Thursday, April 25, 2024

Northeastern Italy

The famed city of Venice began as a Byzantine settlement. We saw in the compound posting on this blog, "The House Of Holy Wisdom, Where The Modern World Began" in the section "Imitations Of The Hagia Sophia", how St. Mark's Basilica in Venice is modeled on the Hagia Sophia. The original city of Venice was built on a number of islands in a lagoon that is sheltered from the Adriatic Sea. Venice is at the far northwest end of the sea.

Venice lasted 1300 years as a major maritime power and finance center, until Napoleon's conquest of 1797. It was legendary for it's devotion to it's patron saint, St. Mark. The bones of St. Mark, the Apostle of Jesus, were actually brought from Egypt to Venice. Ironically, the bones of St. Peter are so important to the Vatican in Rome. The first of the four gospels was written by St. Mark, but it was believed to have been dictated by St. Peter, who couldn't read or write. The bones of St. Mark were misplaced but later rediscovered in St. Mark's Basilica.

Venice led the Fourth Crusade, which was diverted to Constantinople instead of it's original objective of the Holy Land. Artifacts brought back to Venice from that Crusade include the four horses that adorn St. Mark's Basilica. The original horses have actually been moved inside and those outside the basilica are a replica. The original four horses were taken by Napoleon, upon his 1797 conquest of Venice, but were returned to Venice and those atop Napoleon's Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel in Paris are replicas.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arc_de_Triomphe_du_Carrousel#/media/File:Paris_-_Jardin_des_Tuileries_-_Arc_de_Triomphe_du_Carrousel_-_PA00085992_-_003.jpg

Remember that we saw this in the compound posting on this blog, "The Aztec Prophecy", section 7) FOUR HORSES ALL OVER THE WORLD.

Venice was the hometown of Marco Polo, who traveled by land to the orient.

Venice ruled Crete, which was eventually lost to the Ottomans who had conquered Constantinople. It also ruled the Peloponnesus, the southern third of Greece, and Cyprus. Venice engaged in numerous naval battles with the Ottomans. The Parthenon, in Athens, was damaged when the Ottomans were using it to store gunpowder and a Venetian shell ignited it.

Like fellow maritime power Genoa, the fortunes of Venice began to decline when the Age of Discovery began and the new frontier was the Atlantic, rather than the Mediterranean. Napoleon had, along with France, a parallel personal union state in northern Italy. The French Revolution was so far-reaching because the conquests of Napoleon swept away the old order of society, including Venice and the Holy Roman Empire. Today the flag of Italy is in the same revolutionary tricolor form as that of France.

The first of the following scenes is in Piazza San Marco, which is about a thousand years old, looking toward St. Mark's Basilica at the opposite end of the square. The Doge's Palace, built in the Fourteenth Century, was for the ruler of Venice, which was chosen by the nobility. The Campanile, the brick bell tower, in Piazza San Marco adjacent to the Doge's Palace and St. Mark's Basilica, collapsed in 1902 but was rebuilt.

The first four scenes, from Google Earth and Street View, are of Piazza San Marco, including the Doge's Palace, St. Mark's Basilica and the Campanile, or bell tower.





Most places are trying to attract tourists. Some places, like Amsterdam, are trying to restrict tourism numbers because they allowed the city to be marketed as a "party town", and now they regret it because it attracts the wrong kind of people. Venice is trying to restrict tourism simply because everyone wants to visit. Image from Google Street View.


This image from Google Street View is the Bridge of Sighs in Venice, where prisoners walked between the prison, on the right, and the Doge's Palace, on the left.


The central part of Venice is known as Rialto. The following two images, from Google Earth and Street View, are of the Rialto Bridge.



There are multiple scenes following. To see the scenes, after the first one, you must first click the up arrow ^, before you can move on to the next scene by clicking the right or forward arrow, >,  After clicking the up arrow, you can then hide the previews of successive scenes, if you wish.






Here is more of Venice.

https://www.google.com/maps/@45.4455537,12.3282372,3a,75y,92.52h,90t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1soZOTUeGa_1Z5Jh0AwYyHAA!2e0!6s%2F%2Fgeo2.ggpht.com%2Fcbk%3Fpanoid%3DoZOTUeGa_1Z5Jh0AwYyHAA%26output%3Dthumbnail%26cb_client%3Dmaps_sv.tactile.gps%26thumb%3D2%26w%3D203%26h%3D100%26yaw%3D93.584946%26pitch%3D0%26thumbfov%3D100!7i13312!8i6656

Padua is a city that originated in ancient times and has since been controlled by Rome, Venice, Napoleon and the Habsburgs. It is known for it's university, that was founded in 1222 and where Galileo taught, and is today an industrial city.

In the multiple domes of the basilica in this first image from Google Earth, you can see the Byzantine influence of the Hagia Sophia that we saw in the compound posting "The House Of Holy Wisdom Where The Modern World Began".



https://www.google.com/maps/@45.6658021,12.2453888,3a,75y,275.75h,90t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1sWCt2wnWQr8OIa_yd0BN6_w!2e0!6s%2F%2Fgeo1.ggpht.com%2Fcbk%3Fpanoid%3DWCt2wnWQr8OIa_yd0BN6_w%26output%3Dthumbnail%26cb_client%3Dmaps_sv.tactile.gps%26thumb%3D2%26w%3D203%26h%3D100%26yaw%3D278.2007%26pitch%3D0%26thumbfov%3D100!7i13312!8i6656

Like Venice, the city of Trieste has a Grand Canal. Also like Venice, the city started as a Byzantine settlement. It voluntarily came under Habsburg rule as a defense against Venice, and became the Habsburgs' main seaport. Trieste is where Italy meets the Slavic and German-speaking domains. After annexation by Italy, following the end of the First World War, the Italian Government amended the surnames of non-Italian residents so that their names sounded more Italian.

The first two images of Trieste, from Google Earth, are of Castle San Giusto. Trieste has a lot of eastern European influence, such as a city being built around this castle on a hilltop.



https://www.google.com/maps/@45.6496372,13.7685568,3a,75y,90t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1sG-0SN5wAipVPR5QEg0Jcsg!2e0!6s%2F%2Fgeo1.ggpht.com%2Fcbk%3Fpanoid%3DG-0SN5wAipVPR5QEg0Jcsg%26output%3Dthumbnail%26cb_client%3Dmaps_sv.tactile.gps%26thumb%3D2%26w%3D203%26h%3D100%26yaw%3D145.73216%26pitch%3D0%26thumbfov%3D100!7i13312!8i6656

Verona is where Shakespeare's story of Romeo and Juliet took place, two lovers from unfortunately opposing families. In Shakespeare's time Italy was considered as faraway and exotic. The city is of Roman origin and has an arena that resembles the Colosseum. These first two images, from Google Earth, are of the area of Verona where part of the story took place.



The first of the following scenes is at Juliet's Balcony. Another story by Shakespeare was "The Merchant Of Venice".

https://www.google.com/maps/@45.4420224,10.9985543,3a,75y,57.9h,101.75t/data=!3m8!1e1!3m6!1sAF1QipPnqIjzwt5nsfp2w81QUWAaxuLCf6b2JrnNIqmh!2e10!3e11!6shttps:%2F%2Flh5.googleusercontent.com%2Fp%2FAF1QipPnqIjzwt5nsfp2w81QUWAaxuLCf6b2JrnNIqmh%3Dw203-h100-k-no-pi-0-ya58.561237-ro-0-fo100!7i5660!8i2830

Ferrara is an ancient city that later became part of the Papal States, the kingdom actually ruled by the pope, and has palaces from the late medieval era. The Este Palace is from the Fourteenth Century. These first three images of the Este Palace are from Google Earth.




https://www.google.com/maps/@44.8354896,11.6196167,3a,75y,101.89h,90t/data=!3m8!1e1!3m6!1sAF1QipP24ha_P3hHdsqmpCQtSPGBSiWtBoEbNDOkwkml!2e10!3e11!6shttps:%2F%2Flh5.googleusercontent.com%2Fp%2FAF1QipP24ha_P3hHdsqmpCQtSPGBSiWtBoEbNDOkwkml%3Dw203-h100-k-no-pi-0-ya205.53345-ro0-fo100!7i8192!8i4096

Ravenna is an ancient city that later became important to the Romans. In fact, it was the final capital of the Western Roman Empire. It was later reconquered by the Byzantines, heirs of the Eastern Roman Empire. Ravenna was later ruled by Venice, and then was part of the Papal States. These two images, from Google Earth, are of the Basilica of San Vitale.



Bologna was an Etruscan city that has what is possibly the oldest still-operating university in the world, from the Eleventh Century. The Two Towers are from a competition, in the Twelfth Century, between two families to see which could build the highest. The first two images, from Google Earth, are of the two medieval towers in Bologna. The Asinelli Family clearly won, not only is their tower twice as high but the Garisendi Tower is leaning more. Does this remind you of "The Waldorf Astoria" that we saw in the posting by that name, September 2021?




https://www.google.com/maps/@44.6459669,10.9256313,3a,75y,302.1h,90t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1sd1IdjK0HhjgyQ-eKAzBypw!2e0!6s%2F%2Fgeo3.ggpht.com%2Fcbk%3Fpanoid%3Dd1IdjK0HhjgyQ-eKAzBypw%26output%3Dthumbnail%26cb_client%3Dmaps_sv.tactile.gps%26thumb%3D2%26w%3D203%26h%3D100%26yaw%3D311.4035%26pitch%3D0%26thumbfov%3D100!7i13312!8i6656

The Vatican is not the only independent city-state that is surrounded by Italy. Here is a trivia question: Where is a person from if defined by the demonym "Sammarinese"? The answer is that they would be from San Marino. It has existed since ancient times and is today a banking center.

Notice the irregular pattern of the hills on the landscape, in this first image from Google Earth.



at No comments:

A Niagara Falls Perspective On The O.J. Simpson Case

There is a whole dimension to the O.J. Simpson Case that I cannot see anyone has ever brought up.

What about where O.J. Simpson went to high school? You may be wondering what that could possibly have to do with it. He graduated from high school in 1965, 29 years before the double murder and the chase took place.

But look at the following two images, from Google Earth. The building in the foreground, with the red roof, is the high school that he went to. The island in the background is Alcatraz.


O. J. Simpson was going to high school here when the great escape from Alcatraz happened. The tall building in the background partially blocks the view of the island from the school today but that wasn't there when the escape happened, in June 1962. It must have been a prominent topic of discussion at O. J.'s school. 

Could it be just a coincidence that the murders happened on the anniversary of the Alcatraz Escape, June 12? O. J. Simpson's number when he played for the Buffalo Bills was 32 and the murders happened on the 32nd anniversary of the Alcatraz Escape.

What is so intriguing about the Alcatraz Escape is that it is not known whether the escapees survived. Three prisoners, two of which were brothers, pulled off an elaborate escape plan. They got off the island on a raft that they secretly made by sewing raincoats together.

The exact time of their escape at night is not known, and that is where the question of their survival comes in. The deciding factor is considered to be the tide. If the tide was on the way in they would likely have ended up somewhere on the shore of San Francisco Bay and could well have escaped. But if the tide was on the way out they probably would have been swept out to sea and it would be unlikely that they survived.

The authorities searched for the escapees. But a search like this takes a lot of money and effort, as well as attention away from other crimes, and they didn't put anywhere near as much effort into the search as they would have were it known for sure that the escapees had survived.

A whole industry emerged around speculation about what became of the Alcatraz escapees if they survived. It has become part of American folklore.

So what does Niagara Falls have to do with this? When someone goes over Niagara Falls there is a very good chance that their body will never be found. What that does is make Niagara Falls, NY the fake suicide capital of the world. On the U.S. side there are few people around at night and many places where one could get into the water. 

It is not uncommon to read about someone who complained about suffering from sadness and depression, or being heavily in debt, then took a trip to Niagara Falls and was never seen again. It was presumed that they jumped over the Falls. Sometimes they did, but then sometimes they didn't.

I find that this provides a perspective on the O.J. Simpson Case.

Just as with the Alcatraz Escape case that he must have been very familiar with, O. J. Simpson knew that the authorities would put much less effort into looking for him, if he faced arrest for the murders and had to escape, if they thought he was likely dead. O. J. didn't have a tide like the Alcatraz escapees but what he did have was fake suicide. O. J. could pretend to be suicidal. Remember that he had been an actor as well as an athlete.

O.J. Simpson went to the home of his long time friend, Robert Kardashian, after being charged with the double murder, but before he was required to turn himself in, allegedly to avoid the media. The police knew that he was there.

According to one report a delay was requested in when he had to turn himself in because he was "suicidal" and had to see a therapist. I cannot see that this therapy ever took place. What happened instead is that O.J. Simpson suddenly left the Kardashian residence with his old Buffalo Bills teammate, Al Cowlings. 

After the departure of O.J. Simpson, meaning that he was now a fugitive, Robert Kardashian read his alleged suicide letter to the media. It didn't specifically mention ending his life but stated "I can't go on" and "Don't feel sorry for me. I've had a great life, great friends".

I have always thought that this reading of a friend's suicide letter to the media, before knowing that he was dead, was just a little bit bizarre.

That's not all that was bizarre. Robert Kardashian then reported that O. J. Simpson, who had long been close to the Kardashian family, had expressed his intention to commit suicide in daughter Kim's bedroom, who wasn't home at the time. Robert Kardashian had talked him out of it, because the room would then be essentially haunted. After O. J. had left he went and told the whole world about it.

Could it be that this was part of the plan? That it wasn't worth the effort to launch an all-out search for O. J. because he was probably dead by now anyway? Instead of the tide that the Alcatraz escapees had, to convince the authorities that they were probably dead, O. J. Simpson had being suicidal.

Long before that Robert Kardashian had been a lawyer. He would certainly have been called as a witness in the case. But what he cleverly did was reactivate his law license and serve as one of O. J.'s lawyers. That meant the police couldn't question him about the case nor could he be compelled to testify. 

Writing these letters while at the Kardashian house sounds like something a lawyer advised him to do. Remember that he had a scheduled trip to Chicago, and he left right after the murders. The police called him in Chicago. He could have written these letters on the plane back from Chicago.

On the Chicago flight the crew reported that O. J. continuously drank water and used the bathroom. This could be part of the suicidal act also, that he had already taken some kind of pills and was washing it out of his system.

While fleeing with Al Cowlings driving, O. J. made the apparent mistake of making a phone call. Cell phones were still new but the location of a call could be approximately triangulated. The vehicle was moving south on the highway, seemingly going toward Mexico. A news helicopter caught sight of the vehicle and began to follow it. When they realized that they had been seen it seems that they turned around, possibly hoping to get lost in the dense traffic of the city.

What followed is the chase that I am sure no one who followed it will ever forget. I remember turning on the television to watch the news. I thought that this was a preview out of a movie that O. J. had made. I knew about his ex wife and the waiter who was returning her glasses being murdered shortly before. I thought this couldn't possibly be happening in real life. But then I changed the channel and it was the same thing on every channel.

The Ford Bronco was moving slowly along the highway, which had been quickly closed to all other traffic. About twenty police cars, with their lights flashing, were following it. They were holding off trying to stop it because O. J. was in the back seat with a gun to his head. In the air above the police cars was a formation of news helicopters.

People all across America dropped what they were doing to watch. It was absolutely surreal. It was difficult to believe that this was really happening. 9/11 was a shock but it wasn't difficult to believe that it was really happening.

Unfortunately the outside world watched it too, although maybe not live. Five years before the Berlin Wall had come down and it seemed like global democracy had triumphed. People were looking to America to see what a democratic society should be like. Then this had to happen. This surreal episode didn't do democracy any good. It wasn't the two murders, that could happen anywhere. It was the whole society was wrapped up in this difficult to believe spectacle. I am sure that the nearby presence of Hollywood was a factor and this probably wouldn't have happened like this in another city.

The pursuit ended at O. J.'s house. He went inside for a while and police waited until he emerged. O. J. was found to have been carrying in the car a fake beard, a passport and, a significant amount of cash. He wouldn't have this if he was really going to commit suicide.

Holding the gun in the Ford Bronco was part of this plan. So now he wasn't going to get away and pretend that he committed suicide. But there is one more thing that has to be remembered about his youth. It is that his mother worked in a psychiatric hospital. This brings us to Plan B. 

The decade before John Hinckley had drawn attention to the insanity defense by being found "not guilty by reason of insanity" for trying to assassinate Ronald Reagan. While no one wanted to be confined to a psychiatric hospital it was probably preferable to prison. Holding the gun in the car also spared his friend and driver, Al Cowlings, who would otherwise be helping a fugitive to escape. But his "Dream Team" of lawyers lived up to their title and got him acquitted without using the insanity defense.

Could this really be a coincidence? O. J. Simpson was going to high school a short distance away when the great escape from Alcatraz took place. The murders for which he was charged happened on the anniversary of the Alcatraz Escape. O. J. wrote goodbye letters to throw off his pursuers just as the Alcatraz escapees put handmade dummies in their beds to throw off their pursuers. O. J. bought a disguise just as the dummies in Alcatraz were disguised to look like the escapees. There were three Alcatraz escapees just as O. J. had two close friends helping him, Robert Kardashian and Al Cowlings. 

O. J. escaping in Al Cowlings' vehicle very much resembled the escaping from Alcatraz on the raft. The Alcatraz escapees had the tide to discourage an all out search for them because they likely didn't survive just as O. J. had his fake suicide scenario, remember again that he had been an actor as well as an athlete.

If only O. J. Simpson had still been in Buffalo, where he and Al Cowlings had been teammates on the Buffalo Bills. He could have written the goodbye letters and then made a quick trip to Niagara Falls and vanished, and this surreal spectacle could have been avoided.

As far as whether O. J. did it, if everything that was reported in the news was correct then O. J. Simpson absolutely murdered his ex-wife and the waiter who was returning her glasses. The question is whether everything that was reported in the news was correct. A lot of the "evidence" against O. J. is very subjective, such as his supposed demeanor and reactions. There were people claiming to have seen O. J. on the day of the murders and then selling their stories to tabloids. People with any connection to this case were using it to boost their own careers, most notably it introduced the world to the Kardashians.

Race was a heavy factor, there had been the very destructive racial uprising in Los Angeles two years before and now a black man was accused of murdering two white people. There was a police department that was, at the time, notorious for planting evidence and racism. I find it interesting that, 25 years before, the Manson Family had murdered high profile white people nearby in exactly the same way and made it look as if black people did it.

As for Buffalo, where O. J. played for the Bills, the Perry Projects are now in the process of being demolished. A musician emerged from this housing project, named Rick James. The first Manson mass killing was a get-together with actress Sharon Tate. Rick James had been invited but didn't attend, allegedly because of too much partying the night before. What if Rick James had been there? He would have been one of the victims and the world would never have heard of a Superfreak. But it would have changed the whole intended dynamic if they had also killed a black person. What if Rick James had been carrying a pistol and might have prevented the murders?

By the way, my personal opinion about the Alcatraz Escape is that they probably survived and escaped. I checked the phase of the moon for the night of the escape and it was nearing First Quarter, between New Moon and half moon. The Quarters are when the tides are weakest, known as Neap Tides, because the moon and sun are at right angles and thus pulling against each other. The tides are strongest at New Moon and Full Moon, known as Spring Tides, because the sun and moon form a straight line with earth and are thus pulling together. At any rate I am sure that they were aware of the tides, that a rising tide would push them toward shore but a lowering tide would pull them out to sea. They managed every other detail of the escape and I doubt that they missed this.

For more of high profile true crime see "The Assassination Of John F. Kennedy made really simple: www.markmeeksideas.blogspot.com/2023/10/the-assassination-of-john-f-kennedy.html?m=0 

And "The Unabomber And The Zodiac Killer": www.markmeeksideas.blogspot.com/2023/11/the-unabomber-and-zodiac-killer.html?m=0 

at No comments:

Italy And Europe Made Really Simple

How about something absolutely amazing that I have never seen pointed out? Wait until you get to the end of this posting.

Italy is like an exhibit of my geology theory revolving around Continental Asteroids and lines of magma emergence.

The moon is unlikely to have formed along with the earth because the moon is made of rock but lacks the heavy iron core that the earth has. This is why the earth is 64 times the volume of the moon but has 81 times it's mass, and why the moon has practically no magnetic field. 

It is widely believed that an object about the size of Mars, collided with earth and the fragments coalesced by gravity to form the moon. The first landing of astronauts on the moon missed the intended landing site by several km because of unexpected variations in the moon's surface gravity from place to place. This indeed makes it seem that the moon is an assembly of different fragments.

This is not a new idea. My geology theory takes it further to explain the continents, and that there were actually three Continental Asteroids that impacted earth, although it was likely the same object that broke into three pieces while in earth orbit.

The spin of the earth causes magma, hot molten rock, to emerge from below along the equator. The rules of fluid dynamics are that this equatorial emergence must be balanced by perpendicular longitudinal lines of emergence. The added mass of each Continental Asteroid upsets the balance of the earth's rotation. The earth shifts each time so that the center of the new mass is at one of the poles. This caused the pattern of magma emergence to shift also, although emergence continues along the old lines for a long time. 

I got this idea from Mars, the southern hemisphere is higher, and thus heavier, than the northern hemisphere but it doesn't unbalance the planet's rotation because one pole is centered on the lighter hemisphere and one pole on the heavier hemisphere.

This leaves no major feature of the earth's surface, either on land or the seafloor, unexplained. Magma emergence forms ridges on the seafloor but spreads the land apart if under a continental land mass. As a general rule tectonic collisions take place only between continental land masses from different Continental Asteroids. 

There is an abbreviated version of the geology theory from where this comes at "Geology Theory With Satellite Imagery And Maps", March 2024. The full text of the theory is "Updated Geology Theory", April 2024.

ALL IMAGES ARE FROM GOOGLE EARTH

Markup, usually red, is used to illustrate the features being referred to. Each paragraph describes the following image.

There is today a long line of high and mountainous terrain through Greece, Turkey, Iran, and across central Asia. These extensive mountains are not volcanic and are difficult to explain. My geology theory explains them as the remnants of the third of three Continental Asteroids.

This is the western end of this line of mountains, through Greece, Turkey and, Iran.

 

Another thing about this long line of mountains is that it separates two major bodies of water from the rest of the world's seas. The Black Sea is almost completely cut off from the rest of the world's seas. We know it was once part of the world's seas because it is salt water.


The Caspian Sea is a major body of salt water that is completely cut off from the rest of the world's seas, of which it must have once been a part. This shows that the world's seas, which came to earth by comets, were already there and then this long line of mountains was added afterward.
 

This long line of extensive mountains must have once extended further west. What happened is that a comet struck the western end of it and shattered it. The impact tore part of the line of mountains that remained away from the rest. 

In the following image doesn't it look like Greece, to the left, was "torn away" from Turkey, to the right? The gap thus formed is the Aegean Sea, indicated by the red dot. The many Aegean Islands, which are not volcanic, are the "crumbs" that were left behind.

The long line of mountains across Asia actually does continue to the west of Greece but it is diverted at an angle to the northwest. The red line in the following image indicates the mountains across Bosnia and Herzegovina.

The pieces of the shattered western end of this line of mountains drifted tectonically northward. The largest pieces had the most momentum and generally ended up furthest north. This is where the otherwise very difficult to explain Scandinavian Mountains came from.

It is also where the high mountains of northern Scotland came from. The primary line of magma emergence is along the equator, caused by the spin of the earth. But this has to be balanced, according to the rules of fluid dynamics, by longitudinal lines of magma emergence. The best known of these today is the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. 

Britain is basically a jumble of shattered pieces that got caught on one of these longitudinal lines of magma emergence. The straight line across northern Scotland, known as Glen Mor, was caused by the collision with this line of magma emergence.

Various smaller pieces of the line of mountains that was shattered by the comet make up the backbone of western Europe. Relative movement of these pieces forced the seafloor between them upward, making it into dry land.

 

We can see how Britain is really a jumble of fragments that got caught on a longitudinal line of magma emergence by how the Pennine Mountains form a north-south line with the Contentin Peninsula of Normandy. This is on the longitudinal line of emergence in the same way as Sardinia and Corsica in the Mediterranean. The Cambrian (Welsh) Mountains were once part of this line but were pushed westward by the tectonic collision of Italy, pushed by Africa, with Europe. This is the same tectonic collision that formed the Alps.

The impact of this comet not only shattered the line of mountains that originally extended further westward from Greece and Turkey, it also forced a lot of magma to emerge from below. A major reason for all of these magma lines of emergence in this theory is the added weight of the continents from the three Continental Asteroids. The comet came in from the northwest and struck at what is now the Tyrrhenian Sea.

The reason I claim it to have been a comet, rather than an asteroid, is that comets are made mostly of ice. The comet would have thus added water to the world's oceans, but wouldn't leave much in the way of traces. 

How else could Italy have possibly formed? A tight loop of volcanic land like this, that is not on a tectonic plate boundary is seen nowhere else in the world. In the following image the red dot is the approximate impact site of the comet and the red line is the resulting magma emergence that formed Italy. We associate magma emergence with volcanoes but if the emergence is smooth and even there will be no volcano. A volcano forms when the emergence is forced or when it is hindered so that it breaks through at one point.

Another interesting thing is that continental land masses tend to move tectonically, driven by the spin of the earth, but volcanic land masses don't. The reason is that land formed from magma that was within the earth already has the same momentum as the earth but continental land masses, introduced from outside by the Continental Asteroids, don't. 

This shows that the Continental Asteroids came from outside and a new equilibrium has not yet been reached. But Italy, although of volcanic origin, does move tectonically. It's tectonic collision with Europe formed the Alps. Italy moves tectonically because it's magma emergence was forced from outside, by the impact of the comet.

The southeastern peninsula of Italy, Apulia or Puglia, was created by the tectonic collision, rather than by magma emergence. Like the caboose of a slowing train the seafloor was forced upward by Italy moving tectonically and then colliding with Europe, which also formed the Alps. This peninsula is geologically related to Florida, which was similarly formed by the Appalachian collision. This Italian peninsula doesn't have sinkhole lakes like Florida because it is dry.

 

What is really interesting about this idea of a comet impact in what is now the Tyrrhenian Sea, coming in from the northwest, is that if we continue in a straight line from there it brings us to a wide area of northwestern Egypt that is actually well below sea level. This area is called the Qattara Depression and requires some special explanation and this theory makes it simple. The comet could have broken in half before colliding with the earth. Remember that comet Shoemaker-Levy broke apart before colliding with Jupiter in 1994. The second half impacted creating this low lying depression in northern Egypt.


There are three deep, and nearly circular, lakes north of Rome. They are known to be volcanic in nature and I don't think there is anything just like this anywhere else. But what happened is simple. Magma, hot molten rock, emerges from below, driven by the spin of the earth and the added weight of the continents. Sometimes magma emergence is hindered, until it breaks through at one point as a volcano. But what happened here is that magma was forced upward by the sudden impact of the comet. This caused "bubbles" of water to be trapped within the magma and this is what formed these lakes.
 
 

In my geology theory there were three successive Continental Asteroids, millions of years apart, that crashed into the earth. This formed the continents and the debris that was hurtled back into space formed the moon. Of course it could have been one large object that broke apart in earth orbit. The added mass of each of the three impacts unbalanced the earth's rotation. This caused the earth to shift on it's axis each time so that the center of the added mass was at one of the poles. The pattern of magma emergence, from the equator caused by the spin of the earth and the balancing longitudinal lines of emergence, also had to shift each time. But change comes very slowly and emergence continues along the old lines for a very long time after the shift.

The Po Valley across northern Italy is a former equator and the axis of the Adriatic Sea, which intersects it at a right angle, is a former longitudinal line of emergence. Some magma emergence continues, spreading the land apart, and this is why Venice, which is right at the intersection, is sinking.

Something that caught my attention years ago is that two elongated seas, the Adriatic Sea and the Red Sea, are far apart but, allowing for the curvature of the earth, actually form a straight line. This is because this line was a prominent longitudinal line of magma emergence in the previous polar era, somewhat like the Mid-Atlantic Ridge is today. Continued emergence along the former equator formed the Po Valley and the south pole was at what is now the Mascarene Ridge structure around Madagascar.

After the Third Continental Asteroid landed, which resulted in the long and extensive line of otherwise difficult to explain mountains across Greece, Turkey and, Iran into central Asia, the earth had to shift again on it's axis to regain rotational balance. This caused the pattern of equator and longitudinal lines of magma emergence to shift again, although emergence would continue along the old lines for a long time. The equator, which had been where the Po Valley is now, slipped toward becoming the present equator.

We can see this in one line across the Italian Peninsula where Naples Bay, created when magma emergence spread the land apart and around where there is a lot of volcanic activity, is directly across the peninsula from the Gargano Peninsula, on the Adriatic side. This peninsula is not part of the magma emergence that formed most of Italy but is a fragment of the shattered line of mountains that got caught on the emergence line of the temporary equator.

As the equator shifted toward becoming the present equator we see evidence of it again. How else can the northeastern coast of Sicily and the northwestern coast of the Gulf of Taranto form a perfectly straight line, that is parallel to the above line?

 

The south coast of Sicily forms a straight line with the southernmost point of Sardinia. The alignment of the two islands of Malta also conforms to this line. That is because this is a longitudinal line of magma emergence from the previous polar era that also forms the broad valley across northern Spain that hosts the city of Zaragoza.

 

Then we have the perfect north south line formed by Sardinia and Corsica. This is fragments of the shattered line of mountains caught on a longitudinal line of emergence from the present polar era, in a way similar to Britain. This line of emergence continues northward to form the harbor around which Genoa is built, as indicated by the red dot.
 

Italy is really associated with leaning towers. The most famous is, of course, the Leaning Tower of Pisa. 

Not only that but the Garisendi Tower in Bologna leans. This is where two rival medieval families competed to see who could build the tallest tower. The other tower is also leaning, although not as much. The medieval bell tower in Venice actually collapsed, in 1902. What is interesting is that Venice, Bologna and, Pisa form a straight line, and that straight line is at an angle midway between the former equator that is now the Po Valley, across northern Italy, and the axis of the Adriatic Sea, which was a longitudinal line of emergence in the same era.

If some magma emergence was still going on here this midway line is in the position to get the maximum thrust. The resulting spreading of the land apart certainly explains why Venice is sinking. Could the gradually changing thrust be what is causing towers built centuries ago to lean?

The next question is whether anything like this comet impact scenario could have occurred anywhere else in the world. Japan is on a plate boundary and is volcanic in origin, but why did so much magma emergence in one place like this? Where did Korea come from? It's extensive mountains are not volcanic. Yet this is very similar to the situation on the other side of the world, and could be explained by a comet impact in what is now the Sea of Japan. The Sea of Japan is congruent to the Tyrrhenian Sea. Japan is congruent to Italy. Korea is congruent to Greece. The Yellow Sea is congruent to the Aegean Sea.


 

How does a country end up with all of these lines in it's physical geography? The green line, between the two green dots, is a longitudinal line of emergence from the present polar era, with Sardinia and Corsica as fragments of the shattered line of mountains caught on it. 

The red line is a longitudinal line from the previous polar era that defines the south coast of Sicily, the southernmost point of Sardinia, the alignment of the two islands of Malta and forms the broad valley in Spain that hosts the city of Zaragoza. The purple line is the three major volcanoes of Italy, Etna, Stromboli and, Vesuvius, that form a north south longitudinal line in the present polar era. The blue dot is the broad Po Valley, which is the former equator. The yellow line and the white line is traces of that equator as it shifted to become the present equator. The yellow dot is the Adriatic Sea, which is a prominent longitudinal line of emergence from the previous polar era. The intersection where it meets the Po Valley is where the combination of the two is causing the land to spread apart and is why Venice is sinking.

The lines from the previous polar era were there when the comet struck and constrained the magma emergence caused by that, and this explains the physical geography of Italy today.


Now, here is what is so amazing for anyone who has read the Bible. The Book of Daniel, Chapter 2, foretells the end of the great successive empires of the earth and the future establishment of the Kingdom of God. There is a statue with a head of gold but successively inferior metals as we get lower.

The head of gold is explained to represent Babylon. Below that comes Persia, then Greece, and then Rome. Each empire conquers, and then supplants, the one before it. The iron legs of the statue are widely considered to represent the Roman Empire. Elsewhere in the Book of Daniel the "fourth empire" is a "beast made of iron" that "stamps the residue with it's feet". This has also long been considered to represent the Roman Empire.

The Book of Daniel was written long before Rome became a great power and the way it turned out, considering that Rome is represented by iron legs and feet is that the Italian Peninsula is famously shaped like a boot.

The statue in the Book of Daniel, culminating in the Roman Empire, is utterly destroyed by a stone that falls to earth from above. What do you notice here? According to my geological explanation Italy and Europe, which is to be the center of the Antichrist's kingdom in the Last Days, was formed by a comet falling from above in exactly the same way that the culminating unholy kingdom will be destroyed by a stone falling from above.

The writer of the Book of Daniel couldn't possibly have known how Italy and Europe formed, or even that this is where the culminating unholy kingdom would be based, but God knew.

In the compound posting "New Insight Into Bible Prophecy", October 2016, in the section 6) THE IRON AND THE CLAY IN THE BOOK OF DANIEL, we saw that the history of Europe has been the interplay between the heritage of the Roman Empire and that of the Holy Roman Empire. The two have had a kind of "frenemy" relationship, but with neither able to lastingly dominate the other. 

This prophecy in the Book of Daniel describes the feet of the statue, which would be the heir of the Roman Empire, as a mixture of iron and clay. These two do not mix very well but are not completely separate. This perfectly describes the relationship between the heritage of the Roman and Holy Roman Empires. The Kingdom of the Antichrist will represent the two empires finally getting together, before being destroyed and replaced by the Kingdom of Jesus.

The prophecy is that the chaff produced by the impact would be blown away and the impacting stone would grow into a great mountain. The geology of it is that the fragments of "chaff" formed the foundation of Europe and the impact caused the magma to emerge that formed the rock of the Italian Peninsula. This is really a boost for Catholics as the name of St. Peter means "rock".

The Book of Daniel was written before either the Greek or Roman Empires. Why would God choose a statue with a stone landing on it's feet, to destroy it, to represent the successive empires, the last of which will be Rome?

Could it be because of physical geography, that the Italian Peninsula is shaped like a boot with Sicily like a stone about to land on it? 



at No comments: