Atlantis: The Antedeluvian WorldDonnelly, Ignatius
History
Atlantis: The Antedeluvian World
Donnelly, Ignatius
Atlantis (Legendary place); Deluge; Ethnology
The Tokhari, we have seen, are represented as taken prisoners, in a
sea-fight with Rhamses III., of the twentieth dynasty, about the
thirteenth century B.C. They are probably the Tochari of Strabo. The
accompanying figure represents one of these people as they appear upon
the Egyptian monuments. (See Nott and Gliddon's "Types of Mankind," p.
108.) Here we have, not an inhabitant of Atlantis, but probably a
representative of one of the mixed races that sprung from its colonies.
Dr. Morton thinks these people, as painted on the Egyptian monuments, to
have "strong Celtic features. Those familiar with the Scotch Highlanders
may recognize a speaking likeness."
It is at least interesting to have a portrait of one of the daring race
who more than three thousand years ago left the west of Europe in their
ships to attack the mighty power of Egypt.
They were troublesome to the nations of the East for many centuries; for
in 700 B.C. we find them depicted on the Assyrian monuments. This figure
represents one of the Tokhari of the time of Sennacherib. It will be
observed that the headdress (apparently of feathers) is the same in both
portraits, al, though separated by a period of six hundred years.
It is more reasonable to suppose that the authors of the Bronze Age of
Europe were the people described by Plato, who were workers in metal,
who were highly civilized, who preceded in time all the nations which we
call ancient. It was this people who passed through an age of copper
before they reached the age of bronze, and whose colonies in America
represented this older form of metallurgy as it existed for many
generations.
Professor Desor says:
"We are asked if the preparation of bronze was not an indigenous
invention which had originated on the slopes of the Alps?... In this
idea we acquiesced for a moment. But we are met by the objection that,
if this were so, the natives, like the ancient tribes of America, would
have commenced by manufacturing utensils of copper; yet thus far no
utensils of this metal have been found except a few in the strand of
Lake Garda. The great majority of metallic objects is of bronze, which
necessitated the employment of tin, and this could not be obtained
except by commerce, inasmuch as it is a stranger to the Alps. It would
appear, therefore, more natural to admit that the art of combining tin
with copper--in other words, that the manufacture of bronze--was of
foreign importation." He then shows that, although copper ores are found
in the Alps, the probability is that even "the copper also was of
foreign importation. Now, in view of the prodigious quantity of bronze
manufactured at that epoch, this single branch of commerce must itself
have necessitated the most incessant commercial communications."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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