Lost 'Atlantis' found after 70,000 years underwater
A long-lost continent, potentially once home to half a million inhabitants, has been uncovered beneath the ocean's surface.
This submerged landmass, nearly twice the size of the UK, has been dubbed "Lost Atlantis" by researchers. Believed to have been submerged for 70,000 years, it lies off the coast of Australia, nestled between Kimberley and Arnhem Land. Scientists from Quaternary Science Reviews, relying on sonar mapping, identified freshwater lakes within the region, indicating its past habitability for humans. However, with a dramatic surge in sea levels, the landscape would have undergone rapid transformations, displacing potential inhabitants.
"People would have witnessed the landscape evolve before their eyes, steadily retreating ahead of the encroaching coastline," remarked Kasih Norman, lead author of the study and an archaeologist at Griffith University in Queensland, in an interview with Live Science. Norman emphasized the submerged nature of the terrain, lying more than 100 meters (330 feet) below current sea level.
"There's been an underlying assumption in Australia that our continental margins were probably unproductive and weren't really used by people, despite evidence from many parts of the world indicating past human habitation on these continental shelves," Norman continued. "It's important to note that these figures aren't definitive population estimates but rather projections of the landscape's carrying capacity. We're essentially suggesting it could have supported such a population."
This revelation follows geoscientists' recent discovery of a continent that had remained concealed for nearly 375 years, hidden in plain sight.
