148 ANTILLIA AND THE ANTILLES THE ORIGIN OF THE NAME Naturally the origin of the word has been found a fascinating problem. Ever since Formaleoni, 14 near the close of the eight- eenth century, called attention to the delineation of Antillia in Bianco's map of 1436, discussed below, as indicating some knowledge of America, there have been those to urge the claims of the suppositional lost Atlantis instead. The two island names certainly begin with "A" and utilize "t," "1," and "i" about equally; but "Atlantis" comes so easily out of "Atlas," and the great mountain chain marches so conspicuously down to the sea in all early maps, that the derivation of the former may be called obvious; whereas you cannot readily or naturally turn "Atlas" into "Antillia," and there is no evidence that any one ever did so. As to geographical items, both have been located in the great western sea; but that is true of many other lands, real or fanciful. Something has been made of the elongated quadrilateral form of Antillia; but Humboldt points out 16 that in the description transmitted by Plato this outline is ascribed to a particular dis- trict in Atlantis, not to the great island as a whole, and that, even if it could be understood in the latter sense, there seems no reason why a fragment surviving the great cataclysm should repeat the configuration of Atlantis as a whole. There seems a total lack of any direct evidence, or any weighty inferential evidence, of the derivation of Antillia from Atlantis. HUMBOLDT'S HYPOTHESIS Humboldt, in rejecting this hypothesis, advanced another, which is picturesque and ingenious but hardly better supported. 16 His choice is "Al-tin," Arabic for "the dragon." Undoubtedly 14 Vicenzio Formaleoni: Description de deux cartes anciennes drees de la Biblio- theque de St. Marc a Venise, pp. 91-168 of the same author's "Essai sur la marine ancienne des Venitiens," transl. by the Chevalier d'Henin.Venice, 1788; reference on p. 122 and PI. III. 15 Alexander von Humboldt: Examen critique de 1'histoire de la geographic du nouveau continent, et des progres de 1'astronomie nautique aux quinzieme et seizieme siecles, 5 vols., Paris, 1836-39; reference in Vol. 2, p. 193. The other men- tions of Humboldt in this chapter refer to the same volume, pp. 178-211, except allusions to his correspondence with the Weimar librarian. 16 Ibid., p. 211.
