On the southwest side of the Greek island of Crete, near a pristine cove and virgin beaches, sits the ruins of a town Agia Roumeli, that was once called Tara (Tarrha, Tarra, Tarrhus, Tarros, – Greek: Τάρρα). An ancient city with an illustrious history that during the Greco-Roman period was one of the most important of all the Mediterranean.
The natives and people of Tara were some of the most learned men in this part of the world. Writing in 19 A.D., Strabo tells us of its inhabitants’ enthusiasm for learning, especially for philosophy. In this respect, he speaks of Tara as Tarsus and claims the city surpasses Athens and Alexandria and every other university town.
According to traditional history, Greek colonists from Sparta founded the city Taras after the mythical hero Taras. The earliest legends tell us that Apollo, after murdering Python, arrived in Crete at Delphi, which is associated with Tara to be cleansed through purgatorial rituals ministered by the “first priests of Apollo who were Cretans from the City of Gnosis – Knossos.”
Here dwelt the famous temple of Apollo, surnamed Tarrhaeus, and the Oracle of Delphi, near the Southern part of the Samaria Gorge. Outside their temple of Gnosis, it simply read, “Know Thyself and Nothing in Excess.” The place where the High Priest Carmanor (Karmanor) where Apollo’s purification was woven into the Greek myths of the god’s entry into Delphi, and in times of plague (COVID), Epimenides Gnosis and other Cretans were summoned by the Delphic oracle.
During the first centuries of the Greco and Roman empires, the Island of Crete and the city-state of Tara was a place of greatest importance to the Imperial Cults in the Mediterranean. It was famous for many hundreds of years because of its history, learning, university, beauty, people, and its central location near mainland Greece and Egypt to operate its powerful maritime fleets and mercenary armies of archers.
The spiritual and historical roots of Tara tell us it was once one of the most ancient powerful cities of all the Old World who ruled over the rest of the cities such as in Southern Italy and Rome that was known as “Magna Graecia (Greater Greece)” in the time Before Christ (BC) and early AD. It once had one of the most advanced governments and militaries with a powerful fleet of ships that included a field army of tens of thousands of men.
It was inhabited and fiercely contested over since time immemorial. Due to the richness of the landscape which provided an abundance of fresh water and wildlife for food and the excellent quality of its wood, Tara or Tarsus became the epicenter of the world and of religion as well.
A famous old town that I believe various historical accounts connects us to the cities Tarsus, Tarshish, Tyre, Tyanna, and Ataroth, which I have found are all the same city but with different names throughout the last 2,000 plus years.
In order to travel to this area of Crete, you will find that there are no roads or tourist industries in or around the sleepy town of Agia Roumeli. By design or fate. The only way to find the remnants of Tara is by boat or a very long hike.
It has just about disappeared from history, but a necropolis was once excavated there, and some ruins can still be seen of it on the eastern side of the river (which runs down through the Samaria Gorge). The exact area that I believe is the same river described Biblically concerning the Tarsus and the story of Saint Paul’s (Saul of Tarsus) hometown near the Cydnus River now called the river Tarraios, which was also located near the ancient village of Samaria, midway down the gorge. Mt. Tarsus would be the beautiful White Mountains.
The river Tarraios dries up in summer but floods in winter, runs the length of the gorge and its mouth is at Agia Roumeli, formerly Tarra.
The recent photo below is from the lower part of the necropolis of Tara just above a rare “black sand beach” looking towards the Libyan sea.
HOW THE LEARNED MEN OF TARA MIGRATED TO ROME
What made the school of Tarsus different from other areas of the world according to Strabo was the fact that the entire student body was composed almost entirely of natives, who, after finishing their course, usually went abroad to complete their education and in most cases did not return home. Whereas in most universities, the students were mainly foreigners, and the natives did not show the same great love of learning.
In fact, Strabo emphatically states that Rome is full of Tarsians and Alexandrians and I believe they played a very important role in the formation of the early Roman Empire.
Among the famous learned men and philosophers were Stoics Antipater, Archedemus, Nestor, Athenodorus surnamed Cordylion, the friend and companion of the younger Marcus Cato also known as Athenodorus Cananites, (called Canaanites after the village of his birth), who was the tutor and friend of the first Roman emperor, Augustus Caesar and is credited with reforming the Tarsian constitution. Other philosophers of Tarsus were Nestor, a representative of the Academy, and tutor of Marcellus, Augustus’ nephew and destined successor, and of Tiberius, Plutiades and Diogenes;
Tara was the birthplace of philosophers, strategists, writers, and athletes such as Aristoxenus, Livius Andronicus, Heracleides, Iccus, Cleinias, Leonidas, Lysis, Sosibius, and Lucillus of Tarrha (or Loukillos). He commented on the Argonauts of Apollonius of Rhodes. In mythology, Chrysothemis, was the victor of the Pythian Games at Delphi and was also the son and poet of the High Priest Carmanor, who was from Tara as well.
Among the famous learned men and philosophers from Tara, Crete were people such as Paul the Apostle, Stoics Antipater, Archedemus, Nestor, Athenodorus surnamed Cordylion, the friend and companion of the younger Marcus Cato also known as Athenodorus Cananites, (called Canaanites after the village of his birth), who was the tutor and friend of the first Roman emperor, Augustus Caesar and is credited with reforming the Tarsian constitution. Other philosophers of Tarsus were Nestor, tutor of Augustus’ nephew, Marcellus.
It was distinguished for the culture of Greek literature and philosophy, so it was the rival of Athens and Alexandria. People such as Paul the Apostle were born here and it was the location of the first meeting between Mark Antony and Cleopatra that had occurred a long ago and was also home to the infamous, Cleopatra’s Gate.
Some of the most famous people I have discovered from Tara AKA Tarsus were the highly influential Greek neo-Pythagorean philosopher, Apollonius of Tyana, who was educated at Tarsus in the Temple of Aesculapius and also lived and died on Crete. Apollonius was a student of the Pythagoreans whose teachings were held in the highest esteem and influenced both scientific thought and occultism for many centuries after his death.
Over the last 2,000 years, various legends told over this time about Apollonius in many different languages and by a plethora of authors tell of many places he had allegedly visited that all are spelled in a similar fashion and sound the same like Tarsus, Tarsia, Tyana and Tyre. Stories like Apollonius sails from Tyre to Antioch. In Tarsia, He is carried by pirates from Tarsus; Apollonius returns to Tyre; Apollonius sails to Tarsus; Apollonius returns from Egypt to Tarsus . D. Apollonius sails to Cyrene, etc…
Another famous Taraseian from Tara was Archytas, a Pythagorean and ruler of Tara for seven years. He was an esteemed member of the Pythagorean school for his wisdom and virtues and was famous for being the founder of mathematical mechanics, as well as a good friend of Plato. The Seventh Letter of Plato asserts that Archytas attempted to rescue Plato during his difficulties with the Greek Archon Dionysius II of Syracuse.
I also find it interesting that many of these philosophers from Tara, Tarsus, or whatever you want to call the town were also resemble one another as if they were related by blood.
Under the rulership of Archytas, the government of Tara reached the apex of its development with a political hegemony over the other Greek colonies of Magna Graecia in southern Italy and one of the largest cities in the world, with a population estimated up to 300,000 people. Strabo associates Archytas with the flourishing of Tara and also its military might. In his honor, a crater on the Moon is named Archytas, and just to the southwest, we find his friend, the dark-floored crater Plato.
Due to its history and importance, the city of Tara had become one of the most esteemed and powerful cities in all the Mediterranean from 500 BC onwards which is reflected by its historical alliances and foreign policy. Tara belonged to a federation of Cretan cities composed of Lissos, Syia, Pikilassos, Hyrtakina, and Elyrus (Elyros) who are knowns as the Elyrians (Illyrians). Pausanias tells us how the people of Elyrus in Crete sent a bronze goat to Delphi; “ The goat is suckling the infants Phylacides and Philander, who were said to be the children of Apollo by a nymph Acacallis, whom Apollo visited in the city of Tara.
In later times, we find Tara signed an important agreement cementing an alliance with the neighboring Cretan City of Pergamon through King Eumenes II in 170 under the Attalid dynasty. Eumenes (B.C. 196-159) of Pergamon was the son of Cretan King and friend of the Romans, Attalus (B.C. 241-197).
In the Scripture, the original city of Pergamon is also known as the throne of Satan via Revelation 2:12 “Pergamos – Where Satan’s throne is.” Pergamon was originally located on the Island of Crete approximately 18 miles inland from the west coast. It lies opposite the Island of Dia (Cos, Chios, Patmos) to the west of Mount Ida, and Knossos was as well. It was said to be on the river Caicus almost halfway between Smyrna on the south, and Troy on the north. Pliny places it between the city of Sidonia (Cydonia) and the city of Kiasmos.
Pergamon was also home to the Temple of the ancient Greek God of wisdom, medicine, healing, rejuvenation, and physicians known as ‘Asclepius’. His temple was known as the Sanctuary of Asclepius which was one of the most famous schools, libraries, and medical centers (hospitals) ever known in the ancient world.
Under Augustus Caesar’s rule, the first imperial cult was established in the province of Asia was in Pergamon. Pliny the Elder refers to the city as the most important in the province and the local aristocracy continued to flourish in power up until the 1st century AD.
Lawyer and author, Robert Pashley was the first modern archaeologist to find the location of the city of Tara and investigate it. Pashley was one of the modern foremost experts of Cretan culture in the first half of the nineteenth century. He was the also first person to discover the location of the ancient buried city of Sidonia (Cydonia). At the time of Pashley’s arrival on Crete, it was under Muslim-Egyptian administration so I would assume much of this early history and Biblical secrets he discovered were suppressed. He published his Great Work in the two-volume book, “Travels in Crete.”
The appellation of “tar” to their founding and sister cities was preserved in the names of ancient places such as Tara in Ireland. Home to the Hill of Tara, which is an ancient ceremonial and burial site near Skryne in County Meath, Ireland. According to ancient tradition, it was the inauguration place and seat of the High Kings of Ireland. It was here you find like on Crete, learned me who are known as the Ulam (Ollam) of Mulah and their king who founded Ireland’s first University.
King Ollam is mentioned in the “Annals of the Four Masters,”, as a sage and law-giver and was said to have founded a College of Ollams at Tara, or a ‘School of the Prophets” who ordered the sacred records to be kept at Tara. “These form the basis of ancient Irish history.” (Annals of the Four Masters, note p. 297.) There was actually a famous college at Tara called the Mur Ollam han, or the House of the Learned Four Masters.
In England, we find the city of Tarring, now West Tarring, in West Sussex, which was founded by King Athelstan who is credited with starting Freemasonry in England. When the Normans conquered the country, they took over the governorship and this is reflected in history as being given by the King to the archbishops of Canterbury in the 10th century. Another sister city to Tara, Crete is the coastal city of Tarifa, Spain, and the most famous of all is the ancient city of Rome once called Tarentum and today is known as Terracina, Italy, which is said to have been built by colonists from Crete to name a few.
Early Greek tradition relates that when Taras was shipwrecked, his father rescued him by sending a dolphin which he rode to traverse the sea from the promontory of Taenarum to the south of Italy. Brought ashore, Taras founded Tarentum which was named in his honor. According to Pausanias, he was worshiped as a hero who named both the city and the river, Taras after himself.
“The town of Tarentum consisted of two parts, viz.: a peninsula or island at the entrance of the harbor, and a town on the mainland, which was connected with the island by means of a bridge. On the northwest corner of the island, close to the entrance of the harbor, was the citadel: the principal part of the town was situated southwest of the isthmus.
The modern town is confined to the island or peninsula on which the citadel stood. The neighborhood of Tarentum produced the best wool in all of Italy and was also celebrated for its excellent wine, figs, pears, and other fruits. Its purple dye was also much valued in antiquity.”
The modern name of Tara I have also found is associated with the Biblical Tarsus, which is famously associated as the native place of the Apostle Paul (Acts 22:3) who is also known as Saul of Tarsus, which he claimed was “a citizen of no mean city” (Acts 9:11; Acts 21:39). It stood on the banks of the river Cydnus, about 6-10 miles north of the Mediterranean. Like Tara, it was distinguished for the culture of Greek literature and philosophy, so it was considered the rival of Athens and Alexandria.
Tara may also be associated with the coastal village of Aghios Pavlos (“Saint Paul”) in whose name a small church was built there (first in Byzantine times, then restored in the 1960s), which is a natural port near the southernmost point of Crete south of Rethymnon city, west of Agia Galini, and very close to the tip of Cape Melissa. Some Biblical scholars state that Apostle Paul, landed at the harbor so-called Fair Havens here to preach the Christian faith in Crete.
This makes perfect sense given the fact that Aghios Pavlos has one of the most sheltered bays on the coast with some of the most beautiful green and deep waters you have ever seen. The harbor and beaches here are also well-hidden and peaceful, where just above the pristine beach, you can witness for yourself the small old church of Saint Paul. The beach here has fine dark-colored pebbles with crystal clear blue waters. This area is specially protected from the winds by the high mountainous massive on the west and the north.
During this time of Pompey (67 BC), Tarsus was made the capital over the Roman province of Cilicia, and who we know now as the Jews began to receive Roman citizenship. Antony, who controlled the eastern provinces, declared the city free in 42 BC. Tarsus continued to receive special privileges under Augustus, who exempted the city from imperial taxation because Athenodorus, his teacher and friend, was a Tarsian. Tarsus grew into a cultural and intellectual center. Stoic philosophers like Athenodorus, Zeno, Antipater, and Nestor lived in the city in the 1st century AD.
The gate of Cleopatra, also called the “Sea Gate,” still stands today, but poorly restored and in Turkey like many of Crete’s old stones. Legend has it that Cleopatra sailed up the Cydnus river disguised as Aphrodite and came through this famous gate in 41 BC on her way to meet Mark Antony. Saint Paul had witnessed this event.
You will often find the name Tarsus associated with another name for Crete which is Cappadocia. These various name changes were done I believe to conceal the history and identity of the island from its descendants who were more often than not a serious political problem for whomever ruler ruled the region.
It was said that Julius Caesar passed through the city in 47 B.C. on his march from Egypt to Pontus, and was enthusiastically received. Later with the assignment of the East to Antony’s administration, Tarsus received the position of an independent and duty-free state (civitas libera et immunis) and became for some time Antony’s place of residence. This privileged status was confirmed by Pompey, Caesar, Antony and Augustus granted that honor for themselves and, as a consequence, for their descendants.
In reward for its exertions and sacrifices during the civil wars of Rome, Tarsus was made a free city of Augustus.
the biblical name, Ataroth, one of the stations on the southern frontier of the tribe of Ephraim, close to the territory of the tribe of Benjamin ( Josh . xvi . 5 , 7 ; xviii . 13 ; and xxi . 18 ). Their emblem is the wolf who according to ancient Roman mythology, a she-wolf was responsible for helping rear up the founders of Rome, Romulus, and Remus which is symbolized with the Capitoline Wolf (Italian: Lupa Capitolina), which is the main symbol of Rome.
In the 7th century A.D., the Muslims conquered the island of Crete forcing the Byzantine rulers and Cretan natives to flee and in the 17 century, it fell again, this time into the hands of the Turks.
Finally, it was from the ancient shores of Tara/Tarsus that we know of today as Agia Roumeli that the Greek Government with King George left for Egypt in May 1941, after the fall of Crete to the Germans.
It is well known amongst ancient historians and scientists that Western civilization had its beginning on the Greek island of Crete. I have written about this island many times as being the birthplace of Gnosticism, Judaism, Christianity, the Bible, the Apostles, and the story of Jesus Christ.
Now, we are finding evidence of our ancient human ancestor’s footprints on Crete that date back to 5.6 million years ago, making them by far the oldest footprints ever discovered in Europe.
The footprints were discovered in 2002 by Paleontologist Gerhard Gierlinski, a researcher at the Polish Geological Institute from Warsaw, Poland, who was just on vacation on the island of Crete in Greece enjoying the weather and beautiful beaches with his girlfriend. Since he had a passion for searching for historic artifacts wherever he went, he brought along his hammer, a camera, and a GPS for just such trips.
While traveling along the old Mediterranean shores near Trachilos, he found what looked like human footprints that had somehow been embedded into a flat rock along the shore.
According to the study published in Science Direct, two footprints were found in a natural outcrop above the beach (N 35° 30.857′, E 023° 37.660′), close to the village of Trachilos, west of Kissamos (also known as Kastelli), in the Chania Prefecture of Crete.
You would think that after this discovery, the researcher’s study and finding would have been accepted by the scientific community, but they were instead treated hostile, and the reactions they did receive were negative.
Many of the editors of scientific journals were flat-out disrespectful even when they had no knowledge on the subject, saying that this couldn’t possibly be true and these can’t be footprints at all,” Ahlberg said in an interview with CBC News.
“In every round [of reviews], there would be at least one, and sometimes several, reviewers who were in the first instance savagely hostile. They would just flatly deny that these would be human or hominin footprints. They would say almost anything — they’re bear or monkey [tracks] or whatever.”
Whether that’s true or not, Ahlberg said his experience has shaken his confidence in the process of science.
“The thing that really troubles me is the sense that we won here only through extreme persistence,” he said. “It really does rather make you wonder what other sort of stories have been buried and have never come out.”
Gierlinski said it was important to him to have the scientific community check over his work to ensure he hadn’t made a mistake. But now that his research has been validated by peer review and official publication, he said, “I will be fighting to prove that I am right… because I am sure 100 per cent.”
“In the Earth’s center, ’tis believed the place by Jews called Golgotha, we seek to trace.”
In the story of the Crucifixion of Christ, we are told in John 19:13, “When Pilate heard this, he brought Jesus out and sat down on the judge’s seat at a place known as the Stone Pavement (which in Aramaic is Gabbatha).”
In researching the most recent Biblical text, you will find that the new word is Golgatha, which is said to mean the place of the skull but was originally translated from the word Gabbatha and had allegedly derived from ‘Lithostrōton or lithostrótos, which is said to mean “stone pavement or mosaic pavement. As you can see, lithostroton is a long way from the doctored word we have now being Golgatha and still different from Gabbatha.
Here is a copy showing these various translations and original words that we have today
A clue to the true location is Pilate brought Jesus here and then sat on the judge’s seat. Hence, we know that this place was some earthly court and religious center where the Apostles and Fathers of the Church had taught and performed Baptisms. In 311 or 312, Lucian the Martyr of Antioch (322) mentions a cave, the gates of Hell, and a cleft in the rock of Golgotha in a fragment of the defense made before Maximinus. Lucian had said;
“If yet you believe not, I will also offer you the testimony of the very spot on which the thing was done. The place itself in Jerusalem vouches for these facts, and the rock of Golgotha broken asunder under the weight of the Cross: that cave also, which when the gates of Hell were burst, gave back the body in newness of life.”
According to Eusebius, who had written about the Life of Constantine said the Emperor first beautified the monument with rare columns, then paved with finely polished stone a large area open to the sky, and enclosed on three sides with long colonnades, and lastly erected the Church itself “at the side opposite to the cave, which was the Eastern side.”
So the clues to this location thus far are that it is near or in a cave, so there is a mountain involved with rocks that were said to be near some type of judges seat that also was the gates of Hell and was an essential location and religions center for a long time. The Church of Constantine was opposite to the cave, which was the Eastern side making the Church on the Western side.
St. Cyril of Jerusalem mentions the location frequently, and there was no doubt that Eusebius knew about it in A.D. 315. It is said that next to Eusebius and the Bordeaux Pilgrim who visited Jerusalem in 333, Cyril is considered to be the earliest and most important witnesses as to the site of Constantine’s Churches.
“as we discourse on Christ and Golgotha here in Golgotha, so it was most fitting that we should also speak concerning the Holy Ghost in the Upper Church; yet since He who descended there jointly partakes of the glory of Him who was crucified here, we here speak concerning Him also who descended there.”
In Cat. xiv. § 5, he says, “It was a garden where He was crucified. For though it has now been most highly adorned with royal gifts, yet formerly it was a garden, and the signs and the remnants of this remain.” Cyrill also alludes to the fact that this ceremony allows the initiate to “jointly partake of the glory” when he stated, “He who descended there jointly partakes of the glory of Him who was crucified here.”
Cyrill mentions a ‘garden’ twice, and it is obvious from the comments he made that he knew of this location that was also called allegorically a “garden and where royalty was buried” and the place of their “Holy Sepulchre,” once called Lithostrōton or lithostrótos, and then later changed to Gabbatha and then Golgatha to help conceal its original location from the profane (uninitiated) and grave robbers.
It was said that this custom of teaching and baptizing had remained in Jerusalem in the time of John, Cyril’s successor as Bishop, who in writing to Jerome says, “The custom with us is that we deliver the doctrine of the Holy Trinity publicly during forty days to those who are to be baptized.”
“From thence (the Palace of David) as you go out of the wall of Sion walking towards the gate of Neapolis, on the right side below in the valley are walls where the house or Prætorium of Pontius Pilate was: here our Lord was tried before His Passion. On the left hand is the little hill (monticulus) of Golgotha, where the Lord was crucified. About a stone’s throw from thence is a vault (crypta) wherein His body was laid and rose again on the third day. Thereby command of Emperor Constantine has now been built a Basilica, that is to say, a Church of wondrous beauty, having at the side reservoirs (exceptoria) from which water is raised, and a bath behind in which infants are washed (baptized).”
Then we find out from Vespasian that another old name for this city was the ancient city of Shechem, now Nâbulus: the “porta Neapolitana” therefore was in the North wall of Sion.
So, now we know from all these most preeminent authors on this subject that the place we know of as Golgatha was also called Gabbatha. Before then, it was known as Lithostrōton or lithostrótos, but even later was called the city of Shechem, now Nâbulus (Nebo or Nabou), and Jerome writes Neapolis or Naplouse. Nebo (Nabau), a mountain celebrated as the scene of Moses’s death – a place in the tribe of Judah, Ezra ii. 29; Neh. vii. 33, a town belonging to the tribe of Reuben, taken by the Moabites, who held it in the time of Jeremiah (xlviii. 1).
When I read these latter names of Nâbulus (Nebo or Nabou), Neapolis, or Naplouse, I immediately remembered previous articles I had written about Nicopolis or The Holy Village of Ayios Nikolaos on the Island of Crete, which is also known by the names Agios Nik or Ag Nik – Greek: Άγιος Νικόλαος [ˈaʝos niˈkolaos]) and in English – Saint Nicholas. A place that looks like the mosaic or Stone Pavement I mentioned above.
My research had proved that Nicopolis was anciently called Neapolis (Naplouse or Napolose) and is listed as a city in Samaria between the Mountains of Gebal and Gerizem, approximately 24 miles North of Jerusalem. I have found it also under the names of Sychar, also called Sichem and Shechem.
JERUSALEM – THE HEART OF THE EARTH IN THE DEVIL’S CAVE
The references by Bede of God giving us “salvation in the middle of the earth” and our heavenly city Jerusalem at its center, brought me to another similar reference in the Scripture called the “Heart of the Earth.” A place I know of as the island of Crete where I have discovered before along my path retracing the steps of the History of the Brotherhood and also where I believe happens to be the initiation/baptism and resting place of my most ancient ancestors.
Please keep in mind that this latter research was the result of my studies into the Christian concepts of Hell by also contrasting them with the ancient Greek myths of the Abyss and Hades coupled with the Gods/Deities who were said to rule this region of our world with a type of hive mind force. This hive mind force that is called the LORD, Prince of the World, and Satan in the Judeo Christian Scripture I contend began on Crete where some type of cosmological deal was sealed with the Brotherhood of the East and now, the West in blood and stone at Golgotha AKA the “Heart of the Earth.”
As Eliphas Levi had written, “They clave to their brethren, their nobles, and entered into a curse and into an oath, to walk in God’s law, which was given by Moses, the servant of God, and to observe and do all the commandments of the LORD our God, and his judgments and his statutes. Levi also said, “The fallen angels gathered around their chief, Samiaxas, on a high mountain, which has been called ever since, ‘the mountain of the Oath’, for the Eggregores pledged themselves there one to the other with a sacrilegious vow.”
This is where Jonah had stayed three nights in what is called today in the English doctored versions as the “Belly of a Whale,” but is properly translated from the old Greek Text as “the heart of the earth, the heart of the seas, or more appropriately, the “belly of hell, the world of the dead, which was believed to be far below the surface of the earth.
In Matthew 12:40, the LORD Jesus had said just has Jonah had stayed three nights in Hell, so will the Son of Man, i.e. you and I;
“A wicked and adulterous generation demands a sign, but none will be given it except the sign of the prophet Jonah.
For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so the Son of Man will be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.
The men of Nineveh will stand at the judgment with this generation and condemn it; for they repented at the preaching of Jonah, and now One greater than Jonah is here.”
The secrets and the truth hidden within these passages are found by contrasting them with the Old Greek and Hebrew translations with modern English. By doing so, you will find that English is written more allegorically with similar words and nouns that have been changed from the original text to conceal the true meaning from the profane (uninitiated).
As I stated above, the word whale does not mean a literal whale, it allegorically represents the “belly of hell,” which our ancestors had called the world of the Dead that was located in the “Heart of the Earth.”
The word heart in our modern version of Scripture is variously translated onto the word ‘leb,’ which means the midst or middle (of things), the inner man or mind that serves his moral character that we already know is said to be a wicked and adulterous generation. This is what I like to call the little or false noos, or the second brain that causes many people to become selfish and pursue material desires which are considered evil and wicked i.e. Satanic. By default of character and mode of thinking, they are connected through their own bellies (second brains and emotions) to the “Bely of Hell” or the Abyss and River Acheron underneath their feet.
As I have explained in several previous articles, the earth’s center or what has been called the navel or birth center of the classical Gnostic world and Europe’s first powerful maritime civilization was and is what I like to call the “Holy Island of Crete.” Several historians, Greek myths, and many Biblical stories originate and also prove that Crete is the original home of the Tribe of Judah, the true home of Freemasonry, and also the place they call ‘Golgatha.’
In the Scripture, the true center of the world is where the Heiros Gamos had begun, where you will find the Seat of Satan at Pergamon, which would be the judge’s seat at a place known as the Stone Pavement (which in Aramaic is Gabbatha), and the mapping of the world which is referred to as Jerusalem, or what we can call the “New Jersulaem” in Ezekiel 5:5;
“This is what the Sovereign LORD says: This is Jerusalem, which I have set in the center of the nations, with Symbols – Jerusalem map countries all around her.”
Here is a very old map made by the German Heinrich Bunting that shows exactly what I’m stating here.
This location would be the ancient official spiritual center for all Judeo-Christian religions. In Ezekiel 38:12, the Jewish people are simply referred to as the people who live at the “center of the world,” and in Hebrew reads, “the naval of the world.” I had detailed this research in a previous article, The Ancient Naval Center of the Old World, where I explain that the island of Crete in the Mediterranean Sea is halfway between Europe, Africa, and Asia, and was considered in ancient times as being at the center of the world, and the original location of the first city of Jerusalem.
Jerusalem was the capital of Judah and the center of Israelite and Hebrew worship. It was the “metropolis” of the Greek Hellene nation, the house of the Ark of the Covenant amongst the globes royal houses, and the place of the crucifixion of Christ AKA Golgatha.
For example, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre on Crete is one of the holiest sites in all of the Christian world, unbeknownst to the most pious of Christians. There is a small church once called Aphendi Kristos, or the Lord Christ, near the ancient sanctuaries of Zeus at the Omalos plateau (Κορυφή Αφέντης Χριστός – Δίκτη, από το οροπέδιο του Ομαλού) which is part of the “Samarian Gorge” in Chania, Crete.
Near here was the throne of Zeus, the Father of the Olympian gods, and where he was said to have driven his beloved chariots. According to the historian Diodorus Siculus, the goddess Diana was born here. The peak at Gingilos is known as “Rotten Mountain,” wherein ancient times, according to a tradition, there was also a famous Oracle at the Demonospilio (Cave of Demons or Devil’s Cave, known as the den of demons. It is also said that this was also the place of the Oracle of Delphi, which I have also connected to Crete and this precise location in my article, The Pythia Priesthood of the Delphic Oracles.
And here we find the cave of the infant Zeus (Heart of the Earth/Fungi Garden of the Apostles) who was hidden by the priesthood over 2,000 years ago. This is the same cave of Epimenides Gnosis, AKA Orpheus, and also where Pythagoras was initiated into the Orphic mysteries.
It was here where Pythagoras had learned the laws of Minos and was initiated by the Ancient Priesthood of Jupiter (Amon) on the Sacred Mountain of Mount Ida (Zion), and in the same cave on Crete that the greatest of all Greek Gods, Zeus was educated and also hidden from his most vengeful father, known in mythology as Cronus and in science as Saturn.
As I explained in a previous article, The Cretan City of Cutha, is also the location of the ancient city of Kutu or Kutha, which is also the name of the capital of the Sumerian (Samarain Gorge) AKA Mesopotamian underworld. This is where “Irkalla AKA Kur, Irkalla, Kukku, Arali, Kigal, and various other names, was a dark, dreary cavern located deep below the ground, where inhabitants were believed to continue “a shadowy version of life on earth”.
The only food or drink was dry dust, but family members of the deceased would pour libations for them to drink.”
This cave was said to be the abode of various demons such as the child-devourer demon known as Lamashtu, the fearsome wind demon and protector god Pazuzu, and the demons who drag people into the underworld to be tortured were called the “galla.” Galla or Gal is where we get the English word cock or rooster which in Greek is ἀλέκτωρ, ορος, ὁ or alektór and in Latin is gallus or gallinaceous. The surname for Jesus being a Galilean from Gallillee on Crete and his Apostles like Simon who became Satan was surnamed Peter were Galileans as well. (Matthew 26:69; John 7:41)
The King of Demons in Judaism is named Asmodeus (Ashmedai) who according to the Kabbalah, is a cambion, born as the result of a union between King David, and the Queen of Demons named Agrat Bat Mahlat who was a succubus. David was the second king of the United Kingdom of Israel and Judah, and also an ancestor of Jesus.
This cave of Zeus sits just above the Plain of Nida on Mount Ida, to the southwest of Knossos. The mother of Zeus was also known in Latin as “Mater Idaea (Idaean Mother).” The name Mount Ida is where the Tribe of Judah had received their name, “the ‘Idaeans,” which is just an earlier spelling of the Judaeans.
This would be the Capital of the Underworld, i.e. Hell and the place of the Skull, Golgatha where Jesus was martyred.
It is alleged that the Roman emperor Constantine had established the Church here in the year 333 A.D., after his mother, Queen Helena, marked the place of Golgotha during her visit in 326AD. Now, here is an image of the Church of Constantine and Helen in Crete with the Double-Headed Eagle or more appropriately, the Double-Headed Phoenix.
The symbol of the 33rd Degree of Freemasonry.
Ancient Crete was the Capital of the Secret Mysteries and home to the Holy Grounds of many famous Gnostics, philosophers, Apostles, and Saints throughout the history of the world. The priesthood of the Curetes had formed here who Herodotus had said came to Crete with the Phoenician Prince Cadmus.
Epimenides, one of the founders of the ancient Gnostic mysteries of Orphism was born in the city of Gnosis, which today is called the city of Knossos (Latin) on Crete. He lived in the 7th century B.C. and established a religion that was centered at the cave of Zeus. Epimenides was a lawgiver, prophet, sage, poet, and author who composed several works in verse such as on the origin of the priesthood of Crete known as the Curetes and the Corybantes.
Hence, the Double-Headed Phoenix as their Coat of Arms and the national flag and their adherence to a national religion being the Russian Orthodox Church as the official state symbol of the late Byzantine Empire, symbolizing the unity between the Byzantine Orthodox Church and State.G
This history and ancient facts are also encoded within Greek mythology when the God Zeus sent two eagles (phoenixes) across the world to meet at its center, the “navel” of the world.
This was their holy center called Omphalos, where it was said that the navel-string of the infant Zeus had fallen to the ground.
The story is told in Myth by Hesiod in which Zeus is hidden in a cave by his mother Rhea from his child devouring Father, Kronus. Hesiod had written;
“Thither came Earth carrying him swiftly through the black night to Lyctus first, and took him in her arms and hid him in a remote cave beneath the secret places of the holy earth on thick-wooded Mount Aegeum; but to the mightily ruling son of Heaven, the earlier king of the gods, she gave a great stone wrapped in swaddling clothes.
Then he took it in his hands and thrust it down into his belly: wretch!
He knew not in his heart that in place of the stone his son was left behind, unconquered and untroubled, and that he was soon to overcome him by force and might and drive him from his honors, himself to reign over the deathless gods.
“After that, the strength and glorious limbs of the prince increased quickly, and as the years rolled on, great Cronos the wily was beguiled by the deep suggestions of Earth and brought up again his offspring, vanquished by the arts and might of his own son, and he vomited up first the stone which he had swallowed last. And Zeus set it fast in the wide-pathed earth at goodly Pytho under the glens of Parnassus, to be a sign thenceforth and a marvel to mortal men.
And he set free from their deadly bonds the brothers of his father, sons of Heaven whom his father in his foolishness had bound. And they remembered to be grateful to him for his kindness and gave him thunder and the glowing thunderbolt and lightning: for before that, huge Earth had hidden these. In them, he trusts and rules over mortals and immortals.”
Pausanias (x. 24. 6) saw near the tomb of Neoptolemus (Nicopolis, Neapolis, Naplouse, Napolose) “a stone of no great size,” which the Delphians anointed every day with oil, and which he says was supposed to be the stone given to Cronos.
To represent and honor this location as the Eastern and Western Brotherhood’s Capital (Double Headed Phoenix), a religious artifact in the form of a stone omphalos was created.
It is known as the Omphalos at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, Jerusalem, which is an ancient Christian tradition, representing the navel of the world (the spiritual and cosmological center of the world). Jewish tradition held that God revealed himself to His people through the Ark of the Covenant in the Temple in Jerusalem, which rested on the Foundation Stone marking the center of the world.
The destruction of the ancient Palace Temple (the Second Temple), the royal archives, and the entire city of Knossos had come at the orders of Roman Emperor, Nero who had sent Vespasian and his son Titus to Judea to subdue the Jewish nation in a massive invasion of the Holy Island of Crete in the year 67 A.D. Titus had served under his father on the island of Crete in the kingdom of Judaea (Greco-Egypt) during the First Jewish-Roman War. For winning this historic holy battle for the Romans, Titus would later become known as Saint Titus,Bishop of Crete and companion to the Apostle Paul.
Roman Senator and historian Cornelius Tacitus (110 A.D.) had written that the Jews often traveled to Crete to celebrate the festival of Pentecost in Jerusalem and that they eventually were exiled from the island when Saturn was driven from his throne by the violence of Jupiter. In The Works of Tacitus, he explains the Jewish people and the exodus from the island of Crete to Africa’s coast in Libya.
Hence, this would be a thread of history and ideas which Bede, my ancestor, had sought to trace with its center near the Omalos plateau at the Oracle at the Demonospilio on Crete, Golgatha, I have placed.
Located on the Eastern side of the island Crete in Greece near the port of Saint Nicholas (Agios Nikolaos or Aghios Nikolaos), is the quaint city Elounda (Greek: Ελούντα, romanized: Elúnda, Elunda, Elunta) situated around a beautiful deep blue lake that is a hundred feet deep, and more than a quarter of a mile diameter in what looks like the crater of an old volcano. Not many people know that it was once known as one of Greece’s strongest and most famous ancient towns.
Full of ruins of great age, this is a place where Biblical prophets and the first eminent Freemasons such as Dadleus once walked amongst the old stones now mixed in with modern villas, attractions, and quaint eateries that are some of the most esteemed in all of Greece. The importance of this city is relayed to us in Greek mythology with the story of Tyros or Tyro who was the Goddess-mother of the Tyrians (Tyrrhenians or Tyrsenians) whose father was named Cretheus (Crete) along with Sidero (Sidon), and Eolus, who are credited as the founders of cities in Hellas.
Buried beneath the modern town and mythology, you will find that this location as a hidden history and like many other Cretan cities, it has been known by a plethora of names over the last two thousand years. I have found that it was known as the ancient city of Goulas but was also spelled Olous, Oloundas, and Eloundas. These names reconcile with the mythology of Tyros. Digging further, I discovered that this same city may have also been called Lyctus, Lyttos, or Lato depending on the writer and time.
These cities were said by many historians to have a wooden statue of Britomartis carved by the famous Knossian Mason, Daedalus. The best authorities on the wooden statue of Britomartis are Strabo and Pausanias. Strabo, in his Geography, said, “Lyktos (Lyctus) [in Krete] . . . the seaport is Kherronesos (Cherronesus), as it is called, where is the temple of Britomartis.” Pausanias, in the Description of Greece, mentions a wooden statue of Britomartis at OIus in Crete, along with a wooden Athena at Knossos.
The history I speak of can be found all over the ancient peaks of Elounda are ancient walls built of massive stones of the past, some well-preserved, others crumbling into the dust of time, as the feral olive trees of Abraham and countless wildflowers dot the landscape. The biblical and Masonic history of this town along with its association with Lato and Tyre as it is mentioned by many authors as “the great city of Goulas (Lato), dated to the prehistoric period and a massive stone entrance likened to the Lion Gate at Mycenae.” (1)
The people of Goulas (Olous, Oloundas, Eloundas) are sometimes referred to in literature as the Olotians or Oloutians and there was also a sanctuary here to Zeus where an inscription was found showing a decree inviting Knossos to arbitrate between Lato and Olous was set up”, and also a decree in honor of a physician from the island of Kasos, who had helped the Olontians in time of plague.
The English admiral who worked for the Royal Navy, Thomas Abel Brimage Spratt (11 May 1811 – 12 March 1888), associates Goulas with Lato who was in league with Pergamon in his work “, Travels in Crete”, published in 1865, Spratt said that he located the remains of the ancient city on the hill of Goulas, but wrongly identified them as the remains of Olous or Oleros. The archaeologists F. Halbherr, L. Mariani and A. Taramelli, visited the site and identified it as ancient Lato. As one of the hundred cities of Crete, Lato had eventually formed a league with Rhodes, Teos, and King Eumenes of Pergamon and participated in the League of the Cretan cities who all shared the same laws.
One of these names you will notice as being some of the 7 churches such as I have written before like the ancient Cretan city of Pergamon (Pergamum) which is first mentioned in history by Xenophon, and it becomes the center of importance when a Cretan King and friend of the Romans named Attalus (B.C. 241-197), and his son Eumenes (B.C. 196-159) had ruled over the city, schools, and church there. Pliny had called it, “longe clarissimum Asiae Pergamum.” Also, the place wrote about by Saint John in the Book of Revelation as the original uncorrupted church of Christ and one of the seven churches that later became the seat of Antichrist or Throne of Satan.
According to the Annual of the British School at Athens, “It may safely be said that of no prehistoric city on Hellenic soil are such extensive remains extant above ground as of the Cretan Goulas. The walls, indeed, are not so massive as those of Tiryns, there is no single monument to fix the attention like the Lions’ Gate at Mycenae, nor has excavation as yet done anything to add to what meets the eye on the surface of the earth. But for the mass of primeval ruins, the still-standing remains of individual dwelling-houses, the number of distinct quarters within the walls and the area they occupy, Goulas is without a rival. Its site, moreover, with its twin citadel peaks—the northern one looking down over a thousand feet sheer to the valley below—is more commanding than that of any sister city.” (2)
The American Journal of Archaeology, Volume 2; Volume 9 describes the excavations at Lato (Olous, Goulas, Oulas) in 1899-1900 where they found the temple of Zeus “at the north end a broad flight of steps led to the prytaneum, consisting of an inner room with a bench and altar, and an outer chamber which probably contained the sacred fire.” Researchers also discovered an important Biblical inscription is a treaty of the third century, between Gortyna and Lato, providing for a cessation of hostilities and the legal settlement of future disputes.
The author details his own observations of the massive Limestone Masonry found here was created with extraordinary difficulty resembling the Sixth or Mycenaean City of Troy. He had written;
“My own observations of the site of Goulas have been the result of three successive visits in 1894 and the two following years, and on each occasion, I was able to spend several days in exploring this almost inexhaustible maze of ruins. The principal discovery made by me on my first visit was the existence, in addition to the citadel height to the north mentioned by Spratt, of a second Akropolis to the South of the intervening hollow, and on the summit the remains of a very interesting building with a megaton recalling some of those of the Sixth or Mycenaean City of Troy.
In my next visit (1895), I was accompanied by Mr. J. L. Myres, and in the general plan opposite p. 194, which gives the first detailed view of Goulas as a whole, he has embodied the result of our joint labors. It must here be said that, from the vast masses of limestone blocks which encumber the ground, the tangled growth of brush-wood in their crevices, and the steepness of part of the site, the planning and measurement of the remains is a work of extraordinary difficulty, nor can anything more than approximate accuracy be claimed for the general result”
The coins that have been unearthed here are known as the “Coins of Olous” which were said to have been struck towards the latter part of the fourth century B.C., showing the head of Britomartis (Artemis) and on the reverse, a Freemasonic Square with what appears to be the letter G in the middle which is the oldest representation of Masonry on a coin that I could find anywhere.
Other coins found here show Britomartis with her hair in the classic Hellenic fillet, bay-wreath, necklace and quiver, and as their reverse of the coin is Zeus enthroned with an eagle on his right hand, a scepter in his left (fig. 537)” and silver coins of Antiochos viii Grypos, king of Syria, dated between 12 I and 96 B.C., showing Zeus standing within a laurel-wreath holding a long scepter in his left hand, an eight-rayed star, in his right; and on or over his head is the crescent moon.
To go along with this fabulous history, more recently in October 2019, according to the Greek Ministry of Culture and Sports, archaeologists have discovered a treasure trove of artifacts dating back thousands of years near the Port of Saint Nicholas. (8) Here is a photo from of the submerged structures in the Vathi bay of the Kolokytha peninsula (photo: Greek Ministry of Culture and Sports)
Άποψη των βυθισμένων δομών στον όρμο Βαθύ της χερσονήσου της Κολοκύθας
The online Greek publication, Tornos News recently reported that a treasure trove of submerged building complexes as well as ancient quarries, chiseled bollards, a loading platform, ships’ ballast, anchors, accidental rejects and signs of a Byzantine shipwreck were discovered by an underwater research team from the Ephorate of Underwater Antiquities and a team of geophysicists from the Laboratory of Satellite Remote Sensing of the Institute of Mediterranean Studies.
Archaeologists also found a submerged ancient city and the foundations of two fortification towers.
The research, carried out last October in much of Elounda Bay, involved volunteer divers and scientists of other specialties. This is the third research season in the five-year project of the two bodies launched in 2017 and supported by the Municipality of Agios Nikolaos. (4)
All these new findings seem to support the history of this ancient city whether it be true history, Biblical, and mythology that I have put forth in this essay.
Cleaning part of the wall of ancient Oloundas (photo: Greek Ministry of Culture and Sports)
SOURCES:
1. Cretan Quests: British Explorers, Excavators and Historians Page 12 – Davina Huxley, British School at Athens – 2000
2. The Annual of the British School at Athens By British School at Athens
3. The American Journal of Archaeology, Volume 2; Volume 9
On the northeast coastal area of the island of Crete lying east of the island’s capital Heraklion, and north of the town of Ierapetra and west of the town of Sitia, you will find the most ancient Holy Village of Ayios Nikolaos, which is also known by the names Agios Nik or Ag Nik – Greek: Άγιος Νικόλαος [ˈaʝos niˈkolaos]) and in English – Saint Nicholas.
At the northern end of the harbor of the village on a small headland, there is a famous old Church of Hagios Nikolaos – St. Nicholas, which gave its name to the town.
St. Nicholas is the patron protector Saint of Holy Russia who according to the Russian Orthodox Church, has saved Russia many times from catastrophe. In fact, it is said that almost every church in Russia has at least one St. Nicholas icon and his image has always received the greatest reverence from the Russians. Nicholas is also the patron saint of fishermen, sailors and of all of Greece.
The Church of St Nicholas is surrounded by the largest cypresses which were used anciently to build the ships for the Phoenicians/Cretans and it belongs to the most important holy churches in Crete and its walls are adorned by many priceless frescoes. This location is where it is said that the old temple of Poseidon had stood and the court of the physicians.
There are many other old important Orthodox Churches nearby such as Agios Nikolaos in Ormos, the Early Christian Basilica in Elounda, Kera, Agios Ioannis Prodromos, Hodegetria, Agios Georgios Kavoussiotis and Agios Ioannis Theologos in Kritsa, Metamorphosis in Neapolis, Agios Onoufrios in Voulismeni, Kera-goniotissa in Latsida, Agios Georgios Selinaris, Agios Georgios Vrachassotis Monastery, Fraro Monastery and Megali Panagia in Neapolis, Koufi Petra Convent and Kremasta Convent in Vrysses.
There are quite a few beautiful beaches that are close by as well. Beaches like Ammos, Kitroplatia in the town center, Ammoudi and Havania beaches, which is on the way to Elounda and Plaka pebble beach.
Going back further in time we find that this ancient Cretan town is of extreme historical significance due to the fact that it was one of the twelve towns of Attica. It was anciently called Tenos, which was sacred to Poseidon, the modern town of St. Nicholas is built. It was eventually was melded into one political community by King Theseus who was said to be the founder-king of Athens.
The story of Thesus tells us that he was rescued from the Labyrinth by the Cretan King Mino’s daughter Ariadne and for her Great Work, she was given the Crown that was legally called Gnosia Corona, and she has officially surnamed Gnosis, from the City of the Goddess in Crete – Knossos.
This may be why the village of Saint Nicholas (Ayios Nikolaos) is very close to a Knossos – The City of Gnosis. It was from the harbor of Ayios Nikolaos that was also known as the port from which the Theorise, or sacrificial embassies to Delos. There is also the alleged 4th-2nd century BC settlement of Lato, which I believe is another name for Delos, now Dia.
About two miles from Mount Ida, you will find what was once known as “The Plateau of St Nicholas (Russsian: Ayios Nikolaos & Greek: Άγιος Νικόλαος)” and is more commonly called “The Plateau of Isopata”. It is from this location where you will obtain a most spectacular “royal view” of the city of Knossos and the Harbor below.
It is from this location that researchers discovered one of the largest and most decorated royal tombs ever found on Crete. It was said to be of princely dimensions and construction that no British general, Turkish bey, Venetian noble, or Greek archon was ever buried in such a grave.
Today it is known as the Royal Tomb of Isopata and is said to date back approximately 3,500 hundred years since this burial chamber was completed.
This is also where the famous 3,500-year-old sarcophagus of Hagia Triada was discovered.
As I mentioned, St. Nicholas is the patron Saint of All Russia and according to Russian historians, there are five gates to the Kremlin, in Moscow with the Nikolskiya Vorotui, or Gate of St. Nicholas being one of them. There is a legend that says before the invasion of 1812 this Gate, with the tower, was restored after the late Emperor Alexander came to the throne. But in 1812 the most of the tower was blown in ruins, except for the base of the structure.
The Russians rebuilt the tower in a much more magnificent style than before. Symbolically on the East side of the Nikolskiya Vorotui, is an image of St. Nicholas, in a frame with a lit candle which is always kept burning and a dove over-hovering signifying the immortal spirit of Nicholas. The Son of Man is at the left of the image ascending, and below is an angel known as a seraph holding a three-branched candlestick, said to be emblematical of the Trinity.
The seraphs or seraphim are six-winged beings that fly around the Throne of God crying “holy, holy, holy.” They hold 5th rank of ten in the Jewish angelic hierarchy and the highest rank in the Christian angelic hierarchy of angels that govern this current world.
This is why you will find many religious processions and Christian celebrations all around the village of Agios Nikolaos to celebrate this Russian Saint and why the Village of Ayios Nikolaos is one of Crete’s hottest tourist spots with many Russians traveling here every day to honor their country’s patron Saint.
In our modern era, the great village of Ayios Nikolaos has been chosen by some of the world’s most famous directors to shoot many films that appear to have a secret esoteric meaning such as Jules Dassin, Walt Disney, BBC producers, and many others. These movies and documentaries then led to the rapid tourist development of the area which still exists to this very day.
Movies like “He Who Must Die,“: which was based on the novel’ Christ Recrucified. Interestingly, this movie mirrors true history. The film is about a Turkish-occupied Greek village shortly after World War I, villagers put on a Passion Play, with ordinary people taking the roles of Jesus, Peter, Judas, etc. Staging the play leads to them rebelling against their Turkish rulers in a way that mirrors Jesus’s story.
“My father bones. And his Father’s bones. We’ll build our new village on them!”
