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  • From: Rochelle Altman <willaa AT netvision.net.il>
  • To: b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Off Topic: Squid (was: Leviathan)
  • Date: Mon, 17 Jul 2006 17:02:25 +0200

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)




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