Page 25 - Fingerprints of the Gods by Graham Hancock

Graham Hancock – FINGERPRINTS OF THE GODS

Chapter 2

Rivers in the Southern Continent

In the Christmas recess of 1959-60 Charles Hapgood was looking for
Antarctica in the Reference Room of the Library of Congress, Washington
DC. For several consecutive weeks he worked there, lost in the search,
surrounded by literally hundreds of medieval maps and charts.

I found [he reported] many fascinating things I had not expected to find, and a
number of charts showing the southern continent. Then, one day, I turned a page
and sat transfixed. As my eyes fell upon the southern hemisphere of a world map
drawn by Oronteus Finaeus in 1531, I had the instant conviction that I had found
here a truly authentic map of the real Antarctica.

The general shape of the continent was startlingly like the outline of the continent
on our modern maps. The position of the South Pole, nearly in the center of the
continent, seemed about right. The mountain ranges that skirted the coasts
suggested the numerous ranges that have been discovered in Antarctica in recent
years. It was obvious, too, that this was no slapdash creation of somebody’s
imagination. The mountain ranges were individualized, some definitely coastal
and some not. From most of them rivers were shown flowing into the sea,
following in every case what looked like very natural and very convincing drainage
patterns. This suggested, of course, that the coasts may have been ice-free when
the original map was drawn. The deep interior, however, was free entirely of rivers
and mountains, suggesting that the ice might have been present there.
1
Closer investigation of the Oronteus Finaeus Map by Hapgood, and by Dr
Richard Strachan of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, confirmed
the following:

1 It had been copied and compiled from several earlier source maps
drawn up according to a number of different projections.
2
2 It did indeed show non-glacial conditions in coastal regions of
Antarctica, notably Queen Maud Land, Enderby Land, Wilkes Land,
Victoria Land (the east coast of the Ross Sea), and Marie Byrd Land.
3
3 As in the case of the Piri Reis Map, the general profile of the terrain,
and the visible physical features, matched closely seismic survey maps
of the subglacial land surfaces of Antarctica.
4

The Oronteus Finaeus Map, Hapgood concluded, appeared to document
‘the surprising proposition that Antarctica was visited and perhaps

1 Maps of the Ancient Sea Kings (henceforth Maps), p. 79.
2 Ibid., p. 233.
Ibid., p. 89.
3
4 Ibid., p. 90. These maps were made in 1958, International Geophysical Year, by survey
teams from several different nations.

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