ATLANTIS: Fact or Fiction?

Hello Divas! Today we're back to unpack the myth, the legend and the facts about the Lost City of Atlantis! According to the Greek philosopher Plato, Atlantis was said to have been blessed by Poseidon, god of the sea, becoming home to his demi god offspring, who turned the 'fertile plain' into the greatest civilisation that ever lived. With expertise in metallurgy, craftsmanship, commerce, agriculture and maritime trade, at a time where the rest of the world lived in small nomadic communities, the story of Atlantis has been met with great scepticism. BUT what if Plato was talking about another island entirely? A real place where the history, archeology and geology all line up - Bronze Age Crete. I can't wait to unpack this one with you all! If you'd like to read the Timaeus https://brittlebooks.library.illinois.edu/brittlebooks_open/Books2010-03/plato0001timpla/plato0001timpla.pdf and Critias https://www.gutenberg.org/files/1571/1571-h/1571-h.htm yourself, then the translations I used are linked. If you also want more Hot History you can follow along on ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Instagram⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ https://www.instagram.com/hothistoryclub/?hl=en, ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠TikTok⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ https://www.tiktok.com/@hot.history?lang=en and ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠YouTube⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ https://www.youtube.com/@hot.history and of course, right here! Til next week, Ainslie x

• 0:00Speaker 00

  An ancient world, dating back to around 10,000 BCE, created by Poseidon. This level of execution and scale and grandeur is wild and outlandish even to us today, let alone when this was meant to have been built around 10,000 BCE. And it's no wonder that it's found its way into pop culture. Is it real? And if not, where does this legend come from?

• 0:38Speaker 01

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• 1:08Speaker 00

  Hi guys and welcome back to Hot History, your corner of the internet where we cover all the things in history that you probably should know but don't. I'm Ainslie Harvey, your hot historian here, ready to chat about the myth, the legend and the facts of the lost city of Atlantis. Now, I've been obsessed with Atlantis since I was a kid, not in the least because Milo from Atlantis, the Lost Empire is like an OG crush of mine, but also because of what it promised. An ancient world, dating back to around 10,000 BCE, created by Poseidon, god of the sea, to become a technological marvel with pure, almost superhuman inhabitants that were eventually

• 1:51Speaker 00

  swallowed by the sea, waiting for us to find it. It is incredible and it's no wonder that it's found its way into pop culture, from Little Mermaid to Aquaman. But the big question is, is it real? And if not, where does this legend come from? So to answer this question, we are rewinding it all the way back to 360 BCE today, the ancient world, around 9,000 years after Atlantis is meant to have sunk with the man who started it all, Plato. Now, guys. I am only going to say this once and I'm doing it early on. So if you come to me in the comments about this, I will set the ghost of Napoleon on you. Okay. I'm from Australia.

• 2:36Speaker 00

  Over here on our golden sunny shores, we say Plato, not Playtel. So let's all get the funny hee hees out of our system. Yes, when I say it, it sounds like the stuff kids play with at parties. So ready, three, two, one. R and R. We're done. Thank you very much. Now, chances are you've heard of Plato before, but if not, totally fine. Again, this is the place for all the things in history you probably should know, but don't. So the quick download of what you need to know is Plato is one of the most famous philosophers in history and a key figure in Western thought. Now, he was born into an aristocratic family in Athens during the Peloponnesian War around 431 to 404 BCE.

• 3:21Speaker 00

  And this is super important here, guys, because Athens and its experiences form a huge part of the Atlantis story, as does Plato's relationship with his tutor, fellow famed philosopher Socrates, whose execution in 399 BCE saw Plato become incredibly disillusioned with ideals of democracy and morality. This was pivotal for the young Plato, who founded one of the earliest institutions of higher learning in the Western world, the academy in Athens, to share his thoughts and teachings on the subject, which he recorded in the form of written dialogues, two of which we will be looking at today.

• 4:05Speaker 00

  The first is the Timaeus and the second is the Cretaeus, I think is how you say it. I'm gonna go with Cretaeus, guys, which were written by Plato between 360 to 355 BCE, when he was in his late 60s to early 70s. And the reason that we are focusing on these two in particular is because they are the very first mentions and the original sources of Atlantis.

• 4:32Speaker 00

  Now, this episode is going to be split into two halves. First, we'll talk about Plato's Atlantis and what he says about this famed island, you know, where this kind of myth originates. Um, and then we're going to talk about whether it is real. But first, I wanna make mention, one, of my outfit. Look at the cute little fossils I've come prepared. Secondly, I wanna set a really clear timeline here because there are some huge stretches of time between when Atlantis supposedly existed and when Plato is actually writing about it. So, like I said, Atlantis is said to have existed around 9,000 years before Plato was born.

• 5:12Speaker 00

  Just for context, as to how long we're talking about here, it's been 2,056 years since Cleopatra died. R.I.P. Queen, miss you, think about you every day, right? Times that by just over four, and that is how much time separates Plato and the fabled Atlantean society, which makes authenticating it rather hard to do. But guys, Plato was very thoughtful and he does us a favor by going to lengths to back up the story of Atlantis by giving us his original source. So, in the opening lines of the Timaeus, he says, "He got this story, which strange though it be, is yet perfectly true, as Solon, the wisest of the seven, once affirmed."

• 5:57Speaker 00

  Now, what the fuck does that mean? Well, Solon was an ancient Athenian lawgiver who Plato says received the story of Atlantis when travelling in Egypt where he, quote, "conversed with a priest, Attias, who goes on to tell Solon how that 9,000 years ago, the ancient Athenians overthrew the power of Atlantis. For Atlantis was a vast island in the ocean, and her people were mighty men of valor." So, according to Plato here... Solon, this Athenian lawgiver, is super confused by this. He's got no idea what these priests are on about. He's never heard of this island. He's never heard the word Atlantis before. And as such, questions the priest, who replies,

• 6:39Speaker 00

  "Solon, ye are all children in Helas," Helas meaning Greece, "and no truly ancient history is to be found among you. Forever and anon, there comes upon the earth a great destruction by fire or by water, and the people perish and all their records and monuments are swept away." So this priest is kind of throwing shade here. He's like, "Yeah, you wouldn't have heard about it because Greece is always being, you know, ravaged by fire or some kind of destruction here. And all your records are constantly destroyed. So you don't really have any, like, proper great history, you know?" He continues after this, saying, "But in Egypt, we are preserved from fire by the inundation of the Nile

• 7:22Speaker 00

  and from flood because no rain falls in our land. Therefore, our people has never been destroyed and our records are far more ancient than in any other country on earth." The great irony here, of course, being that the Library of Alexandria, Egypt's great, like, knowledge bank, was literally burnt down by Caesar. But anyway, Solon, at this point, he's like, "Okay, fair enough. You know, it makes sense why we've never heard of this before. As you say, we're always being burnt down or something's happening. So tell me more." The priest then tells him the story of Atlantis. Solon records this in a manuscript at some point before his death in 560 BCE,

• 8:05Speaker 00

  which Plato then tells us, "Was left with my grandfather, Drupeidas, and is now in my possession." So basically, Solon hears this tale, records it, gives it to Plato's granddad. Plato finds it and, you know, expands it into his own work within his own words in the Temaius and the Cateus. Key to note here, again, I do love to come back to our timeline. Solon died 130 years before Plato was even born. So if you found a 130-year-old manuscript in your granddad's stuff right now, it would have been written in 1896, during which time Queen Victoria was still alive,

• 8:48Speaker 00

  the Romanovs still had their crowns, and the Gilded Age is still very much a thing. So while not impossible...

• 8:55Speaker 00

  This is, you know, very, very rare and certainly of another time, especially back then. Which is where you get these fertile grounds for whispers and myth and legend which begin to come into effect. Also key to note, I know there's so many like, hey, also this tangent, this tangent, caveat, caveat, caveat. But we have no record of that original manuscript by Solon. And there are also no other earlier or independent Greek or Egyptian references to Atlantis. So it is very difficult to verify Solon as a source, which means that everything comes back to Plato. So let's get in to what he has to say, starting with the Timaeus.

• 9:39Speaker 00

  Now Plato first says, for in those days, the Atlantic was navigable. And there was an island situated in front of the straits, which are by you called the Pillars of Heracles. So what are the Pillars of Heracles? Well, we know these today as the Strait of Gibraltar, the gateway between the Mediterranean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean, which were called the Pillars of Heracles during Plato's time, thanks to Greek myth, where the hero Hercules is said to have created the strait by splitting a mountain in two. So based on Plato's description here, we can gather that Atlantis is beyond the strait, placing it outside the Mediterranean, somewhere in the Atlantic Ocean.

• 10:23Speaker 00

  Plato continues saying, now this island was greater than Libya and Asia together. And therefrom there was passage for the seafarers of those times to the other islands. Now, to us today, an island the size of Libya and Asia sounds fucking huge. But to the ancient Greeks, Libya was most or all of North Africa, west of Egypt. And Asia referred to Asia Minor, AKA modern day Turkey, not the whole continent of Asia.

• 10:53Speaker 00

  So based on this description, if we take Plato very literally, Atlantis would be roughly 6.5 million kilometres squared, comparable to the size of Australia, which sits at around 7.7 million kilometres squared. So not quite what we think when we watch Atlantis or Aquaman and see this like little city under the sea, right? It's also, you'd think anyway, pretty hard to lose and it'd just go missing. Imagine Australia just like sinking into the ocean now, it's pretty wild. What's far more likely in this statement then is that Plato wasn't talking about Atlantis's geographical size, but rather using scale to demonstrate Atlantis's power and might.

• 11:38Speaker 00

  Or, as my best friend says, he's just adding some GST for traumatic effect, which don't we all like relatable king here? Now, he continues in the Timaeus saying, "The Atlanteans were foremost both in war and in all besides, and her laws were exceedingly righteous above all cities. Her deeds and her government are said to have been the noblest amongst all under heaven." So Plato makes very clear to us all from the get-go, this is no ordinary civilization. Instead, he seems to be describing this almost divine, superhuman race, which he pretty much spells out with this verse, "They are the fairest and noblest race amongst mankind," right?

• 12:21Speaker 00

  So we're getting a really clear picture here. There's this island, it's large, if not in physical size, then in stature, which is home to this incredible, advanced race of people. But why? Who are they? Where did they come from? Well, for this, we are going to put a pin in the Timaeus and head on over to the Cretaeus. So in this, Plato tells us that this great civilization all started for a change with a woman and a crazed, overprotective god who wanted to keep her for himself. Wow, so original, never heard it before, crazy.

• 12:58Speaker 00

  So according to Plato, in this text, Poseidon received the island of Atlantis for his lot and begat children by a mortal woman. Now, for those of us not well versed in our Greek gods or our Percy Jackson, Poseidon is the ancient Greek god of the sea and it is known amongst both classicists and historians alike that these gods are fabled to have frequently come down to earth and, you know, have children with mortals, the result of which is a demigod. Ah, hot. Okay. Plato continues on this subject, saying, "He settled them," meaning these children that

• 13:38Speaker 00

  he had with this mortal woman, "in a part of the island which I will describe. Looking towards the sea, but in the centre of the whole island, there was a plain, which is said to have been the fairest of all plains and very fertile. Near the plain again, in the centre of the island, at a distance of about fifty stadia, there was a mountain, not very high on any side." So pretty straightforward, right? There's a mountain in the middle of the island, which is surrounded by a flat fertile plain. From here, Plato goes on to say, "In this mountain there dwelt one of the earth-born primeval men of that country, whose name was Evinor, and he had a wife named Lysope,

• 14:23Speaker 00

  and they had an only daughter, Plato. The maiden had already reached womanhood when her father and mother died, and Poseidon fell in love with her and had intercourse with her." Because, of course he did. Again, noting these children are demigods. But back to Plato. He says, "Poseidon enclosed the hill in which Plato dwelt all around, making alternate zones of sea and land, larger and smaller, encircling one another. There were two of land and three of water, which he turned as with a lathe, each having its circumference equidistant from the centre, so that no man could get to the island, for ships and voyagers were not as yet." Now- If you are watching on Spotify or YouTube, this will be far easier for you as you can see

• 15:08Speaker 00

  the images, but I am going to try my best again to explain for my audio divas here. So what Plato is essentially describing here is a circular city made of a series of rings, namely land, water, land, water, land, water. And then this, you know, Plato's hill, which is enclosed, essentially making this a fortress island surrounded by moats. I always think that's the easiest way to picture this. Just picture a bunch of moats. Plato continues saying, Poseidon brought up two springs of water from beneath the earth, one of warm water and the other of cold, and made every variety of food to spring up abundantly from the soil.

• 15:49Speaker 00

  So he is setting his family up with the ultimate Shangri-La here, guys. It is perfect. There's hot springs, there's cold springs, there's all this food, which is really necessary because Poseidon didn't just have one child to Plato. According to Plato, he begat and brought up five pairs of male children and dividing the island of Atlantis into ten portions, he gave to the firstborn of the eldest pair, his mother's dwelling and the surrounding allotment, and he made him king over the rest. The others, he made princes, and he named the eldest Atlas, and after him, the whole

• 16:32Speaker 00

  island and the ocean were called Atlantic. So basically, Poseidon and Plato have ten sons. They're all twins though, so five sets, ten. The eldest of which, Atlas, is the golden boy. He's got, you know, the innermost circle and his mother's house. He's got the naming rights of the island and the ocean, while the rest of the sons are in charge of their own parcels of land on this island, which seems like a pretty hectic dynamic to share a whole arse island and not commit fratricide, but.

• 17:06Speaker 00

  It seems to have all worked out for them, as Plato tells us. Atlas had a fair posterity and great treasures derived from mines, among them, the precious metal ore chalsum, which, pausing here for just a moment, was a real historical metal alloy, frequently cited in ancient Greek texts as having this kind of reddish, golden, brownie glow, um, and at this point in time, being second only to gold in value. So this is a huge resource, giving Atlantis what Plato describes as, "such an amount of wealth as was never before possessed by kings and is not likely ever to be." Again, he continues, saying,

• 17:49Speaker 00

  "They were furnished with everything which they needed, both in the city and country. For because of the greatness of their empire, many things were brought to them from foreign countries, and the island itself provided most of what was required by them for the uses of life, including abundance of wood and herds of elephants and pastures for animals of all kinds with trees bearing fruit, which the brothers used and employed in constructing their temples and palaces and harbors and docks." So this is, by all accounts here, an incredible place. It's full of natural resources and temples and leaders and, you know, actually makes me think,

• 18:30Speaker 00

  and maybe this is a super niche reference here, guys, but did you ever play virtual villages? Growing up, I did say it was super niche, but it was this really early iPhone app and you had this island and all these like little Sims, basically, who had to keep alive by farming and fishing and mining gold and building huts and stuff, which is literally giving Atlantis right now. So let's hear what these brothers did with their I R L virtual village. Plato tells us, he says, first they bridged over the zones of sea and made a way to and from the royal palace which they built in the centre island. So basically, this big bridge connecting all those different land and sea rings we spoke about, so like a

• 19:13Speaker 00

  bridge over these moats, which leads to this huge royal palace which the brothers built, and according to Plato, was later ornamented by successive generations who learned great skills in design and craftsmanship to decorate the palace. Also, another side note here, this is just an episode full of side notes. I love how these successive generations have just spontaneously appeared without any mention of women to this point. Like, only these great sons of Poseidon have been mentioned, and they're amazing, and they built all this stuff, and they've got these incredible generations who go and improve it and carry on their legacy, but no mention of the women

• 19:56Speaker 00

  who quite literally bring them into the world. And we wonder why women occupy 0.5% of our historical record. It's dudes like Plato here, yeah. So what else is in the city of Atlantis? Well, it's pretty much as we imagine it to be, to be honest, with, as Plato says, "an interior of the citadel fit with a holy temple dedicated to Plato and Poseidon, and surrounded by an enclosure of gold. And there was Poseidon's own temple, which was covered with silver. Within was an image of the god standing in a chariot drawn by six winged horses and touching the roof with his head."

• 20:35Speaker 00

  First thoughts here, one, it's giving Liberace, Versailles, Trump Tower vibes, and two, this level of execution and scale and grandeur is wild and outlandish even to us today, let alone when this was meant to have been built around 10,000 BCE. Just let that sink in for a minute. Ten thousand BCE. A time where the rest of the world, except for this like one little portal of excellence, was locked in the Mesolithic Age. This is also often referred to as the Middle Stone Age. And it was a period where there were no cities.

• 21:17Speaker 00

  There were no states, there were no giant statues of six-winged, horse-drawn chariots. The real people of this time, according to history and archaeology, were hunters and gatherers. They lived in small, mobile groups who not only didn't have agriculture yet, but wouldn't have it for another 2,000 years. So the idea that there's this civilisation erecting temples and golden statues with royal palaces and bridges and moats is not only meant to feel superhuman, but genuinely would have been. And this is something that we will talk about when validating whether Atlantis is real or not. But for now, we're holding our tongues and we are just painting Plato's picture

• 22:01Speaker 00

  and building a foundation for the original source material. So let's keep on going. Now, I'm not going to read word for word from the Cateius and Timaeus, although I do encourage you to read these and I have left the versions I used in the show notes for you. But I am going to call out some of the key passages that describe how Atlanteans lived and operated as a society. So Plato says, "The island remained divided into ten regions with ten rulers, who were absolute in their own city and kingdom, where relations of the different governments to one another were determined by the injunctions of Poseidon, which had been inscribed by the first kings on a column of oryxum in the temple of Poseidon."

• 22:46Speaker 00

  That's a whole lot of words. So to break that down, Poseidon basically gave the original brothers rules on how to behave and govern and be good, right? And they were put on this column and we know them because Plato records them here for us. So they say, "They were not to take up arms against one another and were to come to the rescue if any of their brethren were attacked. They were to deliberate in common about war, and the king was not to have the power of life and death over his kinsmen unless he had the assent of the majority." So it's very utopian here. And I do think that, at least for me, anyway,

• 23:26Speaker 00

  a lot of the mysticism and legend about Atlantis that we all have lies in this advanced form of democracy and utilitarianism, which we today, and let's be real, all throughout history, just kind of marvel at. You know, we're all burdened by war and greed and death and violence. And it's near impossible for us to imagine this perfect society that lived in harmony for generations. But they did. With Plato saying, for many generations, the people of Atlantis were obedient to the laws and to the gods, and practiced gentleness and wisdom in their intercourse with one another.

• 24:10Speaker 00

  So there's this real sense amongst these people on this island of harmony and respect for one another and the balance of what the gods have told them.

• 24:21Speaker 01

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• 24:51Speaker 00

  Plato continues and tells us how the Atlanteans managed to do such a thing for so long, saying, neither were they intoxicated by luxury nor wealth. They knew they could only have the true use of riches by not caring about them. Guys, Karl Marx would be rock hard for this. I bet he read the Grotias on lonely Friday nights in the shower. Like, this is his shit. You know what?

• 25:18Speaker 00

  Now that I actually think about it, Atlantis reminds me 1,000% of Wakanda. Like you have this precious, super valuable natural resource, all this technological development, but there's no greed or attachment to it because it doesn't define them. But no great civilization, except Wakanda, rises without its eventual fall. And for Atlantis, Plato tells us greed and mortal sin certainly played a big role. He says, "Gradually, the divine portion of their souls became diluted with too much of the mortal mixture, and they began to degenerate and were filled with all iniquity."

• 25:59Speaker 00

  So now, these divine Atlanteans who were bestowed the gifts of Poseidon, become less divine and more human, both in the very literal sense, right? Where the further generations pass, this divine blood from the original demigods becomes diluted. But also in the fact that the human sins work their way into these, you know, perfect people forming sinners. Again, guys, this all sounds very familiar. It's giving Garden of Eden, it's giving Fall of Man, and this was thousands of years before the Bible was even a forethought. So truly a tale as old as time here.

• 26:40Speaker 00

  Now, the corruption of the Atlanteans' pure souls angered the gods, in particular Zeus, who Plato tells us wanted to punish them. So he held a council of the gods, and when he had called them together, he spoke as follows. Now, if you are on the edge of your seat, thinking, "Go on, then." What did the big man say to his fellow gods? What's the tea? What's the plans? Please tell me. We'll prepare to be disappointed.

• 27:13Speaker 00

  Because we don't know. The quote ends mid-sentence, literally, the end of the whole Cretias, done. Like, sorry, you're gonna say Zeus is about to boom and belt his command at this grand meeting of the gods and not tell us what was said? Like, I hate waiting a year between House of the Dragon seasons to get answers to cliffhangers. Plato is giving us a two and a half thousand year cliffhanger here. Sickening. Devious behaviour from this man. But we do have some consolation back with the Themaeus, which may not tell us what Zeus was going to say, but does tell us what he did.

• 27:54Speaker 00

  So Plato tells us here, now in this island of Atlantis, there was a great and wonderful empire. This vast power gathered into one, endeavoured to subdue at a blow our country and enslave the whole of the region within the straits. Now, pausing here, the country he's talking about, Atlantis going to war with, is Athens, so his hometown. He continues, saying, then our country shone forth in the excellence of her virtue and strength among all mankind. She was preeminent in courage and military skill, and after having undergone the very extremity of danger, she defeated and triumphed over the Atlanteans and generously liberated all the rest of us who dwell within. The pillars.

• 28:40Speaker 00

  Now, for those of you paying attention, which I'm sure is all of you, to what I said before about the Mesolithic period, we have to remember here.

• 28:50Speaker 00

  Athens has no army, no one has an army, they don't even have buildings, or agriculture, or weapons, or any kind of way to organise people, you know, into a civilisation. So the idea that the Athenians were armed to the teeth with the courage and military skill to take down this advanced race of demigod people in Atlantis is just physically and historically impossible. It makes no sense. So why do you write it then? Did Solon use ChatGPT for his research on Athenian warfare, which spurted out a pic of a guy in a toga with an AK-47? Or did Plato cross-reference his sources on Wikipedia?

• 29:33Speaker 00

  Like, why include this clearly factually incorrect detail, which largely discredits everything he's said? Well, that's a question that gets to the heart of Atlantis and has us come back to Plato himself. So what do we know about him? Well firstly, he's Athenian, right? So that's a pretty clear bias to ignore the facts and fix the game in his home team's favour. But he has just spent all this time saying Atlantis is amazing. So it's kind of embarrassing for them to lose. And again, impossible. So maybe this isn't about fact or history or reality in any way, shape or form.

• 30:18Speaker 00

  In case the demigods didn't give that away already. After all, while there were historians who existed during Plato's time, he wasn't one of them. He was a philosopher, a teacher, someone who, upon the death of their mentor, dedicated themselves to exploring the impact that corruption and moral disintegration has on justice and democracy. And what better way to show this tainted effect? Than with a story of greatness being defeated, which ends, in Plato's own words here, "with violent earthquakes and floods which in a single day and night of misfortune was swallowed up by the earth and the island of Atlantis in like manner disappeared into the depths."

• 31:04Speaker 00

  So the big question then, is Atlantis a history? Or is it philosophy designed to teach? Well, let's try and find out. First things first, just some really simple geology here because contrary to popular belief, rocks are hot and we should defo study them. There is no geological evidence of a landmass of the size Plato claims Atlantis was sinking in the Atlantic. And while there are similar cases, which we will get to shortly, which could fit this description by Plato, he's either wrong about the size of the island, wrong about the sinking, wrong about the location. All wrong about it all, based on this piece of geological evidence.

• 31:45Speaker 00

  The second thing to note about this passage in particular is the language here. Notice how the city isn't destroyed or ravaged by flame, which we so often see in the ancient world. I mean, the Egyptian priest was like having a hee hee about it. But instead, it is swallowed by the sea, which again feeds this very clear picture we have of Atlantis as this intact city that Ariel and Jace Momoa have taken up rooms in, right? Which is essential in this legend of these great people and this great city falling from grace. So much so, it's wiped from the face of the earth. It's not destroyed and the ruins left there. It's gone and returned in whole to the realms of its maker.

• 32:30Speaker 00

  Besides, God of the sea. Again, it's all very um cyclical and perfectly worded, too much so. Then, as I've so greatly harped upon, we have the fact the world at this point in time is in the Mesolithic Age. Right? We can't grow crops, let alone create a six-winged chariot that pulls a giant golden statue of Poseidon inside a temple in a city, because cities don't exist yet. Then, of course, you have the element of the divine. These are demigods, of course, created by Poseidon. A race of superhumans, whose island structure was carved out with a lathe by the god of the sea who gave them warm and cold springs with the turn of his hand.

• 33:16Speaker 00

  Now, obviously, the atheists in the room are going to tell you that's hullabaloo, but even the most spiritually connected Christians, Muslims, Jews, Buddhists, Hindus, will say the same thing because, oh, the Greek gods aren't real. That's just for Percy Jackson and Wattpad's smutty retellings of Hades and Persephone. And that's, of course, before you get to the fact it's paganism, it's evil, false idols, it's sin.

• 33:46Speaker 00

  Right, the point here is that the spirituality of the Greeks with their many gods is largely laughed upon as ancient mysticism, and Atlantis, or at least Plato's version of Atlantis, is heavily imbued in this to its core. Which brings us around to what we think. Now, I personally do not subscribe to the Poseidon story. I also don't believe there was an ancient civilization around in 10,000 BCE which had these great capabilities of metallurgy and construction and trade and agriculture, which was superhuman in nature.

• 34:25Speaker 00

  But do I think Atlantis was a real place? An island of ancient times where civilization developed great skills and artisans, living in harmony before being destroyed by natural disaster? I do. And when I asked you guys this question, you agreed, with 81% of you thinking the story of Atlantis was history, not simply a philosophical tool employed by Plato to make comment on the descent of man and democracy. But what do the pros think? Right? How do historians, archaeologists and classicists look at Atlantis? Well, as I'm sure you can guess, the vast majority of them do not treat Plato's Atlantis as a real historical account.

• 35:10Speaker 00

  Instead, believing that Atlantis is either, one, used by Plato as a philosophical device and not an actual place, or two, a totally fictitious island used for literary purposes of just pure entertainment. Classical scholar Benjamin Jowett sits in his first camp, saying, "The story of Atlantis was a philosophical myth and not literal history." He is joined by historian Kyle Hochstra, who said Atlantis is a fictional island as part of an allegory on the hubris of nations. Meanwhile, 19th century Plato historian Thomas Henry Martin sits in the second camp, saying, "The location was not a real historical place, but a literary creation."

• 35:51Speaker 00

  Archaeologist Kenneth Feeder agrees here, calling Atlantis "a pseudo-scientific myth when treated as real." History, and then all of this is just completely driven home by Christopher Gill from the University of Exeter, who tells us the story of Atlantis is ancient sci-fi. So, Star Wars for ancient Greek people. But not everyone agrees. In fact, there is a third group who more cautiously believe that Plato's account, while exaggerated, is inspired by real events. And this, one, is what I think, and two, I am really keen to unpack with you guys, not in the least because I actually did one of my history major works on this very

• 36:34Speaker 00

  subject, so it's a walk down memory lane for me, and something I think you guys will find super interesting. So this camp believes that Plato isn't talking about Atlantis, but rather another ancient island civilisation, recorded by the Egyptians and destroyed by natural disaster, not the wrath of Zeus. Now, there are a few candidate islands and civilisations that fit this bill, including ancient Thera, aka modern day Santorini, but the most historically accurate fit here, and my personal belief, is that Plato is talking about the ancient civilisation of Minoa. Tell me more, you say, to which I reply, "The Minoan civilisation emerged on the island

• 37:19Speaker 00

  of Crete situated in the Aegean Sea, roughly 63 millimetre miles, or 120 kilometres, south of Santorini, somewhere around 3000 to 2000 BCE, which places us squarely in a period known as the Bronze Age." Now, this was a time that saw mass population growth, the rise of complex societies and advancements in tools, weaponry and farming equipment, as the use of bronze became more widespread. This, in turn, led to the development of trade networks, early writing systems and urban centres with civilisations like the Minoans, the Egyptians and the Mesopotamians,

• 38:00Speaker 00

  flourishing, and in turn, laying the foundations for later classical societies like Plato's Athens. So from the get-go, guys. We're seeing a wave of technological activity passing through this period, which makes sense for the Atlantis comparison, as does the existence of Egypt's growth in this time, which gives far more validity to Solon's original story of the Atlantis tale coming from the Egyptian priests. Now, aside from this, the reason I and other historians believe Plato is talking about the Minoans with Atlantis rather than the Egyptians and the Mesopotamians comes down to a few things.

• 38:43Speaker 00

  Firstly, of the three, the Minoans were more advanced. They developed sophisticated art and engineering, perfecting craftsmanship in pottery and fresco painting that still to this day is regarded as some of the finest in antiquity. They were also masters with bronze and constructed multi-story complexes, the most famous of which is the Nossos Palace. Discovered in 1988 by archaeologist Arthur Evans, the complexity and detail of this discovery led Evans to believe that the Minoans were perhaps, quote, enlightened from above. Sources: with the palace serving as, quote, definitive proof

• 39:25Speaker 00

  that the king exercised suzerenti over the whole island and civilization. Now, if you're thinking, what the fuck is suzerenti? Then you are not alone. I'd also never heard of it. And it links to our second point of why I think Atlantis is ancient Minoa. So, suzerenti is different from sovereignty, even though they sound similar, with the former offering a middle ground, where the suzeran provides protection in exchange for tribute, economic benefits, or loyalty. So less king slash dictator and more official, who is in charge, um, a kind of overseeing the people and island and the resources, but largely kind of leaves them to their own devices,

• 40:08Speaker 00

  which, if you ask me, sounds kind of similar to a certain son of Poseidon who ruled over the central kingdom, but let his brothers take care of their own regions, which is point number two. Like the Atlanteans' utopian society, the Minoans had a hierarchical but cooperative system which was advanced, organised and initially peaceful. In fact, there's very little archaeological evidence of fortifications, almost no emphasis on warfare in their art and no giant walls around Crete screaming, you know, "We're terrified of invasion because we're a warring state who wants to conquer you."

• 40:53Speaker 00

  Instead, what we see in the archaeology here is a society centred around the Gnausus Palace, which redistributed goods that were communally provided to prioritise human needs. So again, Karl Marx, he wants a summer house here, like it is OG socialism. Or, in other words, a system where social stability meant you didn't need to stab your neighbour, right? It's all very Atlantean. Now, the third reason I think ancient Minoa is Atlantis is trade. So Plato tells us the Atlanteans were a dominant maritime empire and the Minoans? Same deal here, guys. They were the undisputed naval power of the Aegean for centuries with significant archaeological

• 41:38Speaker 00

  evidence that they traded with Egypt, Syria, Asia Minor and Sicily, with Minoan pottery, art and cultural influence found in all of these regions. This is also the view of early 20th century historian Katie Frost, who was the first major scholar to argue that Plato's Atlantis was predicated on the memory of Minoan dominance in the Aegean as early as 1909, saying, "The Atlantis legend is a reminiscence of Minoan sea power." And you see the comparison so clearly when looking at Minoan maritime history, which brings us to reason number four, the big one, in my opinion, which truly seals the deal here: the destruction. Right?

• 42:22Speaker 00

  It is largely the central part of the Atlantis myth, swallowed by the sea in one day and one night, wiped from the face of the earth. It's what makes Atlantis so enduring as a legend and the end of the Minoans, while not as swift as 24 hours, isn't that different? So how did the Minoans come to an end then? Well, it is in large part thanks to the volcanic eruption of Thera, as we said before, modern day Santorini, around 1600 BCE. Guys, this eruption is so catastrophic, it blows apart most of the existing island. There is ash clouds as far as the eye can see,

• 43:06Speaker 00

  and it triggers massive tsunamis throughout the entire Aegean. For context here, the Vesuvius eruption which buried Pompeii was a five on the volcanic explosivity index. Thera was a seven, with an added couple of tsunamis on top of that. So like, we're not just talking about city ending here. This is genuinely a civilization ending activity. And we know for a fact that these tsunamis reached the Minoans on Crete, with radiocarbon data and marine deposits found inland proving that the Thera eruption reached and wiped out large part of Crete's coastline. It was absolutely devastating.

• 43:49Speaker 00

  Imagine seeing this like huge volcanic eruption, which by the way is still one of the biggest ever recorded in history. You have flame, you have ash, you have lava. And then a 15 metre wave comes crashing towards you. There is no realm where this doesn't seem like an act of God, and it sounds very, very similar to the end of Atlantis. So is it not obvious then that this ancient island that was swallowed by the sea by horrific event is Bronze Age Crete? Marine geologist Nicholas Fleming certainly thinks so, saying, "Submerged landscapes and coastal flooding on Crete contributed to the Atlantis tradition." He is also backed up by seismologist Angelo Galanopulos,

• 44:35Speaker 00

  who said, "Plato's Atlantis is a distorted account of the destruction of the Minoan civilization." Right there, plain and simple. And while, yes, the Thera eruption didn't instantly wipe out the Minoans like the Atlantis story, in fact, they actually managed to hold on for another 250 years post eruption, it did erase large parts of their system, their economy and their dominance within the region. So if you were, say, an Egyptian priest, trying to describe this kind of natural disaster centuries later, you might say, yeah, the whole place just practically

• 45:17Speaker 00

  sank into the sea. See what I mean here? Historically and archaeologically, it all matches up. The only things, again, caveat city of this episode, the only things that don't work is the timing and the location. So let's go through them. Firstly, we already know Atlantis is said to have existed around 10,000 to 9,000 BCE, whereas Bronze Age Crete sits from 3,000 BCE to its fall around 1450 BCE, which, by the way, guys, just to preface, these are all rough numbers. We don't actually know for certain with events this far back in the ancient world. But even still, based on these dates alone, that's a six to seven

• 46:02Speaker 00

  thousand year gap. Which kind of a big deal, you know, not quite like a minor detail we can just glaze over. But there is a pretty likely explanation for this, and it all comes back to Plato and that GST I was...

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• 46:48Speaker 00

  Talking about, right? We know this guy, he loves a bit of drama. So is it not possible that upon finding this old manuscript, which speaks of a powerful ancient island, ravaged by natural disasters, he wants it to be really ancient and really ravaged? And as such, moves the island back from the Bronze Age, where it historically makes sense, to the Missolithic era, where it would actually need to be superhuman to be real.

• 47:22Speaker 00

  Again, remember Plato wrote the Timaeus and Cretias around 360 to 355 BCE. So ancient Minoa isn't really that ancient for him. But a civilization nine thousand years earlier certainly is. I mean, come on. It adds to the drama, right? The legend of Atlantis has endured for so long because it is so enticing. That historically, the timeline just doesn't make sense. Which leaves us with one last thing, the location. Because as I said, the island of Crete is located in the Mediterranean and therefore in the pillars of Heracles. Whereas Atlantis is meant to be outside of the pillars.

• 48:06Speaker 00

  This one too is pretty easily explained. Ancient geography, much like the ancient dates,

• 48:13Speaker 00

  tend to be pretty fucked. After all, let's not forget Plato is basing this story off a 130 year old manuscript, which was passed down through Egyptian priests over thousands of years, across thousands of languages and different cultures. So the idea that locations might get distorted, not exactly shocking here. This is largely the opinion of historian and author of The End of Atlantis, J V Luce, who says, "The story of Atlantis is based on a real place and a real event, though greatly distorted." Archaeologist Kenneth Feeder also agrees with this about both the location and the dates, saying, "There may be a kernel of truth behind the Atlantis story, but it has been vastly exaggerated."

• 48:55Speaker 00

  So it is highly likely then that the location of outside the Pillars of Heracles has been mistranslated. And again, with all the history and the archaeology pointing towards Bronze Age Crete, you've got to make the judgment call. And to me, I think it is highly likely that Egyptians of the time, and later Greeks in Plato's time, could easily see Bronze Age Crete as a powerful island empire and the Minoans as an advanced civilization and wanted to record this. After all, it is pretty good content, which is exactly why we're all here right now.

• 49:37Speaker 00

  But there is a group who, for them, this isn't just content or a process of historical judgment to reach a logical conclusion, rather it is a real effervescent fact. And I'm going to introduce you to some of them, including Ignatius Donnelly. Now, he was a Minnesota congressman and amateur historian who claimed in his 1882 book that all great advances in civilization and technology could be traced back to one place and one people, Atlantis. In his mind, this innately linked Atlantis to the theories of evolution by Charles Darwin,

• 50:22Speaker 00

  who Donnelly even sent a copy of his book to, which Darwin reportedly read in, quote, "a very skeptical spirit." I reckon he would have gotten a big old kick out of this. Modern historian Mark Adams agrees, describing Donnelly as "the first great Atlantis fundamentalist", in that he believed that Plato's story was factually accurate outside of the supernatural elements like Poseidon. He goes on further, stating that "Donnelly knew the results he wanted and rummaged through his sources, searching for only those facts that fit his needs, without pausing to note any reasonable doubts," which I know, I know.

• 51:03Speaker 00

  I pretty much just did the same thing for the date and location in Plato's volumes. But guys, I think we've applied plenty of reasonable doubt here and have actual evidence to back up the theories of ancient Minotaur being Atlantis. Unlike this guy who just like believes it because he wants it to be true. Which, don't get me wrong, I also want it to be true, but facts must prevail. Other prominent figures who have held similar views in the years that passed included the mystic Madame Blavatsky, who in her 1888 book, The Secret Doctrine, tells us, quote, "The Atlanteans possessed psychic and magical powers now lost to mankind."

• 51:45Speaker 00

  Which, if you're a mystic, I'm sure serves pretty good business for you. But my favorite quote of hers is, "The Atlanteans were a race of giants." So just a whole island of hagrid's running around out there in the Atlantic somewhere. Another very, very famous Atlantis believer was none other than Adolf Hitler. Yes, that's right, the mustached maniac had a great deal of his ideology rooted in the lost city of Atlantis, believing that the Aryan race were actually the descendants of these original Atlanteans. Now, when I first heard this, I simultaneously couldn't believe what I was hearing, but also everything made total and complete sense.

• 52:30Speaker 00

  Like, of course Hitler thinks he comes from a race of demigods whose lost city Ariel goes and shacks up in each night. Like, of course. Anyway, old Nut Nut here believed the Aryans were superhumans who had lain dormant for thousands of years, waiting to come into their greatness once more as part of the German Volk, and was so serious about proving this, that he created a squad of scientists and historians tasked with finding evidence to this effect, which included securing very old copies of the Timaeus and Cretaeus by Plato. There are, of course, many other theories as to what other ancient islands may have been mistaken for Atlantis.

• 53:14Speaker 00

  And guys, I'd love to go into them all with you, but we honestly don't have the time. I encourage you, of course, though, to do your own research. However, I feel very confident that what Plato is talking about isn't just philosophical or literary invention, but a real island. The story of which was passed down from the Egyptians, who also rose in prominence alongside the Minoans of Crete, and noted the eruption of Thera as the true source of their destruction. Therefore, planting the seeds for Plato's grand story of the ancient lost city of Atlantis, which has captured us today and those who came before us with as much excitement, skepticism, and wonder as ever before. But

• 53:56Speaker 00

  of course, I want to hear what you think. If you have other theories, DM me, comment below, email me. I want to know. Which brings us to the end of another episode of Hot History. Thank you so much, guys, for following along with me on this episode. And make sure to tune in next week because we are back with one of our hot take episodes covering the topic, do we have a right to destroy history from Epstein Island to the palaces of Saddam Hussein alongside the Burghof, copies of Me and Camp, Queen Victoria's Diaries, and the Robinoff family's bodies? Do we have a right to destroy history because of what

• 54:35Speaker 00

  it represents? Or does it all need to be preserved? We will find out next week. As always, guys, if you're looking for some more hot history before then, you can follow us on Instagram at Hot History Club and on TikTok at Hot.History. It has been a pleasure getting down and dirty in time with you, and I will speak to you all next Friday. Thanks, guys. Love you. Bye.

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