The Oera Linda book by Derel Briarley I first came across the Atland and Oera Linda book mentioned in SIS Internet Digest 1997:1 article by Timo Niroma in Scrutton's The Other Atlantis and its companion volume Secrets of Lost Atland [1], the former work containing selections of the text of the Oera Linda book between passages of commentary. The only other references to the document I have come across are in John Grant's A Directory of Discarded Ideas [2] and a later book on Atlantis by Charles Berlitz [3]. Oera Linda book was a chronicle of the Frisians passed down through the ruling family, O'er a Linda (over the land), who became the Over de Lindens. In 1848 Cornelius Over de Linden received it but, as he could not understand the language it was written in, he ignored it for twenty years before having it examined by an expert in Frisian antiquities who was satisfied with its genuineness. It was discussed in a paper read at a meeting of the Frisian Society in February 1871 and again in The Saturday Review (July 1 1876). Both these items are included as appendices to The Other Atlantis. Where was Atland? According to the 1871 paper 'From (Oera Linda book) it appears that (Atland) was land stretching out far to the west of Jutland, of which Heligoland and the islands of North Friesland are the last barren remnants.' The Other Atlantis is prefaced prefaced by a map showing Atland as 'a huge island off Norway's coast, chiefly within the Arctic Circle, and based apparently on information obtained from paranormal sources. Grant, for some reason, placed it 'between the north of Britain and Greenland'. Interestingly, the Zeno 'Map of the North' [4] shows the piece of continental shelf around the Faroe Islands above water as an island called Frisia, but I don't imagine that was behind Grant's blunder. Jurgen Spanuth's Atlantis of -the North [5] mentions that the Eddas call the northlands 'Atalland' (Thule 23.74) and that 'Atland, Adalland, Oatland occur frequently in old records as names for districts in various countries around the North Sea'. He mentions an island just east of Heligoland which was not fully submerged until the 14th century (AD) and which was mentioned by monks in the 7th century as being dedicated to the god Posite - Poseidon of Atlantis? This would tie in with the judgment of the Frisian experts in the 1871 paper re Atland being off the Danish coast. Before returning to the history of Atland, we must ask, is the Oera Linda book genuine? It was written on cotton paper of large quarto size, with no watermark, and when its ink was analysed in 1875 it was found to contain no iron, which would date it to before 1300. The document is dated 1256 'according to the Christian reckoning', 3449 years after Atland was submerged (placing that in 2193BC). The 1256 document is not original but a copy, one or more consecutive source pages having been lost between pages 157 and 158, the front and back of the same leaf. The source material was prefaced with a warning by Liko Over de Linda dated 803 never to let a monk see the writings, for they sought to destroy all the records and customs of the Frisians. His descendant Hiddo Over de Linda copied the records down 'on foreign paper' as the originals had been damaged by flood 'and started to perish'. He exhorted his son to 'copy them likewise and your children must do so too, that they may never be lost'. This may never have been done but the 1256 copy itself survived; regarded as phoney by the Victorian experts, I believe it to be of interest but stop short of giving it scriptural status, as Scrutton seems to do. 'This is our earliest history. Wr-alda, who alone is eternal and good, made the beginning. Then commenced time', over which all things appeared. The Frisian beginning was more an evolution, like the Greek appearance of all things from Chaos, then an actual Creation and Wr-alda, a form of Brahma, which would be expected considering the racial identity of the Frisians, Greeks and Aryans. The earth, Irtha (Nerthus, the earth-mother Tacitus said was worshipped in first century Denmark) 'brought forth all good things by day and all bad by night' and bore 3 maidens - black, rebellious Lydda, yellow, treacherous Finda whose children 'filled the earth with violence' and white, angelic Frya (Norse Freyja), who 'alone having obedient children', was favoured by Wr-alda. Each bore 12 sons and 12 daughters (Norse gods and goddesses); 'from thence come all mankind'. Lydda was formed from fierce heat, Finda from strong heat, and Frya from moderate heat. 'When the last was born Wr-alda breathed his spirit upon her in order that men may be bound to him'. Frya's land became Friesland. Oera Linda book specifically refers to the islands Vliel and Texel. Britain is described as being 'opposite us' while 'opposite Denmark and Jutland we had colonies'; this seems to imply that Frya's land was the Dutch, not the North, Frisian Islands, clear of Jutland but, however wide Atland's bounds were, they were certainly nowhere near the Arctic, nor between Britain and Greenland. Britain's tin mines were used as a penal colony, the book says, and 'copper, iron, tar and pitch' were obtained from the colonies opposite Jutland (tar and pitch being obtained from coal distillation - or perhaps coal is described by these terms?). 'Before the bad time came our country was the most beautiful in the world. The sun rose higher, and there was seldom frost. The trees and shrubs produced various fruits, which are now lost. In the fields not only barley, oats and rye but wheat (grew) ... the years were not counted, for one was as happy as another'. Then came the 'bad time', a cataclysm involving a year-long blocking out of the sun by clouds and a perpetual calm and damp mist covering the houses; this ended with earthquakes and volcanic eruptions. Land sank, mountains rose; Atland was buried by the sea. The forests of Germany burnt for three years; rivers changed their courses, new islands being laid down at their mouths. So ended Atland. Compare with Spanuth's description of the neoglaciation of the 13th century BC - a fall of 3/4 degrees caused Norway's snow line to fall 400 metres; Alpine glaciers grew; flooding of Northern Europe's bogs; deciduous forests growing along the coast into the Arctic circle were replaced by conifers, the conifers by tundra and the tundra became barren; wheat and vines no longer grew north of Stockholm as they had during the Bronze Age - all due to severe volcanic eruptions and meteoric dust from the comet Typhon. Routes were abandoned and Northern Europe's population fell dramatically. A burning horizon, dated by pollen analysis to about 1000BC, 'is found in all the bogs of Holland, North Germany and Scandinavia (Alps and Black Forest also mentioned in this context) ... the country was thickly forested as far as the Arctic Circle. Warmth-loving deciduous trees were present in many places up to the northern coasts. Towards the end of the Bronze Age, these deciduous forests were burnt up' [6]. 100 years after this cataclysm, 'Finda's people' invaded Germany. These are identified as the Finno-Ugrians but conventional history does not have the Finns entering Europe until the first century BC and the Hungarians until the fourth AD. Scrutton also lists the Egyptians among Finda's people, and the Picts, but it is not clear whether these are his own identifications or if they are actually made in the Oera Linda book. The Frisian soldiers elected Wodin as king (Woden the god, ancestor of the Saxon and Scandinavian royal families, presumably), while the sailors chose Teunis as sea-king and Inka as admiral. Wodin, Teunis and Inka were cousins (Frisian Neef = cousin); the paper read at the Frisian Society suggested that Neef Teunis was deified as Neptune - a distinct possibility in my opinion. Teunis and Inka parted at Cadiz, Teunis going to Egypt and Inka over the blue horizons never to be heard of again. Scrutton suggests he became ancestral to the Incas; while I personally consider the suggestion far-fetched, it is worth bearing in mind Heyerdahl's contentions along similar lines. Oera Linda tells that the Frisians were the dominant force in Europe, much as Spanuth holds the Northern Europeans to be the 'Sea Peoples' of the Iron Age Mediterranean. The missionary priests of the Phoenicians, the Golen, are identified by Scrutton as the Druids and Roman descriptions of the Druids match Biblical accounts of Canaanite religious practices. The Frisians are said to have sold Massillia to the Phoenicians, although conventional history tells us it was a Greek, never a Phoenician, colony. A further cataclysm 1888 years after the sinking of Atland is described thus: 'Irtha shook her forests from her mountains. Rivers flowed overland, the sea raged, mountains spouted fire into the clouds and what they spewed forth the clouds flung upon -the earth ... the low lands of Frya's land were buried beneath the sea ... woods were torn up and scattered by the wind. The next year the frost ... Frya's land was concealed under a sheet of ice ... storms of wind from the north drove mountains of ice and stones. With the spring ... the ice melted ...' This would be in 305BC. Was there any such catastrophe at this time, or may this date be wrong, as the 'bad time' was pushed over a thousand years back into the past (compare with Spanuth's data)? A repetition, as Velikovsky held happened in history to give 'ages in chaos'? However this is not to discard the date 2193BC - perhaps the memory of the date of an even greater event was retained in the racial memory and the events which ended the Bronze Age doubled? I would be interested in anybody's thoughts on the foregoing. Notes and References 1. Robert J. Scrutton, The Other Atlantis and also Secrets of Lost Atland, Neville J. Spearman Ltd, 1977. 2. John Grant, A Directory of Discarded Ideas, Ashgrove Press, 1981, p. 25. Grant refers to it as 'Orea Linda' (sic). 3. Berlitz calls it the 'Dera Linda' book (sic). 4. Hapgood, C. Maps of the Ancient Sea Kings, Chilton & Co., Phil., 1966, pp. 126-127, (rev. ed. Turnstone Press, 1979). 5. Jurgen Spanuth, Atlantis of the North, 1976, English translation 1979, Sedgwick & Jackson. 6. Ibid. _________________________________________________________________ \cdrom\pubs\journals\review\v1998n1\21oera.htm