Phoenicians are responcible for Plato's Atlantis

The art and the technology really don't support the idea that they were connected. Art and technology are the first two ideas to get traded in a civilization, and that's one way you can see who's been where and who trades with whom.

The Phoenecians had the bow long before the Americas developed it. Greeks and Ponecians were using it as a weapon of war during the time that the entire American continent was using slings and atlatls.

The Americas developed pottery thousands of years after it arose in the Old World. If there'd been trade in either direction, they'd just have traded for nice pots and we'd have seen pottery with Old World symbols on them (and writing) dating back thousands of years.

I wouldn't put too much stock in the turbans, Chakotay. The fashion was borrowed from the English, who went on an Oriental kick about 30 years before that.

Originally posted by Chakotay
Comparisons to the ancient Sumerian language (which they label as Ural-Altaic) to modern Turkic languages show common vocabulary. Based on these comparisons it is claimed that the Sumerians were the most ancient documented Turkic people, that they originated from east of the Caspian Sea but established a civilization in Mesopotamia

yes but it continues

Others dismiss this as an expression of pan-Turkist ideology, pointing out that most linguists consider Sumerian a language isolate, while a few others connect it to the Dravidian languages. Further, the classification of languages into an Ural-Altaic group is often criticised, due to perceived lack of evidence and perceived lack of obvious similarties between languages classified as such.

I hope in the future the Islamists can rediscover their ancient roots, abandon aggressive warfare, and help create a future of peace for all races of humankind.

Perhaps what is needed are evangelising Shamanists!

jake1997
www.compmore.net...

intruiging. amoung other things

It is seen that the Sumerians had similar beliefs in the Astral entities, such as the Sky, Moon and Sun, as did the ancestors of Altaic peoples through their Altaic Shamanism.

I tend to think that teh Sumerian Religion, being that of the Heirarchic City State grade, is incompatible with that of the aboriginal turks, at least if we all agree that its something like shamanism.

I tend to follow Joseph Campbells thinking on the process, where the city-state religions are also astral religions but that importantly 'subvert' the shamanist traditions. IE he notes some traditions which he associates with having come from the hierartic grade as having a cheif-astral-creator god who, effectively, challenges either the 'traditiona' shamans or elemental spirits and overcomes them, being the all powerful creator, and then even goes so far as to assign the elementals/shamans/magicians to specific 'societies' which usually themselves regulate a ritualistic dance.

I think that, if the above is something that can be expected, then if the sumerians are ethnic turks using a turkic religion, then we would expect that the correlates with the central asian turkic gods should be such that a new sumerian 'over god' rules over them and removes them from any previous astral/elemental associations, rather than, say, carrying over the shamanistic religion in total.

Thus, in a rather perverse way I'll admit, the similarity between the names of the sumerian and turkic gods speaks against an association.

As far as the rest of the article, I tend to not be particularly swayed by the broad argument of there being a crescent moon and star symbol amoung the sumerians, and one amoung the turks, as necesarily requireing a connection.

The linguistic realtionship is interseting tho, I had only been familiar with the isolate and elamo-dravidic arguements. This article also seems to make the arguement that the elamo-dravidic languages might have more in common with the 'ural-altaic' languages than might normally be expected., in itself interesting.

Originally posted by Byrd
The Phoenecians had the bow long before the Americas developed it.

The Americas developed pottery thousands of years after it arose in the Old World.

I wouldn't put too much stock in the turbans, Chakotay. The fashion was borrowed from the English, who went on an Oriental kick about 30 years before that.

There is no unbiased data proving the old world bow predates the new world bow. I contend the same regarding pottery. You know radio-dating methods are now in serious question, worldwide.

As for turbans, your contention is facetious at best. You see Bird, we bury our dead in shaft graves, and the men were wearing turbans long before the arrival of the English:

Turbans like those of specific regions of India were used in Mexico by 2000 years ago (Smith 1924), and the distribution of turban types elsewhere in America—for example in the southeastern United States—might give clues to later population movements.

I rest my case, and my weary wrists, for now.

[edit on 5-2-2005 by Chakotay]

Quote: "The Phoenecian city-state of Tyre".

Hey guys this phrase "Tyre" sounds familiar - I think that I have heard it before, HA!

Poseidon and Cleito's 10 sons

1. Atlas
2. Gadeirus
3. Ampheres
4. Evaemon
5. Mneseus
6. Autochthon
7. Elasippus
8. Mestor
9. Azaes
10. Diaprepes

Could these possibly be name of Phoenician settlements?

Atlas would be where Atlantis sank. I say possibly the Caribbean. I am still in the oppinion that the mesoamericans where there thousands of years before the Phoenican's appearance. Its just that they, the Phoenicans, planted a city state in the lost Island. The mesoamerican culture and the Phoenician culture could have been mixed together in that newly founded state.

Then there's the son of Gadeirus. Could have this been the ancient city of Gades in Spain founded by the Phoenicians?

The next son that came to mind was Azaes. His name reminds be of island group called the Azores in the Eastern Atlantic.

The other names I'm not sure of. I'll have to search the Web to see if there are any relationships to these names and ancient cities.

I wonder if Sidon and Tyre could represent the parents Poseidon and Cleito.

Is it possible that the Phoenician outpost was Aztlan or Atlan from the Caribbean? When the large island sank the survivors restarted their civilization at Teotihuacan (city of the gods-named by the Aztecs). The name Atlan could have been invented by the Phoenicians in honor of the son Atlas. The rest of the ancient temples in central america could have been there long before the Phoenician appearance and settlement. The ancient cities of Tikal, Chichen Itza, Palenque, Uxmal and others in central america could have been far more ancient than the Phoenician settlement of Atlan in the Caribbean. The Phoenician traders would have been attracted to the mesoamerican's skill of building and crafts. The writing and stone friezes of these ancient temples are far too different to be off-shoot creations of the Phoenicians.

One story I read on this subject indicated that the mesoamericans were the Tsinim and they had sea going vessels that appeared as great logs. The account also included that there was special box on board the log that contained a bowl within it. The bowl had graven lines marking the four corners of the earth and around it were pictures of the host of heaven. The bowl was filled with water and in the middle was a piece of cork with a needle of iron coming out of the cork.

King Meleck of Tyrhena said this to Dedan, the discoverer of the land of the Tsin in the West, "Fear not, oh Dedan; thou hast done well; perchance this loss may be for our greater advantage. Go in peace; nevertheless, speak not to any concerning this matter." As Dedan retired, the king sighed heavily, and said: "Oh, that one could make known to us the spirit that enchants the needle of iron, then should Phoenicia be ruler of the sea, and her merchants become rich above all others, for verily our ships and our sailors are better than those of the Tsinim."

Originally posted by Chakotay
There is no unbiased data proving the old world bow predates the new world bow. I contend the same regarding pottery. You know radio-dating methods are now in serious question, worldwide.

(sigh) ... okay... once more with feeling: YOU CAN'T USE C-14 TO DATE POTTERY OR ANYTHING THAT WASN'T LIVING. ARCHAEOLOGISTS DON'T USE IT VERY MUCH.

Right?

Pottery wasn't C14 dated, and as for the bow, it doesn't need to be dated by "c14", either. We have lots of tomb paintings from Egypt (dated with the year of the King) that show the bow as far back as 3,000 BC. The site that I'm working on (Native American) is dated to about the same time period, and the art there depicts atlatls. The bow doesn't show up in art or in grave goods until the Archaic period, about 2,000 years ago.

Nor did we develop pottery that early. The oldest pottery is from Japan, and dates to about 13,000 years ago. Sumeria and Akkadia had pottery (as did Egypt) before 3,000 BC. The earliest that we developed pottery was after 3,000 BC and it doesn't become common or widespread for quite some time after that. The people here in Texas don't get pottery until 1500 AD (yes, AD); just in time for the Spaniards to show up.

While it hindered technological development, it could be argued that semi nomadic people really didn't need to be trotting around the landscape carrying pots. Baskets were better. Central America had some exquisite pottery, though... however it wasn't developed until around 3,000 BC.

As for turbans, your contention is facetious at best. You see Bird, we bury our dead in shaft graves, and the men were wearing turbans long before the arrival of the English:

Turbans like those of specific regions of India were used in Mexico by 2000 years ago (Smith 1924), and the distribution of turban types elsewhere in America—for example in the southeastern United States—might give clues to later population movements.

The turban's a relatively new phenomina. Choctaw and Cherokees didn't adopt it until after the introduction of cloth. There are numerous drawings of first contact/early contact that don't show any turbans in sight, nor are they mentioned in the oldest writings about these people.

The Aztecs did, indeed, have a form of turban but it's pretty disingenuous to claim similarities to the fairly complex Indian turban. They didn't seem quite as enamored of stacking a whole bolt of cloth on their heads, y'know? And they really weren't making turbans out of deerskin or other hides.

I think that the only part of Atlantis that the Phoenicians play, is in perpetuating the idea that the entire continent sank instead of the capital city.

I believe that one can easily see where Atlantis (the city) was and is today, in the Altiplano of Bolivia. The (continent) of Atlantis is still around, and is now called South America. (imho)

Yes, the Egyptians and Greeks knew who the Phoenicians were, but we are talking about a period BEFORE all of that.

It's my contention that the Phoenicians were mostly made up of Atlantean traders' ancestry, who had started trading with the ancient world. I also believe that before becoming "Phoenicians", they were called "the Sea People" as in some of the older Egyptian tales. Researchers have shown that ships of the era could successfully make the voyages. We can find South American crops such as coffee, tobacco, cocoa, etc. in old Egyptian mummies. We can find Pre-Columbian sculptures of African animals, and caucasians, etc. in South America. We can see that trade took place, but it's my contention that the Phoenicians (as they would come to be called) were really the "middle-men" of the ancient world. They were the most accomplished sailors, and I believe they early on discovered the secrets of common currents and trade routes, and then invented legends to maintain their trade monopoly. Their trading outposts were all along the Mediterranean, and through such legends as the sargasso (as mentioned in Plato's tale of Atlantis), etc. they maintained being the sole source for such unique crops as they came to be highly prized by the Egyptian royalty and no doubt, others in the ancient world.

This would also explain that while there was trade, there was little in the way of ideas exchange. The middlemen were out to make a buck, and by keeping their brethren in South America ignorant in most ways of what was elsewhere, they ensured their suppliers wouldn't blow the whole enterprise...

Originally posted by Byrd
-snip-
Pottery wasn't C14 dated, and as for the bow, it doesn't need to be dated by "c14", either... The site that I'm working on (Native American) is dated to about the same time period, and the art there depicts atlatls. The bow doesn't show up in art or in grave goods until the Archaic period, about 2,000 years ago... Nor did we develop pottery that early. The oldest pottery is from Japan, and dates to about 13,000 years ago... The people here in Texas don't get pottery until 1500 AD (yes, AD); just in time for the Spaniards to show up...

-snip-

Turbans like those of specific regions of India were used in Mexico by 2000 years ago (Smith 1924), and the distribution of turban types elsewhere in America—for example in the southeastern United States—might give clues to later population movements.

The turban's a relatively new phenomina. Choctaw and Cherokees didn't adopt it until after the introduction of cloth. There are numerous drawings of first contact/early contact that don't show any turbans in sight, nor are they mentioned in the oldest writings about these people.

Byrd, greetings. Don't take this personal. I am a Turban-wearing, Black Pottery Making Cherokee Lineage Holder. Read the link above. Archaeology admitted the similarity of Cherokee, Mexican, and Indian turbans in 1924! My Turban is not deerskin. It is tribal cloth. The Cherokees have been making woven cloth- and Black Pottery- for 30,000 years, according to Tribal history. The earliest diaries of contact with the Cherokees from the DeSoto expedition clearly describe and show our people wearing cloth turbans, surrounded by Black Pottery.

Tell the good people in the audience How we date pottery, Byrd. C14? Racemic dating? Radionucleide dating? Or- by simple association with 'known' dated items? We date it by guessing based upon our inherent prejudices. Association dating works like this: someone builds a pyramid 40,000 years ago. I build a campfire on top 35,000 years later. Sand covers it all. You dig it up. You find my charcoal hearth. You date the pyramid: 5,000 years old.

"The bow doesn't show up in art or in grave goods until the Archaic period, about 2,000 years ago."

I have in my lap a book titled Indian Rock Art of the Southwest by Polly Schaafsma, School of American Research. On page 93 is a petroglyph showing two Hohokam hunters together. They are hunting horned quadrupeds. One hunter is armed with an Atl-Atl; the other with a bow. The drawings are contemporaneous, by the same artist. To this day I own and hunt with both Atl-Atl and Bow! The modern assumption that the bow 'replaced' the Atl-Atl through 'cultural evolution' is just that- an assumption. With its inevitable consequences. Its funny the bow doesn't show up until 2000 years ago, since we were (and are) using it to turn the fire drills that made the charcoal in your hearths...

You know the 'People in Texas' had pottery ages before the Spaniards showed up- with the Pueblos on the West, Cherokees to the North and East, and the Mexicans (Anahuac) on the South- come on! Texas was smack in the middle of our major overland trading routes! For aeons...

You are guessing. Nothing personal, all archaeologists are. But many couch their rhetoric in terms that make the uninitiated believe that rhetoric is Dogma. It is most certainly not. Science is about proof, not dogma. And until you come up with proof, my Opinion is as valid as yours. And no more.

What stake have you in the 'accepted' dogma? Simple academic conditioning, seeking of tenure or funding, sincere belief, or the desire to denigrate the Native People of Texas with the label of 'savage' to authorize construction of a road through a burial ground? Yes I'm testy. I spent a lot of time on the Rez throwing out pot hunters and denying non-Native archaeologists permission to dig up old bones.

Now cheer up and realize I like you.

I enjoy our discussions- you make me remember.

Blessings, c.

[edit on 7-2-2005 by Chakotay]

Originally posted by ChakotayByrd, greetings. Don't take this personal. I am a Turban-wearing, Black Pottery Making Cherokee Lineage Holder. Read the link above. Archaeology admitted the similarity of Cherokee, Mexican, and Indian turbans in 1924! My Turban is not deerskin. It is tribal cloth. The Cherokees have been making woven cloth- and Black Pottery- for 30,000 years, according to Tribal history. The earliest diaries of contact with the Cherokees from the DeSoto expedition clearly describe and show our people wearing cloth turbans, surrounded by Black Pottery.

Chakotay, with all due respect, the legends may say you have "always" had cloth. The burial artifacts of our people say differently. So do our people:
www.rra.dst.tx.us...

There are no looms before the whites came, and there were no materials available to us for weaving before the whites came. We were called the "civilized tribes" because we learned the way of the whites; not because we had these things before.

Tell the good people in the audience How we date pottery, Byrd. C14? Racemic dating? Radionucleide dating? Or- by simple association with 'known' dated items? We date it by guessing based upon our inherent prejudices.

And by style, and by evidence from other areas that traded with this area, and by soil layers and by a lot of other things. We just don't wander into an area and go "hmm! A pot! My Crystal Etheric Detector says it's 800,000 years old." A whole site is dated; not a single item. If an item's out of context, we can say that it LOOKS like something from this region and this area, but we can't date it.

Association dating works like this: someone builds a pyramid 40,000 years ago. I build a campfire on top 35,000 years later. Sand covers it all. You dig it up. You find my charcoal hearth. You date the pyramid: 5,000 years old.

Uh... no.

"The bow doesn't show up in art or in grave goods until the Archaic period, about 2,000 years ago."

I have in my lap a book titled Indian Rock Art of the Southwest by Polly Schaafsma, School of American Research. On page 93 is a petroglyph showing two Hohokam hunters together. They are hunting horned quadrupeds. One hunter is armed with an Atl-Atl; the other with a bow. The drawings are contemporaneous, by the same artist. To this day I own and hunt with both Atl-Atl and Bow!

It's a great book. However, they don't clam that the art is 10,000 years old or older.

The modern assumption that the bow 'replaced' the Atl-Atl through 'cultural evolution' is just that- an assumption. With its inevitable consequences. Its funny the bow doesn't show up until 2000 years ago, since we were (and are) using it to turn the fire drills that made the charcoal in your hearths...

Actually, no. It's based on "things buried with people." Bows aren't that fragile and don't disintegrate that easily (and even if they did, we could find the traces.)

You know the 'People in Texas' had pottery ages before the Spaniards showed up- with the Pueblos on the West, Cherokees to the North and East, and the Mexicans (Anahuac) on the South- come on! Texas was smack in the middle of our major overland trading routes! For aeons...

Nope. They were migratory peoples. Baskets were more valuable than pottery. Baskets are flexible and not easily broken. Pots are heavy and fragile and this is why most civilizations that develop it are not nomadic. The people in Texas and along the Plains lived a very nomadic lifestyle and were the last of the North American people to develop pottery.

Yes, we do see pottery earlier in the areas where The People lived in villages. The 500 year date was not meant to suggest the entire North America, but to say that it spread slowly and didn't reach all areas until about the time the Spaniards came.

What stake have you in the 'accepted' dogma? Simple academic conditioning, seeking of tenure or funding, sincere belief, or the desire to denigrate the Native People of Texas with the label of 'savage' to authorize construction of a road through a burial ground? Yes I'm testy. I spent a lot of time on the Rez throwing out pot hunters and denying non-Native archaeologists permission to dig up old bones.

Actually, that's not correct. These are my people, too. But I want them known for their works and for the things they DID do. There's revisionist histories that paint the People as both incredibly advanced or as inept children. I don't like revisionists.

Perhaps someday you'll take an archaeological course or join an archaeological society (which are two places the People need to be represented). You'd find it interesting. The parts on how we know how old something is would be fascinating to you.

If I seem somewhat passionate about this, it's because this logic (the "Indians were once a mighty civilization that fell" has been used to enslave the People.

It says that we are not capable of handling technology and that when given advanced technology, all we do is destroy ourselves. It says that the Native American is not competant to manage resources. It says that the Native American is a degraded savage who needs to be guarded like a child and "trained" correctly in the Christian religion and taught how to speak a proper language like English.

And I just HATE that. I really do.

It doesn't say that the people were building large cities long before Europe had them. It doesn't speak how well we used the technology we had and it doesn't acknowledge the many nations. It just lumps us into one group of "stupid savages who can't deal with technology."

Originally posted by Byrd
Chakotay, with all due respect, the legends may say you have "always" had cloth. The burial artifacts of our people say differently.

Opinion. Not the opinion of the Ketoowah Medicine Society. Your friends do not speak for all Cherokees, or all archaeologists, and you know it.

There are no looms before the whites came, and there were no materials available to us for weaving before the whites came. We were called the "civilized tribes" because we learned the way of the whites; not because we had these things before.Actually, no. It's based on "things buried with people." Bows aren't that fragile and don't disintegrate that easily (and even if they did, we could find the traces.)

Fascinating inaccuracy. You know we spun and wove all manner of cotton, yucca, cedar, dog, llama and mountain goat wool for millenia. You know the Salish loom is the common heritage of all the tribes, and that Precolumbian woven goods are found from Chile to Canada. As a claimed Cherokee woman, you should also be familiar with Finger Weaving, which uses no loom and which is found in Archaic sites. You should also know that we are (no past tense) called the Civilized Tribes because we lived in cities with organized economies and established technologies before the arrival of the Europeans. Bows burned with the cremations practiced by many tribes leave no traces, Byrd, and a bow made from organic materials is not likely to survive for 12,000 or more years burned or unburned. You know that projectile points survive where no bows or atlatls are found, and that projectile point interpretation is disputed.

Perhaps someday you'll take an archaeological course or join an archaeological society (which are two places the People need to be represented). You'd find it interesting. The parts on how we know how old something is would be fascinating to you.

Do not patronize me. Already been there, already done that. I suggest you do some critical thinking on the inaccuracy of current dating methods, then rephrase your last statement as 'the parts on how we estimate how old something is...'

In the interests of science.

I'm now under the impression that the Atlantis fable best fits as a trading enterprise with Atlas being the hub center between the Atlantic Ocean and the Pacific Ocean. I am willing to bet that these were the 'Sea People' or also named the Phoenicians. I read that the Phoenicians had roots from ancient babylon as well. Plato described in the tale that each brother would come to the aid of the other when foreign nations threatened their interests. Its possible that the Atlas outpost employed local natives, who would obviously look different from the inhabitants of the Mediterranean. Suppose Egypt refused to pay for their last shipment of drugs from South America and the merchant/warriors from the Mediterranean needed support from the Atlas hub to teach Egypt a lesson and pay up. Gades needed help from Aztlan.

One other name which I may have found a connection is Autochthon, which is considered an aborigine by definition. The land that comes to mind is Australia. To control the trade routes the Phoenician peoples needed to have either islands or coastal ports both in the Atlantic and the Pacific and possibly the Mediterranean.

There had to have been some ancient settlement of the Phoenicians in the South Pacific or even the coastal region of the Far East due to the fact that there are root words of the Phoenicians found there to this day. The word forms 'Pan' and 'Pho' are what give me this feeling.

Poseidon's ten sons and their possible outposts:
With parents being Sidon and Tyrhena

1. Atlas, Aztlan, Central America, Circular panama canal
2. Gadeirus, Gades, Southeast coast of Spain, Present day Cadiz
3. Ampheres, ?
4. Evaemon, ?
5. Mneseus, ?
6. Autochthon, (an aborigine), Australia?
7. Elasippus, ?
8. Mestor, ?
9. Azaes, Azores, Islands off Westcoast of Africa
10. Diaprepes, ?


So imagine the hub center sinks one day through volcanic disruption destroying the heart of the trade route. Not only does one end sink, the eastern side raises up so that no ships can go from the Atlantic to the Pacific. No more world trade. The economy crashes. No more golden age. Here comes the dark ages. Sounds like the world we're headed for.


[edit on 8-2-2005 by lostinspace]

Like I said before - the Phoenicians Keep it REAL - Thanks for the Alphabet Guys:

"Taautos of Byblos or Thoth came from Byblos, Phoenicia, ca. 2,000 BC. According to the Egyptians, language is attributed to Taautos. He Invented the first written characters two thousand years BC or earlier. Taautos was called Thoth by the Greeks and Djehuti by the Egyptians. The mythology of Taautos is echoed in the god Dionysus, or Njörth the snake priest who was the consort to the moon-goddess. The snake priest was also represented by the symbol of a pillar, a wand or a caduceus. The Greeks equated Thoth with the widely traveled Hermes. According to Egyptian tradition, Osiris traveled the world with Thoth. Asklepios a.k.a. as Eshmun is responsible for carrying on the Teachings of Taautos (Snake Priesthood). In the early ages of Christianity, some monks - such as Pachomius was a Serapic Priest before he became a Christian. Similarly, *Ormus* is said to have been a Seraphic priest before being converted by Saint Mark. Some believe that he fused those Mysteries with Christianity and establishing a school of Solomonic Wisdom."

Atlantis/ EDEN is real, not made up by the Pheonicians. There are myths about
Atlantis is almost all religions and culture. It was a real place. It was the beginning of human civilization. It is the key to who we are!
www.atlan.org...


[edit on 17-2-2005 by pantha]

I find this Phoenician mosaic quite interesting in regards to this subject. Obviously this Cross has nothing to do with Chrisianity but has some significant meaning to the folklore of the Sidonians. There within the frame work of the Cross are two horses and two birds. The fact that the birds and horses are in this area deem them of high importance.


www.werkes.com...

I have read folklore on the Phoenicians that state that there were two horses, one named Zuzin and the other Zummin being the fastest Fleet horses in the kingdom. The two were bridled together and drawn by Prince Heracles (Hercules), son of King Melek. This should bring to mind the famous location of the 'Pillars of Heracles' today known as the Strait of Gibraltar.

Plato's Critias states: 'and in the centre of the larger of the two there was set apart a race-course of a stadium in width, and in length allowed to extend all around the island, for the horses to race in.'
www.sacred-texts.com...

Back to the Phoenician mosaic and the two birds. I'm not to sure about this but here's a thought (grilled I will be). To this day why are some areas in the Atlantic named after birds? The Canary Islands for example. I was told that the Azores were also named after a bird which reminds me of Azaes, one of Poseidon's sons. Then far to the other side of the Atlantic is the name applied to the Quetzal bird, from which Quetzalcoatl took his name.

There you have it, horses and birds with the Phoenician Cross (the shape of the Atlantis water ways).

[edit on 12-6-2005 by lostinspace]

[edit on 12-6-2005 by lostinspace]

The entire idea of Atlantis was born in Plato's mind, and this is pretty obvious to anyone that has read his Dialogues.

In Plato's Republic, the following two passages can be found:

In this education, you would include stories, would you not?… These are of two kinds, true stories and fiction. Our education must use both and start with fiction. . . . And the first step, as you know, is always what matters most, particularly when we are dealing with those who are young and tender. That is the time when they are easily moulded and when any impression we choose to make leaves a permanent mark...

and

...Now I wonder if we could contrive one of those convenient stories we were talking about a few minutes ago," I asked. "Some magnificent myth that would in itself carry conviction to our whole community, including, if possible the Guardians themselves. . . . Nothing new-a fairy story like those the poets tell and have persuaded people to believe about the sort of thing that often happened 'once upon a time,' but never does now and is not likely to: indeed it would need a lot of persuasion to get people to believe it"

This shows that Plato was not above making up stories and pretending they are true, as long as some moral or other training purpose was being addressed by the "tall tale."
Now, from Plato's Critias, we have the following intro to Critias' story about Atlantis:

I will tell an old-world story which I heard from an aged man; for Critias, at the time of telling it, was as he said, nearly ninety years of age, and I was about ten. Now the day was that day of the Apaturia which is called the Registration of Youth, at which, according to custom, our parents gave prizes for recitations, and the poems of several poets were recited by us boys, and many of us sang the poems of Solon, which at that time had not gone out of fashion.

The "aged man" Critias here is Critias the Elder, the grandfather of the Critias that tells the tale. The important part of this passage is the line about the "day of Apaturia." This is a festival where poetry recitals and various other activities are performed by children for the adults. On the last day of Apaturia, babies, young men, and newly married wives were enrolled into their phratriai-"brotherhoods" of related families.

Considering the fact that Plato chooses the setting of a festival where young people are initiated and otherwise focused upon for the time when Critias first heard the story, and that Plato has told us of his strong belief in the use of the "magnificent myth" as a teaching tool to be used to enighten young people, what can we infer about the nature of the tale Critias heard at this festival?

Also, any use of the language of the Aztecs (nahuatl) to try and place some kind of "Atlantis" in or around Mexico is without credence. The early Aztecs moved into Mexico more than a thousand years after Plato died. The languge nahuatl that has so many Atl and Antis sounds has roots in the American Southwest. Variants are spoken today by the Hopi and Navaho. There may have been some contact between the Phoenecians and the natives in the Americas, but we cannot pin Atlantis on Atl and Antis. Nahuatl wasn't spoken in the region until 11,000 years after "Atlantis" supposedly sank.

although i wholeheartedly believe that the phoenicians reached the Americas and established colonies there, i wouldn't go so far as to explain away Atlantis with even this great civilization. the legends are to complex to simply affix them to one scapegoat...

The Phoenician adventures may have had a great contribution to the creation of the Atlantis tale. If you read the entire Critias you'll notice its very specific in detail and that there cannot be found any trace of historical evidence of its existance. The only cases we have are similarities to the account. These similarities may have contributed to the fabrication of the Great Atlantis tale. As a believer in the Pre-Flood world I agree about the gods taking female humans as wives which resulted in the birth of male hybrids. The case of the sea god Posedon taking a human wife named Cleito and only producing male offspring lines up with the biblical account of Noah's day. I have a problem with this sea god having the power to modify the landmass to make alternating zones of sea and land in a circular pattern. Notice how Plato mentions that Posedon is no longer there in Atlantis and neither is his wife. Many generations past and the cities were named after Posedon's ten sons where were no longer there. If this truely was a literal pre-flood story then Cleito and her ten son's would have drown during the flood and Posedon would have resumed his spirit form and thrown into Tartarus. This fallen spirit may have transmitted this history of his ancient kingdom to the Phoenicians.

Bloodletting rituals were common practice in Mesoamerican cultures, where an individual is cut so blood drips out to please the gods. Some stela monuments show the action was in use, as seen by one in Tikal, labeled stela 22.


www.mesoweb.com...

mayaruins.com...

This particular stela is from the north enclosure of Comlex Q. It is the beginning of the 17th Katun, which is celebrated by the lord Yax Ain II in 771 A.D.


The question raise here is:
Did the Maya create the Bloodletting ritual on their own? Or did they learn it from an earlier civilization in another continent?

I have already spoken of a possible connection to the Phoenicians and the Atlantis legend. But how is Mesoamerican Bloodletting and the Phoenicians connected?

The Phoenicians worshipped the god Baal. Baal was a fertility god who was supposed to provide rain and fruitful crops. There is a biblical text that shows that Bloodletting was common to the followers of Baal in the middle East.

1 Kings 18:26-28 (The test of Baal's prophets)
"And they took the bullock which was given them, and they dressed it, and called on the name of Baal from morning even until noon, saying, O Baal, hear us. But there was no voice, nor any that answered. And they leaped upon the alter which was made. And it came to pass at noon, that Elijah mocked them, and said, Cry aloud: for he is a god: either he is talking, or he is pursuing, or he is on a journey, or peradventure he sleepeth, and must be awaked. And they cried aloud, and cut themselves after their manner with knives and lancets, till the blood gushed out upon them."

This biblical event is thought to have taken place around 930 B.C. which would majorly pre-date the Bloodletting stela of Tikal. I would suggest that at some time in ancient history the Sidonians ventured into the Atlantic ocean and met up with an asian civilization in the Americas and their worlds combined and created a culture of their own in the Western world.

Did Atlan really sink?