Bimini Road
Encyclopedia
The Bimini Road, sometimes called the Bimini Wall, is an underwater rock formation near North Bimini
island in the Bahamas. The Road consists of a 0.8 km (0.497098189319845 mi)-long northeast-southwest linear feature composed of roughly rectangular to subrectangular limestone
blocks.
On September 2, 1968, while diving in three fathom
s (5.5 meters) of water off the northwest coast of North Bimini island
, J. Manson Valentine encountered an extensive "pavement" of what later was found to be noticeably rounded stones of varying size and thickness. This stone pavement was found to form a northeast-southwest linear feature, which is most commonly known as either the "Bimini Road" or "Bimini Wall". After Valentine, the Bimini Road has been visited and examined by geologists, avocational archaeologists, professional archaeologists, anthropologists, marine engineers, innumerable divers, and many other people. In addition to the Bimini Road, investigators have found two additional "pavement-like" linear features that lie parallel to and shoreward of the Bimini Wall.
composed of carbonate-cemented shell hash that is called "beachrock
". Beachrock is native to the Bahamas. The highly rounded nature of the blocks forming the Bimini Road indicates that a significant thickness of their original surface has been removed by biological, physical, and chemical processes. Given the degree that these blocks have been eroded, it is highly implausible that any original surface features, including any tool marks and inscriptions, would have survived this degree of erosion.
After a very detailed examination of the Bimini Road and the other linear features, Gifford and Ball made the following observations.
As noted below, these observations are disputed by other investigators. For example, some investigators state that where sand
had washed away between the seams, another course of blocks can be seen along with small blocks underlying these blocks. However, detailed evidence that clearly documents the alleged presence of a continuous second layer (course) of stones beneath the stones forming the currently exposed "pavement" has not yet been published in a reputable, scientific venue with the detail that is needed for critical evaluation. Pictures posted on various Web pages of stones alleged to be artificial "wedge stones" and "prop stones" fail as convincing evidence for a second course of stones because they are typically smaller in size, do not form a continuous course, and too infrequently lie directly beneath the blocks that form the surface of the Bimini Road. This is not what would be expected of an actual underlying course of man-made masonry.
David Zink states:
This led him to conclude:
In addition, early studies of the Bimini Road, i.e. Gifford and Ball and David Zink, report taking numerous samples and cores for examination. In addition, it is safe to presume that a certain number of the innumerable visitors to the Bimini Road have chipped off pieces of it. Scientific sampling and souvenir hunting would have left behind modern "tool marks" on the various blocks composing the Bimini Road for later investigators to find.
of the stones composing the Bimini Road and Uranium-thorium dating
of the marine limestone on which the Bimini Road lies.
In 1978, the radiocarbon laboratory operated by the Department of Geology at the University of Miami dated samples from a core collected by E. A. Shinn in 1977 from the Bimini Road. In 1979, Calvert and others reported dates of 2780±70 (UM-1359), 3500±80 (UM-1360), and 3350±90 (UM-1361) from whole-rock samples; a date of 3510±70 (UM-1362), from shells extracted from the beachrock core; and dates of 2770±80 (UM-1364) and 2840±70 (UM-1365) from carbonate cementing the beachrock core. These dates are temporally consistent in that the shells composing the beachrock core from the Bimini Road dated older than the cement holding them together as beachrock. These dates can be interpreted as indicating that the shells composing the Bimini Road are, uncorrected for temporal and environmental variations in radiocarbon, about 3,500 years old. Because of time-averaging and other taphonomic factors, a random collection of shells likely would yield a radiocarbon date that is a few hundred years earlier than when the final accumulation of shells, which were cemented to form beachrock, actually occurred. The radiocarbon dates from the cement demonstrate that the beachrock composing the Bimini Road formed about 2,800 radiocarbon years ago by the cementation of pre-existing sediments that accumulated about 1,300 years earlier. Compared to the dates from the shells and the cement, it appears that the whole-rock dates reflect samples containing varying proportions of shell and cement without any significant contamination by younger radiocarbon. Both these dates and interpretation are consistent with the detailed research by Davaud and Strasser that concluded that the layer of beachrock composing the Bimini Road formed beneath the surface of North Bimini Island and was only exposed by coastal erosion about 1,900 to 2,000 years ago.
Proponents of the Bimini Road being a manmade feature argue that these radiocarbon dates are invalid because they were obtained entirely from whole-rock samples and subject to contamination from younger carbon. The background data reported by Calvert and others concerning the radiocarbon dates from the Bimini Road demonstrate that not all of these dates come entirely from whole-rock samples. That the dates from the shells and the clearly younger cement holding them together as beachrock are temporally consistent argues against any signification alteration of their radiocarbon content. In addition, other studies using radiocarbon dating to study sea level and the age of sediment and beachrock within the Bahamas have not reported any significant problems with contamination by younger radiocarbon. In their detailed research, Davaud and Strasser accepted the radiocarbon dates obtained from the beachrock composing the Bimini Road from the radiocarbon laboratory at the University of Miami as valid indicators of its age.
Gifford and Ball attempted to establish a minimum age using uranium-thorium dating for the Bimini Road by dating a whole-rock sample of the marine limestone (biopelsparite) that underlies the beachrock that composes the Bimini Road. They described this sample as being "Whole rock marine limestone under beachrock off Paradise Point, North Bimini; some recrystallization." This sample yielded a uranium-thorium date of 14,992±258 BP (7132-19/2). Supporters of the idea that the Bimini Road is a man-made structure frequently cite this date in support of it being artificial.
The uranium-thorium date published by Gifford and Ball is regarded as an invalid and meaningless date for two reasons. First, the sample being partially recrystallized means that this limestone was not a closed system as required for a meaningful uranium-thorium date. As a result, this specific date is only an apparent date that completely lacks any scientific value for interpreting the age of marine limestone underlying the Bimini Road. Currently, specific species of corals and mollusks that can be demonstrated to lack any recrystallization using petrographic and X-ray diffraction techniques are the preferred samples for dating. Any limestone sample that shows the least amount of recrystallization is now regarded as incapable of yielding a scientifically valid date and not even worth an attempt at dating. Finally, it is well documented that about 15,000 calendar years ago, sea level in this region was between 95 and 100 meters (312 and 330 feet) below present sea level. As a result, the location from where Gifford and Ball collected the sample of limestone was between 90 and 95 meters (295 and 312 feet) above sea level at the time indicated by the uranium-thorium date of 14,992±258 BP (7132-19/2). Therefore, it is physically impossible for the marine limestone underlying the Bimini Road to have accumulated around 15,000 BP. Thus, this uranium-thorium date is a meaningless, invalid date lacking any scientific significance. Because this date clearly lacks any scientific meaning, geologists and archaeologists rarely mention it in their discussions of the Bimini Road. The marine limestone underlying the Bimini Road dates to the Sangamonian Stage
, the last interglacial
, when sea level was last high enough for the marine sediments, now lithified into limestone, to have accumulated.
that orthogonal and other joints have broken up into rectangular, subrectangular, polygonal, and irregular blocks. The geologists and anthropologists who have personally studied the Bimini Road include Eugene Shinn of the U.S. Geological Survey; Marshall McKusick. an Associate Professor of Anthropology at University of Iowa
; W. Harrison of Environmental Research Associates, Virginia, Beach Virginia; Mahlon M. Ball and J. A. Gifford of the Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science
, University of Miami; and Eric Davaud and A. Strasser of the Department of Geology and Paleontology, University of Geneva
, Geneva, Switzerland. After either inspecting or studying the Bimini Road, they all concluded that it consists of naturally jointed beachrock. John A. Gifford, a professional geologist, spent a significant time studying the geology of the Bimini Islands for his University of Miami Master's thesis about the geology of the Bimini Islands. Calvert and others identified the samples that they dated from the Bimini Wall as being natural beachrock.
Detailed studies by E. Davaud and A. Strasser of Holocene limestones currently exposed on North Bimini and Joulter Cays (Bahamas) reveal the sequence of events likely responsible for creating beachrock pavements like the Bimini Road. First, a complete beach sequence of shallow subtidal, intertidal, and supratidal carbonate sediments accumulated as the shoreline of North Bimini built seaward during part of the Holocene. Once the deposition of these sediments built the North Bimini's shoreline seaward, freshwater cementation of the carbonate occurred at some depth, possibly even a meter or so below sea level, beneath the island's surface. This cementation created a band consisting of a thick primary layer of semilithified sediments and thinner discontinuous lenses and layers of similar semilithified sediments beneath it. Later, when erosion of the island's shoreline occurred, the band of semilithifed sediment was exposed within the intertidal zone and the semilithified sediments were cemented into beachrock. As the sediments underlying the eroding shoreline was eroded down to Pleistocene limestone, the beachrock broke into flat-lying, tabular, and rectangular, subrectangular, polygonal, and irregular blocks as observed for modern beaches within the Bahamas by E. Davaud and A. Strasser. Thinner layers of beachrock underlying the primary bed of beachrock were also broken up as the loose sediments enclosing them and the thicker primary bed were eroded. As the loose sediment was scoured out from under the blocks and other pieces of beachrock by so-called "scour and settling processes", they dropped downward for several meters until they rested directly on the erosion-resistant Pleistocene limestone as an erosional lag. Eugene Shinn discusses a similar, but not identical, process by which the Bimini Road could have been created.
The downward movement of large, solid objects by scour and settling processes has been documented by Jesse E. McNinch, John T. Wells, and other researchers. They concluded that large, heavy objects could sink into the sea bottom by several meters without significant lateral movement as the result of scour and settling processes if an erosion-resistant layer of sediment was not encountered. In case of the beachrock blocks composing the Bimini Road and other pieces underlying it, the erosion-resistant layer that limited how far they were dropped downward by scour and settling processes is the Pleistocene limestone on which they now rest.
Finally, pieces of thinner layers or lenses of beachrock underlying the primary bed that was broken up and dropped downward to create the Bimini Road would be trapped beneath the blocks as they also were broken up and dropped by erosion. The trapping of these fragments of beachrock beneath the blocks composing the Bimini Road, as erosion removed loose sediments and dropped them on the surface of the Pleistocene limestone, would have created the so-called "prop" and "wedge" rocks and blocks alleged to be a "second course" of "masonry". Presuming that the blocks of beachrock forming the Bimini Road originally formed at some unknown depth below sea level and have been dropped by erosion by several meters, dating the age of the Bimini Road by its relation to past sea level would be a useless technique that would produce misleading results.
Natural pavements composed of stone blocks, which often are far more rectangular and consistent in size than the blocks composing the Bimini Road, created by orthogonal and other jointing within sedimentary rocks, including beachrock, are quite common and found throughout the world. They include a popular tourist attraction, the Tessellated pavement
of Eaglehawk Neck, Tasmania
; jointed bedrock that has been completely misidentified as a man-made "Phoenician Fortress and Furnace" in Oklahoma
; a "tiled pavement" reported from Battlement Mesa
in western Colorado
; the tessellated pavement of the Bouddi Peninsula near Sydney
, Australia
; and Arches National Park
in Utah
. Natural beachrock pavements that are identical to the Bimini Road have been found eroding out of the east shore of Loggerhead Key of Dry Tortugas
and submerged beneath 90 meters of water at Pulley Ridge
off the southwest coast of Florida
.
(an American pulp magazine
) and either authored or coauthored by Robert F. Marx
, a professional diver and visitor to the Bimini Road, argued that the Bimini Road is an artificial structure. In a 1971 Argosy article, Robert Marx reported that Carl H. Holm, who was President, not "head geologist" as reported by Marx, of Global Oceanic; once a manager for North American Rockwell; a ship designer; and retired naval officer stated that there was "little doubt" that the massive stone blocks were cut by people. The same article noted that he was part of an expedition sponsored by North American Rockwell that included Edgar Mitchell, the astronaut, as leader; Dimitri Rebikoff; and "a number of psychics from the Edgar Cayce Foundation." Given the complete lack of citations to this research in GeoRef
, JSTOR
, Web of Knowledge, and other scientific bibliographic databases, neither the data collected from nor the interpretations and conclusions made as a result of this expedition very likely have been publicly reported in a scientific venue where their credibility can be openly evaluated.
Others who consider the Bimini undersea formation to be man-made, as opposed to natural beachrock, are Joseph Manson Valentine, zoologist; Charles Berlitz
, linguist; Gregory Little, psychologist; R. Cedric Leonard
, anthropologist; and Dimitri Rebikoff, French marine engineer. All claim to have investigated the formations in person, and claim to have observed more than one horizontal layer of blocks, at least in places. However, multiple layers of block can result naturally from systematic fracturing of sedimentary rock where multiple layers of sedimentary rock lie on top of each, as can be observed in the case of the tessellated pavement of Tasmania exposed at Eaglehawk Neck
on the Tasman Peninsula.
's "Quest for Atlantis
: Startling New Secrets" followed several different groups researching possible locations for the legendary Atlantis, one of which focused on the Bimini Road. Greg Little led a team of researchers on a dive to recover objects at Bimini Bay. Little and his team reported the discovery of an entire second layer of square-cut rocks with similar dimensions beneath the stones of the Bimini Road. However, they have yet to formally publish in any detail the evidence and observations that demonstrate the presence of this underlying layer and the square-cut nature of its blocks. As a result, its existence remains unproven. Little believes that his discovery suggests that the Bimini Road may actually be one part of an entire wall or water dock
. He has also published an informal critique of Shinn's Skeptical Inquirer article. The Bimini Road was also discussed in season 1, episode 10 of the TV series In Search Of, as well as season 2, episode 3 of the History channel's TV series Ancient Aliens
.
Bimini
Bimini is the westernmost district of the Bahamas composed of a chain of islands located about 53 miles due east of Miami, Florida. Bimini is the closest point in the Bahamas to the mainland United States and approximately 137 miles west-northwest of Nassau...
island in the Bahamas. The Road consists of a 0.8 km (0.497098189319845 mi)-long northeast-southwest linear feature composed of roughly rectangular to subrectangular limestone
Limestone
Limestone is a sedimentary rock composed largely of the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different crystal forms of calcium carbonate . Many limestones are composed from skeletal fragments of marine organisms such as coral or foraminifera....
blocks.
History
Fathom
A fathom is a unit of length in the imperial and the U.S. customary systems, used especially for measuring the depth of water.There are 2 yards in an imperial or U.S. fathom...
s (5.5 meters) of water off the northwest coast of North Bimini island
Island
An island or isle is any piece of sub-continental land that is surrounded by water. Very small islands such as emergent land features on atolls can be called islets, cays or keys. An island in a river or lake may be called an eyot , or holm...
, J. Manson Valentine encountered an extensive "pavement" of what later was found to be noticeably rounded stones of varying size and thickness. This stone pavement was found to form a northeast-southwest linear feature, which is most commonly known as either the "Bimini Road" or "Bimini Wall". After Valentine, the Bimini Road has been visited and examined by geologists, avocational archaeologists, professional archaeologists, anthropologists, marine engineers, innumerable divers, and many other people. In addition to the Bimini Road, investigators have found two additional "pavement-like" linear features that lie parallel to and shoreward of the Bimini Wall.
Physical characteristics
The Bimini Wall and two linear features lying shoreward of it are composed of flat-lying, tabular, and rectangular, subrectangular, polygonal, and irregular blocks. Descriptions of the Bimini Road found in various books and articles greatly exaggerate the regularity and rectangularity of the blocks composing these features. The Bimini Road, the largest of three linear features, is 0.8 km (0.497098189319845 mi) long, a northeast/southwest-trending feature with a pronounced hook at its southwest end. It consists of stone blocks measuring as much as 3 to 4 meters (9 to 13 feet) in horizontal dimensions, with the average size being 2 to 3 meters (6 to 9 feet). The larger blocks show complementary edges, which are lacking in the smaller blocks. The two narrower and shorter, approximately 50 and 60 meters (164 and 197 feet)-long linear features lying shoreward of the Bimini Road consist of smaller tabular stone blocks that are only 1 to 2 meters (3 to 6 feet) in maximum horizontal breadth. Having rounded corners, the blocks composing these pavements resemble giant loaves of bread. The blocks consist of limestoneLimestone
Limestone is a sedimentary rock composed largely of the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different crystal forms of calcium carbonate . Many limestones are composed from skeletal fragments of marine organisms such as coral or foraminifera....
composed of carbonate-cemented shell hash that is called "beachrock
Beachrock
Beachrock is a friable to well-cemented sedimentary rock that consists of a variable mixture of gravel-, sand-, and silt-sized sediment that is cemented with carbonate minerals and has formed along a shoreline...
". Beachrock is native to the Bahamas. The highly rounded nature of the blocks forming the Bimini Road indicates that a significant thickness of their original surface has been removed by biological, physical, and chemical processes. Given the degree that these blocks have been eroded, it is highly implausible that any original surface features, including any tool marks and inscriptions, would have survived this degree of erosion.
After a very detailed examination of the Bimini Road and the other linear features, Gifford and Ball made the following observations.
As noted below, these observations are disputed by other investigators. For example, some investigators state that where sand
Sand
Sand is a naturally occurring granular material composed of finely divided rock and mineral particles.The composition of sand is highly variable, depending on the local rock sources and conditions, but the most common constituent of sand in inland continental settings and non-tropical coastal...
had washed away between the seams, another course of blocks can be seen along with small blocks underlying these blocks. However, detailed evidence that clearly documents the alleged presence of a continuous second layer (course) of stones beneath the stones forming the currently exposed "pavement" has not yet been published in a reputable, scientific venue with the detail that is needed for critical evaluation. Pictures posted on various Web pages of stones alleged to be artificial "wedge stones" and "prop stones" fail as convincing evidence for a second course of stones because they are typically smaller in size, do not form a continuous course, and too infrequently lie directly beneath the blocks that form the surface of the Bimini Road. This is not what would be expected of an actual underlying course of man-made masonry.
David Zink states:
This led him to conclude:
In addition, early studies of the Bimini Road, i.e. Gifford and Ball and David Zink, report taking numerous samples and cores for examination. In addition, it is safe to presume that a certain number of the innumerable visitors to the Bimini Road have chipped off pieces of it. Scientific sampling and souvenir hunting would have left behind modern "tool marks" on the various blocks composing the Bimini Road for later investigators to find.
Age of the Bimini Road
Attempts have been made to determine the age of the Bimini Road using different techniques. These include direct radiocarbon datingRadiocarbon dating
Radiocarbon dating is a radiometric dating method that uses the naturally occurring radioisotope carbon-14 to estimate the age of carbon-bearing materials up to about 58,000 to 62,000 years. Raw, i.e. uncalibrated, radiocarbon ages are usually reported in radiocarbon years "Before Present" ,...
of the stones composing the Bimini Road and Uranium-thorium dating
Uranium-thorium dating
Uranium-thorium dating, also called thorium-230 dating, uranium-series disequilibrium dating or uranium-series dating, is a radiometric dating technique commonly used to determine the age of calcium carbonate materials such as speleothem or coral...
of the marine limestone on which the Bimini Road lies.
In 1978, the radiocarbon laboratory operated by the Department of Geology at the University of Miami dated samples from a core collected by E. A. Shinn in 1977 from the Bimini Road. In 1979, Calvert and others reported dates of 2780±70 (UM-1359), 3500±80 (UM-1360), and 3350±90 (UM-1361) from whole-rock samples; a date of 3510±70 (UM-1362), from shells extracted from the beachrock core; and dates of 2770±80 (UM-1364) and 2840±70 (UM-1365) from carbonate cementing the beachrock core. These dates are temporally consistent in that the shells composing the beachrock core from the Bimini Road dated older than the cement holding them together as beachrock. These dates can be interpreted as indicating that the shells composing the Bimini Road are, uncorrected for temporal and environmental variations in radiocarbon, about 3,500 years old. Because of time-averaging and other taphonomic factors, a random collection of shells likely would yield a radiocarbon date that is a few hundred years earlier than when the final accumulation of shells, which were cemented to form beachrock, actually occurred. The radiocarbon dates from the cement demonstrate that the beachrock composing the Bimini Road formed about 2,800 radiocarbon years ago by the cementation of pre-existing sediments that accumulated about 1,300 years earlier. Compared to the dates from the shells and the cement, it appears that the whole-rock dates reflect samples containing varying proportions of shell and cement without any significant contamination by younger radiocarbon. Both these dates and interpretation are consistent with the detailed research by Davaud and Strasser that concluded that the layer of beachrock composing the Bimini Road formed beneath the surface of North Bimini Island and was only exposed by coastal erosion about 1,900 to 2,000 years ago.
Proponents of the Bimini Road being a manmade feature argue that these radiocarbon dates are invalid because they were obtained entirely from whole-rock samples and subject to contamination from younger carbon. The background data reported by Calvert and others concerning the radiocarbon dates from the Bimini Road demonstrate that not all of these dates come entirely from whole-rock samples. That the dates from the shells and the clearly younger cement holding them together as beachrock are temporally consistent argues against any signification alteration of their radiocarbon content. In addition, other studies using radiocarbon dating to study sea level and the age of sediment and beachrock within the Bahamas have not reported any significant problems with contamination by younger radiocarbon. In their detailed research, Davaud and Strasser accepted the radiocarbon dates obtained from the beachrock composing the Bimini Road from the radiocarbon laboratory at the University of Miami as valid indicators of its age.
Gifford and Ball attempted to establish a minimum age using uranium-thorium dating for the Bimini Road by dating a whole-rock sample of the marine limestone (biopelsparite) that underlies the beachrock that composes the Bimini Road. They described this sample as being "Whole rock marine limestone under beachrock off Paradise Point, North Bimini; some recrystallization." This sample yielded a uranium-thorium date of 14,992±258 BP (7132-19/2). Supporters of the idea that the Bimini Road is a man-made structure frequently cite this date in support of it being artificial.
The uranium-thorium date published by Gifford and Ball is regarded as an invalid and meaningless date for two reasons. First, the sample being partially recrystallized means that this limestone was not a closed system as required for a meaningful uranium-thorium date. As a result, this specific date is only an apparent date that completely lacks any scientific value for interpreting the age of marine limestone underlying the Bimini Road. Currently, specific species of corals and mollusks that can be demonstrated to lack any recrystallization using petrographic and X-ray diffraction techniques are the preferred samples for dating. Any limestone sample that shows the least amount of recrystallization is now regarded as incapable of yielding a scientifically valid date and not even worth an attempt at dating. Finally, it is well documented that about 15,000 calendar years ago, sea level in this region was between 95 and 100 meters (312 and 330 feet) below present sea level. As a result, the location from where Gifford and Ball collected the sample of limestone was between 90 and 95 meters (295 and 312 feet) above sea level at the time indicated by the uranium-thorium date of 14,992±258 BP (7132-19/2). Therefore, it is physically impossible for the marine limestone underlying the Bimini Road to have accumulated around 15,000 BP. Thus, this uranium-thorium date is a meaningless, invalid date lacking any scientific significance. Because this date clearly lacks any scientific meaning, geologists and archaeologists rarely mention it in their discussions of the Bimini Road. The marine limestone underlying the Bimini Road dates to the Sangamonian Stage
Sangamonian Stage
The Sangamonian Stage, also known as the Sangamon interglacial, is the name used by Quaternary geologists to designate the last interglacial period in North America from 125,000—75,000 years ago, a period of...
, the last interglacial
Interglacial
An Interglacial period is a geological interval of warmer global average temperature lasting thousands of years that separates consecutive glacial periods within an ice age...
, when sea level was last high enough for the marine sediments, now lithified into limestone, to have accumulated.
Geological explanation
The consensus among conventional geologists and archaeologists is that the Bimini Road is a natural feature composed of beachrockBeachrock
Beachrock is a friable to well-cemented sedimentary rock that consists of a variable mixture of gravel-, sand-, and silt-sized sediment that is cemented with carbonate minerals and has formed along a shoreline...
that orthogonal and other joints have broken up into rectangular, subrectangular, polygonal, and irregular blocks. The geologists and anthropologists who have personally studied the Bimini Road include Eugene Shinn of the U.S. Geological Survey; Marshall McKusick. an Associate Professor of Anthropology at University of Iowa
University of Iowa
The University of Iowa is a public state-supported research university located in Iowa City, Iowa, United States. It is the oldest public university in the state. The university is organized into eleven colleges granting undergraduate, graduate, and professional degrees...
; W. Harrison of Environmental Research Associates, Virginia, Beach Virginia; Mahlon M. Ball and J. A. Gifford of the Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science
Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science
The Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science is a college and research institute for the study of oceanography and the atmospheric sciences within the University of Miami . It is located on a 16 acre campus on Virginia Key in Miami, Florida, USA...
, University of Miami; and Eric Davaud and A. Strasser of the Department of Geology and Paleontology, University of Geneva
University of Geneva
The University of Geneva is a public research university located in Geneva, Switzerland.It was founded in 1559 by John Calvin, as a theological seminary and law school. It remained focused on theology until the 17th century, when it became a center for Enlightenment scholarship. In 1873, it...
, Geneva, Switzerland. After either inspecting or studying the Bimini Road, they all concluded that it consists of naturally jointed beachrock. John A. Gifford, a professional geologist, spent a significant time studying the geology of the Bimini Islands for his University of Miami Master's thesis about the geology of the Bimini Islands. Calvert and others identified the samples that they dated from the Bimini Wall as being natural beachrock.
Detailed studies by E. Davaud and A. Strasser of Holocene limestones currently exposed on North Bimini and Joulter Cays (Bahamas) reveal the sequence of events likely responsible for creating beachrock pavements like the Bimini Road. First, a complete beach sequence of shallow subtidal, intertidal, and supratidal carbonate sediments accumulated as the shoreline of North Bimini built seaward during part of the Holocene. Once the deposition of these sediments built the North Bimini's shoreline seaward, freshwater cementation of the carbonate occurred at some depth, possibly even a meter or so below sea level, beneath the island's surface. This cementation created a band consisting of a thick primary layer of semilithified sediments and thinner discontinuous lenses and layers of similar semilithified sediments beneath it. Later, when erosion of the island's shoreline occurred, the band of semilithifed sediment was exposed within the intertidal zone and the semilithified sediments were cemented into beachrock. As the sediments underlying the eroding shoreline was eroded down to Pleistocene limestone, the beachrock broke into flat-lying, tabular, and rectangular, subrectangular, polygonal, and irregular blocks as observed for modern beaches within the Bahamas by E. Davaud and A. Strasser. Thinner layers of beachrock underlying the primary bed of beachrock were also broken up as the loose sediments enclosing them and the thicker primary bed were eroded. As the loose sediment was scoured out from under the blocks and other pieces of beachrock by so-called "scour and settling processes", they dropped downward for several meters until they rested directly on the erosion-resistant Pleistocene limestone as an erosional lag. Eugene Shinn discusses a similar, but not identical, process by which the Bimini Road could have been created.
The downward movement of large, solid objects by scour and settling processes has been documented by Jesse E. McNinch, John T. Wells, and other researchers. They concluded that large, heavy objects could sink into the sea bottom by several meters without significant lateral movement as the result of scour and settling processes if an erosion-resistant layer of sediment was not encountered. In case of the beachrock blocks composing the Bimini Road and other pieces underlying it, the erosion-resistant layer that limited how far they were dropped downward by scour and settling processes is the Pleistocene limestone on which they now rest.
Finally, pieces of thinner layers or lenses of beachrock underlying the primary bed that was broken up and dropped downward to create the Bimini Road would be trapped beneath the blocks as they also were broken up and dropped by erosion. The trapping of these fragments of beachrock beneath the blocks composing the Bimini Road, as erosion removed loose sediments and dropped them on the surface of the Pleistocene limestone, would have created the so-called "prop" and "wedge" rocks and blocks alleged to be a "second course" of "masonry". Presuming that the blocks of beachrock forming the Bimini Road originally formed at some unknown depth below sea level and have been dropped by erosion by several meters, dating the age of the Bimini Road by its relation to past sea level would be a useless technique that would produce misleading results.
Natural pavements composed of stone blocks, which often are far more rectangular and consistent in size than the blocks composing the Bimini Road, created by orthogonal and other jointing within sedimentary rocks, including beachrock, are quite common and found throughout the world. They include a popular tourist attraction, the Tessellated pavement
Tessellated pavement
A tessellated pavement is a rare erosional feature formed in flat sedimentary rock formations lying on some ocean shores. The pavement bears this name because the rock has fractured into polygonal blocks that resemble tiles, or tessellations...
of Eaglehawk Neck, Tasmania
Eaglehawk Neck, Tasmania
Eaglehawk Neck is a narrow isthmus connecting the Tasman Peninsula to mainland Tasmania. At the 2006 census, Eaglehawk Neck had a population of 269....
; jointed bedrock that has been completely misidentified as a man-made "Phoenician Fortress and Furnace" in Oklahoma
Oklahoma
Oklahoma is a state located in the South Central region of the United States of America. With an estimated 3,751,351 residents as of the 2010 census and a land area of 68,667 square miles , Oklahoma is the 28th most populous and 20th-largest state...
; a "tiled pavement" reported from Battlement Mesa
Battlement Mesa
Battlement Mesa is a large prominent mesa in western Colorado in the United States. It sits along the Garfield-Mesa county line, between the Colorado River to the north and Plateau Creek to the south....
in western Colorado
Colorado
Colorado is a U.S. state that encompasses much of the Rocky Mountains as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the western edge of the Great Plains...
; the tessellated pavement of the Bouddi Peninsula near Sydney
Sydney
Sydney is the most populous city in Australia and the state capital of New South Wales. Sydney is located on Australia's south-east coast of the Tasman Sea. As of June 2010, the greater metropolitan area had an approximate population of 4.6 million people...
, Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
; and Arches National Park
Arches National Park
Arches National Park is a U.S. National Park in eastern Utah. It is known for preserving over 2000 natural sandstone arches, including the world-famous Delicate Arch, in addition to a variety of unique geological resources and formations....
in Utah
Utah
Utah is a state in the Western United States. It was the 45th state to join the Union, on January 4, 1896. Approximately 80% of Utah's 2,763,885 people live along the Wasatch Front, centering on Salt Lake City. This leaves vast expanses of the state nearly uninhabited, making the population the...
. Natural beachrock pavements that are identical to the Bimini Road have been found eroding out of the east shore of Loggerhead Key of Dry Tortugas
Dry Tortugas
The Dry Tortugas are a small group of islands, located at the end of the Florida Keys, USA, about west of Key West, and west of the Marquesas Keys, the closest islands. Still further west is the Tortugas Bank, which is completely submerged. The first Europeans to discover the islands were the...
and submerged beneath 90 meters of water at Pulley Ridge
Pulley Ridge
Pulley Ridge is a coral reef off the coast of southwestern Florida, United States . The reef lies 100 miles west of the Tortugas Ecological Reserve and stretches north about 60 miles. The ridge has a range of depth from 60–80 meters . Pulley Ridge was originally discovered in 1950. It was found...
off the southwest coast of Florida
Florida
Florida is a state in the southeastern United States, located on the nation's Atlantic and Gulf coasts. It is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the north by Alabama and Georgia and to the east by the Atlantic Ocean. With a population of 18,801,310 as measured by the 2010 census, it...
.
Claims of a human origin
Although it is generally considered to be a naturally occurring geological feature, as a result of the unusual arrangement and shape of the stones some believe that the formation is the remains of an ancient road, wall, or some other deliberately constructed feature. For example articles published in ArgosyArgosy (magazine)
Argosy was an American pulp magazine, published by Frank Munsey. It is generally considered to be the first American pulp magazine. The magazine began as a general information periodical entitled The Golden Argosy, targeted at the boys adventure market.-Launch of Argosy:In late September 1882,...
(an American pulp magazine
Pulp magazine
Pulp magazines , also collectively known as pulp fiction, refers to inexpensive fiction magazines published from 1896 through the 1950s. The typical pulp magazine was seven inches wide by ten inches high, half an inch thick, and 128 pages long...
) and either authored or coauthored by Robert F. Marx
Robert F. Marx
Robert F. Marx is one of the pioneer American scuba divers and is best known for his work with shipwrecks and sunken treasure. Although he is considered controversial for his frequent and successful forays into treasure hunting, fellow treasure hunter E...
, a professional diver and visitor to the Bimini Road, argued that the Bimini Road is an artificial structure. In a 1971 Argosy article, Robert Marx reported that Carl H. Holm, who was President, not "head geologist" as reported by Marx, of Global Oceanic; once a manager for North American Rockwell; a ship designer; and retired naval officer stated that there was "little doubt" that the massive stone blocks were cut by people. The same article noted that he was part of an expedition sponsored by North American Rockwell that included Edgar Mitchell, the astronaut, as leader; Dimitri Rebikoff; and "a number of psychics from the Edgar Cayce Foundation." Given the complete lack of citations to this research in GeoRef
GeoRef
The GeoRef database is a bibliographic database of scientific literature in the geosciences, including the geology of North America and the world. Coverage ranges from 1785 to the present for North American literature, and 1933 to the present for the rest of the world. It currently contains more...
, JSTOR
JSTOR
JSTOR is an online system for archiving academic journals, founded in 1995. It provides its member institutions full-text searches of digitized back issues of several hundred well-known journals, dating back to 1665 in the case of the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society...
, Web of Knowledge, and other scientific bibliographic databases, neither the data collected from nor the interpretations and conclusions made as a result of this expedition very likely have been publicly reported in a scientific venue where their credibility can be openly evaluated.
Others who consider the Bimini undersea formation to be man-made, as opposed to natural beachrock, are Joseph Manson Valentine, zoologist; Charles Berlitz
Charles Berlitz
Charles Frambach Berlitz was an American linguist and language teacher known for his books on anomalous phenomena, as well as his language-learning courses. He is listed in The People's Almanac as one of the fifteen most eminent linguists in the world.-Life:Berlitz was born in New York City...
, linguist; Gregory Little, psychologist; R. Cedric Leonard
R. Cedric Leonard
Richard Cedric Leonard is an author and lecturer on the pseudohistorical belief in ancient astronauts and the mythical city of Atlantis.-Biography:...
, anthropologist; and Dimitri Rebikoff, French marine engineer. All claim to have investigated the formations in person, and claim to have observed more than one horizontal layer of blocks, at least in places. However, multiple layers of block can result naturally from systematic fracturing of sedimentary rock where multiple layers of sedimentary rock lie on top of each, as can be observed in the case of the tessellated pavement of Tasmania exposed at Eaglehawk Neck
Eaglehawk Neck, Tasmania
Eaglehawk Neck is a narrow isthmus connecting the Tasman Peninsula to mainland Tasmania. At the 2006 census, Eaglehawk Neck had a population of 269....
on the Tasman Peninsula.
Sci Fi Channel presentation
Sci FiSci Fi Channel (United States)
Syfy , formerly known as the Sci-Fi Channel and SCI FI, is an American cable television channel featuring science fiction, supernatural, fantasy, reality, paranormal, wrestling, and horror programming. Launched on September 24, 1992, it is part of the entertainment conglomerate NBCUniversal, a...
's "Quest for Atlantis
Atlantis
Atlantis is a legendary island first mentioned in Plato's dialogues Timaeus and Critias, written about 360 BC....
: Startling New Secrets" followed several different groups researching possible locations for the legendary Atlantis, one of which focused on the Bimini Road. Greg Little led a team of researchers on a dive to recover objects at Bimini Bay. Little and his team reported the discovery of an entire second layer of square-cut rocks with similar dimensions beneath the stones of the Bimini Road. However, they have yet to formally publish in any detail the evidence and observations that demonstrate the presence of this underlying layer and the square-cut nature of its blocks. As a result, its existence remains unproven. Little believes that his discovery suggests that the Bimini Road may actually be one part of an entire wall or water dock
Dock (maritime)
A dock is a human-made structure or group of structures involved in the handling of boats or ships, usually on or close to a shore.However, the exact meaning varies among different variants of the English language...
. He has also published an informal critique of Shinn's Skeptical Inquirer article. The Bimini Road was also discussed in season 1, episode 10 of the TV series In Search Of, as well as season 2, episode 3 of the History channel's TV series Ancient Aliens
Ancient Aliens
Ancient Aliens is an American television series that premiered on April 20, 2010 on the History channel. Produced by Prometheus Entertainment, the program presents theories of ancient astronauts and proposes that historical texts, archaeology and legends contain evidence of past...
.
See also
- 1421 hypothesis
- Adam's Bridge
- AtlantisAtlantisAtlantis is a legendary island first mentioned in Plato's dialogues Timaeus and Critias, written about 360 BC....
- Bermuda TriangleBermuda TriangleThe Bermuda Triangle, also known as the Devil's Triangle, is a region in the western part of the North Atlantic Ocean where a number of aircraft and surface vessels allegedly disappeared under mysterious circumstances....
- Marine archaeology in the Gulf of Cambay
- Yonaguni MonumentYonaguni MonumentThe Yonaguni Monument is a massive underwater rock formation off the coast of Yonaguni, the southernmost of the Ryukyu Islands, in Japan. There is a debate about whether the site is completely natural, is a natural site that has been modified, or is a manmade artifact.The site is variably referred...
External links
- Photographs on altarcheologie.nl
- Article: Archaeological Anomalies in the Bahamas, by Douglas G. Richards