Underwater Discoveries – News Archive 2000

October 26 2000 – Over the past five years, and since the publication of

“When The Sky Fell”, Rand Flem-Ath has been working with the renowned author, Colin Wilson, who wrote the introduction to

“When The Sky Fell”, on the many questions raised during the Flem-Ath’s initial research. Published in the UK on October 26th. 2000, their new book, “The Atlantis Blueprint: Unlocking the Mystery of a Long Lost Civilization”, explores the incredible achievements of ancient peoples who accurately surveyed the whole Earth many, many, thousands of years ago. Their abilities are evident in the many ancient units of measurement that are themselves perfect sub-divisions of the Earth’s dimensions. Despite the global trend towards ‘metrication’ many of these ancient units of measurement are still in use today, and a glimpse of the archaic origins of some Greek units of measurement is given in a synopsis of the book that was released prior to publication :

Many ancient units of measurement relate to each other in schemes of regular geometry that have become evident in numerous studies of prehistoric monuments located as far apart as Stonehenge and the Great Pyramid of Giza, and which are also found in the regular geometric distribution of various ancient megalithic monuments around the globe. That ancient peoples the world over were aware of, and regularly used, these schemes of geometry in the siting and dimensions of their various monuments is now well beyond dispute, as is the fact that they were aware of the dimensions of both the Sun and the Moon as well as the Earth.

The mean diameter of the Moon, given by John Michell in his pioneering work, “The New View Over Atlantis”, as 2160 miles, and that of the Earth as 7920 miles, indicate that these units of measurement of the ancient Britons were known and used universally in prehistoric times as part of an ancient ‘canon of harmony and proportion’ that is today long forgotten, despite many of the units themselves still being in popular use. The numbers, 216 and 792, appear time and again in the dimensions of ancient megalithic monuments in various parts of the world – monuments which were built in local units of measurement that are geometrically related to each other within this ancient ‘canon of measures’, and at the centre of which lies the ‘sacred geometry’ of the Golden Section.

But more significantly than this even, if that were possible, there are anomalies in the orientation of many of the monuments themsleves that intrigued Rand Flem-Ath, and which seems to have defined the focus of his most recent work with Colin Wilson. In Mexico, at Teotihuacan, they found a pattern of mis-alignment to the cardinal points that was consistently repeated in other monuments around the world. In the Middle East, at the ancient cities of Ur, Nippur and Uruk, they found that temples and ziggurats were orientated slightly west of north, while others further west in Mesoamerica were orientated slightly east of north. On top of this they found that the current physical locations of the Great Pyramid at Giza, and the Tibetan capitol and religious centre, Lhasa, had both proved to have ‘shifted to latitudes further north’ in a manner complimentary to the apparent mis-alignments of various ancient megalithic monuments they had studied in many places around the world.

In the course of their research, Rand Flem-Ath and Colin Wilson discovered that many of these anomalies pointed consistently to various monuments having been orientated towards the Old North Pole at the locations it had occupied prior to the last great Earth-crust displacement around 9,600 BC. Before this cataclysm, the North Pole, according to Rand Flem-Ath and Colin Wilson, was located in the Hudson’s Bay area of North America at 60N 83W, and prior to that in the Yukon region of Canada. The massive earth-crust displacements required for this to have happened was first proposed by the late Charles Hapgood, whose book “The Path of the Pole”, would make an excellent companion to

“The Atlantis Blueprint” , as would Giogio de Santillana and Hertha von Dechend’s classic essay on myth and the frame of time,

“Hamlet’s Mill” – an excellent pioneering study that delves deeply into the wealth of astro-mythologies of polar-shift found in many ancient cultures.

Sound scientific evidence of the most primitive living conditions endured by the survivors of the 9,600 BC cataclysm is accompanied by similar geophysical and archæological evidence of this latest earth-crust displacement that the authors believe destroyed the Atlantean cultures – the remnants of whose monuments and sacred centres Rand Flem-Ath and Colin Wilson have studied to produce

“The Atlantis Blueprint”. The prehistoric units of measurement that are evident not only in the monuments themselves, but also in their global distribution, combined with their geodetically numerical significance, and geometric relationship to other units of measurement in the ancient ‘canon of measures’, suggest a common source that is without doubt of very great antiquity. Hapgood felt that advanced civilisation could have been well established on a global basis as long as 100,000 years ago, which in the light of the discovery of the Schoningen spears is nowhere near as outrageous as it may at first seem.

Have Rand Flem-Ath and Colin Wilson lifted the veil of secrecy around this ancient ‘canon of measures’ further than previous researchers? The ‘Table of Contents’ for the new book posted on the Flem-Ath’s website gives some clear hints that they may well have done just that. “Chapter Eight: Golden Section Sites” covers many of the ‘sacred geometry’ mysteries that have intrigued the enquiring minds of elite members of numerous secret societies for centuries – organisations which have claimed to be the ‘keepers of sacred knowledge’.

From their investigations of the large-scale landscape geometry of the Rennes-le-Chateau area, the 12th century AD Knights Templar exacavations at King Solomon’s Temple in Jerusalem, through Freemasonry and the Priory of Sion, to the enigmatic underwater monument at Yonaguni, Rand Flem-Ath and Colin Wilson have unearthed a ‘blueprint’ that they are conviced ‘fits’ the pattern of global distribution and orientations of many ancient structures. Can they push the origins of human civilisation back tens of thousands of years earlier than any time previously thought possible? Have their efforts uncovered the existence of a global geodetic survey of our planet that was conducted many thousands of years ago, well before the end of the last Ice Age?

Destined to shake the foundations of the standard interpretation of prehistory,

“The Atlantis Blueprint” is a welcome addition to the growing body of serious literature about ancient civilisation that has emerged in recent decades. The reaction to it’s publication, not just from archæologists but from scholars of the historical sciences generally, has been prominent by its absence so far. It has all the potential to raise the level of debate about prehistoric civilisation to a stage that might finally incorporate discussion of the many and varied archæological anomalies that numerous unimaginative academics have previously chosen to ignore. You can read our review of “The Atlantis Blueprint” by clicking here.

September 19 2000 – National Geographic.com announced that the Turkish Minister of Culture, Istemihan Talay, has granted the National Geographic Black Sea expedition a permit to recover artifacts from the sea floor at the location where Dr Ballard and his team have found evidence of ancient human habitation.

[Regretably, we have been unable to find the new link to the National Geographic page dealing with this update since early 2002 – JM]

September 13 2000 – BBC News Online has reported that scientists have uncovered ancient ruins under the Black Sea which indicate that people lived in the area before a cataclysmic flood inundated their homeland. Some scientists have linked the 7,000-year-old event, thought to have been caused by waters bursting through from the Mediterranean Sea, to the Biblical story of Noah. Dr Robert Ballard told the BBC that:

The team, sponsored by National Geographic, found a rectangular structure, possibly a building, with wooden beam, branches and stone tools lying 90 metres under the sea, of the coast from Sinop. Scientists believe the Black Sea was previously a smaller freshwater lake that was flooded by the Mediterranean Sea 7,000 years ago, when European glaciers melted, the BBC reported. It will be interesting to see what develops here, as rumours about the biblical Ark of the Covenant are rife …

September 12 2000 – The New York Times reported that scientists have discovered evidence of human habitation under the Black Sea that they consider to be the first proof that people thrived along an ancient shoreline before being inundated by a great flood thousands of years ago.

Dr Robert D. Ballard, an undersea explorer, whose robotic devices have solved many underwater mysteries (including finding the Titanic), told the New York Times:

They have discovered a number of stone tools, and carved wooden beams on the sea floor that are part of a well-preserved, though collapsed, structure similar to the wattle-and-daub structures common to the Black Sea area. They also discovered shells from an extinct freshwater creature that are all 7,000 years old or older, as well as shells from saltwater shellfish that are only 6,500 years old. Some scholars believe that this inundation, believed to have been caused when the European glaciers melted 7,000 years ago, could well prove to be the origin of the biblical story of ‘Noah’s Flood’, and the source of the Babylonian flood tale in the Epic of Gilgamesh …

August 24 2000 – It was reported in The Guardian newspaper that an Italian team of scientists have discovered the remains of a temple at the site of a ‘mythical city’. Alex Bellos, their South America correspondent, filed a story that told of the recent discovery of the ruins of a huge temple underwater in Lake Titicaca in the Andes between Bolivia and Peru.

Archaeologists from an international expedition team, Atahuallpa 2000, had made more than 200 dives in the lake, which at 3,800 metres above sea-level is the world’s highest navigable lake. Expedition leader, Lorenzo Epis, told Bellos:

Ceramic artifacts were also found on the floor of Lake Titicaca, which has long been the subject of legends about a ‘lost underwater city’, but Bellos reported that little research had been done before because of the difficulties of diving at high altitudes.

While a submerged city has not been found, Mr Epis said the ruins appeared to be 1,000 to 1,500 years old. It thus predates the Incas and could point to the Tihuanaco people, who lived on Titicaca’s shores before becoming part of the Incan empire.

“This means our civilisations have left more footprints than we had thought,” said Antonio Eguino, Bolivia’s vice-minister of culture. The ruins were found in an area of the lake between the town of Copacabana and the popular tourist destinations of the Island of the Sun and Island of the Moon. The divers followed a submerged road until they arrived at the discoveries, at a depth of about 20 metres.

In addition to the practical difficulties, the research project had to contend with a worried public, who had not been informed of the project. Diving was delayed for four days because of the distrust of the local population on the ‘Island of the Sun’, who believe the lake is sacred.

Akakor Geographical Exploring, an Italian cultural association that organised the expedition, first made a trip to Titicaca in 1998 to look at underwater caves and to research diving techniques at high altitude. Marco Antonio Simi, who was on that expedition, said that the groundwork on pressure levels allowed the group to return this year; most diving technology is based on ocean-bound dives, where pressure levels are very different.

Mr Simi said this was the first time top-level divers and professional archaeologists had investigated Titicaca together, adding that it was rare for specialists of both disciplines to work side by side. The team was looking for an underwater temple. “What they found was the beginning of what they were looking for,” he said.

The story was also carried by BBC Online the previous day on August 23 2000, which also had this interesting underwater picture of divers exploring the recent discovery.

A terrace for crops, a long road and an 800-metre (2,600 feet) long wall was also found under the waters of the lake, sited in the Andes mountains between Bolivia and Peru, the BBC reported:

The complete findings of the 30-member team, backed by the scientific group Akakor Geographical Exploring, are to be published in November 2002.

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“Megalithic urban ruins discovered off the coast of Cuba”

EU English Edition

EU English Edition

“Do Welsh legends of lost cities beneath the sea match Plato’s descriptions of the island civilization of Atlantis? Do Irish myths of a golden age when the eastern Irish Sea was a flowery plain describe the same place Herodotus said disappeared beneath the waves during a single day and night of geological upheaval millennia before Ancient Greece? Author and researcher Paul Dunbavin has embarked on a multidisciplinary investigation into how science could explain such a catastrophe and how modern archaeological findings point to a possible location for lost Atlantis.”

This book theorizes that the Middle Neolithic period around 5,000 years ago was a time of dramatic climate and sea-level changes all around the world. From an up-to-date scientific perspective, Dunbavin distills an array of significant geological theories and then examines the archaeological and mythological record-which together leads to a lost land thousands of years ago in the Irish Sea that was still mentioned in ancient Welsh histories recorded in the 6th century.”