For thousands of years, one of the most enduring tales from Ancient Greece has been that of
Atlantis, the legendary civilization somewhere at the bottom of the sea.
There have been plenty of theories on it, some seemingly backed up by archaeological
evidence around the world, while some even claim that the city could be thriving to this
day.
This is Unveiled, and today we’re answering the extraordinary question; will we ever discover
the city of Atlantis?
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The Atlantis legend owes its life to the Greek philosopher Plato, who wrote about it in his
dialogues, including in “Critias” and “Timaeus”.
Plato says that Atlantis was a great city overseen by Poseidon, the Greek god of the
sea, and the Atlanteans were the most remarkable people in the Greek world.
However, they gradually got drunk on pride and self-confidence, so their city grew corrupt
and debased.
Though Plato’s explanation of exactly what happened to Atlantis has unfortunately (and
somewhat frustratingly) been lost, it’s said that it was Zeus who sent this once great
city to the seafloor, as punishment.
Plato dates this momentous event as having happened roughly nine thousand years before
he was writing, and the dialogues themselves are around 2,500 years old.
So, we’re talking truly ancient history… but the story of Atlantis was never really
intended to be taken literally.
Throughout the many centuries since Plato’s time, it has always stood as an allegory to
show the perils of vanity and self-importance, and as a warning to remind people not to cross
the gods.
Today, the fact that Atlantis is sometimes billed as a historical legend rather than
a totally fantastical story is due in large part to the work of Ignatius L. Donnelly,
an American Congressman in the nineteenth century.
He wrote “Atlantis: The Antediluvian World”, in which he claimed that Plato’s city was
based on truth.
Donnelly’s writings have since been widely dismissed as pseudoscience, but that hasn’t
stopped the general idea of Atlantis existing, waiting to be discovered somewhere, from taking
hold.
One of the darkest and more unfortunate aspects of it was that it was at one time championed
by the Thule Society, a German collective which eventually came to be hugely influential
in the Nazi Party.
Some of them reportedly believed that the Aryan race was superior because they were
descended from Atlanteans… while both Adolf Hitler and particularly Heinrich Himmler were
famously interested in occult archaeology, including in Atlantis.
But the Atlantis story has captured attention in far less dangerous ways, too, and there
are many credible historians who also believe there may be a kernel of truth to it - with
some linking it to the ancient Minoan civilization.
A Bronze Age society existing between circa 2,700 BC up to 1,100 BC, the Minoans lived
primarily on the island today known as Crete, but they had settlements elsewhere in the
Aegean Sea, too.
Quite why the Minoan civilization eventually fell is still a matter of debate, but it’s
widely believed that the eruption of Thera in roughly the sixteenth century BC was either
wholly or partly to blame.
Thera, or Santorini as it’s known today, is a volcanic island and caldera, and its
ancient eruption is thought to have been one of the biggest in human history - dealing
a blow to the Minoans that they simply never recovered from.
Considering that, in Ancient Greek stories, the wrath of Zeus is often itself depicted
as “fire and earthquakes”, the similarities between what might’ve been inflicted on
Atlantis and the Thera eruption are perhaps easy to see.
If what happened to Atlantis is partly based on the fate of the Minoans, then, it means
that we might, in fact, have already found the city.
Or, at least something very much like it.
One of the grandest ruins in all of Europe is Knossos, a vast archaeological site on
Crete thought to have once been the hub of Minoan culture.
Though the ruins have existed for thousands of years, they weren’t discovered until
the late nineteenth century – just a few years before Ignatius Donnelly wrote his book
expanding on the Atlantis legend.
It took decades to fully excavate Knossos, though, due to Cretan civil wars and then
World War One.
But this didn’t stop it from eventually becoming one of Europe’s most important
archaeological sites; a remnant of the first advanced society on the continent.
So much so that, if Atlantis were discovered today and it turned out to be another Minoan
ruin, it’s possible that it actually wouldn’t live up to Knossos; that it would be less
impressive, and offer less insight.
But, crucially, Knossos isn’t underwater.
And it’s that which truly keeps our interest in Atlantis going.
Many modern searches have turned their attention to the Strait of Gibraltar, thanks to Plato’s
fairly vague direction that Atlantis was “beyond the Pillars of Hercules” - on either side
of the Strait.
However, while the northern “Pillar” is today known as the distinctive Rock of Gibraltar,
the southern “Pillar” has never been conclusively identified, let alone anyone finding an underwater
city anywhere “beyond” them.
There are plenty of other candidates for the Atlantis myth, though, including from within
Ancient Greece itself.
Pavlopetri is an underwater lost city, off the coast of Laconia.
It’s thought to be around 5,000 years old; it currently consists of at least fifteen
buildings all submerged in relatively shallow water; and it’s believed to have been destroyed
somewhere around the tenth century BC by a series of earthquakes.
Pavlopetri has been called the basis for the Atlantis story by many, and is today protected
as “underwater cultural heritage” by UNESCO.
Its discovery in 1967 was undoubtedly exciting, but it wasn’t fully mapped and explored
until the early twenty-first century, when robots were used to trawl the ruins.
Even if Pavlopetri isn’t Atlantis, it’s arguably the closest thing we have to it,
helping to shape our general picture of what Atlantis would look like.
Elsewhere, some of the most ancient ruins in the world also already exist underwater.
Atlit Yam, for example, is a Neolithic village off the coast of Israel, which originally
stood 8,300 years ago.
And then there’s what’s sometimes called “China’s Atlantis”; the city of Shi
Cheng, or Lion City, which was submerged on purpose in 1959 to create a reservoir.
Today, tourists can visit Qiandao Lake, beneath which much of the 2,000 year-old Shi Cheng
has been near-perfectly preserved and is now open for diving expeditions.
Clearly, something like Shi Cheng could never be a contender for Atlantis, given that we
know precisely when and why it was flooded over, but sites like these still show how
historic buildings change and disintegrate underwater - further influencing what we imagine
Atlantis to be.
Of course, not one of the many underwater ruins on Earth is populated by anything other
than fish and sea creatures.
And until we find such a place - a fantasy civilization supporting Atlantean merpeople
(or something similar) - the legend of Atlantis is sure to roll on.
As we’ve already proven with sites like Pavlopetri, confidently identifying any sunken
ruin, placing it at any specific point in time, is no mean feat.
So, we may never be absolutely certain that any newly found archaeological site is the
source of Plato’s inspiration.
Add into the equation that the ocean is vast and famously unexplored, and there are no
doubt many more ruins, sites of interests, and even shipwrecks to uncover far beneath
the waves - which could one day lead us to the ultimate in underwater finds.
And, if the Atlantis legend ever were given a real-world location, it would move from
being a fictitious land to a genuine ancient civilization - becoming a must-see site for
anyone interested in Greek and Early history.
But, until then, the search goes on, with varying degrees of confidence that anything
will ever be found.
Perhaps Atlantis really is just a story passed down through the ages… but if any elements
of it are true then there’s an incredible archaeological discovery still to be made,
and the race is on to make it!
What do you think?
Is there anything we missed?
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