlantis, which was, according to Plato, ten. Atlantis is not only the name of the continent, but of the city itself. So Allen went for Tiahuanaco and its mysteries.

Another thing which follows the 'Dialogues' is the plain (Altiplano), that is indeed enclosed by the mountains. It contains volcanoes of similar size to those upon which the city was built. The region faces south, as seen on the Inca map (another good point). As in any other volcanic area, hot and cold springs exist. The mountains contain gold, copper, silver, tin, and a natural alloy of copper and gold that could be 'oricalcum'. This alloy can be found only in this part of the world.

In the Aztec language, "atl" means "water", and in Peruvian Quechua, "antis" means "copper". Besides, Antis is the correct name for the Andes Mountains.

A section of a 600 feet wide channel is found on the rectangular Altiplano. Square irrigated plots also exist. The plain measures 3,000 x 2,000 "stades", which would be 300 feet.

Plato talks about temples and statues of gold built to Poseidon and Cleito. Local legends in South America talk about the "golden city" of El Dorado. It was the same El Dorado that brought the Spanish to conquer the Incas.

The sea of those parts (Lake Poopo) couldn't be searched because of shoal mud.

(to be continued with new views on South America)

IV. Atlantis in the Atlantic

I'll start with the Azores: the area in the Atlantis where many believe there could have never been an Atlantis or a part of it.

Let's go one more time through it though.

Ignatius Donnelly was among the first people to present such a theory and sustain it perfectly. But it's not Donnelly who draws people to search for Atlantis in the Atlantic Ocean, or in the Azores. It's actually the perfect relationship between Plato's work, Piri Reis' and Kircher's map, the legends and stories of the nearby civilizations, the mysteries found on the shores of Africa and Eastern South America, the unanswered questions of the scientists, the common root of the languages, the necessity of the existence of a bridge that brought the white people to Europe. It's so complex and the solution might solve so many problems that it's way too hard to look away from the Azores theory. No other theory would satisfy all the enigmas better than this one.

In 1947, a geology professor, Dr. Maurice Ewing, led an expedition to study the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, a mountainous crest that separates the Atlantic Ocean in two, crossing it vertically. He mapped the sea floor and his data returned a map of a land more or less in the shape given by Kircher's map. His research uncovered rocks that would change Alfred Wegener's, the German scientist, theory on the separation of continents by drifting apart and creating the Atlantic Ocean in the middle. This is the theory that basically denies the possible existence of Atlantis in Atlantic, since, according to his theory, there was no space for such a continent, or island, there.

Dr. Ewing didn't claim the existence of Atlantis, but he did run into some interesting sediments that puzzled him. On the left side of the Ridge levels of beaches and terraces, 2 to 20 miles broad, were found. He also found submerged beaches, about halfway between Bermuda and New York, about 300 miles from the coast.

One year later, Dr. Ewing returned for more investigation, and he dated the sandy beaches. The older group's age was determined to 225,000 to 325,000 years ago, while the other group dates 20,000 to 100,000 years ago. Also the samples taken from the Mid-Atlantic Ridge show fossils of lake and fresh water creatures, and land plants.

In 1970, Dr. David F. Zhirov found submerged sand beaches 2 miles south of Azores.

Azores has a very interesting location. Not only does it have twelve volcanoes, but it is bounded on the west by the Mid-Atlantic Ridge rift valley fault, while at the north you can find the Kurchatkov Fracture Zone, and on the south, by the East Azores Fracture Zone. It is the meeting point of three tectonic plates, thus volcanoes and earthquakes are quite common. There's no wonder that all that is left from the Azores Islands is a few mountain peaks.

The area is highly unstable. For example, trans-Atlantic cables broke a few times in the area, and once, due to lanf risings, the cable was found a few miles off its initial location.

You don't have to take into consideration only the sea rises that took place around 12000 BC, 9300 BC, and about 6000 BC when you are looking for Atlantis in the Azores. You also have to see the volcanoes, and take into consideration the tectonic plates. On the picture below, you can actually see the large number of volcanoes condensed into the Azores. As I was saying in a previous chapter, lands also rise and fall when volcanoes erupt. A whole island can be submerged, or a whole island can appear, and then disappear again.

Of course, you can argue with me that no relics, no temples, nothing had been found here or beneath the ocean. That actually wouldn't surprise me at all: in such an unstable area, finding something under cemented rocks, under the solidified lava, would be extremely hard. Temples tumble, fall. 9000 years of instable activity in the area, and everything would be reduced to big boulders, which would be covered by sediments, molten lava, pieces of mountains that broke during eruptions. The crust could have risen, just like in the other places I have told you about, and then it could have swallowed the temples.

Also, the linguists have found many common words in the languages belonging to the areas encircling the Atlantic Ocean. Coincidence? Hard to believe. More like common source.

So maybe Atlantis - Plato's Atlantis, that is - is not in the Azores. Still, the Atlantic must have had a large island back then. Or else, a bunch of small islands scattered in the ocean wouldn't make sense. Easy to imagine them though being a bit bigger, right?

Well, it's all a matter of belief. But, if this theory proves true, the whole  history might change.