The Sunken Foreunners of Asia

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The Sunken Foreunners of Asia's Ancient Civilisations

Portrait of Graham Hancock

I own a copy of the book UNDERWORLD and I refer back to it from time to time. On this blog I thought I wouldarrange some papers from different places off the internet so that others could have their say on the matter: One thingin particular struck my imagination and so I did some editorializing toward the bottom of the blog. Hancock's thesis isthat there were many sedentary higher cultures on the lower-lying land areas exposed at lowered sea levels duringthe final parts of the Ice Age, and which now lie at the bottom of the sea.

Official Graham Hancock UNDERWORLD Site

http://www.grahamhancock.com/archive/underworld/

"Between 17,000 years ago and 7000 years ago, at the end of the last Ice Age, terrible things happened to the worldour ancestors lived in. Great ice caps over northern Europe and north America melted down, huge floods rippedacross the earth, sea-level rose by more than 100 metres, and about 25 million square kilometres of formerlyhabitable lands were swallowed up by the waves.....But now let's remember as well that along continental margins and around islands across the world an area biggerthan the Unites States of America was inundated at the end of the Ice Age: 3 million square kilometres (an area thesize of India) was submerged around Greater Australia alone; another 3 million square kilometres went under aroundSouth-East Asia; the Florida, Yucatan and Grand Bahama Banks were fully-exposed off the Gulf of Mexico; huge

areas of land were swallowed up in the Mediterranean, the Black Sea, the North Sea and the Atlantic, etc, etc, etc -the list really does goes on and on.

In my view the possibility of a serious "black hole" in scientific knowledge about recent prehistory is plausible,reasonable and worthy of consideration. I therefore propose that the conclusions of modern archaeology regarding theorigins and early evolution of human civilisation should be treated as provisional until a comprehensive, global,marine-archaeological survey of continental shelves down to depths of at least 120 metres has been undertaken."
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http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sunrise/52-02-3/sc-harry.htm

Bridging the Myth and Science of the FloodBy Harry YoungMyths from around the world tell of a time in earth's history when great civilizations and vast expanses of land wereconsumed by cataclysmic floods. Who were the people who formed these civilizations, where and how did they live,what happened to their cities and settlements and the lands they lived on? In his latest book, Underworld: TheMysterious Origins of Civilization (Crown Publishers, New York, 2002; 760 pages, photographs, ISBN 1400046122,hardback, $27.50), Graham Hancock explores these mysteries. Expanding investigations chronicled in Fingerprints of

the Gods and Heaven's Mirror, he lays out evidence based on modern scientific research, comparative mythology,religious and spiritual observances, firsthand diving exploration of underwater megalithic structures, and ancient mapsto demonstrate the likelihood that a technically advanced civilization unrecognized by modern science capable ofnavigating the globe and with a profound understanding of architecture and building, astronomy, and geography existed before and during the last Ice Age and was wiped out by global flooding.Only in the last fifty years, since the invention of scuba diving, has systematic marine archeology been possible. Dueto limited funding and the enormity of the world's oceans, marine archeologists have barely begun to investigate themillions of square kilometers of coastal shelf inundated since the end of the last Ice Age. When they do, shipwrecksare their most common quarry, not signs of antediluvian civilizations, "for the traces, anywhere and everywherearound the world, of submerged structures do not make sense within the current paradigm of history." As a result theunderwater world represents a void in our knowledge of our planet and of ourselves. Myths, however, have much tosay:Descriptions of a killer global flood that inundated the inhabited lands of the world turn up everywhere amongst the

myths of antiquity. In many cases these myths clearly hint that the deluge swept away an advanced civilization thathad somehow angered the gods, sparing 'none but the unlettered and the uncultured' and obliging the survivors to'begin again like children in complete ignorance of what happened . . . in early times.' . . . The academic consensustoday, and for a century, has been that that the myths are either pure fantasy or the fantastic elaboration of local andlimited deluges caused for example by rivers overflowing, or tidal waves. p. 20Looking for evidence of ancient cataclysmic floods, Underworld explores up-to-date geological and climatological
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research on what may have happened during the last 17,000 years. Central to Hancock's investigation are inundationmaps created by Dr. Glen Milne of Durham University which show vast tracts of mostly coastal land which weresubmerged by three waves of cataclysmic flooding between 17,000 and 8,000 years ago. The area of land the bestquality habitable land of that time lost to the sea was huge: 5 percent of the earth's surface or 25 million squarekilometers. While such maps cannot be 100 percent accurate, Hancock believes they are accurate enough to supporthis theories.

Finding an accurate model of the behavior of the oceans during the peak meltdown period at the end of the last IceAge (approximately 14,000 to 7,000 years ago) is difficult. Experts disagree over the sequence, chronology, and

consequences of events, and even the terminology used. For the purpose of the Underworld inquiry Hancock uses theterm "the last Ice Age" to refer to the period between 125,000 and 17,000 years ago; and the term Last GlacialMaximum (LGM) to signify the period between approximately 22,000 and 17,000 years ago when the ice sheets wereat their maximum. At this time most of northern Europe and North America was under ice several kilometers thick,containing so much water that the global sea level was between 115 and 120 meters lower than it is today. Manyareas of land habitable today were uninhabitable before the flood and vice versa, especially around low-lying coasts.The many cycles of the Ice Age correlate with the obliquity and precession of the earth's axis and the changingeccentricity of its solar orbit. These with other factors such as volcanism, asteroidal or cometary impacts, radical thawsand freezes, and geodynamic changes in the earth's crust or mantle are considered by science sufficient to explainthe patterns of global glaciation and deglaciation. The effects of these forces were immense and devastating. Theearth, like a huge sphere of gel, is malleable, and pressure on one area causes an indentation that forces thesurrounding area to rise. Such isostacy occurs when ice caps weigh down on the earth's crust. When the ice melts,the pressure lessens and the bulge surrounding the indentation rebounds and eventually retains its original level.

Thousands of billions of tons of ice weighed on the continental landmasses of North America and Europe at the timeof the LGM 17,000 years ago. The water forming this ice came originally from oceans, so just as the ice pressed thecontinents down, correspondingly the ocean beds rose as the water burden above lightened.

Although there is scientific proof from core samples and in the coral record that sea levels once rose very rapidly, thescientific majority still hold that the 120 meter sea-level rise in the last 10,000 years of post-glacial flooding representsa non-cataclysmic rising process of about one meter per year. Flood myths say differently, as do experts such as thelate Cesare Emiliani, Professor of Geological Sciences at the University of Miami, and John Shaw, Professor of EarthSciences at the University of Alberta, whose work, among others, Hancock draws on to form a synthesized theory. Hedescribes the melting of the ice sheets, and ensuing floods and earthquakes unimaginable by modern standards. Forinstance, in Canada meltwater flooded around a giant ice barrier into Hudson Bay, the Arctic Ocean, and the Gulf ofMexico with a force of around ten million cubic meters per second enough to drain Lake Ontario in four days.

The world at the Last Glacial Maximum. Darker tint shows extra land above sea level.Research since the 1970s suggests that there were three global super-floods: 15,000 to 14,000 years ago; 12,000 to11,000 years ago; and 8,000 to 7,000 years ago. The second period ties in with the date Plato ascribed in theTimaeus and Critias to the destruction by earthquakes and flooding of Atlantis, and with the Tamil myth of thesubmerging of the fabled land of Kumari Kandam. There is also strong evidence that nearly half the total meltwaterreleased at the end of the last Ice Age was concentrated into these three relatively short periods. Such events wouldhave had a momentous impact on the human inhabitants at that time, leaving a marked impression on oral tradition,the original transmitter of all ancient myths.Contrariwise, modern archeology tells us its story of civilized humanity based on numerous conflicting theories andinterpretations of data, and scant material evidence from archeological sites covering a tiny area of the earth'ssurface, almost all of which are on land. Current mainstream thinking puts fully evolved humans on earth 100,000years prior to the beginning of the first floods and cataclysms of around 17,000 years ago long enough for highcivilizations to have developed. A dearth of land-based evidence is no proof that they did not. Land-based evidencedoes exist, however, although interpretation is one major barrier to realizing what it signifies.One main section of Underworld concentrates on India: its ancient inhabitants and spiritual traditions, specifically theIndus Valley civilization and the Vedas. Since the 1890s scholars have thought the Vedas were composed by Indo-European invaders the Aryans and codified by them around 1500 BC. This theory was almost entirely based onthe misinterpretation of a few dozen skeletons found in the ancient Indus Valley. Another cornerstone of the now
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controversial Aryan Invasion Theory is the similarity between Sanskrit (the language of the Vedas) and ancient andmodern European languages such as Latin, Greek, English, Norwegian, and German. However, in the last ten yearsthe Aryan Invasion Theory has fallen apart. The generally accepted proposed codification date of 1200 BC, firstestablished by Max Muller in 1890, does not signify either the Vedas' date or era of origin. Many researchers nowaccept that their composition lies long before in India's oral tradition and that they could be the creation of the Indus-Sarasvati civilization, inferring that there was a movement of language from India to Europe rather than from Europeto India.The Vedas themselves, however, contain an account of their creation: the story of Manu, India's Noah. Hancockdraws close ties between the story of Manu, that of the Sumerian flood survivor Ziusudra, the ancient yuga theory of

the cyclical destruction and rebirth of worlds, and the Seven Sages, a group of "wise men" whose duties include thepreservation of the knowledge contained within the Vedas:the ancient traditions of India itself . . . explain that Manu and the Seven Sages retreated to the Himalayas from aplace that was not the Himalayas at the time of a terrible oceanic flood, and that they brought with them from theirantediluvian homeland not only the Vedas but also all the 'seeds' that would be necessary to re-establish permanentfood-producing settlements. p. 174Hancock goes on to speculate, based on analysis of mythological and scientific evidence concerning glaciation andflooding in the Himalayan region, that "the sages who composed at least some of the verses of the Vedas could havebeen in the Himalayas 12,000 years ago to witness the end of the Younger Dryas," a sudden unexplained globalclimactic freezing. But this "does not fit in at all with the much later date that scholars habitually assign to compositionof the Rig Veda" (p. 196). Speculating further, the author explores the profound reasons underpinning civilization.

Although the modern West is dominated by material and economic theories of human life, India with itsvibrant spiritual culture . . . raises the possibility that the real origins of civilization could be very different not driven

by economics but by the spiritual quest that all true ascetics of India still pursue with the utmost dedication. . . .And since archaeologists are now in universal agreement that there is an unbroken continuity of culture fromMehrgarh I [a prehistoric city in Baluchistan, located 500 km from the Pakistani coast] around 9000 years ago all theway down to the great cities of the Indus-Sarasvati civilization around 4500 years ago, shouldn't we expect signs ofthe same yogic ethic to turn up there? pp. 196-7Graham Hancock pursues these signs in ensuing chapters.The first of Underworld's many accounts of underwater expeditions begins in India as the author, collaborating withdivers from India's National Institute of Oceanography (NIO), dives at the northwest coastal town of Dwarka, sacred toKrishna. Sunken ruins lie off the coast, but it is difficult to match the date of the archeology (1700 or 1800 BC) to theIndian traditional date of 3100 BC when ancient legend holds that Dwarka became submerged and Krishna's deathcommenced the kali yuga. Ruins dating to and before that time are found only in deeper water. Hancock and NIOdivers also explored a mysterious U-shaped masonry structure at a depth of 23 meters, 5 km off Poompuhar in theBay of Bengal. Inundation maps suggest that it would have been submerged about 11,000 years ago. Subsidence

may account for this object's extreme depth, but without further research its origin, location, and purpose remain amystery. Hancock also investigates the myth of Kumari Kandam, an antediluvian civilization said to have existedthousands of years ago around south India. It is believed to have been a great center of learning with magnificentacademies which may have left a legacy of cartographic and astronomical knowledge which exists today in theancient Indian texts. Interestingly, the author spoke to local fishermen who described often diving to free their netscaught on underwater temples with columns, pyramidal pagodas, and buildings with doorways.In the Postscript are details of the remarkable find in May 2001 of what looks like two underwater cities, one extendingfor 9 km underneath the Gulf of Cambay in North West India at depths of between 25 and 40 meters and at distancesof up to 40 km from shore. Detected using side-scan sonar, the images produced reveal clear foundations togeometrical structures and walls rising 3 meters above the sea bed. Both cities lie along the courses of ancient rivers,and remains of a suspected 600 meter long dam have been discovered. Man-made artifacts have been retrieved bydredging, including what may be jewelry, stone tools, pottery, and figurines which carbon dating indicate are 9,500years old. Inundation maps give the date of submergence as between 7,700 and 6,900 years ago, but the cities and

culture that built them are likely to be considerably older.Another flooded kingdom Underworld explores is Malta. Among the many ruined monuments are the undergroundHypogeum and the Gigantija, Hagar Qim, and Mnajdra temples. Conventional wisdom puts their constructionsomewhere between 5,600 and 4,500 years ago. All the temples contain massive stone blocks, weighing some 15tons or more, and are thought to be the earliest free-standing stone monuments in the world. Mnajdra is a solar templewith accurate solar alignments incorporated into its design. The size and sophistication of these temples would implythat their architects and builders had long experience with such structures. It is generally accepted that man appearedon Malta somewhere between 5,200 and 7,200 years ago (when it was an island) and developed its culture gradually.The problem with these chronologies is that there is no archeological evidence on the relatively small island of Maltaof "civilization history" documenting ever more sophisticated construction techniques.

Anomalies surrounding many Maltese land and underwater temples, and a series of man-made grooves called "cart-ruts" cut into limestone bedrock on land and under water, all point to a mystery: who built these features and when?Malta is too isolated and small as it is now to have supported and sustained their development and construction. A

solution lies in the inundation maps, which show islands of the Maltese archipelago connected to Sicily by a landbridge until 16,400 years ago, allowing settlers to arrive at Malta. The land bridge narrowed and eventually becamesubmerged, leaving one large island which was finally inundated 10,600 years ago to leave the present group ofMaltese islands. The inundation is undisputed by scholars; however, the chronology of settlement and itscircumstances are. Hancock offers an alternative hypothesis: that there was a very long process of cultural


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development going on before and during the inundation on what is now Malta and the lands now submerged aroundthe Maltese coast, with the rising sea covering up a large amount of evidence of a much larger civilization than currentacademic thinking allows.Curiously, the large island that formed as the Maltese land bridge drowned is featured on some maps drawn in the1400s, and referred to as Gaulometin or Galonia leta, but it is the wrong shape and geographically misplaced, which isat odds with the usually accurately-represented Mediterranean region. Hancock suggests that what have previouslybeen deemed by cartographic scholars as coastline and island-group inaccuracies around the world may actually beaccurate accounts of coastlines belonging to epochs before and during the Ice Age meltdown period. It is well knownthat most medieval mapmakers were copyists reproducing older maps. Some older maps for example, those of

Ptolemy

were originally researched and drawn at the Library of Alexandria in Egypt. The author asks, "is it possiblethat he . . . was drawing on antediluvian sources," as it is known that Ptolemy based his maps on those of thePhoenician Marinus of Tyre, who in turn drew on even earlier mapmakers for inspiration.Continuing an investigation of ancient maps from Fingerprints of the Gods, Hancock argues that mapmaking was atradition in the ancient world which over the millennia up to Ptolemy's time, rather than undergoing refinement, mayhave been in a state of "decline, degradation and accumulated errors introduced by many different hands into a farolder and once superior map-making tradition" (p. 469). Certainly the new science of inundation mapping has openedup research possibilities. For example, the Reinal map of 1510 appears to show the west coast of India as it lookedmore than 15,000 years ago as well as islands which existed 11,500 years ago that are under water today. Hancockdemonstrates Marco Polo's belief that Ceylon was once connected to India, was one third larger in the past, and wassubmerged. He examines the relationship between the Irish folk legend of Hy-Brasil off the west coast of Ireland, saidto have been submerged thousands of years ago, its position on medieval maps, and an area called Porcupine Bankwhich was exposed land 21,000 years ago. Using inundation and medieval map comparisons, he suggests that the

fabled islands of Antilia and Satanaze are really Taiwan and Japan as they looked 12,500 years ago. In summary hewrites:I propose that the consistent patterns of map anomalies that we have documented from Hy-Brasil to India to Japan bear mute witness to an ancient science of cartography and navigation that explored the world and charted itaccurately over a period of several thousand years during the post-glacial meltdown. p. 669Hancock's complementary land investigation led him to encounter the Japanese Jomon people in an attempt tounravel the mysteries of four Japanese underwater sites: Yonaguni, Kerama, Aguni, and Chatan. It is unclear whetherany of these sites are man made, although a case for human intervention is well presented in Underworld. The Jomonseem to have emerged suddenly in Japan around 16,500 years ago, as dating of their pottery attests. Archeologyshows they had good architectural and building knowledge (incorporating astronomical alignment designs) as well asdeveloped spiritual ideas and religious practices. The Jomon were not wiped out by invading peoples but mergedseamlessly, it appears, with another migrating culture known only as the "Yagoi." Today's Japanese culture is thedescendent of this ancient cultural merging, which implies that the Jomon culture and its ideas still live on. The

underwater ruins exemplify a hitherto unknown and perhaps extraordinary phase in their history.

Iseki Point, YonaguniJapan was not covered by an ice cap, had naturally precipitous coastlines and few low-lying plains, meaning that itlargely escaped the ravages of the Ice Age cataclysms. If Japanese mythology is grounded in the myth-memories ofthe Jomon, it is not surprising that Japan has no indigenous flood myth. Underworld presents the idea that the Jomonlost their "beachfront" properties only, including coastal temples and other sacred and functional sites that now lie 30meters under water. The recurring Japanese myth of the Kingdom of the Sea King connects closely with Japan's

undersea ruins in two ways: that of the kingdom remembered as an island, and as an underwater sanctuary of walls,palaces, and mansions. In Hancock's words, "could it be a memory that great structures with 'turrets and tall towers ofexceeding beauty' once stood above water but are now beneath waves?" (p. 594).The travelogue style of Underworld allows Graham Hancock to connect on a human level with the reader and toexpose the many barriers to his work, such as bureaucracy and the lack of marine archeological reference materialpertaining to underwater monuments. There are many examples cited of mainstream science skimming over important
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demonstrable facts and misrepresenting evidence relating to and synergizing mythology, religious and spiritualphilosophy, astronomy, archeology, geology, and physics, for the purpose of keeping the established textbooktheories of human and planetary evolution alive. Underworld challenges orthodoxy with well-thought-out arguments, ina warm, down-to-earth, and ever-optimistic although sometimes healthily skeptical mood, and the reader is oftenreminded that it is written not by an expert but by an investigative journalist who is not putting forth new dogmas butsimply presenting the growing body of evidence that human history on this planet is much more complex than, andvastly different from, what was previously understood. Important, eclectic, and vast in scope, Underworld representswhat the author appeals for in its closing pages: "research, research and more research," for the purpose of gettingcloser to finding our true origins.

(From Sunrise magazine, April/May 2003)

The HinduOnline edition of India's National NewspaperTuesday, Jun 18, 2002

Vedic literature and the Gulf of Cambay discovery

It is sad to note how intellectuals in India are quick to denigrate the extent and antiquity of their history, even whengeological evidence like the Sarasvati River or archaeological evidence like the Harappan and Cambay sites are soclear.
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THE RECENT find of a submerged city in the Gulf of Cambay, perhaps as old as 7500 BC, serves to highlight theexistence of southern sources for the civilisation of ancient India. The Gulf of Cambay find is only the latest in a seriesthat includes Lothal (S.R. Rao), Dholavira (R.S. Bisht) and others in Gujarat. These discoveries have been pushingthe seats of ancient Indian civilisation deeper into the southern peninsula. We should not be surprised if more suchsites are discovered in South India, especially the coastal regions, for the south has always played a significant ifneglected role in ancient India going back to Vedic times.

I have argued for such a coastal origin for Vedic civilisation in my recent book Rig Veda and the History of India. This

is largely because of the oceanic character of Vedic symbolism in which all the main Rig Vedic Gods as well as manyof the Vedic rishis have close connections with samudra or the sea. In fact, the image of the ocean pervades thewhole of the Rig Veda. Unfortunately many scholars who put forth opinions on ancient India seldom bother to studythe Vedas in the original Sanskrit and few know the language well enough to do so. The result is that theirinterpretation of Vedic literature is often erroneous, trusting out of date and inaccurate interpretations from theNineteenth century like the idea that the Vedic people never new the sea!

Literary evidence

The Rig Veda states that "All the hymns praise Indra who is as expansive as the sea" (RV I.11.1) Agni wears theocean as his vesture (RV VIII 102.4-6). The Sun is called the ocean (RV V.47.3). Soma is called the first ocean (RVIX.86.29). Varuna specifically is a God of the sea (RV I.161.14). These are just a few examples of out of well over a

hundred references to samudra in the Rig Veda alone, including references to oceans as two, four or many (RVVI.50.13). This is obviously the poetry of a people intimately associated with the sea and not of any nomads from land-locked Central Asia or Eurasia.

Vedic seer families like the Bhrigus are descendants of Varuna, the God of the sea as the first Bhrigu is called BhriguVaruni Bhrigu, the son of Varuna. The teachings of Varuna to Bhrigu are found in the Taittiriya Upanishad andTaittiriya tradition of the Yajur Veda, which has long been most popular in South India. The recent find at sea in theGulf of Cambay is near Baroach or Bhrigu-kachchha, the famous ancient city of the very same Bhrigus.

These oceanic connections extend to other important Vedic rishis as well. In the Rig Veda, Agastya, who became themain rishi of South India, has twenty-five hymns in the first book of the Rig Veda and is mentioned in the other booksas well. He is the elder brother of Vasishta who himself has the largest number of hymns in the text (about a hundred),those of the seventh book. Both rishis are said to have been born in a pot or kumbha, which may be a vessel or ship

(RV VII.33.10-13). Vasishta is specifically connected to Varuna who was said to travel on a ship in the sea (RVVII.88.4-5). Both Vasishta and Agastya are descendants of Mitra and Varuna, the God of the sea.

Vishvamitra in the Rig Veda (IIII.53.16) mentions the sage Pulasti, who was regarded as the progenitor of Ravana andKubera and whose city, Pulasti-Pura was located in ancient Sri Lanka. He is mentioned along with Jamadagni,another common Rig Vedic sage and the father of Parshurama, the sixth incarnation of Lord Vishnu, before Rama andKrishna, whose main sphere of activity was in the south of India.

Manu himself, the Vedic primal sage and king, is a flood figure and the Angirasas, the other main seer family apartfrom the Bhrigus, join him in his ship according to Puranic mythology. Southern peoples like the Yadus and Turvashaswere said to have been glorified by Indra (RV X.49.8) and are mentioned a number of times in the Rig Veda as greatVedic peoples. So we have ample ancient literary evidence for the Vedic seer and royal families as connected with theocean and southern regions.

The Cambay site is in the ancient delta of the now dry Sarasvati River, one branch of which flowed into the Gulf ofCambay, showing that this site was part of the greater Sarasvati region and culture, which was the main location forHarappan cities in the 3300-1900 BCE period. Such an ocean front was important for maritime trade for the inlandregions to the north. In this regard, important Vedic kings like Sudas were said to receive tribute from the sea (RVI.47.6).

When the Greeks under Alexander came to India in the Fourth century BCE, the Greek writer Megasthenes in hisIndika, fragments of which are recorded in several Greek writings, mentioned that the Indians (Hindus) had a record of153 kings going back over 6400 years (showing that the Hindus were conscious of the great antiquity of their cultureeven then). This would yield a date that now amounts to 6700 BCE, a date that might be reflected in the Gulf ofCambay site which has been tentatively dated to 7500 BCE. So the old Vedic-Puranic king lists may not be that far offafter all!

Material evidence

A few scholars, like Witzel in the United States in spite of such massive evidence as the Sarasvati River and its


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intimate connection to Vedic literature still try to separate Vedic culture from India and attribute it to a largelyilliterate and nomadic culture that migrated into India from the northwest of the country in the post-Harappan period(after 1500 BCE). Ignoring all other evidence that connects the Vedic and Harappan, they point out the importance ofthe horse in the Rig Veda and argue that not enough evidence of horses has been found in Harappan sites to prove aVedic connection. They fall back upon this one shot argument to ignore any other evidence to the contrary.

However, one should note that these invasionists or migrationists are even more deficient in horse evidence to provetheir own theory. There is no trail of horse bones or horse encampments into ancient India from Afghanistan duringthe 1500-1000 BCE period that is required for their theory of Aryan intrusion. In fact, there is no solid evidence for

such a movement of peoples at all in the form of camps, skeletal remains or anything else.

Those who claim that Vedic culture must have originated outside India because of its lauding of the horse are evenmore lacking in horse evidence. The real problem is not `no horse at Harappa' but `no horse evidence, in fact no realevidence of any kind, to prove any Aryan migration/invasion'. It has been convincingly shown that what the Rig Vedawith its seventeen-ribbed horse (RV I.162.18) describes is a native Indian breed and not any Central Asian orEurasian horse that has eighteen ribs.

The Rig Veda mentions many Indian animals like the water buffalo (Mahisha), which is said to be the main animalsacred to Soma (RV IX.96.6), which does occur commonly on Harappan seals. The humped Brahma bull (Vrisha,Vrishabha), another common Harappan depiction, is the main animal of Indra, the foremost of the Vedic Gods.Elephants are also mentioned.

Most of the animals depicted on Harappan seals are mythical, not zoological specimens anyway. Most common is aone-horned animal that is reflected in the one-horned boar or Varaha of the Mahabharata and the boar incarnation ofLord Vishnu. Many other Harappan depictions are of animals with multiple heads or half-animal/half-human figures.This is similar to the depictions in Vedic imagery which largely consist of mythical animals of this type. For example,Harappan seals portray a three-headed bull-like animal. Such an animal is described in the Rig Veda (III.56.6).

A smokescreen

The horse issue is meant as a smokescreen to avoid facing the facts of the Sarasvati River and the many newarchaeological sites in India. These show no such break in the continuity of civilisation in the region as an Aryaninvasion/migration requires, including the existence of fire altars and fire worship from the early Harappan period.Vedic and Puranic literature itself records the shift of the centre of culture from the Sarasvati to the Ganga at the end

of the Vedic period, referring to the drying up of the river. Scholars like Witzel would have the Vedic people cominginto India after the Sarasvati was already gone and yet making the river their ancestral homeland and most sacredregion!

Vedic literature is the largest preserved from the ancient world, dwarfing in size anything left by other cultures likeEgypt, Greece or Babylonia. The Harappan-Sarasvati urban civilisation of India was by far the largest of its time(3100-1900 BCE) in the ancient world spreading from Punjab to Kachchh. We can no longer separate this greatliterature and this great civilisation, particularly given that both were based on the Sarasvati River, whose authenticityas a historical river before 1900 BCE has been confirmed by numerous geological studies. This great Vedic literaturerequires a great urban culture to explain it, just as the great Harappan urban culture requires a literature to explain it.Both come from the same region and cannot be separated.

Finally it is sad to note how intellectuals in India are quick to denigrate the extent and antiquity of their history, even

when geological evidence like the Sarasvati River or archaeological evidence like the Harappan and Cambay sites areso clear. However one may interpret these, the truth that civilisation in India was quite ancient and profound cannot beignored. I don't think there is any other nation on earth that would be so negative if such ancient glories were found intheir lands.

DAVID FRAWLEY


9/18

Sunken Structure Discovered off Poomuhur, as described in Graham Hancock's Book UNDERWORLD.

Figures from a website discussing global superfloods among other things. For the most part, the process and

the dates are the same as described by Graham Hancock. I may decide to post the pertinent passages fromthis site at a future time for a lengthier discussion: for now, it is enough to say that the account Hancockgives on these matters is Scientifically sound and verifiable in standard reference sources.
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-0C0sQel-NIo/TitiWV_5PGI/AAAAAAAADjc/Jy6qLNYh9cs/s1600/fig%2013_2.jpghttp://2.bp.blogspot.com/-4AnuTC925yc/Titga5rVwNI/AAAAAAAADhk/fSQGN1a5gyE/s1600/Poomuhur+Submerged+Structure.jpghttp://4.bp.blogspot.com/-0C0sQel-NIo/TitiWV_5PGI/AAAAAAAADjc/Jy6qLNYh9cs/s1600/fig%2013_2.jpghttp://2.bp.blogspot.com/-4AnuTC925yc/Titga5rVwNI/AAAAAAAADhk/fSQGN1a5gyE/s1600/Poomuhur+Submerged+Structure.jpg


10/18
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-g4iZljyl6BQ/TitiV-gcXGI/AAAAAAAADjU/RDq67gW7bRE/s1600/fig%2013_6.jpghttp://2.bp.blogspot.com/-SWVVJPqwi6Y/Titjb7HttVI/AAAAAAAADjs/583TL0vOEp0/s1600/fig%2013_10.jpghttp://1.bp.blogspot.com/-g4iZljyl6BQ/TitiV-gcXGI/AAAAAAAADjU/RDq67gW7bRE/s1600/fig%2013_6.jpghttp://2.bp.blogspot.com/-SWVVJPqwi6Y/Titjb7HttVI/AAAAAAAADjs/583TL0vOEp0/s1600/fig%2013_10.jpg


11/18
http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-u6AZOQrpjpc/TitiVWHs8kI/AAAAAAAADjE/oCqZ0s_iEhA/s1600/fig%2013_4.jpghttp://2.bp.blogspot.com/-H0HwVjOCPlI/TitiVnh-7gI/AAAAAAAADjM/rtD4-H7Fuv8/s1600/fig%2013_5.jpghttp://3.bp.blogspot.com/-u6AZOQrpjpc/TitiVWHs8kI/AAAAAAAADjE/oCqZ0s_iEhA/s1600/fig%2013_4.jpghttp://2.bp.blogspot.com/-H0HwVjOCPlI/TitiVnh-7gI/AAAAAAAADjM/rtD4-H7Fuv8/s1600/fig%2013_5.jpg


12/18

Global Superflood Chronology Chart

[One thing of note shown on this chart is the well-documented fact that Carbon-14 precentage in the environment isequivalent to modern levels and dates are theoretically near-exact then. There was a drastic change in level aboutthat time, as shown on this chart, and the earlier levels were much different. In part this is because the cataclysms ofthose days changed the level of Carbon-14 itself. Some experts misjudge on this feature and add to all dates in thisperiod by much too large of an assumed fudge factor, an additional 2000 years or more.]http://www.grahamhancock.com/archive/underworld/AshCF1.php?p=1

Four-part independant article about Ice-age civilisations at Graham Hancock's site.

http://www.grahamhancock.com/archive/underworld/CrispDanAtlantis.php?p=1

Discussion about the location of Atlantis

Atlantis was a Real PlaceA Discussion by Dan Crisp.......

ConclusionMy aim with this essay has been to see whether Critias, in the words of Plato (or Plato in the words of Critias) painteda consistent picture and, if so, of what. Prior to its writing, for all I knew, several hypotheses, including Koudriavtsev's,were readily compatible with the account. I have found that, on the contrary, the account is unequivocal (based onJowett's translation at least):

Crit ias (or Plato) says the kingd om s of Atlantis s tretched from sou thern Spain, at the Pil lars of Heracles,

nor thwards along the con t inental shel f , skir t ing around the Br i t ish Is les, as far as Scandinavia; w ith the great

plain and capital city on t he Celt ic Shelf.

[And to th is sh ould b e added, 'Is lands of the open sea and parts of the Opposi te Cont inent ' -DD]

Now, we should like to prove whether what he says is true! Of course, this is easier said than done, because theEnglish Channel must be one of the worst places to conduct marine archaeology; and that is where definitive evidenceof the truth of Critias' account, if indeed there is any, is to be found. If the Celtic Shelf yields a city on a hill, withconcentric harbours, on a rectangular plain enclosed by an enormous ditch and criss-crossed by canals, I don't thinkanyone could deny that Atlantis had been found.
http://www.grahamhancock.com/archive/underworld/AshCF1.php?p=1http://www.grahamhancock.com/archive/underworld/AshCF1.php?p=1http://www.grahamhancock.com/archive/underworld/CrispDanAtlantis.php?p=1http://www.grahamhancock.com/archive/underworld/CrispDanAtlantis.php?p=1http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-wsYZpUUfUEU/TitiVG8zu7I/AAAAAAAADi8/LpZXsHMh1yQ/s1600/fig%2013_1.jpghttp://www.grahamhancock.com/archive/underworld/CrispDanAtlantis.php?p=1http://www.grahamhancock.com/archive/underworld/AshCF1.php?p=1


13/18

In the meantime, those who have a mind to might like to...

Find out what happened to Koudriavtsev's planned expedition of 1998 to the Little Sole Bank on the edge of the CelticShelf;Study the geology of the Celtic Shelf and determine what the white and black building stones might have been andwhether any red minerals matching the description of orichalcum are found there;Re-examine the evidence of Atlantis in Spain, France and Sweden;Investigate the connections between the "Celtic Shelf Hypothesis" and other legends of lost civilisations, King Arthur's

Lyonnesse, Thule, the Titans and so on;Work out the relationship between Atlantis and the Cro-Magnon people, who settled in western Europe and wereperhaps distinct from the people ranging across the rest of Europe; and determine whether they (or their ancestors)got there by crossing the straits;Compare and contrast the spread of agriculture in Europe immediately after the era of Atlantis with the situation inIndia and the Middle East in the same period;This conclusion actually has very little implication for the many researchers who thought they had identified - or found- Atlantis in other locations around the world. If there are reasons to think advanced civilisations once thrived in South

America, the Caribbean, the Mediterranean, India, Indonesia, etc., they are unaffected by the realisation that none ofthem was the land known to us as Atlantis. All we have done here is identify which of the fascinating and importantresearches into ancient mysteries refer to Atlantis and which refer to other, no less important cultures.

I have no qualms about the territories inhabited by the Atlanteans assumedly between 12000-13000 and 8000-7500

years ago (the superfloods 2 and 3) as stated in his conclusions above: I merely maintain that there is no need toremove the capital city off a mid-Atlantic island when the book UNDERWORLD does indeed give good evidence thatsuch an island did indeed exist and even gives an adequate theory for its sinking to the bottom of the sea. It isessentially of no consequence that Hancock himself does not pursue the matter, because he is obviously trying toavoid the attacks of the more rabid kinds of critics. That there was a settlement on the Celtic Shelf is likely, but it wouldno more be "The Real Atlantis" than Tartessos or Tunisia-both of which areas possibly containing concentric-circlecities but then at one time such settlements were the rule rather than the exception. Many megalithic sites are builtupon the "Henge" plan, and this often carries foreward into the Celtic hill forts (and the idea of "Castles" generally inEurope), but there are other settlements made upon the plan in the New World as well, and they can be of ancientdate. So "The Real Atlantis" turnds out to be the "Empire", or rather, all of those areas inhabited by the Atlanteans.

And it is easy to see how the Atlanteans of the European continental shelf might easily retreat inland as the sea levelsrose and then their newly-colonised lands would become Megalithic Europe. There is a good chance that a parallelprocess was going on from Cuba )Antillia) to Mesoamerica at the same time.

D. Crisp's Atlantean Kingdoms, including also comparable territories of the Westen Mediterranean (also specified inPlato's Atlantis dialogues and presumably also the original Egyptian Myths. This seems likely because these areas arelater listed as the homes of the "Peples of the Sea" as listed by the Egyptians, and the "Peoples of the Sea" seem tobe basically Megalith-builder remnants uprooted from their homes by some catastrophe (said to be connected to themyth of Phaethon, but that's a different story)
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-9rN9KZNLQ6M/TithErrNKlI/AAAAAAAADiM/5lVwHxaL8MM/s1600/mapsViews810.bmp


14/18

Habitable North Sea Bottom 10000 years ago, compared to a chart for deeper water currents around Britain atpresent=the latter probably makes a pretty accurate predictor as to what was lans area then (White area). There is anindependant theory that Atlantis was at the bottom of the North Sea that can be neatly cannibalized here.
http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Ks9O7bpT3jo/Tith6QmY9oI/AAAAAAAADis/yauq0Z1QLyY/s1600/ukmap2_lg.jpghttp://2.bp.blogspot.com/-TUNSaSVphzg/Tith64rhwDI/AAAAAAAADi0/TF5gi05Nm5I/s1600/doggerland_450.jpghttp://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Ks9O7bpT3jo/Tith6QmY9oI/AAAAAAAADis/yauq0Z1QLyY/s1600/ukmap2_lg.jpghttp://2.bp.blogspot.com/-TUNSaSVphzg/Tith64rhwDI/AAAAAAAADi0/TF5gi05Nm5I/s1600/doggerland_450.jpg


15/18

Map of Megalithic culture following the Global Superflood 3, and concentric circles from Megalithic Ireland.

Physical type of the Megalith Builders as recognised in their modern descendants, and (below) megalithic remainsfrom the Netherlands.
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-cYM9ZRaNXTQ/Tith5jPp33I/AAAAAAAADic/D0-x4QE33uA/s1600/Megalith-builders.jpghttp://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ftlspfqu7AA/TithDgb_92I/AAAAAAAADhs/4oKggjfRWXQ/s1600/Irish+Megalithic.jpghttp://1.bp.blogspot.com/-u4HPSc8zkZg/Tith6FN3ZoI/AAAAAAAADik/_lRceOEz_m8/s1600/Megalithic+Europe.bmphttp://1.bp.blogspot.com/-cYM9ZRaNXTQ/Tith5jPp33I/AAAAAAAADic/D0-x4QE33uA/s1600/Megalith-builders.jpghttp://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ftlspfqu7AA/TithDgb_92I/AAAAAAAADhs/4oKggjfRWXQ/s1600/Irish+Megalithic.jpghttp://1.bp.blogspot.com/-u4HPSc8zkZg/Tith6FN3ZoI/AAAAAAAADik/_lRceOEz_m8/s1600/Megalithic+Europe.bmphttp://1.bp.blogspot.com/-cYM9ZRaNXTQ/Tith5jPp33I/AAAAAAAADic/D0-x4QE33uA/s1600/Megalith-builders.jpghttp://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ftlspfqu7AA/TithDgb_92I/AAAAAAAADhs/4oKggjfRWXQ/s1600/Irish+Megalithic.jpghttp://1.bp.blogspot.com/-u4HPSc8zkZg/Tith6FN3ZoI/AAAAAAAADik/_lRceOEz_m8/s1600/Megalithic+Europe.bmp


16/18

Megalith-Builders and Rock Artists of the Sahara, Ancestors of the Ancient Egyptians

http://www.grahamhancock.com/archive/underworld/DrSunilAtlantis.php?This is a short statement on the Graham Hancock site concerning the theory that prehistoric Sundaland was Plato's

Atlantis. Sundaland was the large exposed-land area in the place where we have Indonesia in more modern times,and because it is in the wrong hemisphere, it is not a suitable location for Atlantis. On the other hand it makes a mostsatisfactory location for Lemuria and it seems to be the center of a very old farming culture that was established atleast bu Global Superflood 1 and persisted until Global Superflood 3: ancestor of all the Agricultural cultures of Southand East Asia with some very early partially-ground stone tools and thought to have had pottery by 15000-16000years ago by some estimates published in the Scientific American. There are indications that large areas now underthe sea were cultivating rice before 10000 years ago. The book Eden in the Easthas an exellent summary ofevidence uin this area.
http://www.grahamhancock.com/archive/underworld/DrSunilAtlantis.phphttp://1.bp.blogspot.com/-SIzevPZ3I5c/TithEZVaUxI/AAAAAAAADiE/oeH2yMPoX4g/s1600/map34.jpghttp://3.bp.blogspot.com/-oDH0zTEdPM4/Tith5YHoitI/AAAAAAAADiU/s3xfhFTS77k/s1600/hunebed1.jpghttp://1.bp.blogspot.com/-SIzevPZ3I5c/TithEZVaUxI/AAAAAAAADiE/oeH2yMPoX4g/s1600/map34.jpghttp://3.bp.blogspot.com/-oDH0zTEdPM4/Tith5YHoitI/AAAAAAAADiU/s3xfhFTS77k/s1600/hunebed1.jpghttp://www.grahamhancock.com/archive/underworld/DrSunilAtlantis.php


17/18

An illustration of the Tamil legend of KumariKandem, the equivalent to Lemuria and Churchward's Mu. The Yonagunistructure off of Taiwan is more likely "Lemurian" in origin and there are probably thousands of other sites like it at thebottom of the sea in the general area. Taiwan is important as a dispersal point for the modern populations of PacificIslanders. The Pacific Island peoples are interesting because they have all gone through a bottleneck: they aregenetically distinct for tens of thousands of years and yet their dispersal is much more recent, in postglacial times.Most of them all speak related languages of the Malayo=Polynesian group, also postglacial and thought to havedispersed from about the area of modern Taiwan (See Wikipedia under Malayo-Polynesian Languages)
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-ySe1XTQVi6k/TithDzbNGgI/AAAAAAAADh0/MmvNentbYow/s1600/KumariKandam.jpghttp://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Q0WxIJesax4/TithEMD8f7I/AAAAAAAADh8/HSO8H2aojJM/s1600/Lemuria.jpghttp://2.bp.blogspot.com/-ySe1XTQVi6k/TithDzbNGgI/AAAAAAAADh0/MmvNentbYow/s1600/KumariKandam.jpghttp://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Q0WxIJesax4/TithEMD8f7I/AAAAAAAADh8/HSO8H2aojJM/s1600/Lemuria.jpg


18/18

Amended Chart for the Time Of Man (Alterations by DDincl. adding the dates of the three Global Superfloods. The last of the Superfloods also includes the Black Sea Flood.)
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-9P47LLQNTSE/Titinatm7iI/AAAAAAAADjk/T8xgFepPm04/s1600/timeofman_timeline.bmp

Documents

The Sunken Foreunners of Asia