f Atlantis, the
identical features recur, but are more fully described. In the centre of
the island of Atlantis stood a mountain, surrounded by a plain, which was
ultimately made square. The mountain was the residence of a pair of
mythical lovers, consisting of a god and of a mortal woman, and became the
birthplace of their offspring, "a divine race of kings." "The god ... with
his divine power, agreeably adorned the centre of the island, causing two
fountains of water to shoot upwards from beneath the earth, one cold and
the other hot, and making every variety of food to spring abundantly from
the earth." The central hill, from which thus proceeded all life and
festivity, was at first "circularly enclosed, the land and sea being
formed into alternate zones, greater and less, two out of land and three
out of sea, from the centre of the island all equally distant." The ten
kings, born of the "divine union, lived each in his own district and city,
and ruled supreme over his people. The government and commonwealth in each
case was, by the injunction of the god, according to the laws which were
handed down. The latter were inscribed on a column of orichalcum which was
deposited in the centre of the island, in the temple of the god, where the
ten kings originally assembled every fifth year. A fire burned near the
column and a bull was sacrificed at its base, after which a sacred cup was
filled with its blood and this was poured into the fire by way of
purifying the column" (Critias, VII-XVI).

The above mention of a column is of interest when it is realized that, in
historical times, the laws of Solon were actually inscribed on a square
wooden pillar which was made to revolve or turn and was placed on the
Acropolis. The presence of a revolving pillar on the Acropolis, the sacred
centre of the Athenian state, is, moreover, curiously in keeping with the
conception of axial energy set forth by Plato and awakens the desire to
learn from Greek scholars what relationship, if any, there was between the
Sanscrit aksa=axle or axis, the Greek akra (akris=summit, akros=most high,
supreme, akrisios=mountain-top god) and the Egyptian ak=the Centre, and
hak=a king; and whether the word polis=city was connected with polos=the
pole-star, an axis, pivot or pole, from polein=to turn, and may be
interpreted as the equivalent of the Egyptian An and Annu. It would also
be important to learn whether the name of the principal ancient god of
Greece,