An 800-year-old medieval map of Nice Britain stored in an Oxford library has been studied by two scientists and it clearly exhibits two islands mendacity off the Welsh coast, giving additional momentum to the “Welsh Atlantis” principle.

Enshrined in legend for hundreds of years, many tales and tales have been advised concerning the legendary lacking land misplaced beneath Cardigan Bay, Wales. The researchers counsel that one of many islands is located between Aberystwyth and Aberdovey, with the opposite nearer to Barmouth within the north, based on Nice Britain’s “oldest map.”

This can be proof of the legendary sunken kingdom of Cantre’r Gwaelod, mentioned to be misplaced within the levels of post-glacial evolution. The 2 lecturers engaged on this examine have advised that the islands are possible remnants of a low-lying panorama underlain by tender glacial deposits. These deposits have been possible laid down 10,000 years in the past on the time of the final Ice Age however now lie beneath the ocean and rivers.

The Gough Map from 1360 AD, exhibits two islands off Cardigan Bay, which can be a part of the misplaced Welsh Atlantis. Be aware: North is left; east is up. (Bodleian Library, Oxford / Public Domain)

The Gough Map: Rising Seas Cowl Welsh Atlantis?

The proof, revealed in a examine within the journal Atlantic Geoscience, which has integrated literary proof and folklore traditions with a hypothetical framework that includes the waning of the final Ice Age.

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Based on the examine authors this framework means that “throughout the Pleistocene, Irish Sea ice occupied the realm from the north and west, and Welsh ice from the east… erosion proceeded alongside the traces of a template offered by a retreating shoreline affected by Holocene sea-level rise, shore-normal rivers, and floor run-off from the relict cliffline and interfluves… continued down-wearing, marginal erosion and marine inundation(s) eliminated the 2 remaining islands by the sixteenth century.”

This proof has been introduced by Simon Haslett, honorary professor of bodily geography at Swansea College, who was on the lookout for the misplaced islands in Cardigan Bay whereas he was a visiting fellow at Jesus Faculty, Oxford. At Oxford he met David Willis, Jesus Professor of Celtic, who collectively studied the map in query generally known as the Gough Map, “the earliest surviving full map of the British Isles.” The Gough Map is held within the Bodleian Library at Oxford College, stories The Independent.

“The Gough Map is awfully correct contemplating the surveying instruments they’d have had at their disposal at the moment. The 2 islands are clearly marked and will corroborate modern accounts of a misplaced land talked about within the Black Ebook of Carmarthen,” mentioned Professor Haslett in an interview with the BBC. The Black Ebook of Carmarthen is a manuscript courting to 1250 AD, which is believed to be the principle proof of the Welsh Atlantis.

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Element of the Gough Map exhibiting Wales and the 2 “misplaced” islands of Cardigan Bay within the bottom-center of the picture. (Picture reproduced with permission of the Bodleian Library, Oxford: Oxford, Bodleian Library MS. Gough Gen. Top. 16 by Haslett, S. Okay., & Willis, D. / Atlantic Geoscience )

Disappearing Islands: Fantasy and Actuality

The 2 scientists posit that the islands got here into existence and disappeared once more, significantly throughout rising sea ranges within the Anthropocene. Some lecturers have advised that the myths associated to those islands originated within the “Outdated North,” in Scotland or Northumbria, travelling right down to Wales later. In any case, Professor Haslett explains that the native folklore was rooted in historic and geographical realities.

Throughout Roman cartographer Ptolemy’s time (100-170 AD), the Welsh shoreline was someplace round 13 kilometers (8 miles) additional west than it’s as we speak. This might clarify the proof introduced within the Gough Map for the 2 islands positioned in Cardigan Bay. A few of these folks legends say that way back one might stroll between these lands, a folks reminiscence that stems from rising sea ranges after the Pleistocene.

“Nevertheless, legends of sudden inundation, corresponding to within the case Cantre’r Gwaelod, may be extra more likely to be recalling sea floods and erosion, both by storms or tsunami, which will have pressured the inhabitants to desert residing alongside such weak coasts. In roughly a millennium, from Ptolemy’s time to the constructing of Harlech Citadel throughout the Norman interval, the seascape had fully altered,” added Professor Haslett.

The fortress constructed at Harlech, constructed clearly with the concept of getting a “strategic benefit” overlooking the shoreline, quickly turned landlocked. Moreover, the mass erosion of the islands launched boulders that induced the buildup of distinctive stone buildings generally known as “sarns” within the vernacular. Placing it into context, this disappeared panorama possible existed 30 meters (98.4 toes) above present sea ranges.

Professor Haslett concluded on a somber be aware, bringing collectively previous and current, that, “Legends of sudden inundation, corresponding to within the case of Cantre’r Gwaelod, may be extra more likely to be recalling sea floods and erosion, both by storms or tsunami, which will have pressured the inhabitants to desert residing alongside such weak coasts… These processes did not occur simply as soon as, they’re nonetheless on-going. With rising sea ranges and extra intense storms it has been advised that folks residing round Cardigan Bay might change into a few of Britain’s first local weather change refugees, inside our lifetimes.”

Prime picture: Statue overlooking Cardigan Bay, the place the misplaced Welsh Atlantis could lay beneath the waves of as we speak. Supply: davidyoung11111 / Adobe Inventory

By Sahir Pandey