In the dialogue Timaeus, written in the fifth century before Mr. E. ancient Greek philosopher Plato, one of Crete tells the amazing story of Her allegedly told Solon - Athenian statesman who lived two centuries before Plato, Egyptian priests from the city of SAIs

"There was an island which lay before the Strait which you call Gerlovina pillars, He was named Atlantis, and was more than Libya and Asia together

The government of the Union of the kings of this island stretched to many other Islands and on the opposite part of the mainland, and on the side of the channel - up to Egypt and the TIR* of (Italy) But when 9000 years ago there was unprecedented earthquakes and floods, Atlantis disappeared one terrible day, plunging into the abyss "

In another dialogue "of Crete" - Plato describes in detail Atlantis

"The land of Atlantis was generous, the island was struck by the magnificence and abundance Even elephants were found on him a great multitude Using the gifts of the earth, the kings ustroilsya-tilida palaces, harbour and shipyard and put in order the entire country They threw the water bridge rings surrounding the ancient metropolis Just had enough Kings encouraged the development of all sorts of crafts, science and culture, which reached on the island of unprecedented prosperity

Laws in Atlantis were established according to the regulations of the God Poseidon and traced the first kings on a marble stele which stood at the center of the island-the inside of the temple of Poseidon "

The followers of Plato, including the greatest scientist-encyclopaedist antiquity, Aristotle, for centuries discussed the reliability of the presented Plato information and the probability of the existence of Atlantis With the onset of middle age mention of this island and its inhabitants Atlantis disappear And only with the discovery of America by Columbus in 1492 Atlantis once again the subject of controversy philosophers, historians, geographers

In 1535 in Seville a book Gonzalo Fernandez of Debeda-and-Valdes, dedicated to "Indian" the author compares the power and high culture of peoples inhabiting open Columbus "India", with the words of Plato, that the power of the kings of Atlantis was extended to "opposite mainland," He comes to the assumption that "India" is Plato's Atlantis Soon everything appeared in the works of other Spaniards, as well as in the works, published in England and France

Over the next three centuries, scientists of many countries, adjusting the results of the latest geographical and archaeological discoveries under their hypotheses, tried to open the Atlantis in different parts of the globe - not only in the Atlantic (in particular, in the Sargasso sea), but also in the Mediterranean, Scandinavia, Africa and EB mouth Obi the beginning of the XX century, the German researcher Leo Frobenius found in Nigeria, on the lands of the African people yoru BA, terracotta sculptures and bronze head God of the sea Olokun performed with astonishing realism and skill Later there were discovered the ruins of the ancient city IFA cyclopean buildings of stone walls were covered with a tiled stove and a copper plate Frobenius suggested that Olokun is Poseidon's Yoruba wearing dark blue clothes, the descendants of the Atlanteans, vestments which (according to Plato) were mostly of the same color

Up in 1964 publishing house "Idea" has issued a monograph N f Zhirova "Atlantis" In it the author expresses the conviction that the main Empire of Atlantis existed on the site of the present Azores archipelago

In the late 60-ies of the magazine " Kurier", the organ of UNESCO, wrote about mysterious structures found in shallow water near the Islands of Bimini and Andros Bahamas archipelago One of them is the similarity of the ancient bridge, photographed under water, was shown on all-Union TV "Club of travellers" But so far nobody has been able to prove that it is a creation of human hands, and, moreover, that these hands were the hands of Atlantis In March 1979, Western news agencies have spread sensational news in research submarine mountain Amper Soviet oceanologists from the research vessel "Vityaz" found Atlantida In particular, the Agency "Reuters" passed from Lisbon "Soviet scientists recently got pictures that might confirm the existence of between Portugal and the island of Madeira lost continent of Atlantis, a Prominent Soviet oceanographer Dr. Andrei aksyonau said that the photos are visible underwater mountain to the ruins of walls and huge staircase"

However, it turned out that the pictures were taken much earlier, and not with the "Vityaz", and with the ship "Moscow University", and that Aksenov only mentioned imprinted on these two images residues of artificial constructions of Course, the pictures did not give grounds to consider these constructions belonging to the legendary Atlantis

And here is the latest sensation

In the magazine Weekly World News 24 April 2001 reported that almost 30 years ago, on July 25, 1973, the American submarine found Atlantis off the coast of Spain, the Author is a researcher Jeremy Jorvik, prepared for printing the book "Mission - Atlantis know sailors lost continent"

According to Horwich referring to recently declassified documents and interviews with former seamen, "the ruins lie at the depth of 1600 meters and occupy a huge area, approximately 50 square kilometers"

Then the commander of the submarine informed the authorities about sensational opening, then immediately got an order to consider it a top-secret Order originated from the Richard Nixon, US President

"Nixon's advisors, including Henry Kissinger, " continues Jorvik, from legends knew about the progress in Atlantis high technical level, they also Knew that during the Second world war in search of Atlantis sent their submarines Hitler, who hoped to discover and apply technological achievements Atlanteans for creation of weapons, which would have allowed Germany to conquer the world

Nixon believed that the use of "technological innovations" Atlanteans could provide America's victory in the cold war against the Soviet Union, so he decided to try to get them And the Russians failed to beat the Americans, Nixon and ordered to classify everything that was associated with the opening of the sunken island

Since then, the U.S. Navy has organized four expeditions Atlantide on submarines, equipped with the latest search engine technology Last one took place in 1997 Jorvik argues that these expeditions returned not only with samples of subjects of ancient culture, but also with products, confirming a high technical and scientific level of civilization of Atlantes

"Apparently technique and technology of Atlantis was based on the principles still remain far ahead just made modern Western science, " says Jorvik - For me there is no doubt that such novelties of our military equipment, such as aircraft invisible, built to Stells-technologies and anti-missile systems currently under development in the USA and strongly promoted by President Bush, are created using knowledge, poluchennykh a result of the studies of the finds recovered from the ocean floor near the Spanish coast"