Fights against the Libyans are mentioned from early times, long before the Sea Peoples´ war in the time of Rameses III, where the “Libu” were counted as one nation among the “Sea Peoples”

About 2900 BC : King Scorpion performed a victorious military campaign against the Libyans.

About 2600 BC : Another successful campaign against Libya took place under pharaoh Snofru

About 2470 BC : Pharaoh Sahure sent the Egyptian fleet against Libya and won the battle

About 1960 BC : Campaign of an Egyptian army against Libya under pharaoh Sesostris

About 1335 BC : An attack of Libyan warriors into the Nile delta region was beaten off by pharaoh Rameses II

About 1305 BC : Egyptian campaign against Libya

About 1230 BC : Egypteans drove out the Libyans from the Nile delta under pharaoh Merenptah

About 1228 BC : Libyans force their way into the Nile delta and are settling there

About 1193 BC : Rameses III defeats the Libyans in the Nile delta

About 1189 BC : Egyptian fleet under Rameses III defeats a fleet of the Sea Peoples

About 1187 BC : Egyptian army beats off an attack of the Libyans

1085 – 950 BC : Pharaohs are dependent from Libyan mercenaries

950 – 730 BC : Libyan kings rule in Egypt as the 22th dynasty

It seems that the Libyans played for more than 2000 years a very important role in the Mediterranean. The Egyptian inscriptions are naturally containing only their own victories and not the battles won by the Libyans.

What can we deduce from this for our Atlantis problem?

According to many modern scholars, the first naval BATTLE in history took place ca 1175 BC when Ramses III defeated the Pelestim.

However, your list describes an entirely different viewpoint for the first naval battle. You show a sea battle ca 2470 BC between the Libyans and Egyptians.

Herodotus agrees with this notion of an ancient naval power which had its homebase in Libya.

Here is what Herodotus tells us about the origin of the Greek pantheon, especially Poseidon/Neptune.

One and only one god came from the Libyans. That is Poseidon/Neptune. In fact, the ONLY country which worshipped Poseidon in ancient times was Libya (at least according to Herodotus).

A handful of female goddesses came from the Pelasgians: Juno, Hestia, Themis, the Graces and the Nereids.

The Dioscuri twins also came from the Pelasgians.

And all the other Greek Gods came from Egypt (at least that is what Herodotus claimed).

quote from: http://www.geocities.com/Athens/1314/Lesson1.html
"Almost all the names of the gods came into Greece from Egypt. My inquiries prove that they were all derived from a foreign source, and my opinion is that Egypt furnished the greater number. For with the exception of Neptune and the Dioscuri, whom I mentioned above, and Juno, Vesta, Themis, the Graces, and the Nereids, the other gods have been known from time immemorial in Egypt. This I assert on the authority of the Egyptians themselves. The gods, with whose names they profess themselves unacquainted, the Greeks received, I believe, from the Pelasgi, except Neptune. Of him they got their knowledge from the Libyans, by whom he has been always honoured, and who were anciently the only people that had a god of the name. The Egyptians differ from the Greeks also in paying no divine honours to heroes.

Unfortunately I do not know more about the military naval expedition in 2470 BC. I found this point in the book "Peter´s Synchronoptical World History", edited 2001 in Munich/ Germany, where all known historical dates are collected in their chronological order of events, but without mentioning the respective source.

What we have shown you all.

Atalante and myself that is.

Atlantis Continental Island
The Egyptian Secrets
Lake Tritonis
Atalantes/Aterians
Cyrene
Atranto
Araklum
Very early Sea battles.
Kings,Queens and in betweens.
Pharaohs,Sparrows and Falcons.

Think of the Egyptian Heiroglyph for Atlantis and you will see the balance of the scales.

2 Falcons facing west
1 lion facing west
2 half suns
1 water symbol
1 reed
1 Crook

It all adds upto Life.

Libya played a very important role with Atlantis where Thoth gathered wisdom and Atlas/Neptune established the last Atlantean stronghold.

If you would like to see the Glyph;
http://www.mts.net/~perasa/

That puts Atlantis in the Atlantic.

Plato was very specific on the fact that Atlantis was located in the Atlantic Ocean.

Indeed, this ocean took this name because it was deemed the "Ocean of the Atlanteans". Hence, Mediterranean locations such as Troy, Crete (Thera), Carthage, the Bosphorus, etc., automatically disqualify as the site of Atlantis.

However, one should carefully recall that what the ancients called by the name of Atlantic Ocean, or others such as Outer Ocean, Kronius Oceanus, Mare Magnum, Mare Oceanum, etc., was not the same one we now address by that name. As we discuss in detail elsewhere, the Atlantic Ocean (or simply "Ocean") of the ancients of the times of Plato, Herodotus, Aristotle and others was the whole of the earth encircling ocean. This difference in nomenclature is essential, for it ties with the root of the problem of Atlantis, and explains why all researchers so far have failed to find the true site of Atlantis.

The ancients figured the world that is, the lands they knew of (Eurasia and Africa), the so-called Ancient World as a roughly circular plate surrounded all around by the Ocean ("Atlantic"). Outside this Circular Ocean, "containing" it, so to speak, was the true "Continent",..
.... As a matter of fact, the very word "Ocean" derives from the Sanskrit acayana meaning "encircling all around".

The ancients figured the world that is, the lands they knew of (Eurasia and Africa), the so-called Ancient World as a roughly circular plate surrounded all around by the Ocean ("Atlantic"). Outside this Circular Ocean, "containing" it, so to speak, was the true "Continent",..
.... As a matter of fact, the very word "Ocean" derives from the Sanskrit acayana meaning "encircling all around".

Agreed Cat,
While it is sometimes appropriate to take things out of context, it is not always appropriate.

I did some checking about Sahure ca 2470 BC, and his navy etc.

The first recorded visit to the distant land of Punt took place under Sahure.

And Sahure had a fleet of ships going to asia (Byblos?), manned by both asiatics and Egyptians.

Sahure's report about his attack on Libya is considered semi-Legendary, because it was plagiarized by two later Pharoahs, including the 25th dynasty pharoah Taharqa (680-664 BC), who ruled Egypt at the same time when Phoenicia was conquored by the Assyrians. During Taharqa's reign, a large number of Phoenician colonists was migrating to the west end of the Mediterranean Sea.

The plagiarizing behavior of Taharka makes it clear that texts about Sahure's "Libyan raid" story could have been available to the priests who told Solon about Atlantis.

quote from: http://encyclozine.com/Sahure
Most foreign relations during the reign of Sahure were economic, rather then combative...

However, this same scene of the Libyan attack was used two thousand years later in the mortuary temple of Pepi II and in a Kawa temple of Taharqa. The same names are quoted for the local chieftain. Therefore, we become somewhat suspicious of the possibility that Sahure was also copying an even earlier representation of this scene.
endquote

As I mentioned in the other thread where you discussed this same subject:

A possibility that the even earlier reference relates the story of the Baltic Libya, pre-dating the migrations south of all the cultures/tribes maintaining their positions surrounding the Middle-Earth-Sea at the end of the climatic optimum.

See thread HOMER IN THE BALTIC

However, one should carefully recall that what the ancients called by the name of Atlantic Ocean, or others such as Outer Ocean, Kronius Oceanus, Mare Magnum, Mare Oceanum, etc., was not the same one we now address by that name. As we discuss in detail elsewhere, the Atlantic Ocean (or simply "Ocean") of the ancients of the times of Plato, Herodotus, Aristotle and others was the whole of the earth encircling ocean. This difference in nomenclature is essential, for it ties with the root of the problem of Atlantis, and explains why all researchers so far have failed to find the true site of Atlantis.

It would be nice if we can reach a concensus that the ENTIRE mediterranean region is part of the encircling Ocean. In the quote below, Aristotle is saying that the Ocean flows around Greece (i.e. "around us").

The corresponding quote from pseudo-Aristotle is:
Cf. De mundo syr. 139.16-21, 139.23-140.1 [< gr. 393a 16-21, 23-28]: That sea which is outside the whole Habitable World is called the Atlantic and the Oceanus. It also flows around us here. Because on the west a narrow mouth (fumo aliso) is open to it from the inside – at what are called the Stelae (STLWS) of Hercules – its flow proceeds into this sea by us, as if into some harbour, and thus widens out little by little here, spreading out until it embraces (lobek < perilambánô) the large gulfs which adjoin each other. … It is said first to widen out to the right after proceeding from the Stelae (ST’LS) of Hercules and is divided into two gulfs and passes the islands called the Syrtes, one of which they call the Greater Syrtes and the other the Lesser Syrtes. On the other, northern, side it does not widen out immediately in the same way, but makes there too three gulfs (cubbin),18 that called the Sardinian (SWRDWNYQWN), that called the Galatian (G’LTYQWN) and the Great Adriatic (’DRY’S rabbo). After these is another slanting gulf which is called the Sicilian (SQYLYQWN).

it is really interesting what you found out about Sahure and his navy.
And also the remarks in the "570 bC -Atlantis Risen" thread about a possible Libyan sea base in the lake Tritonis, which was in old times connected to the Mediterranean.

Archaeological findings of the Bell Beaker People (2500 - 2000 BC) are known from Morocco, but as far as I know not yet from Libya. This does not say that they could not be there. In this area only few excavations were made up to now.

But do you remember when Jonas Bergman first posted his website? Initially it included a link to a college masters thesis, which covered BOTH Morocco and Algeria, as far east as Cape Bon (=Carthage/Utica). Perhaps that link was titled Mzora, but I am not sure.

It turns out that there was a megalithic construction style along the SOUTHWEST coast of the Med, from Gibralter to Cape Bon. These people, or this culture, is in the right place to be using obsidian from a source a little way offshore from Cape Bon. That source of obsidian was the island of Pantelleria.

If this was a unified culture across northwest Africa, then the Bell Beaker people probably only delivered goods to the WESTERN end of that culture. So the Egyptians would only hear rumors about Bell Beaker People, instead of making direct contacts.

and now changing topics:
2) There were two different groups of Hyksos. Dynasty 14 called themselves the Khasus, and seized nome 6 of the Nile Delta, called Xois in Greek language (immediately south of Neith's two nomes, 4 and 5). Then the next dynasty of Hyksos called themselves "overlords of the Kasus", or Hyk Khasu, and ruled from their capital city at Avaris.

The ancient Egyptian story called The Contendings of Set and Horus is talking about the politics of that first Kasu dynasty 14 (becasue it claims the Ennead gods ruled from the the city of Xois, rather than the normal location at Heliopolis). Riven was amused when I pointed out to him that this Egyptian story, The Contendings of Set and Horus, can be regarded as THE LOST ENDING OF PLATO'S CRITIAS. (In that story, Neith is called Neith the Great, meanwhile Zeus is called the Universal Lord.)

I expect that the two dynasties of Hyksos were tied to the general region of Syria, and had very little to do with Libya.

3) Descendents of the Meshwesh were probably the dominant culture, or civilization, in northern Libya during 1200-700 BC.

But then around 700 BC, the 25th dynasty of Egypt conquored the Sais/Meshwesh people, and thus unified Egypt for about a century. In my opinion, this CONQUEST of the Libyan Meshwesh and of Sais is the reason why the 25th dynasty pharoah Taharqa (680-664 BC) plagiarized the old theme of (Sahure) defeating a powerful Libyan adversary.

Bodies of salt water are separated into 3 sizes:
gulf (small), sea (medium), and ocean (large).

Plato consistently stated that Atlantis was located in or on a SEA (pelagos).

And to be more precise, Plato never used the word "ocean" as a location for Atlantis.
(This is one of the most impressive items which I noticed in the research of Georgeos).

quote:

---

Yep, Atlantis was located in the Atlantic Ocean. It was also called "open sea", while the Mediterranean was only called a "harbor".

---

I agree with Smiley. If Plato can call the Mediterranean a harbor, then the Atlantic could easily be referred to as a sea. We have to consider that Plato is speaking relatively.

Also, it is important to look at his dialogues in context.

Diodorus collected information about the Amazons for his book "Bibliotheca Historica" (Historical Library) from the book “Kyklos” of Dionysios of Mytilene (2th century BC), who got his information during his studies in the famous library of Alexandria from older books of Linos and Timoites (now lost).

According to the stories, the Atlanteans inhabited a rich country bordering the Atlantic ocean. The Atlanteans were notable for their hospitality to strangers and boasted that the gods were born among them. They claimed Uranus as their first King, and it was he who civilized the people "causing them to dwell in cities and till the soil". After his death, Uranus' 45 children divided the Kingdom when Atlas (one of the Titans) received the area of Atlantis and named it for himself. Atlas was a wise ruler and like his father was a great astrologer. Since he was the first one to discover the knowledge of the sphere, the people have created a legend saying that he bears the world upon his shoulders. His seven daughters, Atlantides, were adored as goddesses, and their offspring were the first ancestors of several nations, including Greek civilization.
http://www.auburn.edu/~downejm/sp/epsaas/epsaasDiod.html http://www.timelessmyths.com/classical/amazons.html

There is no such thing as a "Great Astrologer". It is an oxymoron, with the emphasis on moron.

many thousands of supposedly intelligent people still believe that one may be born under the domination of a lucky or an unlucky star; that the juxtaposition of the heavenly bodies determines the outcome of various terrestrial adventures. Fortunetellers are still patronized by the credulous.

The courses of the stars in the heavens have nothing whatever to do with the events of human life on earth. Astronomy is a proper pursuit of science, but astrology is a mass of superstitious error.

This pseudo science of Babylon developed into a religion throughout the Greco-Roman Empire. Even in the twentieth century man has not been fully delivered from this superstitious belief.

In your last post, about Diodorus and his Amazon/Atlantean stories, I noticed an interesting issue.

If the mythical Amazons (i.e. Libya) made war againt the Egyptian god-king Horus, this could supply a crucial linkage.

Diodorus seems to be implying that the Egyptian god-king Set (who attacked Horus the Elder and poked out one eye of Horus) corresponds to Diodorus's Amazons.

Modern Berbers may be the cultural descendents of both the Amazons and Set.

Certainly it could be useful to look at any mention of the Libyans in Egyptian texts, if they could have to do with Atlantis. On the other hand, not necessarily must the Libyans always have been allied with the Atlanteans; from Plato´s text we know it only for the time of the war.

The Berbers are often described as descendants of the old Libyans, and the so called Tifinag alphabet of the Touaregs, a surviving Berber tribe, might well have had its roots in the alphabet of Atlantis.

Just two months ago a book was edited in Germany, which is locating Atlantis itself near the lake Tritonis in Algeria.

Ulrich Hofmann: Platons Insel Atlantis, 264 pages, edited by Books on Demand, 2004

In the book is no hint to an english website, but I remember that there existed a website with the same location.
I will read the book in the next weeks to find out if something interesting is to be found there for our topic.

Unfortunately I have no time now for further discussion, because I leave my home for about 4 weeks.

Hofmann looks at the predynastic cultures in Egypt, especially the so called Naqada I (4000 – 3600 BC) , and found close relations between their customs of burying their dead and decorating their ceramics with those in north west Africa. Already Flinders Petrie, the first explorer of the “Naqada culture”, thought that these peoples would have had immigrated from the west, from Libya. They decorated their ceramic vessels with ship patterns, and also among the rock engravings from this time are many ships.
http://www.artsales.com/ARTistory/Ancient_Ships/02_edpetros.html
> The earliest historic record of seafaring ships that can be found seem to be the Neolithic petroglyphs or rock art that are found in the Egyptian eastern desert.
Many of these patterns have been dated to the Naqada period of Egyptian history which covers approximately the period of 4500-3100 BCE <<

It seems that the ships with the high bows and sterns (as the boat on the Phaistos disk) were sea-going vessels and not only river boats, and that the immigrants (or traders) came from the Mediterranean and from the West. Remembering Plato´s statement that Libya was part of the empire of Atlantis, it is probable that we can see Atlantean ships in the ship petroglyphs of the Egyptian Eastern Desert .

Hofmann thinks that the first high culture in Egypt, long before the first dynasty, was coming from the west, from Atlantis-Libya, and that also among the first pharaohs and their wives were descendants of the “Tehenu” (Libyans).

Also the “Gebel el-Arak knife”, from prehistoric Egypt, Naqada II (3500 – 3100 BC) shows boats of the “Phaistos disk” type, as Riven has found out. http://www.homestead.com/wysinger/gebelea.html
>The other interesting thing is that the foreigners being attacked with the long hair look like the Maxyans as described by Herodotus. Definitely Libyan ancestors I would say. < (Riven)

It seems worthwile to make further study on the relations between early Libyans (Atlanteans) and early Egypteans

That region also contains ruins of the oldest known gold mines. Ancient ships may have been used to transport the ancient gold,
so I am re-posting here a message which I previously put in the Zep Tepi topic.

atalante
Member posted 01-22-2005 13:34
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Research during 2002-2005 has located what is believed to be the earliest goldsmiths in the world. Tentatively the culture is dated 5500-3100 BC. It was located in southeast Egypt, near the Red Sea, in the Valley of Daghbeg.
quote from the Discovery Channel in Feb 2002: http://dsc.discovery.com/news/briefs/20020204/egyptian.html

The discovery of several mines that date to 5,500-3,100 B.C. in southern Egypt leads researchers there to believe the ancient Egyptians were the first to extract gold and to use the precious metal for making jewelry.

While the exact dates of the mines have yet to be confirmed, researcher Ali Barakat of Egypt's Geological Survey Authority recently told the Egyptian State Information Service that the Egyptians who lived both near the Red Sea and in the Valley of Daghbeg were the world's first goldsmiths.

Barakat added that the ancient Egyptians were the first to map geological charts of gold mines. He also said that they developed an effective technique for extracting gold from quartz veins.
According to Barakat, remnants of tools and ditches suggest that workers would grind stone containing gold into a fine powder. Water would be added to help dissolve deposits. The mixture then was poured into square-shaped basins that would trap sediments and leave the gold for collecting.

...

Although the metal was plentiful, it was reserved for nobility.

"The Egyptians referred to it as the skin, or the flesh, of the gods," she said. "Because of its color, gold was also associated with the sun."

endquote

That article by Discovery Channel was based on a press release in January 2002 by the Egyptian State News Agency. http://www.sis.gov.eg/online/html4/o230821.htm

One very interesting element of this story is that large "channels" have now been discovered in association with perhaps the earliest gold mining culture in the world.

These archaeological finds help to explain the function (i.e. sedimentary ore processing) of some upstream "channels" in Plato's story of Atlantis.

And farthermore, the ancient Egyptians had told Solon/Plato that Atlantis had a massive amount of gold, as reported in Critias 120e-121a. http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/ptext?doc=Perseus:text:1999.01.0180

Critias 120e
Consequently they thought scorn of everything save virtue and lightly esteemed their rich possessions, bearing with ease

[121a] the burden, as it were, of the vast volume of their gold and other goods; and thus their wealth did not make them drunk with pride so that they lost control of themselves

Mythically speaking, this 5500-3100 BC period for Egypt's Daghbeg gold mines can correlate to the "golden age" which was ruled by the Greek god Cronos.

Absonite: You are the first to point out that the names of the oceans were not what we call them today, but say that the Mediterranean was no harbor based upon what it appears today.

quote:

---

the Atlantic Ocean (or simply "Ocean") of the ancients of the times of Plato, Herodotus, Aristotle and others was the whole of the earth encircling ocean.

[quote]This power came forth out of the Atlantic Ocean, for in those days the Atlantic was navigable; and there was an island situated in front of the straits which are by you called the Pillars of Heracles; the island was larger than Libya and Asia put together, and was the way to other islands, and from these you might pass to the whole of the opposite continent which surrounded the true ocean;

---

This description is distinctly separating 2 completely different bodies of water ... i.e. the Atlantic Ocean and the "true ocean" beyond which would be the ocean that you are speaking about.

But, it is quite clear that they are 2 distinctly different bodies of water, and the ancients knew the difference.

Also, in this passage, the location is clear. An island was

quote:

---

an island situated in front of the straits which are by you called the Pillars of Heracles

---

quote:

---

You think the Mediterranean is just a harbor? Try swimming it sometime.

---

You are "assuming" that the Mediterranean has always been as it is now, but it hasn't. There was a time when a whole lot more land was above the Mediterranean Sea's level. So, if we put it into perspective, at one time, the Mediterranean could have been what they would have called a "harbor".

Why do you think that they find so many submerged cities?

quote:

---

Who called it a harbor?

---

quote:

---

This power came forth out of the Atlantic Ocean, for in those days the Atlantic was navigable; and there was an island situated in front of the straits which you call the Columns of Heracles: the island was larger than Libya and Asia put together, and was the way to other islands, and from the islands you might pass through the whole of the opposite continent which surrounded the true ocean; for this sea which is within the Straits of Heracles is only a harbor, having a narrow entrance, but that other is a real sea, and the surrounding land may be most truly called a continent.

---

If you note, he said specifically

quote:

---

for this sea which is within the Straits of Heracles is only a harbor, having a narrow entrance,

---

You have pointed to a very important clue:

> The discovery of several mines that date to 5,500-3,100 B.C. in southern Egypt leads researchers there to believe the ancient Egyptians were the first to extract gold and to use the precious metal for making jewelry<

When this part of Egypt was a famous source of gold, it is obvious why the Atlanteans may have travelled there by ship - via Mediterranean and Nile river - to get this precious metal. It is also possible that they, having special experience in gold mining, were exploring new sources and during one of these expeditions came to this remote place, as our today oil explorers are searching everywhere on the globe.

quote:

---

...(Petrie) discovered many cemeteries on the western bank of the Nile, between the districts of Naquada and Ballas, the contents of which differed considerably from those of other graves in Egypt, and which he therefore regarded not as Egyptian but as belonging probably to a Lybian race." One of the remarkable differences was the posture of the buried dead. With few exceptions up to this time the dead were found lying on their backs or on their sides at full length, the bodies found by Dr. Petrie in the districts named were "doubled up, the knees drawn up, the hands before the face, and lying on the left side ... The funeral objects were peculiar." These considerations led Dr. Petrie to conclude that the race they represented was not Egyptian, A year later, however, the French Egyptologist Prof. E. Amelineau made discoveries of a similar character in the "rubbish mounds known as Umm el-Ga'ab, near the ancient, sacred city of Abydos." "The tombs of the kings of Abydos," remarks Prof. Steindorff, "being purely Egyptian (as the inscriptions found in them prove,) it naturally follows that the civilization brought to light through these tombs is also Egyptian, and does not belong to another people as Petrie at first assumed."

---

Scroll about 1/2 way down to see some period pieces discovered.

Decorated with an unusual burial scene, it had been considered a fake, as it was "too good to be true". The decoration on the vase shows a figure on a boat, lying on its back and curled in the foetal position. This is how some early Egyptians may have been buried before mummification was introduced.