Table of Contents
The Temple of Poseidon stands at the centre of most accounts of Atlantis. Plato describes it in the Critias. Later seers and channelers describe it again, each in their own way. This page puts their descriptions side by side.
Plato’s temple
In the Critias, the temple stands in the centre of the island, inside the rings of land and water. Plato gives its size as one stade long and three plethra wide, about 185 by (295 feet). The walls were coated in silver and the pinnacles in gold.
Size, silver and gold
The passage that follows describes the outside, the inside and the statues. The translation is W. R. M. Lamb’s (1925).
And the temple of Poseidon himself was a stade in length, three plethra in breadth, and of a height which appeared symmetrical therewith; and there was something of the barbaric in its appearance. All the exterior of the temple they coated with silver, save only the pinnacles, and these they coated with gold. As to the interior, they made the roof all of ivory in appearance, variegated with gold and silver and orichalcum, and all the rest of the walls and pillars and floors they covered with orichalcum. And they placed therein golden statues, one being that of the God [Poseidon] standing on a chariot and driving six winged steeds, his own figure so tall as to touch the ridge of the roof, and round about him a hundred Nereids on dolphins (for that was the number of them as men then believed); and it contained also many other images, the votive offerings of private men.
Plato, Critias 116d–e, tr. W. R. M. Lamb
The pillar of law and the bull sacrifice
The ten kings of Atlantis kept their laws on a pillar of orichalcum inside the temple. Every fifth and sixth year they met there to judge each other. Before judging, they hunted a bull without iron weapons and sacrificed it over the pillar.
But their authority over one another and their mutual relations were governed by the precepts of Poseidon, as handed down to them by the law and by the records inscribed by the first princes on a pillar of orichalcum, which was placed within the temple of Poseidon in the center of the island; and thither they assembled every fifth year, and then alternately every sixth year—giving equal honor to both the even and the odd—and when thus assembled they took counsel about public affairs and inquired if any had in any way transgressed and gave judgement.
Plato, Critias 119c–d, tr. W. R. M. Lamb
More on the full text: Timaeus and Critias.
Shirley Andrews
Shirley Andrews retells Plato’s description in Atlantis: Insights from a Lost Civilization. She adds that the gold wall around the temple grounds gave the capital its name, the City of the Golden Gates. She also writes that many psychics call the city Chalidocean.
Diana Cooper and Shaaron Hutton
In Discover Atlantis, Diana Cooper and Shaaron Hutton describe a very different temple. In their account the Intergalactic Council built it at the start of the Golden Age. It stood in the Atlas Mountains of Atlantis and formed a seventh peak.
The seven peaks stand for seven spiritual laws. The temple itself stands for the first of them, the Law of One. The others are Karma, Manifestation, Grace, Responsibility, Unconditional Love and Intention.
Their temple is simple. It is built of white, black and red local stone, with orichalcum on the outer walls and white marble inside. They also call it the Cathedral of the Sacred Heights. At its centre stood the Great Crystal, the generator crystal of Atlantis.
Stewart Pearce
Stewart Pearce places the temple at the spiritual heart of a much larger Atlantis. In his channeled account, islands from the Azores to Crete were once the peaks of its mountain range.
We will be with you, we promise. Atlantis was much, much bigger than you anticipate. It stretched from the present eastern coastal waters of North and Mesoamerica, including the islands of the Caribbean, and stretched over what you call the Atlantic Ocean, through the Mediterranean Sea. And the islands that you know today — the Azores, Santorini, Sardinia, Majorca, Crete, etc. — were all high peaks of the mountain range that contained the Temple of Poseidon at the very spiritual heart of Atlantis.
In part 2 of the same series, Pearce calls it the Temple of Infinite Being and places it in what is now the Atlas Mountains of Morocco. There a thirteenth crystal skull, made of amethyst, floated in the sanctuary.
Frederick S. Oliver: the Incalithlon
Frederick S. Oliver wrote A Dweller on Two Planets under the name Phylos the Thibetan. It was published in 1905. His great temple of Poseid is the Incalithlon, dedicated to Incal, the god of the Sun, in the capital Caiphul. In chapter XIV, “The Adoption of Zailm”, the narrator is adopted there by Prince Menax.
A pyramid shaped like a cave
The Incalithlon looked like the Great Pyramid from outside, but had no windows. Inside, the great hall was built like a cave of stalactites, lit by hidden lamps.
Outwardly the Incalithlon was shaped like the Egyptian pyramid of Cheops, not quite so high, but covering an area of twice as great extent. No windows pierced its sides, and sunlight or that of day never entered its interior. Besides a number of small apartments, the building contained one vast hall where was space for several thousand worshippers.
Phylos (Frederick S. Oliver), A Dweller on Two Planets (1905), p. 131
The Maxin, the Unfed Fire
At the back of the hall, on a triangle of red granite, a quartz cube carried a white flame called the Maxin. It gave no heat, and it killed anyone who touched it.
In the very center of it was a large block of crystal quartz, upon the perfect cube of which rose the Maxin. This seemed aflame, in shape like a giant spear-head, and it cast a light of intense power over all things around, yet one could look at its steady, unwavering white glow without desiring shade for the eyes, even though these were not strong.
A Dweller on Two Planets, p. 132
According to Oliver, a ruler who reigned for 434 days created the cube and the flame centuries earlier. He wrote the laws in a book and placed it under the flame. He also gave a warning.
Hearken unto me. This is my law. Behold it also written on the Maxin-Stone. No man shall remove it, lest he die. Yet after centuries have flown, behold! the Book shall disappear in sight of a multitude, and no man shall know its place. Then shall the Unfed Light go out, and no man be able to rekindle it. And when these things have come to pass, lo! the day is not far off when the land shall no more be. It shall perish because of its iniquity, and the waters of Atl shall roll above it! I have spoken.
A Dweller on Two Planets, p. 133
The high priest’s blessing
The high priest, Mainin, blesses Zailm at the Maxin-Stone with a warning that comes true later in the book.
Be thou erect in the sight of Incal, that no man may accuse thee truthfully. This do, and thy days shall be long. But even as thou shalt fail, so then shall thy time be shortened. May the peace of Incal be with thee.
A Dweller on Two Planets, p. 135
More: Atlantis temples.
