When I saw the WordPress Daily Prompt of City today, the first thing that popped into my mind was the lost city/island/continent of Atlantis.
Atlantis (Ancient Greek: Ἀτλαντὶς νῆσος, “island of Atlas”) is a fictional island mentioned within an allegory on the hubris of nations in Plato’s works Timaeus and Critias, where it represents the antagonist naval power that besieges “Ancient Athens”, the pseudo-historic embodiment of Plato’s ideal state.
In the story, Athens repels the Atlantean attack, unlike any other nation of the (western) known world, supposedly giving testament to the superiority of Plato’s concept of a state. At the end of the story, Atlantis eventually falls out of favor with the gods and famously submerges into the Atlantic Ocean.

Despite its minor importance in Plato’s work, the Atlantis story has had a considerable impact on literature. The allegorical aspect of Atlantis was taken up in utopian works of several Renaissance writers, such as Francis Bacon’s New Atlantis and Thomas More’s Utopia.
On the other hand, 19th-century amateur scholars misinterpreted Plato’s account as historical tradition, most notably in Ignatius L. Donnelly’s Atlantis: The Antediluvian World. Plato’s vague indications of the time of the events — more than 9,000 years before his day — and the alleged location of Atlantis — “beyond the Pillars of Hercules” — has led to much pseudoscientific speculation. As a consequence, Atlantis has become a byword for any and all supposed advanced prehistoric lost civilizations and continues to inspire contemporary fiction, from comic books to films.
While present-day philologists and historians accept the story’s fictional character, there is still debate on what served as its inspiration. The fact that Plato borrowed some of his allegories and metaphors — most notably the story of Gyges — from older traditions has caused a number of scholars to investigate possible inspiration of Atlantis from Egyptian records of the Thera eruption, the Sea Peoples invasion, or the Trojan War. Others have rejected this chain of tradition as implausible and insist that Plato designed the story from scratch, drawing loose inspiration from contemporary events like the failed Athenian invasion of Sicily in 415–413 BC or the destruction of Helike in 373 BC.
This leaves Atlantis as one of the ultimate mystery locations… and my photo does not help to reveal its coordinates!
Technical Details
The image was captured with a Canon EOS 5D Mk II using an EF 24-105mm f/4L lens. Exposure settings were 1/100 second at f/6.3 and 400 ISO.
Neat! I loved learning more about that myth!
Thank you! Glad you enjoyed it.
Frank
Interesting. I enjoy a good search to prove a myth true. However it always turns out that the find interpretation is biased to fit the myth.
Nice picture.
Glad you enjoyed it! This is one myth that I think is truly mythical without any basis in fact. If you want to find Atlantis, the Bahamas are your best bet 🙂
Great photo. I’ve always wondered (and admittedly, still do) whether Atlantis was an actual place. Love your creativity, Frank. Blessings!
Thank you, Debbie!