Vile Vortices (part 1 of 2)



Icosahedron



Vile vortices's are phenomena that was proposed by a noted naturalist and paranormal investigator, Ivan Sanderson.  Mr. Sanderson originally garnered notoriety by writing and lecturing on the animal kingdom.  he was a frequent contributor to The Saturday Evening Post as well as a guest on The Gary Moore Show.  After having some cryptozoological encounters as a youth he took up interest in the field and subsequently also took up researching UFO phenomenon as well.  



While investigating the paranormal he developed the theory of "Vile Vortices".  The theory attempts to explain why areas of the world seem to have higher incidents of paranormal phenomenon then others.  The theory states that there are twelve (12) locations around the globe, which are equidistant from each other, which have predispositions to paranormal phenomenon.  There are five (5) located at 26° 34' 12" N and five (5) located at 26° 34' 12" S latitude.  They are exactly 72° degrees longitudinally apart from each other around the circumference of the globe.  In addition the points in the northern hemisphere and southern hemisphere are staggered longitudinally by 36° so that all of the individual points are 4457.30 miles from their neighboring points.  In essence, by just using the points supplied by Mr. Sanderson you turn the sphere of the Earth into an Icosahedron, a polyhedron with twelve (12) vertices's, thirty (30) edges, and twenty (20) faces.  To the right is a graphical representation of the structure "sans" earth.  The next logical questions is whether there is evidence that these points are any more prone to paranormal phenomenon, and if so, why?

In 1972 Mr. Sansderson wrote an article titled "The Twelve Devil's Graveyards Around the World" for Saga magazine.  In the article Mr. Sanderson attempted to show, using statistical analysis, that the vortices's mentioned above had increased chances of ships and planes to go missing.  Two (2) locations do, to this day, have a well developed mythology surrounding them.  The first (1st) would be:

The Bermuda Triangle


The Bermuda Triangle is an area of ocean off the north American eastern seaboard that people have stated has a higher incident of unusual phenomenon than normal.  Numerous ships and planes have gone missing in this triangle consisting of points in Miami, Florida, San Juan, Puerto Rico, and Bermuda.  There is no question that hundreds (100s) of ships and planes that have gone missing in the triangle, the question is why?  Numerous theories have been proposed to explain the disappearances and they have ranged from simple human error to tears in time-space allowing the unfortunate travellers to travel into the past or future.  A full article on this locale would be quite large, as there has been numerous famous, and some not so famous but equally unusual mishaps have occurred, to speak nothing of all the theories, paranormal or otherwise that would need to be expounded on.  So let's just say for now that this vortice does appear to sync up with a noted paranormal location.  Score one (1) for Mr. Sanderson.  This leads us to the second (2nd) vortice, which has actually been acknowledged by a nation's government:
The Devil's Sea

The Devil's Sea is a area of ocean off the coast of Japan that is known to be prone to ships and aircraft going missing.  Unlike it's "cousin" the Bermuda Triangle, its size and shape are not in complete agreement amongst researchers.  In the illustration to the left the map shows the two (2) most common shapes.  As you can see, one of the shapes is located more predominately off the coast of Japan, as opposed to the other which grazes the waters off the city of Yokohama then dive south-southeast to the island of Guam.  There are some researchers that have proposed that the Bermuda Triangle should be larger, are positioned differently but it seems with the Devil's Sea the tendency to do this is much more prevalent.  Like the Bermuda Triangle there have been a number of noted missing ships, unfortunately many of these are unknown to western researchers due to the fact that many of the reports are in Japanese which makes them difficult for people unfamiliar with the language to discover.  The next site is:

Karachi, Pakistan (Rama civilization)

This vortice itself does not appear to have any reports of unusual phenomena but the area was the home to an ancient and quite extraordinary civilization, if the reports are in any way correct.  Below is an excerpt from a web article which really does define very well how the Rama civilization was discovered, what is encompassed, and some of the more exotic lore surrounding the culture.

"It was 1856 when a group of English engineers in then British-dominated India were confronted with an incredible discovery. They had been seeking hard-to-find rocks to place under the railroad they were constructing and asked the locals for advice where to go. The natives had no problem with the answer. They claimed there were many fine bricks in an ancient deserted town nearby a place they called Mohenjo-Daro' (translated it's Mound of the Dead).

The British, ever skeptical of local assuredness and confident they knew India better than anybody who had lived their for several millennia, consulted their maps. The British found no such placed marked Mohenjo-Daro. Fortunately, they checked it out anyway and discovered a whole lost city in the ruins under the dust.

Because of the reluctance of Western historians and society to accept the facts that were being dug up, it was not until 1920 that Mohenjo-Daro was established as part of the seven great Rishi (Sanskrit for Master) cities of the ancient Rama Empire of the Indus Valley of Ancient India.

It took until the 1980's for this new find to get even the scarcest of mentions in a few history and encyclopedia books.

According to ancient Sanskrit texts like the Ramayana and Mahabahrata, the Rama Empire thrived thousands of years before the English believed a civilization even existed in the area. Current texts admit that this great civilization ended somewhere between 2,500 and 4,500 B.C. When did it all begin? Some Sanskrit scholars would say the Rama Empire thrived around 10-15,000 B.C. and that only remnants survived the great war that their history recorded.

Western archeologists have long insisted that the tales of a technologically advanced civilization were merely figments of some over-imaginative Indian writer, but they will admit to being puzzled at the findings at Mohenjo-Daro and other Rishi cities.
The cities were highly developed with a great degree of pre-planning in streets, covered sewage systems, private toilets, running water to homes, remarkable plumbing and homes constructed of kiln-fired brick. This is more sophisticated than many of the cities in India, Pakistan and Asia today.

What is so special bout kiln-fired brick? According to Jay Carrigan, the former VP of Alton Brick of Illinois, "It requires 1,700-1,900 degrees of heat to bake the bricks. Currently the ceramic lining is used inside the ovens and the oven needs to withstand temperatures of 2,500 to 3,000 degrees".

In spite of the evidence, many experts say they could not have manufactured kiln-fired bricks as they did not have the technology to do so.

What is even more baffling is how the ancient Sanskrit texts say this civilization ended.

According to the texts a great war erupted between the Rama Empire and a more militaristic group called the Atlans. The Asvin Priest Kings of the Rama Empire were forced to use their mental-psychic powers to create a defensive illusion. While this tactic was successful at first, the Atlans persisted and returned with their ultimate weapon. This weapon is described as Kapillas Glance in both the Mahabaharata and Drona Parva. It was described, "A single projectile, charged with all the power of the universe. An incandescent column of smoke and flame as bright as the thousand suns rose in all its splendor. It was an unknown weapon, an iron thunderbolt, a gigantic messenger of death which reduced the entire race of the Vrishnis and Andhakas to ashes. The corpses were so burned as to be unrecognizable. The hair and the nails fell out. Pottery broke without apparent cause and the birds turned white. After a few hours all the foodstuffs were infected. To escape from this fire, the soldiers threw themselves in streams to wash themselves and their equipment.".
Possibly a nuclear detonation over 14,000 years ago?

Within the remains of Mohenjo-Daro there is evidence to back up the Sanskrit texts. Beginning in the 1950's thousands of black lumps and stones in these cities were examined and found to be vitrified. This process is only possible with heat well in excess of natural means. Also, skeletal remains examined by soviet scientists found radioactivity levels 50 times that which is considered normal.

Robert Oppenheimer, regarded as the "father of the atomic bomb" was aksed after the first detonation at Alamogardo if that was the first atomic bomb ever to be detonated? Oppenheimer, who was known to be familiar with Sanskrit writings, replied "Well, yes in modern history."
Source: Associated Content

Wharton Basin

Wharton Basin is the named part of the marine area of the north east quarter of the Indian Ocean.
It lies east of the Ninety East Ridge and west of Western Australia.  I included line of longitude and latitude in the above map to assist with the location of the point since, other than the sub-continent of Australia to its west, there is very little around this point.

It is of interest in relation to Indian Ocean floor movement and adjacent fracture zones and the relationship between the Indian and Australian plates and is one a number of features of the Indian Ocean that has been studied extensively.

Primarily due to the remoteness of this location I have uncovered no reports of any unusual activity in the present or past.

Algeria


Location of the "Algerian" Vile vortice.  Note it is near the juncture of Algeria, Mali, and Mauritania.

Below is an excerpt from a public domain book available online, Manners and Monuments of Prehistoric Peoples by Marquis de Nadaillac (1892).  In the text below the author goes into details about megalithic sites that have been discovered in Algeria.  Unfortunately, since the writing of this book many of the locations mentioned have changed names, or the names he referenced were used just by the local peoples which caused them never to be used on an official map of the area.

"Algeria presents a vast field for research, and it is easy to find dolmens and cromlechs, such as that shown in Fig. 64, which are sepulchres with a central dolmen surrounded by a double or triple enceinte of monoliths driven into the ground. These monuments, much as they differ in form and arrangement, are undoubtedly the work of one strong and powerful race that dominated the whole of the north of Africa; and are represented in historic times by the Berbers, and at the present clay by the Kabyles.

Cromlech near Bône (Algeria).  Fig. 64

 Although a very great many of them have been destroyed, the French possessions in Algeria are still as rich in monuments of this kind as any of the countries of Europe. On Mount Redgel-Safia six hundred dolmens have been made out, with stone tables resting on walls of dry stones and frequently surrounded by cromlechs. Dr. Weisgerber has recently announced the discovery in the valley of Ain-Massin, on the vest of Mzab,) of a cromlech consisting of a number of concentric circles of large stones set upon an elliptical tumulus, more than fifty-four square yards in area. Quite close is a workshop of flint weapons, probably in use at the time of the erection of the megaliths.  In Midjana, the number of megaliths exceeds 10,000, and General Faidherbe counted more than 2,000 in the necropolis of Mazela, and a yet larger number in that of Roknia. “At Bou-Merzoug,” says M. Feraud, “in a radius of three leagues, on the mountain as well as on the plain, the whole country about the springs is covered with monuments of the Celtic form, such as dolmens, demi-dolmens, menhirs, avenues, and tumuli. In a word, there are to be found examples of nearly every type known in Europe. For fear of being taxed with exaggeration, I will not fix the number, but I can certify that I saw and examined more than a thousand in the three days of exploration, on the mountain itself, and on the declivities wherever it was possible to place them. All the monuments are surrounded with a more or less complete enceinte of large stones, sometimes set up in a circle, sometimes in a square. In some cases the living rock forms hart of the enceinte, which has been completed with the help of other blocks frolic elsewhere. It is often difficult to decide where the monument end, and the rock begins. When the escarpment was too abrupt, it was levelled with the aid of a kind of retaining wall, which forms a terrace round the dolmen. The dolmens in the plain seem to have been constructed with even greater care. The enceintes are wider and the slabs of the tables larger.” Megalithic monuments are met with even in the desert. A pyramid built of stones without mortar rises up in the districts inhabited by the Touaregs; and quite near to it are four or five tombs surrounded by standing stones.

In Algeria, we also meet with quadrangular pyramids called djedas, which measure as much as ninety feet on each face, but do not rise more than three feet above the ground. The dead were buried beneath them in a crouching position. We know nothing either of the origin of these djedas or of the date to which they belong."

Source:  Globusz

Now we know that there are, or were, megalith structures in north Africa, specifically Algeria, the next question who put them there?  Now, there have been numerous civilizations that have existed in north and west Africa but we are going to focus on the civilizations that appear to have existed far enough into antiquity that they may have been responsible for the megaliths.

To the right is a map of Africa that breaks down the language groups that prevalent in various regions.  This map is valuable in the fact it gives a overall feel to where various cultures have resided in the past, as the languages of many now defunct civilizations do persist long after the civilization has faded away.

There are three (3) north-west African ancient cultures, so far discovered, that seem to be the most likely responsible for the megaliths in the excerpt above.

The first (1st) we will mention is the Songhay or Songai empire.  There have been three (3) empires that have existed in the area of Mali and Mauritania, and the Songhay appears to be the most recent, yet it is the only one that's area extended far enough north in Mali to approach the actual vortice.  The map shown below left show the greatest extent of the three (3) empires.  An interesting fact about the Songhay, and Mali, empires is that they both encompassed the area known as Timbuktu.  In the map to the right it is labeled with one of its alternative spellings, "Tombouctou".

In reference to the city:

"In its Golden Age, the town's numerous Islamic scholars and extensive trading network made possible an important book trade: together with the campuses of the Sankore madrassah, an Islamic university, this established Timbuktu as a scholarly centre in Africa. Several notable historic writers, such as Shabeni and Leo Africanus have described Timbuktu. These stories fuelled speculation in Europe, where the city's reputation shifted from being extremely rich to being mysterious. This reputation overshadows the town itself in modern times, to the point where it is best known as a metaphor for a distant or outlandish place."
Source:  Wikipedia



Light Blue : Chleuhs
Purple : Zaians (Middle-Atlas mountains Berbers, also
called Amazighs in a specifically sense or Brabers)
Yellow : Riffis Pink : Chenwis Red : Kabyles
Green : Chawis Dark Blue : Tuaregs
Orange : Saharian Berbers (Zenagas, Mozabites, Siwis)

 The next culture that seems a reasonable candidate are the Berbers.  The name Berber appeared for the first time after the end of the Roman Empire.  The Egyptians, Greeks, Romans, and Byzantines mentioned various tribes with similar names living in Greater "Libya" (North Africa) at the areas where later would be found the Berbers. 



Northern African cave paintings, dating back 12 000 years, have been found at Tadrart Acacus in Libya. A Neolithic culture, marked by animal domestication and subsistence agriculture, developed in the Saharan and Mediterranean region (the Maghreb) of northern Africa between 6000 B.C and 2000 B.C. This type of life, richly depicted in the Tassili n'Ajjer cave paintings of southeastern Algeria (below left), predominated in the Maghreb until the classical period. The proto-Berbers lacked a written language and so have tended to be overlooked by written historical accounts.  The modern Berbers are assumed to be descended from the tribes of Ancient Libya which are mentioned in records of Ancient Egypt. During the New Kingdom, the Egyptians later fought against the Meshwesh and Libu tribes on their western borders.  During the pre-Roman era, several successive independent states (Massylii) existed before the king Masinissa unified the people of Numidia.  In historical times, the Berbers expanded south into the Sahara, displacing earlier populations such as the Azer and Bafour.  The Bafours were the original inhabitants of Mauritania, and the ancestors to the Imraguen and Soninke peoples of western Africa.

The last possibility for I will delve into is the Zingh Empire.  If there was ever a society shrouded in mystery and psuedo-science it would be this one.  Very little is known of it, or even the sources for the information we do have.  Below is an excerpt which covers most everything that we "know" of the empire.  This may be the subject for a future blog post.
"The ancient West African coastal and interior Kingdoms occupied an area that is now covered with dense vegetation but may have been cleared about three to four thousand years ago. This includes the regions from the coasts of West Africa to the South, all the way inland to the Sahara. A number of large kingdoms and empires existed in that area. According to Blisshords Communications, one of the oldest empires and civilizations on earth existed just north of the coastal regions into what is today Mauritania. It was called the Zingh Empire and was highly advanced. In fact, they were the first to use the red, black and green African flag and to plant it throughout their territory all over Africa and the world.

The Zingh Empire existed about fifteen thousand years ago. The only other civilizations that may have been in existance at that period in history were the Ta-Seti civilization of what became Nubia-Kush and the mythical Atlantis civilization which may have existed out in the Atlantic, off the coast of West Africa about ten to fifteen thousand years ago. That leaves the question as to whether there was a relationship between the prehistoric Zingh Empire of West Africa and the civilization of Atlantis, whether the Zingh Empire was actually Atlantis, or whether Atlantis if it existed was part of the Zingh empire. Was Atlantis, the highly technologically sophisticated civilization an extension of Black civilization in the Meso-America and other parts of the Americas?"

Source: Race & History.com

So what we have here are three (3) different societies which could have been responsible for megaliths in north Africa.  In my humble opinion the culture that created these monuments migrated out of the area when the desertification of the Sahara destroyed their homeland.  What was left of this culture was more likely than not swallowed by the sands.  The only incidents where this did not happen are situations like in Egypt where the structures left, namely the pyramids, were so immense and made out of a material so strong that the sands have not been able to erode them down and they are too large to bury.  One must wonder how many ruins of civilizations have disappeared globally, whether eroded away by blowing sands, buried under miles of ice, consumed by rising oceans, or devoured by encroaching jungles.

Hawaii, United States

The next vortice we will be covering is the off the coast of Hawaii.  The vortice resides approximately six-hundred (600) miles north-east of the "big island".  Beings that we are dealing with a location in the open ocean it somewhat limits the number of phenomenon we can look for.  Now, this isn't to say that this location is devoid of phenomena, it unfortunately may be going on without any witnesses.  As you can see below there is some shipping interests that navigate this part of the ocean.  The graphic below is a one (1) month window of traffic that flows through this part of the seas.

The one (1) item of note about the area is that the island of Hawaii is the world's largest volcano.  Being's that this volcano is not located at the interface between two (2) plates it has been identified as being over a "hot spot".  Wikipedia defines a "hot spot" as "The places known as hot spots or hotspots in geology are volcanic regions thought to be fed by underlying mantle that is anomalously hot compared with the mantle elsewhere. They may be on, near to, or far from tectonic plate boundaries. There are two hypotheses to explain them. One suggests that they are due to hot mantle plumes that rise as thermal diapirs from the core-mantle boundary.  The other hypothesis postulates that it is not high temperature that causes the volcanism, but lithospheric extension that permits the passive rising of melt from shallow depths.  This hypothesis considers the term "hotspot" to be a misnomer, asserting that the mantle source beneath them is, in fact, not anomalously hot at all."  Now if we are to entertain the theory that the vile vortices are location where anomalous phenomena occur than we must consider that possibility that this location was more susceptible to becoming a "hot spot" due the nearby vortice.

To the left is a map demonstrating the locations of possible hot spots around the wold.  The red markers denote well established hot spots, the yellow are older, and the green are the oldest locations.  Note that Bermuda (Bermuda Triangle) is also a long extinct hot spot.  Of course, the argument can be made that if you put enough dots and lines on a map they are bound to intersect, and that point is valid.

Lastly we will look at the ages of the various islands and sea mounts which comprise the chain.  This is illustrated to the left.  Currently it is debated as to whether the migration of the volcanism across the Pacific plate is due to the plate moving above it, or the actual plume located in the mantle to be migrating under the plate.  Either way, this plume of magma has found its way rather close to one of the vortices so I will leave it up to the reader to determine whether this is coincidence or a phenomena similar to how a sunflower always turns its "face" to the sun.

Ok readers, this posting has gotten larger than I ever intended so I have decided to break this article into two (2) parts.  This, of course, is part one (1) and it contains six (6) of the twelve (12) vortices to be covered.  The second (2nd) part will come as soon as I get it finished.  I would imagine a week would be a good estimate of time for its release.  I hope you are enjoying this article so far and you return for the second (2nd) part.