Atlantis off the Gibraltar Strait? Myth and geology.

The bathymetric maps from the western part of the Gibraltar Strait indicate the occurrence of a shoal between -56 and -200 m depth. During the Late Glacial Maximum (21-19 kyr BP), this shoal was the main island of an archipelago lying between Europe and Africa. The island (14 km x 5 km) was set in the middle of a narrow pass in the western part of the present strait, opening westward into an inner sea. This island was submerged around I I kyr BR This location, the palaeolandscapes for the Late Glacial period, and the time of submergence exactly fit the Atlantis description given by Plato in the 'Timaeus'. The 'mighty power which unprovoked made an expedition against the whole of Europe and Asia' could be the irrupting culture of northern Europe pushed to the south by the rough climates of the Late Glacial Maximum. (C) 2001 Academie des sciences / Editions scientifiques et medicales Elsevier SAS.