Atlantis In Middle Danube Depression

Late Quaternary Paleogeography of the Pannonian Basin, the Key to Locate the Atlantis in the Middle Danube Depression Mircea Ţicleanu, Paul Constantin, Radu Nicolescu The attempts to identify the area that might correspond, undoubtfully, to the mythic land Atlantis, hadn’t succeeded so far, as they weren’t relied on the paleogeographic reality, very important for The Old World far history. These were connected to the long maintenance in the present Depression of Middle Danube, thus within the Pannonian Basin, of an endoreic region in which a huge lacustrian area survived: The Pannonian Lake. This was definitely isolated from the neighbored basins of the Central Paratethys about 7 m.y. ago and it maintained until prehistoric time, as an inner sea characterized mainly by the presence of an archipelagos in its Western part. Only after The Iron Gates Gorge shaping, probably during some cataclysms which affected the whole Earth, the old lake picture radically changed. In the South-Eastern part of the Pannonian Basin, a lake maintained for a long time. It was supplied mostly by the 4 main rivers of the Middle Danube Depression. The last huge catastrophe that struck this edenic humanity realm, about 11.600 years ago, was due to a meteorites rain that affected Terra, a well described rain from the biblical text (Apocalypse of John). It was concentrated upon the Western area of the Atlantic Ocean where a huge vapors mass appeared which turned towards East, and triggered The Great Flood (or Biblical Deluge) that could be better understood only in connection with the Pannonian area paleogeography. The same catastrophe led to the last paleogeographic picture of the Pannonian Basin, meaning a relict lake whose shore maintained for a long time at about +100 m height, and existed during the Early Holocene [Ţicleanu et al., 2006 - The XVIIIth Congress of the Carpathian-Balkans Geological Association, Belgrade]. Picturing a Pannonian Atlantis might easily solve some location problems, difficult to be solved so far, and could very well answer the numerous criteria proposed for a realistic search of this fascinating mythic land. Thus, the West Pannonian archipelago allowed the finding of an island to which the Atlants capital could be linked. The Pannonian Lake corresponded to the Atlantes navigable sea, placed “beyond” the “Pillars of Herakles”, that could be found only within the area of the Iron Gates gorge, as a few antic authors (i. e. Pindar) or actual ones (i. e. Densusianu), and as a lot of myths and toponyms connected to the mythic hero Hercule did. The sudden disappearance of the Pannonian Lake might explain the appearance of some fine, unconsolided sediments (mud) that isolated for a while the off-islands of the Pannonian Lake. The moment of the Atlantis “sunken” can be established together with the meteorites rain from about 9.541 B.C. (a much closer data to the one mentioned by Plato). The Atlantes civilization (which beyond the archipelago included as well areas from the Pannonian Lake shores, thus the total area was closed to the one estimated by Plato) developed in a mild climate, influenced by the Atlantis position in connection to a huge water mass and the presence of some important hydrothermal resources, known even nowadays inside the Pannonian Basin (nowadays there could be found the largest thermal lake in the world – the Héviz Lake, and about 1500 thermal springs as well). This civilization was based on the presence of some important natural resources (forests, salt, gold, silver, copper etc) known even in the

2 present in the Carpathians, which border the Pannonian Basin in the North, and in the East. This view might effectively solve not only the Atlantis location problem, but the connection to real geographic areas of some mythic paleogeographic data for which no viable solution was found so far, among there could be mentioned Thot Lake and Ha Lake (Egyptian myths), Ginnunga Gap, Audhumbla, Yggdrasil and Asgard (Scandinavian myths), Cronus Sea (that became “The Dead Sea”) and Okeanos (Greek myths), the Life Land and the Death Waters (Sumerian myths), Havila Lands, Cus Lands, and Asiria (in the Bible), Alybe (=Alybas) Lands (Homer) and Siriat (Egyptians). The mythic land Vanenheim (= the Land of Vans), whose name is kept by the actual “Panonia” could be distinguished of all. Such point of view was sustained by us even from 1991 [Ţicleanu et al., XIIth International Congress of the Prehistoric and Protohistoric Sciences, Bratislava]. The Pannonian Lake (“Atlantis Sea”) and the Atlantis Island disappearance following some successive catastrophes: floods, earthquakes, tsunami could led to the disappearance of the main material remains of Atlantis civilization described by Plato and considered by many Atlantologists as very important criteria in searching the Atlantis The population saved after such events kept in memory both the Flood myths, and the Atlantis disappearance as well. Afterwards, these myths were brought in by the population spread in those areas. In addition, the old inhabitants of the Pannnonian space “exported” own toponyms of this primordial area in numerous regions where they settled on, after successive migrations. The relations between the Atlantes and the old Greeks could be easily explained in connection to the Pannonian area as well, by the present toponyms with Greek mythic resonance from the North-West area of the Apuseni (Western) Mountains. There had to be mentioned the “trend” to find a solution for the Atlantis problem according to the information, unjustified absoluted many times, offered by Plato in his writings, in the terms in which extremely precious data were comprised in other antic authors writings, among which Diodorus Siculus with his “Biblioteca Historica”, mainly from the traditions regarding the Amazons. One should not neglect that from the near close of this area there were some world priorities: “The Mesolithic Paradise” (Lepenski Vir – 9.000 BP), the oldest world known writing (Vinca, Tartaria – about 7.500 BP), the oldest ceramic tubes network for drinkable water (inside the area of the old Dacian capital from Sarmizegetusa Regia, in the South Carpathians - about 7.000 BP). In addition there had to be mentioned the Dacian sanctuary presence from Sarmizegetusa, a proof of a very developed civilization, placed within the central area already known as “The Old Europe”. Abstract of the paper presented at 2nd International Conference "The Atlantis Hypothesis: Searching for a Lost Land”, 10 - 11 November 2008 Athens, Greece (November 10, 2008 Session 2)