Page 33 - Fingerprints of the Gods by Graham Hancock

Graham Hancock – FINGERPRINTS OF THE GODS

Antarctica were free of ice; the source for the Oronteus Finaeus Map, on
the other hand, seems to have been considerably earlier, when the ice-
cap was present only in the deep interior of the continent; and the source
for the Buache Map appears to originate in even earlier period (around
13,000 BC), when there may have been no ice in Antarctica at all.

South America

Were other parts of the world surveyed and accurately charted at widely
separated intervals during this same epoch; roughly from 13,000 BC to
4000 BC? The answer may lie once again in the Piri Reis Map, which
contains more mysteries than just Antarctica:

• Drawn in 1513, the map demonstrates an uncanny knowledge of South
America—and not only of its eastern coast but of the Andes mountains
on the western side of the continent, which were of course unknown at
that time. The map correctly shows the Amazon River rising in these
unexplored mountains and thence flowing eastwards.
15
• Itself compiled from more than twenty different source documents of
varying antiquity, the Piri Reis Map depicts the Amazon not once but
16
twice (most probably as a result of the unintentional overlapping of
two of the source documents used by the Turkish admiral ). In the first
17
of these the Amazon’s course is shown down to its Para River mouth,
but the important island of Marajo does not appear. According to
Hapgood, this suggests that the relevant source map must have dated
from a time, perhaps as much as 15,000 years ago, when the Para
River was the main or only mouth of the Amazon and when Marajo
Island was part of the mainland on the northern side of the river. The
18
second depiction of the Amazon, on the other hand, does show Marajo
(and in fantastically accurate detail) despite the fact that this island was
not discovered until 1543. Again, the possibility is raised of an
19
unknown civilization which undertook continuous surveying and
mapping operations of the changing face of the earth over a period of
many thousands of years, with Piri Reis making use of earlier and later
source maps left behind by this civilization.

• Neither the Orinoco River nor its present delta is represented on the
Piri Reis Map. Instead, as Hapgood proved, ‘two estuaries extending far
inland (for a distance of about 100 miles) are shown close to the site of
the present river. The longitude on the grid would be correct for the

15 Maps, p. 68.
16 Ibid., p. 222.
Ibid., pp. 64-5.
17
18 Ibid., p. 64.
19 Ibid., p. 65.

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