[circular reasoning]

  The Demands of the Saturnian Configuration Theory
by   Dwardu Cardona

      Summary

/The Saturnian theory proposes a line-up of the planets Saturn, Venus,
Mars and Earth, all sharing the same axis of rotation. According to the
mytho-historical record, this seemingly outrageous arrangement of
planets existed in prehistoric times before it fell apart in a series of
catastrophic events. In reconstructing the events in the formation and
destruction of this configuration, certain demands which the theory
raises have to be met. These events should also have left tell-tale
marks on the terrestrial environment./

      Introduction

For those who are not familiar with 'the Saturnian configuration', the
theory, bizarre in the extreme, can be reduced to its simplest form by
positing that the planets Saturn, Venus, Mars and Earth were once much
closer to each other. More than that, they were strung out in a linear
conformation, /in the order given above/, which Frederic Jueneman once
jocularly described as a 'celestial shish-kebab'. They were strung out,
one 'below' the other, rather than circling around each other. This would
have meant that the planets composing this unheard-of configuration all
shared the same axis of rotation and also that, from Earth, man would have
seen the planet Mars centred on Venus which, in turn, appeared to be
centred on Saturn.

I make no apologies here for the fact that this theory was constructed
on the basis of the mytho-historical record rather than from
astrophysical considerations. Note that, other than its mythological
content, the mytho-historical record also incorporates the /worldwide/
astronomical beliefs of our ancient forefathers and that these beliefs
coincide with their mytho-religious convictions. Ancient astronomical
beliefs and mythology can therefore be considered together as a unified
whole, even though in-depth research of such subjects ends up describing
a Solar System that was entirely alien to the one we now inhabit.

The reconstruction of this model, together with its attendant
event-filled scenario, is the fruit of decades of research - first by
David Talbott and myself, later by Ev Cochrane and now Wallace
Thornhill. For me, the impetus for this derived directly from the
writings of Dr Immanuel Velikovsky, even though it led to the complete
abandonment of Velikovsky's own scenario. It has often been stated by
those who now oppose Velikovsky's /Worlds in Collision/ [1] cosmic
scheme that the good doctor might have been incorrect in details but
correct in his overall reconstruction. As the years went by, I came to
the opposite conclusion and now claim that Velikovsky was correct /in
details/ but entirely wrong in his overall presentation. He had the
pieces correct but, unfortunately, displaced them in time.

Be that as it may, the outlandishness of what my research uncovered made
me disbelieve the entire thing and it was not until I read /Hamlet's
Mill/ [2] that I finally accepted all I had unearthed. Maybe if scholars
of the calibre of de Santillana and von Dechend were able to unearth the
same set of bizarre situations I was not far off the mark. If they could
discuss the ancient belief of a Saturn permanently fixed in Earth's
north celestial sphere, then so could I. That they chose not to accept
what they had discovered was their business but the lameness with which
they ended up explaining it away made me all the more ready to accept it.

I shall not retrace the meandering path that led me to my conclusions
[3], nor attempt a validation of the physical feasibility of the model.
As Talbott said, when asked whether he should suggest some physical
principles which could account for his scenario, 'I'm not a physicist'
[4]. Neither am I but remember that things once thought impossible have
eventually been found to be possible and that many of these have ended
up becoming dogmas of science - e.g. meteoric falls, the non-illusory
nature of comets and continental drift. However let's put all that aside
and concentrate on the demands which the Saturnian configuration theory
raises - and whether or not these can be met.


      What do I mean by 'demands'?

Theories do not stand in isolation; they raise certain demands. For
instance, the theory of the nuclear fuelling of the Sun demands that it
sheds a vast amount of neutrinos. To date, only about two-thirds of the
predicted amount have been detected. The theory of the Big Bang demands
that a vast amount of matter should be there. To date, this 'dark
matter' is still being looked for. These two theories should not be
allowed to stand but, because scientists are still optimistic of
eventually detecting both the missing neutrinos and the missing dark
matter, they are /allowed/ to stand.

I shall not use similar optimism as a crutch to validate the Saturnian
configuration theory. I aim to present a series of demands which it
raises, both within itself and also through hard science, and how these
can be met. The list is not comprehensive but it should suffice to
illustrate the significance and consequence of the evidence. I have
neither the space nor the time to deal with all the planets that once
constituted the Saturnian configuration and shall therefore concentrate
on the two most important bodies of the alignment - Saturn and Earth
itself. The roles which Venus and Mars played in the events must await a
future work.


      The Age Of Darkness

My version of the Saturnian scenario posits that man's earliest memory
was of a sky in which the planet Saturn was the only visible celestial
body, looming large in an all-pervading darkness - an endless night. One
of the most persistent beliefs among the civilisations of ancient
nations and also 'primitive' societies is that during a time remembered
as 'the beginning', Earth was engulfed in darkness. Time and again we
are told that 'in the beginning' there was no Sun, no Moon, no stars.
The planetary god of beginnings, we are told /ad nauseam/, ruled alone
and in darkness. Whether we turn to the pages of /Genesis/ or to the
ancient Egyptian myths of creation, the message is always the same;
whether we seek the first appearance of the Hebrew /Elohim/ or the
Egyptian /Atum/, it is always stated that the god existed alone in
darkness. It is the same in the ancient texts of India, not only among
the Hindus but even among the lesser tribes: 'When this world was first
made, there was neither sun nor moon ... and everything was dark' [5].
The /Laws of Manu/ preach: 'This world was darkness, unknowable, without
form, beyond reason and perception, as if utterly asleep' [6]. Turn to
Japan, or the ancient Greeks; travel to the cold spaces of Siberia, or
cross the ocean to North America, Central America, or South America;
cross the Pacific to the archipelagos of Micronesia, Polynesia,
Malaysia, Africa; it does not matter where one travels, or whose ancient
beliefs one examines, the message is the same.

There are simply too many myths telling about this Age of Darkness to
present them all here. An earlier paper on solely this subject [7] had
to be selective to avoid boring the reader with this repetitive myth. My
intention here is not to supply the evidence for this world-wide belief,
since that is readily available [8], but to indicate what a theory
positing such a state of affairs would additionally demand.

First, a caveat: this darkness was described as having been primarily in
the sky. Such a darkness, however, could not but have touched Earth and
many myths more than hint at this; in some instances, they actually
state as much. However the description of such darkness should not be
understood as meaning that there was absolutely no light. For anything
to be visible at all, there must have been some light. Even though
Saturn, at this stage, had not yet flared up to become a virtual sun, it
must have shed /some/ light. The myths indicate this. For instance, in
the /Linga Purana/ we read:

    'When the night of Brahma born of the unmanifest reached the stage
    of dawn, this visible universe was one that had not been analyzed.
    It was still enveloped in the nocturnal darkness ... [but] the
    self-born lord, he who achieves all the affairs of the worlds, moved
    about like a glow-worm, with a desire to manifest' [9] 

Thus, not only was the universe ('this all') enveloped in darkness but
Brahma (i.e. Saturn) radiated, if only feebly, 'like a glow-worm'. I
shall not list myth after myth to drive this point home but shall give
one more from the lore of the North American /Mbayá/ which states that:

    'the First Being ... made darkness. He made the cradle of darkness
    ... [but] he did not see [this] darkness, though the sun did not yet
    exist. He was lit by the reflection of his own inner self' [10]. 

These fragments and others suggest that, even in this Age of Darkness,
Saturn must have radiated a diffused glow but this was too dim to dispel
the surrounding darkness. We must therefore think of this darkness as
that which grips present-day terrestrial nights when the Moon lights up
the landscape. However remember that the Saturnian theory posits that
Saturn and Earth shared the same axis of rotation, so Saturn, at this
time the only luminary visible in the sky, was not seen to rise and set,
but remained permanently visible, fixed in Earth's north celestial
sphere. Add to this the perpetual night which the theory also posits as
existing during the same time and mankind would have been unable to tell
the passage of time.

This becomes one of the theory's first demands, because if mankind was
not able to tell the passage of time during this period, the
mytho-historical record should tell us as much. Does it?


      The Timeless Era

As noted in an earlier paper [11], in this respect ancient man did not
mince words. The /Satapatha Brahmana/ speaks of a time when the year
'was not then in existence' [12]. Not only the year - but time itself:
in its inimitable mixture of Muslim and pagan doctrines, the /Malay
Charmbook/ speaks of an era 'before the beginning of time' [13]. There
is reason to believe that what the ancients termed the 'year' was
synonymous with their concept of time. For instance, the /Maitri
Upanishad/ has it that 'the year, verily, is Prajapati, [who] is Time'
[14]. This synonymity is also apparent in Hebrew, where /yom/, normally
taken to mean 'day', has the additional meanings of 'year' and 'time'
[15]. Similarly in Egypt the word /thera/, which means 'year', also
means 'time' [16]. Even Macrobius spoke of a primordial period of chaos
during which 'no time existed' [17]. The Chinese /Compendium of
Wong-shi-Shing/ tells of the age during which 'the day and night had not
yet been divided' [18].

I could go on supplying records but this is not the place. All I wish to
stress is that the first demand raised by our interpretation of the
mytho-historical record is actually met by that record. Thus the record
not only serves as a basis for our reconstruction of cosmic events but
also as a means to test itself. More than that, it continues to do so,
step by step, because as one demand is met, another arises. The first
demand raises another: since the record records an era when time did not
exist, it should also record a following era when time was recognised as
having begun.


      The Beginning Of Time

Not only do such records exist but quite a few connect the beginning of
time directly with Saturn. Macrobius tells us:

    'they [i.e. the ancients] conclude that, when there was chaos, no
    time existed, insofar as time is a fixed measure derived from the
    revolution of the sky. Time begins there; and of this is believed to
    have been born Kronos [i.e. Saturn] who is Chronos [i.e. Time]' [19]. 

It has often been argued that Kronos/Saturn has no philological
connection with Chronos/Time [20]. However what we are positing is not a
/philological/ connection but a direct identity of one with the other,
an identity which has long been recognised by past mythologists and
students of ancient religion [21]. Even as far back as Cicero (106-43
BC), the equation had long been accepted:

    'Saturnus was chosen as the one to have as his province the
    intervals and cycles of time. In Greek this god is called by the
    very word time, since Kronos is the same as chronos, that is, time.
    We call him Saturnus because he saturates himself with years' [22]. 

The association of time with Saturn does not rest solely on the
identification of the Greek /Kronos/ with /Chronos/. We find the same in
India where Kala, one of the names for the planet Saturn, also means
'time' [23]. As it happens, the Indic Kala (i.e. Time) is also one of
the epithets of the Hindu Yama [24], the same as the Persian Yima, whose
identity as Saturn is also well known [25]. This tells us that Time was
simply another name for Saturn.

To the Hindus, the 'Wheel of Time' is known as the Kala-cakra (or
'chakra') [26]. It is important that it was Brahma who was said to turn
this wheel of time [27], because another name for the planet Saturn in
Sanskrit is /Brahmanyah /[28], which indicates that Saturn is considered
to be Brahma's planet. In fact, while Indologists may find it difficult
to accept, Brahma has long been identified as Saturn by certain Hindu
sages [29]. The /Svetasvatara Upanishad /alludes to Brahma as 'the time
of time' [30].

What of the /beginning/ of time? Is it stated anywhere that this
originated with Saturn? The /Mundaka Upanishad/ proclaims that the year,
which we have seen as having been synonymous with time, came /from/
Brahma [31]. The /Atharva Veda/ states that 'time in the beginning [is
or was] Prajapati' [32]. Being an epithet of Brahma [33], Prajapati,
too, must be seen as an alias of Saturn, as the Arabic scholar,
Al-Biruni, discovered in his travels to India [34] - and was not Kronos
himself lauded as 'the /originator/ of times' [35]?

I could supply many more sources but time does not permit. The
association of time with the planet Saturn has not eluded mythologists
and, in seeking an explanation, they have naturally appealed to logic.
As far back as 1875, attempts were made to justify the phenomenon by
appealing to the planet's present lagging orbital pace [36]. As it moves
along its orbit, Saturn is the slowest of the planets which were visible
to the ancients' unaided eyes. However, slow as Saturn might move, it
/moves/, and in that respect it is no different from other planets.
Besides, why would the /beginning/ of time be associated with the planet
solely because of its slow pace? Why would Saturn's sluggish amble have
led to the belief that time must have had a beginning, that at one
period time did not exist?

Why was Saturn chosen to represent the year? If any celestial body can
currently claim the right to represent the year, it is surely the Sun.
As an indicator of the passage of time, it is supreme. Even the Moon
would have been a better indicator than Saturn. Moreover, our ancient
forebears would hardly have even noticed the planet Saturn if it then
appeared, like now, as only a pin point of light in the night sky - let
alone noticed its slow advance across the sky.


      The Saturnian Sun

An extensive tour of the Saturnian model and scenario leading from the
meeting of one demand to the other would take us the proverbial
'forever-and-a-day'. I shall, therefore, leave the /snowballing/ effect
of these demands to a later work and concentrate on a few other examples
taken in isolation. One theme concerns the model's predication that
Saturn once shone as a virtual sun. It also posits that what past
mythologists have identified as a bevy of sun-gods (such as the
Assyro-Babylonian /Shamash/, the Egyptian /Ra/, the Indic /Surya/, the
Greek /Helios/) are actually misidentified /Saturnian/ suns. In the case
of Shamash, of course, the issue is at once settled by appealing to the
ancients who venerated the god. Here, despite the objection of most
modern mythologists, the case is really closed since the
Assyro-Babylonians themselves vouched for the identity of Shamash as a
name for the planet we call Saturn [37]. The case is a little more
circumspect when it comes to the Egyptian Ra. Despite the fact that an
ostracon from the Ptolemaic period was discovered bearing an inscription
equating Ra with the Greek Kronos (i.e. Saturn) [38], I could not at
first accept it, as Ra is presented in all books on Egyptian mythology
as the sun-god /par excellence/. Yet if the theory demanded that Ra was
really a personification of Saturn rather than the Sun, it should also
demand that the characteristics and motions ascribed to Ra will not be
found to fit those of the Sun.

As examples, Ra was often lauded as 'Lord of the Circles' and 'he who
entereth [or liveth] in the Circle' [39]. He was described as 'the
sender forth of light into his Circle' and the 'Governor of [his]
circle' [40].

What is this 'Circle' that the hymns allude to? Egyptologists inform us
that it was what the Egyptians referred to as the /Duat/, a word that
has been rendered into English as 'the Underworld'. This makes one think
of some dark region underground but according to Wallis Budge, the Duat
was to be discovered 'away beyond the earth, probably in the sky' [41].
A clue to the real nature of the Duat comes from its description as
being divided into regions, each of which (among other things) was
called /qerert/, an Egyptian word that means 'circle' [42]. A circle
composed of regions which were also circular is best understood as a
nest of concentric circles. The most convincing evidence concerning the
interpretation of the Duat as a circle, however, comes from the
hieroglyphic determinative of 'Duat' which is depicted as a star
surrounded by a band or circle [43].

It is thus obvious that, whatever Ra once signified, it was a celestial
body that resided within a circle or band or ring - nay, within a nest
of concentric circles or bands or rings. As we all know, the Sun does
not send forth its rays into a circle; it does not reside in a ring or
nest of rings. The planet Saturn, however, does [44]. There are those
who will tell us that, under certain conditions, the Sun /is/ seen to be
surrounded by a ring. They are alluding to that atmospheric refraction
which lends a halo to the solar orb. However not only is this too rare
an apparition to earn Ra his title of 'Governor of his Circle' but it is
a phenomenon that is restricted to northern regions and hardly, if ever,
seen at the latitude of Egypt. Furthermore the Egyptians assimilated Ra
to the god Atum and, in fact, this deity is often referred to in
Egyptian documents as Atum-Ra. This god bore a specific and strange
characteristic: Atum was honoured as a sun of night [45]. Does the Sun
shine at night?

Students of Egyptian mythology have long grappled with the exact meaning
that lies beneath this strange characteristic of Atum. The best
explanation Wallis Budge could offer was that Atum was the Sun /after/
it had set [46]. By this he meant to imply that the Egyptians worshipped
the Sun even when it was absent from the sky. Sun worship at night,
however, makes for an incongruous institution.

A 'sun of night' was also believed in by the Assyro-Babylonians but
there this was explicitly identified as the planet Saturn. As Jastrow
stated: 'Strange as it may seem to us, the planet Saturn appears to have
been regarded as 'the sun of night' ... ' [47]. In view of the fact that
Atum-Ra was likewise lauded as a sun of night, coupled with the
Ptolemaic equation of Ra as Kronos, should we not then give credence to
the identification of Ra as the same Saturn?

In another hymn we read:

    'O Ra ... the heir of eternity, self-begotten and self-born, king of
    earth, prince of the netherworld [of the Duat, really] ... thou dost
    rise in the horizon of heaven and sheddest upon the world /beams of
    emerald light /...'[48]. 

Not only did Ra shed a green, or emerald, light, he himself was green.
As Donald Mackenzie wrote, in his form of Sebek-Tum-Ra, this sun was the
'radiant green disk' [49]. 'Hail Green One' was the manner in which Ra
was lauded [50]. Mythologists have no explanation why the ancient
Egyptians alluded to Ra as having been green and shedding a green light
and, as long as they continue to believe that Ra was the Sun, how can
they? Does our present Sun shed a green light? Is the disk of the
present Sun green? Of course neither is the planet Saturn green - but
what if it once was?

Consider further the motions of the celestial object called Ra. In one
of the /Coffin Texts/, the deity is addressed with these words: 'You
shall go up upon the great West side of the sky and go down upon the
great East side of the earth' [51]. Does the Sun 'go up' in the west?
Does it 'go down' in the east? Faulkner, who translated this passage,
could not help stating that this 'unexpected reversal of the points of
the compass is incomprehensible' [52] and ended up blaming what, to him,
was an inconsistency on 'a blunder in an early copy which no one has
noticed or at least attempted to correct' [53]. This, however,
presupposes that there must be other texts which give the rising and
setting of Ra correctly. However, as David Talbott has indicated,

    'wherever the direction of the [sun] ship's movement is explicitly
    connected with the phases of morning and evening, the texts /always/
    reverse the direction expected by the solar interpretation' [54]. 

More than that, when sailing in his ship, or boat, Ra is said to move
/down/ at dawn [55] and 'upstream' /at night/ [56], contrary to what we
see the Sun doing in our sky. How, then, can mythologists continue to
claim that the Egyptian Ra was a personification of the Sun?


      The Polar Station

If, as the model assumes, Saturn appeared motionless in Earth's north
celestial sphere, how could it have been seen to rise and set, even if
contrary to the way the Sun does? This troubled me for some time until,
with David Talbott, I realised that the fault lay with mythologists and
not mythology or, more correctly, the fault lay with those who had
/translated/ the ancient myths - not that I blame them, because they
only had the arrangement of the /present/ sky to work with. When it
comes to the Egyptian Ra, the terms 'rising' and 'setting' were actually
mistranslations. If we translate the Egyptian texts concerning Ra
literally and forget about what the Sun is supposed to do, we find that
the light of the god is simply said to 'come forth' and 'recede'. The
god himself 'comes out' and 'goes in' [57].

Egyptologists, of course, will claim that this was the way in which the
Egyptians alluded to the rising and setting of the Sun - and one cannot
really blame them. However, as Talbott noted [58], when we say that the
Moon comes out at night, we do not mean that it rises but that it grows
bright. Similarly with Ra, the god did not rise and set; he simply grew
bright and dimmed. This is vindicated by the additional fact that the
god was said to come forth and recede while remaining /em hetep/, i.e.
'at rest' or 'in one spot' [59].

It was this immobility of Saturn, stated of the god /and/ the planet,
that made me realise very early in my research, together with Talbott,
but independently of him, that Saturn had once occupied a stable
position in Earth's north celestial sphere. It is not possible here to
enumerate all the evidence concerning Saturn's immobility but a few
snippets may be in order. For instance, one of the names for the planet
Saturn in Assyro-Babylonian was /Lu-Bat Sag Us/, which translates as
'the steady planet' [60]. In Hebrew, the same planet is called S[h]abet
(or Shabath), i.e. the 'Resting Planet' [61]. In the /Papyrus of Ani/,
in which the deceased is prepared to enter heaven, he is addressed with
these words: 'O thou who art without motion like unto Osiris!' - and
this passage is twice repeated [62]. It thus becomes evident that Osiris
was not only remembered as a sun that shone during the night [63] but as
one that did not move. To indicate that this was no idle speculation by
the ancient Egyptians, we also find Ra himself lauded as he 'who dost
lie without movement' [64]. If Ra was the Sun, as mythologists would
have us believe, why was it said to have been 'without movement'?

Therefore when the Makiritare Indians of Venezuela speak of /Wanadi/, a
celestial being 'in the highest sky' who 'lit everything down to the
very bottom' without ever setting, we can be sure that they are
referring to the same planet Saturn. 'Wanadi is like a sun that never
sets', they say [65].

Unless I am mistaken, there are only two ways in which the planet Saturn
could have appeared suspended motionless in the sky without rising and
setting. The first, and most believable, is to assume, as Lynn Rose and
also Harold Tresman have done [66], that Earth orbited Saturn in
phase-lock, like the Moon does in relation to Earth, thus always
pointing the same hemisphere toward Saturn. As seen from Earth, Saturn
would have appeared stationary in the sky. The second manner in which
Saturn could have appeared immobile is much more difficult to digest and
this is to have Earth stationed directly 'below' Saturn with both bodies
sharing the same axis of rotation.

For years I objected to Rose's explanation of this phenomenon [67], just
as he objected to Talbott's and mine [68]. More recently, Frederick Hall
and David Talbott have suggested that it is quite possible that Saturn
was phase-locked with Earth, in the manner that Rose posits, /before/ it
moved into a north polar position in relation to Earth[69] but, while I
accept the possibility, I shall leave it for Talbott to expound on it at
some future date. Even so, given that Rose's model is more feasible from
a physical point of view, why should I continue to opt for the more
bizarre idea of a Saturn stationed in Earth's north polar sky? The
answer is simple: that is where the mytho-historical record places
Saturn. Even Rose had to accept this:

    'The traditions about an immovable Saturn atop some special pole
    made little sense after the Age of Kronos had come to an end. Those
    traditions were later revised and were attributed to the only
    'immovable' point ... that could be found in the newer sky. To
    people in the northern hemisphere ... this was the north celestial
    pole ...'[70]. 

While it is possible, is it /probable/ that 'these traditions' would
have later been 'revised' all over the world? I cannot list all the
multitudinous sources which claim that Saturn was once stationed in the
spot in the sky now occupied by the Pole Star but I shall give a few
snippets. The Egyptians, for instance, had no qualms about placing Ra
'in the north of heaven' [71], which again raises the question: if Ra
was truly the Sun, what would he be doing there? In the 'Babylonian'
zodiac, the emblem representing Shamash (i.e. Saturn) together with that
of Venus and Sin, is placed in the north celestial sphere [72]. The
Iranian Kevan, i.e. the planet Saturn, was said to have occupied the
polar centre [73]. Bran, the Celtic Saturn, was called 'the Niggard from
the North' [74]. In China, the planet Saturn is given the same name as
the Pole Star [75]. In addition, the records of the ancients do not
describe this strange situation always in the same manner but in a
hundred different ways, contradicting the diffusionist borrowing of the
belief.

Can the demands which this postulate raises, too, be met? The postulate
concerning the former polar station of the planet Saturn raises more
than one demand but I shall only touch upon one - and it will serve to
show that /physical/ requirements, as well as those which the
mytho-historical record itself answers, /can/ be met.


      The Lithic Bulge

Terrestrial tides are caused by the attraction of the Sun and Moon on
Earth's oceanic waters. It matters not for this study whether this is
due to gravitational pull or to some form of electric, or
electromagnetic, forces. The result is what concerns us and it is there
for all to see. We know that when the Sun and Moon apply their combined
attractive forces at right angles to each other, the tides are low in
comparison to when the Sun and Moon are in direct line with each other.

Now consider: with the massive Saturn in proximity to Earth, the tides
that would have been raised should have exceeded present ones and, since
Earth's tides are aggravated when the attractive force of the Moon is
added to that of the Sun, the additional pull of Venus and Mars (which
the theory dictates to have been in direct line with Saturn and Earth)
should have raised the northern tide even more. In addition, with Saturn
positioned in Earth's north celestial sphere, terrestrial tides should
have accumulated at Earth's north polar region. The hydrosphere would
not have been the only terrestrial element to respond to Saturn's
attractive force: the atmosphere should also have piled up at Earth's
northern areas and so, also, should Earth's crust [76]. This is what the
Saturnian thesis demands - do we find it so?

To be fair, we cannot now take a trip up north to see if the water of
the world is actually piled up in a tide around the North Pole. Earth's
crust, however, is a different matter. Earth's hydrosphere and
atmosphere would have easily (although not necessarily suddenly) have
rebounded to settle in a more uniform shell around the world. Earth's
crust, on the other hand, would have taken much longer to readjust to
the new conditions. Since the Saturn configuration scenario is theorised
to have played its drama just prior to the rise of civilisation, we
should expect this northern lithic bulge not to have yet subsided. Do we
find any evidence of it?

Lynn Rose has opted for the Afar Triangle region in East Africa as the
former site of the Saturnian 'World Mountain', which he seems to have
understood as Earth's former lithic bulge, at that time when Earth's
land areas were still massed together in the super-continent 'Pangaea'
[77]. This is an idea which had already been published by Frederick Hall
[78] and, later, picked up by Harold Tresman [79]. Given Hall and
Talbott's more recent theory concerning Earth's previous phase-lock with
Saturn before being freed to line up with Saturn's rotational axis [80],
this theory seems to hold promise as long as the break-up of Pangaea (at
least in my opinion) is relegated to a time /before/ the advent of
mankind [81]. Whether this state of affairs pertained or not will be
left for future research. What concerns us here is a lithic bulge which
formed in Earth's north polar regions in response to the attractive
forces of the lined-up planets of the Saturnian configuration. While
advocating his own model (which replaces Saturn with Mars as the
northern body), Frederic Jueneman came closer to the mark when he, also,
posited the one-time existence of such a lithic bulge [82] (even if his
diagram greatly exaggerated the tidal bulges on both Earth and Mars)
[83]. However is there any evidence of a remnant of such a tidal bulge
in Earth's north polar region?

There is and it has been known since 1958 when the aberrations in the
orbit of Vanguard I around Earth led NASA to disclose that Earth is
actually pear-shaped, with a bulge at the north pole. Other satellites
since Vanguard I have confirmed this discovery [84]. The real shape of
Earth, as now deduced, is better described as a triaxial spheroid rather
than an oblate one, with the bulge of its pear-shape measured in metres
rather than kilometres [85] but as a residue of a former greater uplift
of land even metres are of significance. As Frederick Hall asked:

    'What pulled Earth out of shape from above its north pole? The small
    dimensions of this shift indicate the pull was short term (as in
    centuries to millennia) rather than eons. /Furthermore the effect is
    relaxing, and in geological terms the distorting influence must have
    been remarkably recent/.' [86]. 

In a personal letter, Leroy Ellenberger advised me that any 'tidal bulge
that would have been raised would not have had time to relax since the
disruption' [87]. 'Fred Hall cites the 18 meter polar bulge in Earth's
figure; but any polar Saturn would have produced a bulge which today
would be measured in kilometers!' [88]

How does Ellenberger know how far Saturn was from Earth in order to
deduce the height of Earth's tidal bulge under its influence? How does
he know how long this tidal bulge would have existed and how does he
know when the Saturnian configuration disrupted? I, for one, have never
hinted at these parameters and, without knowing these, nothing can be
said concerning the height of the original bulge or to what extent it
should have relaxed by now. It is true that Earth's present pear-shape
could be explained by other causes than the Saturnian configuration
theory but that is not the issue. What concerns us here is that the
theory demands such a state of affairs and the demand is met.


      The Axis Mundi

One of the most mysterious elements that can be retrieved from the
mytho-historical record concerning the Saturnian configuration is what
seems to have appeared, at least at first, as a tapered swathe of light
stretching down from the configuration to touch Earth at its northern
horizon. Having received the generic name /axis mundi/, this appendage
is also recognised as the 'polar column' and 'cosmic tree'. It was even
known as the 'world mountain' which, Rose notwithstanding [89], is not
to be confused with the lithic bulge.

This tapering appendage has been explained in various ways. Rose
compared it to the 'flux tube' between Jupiter and its satellite Io
[90]. In Jueneman's Martian (as opposed to Saturnian) model, the /axis/
is a colossal Rankine vortex [91]. Talbott, on the other hand,
originally explained the polar column as a stream of debris stretching
between Saturn and Earth [92] but later amended this to a stream of
debris attracted from /Mars/ towards Earth [93]. Wallace Thornhill
believes he has recognised this ethereal pillar as a sustained plasma
discharge in the form of Birkeland current [94].

Maybe all three of these functions came into play at once or in
succession (Talbott himself seems to accept Thornhill's explanation in
conjunction with his own [95]) but this might be stretching things a
little. One objection to Talbott's interpretation, meanwhile, is the
lack of recognisable Martian material in Earth's Arctic regions. Let's
face it, if the polar column was really composed of material ejected
from the planet Mars for decades, possibly centuries, this process
should have completely scoured the face of Mars, depleting it of loose
rubble. However, as we have found out from recent robotic landings, the
surface of Mars (like that of the Moon) is littered with loose rubble.
Also, the bombardment from Mars should have strewn Earth's Arctic
regions with Martian detritus. Granted, no one has yet conducted a
/deliberate/ search for such material but none has yet come to light.
Meteorites believed to have originated from Mars have been found
elsewhere, including the Antarctic [96], but none has yet been
discovered in the Arctic regions.

What Thornhill's explanation has going for it is the fact that galaxies
exhibit what he terms 'plasma focus characteristics at their centre
during their active, or quasar, phase by emitting beams of particles in
the form of twisted vortices' [97]. These vortices bear a remarkable
similarity to the /axis mundi/ deduced from the mytho-historical record.
Moreover, such a beam in the form of a filament of light has now not
only been detected in conjunction with a planet (as opposed to a galaxy)
and but even photographed. Together with the beam, we now have the first
actual photograph of an extra- solar planet, a member of the double-star
system TMR-1. The photograph shows what appears to be a runaway planet,
jettisoned by the double stars, together with what has been described as
'a thin filament of gas' extending all the way from the planet to its
primaries [98]. Anyone living on that planet looking up in the right
direction would see a swathe of light stretching from the horizon to the
double sun very much like the swathe of light our ancestors would have
seen stretching from Earth's northern horizon to the Saturnian
configuration. Those who told us that such a phenomenon is not
physically possible can now be silenced.

One other aspect of Thornhill's postulate that fits well with the
mytho-historical record is that magnetic fields tend to twist Birkeland
currents into 'ropes' [99], making the structure appear like entwined
snakes. This structure is important because, during its final phase, the
Saturnian /axis/ developed exactly that form.

Now ... if only we could make Thornhill's plasma discharge, this
Birkeland current, twist and suck, because there is every indication
that the /axis mundi/, this polar column, did just that - and therein
lies the beauty of Jueneman's model, because the Rankine vortex he uses
as an explanation for the phenomenon is, in effect, nothing but a
colossal planetary tornado. As everyone knows, tornadoes not only twist,
they also suck.

At this point I shall reverse my method of raising and meeting demands
because it is not enough to use the mytho-historical record to test
itself, or to test it using physical science; the mytho-historical
record should also be used to test physical science. Can the
mytho-historical record validate the postulate that the /axis mundi/
went through a twisting, or churning and sucking process?


      The Whirling Column

I shall not present all the evidential sources which attest to the
whirling motion of the cosmic pillar but shall merely present the
opinions of four authorities on the subject and leave those who are
interested to check their sources.

De Santillana and von Dechend are two of many who came to the conclusion
that the /axis/ did twist and turn - although they seemed unsure of
whether it did so slowly or rapidly [100] - even if, to them, the /axis/
was anything but an actual physical entity. So did Elmer Suhr, who spoke
of the 'whirling cosmic column'[101] and 'the whirling column of the
cosmos' [102]. Suhr stressed: 'It is especially important to think of
the cosmic column not as a static post but as a constantly whirling
crucible ...'[103]. Talbott also recognised this when he wrote that 'the
cosmic mountain in many creation epics /is/ presented as a churning,
serpentine column rising along the world axis ...'[104].

In most instances, past authorities have mainly opted for the abstract
(though real) axis between Earth's North Pole and the celestial north
pole as an explanation for the /axis mundi/. In a sense, of course, they
were correct but it is obvious from descriptions of the Saturnian
/axis/, as well as prehistoric petroglyphs, that the polar column was a
/visible/ entity rather than a deduced abstraction [105] - so much so
that, in some cases, the /axis/ was even pictured as a ladder reaching
to the Saturnian sun [106].

Suhr, on the other hand, theorised that the cosmic pillar owed its
genesis to the deduced cone-shaped shadow which the Moon sends toward
Earth during a solar eclipse [107]. However I am hard pressed to
understand how he can reconcile this explanation with his own conviction
that the world axis went through a whirling motion.


      The Entwined Serpents

As stated above, one aspect of Thornhill's postulate that fits well with
the mytho-historical record is that magnetic fields tend to twist
Birkeland currents into 'ropes', making the structure appear like
entwined snakes. This is important because, among other things, the
cosmic pillar was often described as having the form of a serpent or
celestial dragon [108].

As already noted, Talbott, keeping to his theory that the axis was
actually a stream of debris raining down on Earth from the Saturnian
configuration (Saturn itself or Mars), recognised the fact that

    'the cosmic mountain in many creation epics /is/ presented as a
    churning, serpentine column rising along the world axis ... in
    several lands the word for 'mountain' is the same as the word for
    'serpent' or 'dragon', though our natural world offers no basis for
    the equivalence' [109]. 

Talbott offers the following examples:

    'In Mexico, Nahuatl /can/ mean 'serpent' but also 'mountain ...[the]
    Egyptian Set is the primordial serpent or dragon, but /set/ also
    means 'mountain' ... [the] ancient Sumerian dragon ... was the /Kur
    /... but /kur/ also possessed the meaning 'mountain' ... [the] Greek
    /Boreas/ is the primeval serpent ... but etymologists connect the
    serpent-dragon's name with a primitive /bora/, 'mountain''[110]. 

Suhr tells us: 'Among primitive peoples there are signs of the column in
the form of a python or dragon rising from the level of the earth to the
clouds'[111]. He adds that among the Murngin people of northern
Australia, the great python 'is the most impressive representative of
the column'[112]. In China '[a] dragon ascending from the earth to the
clouds can serve as the whirling column - which no doubt accounts for so
many dragons on pillars'[113].

A serpent, or dragon, on the other hand, is not exactly the same thing
as a pair of entwined serpents. If we are going to keep to the motif of
Thornhill's Birkeland current, where do we find the cosmic pillar
described as a pair of entwined serpents or, at least, a serpent
entwined around a vertical prominence? We need only turn to the object
the Greeks referred to as the /caduceus/ - two serpents entwined around
a central shaft, which Suhr also recognised as representative of the
cosmic /axis/ [114]. Nor must we think of the caduceus as a uniquely
Greek invention, since the symbol was also popular in the east,
including Mesopotamia [115].

A 4th century BC relief from Greece depicts a cylindrical altar with a
snake coiled around it. Arthur Cook, who mentioned it in his monumental
work on ancient religion, found it difficult to interpret [116]. What he
should have realised is that the word 'altar', although derived from
Latin, has its phonetic equivalent in the Arabic Al-Tur which means 'The
Mountain' [117]. This connection did not escape Talbott, who has
provided intriguing insights concerning the associations between the
altar, the world mountain, the cosmic pillar and other Saturnian
elements [118].

Other examples of this motif are encountered in depictions of Mithras,
shown with a serpent coiled around him in spiral fashion, and of the
Mithraic /Kronos/, or /Aion/, who is likewise shown within the coils of
a spiralling snake [119]. Variants of the same motif are to be found in
the serpent-footed Yahweh on coins of the Hellenistic period [120]. That
Yahweh originated as a personification of Saturn was well understood by
William Heidel, even if he himself did not quite accept the
identification. Despite the slight phonetic similarity between the names
Jehovah (Yahweh) and Jove (Iovis), Alfred de Grazia's view that Yahweh
was a personification of the planet Jupiter [121] cannot be upheld. As
Heidel tells us: 'That Yahweh and Saturn were identical was a belief
widely accepted in antiquity ...'[122].* *This can be verified through
Tacitus who recorded that the Jews worshipped the planet Saturn as their
god [123]. I mention this because the images of Yahweh reproduced on the
coins referred to above do not merely show him as serpent-footed but
with both serpentine legs entwined together, thus conforming to the
demands of our model.

If we opt for Jueneman's Rankine vortex in lieu of Thornhill's Birkeland
current (at least temporarily) how does this scheme account for the
serpentine nature of the image? The answer is easy enough: as Jueneman
explained,

    'Terrestrial tornadoes occasionally exhibit smaller counter-rotating
    vortices in close proximity to the primary whirlwind. On a much
    vaster scale, similar counter-rotating catenulate /bolus flows/
    would have snaked around the polar column in filamentary fashion,
    first in a counterclockwise, then in a clockwise direction in a slow
    oscillation'[124]. 

It is this bolus flow that would have given the planetary tornado, or
Rankine vortex, its serpentine quality.


      The Watery Vortex

If, as Jueneman surmises, the polar column /was/ a Rankine vortex which
sucked up a goodly portion of Earth's hydrospheric content, we should
find it so mentioned somewhere in the mytho-historical record. Once
again, the model demands it. Looking at the vortex from a safe distance,
ancient man would not have realised that it contained water. When the
polar column was severed, however, the water contained within it would
have been released and from this ancient man should have deduced that
the column did contain a reservoir of water. Does the mytho-historical
record meet this demand?

We have already seen that among the Australian Aborigines the great
python is the most impressive representative of the polar column. It is
therefore significant that this python is not only believed to tower up
to the level of the clouds but that he also 'brings about rain and
flood' [125].* *The Efe pygmies of the Ituri forest tell of a deluge of
water which gushed forth as a mighty river when their version of the
Cosmic Tree, which was the polar column, was felled [126].* *Similarly,
the Arawak Indians of the Guinas tell of a wondrous tree which Sigu cut
down. From its stump, water gushed out in such quantity as to cause a
deluge [127]. This tale is also found among the traditions of the Cuna,
who tell of their mischief-maker, the Tapir, chopping down the Saltwater
Tree from which salt water gushed out to form the oceans of the world [128].

Thus, Velikovsky was correct when he surmised that the water of the
Deluge would have been salty but not, as he believed, because the salt,
or at least its chlorine content, originated from Saturn [129]. The
water was salty because it came from the same oceanic water the vortex
had sucked up in the first place. Nor is this idea solely met among
so-called primitive tribes. For instance, a mysterious plant was
supposed to grow in the Mesopotamian /apsu/ which was connected to the
watery abyss by what is termed a /ratu/ - a word that de Santillana and
von Dechend conjecturally translated as a 'water pipe' [130]. According
to William Albright, a flood rose out of this /ratu /[131].


      The Flood From The North

If this is so, our scenario would then demand an additional set of data.
If the Flood, or at least one of them, was caused by the release of
water that had been contained in the vortex churning away in Earth's
northern regions, the mytho-historical record should be able to supply
us with some accounts that tell of a flood that swooped down from the
north. This demand, too, is met.

Among the traditions of the Wintus, who once inhabited the Upper
Sacramento Valley in California, we encounter the following:

    'Water rushed in through the open place made by Lutchi when he
    raised the sky. It rushed in like a crowd of rivers, covered the
    earth ? as it rolled on toward the south. There was so much water ?
    that it rose to the top of the sky and rushed on toward Olelpanti
    [the highest heaven]' [132]. 

There is no need to point out that a flood which rolls on 'toward the
south' must have 'rolled' in from the north. The Wichita Indians of
Oklahoma tell something similar: they believed, 'the time would come
when there would be some sign given so that the people would know that
something was about to happen; that when the time should come it would
begin from the north' [133]. Sure enough, after a while, there came some
signs 'which showed that there was something in the north that looked
like clouds' but the 'clouds that were seen in the north was a deluge'
[134]. The Pawnee also claim that the water of the Deluge 'poured down
from the heavens, and the water came from the northwest upon the earth
so that it became deep ? '[135].

What of the hard sciences? Is the evidence there? Once again, I can only
mention a few items here but that an enormous flood had once swept down
from the north to scour the land surface of North America has been
suggested by J. Harlan Bretz [136]. Similarly, C. Warren Hunt speaks of
evidence pointing to a flood from the north, excavating the land as it
went before it emptied into Lake Bonneville [137]. That Lake Bonneville
itself also burst its bounds to cause a secondary flood has been
documented by Robert Jarred and Harold Malde. What is of additional
interest here is that the area once covered by this lake constitutes a
vast salt deposit 100 square miles in extent [138]. Similar signs of a
vast scouring flood from the north have also been discovered in Siberia
[139].

It is, of course, theorised that this flood was due to the catastrophic
melting of the northern ice cap at the end of the Ice Age. I, on the
other hand, claim that, at this time, the northern ice cap had not yet
been formed.


      The Churning Of The Ocean

One of the most dramatic images of the concept, which brings various of
our motifs together, is invoked by the Indic myth, from the
/Mahabharata/ and the /Bhagavata Purana/, concerning the production of
/amrita/ (or ambrosia). Briefly the myth is this: in an effort to
produce this divine nectar, both gods and demons used Mount Mandara as a
churning stick. Winding the serpent Vasuki, also known as Ananta [140],
around Mount Mandara, the gods (at one end) and the demons (at the
other) grasped hold of Vasuki by the head and tail and, pulling him back
and forth, were able to rotate Mount Mandara fast enough to whisk the
sea into an ocean of milk from which amrita was produced [141].

In most visual representations of this myth, Mount Mandara is depicted
not in the form of a mountain but as a pillar [142], thus validating the
conviction that the mythic World Mountain and the Axis Mundi were one
and the same. In fact, it has long been known to Indologists that Mount
Mandara stood for the axis of the world [143]. The second noticeable
thing is hardly worth mentioning: this cosmic pillar /did/ twist and
churn. In Vasuki we recognise the bolus flow wrapped around the central
vortex - and it is interesting to note that this entity was 'associated
with the north' [144], locating the entire action there. Finally, in the
divinities' churning by pulling the coiled Vasuki this way and that, an
echo is retained of the clockwise/counter-clockwise rotation of the
bolus flow described by Jueneman.

The elements contained in the myth of the churning of the ocean must not
be thought of as uniquely Hindu in origin. In the Hindu myth, for
instance, Mandara was placed on the back of a tortoise. In Chinese
mythology, it is Shang-ti who is depicted as standing on the celestial
tortoise, while the serpent was said to have encircled the tortoise
[145]. Shang-ti's title was 'The Holy and Propitious Prince of the North
Pole', who is usually represented as surrounded by a halo [146], both of
which have special meaning to this study. It is also noteworthy that the
symbolism of the tortoise and serpent goes at least as far back as the
Han Dynasty and was used as an emblem for the northern region of the
world [147]. More than that, as Lord of the Centre, Shang-ti was also
revered as Huang-ti [148], who is perhaps better known as the Yellow
Lord [149] or Yellow Emperor [150], long acknowledged to be an avatar of
Saturn [151].

In the Japanese /Kojiki/ we learn of the Heavenly Jewelled Spear which
joined heaven to Earth and which acted as the churning stick responsible
for the surfacing of the mythical (one might as well say celestial)
island of Onogoro [152].

The reason behind the churning of the milk ocean seems to be variously
given. Thus, according to Veronica Ions, the divinities involved were
actually bent on retrieving certain items, including the famed amrita,
which had been lost during 'one of the periodic deluges which destroyed
the world' [153]. In fact, these items /were/ eventually retrieved from
the milk ocean due to the churning action of Mandara [154]. While, as
yet, I have not been able to ascertain this assertion in an /original/
Indic source, if well-grounded it would mean that, following the flood,
or at least one such flood, the axis vortex re-established itself. In
any case, Ion's assertion seems to point to a re-creation of Saturn's
cosmos which can be deduced on the strength of other evidence much too
complex to go into here.


      The Arctic Carnage

Does this scenario, involving a tornado of planetary proportions, raise
even more demands? We are all acquainted with the destructive force that
tornadoes exhibit. Should not Saturn's Rankine vortex, therefore, have
left signs of an even greater destruction, especially since this titanic
maelstrom would have wrought its devastation while standing still laterally?

A full exposition of the history of the Axis Mundi requires a volume to
tell in full and here I can only provide a few isolated items. Firstly,
there is the Arctic 'muck', or frozen soil, which 'covers no less than
one seventh of the land surface of earth', all of which encircles the
Arctic Ocean and lies within the Arctic Circle [155].* *Composed mainly
of silt, sand, pebbles and boulders, it is often accompanied by
'preserved, semi-decayed, or fully decayed vegetable and animal matter'
[156]. Its depth in some places 'has always caused even the most
open-minded geologists to boggle' [157]. The Russians, who have
conducted studies on this muck, have in some places drilled down more
than 4000 feet without reaching rock bottom [158]. Entire forests have
been found buried in this area, including plum trees complete with their
leaves and fruits [159] and also palm trees and huge exotic ferns [160].
Animals are also found buried in this muck, the most notable of which is
the mammoth. As George Gaylord Simpson was astute enough to realise,
catastrophic events at the end of the Pleistocene were not only much
more severe in North than in South America, they also affected a much
larger proportion of animals [161].

Now here is the puzzle. As one writer put it, 'how do you get that
thickness of what is manifestly surface-derived material if it is the
result of mere run-off?' [162]. As Dolph Hooker says: 'In some areas
there are no evidences of former highlands from which sediments could
have been eroded and transported to the areas of perma-frost' [163]. Now
consider the model being discussed. Would not such a colossal vortex
have scoured the land, year-in year-out, uprooting not only whatever
trees might have thrived in the region but also sizeable chunks of rock
and boulders which would have swirled around, grinding relentlessly
against each other, breaking apart into ever smaller pieces until ground
into sand and silt? What is the area that is now filled with the Arctic
Ocean if not an immense basin scoured out of the living rock?

I almost hate to bring up the subject of the frozen mammoths, so much
has been written about them. I shall not discuss here the few that have
been found frozen complete or almost complete in areas where the muck
has melted. What I shall stress is the vast remains of torn and broken
mammoths both in Alaska and Siberia which are associated with evidence
of an atmospheric tempest of unprecedented dimensions. The Liakhov
Islands, the islands of Stolbovoi and Belkov and the New Siberian
Islands are so full of mammoth bones and tusks that one investigator
described these lands as if they were 'actually composed of the bones
and tusks of elephants' [164]. Similar remains in Alaska have also been
numbered in thousands [165]. In both Siberia and Alaska, the signs of
destruction are very apparent. In Alaska, multitudes of trees are found
'twisted and torn' and 'piled in splintered masses'. Mammal remains
(mammoths, mastodons, bisons, horses) are found dismembered and torn but
with portions of ligaments, skin, hair and even flesh, still intact and
fresh, all mingled with the splintered remains of this once mighty
forest [166]. In Siberia it is exactly the same: entire uprooted
forests, bituminous trunks and fossilised charcoal, everywhere
intermingled with petrified ash, veins of ice and sand that has turned
into sandstone. Among this colossal devastation are found the skeletons
of mammoths, rhinoceroses, bison and horses [167].

Neglecting to take the effects of his own Rankine vortex into
consideration, Jueneman opted for waves of translation due to
terrestrial stasis as the reason 'why hecatombs of broken and smashed
animal bones literally blanket the Arctic regions' [168]. However would
waves of translation have carried trees /without dropping their leaves
and their fruits along the way/? Besides, as he himself pointed out,
these waves of translation would not only have swept from the equator
towards both poles, carrying boulders, uprooted trees and mangled
animals with them; they would also have travelled back /towards/ the
equator [169]. Why, then, did the waves not carry most of the boulders,
uprooted trees and mangled animals back with them or, as Richard Smith
asked [170], why do we not find the same state of affairs in the
/Antarctic/? As I replied to Smith [171], the answer is simple: there
was no vortex churning above Earth's South Pole.

Gordon Williams questioned Jueneman's explanation and also mine while
presenting his own [172]. Unfortunately, he relied, in part at least, on
his mistaken belief concerning the Orphic Egg of myth [173] and also his
non-polar placement of Saturn. There is much that can be said against
Williams' views but this is not the time or place. All I shall say is
that, on this topic, I have the additional evidence of the
mytho-historical record on my side - as the theory, in fact, continues
to demand.

What is this evidence? Does it have anything to say about the
catastrophic demise of the mammoths in the north? Given that 'mammoth'
is an English word derived from the Russian /mamantu/ through the Tatar
(or Tartar) /mamma/, which means 'earth' - 'because their remains are
found embedded in the earth' [174] - I shall use the word 'elephant' in
its stead, which is how they would have been remembered by the Hindu
descendants of those who witnessed the event. Are elephants mentioned in
the record in connection with the polar vortex? In the /Mahabharata/ we
read that Mandara, that churning mountain, was 'crowded with tusked
animals' [175]. When the churning began, it is said, great trees spun
off, were crushed against one another, lightning flashed forth, a fire
blazed burning the elephants and other beasts 'and all the various
creatures there lost their life's breath'. The water pouring from above
eventually dowsed the fire and flowed into the ocean [176]. Thus we have
here the entire spectrum of the devastation: the whirlwind, the uprooted
forest, the carnage, the fire and the ensuing flood. Does this not tally
with what is found in Earth's northern regions? There are other
instances in Indic lore which touch upon the same event but the above
should suffice for now.

If man was close enough to this planetary tornado to witness it, how was
he not engulfed in its carnage? Why do we not find human remains in the
northern permafrost? Man is an intelligent animal and would have known
enough to stay in the safety zone outside the periphery of the vortex.
Thus it was written in relation to Mount Meru, the 'golden mountain'
which, like Mandara, was a stand-in for the /axis mundi/ [177], that men
cannot approach it. 'Dreadful beasts of prey wander over it', wrote the
ancients, 'but others cannot approach it even in thought' [178].

Animals, however, are not stupid either. So why were they dim-witted
enough to get caught in the maelstrom? In fact, at first they were not.
Like man, they would have respected the safety zone but in the end, when
the planets were displaced from their polar alignment, the funnel of the
polar column was dislodged from its axial locus. Swirling now in
corkscrew fashion, writhing like a serpent, it went berserk and
overstepped the bounds within which it had been contained for ages.
Taken unawares, beasts fell prone to it. Man, apparently, was just that
bit smarter.


      The Onslaught Of Ice

The penultimate question I wish to raise concerns the freezing of the
entire hecatomb - animals, trees, boulders, sand and all the other
detritus which constitutes the Arctic muck or permafrost. How did it all
freeze? Where did the ice come from? Does the record have anything to
say about it? Is it traceable to the planet Saturn or Earth's primeval
position in relation to Saturn? Can this demand also be met?

This is an easy question to answer. The Greeks, for instance, had long
associated the planet Kronos (i.e. Saturn) with snow and hail [179]. In
fact, Saturn was /renowned/ for being 'cold' and 'moist' [180]. This
seemingly-odd belief is not met only among the Greeks. Abu Ma'sar also
stated that Saturn's nature is cold [181]. Alcabitius likewise recorded
that 'he [Saturn] is bad, masculine, in daytime cold?' [182] Epigenes of
Byzantium classified Saturn as 'cold and windy' [183]. Dorotheus also
talked of 'cold Saturn' [184]. Pliny wrote that 'Saturn is of a cold and
frozen nature' [185], while Virgil spoke of 'Saturn's cold star' [186].
We can thus be almost certain that when the Zunis of New Mexico refer to
Awonawilona as having also been associated with cold [187], they were
reiterating an archaic testimonial to the planet Saturn's association
with snow and ice. This is made all the more clear since Awonawilona
means 'All-Father Father' [188], an epithet reserved elsewhere for the
Saturnian deity. Thus Kronos/Saturn was referred to as 'First Father'
[189], while Odin was known as 'All-father' [190], the very same name of
the Zuni Awonawilona.

Mythologists have never supplied a convincing explanation for why the
planet Saturn and its deity should be associated with cold, snow and
ice. A telling clue comes from William of Conches, who says 'Saturn is
called cold not because he is inherently cold himself but because he
/causes/ cold' [191]. Why would it have been believed that Saturn causes
cold unless it, or he, was remembered as having once done precisely
that? Nonnos, for instance, told of the 'shining victory of Zeus at war
and the hailstorm snowstorm conflict of Kronos' [192]. Is it not written
that during the war between Zeus and Kronos, a war said to have lasted
ten years, Zeus pelted Kronos with thunderbolts, while Kronos retaliated
with snow? Is it not told in the Persian /Shahnama/ that when Kai
Khusrau departed he prophesied that 'a furious blast' will rise 'and
snap the boughs and leafage of the trees' and 'a storm of snow will
shower down from heaven's louring rack' [193]? In the first fargard of
the /Vendidad/, it is written how Ahura Mazda is made to say:

    'I, who am Ahura Mazda, created Aryanem Vaejo of good capability.
    Thereupon, in opposition to it, Angro-mainyus, the Death-dealing,
    created a mighty serpent and snow?'[194] 

The Modoc Indians of southern Oregon and northern California tell of how
the Chief of the Sky Spirits drilled a hole in the sky with a rotating
stone, through which he pushed snow and ice to form a mound which almost
touched the sky [195]. Dorothy Vitaliano understood this as a memory
associated with Mount Shasta's eruption [196] but the drilling of the
sky with a rotating stone is too similar to the churning of the ocean by
Mount Mandara to escape notice. Destruction of the world by cold is also
met among the marginal, forest, and southern Andean peoples [197]. As
Dolph Hooker informs us:

    'In spite of long continued efforts to prove that ice sheets
    accumulated because climate had deteriorated, little if any actual
    evidence has been discovered to validate the theory. On the
    contrary, there is evidence that glacial ice appeared with
    catastrophic suddenness. There is evidence that at a time when
    temperate climatic conditions extended even into polar regions, the
    world, teeming with warmth-loving species of flora and animal life,
    was overwhelmed by fall of snow, ice and rain, so violent, so
    sudden, so chilling, that great numbers of creatures were forthwith
    destroyed; so vast, so violent that it brought to an abrupt end one
    geologic age and ushered in another'[198]. 

    'Knowing that glacial ice came upon the world stage suddenly, we
    understand why we cannot find evidence that Earth's climate grew
    cold /before/ the advent of an ice age; why, on the contrary,
    climate grew colder only /after/ the ice arrived and only to the
    extent that the ice itself refrigerated the Earth?' [199]. 

Meanwhile, while I do not agree with him when it comes to the actual
source, the extraterrestrial origin of the ice which caused the
so-called Ice Age has been promoted by William Thompson, who formerly
worked at NASA [200] - and this information should not be ignored simply
because it comes from a Creationist source. As Hooker also tells us:
'Obviously the perma-frost accumulated from the bottom upward - not by
freezing from the top downward' [201]. What this means is that the
detritus which forms the permafrost was frozen as it was being laid down.

Am I here suggesting that the ice which caused the 'Ice Age' came from
the planet Saturn? No - I am claiming that the snow, ice and sleet came
from the axial vortex when it was severed for the last time because that
is where a vast quantity of terrestrial moisture had been stored. Why
and how did it freeze to fall as snow, ice and sleet? As mentioned
earlier, this all transpired during the break-up of the Saturnian
configuration. Saturn, Venus and Mars were thrown out of axial alignment
and so was Earth. Its axis shifted to take up its present alignment. Do
we also find this in the mytho-historical record? Is this demand also met?


      Earth's Shifting Axis

The topic of Earth's shifting axis has been touched upon by many writers
and I shall not reiterate all the evidence. The Muria, a tribe of the
Bastar State in the Central Provinces of India do not chew words in the
telling of their creation myth. They tell without ambiguity how
Mahapurub turned the world topsy-turvy [202]. There are many records of
this nature and I shall not repeat them all but I shall include that of
the Hopi because it is one of the best to illustrate the subject. These
Indians narrate [203]:

    'the world, with no one to control it, teetered off balance, spun
    around crazily, then rolled over twice. Mountains plunged into seas
    with a great splash, seas and lakes sloshed over the land; /and as
    the world spun through cold and lifeless space it froze into solid
    ice/.' 

How would these Indians have known that the teetering of the world would
cause seas and lakes to slosh over the land? How would they have known
that a shifting of Earth's axis could freeze it into solid ice?

Had I any faith in the accuracy of /counting/ the annual layers of ice
retrieved in cores drilled out of Greenland's ice fields, I would even
have been able to date the event for you.


      Saturn's Departure

My final point concerns Saturn's departure. I need not tell you that
Saturn is no longer in Earth's proximity. The theory then demands that
somewhere in the record, Saturn's removal from Earth's proximity should
be encountered. So we find as, for example, with the tale of
Quetzalcoatl [204],* *whose 'paladins' died from the cold through the
snow that fell upon them just before the god took off on his serpent
raft to be seen no more [205]. I mention this one myth because, as one
can see, it ties in nicely with Saturn's removal at the very time when
Earth, teetering off balance, was deluged with the ice that ushered in
the so-called Ice Age.

There is much more that I can add to the topic of Saturn's removal from
Earth's vicinity but it is time to call it quits. Even so, having said
so much about the Egyptian Ra at the beginning of this treatise, it is
perhaps fitting to end with him. Thus, in an Egyptian myth, Ra is made
to say:

    'Weary indeed are my limbs and they fail me. I shall go forth ?
    Henceforth my dwelling place must be in the heavens. No longer will
    I reign upon the earth.'[206] 

and:

    'I have determined to cause myself to be uplifted into the sky, to
    join the blessed gods and to renounce rule of the world.' [207]. 

Then Ra raised himself from the back of the goddess Nut into the sky [208].

If Ra was truly the Sun, where was it prior to its ascent into the sky?
If, as mythologists tell us, Nut /was/ the goddess of the sky, what
would it mean that the Sun rose from the back of the sky (i.e. Nut)
/into/ the sky? What does it mean that, before ascending into the sky,
the Sun had reigned upon Earth? What does it mean that the Sun once
ruled the world? Do we not, in fact, find it stated in an Orphic
fragment that 'Saturn dwelt openly on earth among men' [209]? So, also,
Dionysus of Halicarnassus who declared that 'Kronos ruled on this very
earth' [21]. Besides, as it was written, when Ra removed himself into
the sky, 'darkness came on' and 'Ra was borne through darkness' [211].
Does this make sense if Ra was the Sun? Do we see darkness coming on
when the Sun rises into the sky? The answer to this mystery is that the
sun of night, which had ruled Earth due to its proximity, had now
removed itself into the blackness of space. True night, as we now know
it, finally descended upon the world and the stars, which could not have
been seen as long as the Saturnian sun of night was shining down on
Earth, appeared in all their brilliance for the first time. Do we find
this stated in the mytho-historical record? Can this last demand be met?
As it is written:

    '[When Ra left Earth he] went on his way through the realms which
    are above, and these he divided and set in order. He spake creating
    words, and called into existence the field of Aalu, and there he
    caused to assemble a multitude of beings which are beheld in heaven,
    even the stars?' [212]. 


      Notes and References

1. I. Velikovsky, /Worlds in Collision/, New York, 1950.
2. G. de Santillana & H. von Dechend, /Hamlet's Mill: An Essay on Myth
and the Frame of Time/, Boston, 1969, p. 135.
3. See 'The Road to Saturn', /AEON/ I:1, Jan. 1988, pp. 108-129 and 'The
Road to Saturn, Part II', /AEON/ I:3, May 1988, pp. 109-138.
4. J. Gibson, 'Saturn's age', /Research Communications Network
Newsletter/ #3, Oct. 15, 1977, p. 4.
5. R. Van Over, /Sun Songs: Creation Myths From Around the World/, NY,
1980, p. 299.
6. /Laws of Manu/ I:v:5.
7. D. Cardona, 'Darkness and the Deep', /AEON/ III:3, Oct. 1993, pp. 49-70.
8. E.g., /ibid/., where sources are cited in /quantum sufficit/.
9. /Linga Purana/ I:59:6-9.
10. J. Bierhorst, /The Red Swan: Myths and Tales of the American
Indians/, N. Y., 1976, p. 38 (paragraphing altered).
11. D. Cardona, 'The Beginning of Time', /AEON/ III:5, May 1994, pp. 71-76.
12. A. B. Cook, /Zeus: A Study in Ancient Religion/, Vol. II, Part II,
N. Y., 1965, pp. 1035-1036.
13. Van Over, /op. cit/. [5], pp. 386-387.
14. /Maitri Upanishad/ VI:15.
15. J. Strong, /Hebrew and Chaldee Dictionary/, Madison, 1890, p. 48.
16. E. A. W. Budge, /An Egyptian Hieroglyphic Dictionary/, Vol. II, N.
Y., 1920/1978, p. 857.
17. Macrobius, /Saturnalia/ I:22:8.
18. As cited by I. Donnelly, /Ragnarok: The Age of Fire and Gravel/,
republished as/ The Destruction of Atlantis/, N.Y., 1971, pp. 210-211.
19. Macrobius, /loc. cit/.
20. /Cf./ especially Cook, /op. cit/. [12], p. 374.
21. /Cf./ especially W. A. Heidel, /The day of Yahweh/, N. Y., 1929, pp.
468-469; L. C. Stecchini, 'Chronos and Kronos', /KRONOS/ VII:2, Winter
1982, p. 41.
22. Cicero, /De Deorum Natura/ II:25.
23. de Santillana & von Dechend, /op. cit/. [2], p. 135.
24. E. Burgess, /Surya Siddhanta/, Calcutta, 1860/1935, p. 5.
25. H. Collitz, 'Konig Yima und Saturn', /Festschrift Pavry/, 1933, pp.
86-108.
26. W. E. Begley, /Visnu's Flaming Wheel: The Iconography of the
Sudarsana-Cakra/, N. Y., 1973, p. 96.
27. F. O. Schrader, /Introduction to the Pancaratra and the
Ahirbudhnya-Samhita/, Madras, 1916, pp. 106, 132.
28. V. S. Apte, /The Practical Sanskrit-English Dictionary/, Delhi,
1975, p. 708.
29. E. Moor, /Hindu Pantheon/, London, 1864, p. 218.
30. Van Over, /op. cit/. [5], p. 308.
31. /Ibid/., p. 311.
32. /Atharva Veda/ XIX:53:8-10.
33. W. D. O'Flaherty, /Hindu Myths,/ Harmondsworth, 1976, p. 350.
34. E. C. Sachau, /Alberuni's India,/ London, 1914, pp. ii, 121.
35. de Santillana & von Dechend, /op, cit/. [2], p. 133 (emphasis added).
36. See, for instance, G. Schlegel, /Uranographie Chinoise/, Leiden,
1875, p. 628.
37. M. Jastrow, Jr., 'Sun and Saturn', /Revue D'Assyriologie et
D'Archeologie Orientale/, Paris, Sept.1910, pp. 163-164.
38. F. Boll, 'Kronos-Helios', /Archiv für Religionswissenschaft/ XIX,
1916-1919, pp. 343 ff.
39. E. A. W. Budge, /The Gods of the Egyptians/, Vol. II, N. Y.,
1904/1969, p. 339.
40. /Ibid/., pp. 339-340.
41. /Ibid/., pp. 170-171.
42. /Ibid/., p. 176.
43. E.A.W. Budge, /An Egyptian Hieroglyphic Dictionary/, Vol. I, N. Y.,
1920/1978, p. cxxv; S. A. B. Mercer, /The Pyramid Texts/, Vol. II, N.
Y., 1952, p. 156.
44. Note that the ring, or rings, around Ra to which the hymns allude
was not the /present/ set of Saturnian rings but that does not detract
from the point being made.
45. E.A.W. Budge, /Osiris & the Egyptian Resurrection/, Vol. I, N. Y.,
1911/1973, pp. 65, 104.
46. E.A.W. Budge, /The Egyptian Book of the Dead/, N. Y., 1895/1967, p.
246, where Atum, here called Temu, is referred to as 'the night sun, at
the twentieth hour of the night'. Elsewhere in the same work, Atum is
referred to as /Tum/ and/or /Atemu/ (see p. cx).
47. Jastrow, /op. cit/. [37], p. 170.
48. Budge, /op. cit/. [46], p. 250 (emphasis added).
49. D.A. Mackenzie, /Egyptian Myth and Legend/, N. Y., 1907/1978, pp.
236-237.
50. E.A.W. Budge, /Osiris & the Egyptian Resurrection/, Vol. II, N. Y.,
1911/1973, p. 355.
51. /Coffin Texts/, Spell 18.
52. As quoted by D. Talbott, 'The Ship of Heaven', /AEON/ I:3, May 1988,
p. 85.
53. /Ibid/.
54. /Ibid/., p. 86.
55. /Pyramid Texts/, Spell 1133.
56. /Coffin Texts/, Spell 136.
57. D. N. Talbott, /The Saturn Myth/, N. Y., 1980, p. 49.
58. /Ibid/.
59. /Ibid/., p. 48.
60. Jastrow, /op. cit/. [37], p. 170.
61. R. H. Stieglitz, 'The Hebrew Names of the Seven Planets', /Journal
of Near Eastern Studies/, April 1980.
62. Budge, /op. cit./ [46], p. 315.
63. A. F. F. Mariette-Bey, /Catalogue du Musée de Boulaq/, 1864-1867,
pp. 20-21, 100-101; E. A. W. Budge, /Osiris and the Egyptian
Resurrection/, Vol. I, N. Y., 1911/1973, p. 21.
64. Budge, /op. cit./ [46], p. 250.
65. M. de Civrieux, /Watunna: An Orinoco Creation Cycle/, Berkeley,
California, 1980, p. 21.
66. L.E. Rose, 'Variations on a Theme of Philolaos', /KRONOS/ V:1, Fall
1979, p. 26; H. Tresman & B. O'Gheoghan, /SISR/ II:2, pp. 35-40.
67. E.g. D. Cardona, 'The Reconstruction of Cosmic History', /AEON/
II:2, February 1990, pp. 116 ff.
68. L.E. Rose, /op. cit/., pp. 12 ff.; /idem/, 'On Saturn at the North
Pole', /AEON/ I:6, December 1988, p. 39.
69. F. F. Hall, 'Solar System Studies', Part 2, /AEON/ I:4, July 1988,
p. 28.
70. Rose, /op. cit./ [66], p. 30.
71. E.A.W. Budge, /The Book of the Dead/, New Hyde Park, 1960, p. 86.
72. G. Rawlinson, /The Seven Great Monarchies of the Ancient Eastern
World/, Vol. II, N. Y., 1884, facing p. 176.
73. L. de Saussure, 'Le Système Cosmologique Sino-Iranienne', /Journal
Asiatique/, April-June 1923, pp. 235-297.
74. F. Hitching, /The World Atlas of Mysteries/, London, 1978, p. 231.
75. de Santillana & von Dechend, /op. cit/. [2], p. 136.
76. /Cf. /R.B. Driscoll, 'Magnetic Models of the Polar Configuration',
/AEON/ IV:2 August 1995, p. 25.
77. L.E. Rose, 'The Afar Triangle as the Nether Reaches of Eden and
Babel', /AEON/ II:4, May 1991, pp. 5-28.
78. Hall, /op. cit/. [69].
79. H. Tresman, 'Geological Genesis', /C&CW/ 1993:1, pp. 9-13.
80. Hall, /op. cit/. [69].
81. /Cf./ W. Thornhill, 'Evidence for the Extreme Youth of Venus',
/C&CR/, 1993 Special Issue, p. 79.
82. F.B. Jueneman, /Limits of Uncertainty/, Chicago, 1975, pp. 84.
83. /Ibid/., p. 82.
84. D. King-Hele, 'The Shape of the Earth', /Scientific American/, Oct.
1967, pp. 67-76; D. A. Slade, 'Eric Crew and the Tippe-Top', /SISW/ 4:3,
Dec. 1981, p. 35.
85. Hall, /op. cit/., [69] p. 18.
86. /Ibid/., p. 19 (emphasis as given).
87. C.L. Ellenberger, private communiqué, Sept. 26, 1988.
88. /Ibid/.
89. Rose, /op. cit/. [77], pp. 6, 10-11, 14, 16, 18.
90. Rose/ op. cit/. [66], pp. 37-38.
91. F.B. Jueneman, 'The Polar Column: A Physical Model of Myth', /AEON/
I:4, July 1988, pp. 36-49.
92. Talbott, /op. /cit. [57], p. 214.
93. D. Talbott, /Symbols of an Alien Sky/, Beaverton, Oregon, 1997, pp.
127, 144 ff.
94. W. Thornhill, /The Electric Universe/, Beaverton, Oregon, 1997, p. 100.
95. E.g. D. Talbott, 'The Saturn Thesis', Part 3, /AEON/ IV:6, May 1997,
p. 50.
96. /Cf./ E. Cochrane, 'Martian Meteorites in Ancient Myth and Modern
Science', /AEON/ IV:2, Aug. 1995, pp. 57 ff., where various other
sources are cited.
97. Thornhill, /op. cit/. [94], p. 22.
98. Anonymous, 'Planet Poseur?', /Discover/, Aug. 1998, p. 24.
99. Thornhill, /op. cit/. [94], p. 17.
100. de Santillana & von Dechend, /op. cit/. [2], pp. 159, 231.
101. E. G. Suhr, /Before Olympos/, N.Y., 1967, p. 53, but see also pp.
69, 72.
102. E.G. Suhr, /The Spinning Aphrodite/, N.Y., 1969, p. 36.
103. Suhr, /op. /cit. [101], p. 79.
104. Talbott, /op. cit./ [57], p. 214 (emphasis as given).
105. /Cf./ E. Cochrane, 'The Milky Way', /AEON/ IV:4, April 1996, pp. 39
/ff./, esp. illustrations on pp. 46, 53, 54, 55.
106. E. Cochrane, 'Stairway to Heaven', /AEON/ V:1, Nov. 1997, pp. 69
ff., esp. illustrations on pp. 75, 76.
107. Suhr, /op. cit/. [101], p. 72; /idem/ [102], pp. 53 ff.
108. /Cf./ illustrations in Cochrane, /op. cit./ [105], pp. 57 & 58;
compare the latter to the one on p. 55.
109. Talbott, /loc. cit/. [57].
110. /Ibid/, (emphasis as given).
111. Suhr, /op. cit./[101], p. 80.
112. /Ibid/., p. 84.
113. /Ibid/., p. 85.
114. /Ibid/., pp. 72 ff.
115. /Ibid/., p. 72.
116. Cook, /op. cit/. [12], pp. 1175-1176.
117. N. J. Dawood (translator), /The Koran/, Harmondsworth, 1978, p. 445.
118. Talbott, /op. cit/. [57], pp. 314-315, 330.
119. Cook, /op, cit/. [12], pp. 1952-1953.
120. D. H. Kelley, 'The Nine Lords of the Night', /Contributions of the
University of California Archaeological Research Facility/, No. 16, Oct.
1972, p. 63.
121. A. de Grazia, /Chaos and Creation/, Princeton, N. J., 1981, p. 198;
see also, Velikovsky /op. cit./ [1], pp. 99-100.
122. W.A. Heidel, /The Day of Yahweh/, N. Y., 1929, p. 465.
123. Tacitus, /The Histories/, V:iv.
124. Jueneman, /op. cit/. [91], p. 40.
125. Suhr, /op. cit/. [101], p. 84.
126. J-P Hallet (with A. Pelle), /Pygmy Kitabu/, N. Y., 1973, p. 212.
127. /Ibid./, pp. 240-241; de Santillana & von Dechend, /op. cit/. [2],
pp. 217-218.
128. /Ibid., /p. 247.
129. I. Velikovsky, 'On Saturn and the Flood', /KRONOS/ V:1, Fall 1979,
pp. 7-8.
130. de Santillana & von Dechend, /op. cit/. [2], pp. 419-420.
131. W.F. Albright, 'Notes on Assyrian Lexicography', /Revue
d'Assyriologie et d'Archéologie Orientale/, 16, 1919, pp. 175 ff.
132. J. Curtin, /Creation Myths of Primitive America/, 1899, p. 22.
133. G.A. Dorsey, /Mythology of the Wichita/, 1904, chapter entitled
'The Deluge and the Repeopling of the Earth'.
134. /Ibid/.
135. G.A. Dorsey, /The Pawnee: Mythology/, Part I, 1906, pp. 134-137.
136. See S.J. Gould, 'Toward the Vindication of Punctual Changes', in
W.A. Beggren & J.A. Van Couvering (eds.), /Catastrophes and Earth
History: The New Uniformitarianism/, Princeton, N. J., 1984, pp. 17-18.
137. C.W. Hunt, /Environment of Violence/, Calgary, Alberta, 1990, p. 126.
138. R.D. Jarrett & H.E. Malde, 'Paleodischarge of the Late Pleistocene
Bonneville Flood, Snake River, Idaho, Computed from New Evidence',
/Geological Society of America Bulletin/ 99, July 1987, p. 127.
139. V.R. Baker, /et al/, 'Paleohydrology of Late Pleistocene
Superflooding, Altay Mountains, Siberia',/ Science/ 259, Jan.15, 1993,
pp. 348-350.
140. J. Herbert, 'Hindu Mythology', in 'India: The Eternal Cycle',
/Larousse World Mythology/, London, 1972, p. 210.
141. O'Flaherty, /op. cit/. [33], pp. 274 ff.(NOTE: This myth, as it
appears in the /Mahabharata/, incorporates at least two earlier versions
so that certain elements and events are duplicated. See -/Ibid/., pp.
273-274.)
142. E.g. illustrations in: Herbert, /op. cit./ [141], p. 211; P.
Masson-Oursel & L. Morin, 'Indian Mythology', /New Larousse Encyclopedia
of Mythology/, London, 1972, p. 363; W. R. Fix, /Star Maps/, London,
1979, pp. 26, 27.
143. Herbert, /loc. cit /[141].
144. Kelley, /op. cit/., p. 60.
145. H. Maspero, 'The Mythology of Modern China', /Asiatic Mythology/,
N. Y., 1972, pp. 340-341.
146. /Ibid/., p. 339.
147. /Ibid/., p. 340.
148. /Ibid/., p. 339.
149. /Ibid/.
150. /Ibid/., p. 332.
151. de Santillana & von Dechend, /op. cit/. [2], p. 129.
152. D.L. Philippi (trans.), /The Kojiki,/ Tokyo, 1969, p. 49.
153. V. Ions, /Indian Mythology/, London, 1967, p. 48.
154. /Ibid/.
155. Anonymous, 'Much About Muck', /Pursuit/, Oct. 1969.
156. /Ibid/.
157. /Ibid/.
158. /Ibid/.
159. /Ibid/.
160. I.C. Johnson, 'Antarctic Anomalies', /AEON/ II:1, June 1989, p.
126. (Note: Despite the title of this paper, Arctic anomalies are
mentioned in conjunction with Antarctic ones.)
161. J. Abery, review of G.G. Simpson, /Splendid Isolation/, Yale, 1980,
/SISW/ 4:1, July 1981, p. 27.
162. 'Much About Muck' /op. cit./ [156].
163. D.E. Hooker, /Those Astounding Ice Ages/, N. Y., 1958, p. 95.
164. D.G. Whitley, 'The Ivory Islands in the Arctic Ocean', /Journal of
the Philosophical Society of Great Britain/, XII, 1910, p. 41.
165. F. Rainey, 'Archaeological Investigation in Central Alaska',
/American Antiquity/, V, 1940, pp. 301-307; F. C. Hibben, 'Evidence of
Early Man in Alaska', /American Antiquity/, VIII, 1943, pp. 256-257.
166. /Ibid/., p. 256.
167. Whitley, /op. cit/. [165], p. 50.
168. F.B. Jueneman, 'The Terrestrial Sea: A Critical Model of Science
and Myth', /AEON/ IV:6, May 1997, pp. 32-33.
169. /Ibid/., p. 33.
170. R.M. Smith, 'Some Thoughts on the Saturnian Sun and Polar Column',
/AEON/ V:1, Nov. 1997, p. 5.
171. D. Cardona, in /ibid/., p. 6.
172. G.P. Williams, 'Changing Sea Levels', /AEON/ V:3, Dec. 1998, pp. 21 ff.
173. /Cf./ D. Cardona, "The Evolution of the Cosmogonic Egg," /AEON/
III:5, May 1994, pp. 52-70.
174. N. Webster, /Webster's Twentieth-Century Dictionary of the English
Language/, N. Y., 1939, p. 1000.
175. O'Flaherty, /op. cit/. [33], p. 274.
176. /Ibid/., p. 276.
177. /Ibid/., p. 348.
178. /Ibid/., p. 274.
179. Cook, /op. cit/. [12], Vol. II, p. 558.
180. R. Klibansky, /et al, Saturn and Melancholy/, London, 1964, pp.
127-195.
181. Abu Ma'sar, /Introduction to Astrology/, cited in /ibid/., p. 130.
182. Alcabitius, /Introductorium Maius/, cited by Klibansky /et al, op.
cit/. [181] p. 131.
183. Epigenes of Byzantium, as quoted by Seneca, /Naturales
Quaestiones/, vii:4:2; see also Cicero, /De Natura Deorum/, ii:119.
184. Dorotheus, as cited by Klibansky, /op. cit/. [181], p. 148.
185. Pliny, /Natural History/, II:vi:34.
186. Virgil, /Georgics I:336./
187. Van Over, /op. cit/. [5], p. 24.
188. /Ibid/.
189. /Great Magical Papyrus of Paris/, 4:308 ff., as cited in K.
Preisendanz (trans.), /Papyri Graecae Magicae: Die Griechischen
Zauberpapyri/ , Vol. I, Berlin, 1928, p. 173.
190. J.W. Perry, /Lord of the Four Quarters: Myths of the Royal Father/,
N. Y., 1970, p. 185.
191. William of Conches, /Philosophia/, as paraphrased by Klibansky,
/op/. /cit/., [181] p. 181 (emphasis added).
192. Nonnos, /Dionysiaca/, XII:52-63.
193. de Santillana & von Dechend, /op. cit/. [2], p. 42.
194. /Vendidad/, fargard 1:3.
195. D.B. Vitaliano, /Legends of the Earth/, Indiana University Press,
1973, p. 125.
196. /Ibid./
197. H. Osborne, 'South American Mythology', /Mythology of the
Americas/, London, 1970, p. 379.
198. Hooker, /op. cit/. [164], p. 48.
199. /Ibid/., p. 94 (emphasis as given).
200. W.I. Thompson III, 'Extraterrestrial Origin of the Ice Age', / A
Symposium on Creation/, VI, Seattle, 1977, pp. 91 ff.
201. Hooker, /op. cit/. [164], p. 94.
202. Van Over, /op, cit/. [5], p. 300.
203. F. Waters (with O. White Bear Fredericks), /Book of the Hopi/,
N.Y., 1974, p. 20.
204. For Quetzalcoatl as Saturn see, D. Cardona, 'Morning Star', /AEON/
IV:1, April 1995, pp. 11-21 where various sources are cited.
205. de Santillana & von Dechend, /op. cit/. [2], pp. 78, 360.
206. Van Over, /op. cit/. [5], pp. 262-263.
207. /Ibid/., p. 270.
208. E.A.W. Budge, /The Gods of the Egyptians/. Vol. 1, N.Y., 1904/1969,
p. 367.
209. O. Kern (ed.), /Orphicorum Fragmenta,/ Berlin, 1963, p. 186.
210. Dionysius of Halicarnassus, /Roman Antiquities/ I:36:1.
211. D.A. Mackenzie, /Egyptian Myth and Legend,/ N.Y., 1907/1978, p. 10.
212. /Ibid./

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      Question Session 6 on Dwardu's paper Chairman David Salkeld

*Q1* *Janek Pietron* was sceptical about the Saturn myth and asked about
Mars configurations and the appearance of Venus and Mars at the North
Pole. Dwardu said these were valid queries which were more fully dealt
with in as yet unpublished portions of the Saturn scenario. In the
Saturn configuration, the stars were not visible. They became visible at
the time of the breakdown of the configuration. The planets that were
visible were not turning around - they were in a steady line.

*Q2* *Trevor Palmer* asked for some indication of when the Saturn
catastrophe took place. Did the Pleistocene Ice Age, with ice sheets
over North America and Northern Europe happen and, if so, over what time
scale? Dwardu replied that there was a time when the ice caps did not
exist. When they did develop, it happened quickly. This does not mean
there were no earlier ice ages but this goes beyond the scope of the
present model.

*Q3* In response to a question from *Lynn Rose*, Dwardu explained that
all the planets on the 'shish kebab' shared the same axis of rotation.