Message #160295

[Autolocus]

SIGNIFICANT PASSAGES FROM THE TALE

The Atlantis narrative has been so often translated and copied,
at least as to its more significant parts, that one hesitates to
quote again; but there are certain items to which attention
should be drawn, and brief extracts are the best means of ef-
fecting this. The following passages are from the Smithsonian
translation of Termier's remarkable paper on Atlantis repro-
duced by that institution. It differs verbally from the transla-
tion by Dr. Jowett but not in the broader features. Of the two
quotations the first is from the "Critias." It is briefer than
the other, though forming part of a more elaborate and extended
account of the island. Taking his appointed part in the dialogue,
Critias says:

According to the Egyptian tradition a common war arose 9,000 years
ago between the nations on this side of the Pillars of Hercules and the
nations coming from beyond. On one side it was Athens; on the other the
Kings of Atlantis. We have already said that this island was larger than
Asia and Africa, but that it became submerged following an earthquake
and that its place is no longer met with except as a sand bar which stops
navigators and renders the sea impassable. 4

Pierre Termier: Atlantis (transl. from Bull. I'Inst. Ocfanogr. No. 256, Monaco) ,
Ann. Rept. Smithsonian Instn. for 1915, Washington, D. C., pp. 219-234; reference
on p. 222.