Did The Dark Ages Exist? (NEW CONCEPTS)

[Mick Harper]

And here are some of the successors of 'Drake' at work

[Chad]

[Hatty]

[Ishmael]

[Wile E. Coyote]

[Chad]

[Hatty]

Xavier is a(nother) Sar word.

Drake-dragon, the circumnavigator, reminds me of the giant serpent or dragon encircling the world which seems to be a world myth.

[Wile E. Coyote]

[Hatty]

[Wile E. Coyote]

[Hatty]

[Duncan71]

I dare say Hatty. Is that a pun?

[Ishmael]

There's more coming.

[Ishmael]

Is Saint Francisque Drac -- aka. Sir Francis Drake -- an alias of Saint Francis Xavier? Maybe. Until raised in this thread, I'd never considered the possibility, nor heard of Xavier. Consulting the latter Saint's biography, I see little obvious overlap between his tale and that of Francis Drake. The possibility remains, however, that each could be a fictionalized biography for a "Saint" or "Sir" that otherwise lacked a biography but who was somehow known to exist -- if for no other reason than his name appeared to be present on certain maps.

In the specific matter of Drake, however, I am prepared to advance the notion that his biography is an amalgam of two different biographies. Either that or significant "historical" detail from a secondary source has been inserted within his biography. Those details explicitly concern the circumnavigation. I will claim that these were not present in Drake's original biography.

That original biography is a romantic tale of a certain -- apparently European (though not necessarily English) adventurer pirate. Was his name Drake? Or even Francis? Perhaps. Perhaps not. But the tale is there and is discrete absent the circumnavigation. Our hero pirate lives a life of adventure in the Caribbean harassing the Spanish and winning both fame and fortune before finally losing his life in the same area and in the same circumstances.

In the midst of this dashing career he participates in two significant events of historical import: The Spanish Armada and the Circumnavigation of the Globe. Concerning even the first of these events, there is great reason for doubt, though we will not here consider those reasons. About the second, however, there is a great cloud of anomalies.

(If both events are inventions, then Drake would seem to have been a personage borrowed by historians to fill in certain gaps that needed filling).

[Ishmael]

Drake's circumnavigation of the globe was actually accidental. He is said by historians to have been sent by Elizabeth I on a mission to harass the Spanish on the Pacific coast. He circled the Globe afterward on his own initiative.

Drake's voyage is full of many odd things but perhaps the oddest of all is this: Not a single ship with which he set out from England would round Cape Horn and enter the Pacific Ocean. He sailed with six ships in total. Five of them turned back or sunk. This left only one -- which happened to be Drake's flag ship -- to approach the southern tip of South America.

But then a funny thing happens in this tale.

Drake's ship suddenly changes its name.

For no reason, and despite the fact that, according to some, at-sea name changes for ships were thought to be bad luck, Drake decided to change the name of his vessel.

The ship that had sailed under Drake in the Atlantic was called the Pelican. But the ship he sailed in the Pacific and on through the Indian Ocean and round the Cape of Good Hope had a completely different name.

That name was The Golden Hind.