Galego | English

Non fiction

As cidades asolagadas. As augas e o Alén en Galicia

By Antonio Balboa Salgado

About this book

Underwater cities are one of the most remarkable elements of current Galician folklore, though already addressed by Murguía and Taboada Chivité. This study tries to go deeper into their meaning and the meaning of water in general analysing the existing cases in Galicia and other Atlantic countries, such as for example Is in Brittany.

For long they were considered Christian reminders of prehistoric Palafittes but in this book there is a modern and new approach considering former examples from Ancient Galician and European history, the fight with the sea by Celtic peoples or the “countries under the waves” in Ireland.

Book fragment

Despite the fact that it is obvious that we have cases of underwater cities all over Galicia, we will just go back to those that are documented, as we have enough information on them or they seem significant. It is not a matter of increasing their number. Therefore, we must first examine the analysis, highly valuable most of them though peculiar of their times, of previous researchers.

It is important to draw conclusions from the whole set of known testimonies that, considering the similarities amongst traditions, may be applicable to others not gathered in this world. After this prior step we can address the gist of this study. The foundations for our work are an analysis of different intertwined levels. First we will see cases of underwater cities in Atlantic Europe known through folklore or literature. The goal is to get to know the coherence of Galician legends with other contemporary traditions. It must be said beforehand that our area of study is restricted to the Indo-European world and to its Western part within it where the world of the Celts, Germans and Classics have a prominent role to play.