Robert Snedden - Atlantis and Other Lost Worlds

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Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Snedden, Robert.

Title: Atlantis and other lost worlds / Robert Snedden.

Description: New York : Gareth Stevens, 2017. | Series: Mystery hunters | Includes index. Identifiers: ISBN 9781482459968 (pbk.) | ISBN 9781482459982 (library bound) | ISBN 9781482459975 (6 pack)

Subjects: LCSH: Atlantis (Legendary place)--Juvenile literature.

Classification: LCC GN751.S64 2017 | DDC 001.94--dc23

First Edition

Published in 2017 by

Gareth Stevens Publishing
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Copyright 2017 Gareth Stevens Publishing

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CONTENTS

People have always been fascinated by stories about lost cities and lands, of great cities that are impossible to find, of lands hidden beneath the surface of Earth, or kingdoms that have vanished beneath the ocean waves. Some people are so convinced by these tales that they believe they are more than just stories. They look for evidence that these lost places were real.

Unknown Lands

Why do we tell stories about mythical lost cities and lands? Tales of mysterious, distant places have always captured the imagination. Long before the map of the world was complete, it was easy to weave fantastic stories about what might lie in unknown parts of the planet. Until the seventeenth century, for example, the people of Europe had no idea that the continent of Australia even existed.

Some of the stories of lost places may be no more than that: just stories. However, archaeologists and scientists have uncovered evidence that some places that vanished from history actually did exist.

MYSTERY HUNTER

Look for the Mystery Hunter boxes throughout the book. They will ask you to consider the information given in each chapter and answer questions based on what you have read. Then turn to pages 4445 to see if your answer is correct.

The Truth About Troy

Did the Greeks wooden horse look something like this? No one knows!

You might have heard the story of the ancient city of Troy and its war with Greece, called the Trojan War, and how the Greeks soldiers hid in a giant wooden horse to get inside the enemy city. For a long time, historians believed that the story, like Troy itself, was just a myth.

The nineteenth-century German archaeologist Heinrich Schliemann thought the city really did exist. In a series of digs, Schliemann uncovered the ruins of Troy in what is now Turkey. The city does indeed seem to have been destroyed by the Greek armies of King Agamemnon sometime between 1260 and 1240 BC. However, the tale of the wooden horse may be no more than an exciting story.

The Cliff Palace was forgotten for 500 years.

MYSTERIOUS FACTS

Before Europeans arrived in America, Native Americans lived in towns and villages across the continent. In the southwestern United States, people lived in towns cut out of cliffs. Historians call these cliff dwellers Pueblo peoples (pueblo is Spanish for town). The largest cliff town was the Cliff Palace in Colorado. It was abandoned around AD 1300 and remained undiscovered until 1888, when riders looking for stray cattle came upon it.

Flood and Fire

Is it possible that natural disasters were the seeds for some of the myths and legends of lost places? Could floods, volcanic eruptions, or other disasters have buried whole cities beneath water or ash?

Lost in Legend

Legend tells us that the lost city of Ys, said to have been the most beautiful in Europe, once stood on the coast of Brittany in France. In one story, the coast was being worn away by the sea, threatening the city with flooding. The king built a wall around the city to protect it from the water. A single gate, to which only the king had the key, was opened at low tide to let ships in. One stormy night, however, the kings daughter was tempted by the Devil into opening the gate. The sea swept in and Ys was lost. According to the legend, the church bells of Ys can still be heard when the sea is calm.

It is easy to imagine how real experiences of flooding could give rise to a story like that of Ys. There are similar stories, such as the mythical city of Kitezh, which was said to have sunk beneath Lake Svetloyar in Russia. The Isles of Scilly off the coast of Cornwall in England are believed to be the site of the vanished great kingdom of Lyonessewhere the legendary King Arthur of Britain is said to have fought his last battle. In fact, there is some evidence that rising sea levels may have flooded large areas around AD 400 to 500, turning one large landmass into the many small islands we know today.

Mount Vesuvius still looms over the ruins of Pompeii. The last major eruption took place in 1944.

Disaster came so swiftly to Pompeii that many people had no time to flee and were buried beneath the ash.

Lost Pompeii

An erupting volcano can also cause massive destruction. In AD 79, the volcano Vesuvius in Italy erupted in a devastating explosion that buried the Roman town of Pompeii under a thick layer of ash and rock. Pompeii vanished and became largely forgotten, except in stories. It was rediscovered nearly 1,700 years later, when a canal was being constructed near the site of the buried town.