Lost Worlds of the Atlantic 2 – Numenor/Atlantis

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Welcome to part 2 of Lost Worlds of the Atlantic – Numenor/Atlantis

If you remember from part one, many Tolkien fans believe that Plato’s Atlantis and Tolkien’s Numenor are actually one and the same. We are going to have a quick look at Plato’s directions, draw them out and see where it leads; then we will look at Tolkien’s map of Numenor and see if the map of the ocean floor, as the Middle Earth area does, bears a remarkable resemblance to the specific features shown on Tolkien’s map.
The translation of Plato’s description says basically that Atlantis was in the Atlantic beyond the Mediterranean Sea. It says it was in front of the mouth of the Mediterranean, and that it was “the way to other islands which led to an immense continent that surrounds them or engulfs the sea”.
The phrase “In front of” means that it was due west of it…not necessarily close to blocking it.
The phrase “That it was the way to other islands that led to an immense continent” means that by continuing past Atlantis you would find other islands that trail off toward an immense continent.

As you can see on this ARCgis.com map of the ocean floor, if you move due west from the Strait of Gibraltar you eventually come directly to the Corner Seamounts. Beyond that are other clearly visible seamounts (islands) that trail off until they reach North America. If Atlantis and Middle Earth were at one time above sea level, then North and South America, being even higher, would have been a single land mass engulfing most of the ocean.

This does not rule out the area as being Numenor (the description might have only mentioned the tallest peak and its location) but it is possibly bad news for any hopes of finding the actual main city of Numenor which was supposed to be east of the center mountain, near the shore.
I hope the remains of the city are at the bottom of the east side of the second peak, where the sea port might have been, but I fear the legends that say a volcano erupted and covered the city in lava as it sank beneath the waves might be true. In that case, there would be no possibility of finding any sign of a city there, but the island nation was large (hundreds of miles across) and if this is the location of Numenor or Atlantis, there will be other cities and temples, some high up on those mountains. So there is still a chance they could be found.

Personally, I believe this is the site of the location of Numenor. I also believe this is the site of the nation called Atlantis. I think that Plato was recounting stories and these stories that referred to Atlantis as larger than Libya and Asia combined were probably referring to its power and its area of influence rather than its physical size.

What has been achieved by the Tolkiens is unprecedented. No other lost world has had such benefactors, who by their efforts alone have rescued a civilization from obscurity. With their novels and stories they have rescued the heroic myths and legends of a society lost in disaster. Because of their dedication to detail and completeness, they will ultimately be responsible for the discovery of the location and the ruins of the civilization that no doubt spawned our own earliest civilizations’ architecture and metallurgy.

My love of the Tolkien works has been enhanced by these discoveries. I now have a hunger for more information, more history, as told in the many stories about Middle Earth and its legends written by both the Tolkien authors; J. R. R. and his son Christopher R.

Like so many people, I have read THE LORD OF THE RINGS, and THE HOBBIT. Now, I plan on reading the rest of their works, I recommend everyone do the same.