In Atlantica Orientalis (pub. 1751) the Swedish Lutheran-Evangelical Pastor Johannes Eurenius (1688-1751) describes that the Swedes and Goths are the descendants of the dispersed tribes of Israel, who were deported out of the land of Israel app. 721 BC. When the Israelites had migrated to Russia, they became known as Scythians, and eventually they ended up in northern Europe where they became known as Swedes, Goths, and the tribes related to them.

Eurenius writes that the Greek legend of the lost land of Atlantis actually is a folk memory of the Israelites’ lost land from which they had been deported, and that Atlantis therefore actually refers to the land of Israel/Palestine. Hence the title of the book.

Atlantica Orientalis was also published in a Latin translation in 1764.

Mikkel Stjernholm Kragh, March 2010