"A city of dreams." "Incredible architecture." "A massive navy." "Atlantis is thought to be one of the most advanced societies of the ancient world." "Then, without warning, it literally vanishes overnight." "An extraordinary civilization, lost forever." "But its memory is not soon forgotten." "Legendary status has made Atlantis the holy grail of modern archaeology." "Listen, the whole cut of the structure is human." "The city may not necessarily be on the bottom of the sea, but on the bottom of these flatlands." "Atlantis should be somewhere around here." "But where?" "And if it is here, how come we can't see it?" "This team of obsessed scientists believes they've finally hit the jackpot." "National Geographic Finding Atlantis Original Air Date on March 13, 2011" " sync, corrected by elderman " "The extraordinary tale of Atlantis reaches back to the very dawn of Western civilization." "This city of Atlantis is seen by many as the mother of Egypt, and Mesopotamia, and Israel, and Europe, and all the other civilizations that began in this area." "And if it began here we may be looking at the single-most important site for humanity." "The discovery of Atlantis would completely rewrite the early chapters of history." "Myth would become reality." "So finding this mysterious sunken city has become the stuff of obsession." "Generation after generation has set out in search of her, but every quest has ended in failure." "Now, with the help of modern technology, one team may finally beat the odds." "They're employing everything from satellite photography, to ground penetrating radar, to underwater archaeology in a passionate bid to find the sunken city." "But does Atlantis even exist?" "The legendary city may be just that: a legend." "Over millenia the story of the ancient city has taken on a life of its own, transformed into countless fantasylands." "To separate fact from fiction, any search for Atlantis must begin with the original source material." "And Angela Hobbs knows just where to look." "Dr. Hobbs:" "All we know about Atlantis comes from a few pages of the book that I'm holding in my hands, written by the Greek philosopher," "Plato." "He is the gold standard." "There is no other ancient source for the myth of Atlantis." "This is it." "The records speak of a vast power that sprang forth from beyond from the Atlantic Ocean for at that time this ocean was passable since it had an island in it in front of the strait that you people say you call "The Pillars of" "Heracles"." "Plato's descriptions of" "Atlantis are incredibly intricate." "His writings provide any Atlantis seeker a detailed road map." "According to Plato, Atlantis was an island kingdom with land rings and circular harbors, situated just beyond the Pillars of" "Hercules." "Many believe that the "Pillars of Hercules"" "describe the peaks that flank the entrance to the Strait of Gibraltar, the Northern pillar being the Rock of" "Gibraltar, and the Southern pillar a corresponding peak in North Africa." "This leads Dr. Richard Freund to begin his search for Atlantis in Southern Spain." "The Pillars of Hercules was known by every single ancient writer as being located in what we call today the "Straits of" "Gibraltar."" "This bay is located just beyond those ancient Pillars of Hercules." "Freund focuses on the" "Guadalquivir River Delta in Donana" "National Park." "He believes a massive ancient bay once existed here in antiquity." "Here we are in the largest marsh in southern Spain, hundreds of square miles." "It is massive." "We're talking about 40, 50 miles worth of just marsh." "And archaeologists think that buried in this marsh is the lost city of Atlantis." "In 1922, archaeologists George" "Bonsor and Adolf Schulten propose that" "Atlantis is hidden under these mudflats." "But for decades, most scholars ignore the theory." "Then in 2004 a young German physicist named" "Rainer Kuehne makes headlines using satellite photography to resurrect the" "Bonsor/Schulten theory." "I am here within the mud flats of the Doñana National Park." "It is exactly here where I think that" "Plato's Atlantis was located." "Kuehne observes strange circular patterns in a satellite photograph of the Doñana mudflats." "Comparing the photograph to the detailed descriptions in Plato," "Kuehne becomes convinced that the lost city is here in Southern Spain." "In his writings, Plato describes a port city with three rings of concentric harbors, and gives exact dimensions for each." "Kuehne believes that the circular patterns he sees fit Plato's measurements." "And there's more." "In his writings, Plato describes two temples in the center island of Atlantis, one dedicated to the god Poseidon." "Within the circular patterns on the Doñana mudflats, Kuehne finds a rectangular anomaly." "When he calculates its dimensions, it comes up a perfect match to Plato's description of Poseidon's Temple." "Today Kuehne's theory has led to a full scale expedition." "A team will determine whether the anomalies detected from space actually correspond to man-made structures under the mud." "It includes anthropologist Juan" "Villarias, whose research is closely followed by Richard Freund, and Paul Bauman, an expert in sub-soil sonar mapping." "Those shapes certainly do not correlate with any possible geological feature." "In my mind there's no question they're man-made features." "One of the big circles is connected with several rectangular structures." "We think that those rectangular structures have a wall below the shape in the soil, and we are trying to find if we have a building." "If there is a building, or any other artefact, deep beneath this mud, it could be the find of a lifetime." "If they can excavate, and come up with just a few really good artefacts that could be dated to 4000 years ago, then we have evidence of one of the great myths in civilization." "The myth of the beginnings of Atlantis." "Even on this team, there are skeptics who say the long lost kingdom of Atlantis is just a myth." "But they need only look a thousand miles east to a place the Turkish call Troia for proof that myth can become reality." "Here lies Troy, one of the most storied cities of the ancient world." "So, this is the main street of the late-Bronze-Age citadel of Troia, dated around the 13th century BC." "For years people thought that the city of Troy was a fantasy, a made-up place described in Homer's epic poem, The Iliad." "In the 3000-year-old story," "Troy is the setting for the Trojan War and the legendary Trojan horse, where the warrior" "Achilles fights for the beautiful daughter of" "Zeus, Helen of Troy." "Like Atlantis, Troy was thought to be just a myth." "Those who searched for it were ridiculed." "There were many voices that would say that the story is pure fiction, that Troy does not exist." "Then, in 1870, amateur archaeologist" "Heinrich Schliemann proves that Troy is a real place after all." "He's able to unearth the fabled city by simply reading one of the oldest myths in" "Western literature as if it was fact." "He used the Iliad, as a tour guide." "He accepted it as a direct description." "Homer describes a city with steep rising walls and broad streets." "Schliemann found them." "The ruins here reveal a city filled with impressive architecture." "Schliemann also needed to locate a city beside two rivers." "Troy is described as a city located at the conflow of two rivers," "Skamandros and Simoeis, which are here." "Most importantly, he needed to find evidence of the Trojan" "War." "And indeed the archaeology here points to a bloody battle." "This building was roofed with wooden beams, and we know that it ended in a fire because the beams were charred, and if there was a Trojan War, this is the best evidence that we have." "For those searching for Atlantis," "Troy is an inspiration, proving that myth and fact are sometimes one and the same." "When Schliemann came here, he was successful;" "he excavated an archaeological site that everybody agrees, nowadays, is the site of Troia." "He wanted to solve an archaeological problem, and he did." "Now the team in Spain is taking an even bigger gamble." "And no one knows if they'll be as lucky." "This rich and strange marshland on the Spanish Coast is part of a protected park called Doñana." "In ancient times this area of southern Spain was underwater and the Doñana Park was essentially a large bay." "In the bay there were created, over a long period of time massive sandbars that allowed people to use these sandbars to create cities." "Dr. Richard Freund believes that the famous rings of Atlantis may have existed in this bay thousands of years ago." "Freund and a team of archaeologists, geologists, and anthropologists pour over satellite photos of the area." "They find what may be circular shadows of an ancient city." "Finally we've narrowed it down to a very specific location around this mysterious circle in the midst of the swamp." "But in order to pick the best areas to investigate, the team needs better images." "And a simple homemade contraption might just fit the bill." "By attaching small cameras to a balloon and a kite, the team can get higher resolution images than the photographs taken from space." "The aerial photographs we're doing today can give us the clearest images that we've ever had." "So today we'll get the best photographs of this entire area with this balloon, and see whether those rings really exist." "We're going to lift the balloon to at least 100 meters, and then we'll probably work at different increments of elevation, 100, 150, 200, and so forth." "Any patterns or anomalies in the soil that appear in these new photographs could indicate buried manmade structures." "But if there was once a mighty city here, what happened to it?" "According to Plato's final chapter, the great city of Atlantis faced a cataclysmic disaster." "Violent earthquakes are followed by great flooding." "After just one day and one night the entire island of Atlantis sinks below the sea." "In order to prove their theory, the Spanish team must find evidence of such a disaster." "Dr. Juan Antonio Morales finds geological evidence of a long history of massive tsunamis hitting this coastline." "Juan Antonio:" "You can see how the displacement of some of these rocks along this shelf is tens, even hundreds, of meters long." "This suggests the displacement is not caused by a single tsunami, but by successive tsunamis." "If the rings of Atlantis existed in this ancient bay and were ravaged by successive tsunamis, the city would have been torn apart, or perhaps pulled into the sea." "As a result, evidence of the lost civilization might not just be under the" "Doñana mudflats, it could be underwater, off the modern coast." "So that's exactly where the team takes their search." "Marine archaeologist Claudio Lozano and" "Morales are equipped with the latest in sonar technology." "The torpedo shaped "towfish" generates sound waves that bounce off the seafloor." "When the signals return, they're received by a computer on deck that converts the sound waves into images." "Any formation that appears on the sonar imaging system is mapped and its coordinates recorded." "Juan Antonio:" "We have seen an anomaly, which is a vertical wall." "This is very different to a geological formation." "Magnifico." "Juan Antonio:" "It is a vertical structure." "Right now, we found an anomaly that is not geological at all; it's very big, very high." "Two walls." "One." "Two." "Completely vertical." "It's very nice." "The shape is not natural." "Juan Antonio:" "It's attractive." "Claudio and Juan Antonio locate what looks to be a large structure 39 feet below the surface." "They'll have to return and dive the site." "But some think the Spanish team is looking in the wrong waters entirely." "The search for Atlantis has plagued many great minds over thousands of years." "Scholars have scoured the globe searching for its ruins." "For some of these explorers," "Plato's description of the city's sophisticated architecture and society clearly points to just one location, the islands of Greece." "And underneath the clay soil on this hilltop in" "Crete lies evidence of an ancient civilization way ahead of its time." "Archaeologists call it Minoa." "Minoans were real master builders." "I'm walking on a four thousand year old street, which was probably the main access through this Minoan settlement." "Beautifully paved with very large slabs especially cut for this building." "All over the island you find elaborate architecture with major ceremonial halls with frescos, with shrines and they really had a very sophisticated life." "Plato says Atlantis boasts gorgeous temples and shrines with a highly ornamented palace situated on the central island." "The Minoan architecture on Crete seems to reflect the same blueprint." "We're in the palace at Knossos, the major site of Minoan civilization with this massive palatial structure at its core." "Could this be the great central palace that Plato describes?" "This is a mega-structure covering about 10,000 square meters." "Now this kind of architecture required incredible planning to get the stones from the quarry, to transport them here, to have the skilled masons work them, to create this kind of straight line and the different kinds of shapes would have been" "very, very difficult." "Walking amongst the breathtaking remnants of their ancient world it's easy to imagine the Minoans calling their city by another Atlantis." "To match the descriptions of" "Atlantis, the Minoan city also has to have an acropolis with dwellings and halls." "And it's all here at Knossos." "According to Plato, the bull is a central part of Atlantian culture." "In Atlantis sacred bulls roam free around the temples." "They're worshipped by priests and sacrificed in honor of Poseidon." "Here in Knossos, it's obvious bulls were once a powerful symbol." "I'm above the northern entrance passage at Knossos, and behind me is this imposing bull fresco." "Now, it really seems as if the bull was a very significant part of Knossian political propaganda." "There's a bull-leaping scene, found in fresco fragments over in the east part of the palace as well." "The cultural importance of the bull, the stunning architecture, the depictions of a utopian lifestyle, together paint a familiar picture." "It seems possible that the people we call" "Minoans are really the long lost people of" "Atlantis." "But Atlantis famously came to an end." "Plato says the city was destroyed in a single day and night." "Evidence suggests the Minoan people may have suffered a similar fate." "It's from this kind of archaeological evidence that we can deduce some kind of a crisis situation." "A lot of things went bad." "On the southern coast of" "Spain, researchers have discovered buried structures they believe may be the lost city of" "Atlantis." "It's not geological at all." "But there are those who think the" "Spanish team is way off course, that Atlantis was actually located in the" "Greek Islands." "The archaeology here is convincing." "There is evidence that the Minoan people of" "Crete suffered a terrible disaster, an ancient cataclysm that may have wiped out this advanced civilization just as" "Plato describes." "Clues to this catastrophe can be found 85 miles north of Crete on the Greek island of Santorini, also known as Thera." "The disaster that occurred here nearly defies description." "It's a volcanic island and the volcano exploded very, very spectacularly about 3600 years ago." "And we have here evidence with this very impressive architecture, not even excavated;" "it's just been exposed as it's eroded by the sea." "And you can see here evidence of the Theran eruption with ash layers and pottery showing this building was destroyed at exactly this time." "The ash cloud from Thera blocks out the sun for days." "For the people of Crete, the effects are devastating." "You had these huge ash clouds arriving on the island of Crete and they deposited sort of like, thick packages of volcanic ash that must have caused tremendous problems in their agriculture, in their shipping, in their commerce." "A lot of people probably lost their houses." "You had volcanic winters." "A lot of things went bad." "The earthquakes and massive volcanic activity on Santorini likely produce tsunamis, gigantic waves that crash onto the north coast of Crete." "These waves would carry with them volcanic pumice, a very porous and solidified lava-rock." "Evidence of pumice on Crete could be proof that an ancient tsunami hit here." "There are some spots along the north coast of the island where you find pumice deposition that is probably related to the Santorini eruption." "And there's been recent activity from archaeologists suggesting that those deposits could really only have been caused by something like a tsunami." "Minoan architecture, temples, art, culture, it's all wiped out by one of the most powerful eruptions in human history." "The case linking the Minoans to Atlantis is strong." "But the legend of Atlantis hinges on its sinking and overnight disappearance." "And for the Minoans the eruption of Thera is not the end." "Some manage to survive." "We have clear continuity in the" "Minoan civilization after the Theran eruption." "We can see archaeological layers showing the occupation at the time of the eruption, and then rebuilding, and reoccupation straight away afterwards." "It seems that despite compelling evidence, this is not the place that Plato describes." "The Minoan civilization did not sink into the sea." "It persevered." "Ultimately this triumphant story of survival is the greatest evidence against the theory." "But back on the mudflats of Spain, the jury is still out." "Dr. Freund and his team believe they're on the verge of uncovering a city that fits all the criteria laid out by Plato." "We're standing here at the outskirts of the Doñana National Park, the source of tremendous speculation that perhaps this was the place where" "Atlantis was located, and this was the place, the mud, the shoal, into which it disappeared." "In Doñana Park, the team reviews the new aerial photographs taken from their kite and balloon cameras." "Oh, this is interesting, right there." "The feature right here, at a higher altitude you may see the rectangle that we were talking about." "Any circular or rectangular patterns could provide strong evidence of a footprint of a lost city." "This particular feature was not included in our list, so this is new, that Paul's photography has revealed to us." "And this area has been cleared by the grass cutters for thatch." "And even after clearing, the feature was still visible from the kite photos." "It's clearly not just a feature that's visible in the vegetation, but visible in the earth." "These traces may be the last markers of Atlantis." "This is I think the most important feature in the aerial photography that's been done." "It's the one that most resembles anything like" "Atlantis." "It has an area that looks like a port leading into a large circle where the concentric circles would have been." "Freund is convinced that the photographs reveal a pattern that matches" "Plato's description, a series of circular harbors with a central canal connecting them to the ocean." "The team also identifies other supporting features." "Circular features, linear features, parallel features, all in the order of a human scale." "For instance, things that look like pathways, or roadways that are a meter to two meters across." "Features that look like buildings that are four to eight meters across." "The team now uses ERT, electrical resistivity tomography, to record images of what lies underneath the circular patterns." "What we're doing here is we're running a bunch of current through the ground, and we're measuring what comes back from that, and we'll be able to get a picture of what's in the subsurface," "up to about twelve meters below the ground surface." "The crew frantically searches for any remnants, the lost city of Atlantis may finally be in their grasp." "But another ancient mystery also looms" "The biblical story of the lost city of Tarshish." "Tarshish is a city mentioned many times in the Bible." "Many scholars believe that it's simply another name for the ancient and famous city of Tartessos." "Most scholars agree that Tartessos was located in southern Spain, and that Tarshish was located in southern" "Spain." "Tartessos was Tarshish." "In the written sources," "Tartessos and Tarshish are famous for their metals." "Trade ships would travel for years, from as far away as the Middle East, to fill their holds." "But Tartessos and Tarshish abruptly disappear from the historical and Biblical records, it's as if the cities suddenly cease to exist." "Freund believes that's because in ancient days" "Tartessos and Tarshish went by another name:" "Atlantis." "We have two remarkably similar stories being told in the story of" "Tarshish in the Bible, and the story of" "Atlantis in Plato and Roman sources." "In the story of Plato, Atlantis is a port city located on an island at the far end of the known world, where deepwater ships would come, taking three years to arrive at the end of their journey." "In the Bible, Tarshish was that city that may have been built on an island, a deepwater port, at the end of the known world for the Bible, and it was a place that took three years, according to the Book" "of Chronicles, for them to arrive at the end of their journey." "Tartessos is Tarshish is Atlantis." "It's an interesting theory." "Each city is documented as a famous port that mysteriously disappears from the written record." "And the similarities don't end there." "Each of the three cities is said to have great mineral wealth with access to massive amounts of gold, silver or copper." "Dr. Hobbs:" "Plato certainly does talk about mines, which the Atlantians have access to, and one of these mines being for this probably fantastical metal called" ""orichalc"." "Some archaeologists think they know what it might be or what it might be like." "All we know is that it glows like fire." "Scholars translate orichalc as" ""mountain copper"." "Today, just up-river from the Doñana mudflats, the hills shadowing the Rio Tinto are mined for gold, silver, and copper." "And there's evidence to suggest there's been mining here for over 5000 years." "The mudflats' proximity to these deposits of valuable ore make any ancient city located here a strong candidate for Atlantis." "It's just one more clue that points to the coast of Southern Spain as the best location for the lost city." "But the only way to know for sure is to get a closer look." "Juan Antonio:" "The anomalies we have seen and the structures are completely square." "This is curious because these four are forming a line two meters high." "For me, this is the most interesting stone in this area." "My best option is to go there to dive." "Using side scan sonar, the team isolates five areas off the southern coast of Spain that may hold remnants of the lost city of Atlantis." "The sonar images show what looks like man-made structures on the sea floor." "Right now we are sailing to one of the points that we want to check." "We call it the Cathedral, it's is really big, it's about 40 meters long." "The main characteristics that we are looking for is if it's human made or not." "It's the beginning of storm season." "High winds and foul weather pick up at the end of September and continue through the winter." "The divers have only a small window of opportunity to investigate the site before the weather turns ugly." "We have good news!" "Strong winds from yesterday blew the dark water that came from the river." "We will have better visibility than we expected." "Nearly 39 feet below the surface, the divers discover some unusual formations:" "stones that seem to have been cut," "maybe by the men of Atlantis." "These stones may have once been part of the great city walls that Plato describes." "Man-made, yeah." "It's, too perfect to be casual." "Take a second look, yeah?" "Listen, I don't want to use the radio to say these things." "But Vlad has found a beam, a circular man-made rock, and the whole cut of the structure is human." "As each diver surfaces, more details of the unique discovery are revealed." "There was a stone, but it wasn't square." "It was, on the end it has, it looked like it was worked as well." "On the end was a point, it was a cone." "Some places it's like a wall, no?" "And there are like steps, from a stairway." "Very mysterious, no?" "Incredible!" "What a day!" "Incredible." "The dive is a success." "But the team's geologist," "Juan Antonio, doesn't want to jump to any hasty conclusions." "First he needs to review the hours of underwater footage." "Any discoveries from the diving expedition could be linked to potential finds in" "Doñana, so the team continues their search on land." "Archaeologists conduct a careful survey of the surface hunting for any cultural remains." "When we're looking for Atlantis, we're not just looking for the buildings of" "Atlantis." "What we're looking for is the culture of" "Atlantis." "We may not find all of the contours of the city." "You could find a wall, you could find two walls, you could find rectangles." "It still doesn't connect it directly with the ancient near east and all of the great civilizations from the Aegean through the Mediterranean." "Every once in a while in archaeology you come upon a smoking gun, something that connects all the dots for you." "While searching within the large circular patterns in the soil, Freund and his colleagues suddenly discover two incredible artefacts." "Look at that, look at that." "Oh my gosh people wait a whole career to find one of these little figurines, and to find two, it's just magnificent." "It's an ancient statuette, probably at least 2000 years old." "She is one of the most spectacular kinds of goddesses." "Is she Astarte, or Ishatar?" "If they are Astarte or Ishatar, it would make them Bronze Age icons, dating as far back as 4000 years." "The beautiful figures may represent a direct connection between this area and the great civilizations of the ancient world, from the ancient near east, through the Aegean, to the Mediterranean." "Those two small figurines can connect it, because if we find the culture that fits into that context, then we found Atlantis." "Meanwhile, now back on land," "Claudio, Juan Antonio, and the team of divers carefully review their footage, analyzing what seems to be the ruins of a man-made structure." "Juan Antonio:" "This surface looks like the top of a block, like a sidewalk made by man." "It looks like a wall, but I see lines." "So, for me, this isn't a wall, it's a fissured stratum." "These occur because of geological forces." "I can't say for certain, that's difficult for me to believe." "Even if it's a natural formation it may have been modified." "It looks man-made." "Juan Antonio:" "Naturally formed rocks might have been used to build a wall." "That is possible." "Each stone raises new questions." "Although they appear to have been formed geologically, it's possible they were later used as building materials." "When we examine the deposits in the area of Doñana we see that many of these rocks, or other kinds of rectangular rocks, have been re-used in construction." "If the stones were transported and used as building blocks, the most likely location for a construction site is under the Doñana mudflats." "For three days now, the team has been conducting advanced imaging across the geometric patterns first seen in the aerial photographs." "Let's get Juan over here, just let him look at this." "This is the big circle." "Any structures below the soil will show up as distinct breaks in the so-called density and conductivity graph." "If there are evenly spaced breaks that match the circular patterns on the surface, it will be strong evidence that there are buried structures under the mud that could be the city of Atlantis." "Ok, so here's the results from the electrical imaging across the large circle that is particularly reminiscent of Plato's description of Atlantis." "The section is 160 meters long and 12 meters deep." "We have breaks here, and breaks again at." "60 meters." "60 meters." "The results look positive." "The images show breaks consistent with the circular patterns seen from above." "In my view, the pattern of resistivity to electricity matches the pictures, matches the shapes of the borders of the features." "We can explain the circles because they really are there." "There is some kind of representation in the soil." "If a city was suddenly buried here, all of the organic material associated with that civilization would also be trapped." "Over the centuries this material would decompose and produce gas." "While retrieving core samples the team taps into just that." "We have a mysterious methane layer that could indicate flora and fauna and human activity that were sealed in one single layer in a catastrophic event." "Freund is feeling optimistic." "Early lab results from the finds at the Donana mud flats are in, and so far they look positive." "Carbon-14 dating has told us that artefacts found inside of the marsh go from the period of 5000 BCE all the way down to approximately 2000 BCE." "We have a coring that tells us there was a deep-water port that continued in to the center of this marsh." "Electrical resistivity tomography identifies that there were actual signatures of walls that were located below the surface." "And we have a mysterious methane layer that was sealed about six to nine meters below the surface." "It goes down deep, what is it?" "It must be about five meters?" "Methane is created by the decomposition of organic matter." "If the entire Atlantis civilization was suddenly buried, it could create a huge deposit of trapped methane like the one found by the research team." "Although other explanations for the gas are possible, its unique location coupled with the history of tsunamis on this coast together make a strong case that a tsunami crashed onto this site and buried a city." "The surrounding flora, fauna, and people would have all died." "The researchers are anxious to excavate, but there's ground water right below the surface." "And that poses serious problems." "Going deeper than seven meters is technically very complex." "And very expensive." "It could be years before anything is unearthed here." "But further inland, other Spanish archaeologists have recently made a discovery that could lend further evidence to the Donana theory and point the way to" "Atlantis." "This is Cancho Roano, one of the greatest archaeological discoveries of the 20th century." "In the 1970's and 1980's archaeologists discovered a series of different villages that preserved Tartessan culture." "This Tartessan culture was so different than all the other culture around it." "It was the culture of the south." "Freund believes Tartessan culture was really Atlantian culture." "But these twenty-five hundred year old ruins are 125 miles from the coast, a long way from home." "Why did they come here?" "Some cataclysmic event on the coast pushed them out of their homes in the 9th century." "Freund believes this place is not the remains of a once bustling village, rather it's a memorial to the lost kingdom of" "Atlantis." "He calls it a ritual city and says that this site is actually a miniature replica of" "Atlantis built in homage." "Cancho Roano is just one of several ritual cities found in this area." "The people who built these sites were commemorating something, but was it the legendary seaside kingdom of Atlantis, hundreds of miles away?" "Detectives say you follow the money." "Archaeologists say you follow the stone." "Slate is the key." "This room it's paved with slate." "This slate room may have been the residence of the High Priest for the entire memorial city." "And slate is not indigenous to this area but 250 kilometres to the south on the coast it's very famous." "The people would have brought slate all the way up to this Cancho Roano site." "Freund believes the slate in the temple connects this inland site with the coastal city of Atlantis." "On its own, it's not enough to establish a solid link." "But there's something else." "It was an altar." "A secret symbol that helps make his case." "Another clue is the holy of holies." "Located at the centre of the entire city, just like Poseidon's temple that's mentioned in the writings of Plato." "This was the place where the most sacred rituals would take place, sacrificing of animals." "Ritual objects were found here, gold and silver, bronze." "According to Plato, the story of Atlantis came down to him from the Greek Legislator Solon who heard it from the priests of ancient Egypt." "It seems the Egyptians had direct contact with the Atlantians." "And in the most holy space of Cancho Roano, there's a 3500 year old Egyptian symbol." "In this place, in the centre, was found a symbol." "A symbol that goes back to Pharaoh Ahmose in the 16th century BCE." "It's a symbol of holy metallurgy." "This symbol links the site to the metalworkers so revered by the ancient" "Pharaohs." "In the historical record there are three cities famous throughout the world for their mastery of Tarshish," "Tartessos, and Atlantis." "This symbol could connect this place to all of them and may be the ultimate proof that the three cities were one and the same." "But there's one more piece of evidence connecting Cancho Roano to Atlantis, the most remarkable artefact of all, an ancient carving that seems to preserve the very emblem of Atlantis." "It's a stone indicator of what they were memorializing." "Who they were." "And what is it?" "It's a symbol of concentric circles, one inside the other, and they're found right at the threshold." "At the entrance of Cancho" "Roano ,and in many other ritual cities, are large stone stele." "As you would come up to the city you would see this standing stone in front of a warrior with his sword drawn and here we have the concentric circles of the city that he's guarding." "This sign post points to a city with one entrance in, coming in and coming out." "And in the centre, the same thing that Plato was describing in Atlantis, central shrine of Poseidon." "It's their memory of the past, and the symbols that we find on this, is the way they remember Atlantis." "If this structure was built by refugees from Atlantis, then this is the shared memory of their sunken home, a scale model of the lost city, still buried perhaps, beneath the mud of southern Spain." "In a deserted patch of marshland may lie the secret that explorers have been seeking for more than 2000 years." "Advanced imaging technology has detected circular patterns like those described by" "Plato." "The same design that's repeated on a 2500-year-old memorial." "New science seems to have revealed a guarded island city of circular canals with a central shrine and a waterway that leads to its heart." "Maybe this is where our civilization was born, home to an ancient and advanced people, a culture of extraordinary achievement." " sync, corrected by elderman "