INUNDATION OF ATALANTE (426 BCE) - DISCUSSION

Strabo and Diodorus Siculus mention tsunamigenic earthquakes in the region of Atalante, with the former basing his account on a lost catalogue of ancient earthquakes by Demetrius of Callatis (c. 200 BC), and the latter simply mashing up Strabo with Thucydides. Inconsistencies between the accounts, along with evidence from recent archaeological excavations, suggest Strabo could be describing a more powerful seismic event from the 3rd century BC, but from the perspective of Plato's Atlantis story, the key issues are earthquakes, tsunamis, and the inundation of a town called Atalante: it hardly needs emphasising that this might well have resonated with him. THe link takes you to an discussion of the events by Papaioannou I., Papadopoulos G.A., and Pavlides S., ‘The Earthquake of 426 BC in N. Evoikos Gulf Revisited: Amalgamation of Two Different Strong Earthquake Events?’, Bulletin of the Geological Society of Greece 36 (2004).