Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Rochelle Altman <willaa AT netvision.net.il>]

Peter,

This is getting way off topic. So, to close this thread on an informational 
note:

1) No, Britain was NOT still connected to the continent at that period. The 
English Channel opened  ca. 10,000 BCE. No land bridge. Further,
the channel was an impassable, turbulent barrier for thousands of years. 
The only way to reach the British Isles was by sea -- and on the Atlantic 
coast.
2) The mtDNA connection is Atlantic coasts, not by land, but  by sea.
3) Yes, I know that the Rhodes deep is 4,000 plus meters. It's the only 
place in the Med deep enough for giant squid to live.
4) Giant squid live in the depths.
5) The extremely rare wash-ups are mangled squid that appear to have lost a 
battle with a whale. As far as I know, there are no whales today in the 
Med. -- not usually, that is. Individual whales do get "lost."
6) I already stated the area between Rhodes and the current Syrian coast is 
squid heaven.
7) Their normal habitat is not near land.
8) I do not know if a few giant squid are still in the Med basin; they 
would have been when the ice ages began. (The levels predicted by "global 
warming" were the height of sea level prior to the ice ages.) Possible, but 
who knows? Certainly none have been sighted from submersibles or undersea 
trawls... for what that is worth. (The seas are the great unknown today; 
new species turn up daily.)
9) Giant squid do not surface except in chase of prey. Considering that 
their normal prey is a whale, perhaps the stories maintaining that the 
creature sank ships is due to a squid assuming a ship is a basking whale. 
(Row, row your boat -- carefully).
10) The fact that the islands have been shown to have been populated by sea 
indicates early maritime voyaging -- even if only in skin boats.
11) The fact that the Rhodes Deep is within sight of land and coastal 
navigation is a fluke; near land is not their normal habitat. However, the 
fluke supports the concept of myriad tales across a diverse area of the 
Eastern Med..
12) Yes, you do have to be in blue water to sight giant squid today. The 
rare wash-ups are on the oceans, not in the Med.

> On 16/07/2006 22:20, Rochelle Altman wrote:
> > Primitive? Did not include deep sea ventures? There has been contact _by 
> > sea_ between the Atlantic coasts of the British Isles, Scandinavia, and 
> > the Atlantic coast of France with the Atlantic coast of the Iberian 
> > Peninsula since 10,000 BCE. The mtDNA study (longue duree) published in 
> > 2004 establishes the connection. Blue water sailing has been around for a 
> > very long time.
>
> Yes, but maybe not this long. Britain was still connected to the Continent 
> at this period, and I think Scandinavia also through Denmark. And it is 
> hardly a deep sea venture to cross these straits even on the present 
> coastline - not need to get out of site of land. On the other hand, humans 
> crossed to Australia something like 60,000 years ago, and even at the 
> lowest water levels during the Ice Ages that was a voyage out of site of 
> land - although possibly an accidental one.
>
> But then why do you need to be in the deep sea to see giant squid? They 
> are occasionally washed up on land, and their regular habitations are not 
> necessarily very far from land. I don't think there are now any in the 
> Mediterranean, but if there used to be they may well have lived in the 
> Rhodes Deep, as Rochelle suggested, which is over 4000 metres (not feet) 
> deep and only about 50 km from the mountainous coasts of Rhodes and 
> Turkey, so within the range of coastal navigators.
>
> --
> Peter Kirk
> E-mail:  peter AT qaya.org
> Blog:    http://speakertruth.blogspot.com/
> Website: http://www.qaya.org/

Regards,

Rochelle Altman
(who wants to go down to the sea again -- sigh)