At the bottom of the Southern North Sea there is a landscape: river beds (including one as big as the Rhine which has been named The Shotton), coastlines, lakes and lots of preserved human settlements, spread out over the tens of thousands of square kilometres of land lost when the last ice age ended and sea levels rose, cutting off our island from the continent. This landscape came to light when it occurred to a PHd student that there might be some mileage in examining seismic data from the oil exploration companies who’ve mapped the sea floor in minute detail over the last few decades.
I love excited scientists and these archaeologists are very excited. They’ve begun to uncover a stone age landscape, essentially untouched in 9,000 years – dwellings, hearths, graves, middens and all the rest – and they’re beside themselves. The only problem, obviously, is that it’s under the sea. But… Do they look bothered? The Bridge at the Bottom of the Sea is brilliant radio and this is the kind of quietly mind-blowing news that should really be on the front pages instead of all the other rubbish. Here’s an MP3 in case it’s overwritten.
By the way, I find myself wondering, how does a creationist account for this vivid and pristine evidence of human settlement from thousands of years before the bible’s proposed start date? Don’t answer that.