Plato, one of the most important ancient greek philosophers, was both a student and a friend of Socrates, has talked about the disappearance of Atlantis, describing the lost city in a way that makes it resembling to Strongyle island (Santorini before the Minoan eruption).
According to Plato’s scripts, Atlantis was a round-shaped island (just like Strongyle)inhabited by people who had developed a very important civilization. Plato had been informed by Critias that Solon, one of the sages of the ancient world, had travelled to Egypt where some priests in Saida processed a script where the disaster of Atlantis had been described. That script passed from Solon to Critias’s grandfather and then to Critias and Plato.
As far as Plato’s description is concerned, Atlantis was a wealthy kingdom consisting of a large and a small island. These islands occupied a part of Libya and Egypt and a part of Europe as far as Tyrrhenia. There were 10 citis in Atlantis which all were destroyed by earthquakes or sank due to floods. This happened, according to Plato, nine hundred years before the period Solon lived. This must be around 1500 BC. Even though Santorini seems top fit the characteristics of the lost Atlantis, there must have been a confusion as the Egyptian priests who talked to Solon about Atlantis, actually referred to the end of the Minoan civilization in Crete, attributing it to the sinking of the island in the sea. However, it was Santorini the island that had sank.
Even though Plato made it clear that the story about Atlantis was real, Aristotle doubted on it and believing that the lost Atlantis story was an imaginary myth created by Plato. However, other have supported that story as truth and among them we find philosophers, writers even Stravon, an ancient geographer.
In modern times, the myth of the lost Atlantis was firstly connected with Santorini by French archaeologists who discovered amazing findings under a thick layer of pumice in Thera and Therasia, in 1872. In the beginning of the 20th century this issue came up again and some scientist connected the lost Atlantis with Crete island thanks to the Minoan civilization which was one of the most important during ancestry as well.
According to a greek archaeologist named S. Marinatos, the volcanic eruption of Santorini related to the decline of the Minoan civilization. He also has referred to Pindaros who lived in the 5th century BC (one hundred years before Plato). Pindaros wrote in his work entitled “Pithionikos” to the war with Zeus and Poseidon. They rammed the earth with the thunder and the trident making people sink in the underworld. “They left only my mother alive with her beautiful palace untouched” Pindaros says. Taking into account specific passages of Pindaros’s texts, S. Marinatos believes that this palace was located in Santorini.
The Minoan eruption has also been recorded by Homer in his Odyssey. One can read that the city of Phaeacians which was buried under huge rocks was one day sailing away from Evoia, just like the distance to Santorini. The disaster was believed to due to Poseidon’s anger.
Angelos Galanopoulos, professor of Seismology at the University of Athens made a research on the findings that were discovered at the mines of Fira, which date back to the Bronze Age. He has considered them as relevant to Atlantis island mentioned by Plato.
After having cooperated with a journalist dealing with archaeological topics, Edward Bacon, a book concerning the true and the mythological aspects of the lost Atlantis was published. The writers have tried to prove that Atlantis was in Santorini, using scientific evidence. Apart from them, several scientists have dealt with the myth of the lost Atlantis, presenting their own clues. Some of them seem to agree and others argue even on the existence of the lost Atlantis.