A recent documentary stated that Atlantis was around the island of Crete area. Did anyone see this documentary

Answer 1

G'day Charly,

Thanks for the question.

I haven't seen the documentary. However, the location of Atlantis has long been the subject of speculation although many would argue that it is a fictional place.

Atlantis (ancient Greek: Ἀτλαντὶς νῆσος, "Island of Atlas") is the name of an island first mentioned and described by the classical Greek philosopher Plato. According to him this island, lying "beyond the pillars of Hercules", was a naval power, having conquered many parts of western Europe and Africa. Soon after a failed invasion of Athens, Atlantis sank in the waves "in a single day and night of misfortune" after a natural catastrophe happened 9,000 years before Plato's time.

As a story embedded in Plato's dialogues, Atlantis is mostly seen as a myth created by Plato to back up a previously invented theory with "real" facts. Some scholars express the opinion that Plato intended to tell real history. Although the function of the Atlantis myth seems to be clear to most scholars, they dispute whether and how much Plato's account was inspired by older traditions. Some scholars argue Plato drew upon memories of past events such as the Thera eruption or the Trojan War, while others insist that he took inspiration of contemporary events like the destruction of Helike in 373 BC or the failed Athenian invasion of Sicily in 415-413 BC.

The possible existence of Atlantis was actively discussed throughout the classical antiquity, but it was usually rejected and occasionally parodied. While basically unknown during the Middle Ages, the Atlantis myth was rediscovered by Humanists at the very beginning of modern times. Plato's description inspired the utopian works of several Renaissance writers, like Francis Bacon's "New Atlantis". More than ever, Atlantis inspires today's literature, from science fiction to comic books.

The 1882 publication of Atlantis: the Antediluvian World by Ignatius Donnelly stimulated much popular interest in Atlantis. Donnelly took Plato's account of Atlantis seriously and attempted to establish that all known ancient civilizations were descended from its high neolithic culture.

Since Donnelly's day, there have been dozens—perhaps hundreds—of locations proposed for Atlantis. Some are scholarly or archaeological works whilst others have been made by psychic or other pseudoscientific means. Many of the proposed sites share some of the characteristics of the Atlantis story (water, catastrophic end, relevant time period), but none have been proven conclusively to be the historical Atlantis. Most of the historically proposed locations are in or near the Mediterranean Sea, either islands such as Sardinia, Crete and Santorini, Cyprus, Malta, and Ponza or as land based cities or states such as Troy, Tartessos or Tantalus (in the province of Manisa), Turkey, and the new theory of Israel-Sinai or Canaan as possible locations. The massive Thera eruption, dated either to the 17th or the 15th century BC, caused a massive tsunami that experts hypothesize devastated the Minoan civilization on the nearby island of Crete, further leading some to believe that this may have been the catastrophe which inspired the story.

I believe that the documentary you were referring to was on the History Channel and was called Atlantis Theory.

If you would like to read more about Atlantis, I would recommend these books and journal articles:

* Berlitz, C (1969). The Mystery of Atlantis: The Eighth Continent?, London: Souvenir Press.
* De Camp, LS (1954). Lost Continents: The Atlantis Theme in History, Science, and Literature, New York: Gnome Press.
* Donnelly, I (1882). Atlantis: The Antediluvian World, New York: Harper & Bros. Retrieved November 6, 2001, from Project Gutenberg.
* Ellis, R (1998). Imaging Atlantis, New York: Knopf. ISBN 0679446028
* Erlingsson, U (2004). Atlantis from a Geographer's Perspective: Mapping the Fairy Land, Miami: Lindorm. ISBN 0975594605
* Flem-Ath, R & Wilson, C (2000). The Atlantis Blueprint, London: Little, Brown and Company. ISBN 0316853135
* Gill, C (1976). 'The origin of the Atlantis myth', Trivium, vol. 11, pp. 8-9.
* Griffiths, JP (1985). 'Atlantis and Egypt', Historia, vol. 34, pp. 35f.
* Heidel, WA (1933). 'A suggestion concerning Platon's Atlantis', Daedalus, vol. 68, pp. 189-228.
* Jordan, P (1994). The Atlantis Syndrom, Stroud: Sutton Publishing. ISBN 0750935189
* Nesselrath, HG (2005). 'Where the Lord of the Sea Grants Passge to Sailors through the Deep-blue Mere no More: The Greeks and the Western Seas', Greece & Rome, vol. 52, pp. 153-171.

* Ramage, ES (1978). Atlantis: Fact or Fiction?, Bloomington: Indiana University Press. ISBN 0253104823
* Spence, L [1926] (2003). The History of Atlantis, Mineola, NY: Dover Publications. ISBN 0486427102

* Vidal-Naquet, P (1986). 'Athens and Atlantis: Structure and Meaning of a Platonic Myth', in P Vidal-Naquet, The Black Hunter, Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, pp. 263-284. ISBN 0801832519
* Wilson, C (1997). From Atlantis to the Sphinx, London: Virgin Books. ISBN 0880641762
* Zangger, E (1993). The Flood from Heaven: Deciphering the Atlantis legend, New York: William Morrow and Company. ISBN 0688113508

I have attached some sources for your reference.

Regards

Answer 2

I think I did, where they found a city underneath another city where a volcano covered it and later they just built on top of it, and weird shaped hills like dolphins and stuff? I watch too much discovery channel!!!

Answer 3

Yes I did see that one, it did have some interesting points. It also showed another archaeologists theoretical site which didn't seem to be that possible

Answer 4

This is all speculation