by William Skink
I’m going to take a little break from politics today in order to take a look at the lost city of Atlantis.
Last week, I finished a book by Mark Adams, titled Meet Me in Atlantis. I found the book, which came out last year, at Shakespeare and Co. It was a fortuitous find, considering Atlantis had come up several times in my research of the occult aspects of Nazism and the overlap with the origins of the New Age movement.
What I didn’t know about Atlantis is the fact that all we know about this presumed mythical city came from Plato, who described Atlantis in oddly very specific detail. Another fascinating detail is that the revived contemporary interest in Atlantis came primarily from the writing of a US Congressman from Minnesota, one Ignatius Donnelly:
Ignatius Loyola Donnelly (November 3, 1831 – January 1, 1901) was a U.S. Congressman, populist writer, and amateur scientist. He is known primarily now for his theories concerning Atlantis, Catastrophism (especially the idea of an ancient impact event affecting ancient civilizations), and Shakespearean authorship, which many modern historians consider to be pseudoscience and pseudohistory. Donnelly’s work corresponds to the writings of late 19th and early 20th century figures such as Helena Blavatsky, Rudolf Steiner, and James Churchward, and has more recently influenced writer Graham Hancock.
The concept that myths derive from kernels of truth was once a laughable idea, but as locales like the ancient city of Troy get discovered, and with new abilities to utilize technology, like satellite imaging, archaeologists are less prone to ridicule.
I think this is an important topic to take seriously because absent solid scholarship, wild fictions take hold. Atlantis played prominently in Blavatsky’s Secret Doctrine and her description of “root races“:
Root races are stages in human evolution in the esoteric cosmology of theosophist Helena Petrovna Blavatsky, as described in her book The Secret Doctrine (1888). These races existed mainly on now-lost continents. Blavatsky’s model was developed by later theosophists, most notably William Scott-Elliot in The Story of Atlantis (1896) and The Lost Lemuria (1904).
This is where modern day white supremacists who believe in the superiority of their Aryan origins get a lot of their twisted ideology from. If this topic goes unchecked by more objective scholarship, then it will remain a breeding ground for developing deeply racist belief systems, including the state-sponsored racism of modern day Israel.
One of the more interesting aspects of the Atlantis myth is how this ancient city was allegedly destroyed. The following quote comes from this Smithsonian Mag article about ten ancient stories and the geological events that may have inspired them:
Plato, the ancient Greek philosopher, wrote of a great civilization called Atlantis founded by a race of people who were half god and half human. They lived in a utopia that held great naval power. But their home, located on islands shaped like a series of concentric circles, was destroyed in a great cataclysm.
Science: Atlantis probably wasn’t a real place, but a real island civilization may have inspired the tale. Among the contenders is Santorini in Greece. Santorini is now an archipelago, but thousands of years ago it was a single island—a volcano named Thera. Around 3,500 years ago, the volcano blew up in one of the biggest eruptions in human history, destroying the island, setting off tsunamis and blowing tons of sulfur dioxide into the atmosphere where it lingered for years and probably caused many cold, wet summers. Those conditions would have ruined harvests in the region and are thought to have contributed to the quick decline of the Minoans, who had dominated the Mediterranean from nearby Crete.
The city of Helike in Greece has also been suggested as inspiration for Atlantis. The ancient metropolis was wiped off the map by an earthquake and tsunami in December of the year 373 B.C.
Just this century we have seen two major earthquake/tsunamis disasters devastate Japan and Southeast Asia. Closer to home, FEMA is planning drills next week on how to respond to a cataclysmic tsunami hitting the Pacific Northwest:
Starting on June 7th, FEMA will be conducting a large scale drill that has been named “Cascadia Rising” that will simulate the effects of a magnitude 9.0 earthquake along the Cascadia Subduction Zone and an accompanying west coast tsunami dozens of feet tall. According to the official flyer for the event, more than “50 counties, plus major cities, tribal nations, state and federal agencies, private sector businesses, and non-governmental organizations across three states – Washington, Oregon, and Idaho – will be participating”. In addition to “Cascadia Rising”, U.S. Northern Command will be holding five other exercises simultaneously. According to the final draft of the Cascadia Rising drill plan, those five exercises are entitled “Ardent Sentry 2016″, “Vigilant Guard”, “Special Focus Exercise”, “Turbo Challenge” and “Joint Logistics Over-The-Shore”.
The primary scenario that of all of these participants will be focusing on will be one that involves a magnitude 9.0 earthquake along the Cascadia Subduction Zone followed by a giant tsunami that could displace up to a million people from northern California to southern Canada.
Maybe one day there will be stories told about the mythical city of Seattle.
JC
Mythical stories about Caracas Venezuela will precede any of Seattle’s demise.
I have walked the ruins of Ani, Turkey, near Kars. It’s an amazing feeling to stand on rubble of a once-great civilization. Makes one think about all the things our own culture could do to prevent such decline and ruin. http://www.theatlantic.com/photo/2014/01/the-ancient-ghost-city-of-ani/100668/ The cities of Iraq, Syria, and Libya are not far behind. Detroit?
Valar Marghulis, Steve. All men must die. Civilizations die with them.
Love this post, Lizard. Written as one sitting on top of the largest Super Volcano on the planet (possibly second largest, but the science is still out), I’ve read some of the Atlantis theories as well, and the Thera volcano is probably the likely culprit. Yellowstone could bring ‘Murika right into the dust, and many other cultures with us. Given the speculation and number of conversations that have taken place considering that very thing, I still find it mildly surprising how many people are so very willing to politicize geology, geography, archeology and physics itself, just to make a specious point about the power of ‘right-thinking’.
Sodom and Gomorra were the mythical Atlantis.
The only vaguely threatening aspect of your post are the simultaneous drills that will be going on … They are an access point for spooks to use public resources to stage fake events. They use real police, medical and emergency response people, and crisis actors. News media then treats the whole thing as if it were real. Nice gig. Last I read there were seventeen drills going on on 9/11, but then I quit reading about that fake event.
I’ve tried to suggest to you, but to your credit you’re not suggestible in most regards, the occult is a shield behind which exist real people who don’t believe any of the superstition, but use it as a Trojan horse, a shield, a way to scare ordinary people away. Blavatsky was a spook, Crowley was a spook, Houdini … He whole Son of Sam charade (where no one died) was a spook operation hidden behind the occult to scare us mortals away. Various authors (Maury Terry, Dave McGowan) wrote about it as if there were a network of Satanists connected and operating in concert. Hoax. Makes me wonder if Terry and McGowan (rip) are/were spooks.
“Spook” = intelligence operative. It’s not new. Since feudal times, maybe even Plato’s time, the few who rule the many have needed eyes to watch us, and ways to control our beliefs and behaviors. Infiltrators, fake events, weird belief systems, highly publicized distractions, whole movements borne of planted ideas are not unusual. They keep us occupied, distracted. The occult is a wall behind which exist ordinary people who want to keep us confused and under control.
And then I am done. But you brought occult to my website, so I repay by bringing reality to yours.
So you don’t believe in volcanoes either? I suppose you think that “they” faked the Mount St. Helens eruption, and all the ash photos were faked. Probably faked the earthquake off of Fukushima and all the nuclear power plant chaos and radiation too. Except, nuclear bombs are a hoax, so that means that nuclear power is probably faked too with underground coal burners electrifying the grid underneath. I guess the Banda Aceh earthquakes and tsunami were probably the Wachowski brother’s coup de grâce before they became the Wachowski sisters and garnered your disdain, because… why???
Pop, pop, fiz fiz, oh what a relief it is. Take another valium and swig it down with a glass of your pinot and dream on in your fantasy island world where facts don’t matter and you can mold them to fit your comfort.
I’ll re-read your post now to see if anything you wrote is in anyway related to anything I wrote.
Nope.
When you are done grab-bagging, try Pinot Grigio. It will ease your pain. You and Talbot might even shed tears in each other’s drinks as you complain about me.
And nothing you wrote had anything to do with Skink’s post. Just more thought coppery.
I dealt directly with his impression that the occult is a wormhole to another world. We are stuck in this one. None of us have any special friends, good or evil, on the other side. But the Intel community have exploited the occult, used it to scare people, stage grisly fake murders, massacres, all for ulterior motives. And Skink is buying in. Must be something real, he is saying. He is wrong.
You, hmmm, you, once impressed me, now think of you as Talbot Lite. You are wise to leave me be. I only leave burnt fingers.
Nope, you’re just a thought cop trying to stick people into your little closed minded fake/hoax boxes full of bigotry, hatred, anti-intellectualism and pseudo science. I’ll say and do what I please however I want. Your brand of nihilism just puts the icing on the cake of unreason.
Some time you might try leaving the realm of belief and looking at evidence. This is why I turned on you. Just as with this whippng you just gave me, full of accusations of defects, evil intents and personal failings, you’ve offered nothing of substance. Those few times in the past when you have drifted into evidence, it was a short trip. You quickly retreated into prejudice, presupposition, and belief. I try not to judge a man when he is at his worst, but you are certainly capable of better.
If we want mythical stories told of the place called Seattle, I suggest this:
Mark, this post doesn’t deal with the occult. it’s about myths, real disasters and the disparate ideologies that have used the myth of Atlantis to posit a lost super-race that justifies their racism, which you would have known had you read the post.
I find it humorous that you come here, make an ignorant comment, then act like a little baby (sorry babies) when JC calls out your bullshit. if you want to be left alone, there is a simple thing you can do: don’t comment here. but if you do comment here, which you are more than welcome to do, then other will respond. and if they attack your willful ignorance and close minded thought-coppery, well, at this point in your blogging crusade, I’d say it’s exactly what you deserve.
I didn’t know beans about the last Thera eruption, until our very old farts book club took a glimpse at what happened. And was recorded in the Bristle Cone pines of now California. Might have been one of the drivers for beginning of Shang Dynasty. Very likely caused a tsunami that destroyed not only the vessels, but also distant harbors, supplied by the shipping empire of the Minoans.
So for historians the important thing, is how the Mycenaean culture of piracy vessels blossomed and took over Mediteranean commerce.
But after the above boiler plate stuff, came the interesting part. By 1625 or so, Women in Minoa had seperate rights from men, Mothers could pass property to daughters. Got to read the story in different sources, but after awhile comes the notion that gender parity was long establised.
If only Plato had known that!
Ha!
If only men recognized the variety plus solidarity among scores of communty action
involvements, organized by women of the world.
Ha! Here we are again. You’ve heard it before,
‘Sexism corrupts racism’
I kind of try to avoid gender biased views of the normal, also the para-normal, and phases
of occult participation with a non-normal world.
In shorter words, perhaps some women would like to comment on the occult and subsequent varietal material William Skink brings to the light of day.
I read the post, always do. You’re projecting. JC is steaming about the nose and ears, as I have tested his mettle in recent days. I dealt with him below. You have a notion, which you have stated plainly, that because authority figures take the occult seriously, so should you. I have offered up evidence and suggested you read a paper that puts the whole occult business right where it belongs – spookery. Of course, you were doing a drive by, and it was not a two minute video, but a long involved essay, so you have no clue what I am talking about. You’re coming off as a lightweight with hurt feelings, like JC.
Of course I have read about Atlantis, Plato, the lost continent, and know of all the wild speculation. What is real? I cannot know. But I repeat my grounding: I have seen no evidence that any of us knows what lies beyond our mortal existence. There are fakes all around us who claim some insight. Intelligence operatives have exploited this superstition as a means of subtle suggestion and thought control.
In short, you got nothing.
Seattle was once a magnificent technologically advanced city, with round topped spires pointing up into the sky ! ….. Then one day the Earth shook, and the sea opened, and it vanished into the sea ….