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COMMANDER RALPH'S PIRATES AND ANCIENT MAPS MAGIC TIME PORTAL |
HI, TIME ADVENTURERS! |
COMMANDER RALPH I'M HIDING! |
YOU SEE, I WAS PIRATED AWAY! |
JUST LOOK AT THE PLACES AND THINGS I'VE SEEN! |
FROM WHOM? |
WILL YOU GET AWAY, YACKY? |
THAT PIRATE BIRD IS GOING TO LEAD..... |
OK...FROM WHOM AM I HIDING, YOU ASK ? |
WELL...FROM ONE OF THE FAMOUS BARBARY CORSAIRS HIMSELF... OTTOMAN PRIVATEER-ADMIRAL PIRI REIS ! |
PRETTY KOOL, RIGHT? |
Piracy goes all the way back to ancient times of Greece and Rome! Did you know that? |
Once a famous Roman leader was captured by pirates when he was 25. Can you guess who he was? |
Around 500 BC, pirates attacked the many cargo ships that sailed the Mediterranean Sea. |
Early Greek pirates used small, fast ships that had a shallow bottom. These ships were called triremes and had great maneuverability which allowed the pirates to escape into bays and channels wHere the larger ships could not go. |
Go ahead take a guess...... |
Hey... you're fantastic! |
doing some time travelling. |
This historic leader was none other than |
Julius Caesar! |
Got it in one! I can tell you've been |
Most of the pirates who sailed the Mediterranean Sea were called Corsairs. |
Once on a voyage across the Aegean Sea in 75 BC, Julius Caesar was kidnapped by Cilician pirates and held prisoner in the Dodecanese islet of Pharmacusa. |
THIS IS HOW THE STORY GOES...................... |
That's no surprise, is it? |
The story continues....When the pirates thought to demand a ransom of twenty talents, Caesar is said to have laughed and said "I am worth a hundred!", and the pirates indeed raised the ransom to a hundred. |
After the ransom was paid, Caesar raised a fleet, pursued and captured the pirates, and imprisoned them in Pergamon. The governor of Asia refused to execute them as Caesar demanded, preferring to sell them as slaves, but Caesar returned to the coast and had them crucified on his own authority, as he had promised when in captivity – a promise the pirates had taken as a joke. Moral of the story....don't joke with Caesar! |
Being Caeasr, he maintained an attitude of superiority throughout his captivity. |
A privateer or corsair used similar methods to a pirate, but acted while in possession of a commission or letter of marque from a government or monarch, authorizing the capture of merchant ships belonging to an enemy nation. Kind of a James Bond License to plunder or steal. |
What made them different from ordinary pirates? |
For example, the United States Constitution of 1787 specifically authorized Congress to issue letters of marque and reprisal. The letter of marque was recognized by international convention and meant that a privateer could not technically be charged with piracy while attacking the targets named in his commission. All clear on that now? |
NOW ON TO ADMIRAL PIRI REIS |
Admiral Piri Reis or Piri Ibn Haji Memmed, was the nephew of the famous Turkish pirate Kemal Reis. Piri Reis became one of the most famous corsairs who participated greatly in Ottoman potency in the Mediterranean Sea in the XVIth century. He was named Commander-in - chief of the fleet of Egypt in 1551. |
Unfortunately, he was decapitated three years later by Soliman Splendid for a somewhat dubious affair. |
His passion was cartography and his high rank within the Turkish navy allowed him to have a privileged access to the Imperial Library of Constantinople. |
He is primarily known today for his maps and charts collected in his Kitabi Bahriye (Book of Navigation), a book which contains detailed information on navigation, as well as extremely accurate charts describing the important ports and cities of the Mediterranean Sea. |
OK, YOU ASK ....WHY IS HE SO INTERESTING? |
HE COMPILED A MAP WHICH IS NOT SUPPOSED TO EXIST! |
At Gallipoli, in the month of Muharrem of the year 919 (that is, between the 9th of March and the 7th of April of the year 1513) Piri Reis created a world map that has shocked and mystified scientists to this day, since its discovery in 1929 while Topkapi Palace, Istanbul, Turkey was being converted into a museum. |
SO WHAT COULD BE SO SHOCKING? |
CONSIDER THIS...... |
He himself had written notes on the map that gives a picture of the work he had been doing. He says he had not been responsible for the original surveying and cartography and that his role was merely that of a compiler who used a large number of source-maps. |
The portion of the map that was discovered was drawn on gazelle skin. To draw his map, Piri Reis used several different sources, collected here and there along his journeys. |
He then says then that, while some of the source-maps had been drawn by contemporary sailors, others were charts of great antiquity, dating back up to the 4th century BC or earlier! It has also been suggested that he had probably come into possession of charts once located in the Library of Alexandria, the well-known, most important library of ancient times. When the map was complete, he presented it to Ottoman Sultan Selim I in Egypt in 1517. |
The Piri Reis map shows the western coast of Africa, the eastern coast of South America, and the northern coast of Antarctica. The northern coastline of Antarctica is perfectly detailed. The most puzzling thing, however, is not so much how Piri Reis managed to draw such an accurate map of the Antarctic region 300 years before it was discovered, but that the map shows the coastline under the ice. Geological evidence confirms that the latest date Queen Maud Land could have been charted in an ice-free state is 4000 BC! |
OK, YOU SAY.....COMMANDER RALPH, ARE WE ENTERING THE TWILIGHT ZONE OR WHAT? |
AHhhhhhhhh......THE PLOT THICKENS! |
One of the many researchers to study this map was Prof Charles H. Hapgood. He requested an evaluation of the map by the US Air Force. He received his reply on 6 July 1960. Here is the reply: |
8 RECONNAISSANCE TECHNICAL SQUADRON (SAC) UNITED STATES AIR FORCE Westover Airforce Base Massachusetts |
6, July, 1960 Subject: Admiral Piri Reis Map TO: Prof. Charles H. Hapgood Keene College Keene, New Hampshire |
Dear Professor Hapgood, |
Your request of evaluation of certain unusual features of the Piri Reis map of 1513 by this organization has been reviewed. |
The claim that the lower part of the map portrays the Princess Martha Coast of Queen Maud Land, Antarctic, and the Palmer Peninsular, is reasonable. We find that this is the most logical and in all probability the correct interpretation of the map. |
The geographical detail shown in the lower part of the map agrees very remarkably with the results of the seismic profile made across the top of the ice-cap by the Swedish-British Antarctic Expedition of 1949. |
This indicates the coastline had been mapped before it was covered by the ice-cap. |
The ice-cap in this region is now about a mile thick. |
We have no idea how the data on this map can be reconciled with the supposed state of geographical knowledge in 1513. |
Harold Z. Ohlmeyer Lt. Colonel, USAF Commander |
WERE THEY RIGHT OR WRONG IN THEIR EVALUATION? |
The question is: Who mapped the Queen Maud Land of Antarctica 6000 years ago? Which unknown civilization had the technology or the need to do that? |
It is well-known that the first civilization, according to traditional history, developed in the mid-east around year 3000 BC, soon to be followed within a millennium by the Indus valley and the Chinese ones. So, accordingly, none of the known civilizations could have done such a job. Who was here in 4000 BC, being able to do things that only NOW are possible with the modern technologies? |
This evidence of a lost technology will support and give credence to many of the other hypotheses that have been brought forward of a lost civilization in remote times. Scholars have been able to dismiss most of those evidences as mere myth, but here we have evidence that just cannot be dismissed. The evidence requires that all the other evidences that have been brought forward in the past should be re-examined with an "open mind." |
THERE ARE A MILLION OTHER MYSTERIES ABOUT THIS MAP...... |
Scrutiny of the map shows that the makers knew the accurate circumference of the Earth to within 50 miles! |
The precision on determining the longitudinal coordinates shows that to draw the map, it was necessary to use spheroid trigonometry, a process supposedly not know until the middle of 18th century! |
Remember that it was only at this time that man would be released from his caves and begin to "civilize" the Middle East (coincidence?). But, it seems that the whole planet had been mapped! |
Here's just a few, for example...... |
It shows the coasts of the Antarctic which would be discovered in 1818..... that was 300 years later! |
The maps that the Piri Reis map was based upon were very old, and they themselves were based on much older maps still. Maps that date to before 4000BC. |
I'VE GIVEN YOU THE SEED FOR THOUGHT...... YOU MUST DECIDE ........................ REMEMBER WITH EVERY NEW DISCOVERY, THERE ARE ALWAYS TWO SCHOOLS OF THOUGHT..... NOW IT'S TIME FOR YOU TO SEEK OUT THE ADVENTURE! |
GOTTA RUN NOW......BUTTERBYE BEAM ME UP..... |
QUICK! |
And by who? |
LET MY BARBARY PIRATE GUIDE YOU TO YOUR NEXT PORT OF CALL! |
This article uses material excerpted from Wikipedia®. Article and photos are distributed under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License |
Photo of Commander Ralph copyright 1999-present by J Shahverdian |
Music from the Album Symphonie du Chocapik by Rapheél Badawi distributed under the Licence Art Libre |
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