Is it more difficult to believe that the early Frisians, being hardy and intrepid marine adventurers, sailed to the Mediterranean, and even proceeded farther, than that the Phœnicians sailed to England for tin, and to the Baltic for amber?
In his preface, the translator William R. Sandbach compares the Frisian voyages with the Phoenician trips to the Baltic for amber. Dr J. O. Ottema's introduction says the Phoenicians sailed to Friesland for tin, iron and amber about 2000 years before Christ. In the book itself, the Jutten are named after looking for amber on the shore.
They mention an island called Basileia, Greek for "royal", where amber washes ashore.
The amber was carried there by the river Eridanus.
Spanuth identifies the Eridanus with the Eider, a river of Schleswig-Holstein that still carries amber near its mouth.
Amber does not occur in the Heligoland rock.
So the amber island Basileia must have lain between Heligoland and the Eider mouth.
"The orichalc of the Atlantis report could only mean amber, and we shall therefore translate the word orichalc with amber."
His reasons: amber was valued next to gold in the Bronze Age, it was dug from the ground on the North Sea coast, it glows like fire, and it was traded as far as Mycenae and Egypt.
Words passed from the Atlantean language into Egyptian and then Greek, which he says explains errors such as "orichalc" for amber.
He argues that only amber fits Plato's description in a North Sea setting: precious next to gold, dug from the ground and shining like fire.
Jürgen Spanuth, a German pastor, placed Atlantis near Heligoland in the North Sea. He located the royal island with the help of Basileia, an island where ancient writers say amber washed ashore. He also read Plato's orichalc as amber, which I doubt because Plato calls orichalc a metal.
We speak of diamonds, amethyst, larimar, rubies, emerald, citrine, carnelian, moonstones, pink quartz, amber, tourmaline, clear quartz—each representing one of the light rays of we 12 Angels, each representing the planets that signify our angelic core energies.
Stewart Pearce says he channels 12 beings of light called the Angels of Atlantis. In this session the angels say Atlantean temples were tuned with crystals and precious stones, amber among them. Each stone stands for one of the angels' 12 light rays.
In 'its markets must have met the maize of the Mississippi Valley, the copper of Lake Superior, the gold and silver of Peru and Mexico, the spices of India, the tin of Wales and Cornwall, the bronze of Iberia, the amber of the Baltic, the wheat and barley of Greece, Italy, and Switzerland.
Ignatius Donnelly pictures the markets of Atlantis as a meeting place for goods from the whole known world. Baltic amber is on his list, next to Cornish tin and the gold of Peru and Mexico. His words “must have met” show that this is his own reconstruction.
Jon—that is, “Given”—was a sea-king, born at Alderga, who sailed from the Flymeer with a fleet of 127 ships fitted out for a long voyage, and laden with amber, tin, copper, cloth, linen, felt, otter-skins, beaver and rabbit skins.
This passage comes from the Oera Linda Book, a manuscript that tells the history of the Frisians from the sinking of Atland onward. Jon, a sea-king from Alderga, sails out with 127 ships, and amber is the first item in their cargo. In my study I connect his name with John in the Oahspe Bible.
In my review of the Oera Linda Book, the Jutten east of Denmark take their name from looking for amber (jutten) on the shore. My note beside that passage lists the main amber regions, above all the Baltic coast, where amber washes ashore after storms. Later in the book, the people of Sidon keep asking Teunis and his men to sell them amber.
They visited the British Islands for tin, and the shores of the Baltic for amber.
This 1881 history of America describes the Phoenicians of Tyre and Sidon as the great sailors of the ancient world. It says they sailed to Britain for tin and to the Baltic for amber. The book uses their long voyages to suggest that they knew of a fertile island in the Western Ocean.
Hashmallim comes from the Hebrew hashmal, a word in Ezekiel 1:4 that the King James Bible renders "amber." The Greek Septuagint uses elektron, and in modern Hebrew hashmal means "electricity." The Hashmallim are beings of shining light and hold the fourth rank in Maimonides' list.
And I looked, and, behold, a whirlwind came out of the north, a great cloud, and a fire infolding itself, and a brightness was about it, and out of the midst thereof as the colour of amber, out of the midst of the fire.
Ezekiel's vision opens with fire and a brightness "as the colour of amber."
My overview of angel orders includes the Hashmallim. Their name comes from the Hebrew word hashmal, which can be translated as amber or as electrum, a shining mix of gold and silver. In Kabbalah, the Jewish mystical tradition, they are angels of a glowing, fiery nature.