Investigation: Hollow Earth — Sources, Maps, Books, and Atlantis

Status

Date: 2026-03-16 Status: Ongoing

This investigation catalogues sources of Hollow Earth theory, origins of maps, books (especially pre-1940 non-fiction for deep study), controlled opposition (e.g. reframing as science fiction/fantasy), scientific and literary references to concentric circles/shells, inner sun, north/south entrances, and Atlantis (including the open question: Atlantis on Earth at the North Pole vs. Mars, and whether ruins lie inside Earth or Mars).

Related in-repo: A.md (Halley, Lamprecht seismology), history/chronology, cosmos/mars (Mars = Atlantis, hollow planets), governance/war/investigations/vril-society (Nazi hollow earth, Agartha, maps).

PART ONE: SOURCES AND ORIGINS

I. Where the Idea Came From

• Ancient / mythological: Underworld and subterranean realms appear in Greek (Hades), Norse (Svartalfheim), and Buddhist (Shambhala) tradition. These are usually symbolic or mythic, not geometric hollow-earth models.
• Scientific formalisation: The hollow-earth idea was formalised in scientific terms in the late 17th and early 18th centuries:
  • Edmund Halley (1692) — Proposed Earth as a hollow shell (~500 miles thick) with two concentric shells and an innermost core with an inner sun; atmospheres between shells; each shell with its own magnetic poles and different rotation speeds. (Some secondary sources describe Halley as proposing four concentric spheres; the primary formulation in our repo is “two concentric shells and an innermost core.”)
  • Leonhard Euler — Later proposed a single-shell hollow Earth with a small central sun (~1,000 km across) providing light and warmth for an inner civilisation.
  • John Cleves Symmes Jr. (1818) — Proposed five hollow concentric spheres nested like an onion, with habitable spaces between them, and large polar openings (~2,300–4,000 miles across) at North and South Poles.
• 19th-century expansion: Polar expeditions were promoted (e.g. Jeremiah Reynolds) to find entrances; a genre of “journey to the interior” literature and non-fiction arguments (Reed, Gardner, Teed, Culmer) developed. Before the 1940s, hollow earth was widely treated as a serious geographical/cosmological hypothesis, not only as fiction.

PART TWO: MAPS — Where They Came From and Why They Exist

II. Map Origins

• No single “official” hollow-earth map. Maps depicting inner Earth, polar holes, or Agartha are composites, interpretations, or artistic/cartographic visualisations of written theories.
• Key sources of “hollow earth” map imagery:
  1. Theories turned into diagrams — Symmes, Gardner, and others published cross-sections and polar views (concentric circles, polar openings, inner sun). These are theoretical diagrams, not surveys of a discovered interior.
  2. Heinrich C. Berann (1966) — National Geographic commissioned Berann to produce an ocean-floor-style map of Antarctica (sometimes shown ice-free). It shows submarine topography and passages. Hollow-earth proponents interpret convergence points or passages as “entrances” to inner Earth. Berann did not label it as a hollow-earth map; the interpretation was added by others. See vril-society: “Nazi symbols on hollow earth maps” are best explained as postwar additions; Berann’s map is 1966, not Nazi-era.
  3. Agartha / occult maps — Saint-Yves d’Alveydre’s Mission de l’Inde (1886) and later theosophical/esoteric works placed Agartha (inner kingdom) in the Himalayas, under pyramids, or at remote sites. “Maps of Agartha” mark these symbolic entrances; they are not geodetic surveys.
  4. U-Boat 209 / “Nazi” maps — Alleged letter from Karl Unger (U-209) and “Nazi maps to Agartha” circulate online; provenance is unverified. No authenticated Nazi-era map explicitly depicts Agartha with swastikas or SS runes. See vril-society investigation.
• Why there appear to be maps: Because (a) theorists drew diagrams of their models (Halley, Symmes, Gardner); (b) real scientific maps (e.g. Berann’s Antarctic) were reinterpreted by hollow-earth authors; (c) occult traditions produced symbolic “entrance” maps; (d) postwar authors combined Nazi iconography with hollow-earth imagery for dramatic effect. So “hollow earth maps” exist as a genre of derived and interpretive cartography, not as a single lineage from one explorer or state.

PART THREE: BOOKS — Pre-1940 and Later (Find Online / Deep Study)

III. Thesis: Before the 40s, Not Classed as Fiction

Many serious works argued for a hollow Earth with detailed physical, magnetic, and polar geography. They were non-fiction or theoretical; the reframing of hollow earth as primarily science fiction or fantasy intensified in the 20th century (see Part Five: Controlled Opposition).

IV. Books to Locate and Study (Online Where Possible)

Proponent works (theory, not novels):

Fiction that may reframe or absorb the theory (see Controlled Opposition):

• Jules Verne, Journey to the Center of the Earth (1864) — LOC, many editions.
• Edward Bulwer-Lytton, The Coming Race (1871) — Vril; HathiTrust.
• Mary Bradley Lane, Mizora: A Prophesy (1899) — Gutenberg.
• L. Frank Baum, Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz (1908) — subterranean; HathiTrust.
• Edgar Rice Burroughs, Pellucidar series (1914–1963) — inner surface of hollow Earth. LOC.

Library of Congress guide: Hollow Earth Theories: A List of References — books, theory-books, secondary sources. HathiTrust and Internet Archive links above are from LOC guide or standard repositories; create free accounts where required.

Anna’s Archive: For downloading Hollow Earth books from Anna’s Archive (search, download, unzip, scan, create MD index), see docs/ANNAS_ARCHIVE_HOLLOW_EARTH. Script: cosmos/cosmology/hollow_earth/scripts/index-downloaded-books.sh.

Life inside the Earth — Summary from primary-text search

A systematic search of hollow-earth primary texts (Culmer 1886, McBride/Symmes 1826/1878, Bernard 1964, Reed 1906, Lang 1938) for references to life inside the earth yields the following. Full line-level references and per-author tables are in the wget investigation: paradigm-threat-timeline repo → wget/hollow_earth/investigation-hollow-earth-life.md.

Attributes of life (as stated in the texts):

Locations given for life: inner world; internal habitable/inhabited region; interior of the earth; hollow interior; concave surface (inner surface of shell); polar orifices/openings; inside polar openings; beyond the pole (Byrd: 1,700 mi N, 2,300 mi S); basin inside orifice; rivers and oceans within the globe; “those regions” / northern approach. Note: Pre-1940 authors do not mention Nazis, Agartha-by-name, or “breakaway civilization”; “advanced civilization” appears in Bernard (1964), drawing on Byrd narrative.

PART FOUR: CONCENTRIC CIRCLES / SHELLS — Counts and Correlation

V. Scientific and Literary References to Number of Circles/Shells

Correlation: Halley and Symmes both use concentric structure; Halley 2 shells + core (or 4 spheres in some readings), Symmes 5 spheres. So “how many circles” varies by author (1, 3, 4, 5). No single canonical number; tracking by source is essential. Open: Systematic survey of every pre-1940 text for exact counts and diagrams.

PART FIVE: INNER SUN

VI. References to Inner Sun / Central Sun

Conclusion: Inner sun is a recurring feature across scientific (Halley, Euler) and popular hollow-earth literature; names and sizes vary. Correlation with “concentric circles” is that the innermost region is often the luminous core (inner sun).

PART SIX: NORTH AND SOUTH ENTRANCES

VII. References to North and South Pole Entrances

Conclusion: North and south entrances are standard in Symmes-derived and Gardner/Reed/Byrd-era literature. Both poles are consistently mentioned; some add other entrances (Himalayas, pyramids).

PART SEVEN: ATLANTIS AND HOLLOW EARTH

VIII. Atlantis in the Literature

• Plato (Timaeus/Critias): Atlantis is an island “larger than Libya and Asia together,” beyond the Pillars of Heracles; ocean navigable; confederation of kings; later “sinks” or is lost. No Plato text places Atlantis inside the Earth.
• Nazi / Ahnenerbe: Claimed Aryans descended from Atlantis; when Atlantis “sank,” superior people migrated north (e.g. to Germany). Tacitus’ Germania misused. No primary Nazi document places Atlantis inside hollow Earth; Atlantis is the origin of the race, not the interior.
• Hollow-earth + Atlantis: Some modern conspiracy or occult narratives place lost civilisations or “Atlantis” inside Earth (e.g. Agartha as advanced inner civilisation). So “Atlantis” and “hollow earth” are linked in popular culture by (a) lost advanced civilisation, (b) North (Hyperborea, Thule, polar entrance), (c) Nazi interest in both.

IX. Atlantis: North Pole on Earth vs. Mars — Open Investigation

• Paradigm-threat thesis (cosmos/mars): In Saturnian Cosmology, Mars appeared above Earth’s North Pole during the Golden Age and was remembered as the island of Atlantis. Atlantis “falls” when the planetary configuration breaks; Mars leaves proximity to Earth. So Atlantis is not on Earth’s surface at the North Pole—it is Mars as the “island” in the sky. No ancient text (before Plato) names “Atlantis”; Plato’s account fits a celestial land “beyond” the Pillars.
• Open questions:
  • Was there also a terrestrial “Atlantis” (land at/near Earth’s North Pole) that fell or sank? Or is every “Atlantis fell at the Pole” story a transposition of the Mars event?
  • Ruins of Atlantis: If Atlantis = Mars, “ruins” could be on Mars (surface or interior). If some Atlantis tradition refers to an inner-earth civilisation, could “ruins of Atlantis” be inside Earth (or inside Mars)? No mainstream or pre-1940 hollow-earth texts are cited here that explicitly place Atlantis inside Earth or on Mars; this is left as an open investigation: how Atlantis relates to hollow Earth, and whether any tradition or document places the ruins of Atlantis inside Earth or on Mars.

PART EIGHT: CONTROLLED OPPOSITION — FICTION AND FANTASY

X. Reframing Hollow Earth as Science Fiction / Fantasy

• Thesis: Authors and institutions that present hollow earth only as science fiction or fantasy (e.g. Tolkien’s Middle-earth, Verne’s journey, Burroughs’ Pellucidar) can function as controlled opposition: they absorb and repackage the idea so that the public associates it with make-believe rather than with serious pre-1940 non-fiction and scientific debate.
• Jules Verne (1864): Journey to the Center of the Earth — adventure into a prehistoric inner world; resurface at Stromboli. Framed as fiction; may have shifted popular perception toward “hollow earth = story” and away from Symmes/Gardner-style theory.
• Edward Bulwer-Lytton (1871): The Coming Race — Vril energy; subterranean advanced race. Theosophists and later Nazi-occult narrative (Vril Society) adopted “Vril”; the book is fiction but became a source for “inner civilisation” claims. So it both spreads the idea and labels it as a novel.
• Edgar Rice Burroughs: Pellucidar series — hollow Earth with inner surface, dinosaurs, lost races. Explicitly fantasy/adventure; reinforces “hollow earth = pulp fiction.”
• Tolkien: Middle-earth is surface world, not literally hollow Earth. Some commentators link “Middle-earth” or subterranean realms (Moria, etc.) to hollow-earth or underworld motifs. If Tolkien is cited as evidence that hollow earth is “just fantasy,” that would be controlled opposition in the sense used here: directing attention to fictional treatment so the non-fictional tradition (Halley, Symmes, Gardner, Reed, Lang) is forgotten or dismissed.
• Pattern: Identify authors and works that (a) use hollow-earth or inner-world imagery, (b) present it only as fiction/fantasy, and (c) are used in popular or academic discourse to imply that hollow earth has no serious historical or scientific basis. List such works for further study.

PART NINE: IN-REPO REFERENCES AND OPEN QUESTIONS

XI. References in This Repo

• A.md — Halley 1692 (two concentric shells, innermost core, inner sun); Jan Lamprecht hollow-planet seismology; shadow zone; no Outer/Inner core in his model.
• cosmos/mars — Hollow Earth as shell with central sun and openings at both poles; all planets and suns hollow (EU); Mars = Atlantis above North Pole; humans on Mars live primarily on inside of Mars.
• history/chronology — Saturnian Cosmology; hollow earth EU model image.
• governance/war/investigations/vril-society — Nazi hollow earth, Agartha, Berann map, U-209 letter, Nazi symbols on maps; Mars and inner Earth as loci.
• cosmos/flat_earth/co.md — Hollow Earth and Saturnian Cosmology contrasted with Flat Earth as controlled opposition.

XII. Open Questions and Next Steps

• Maps: Trace every distinct “hollow earth map” image used in books and online to its first publication (Symmes, Gardner, Berann, occult, postwar).
• Concentric count: Table every pre-1940 work that states a number of shells/spheres; check for correlation (e.g. 5 vs. 4 vs. 3).
• Books: Download and deep-study Gardner 1920, Reed 1906, McBride 1826, Culmer 1886, Lang 1938 (Internet Archive), Teed 1898/1905; extract all mentions of inner sun, polar openings, concentric structure, Atlantis.
• Controlled opposition: List all novels/films (Verne, Bulwer-Lytton, Burroughs, Tolkien-related, etc.) that are cited to dismiss hollow earth as “just fiction”; document who does the citing (academics, media, textbooks).
• Atlantis: Search pre-1940 hollow-earth and theosophical texts for “Atlantis” + “inner earth” or “North Pole”; document any claim that Atlantis sank at North Pole or that its ruins are inside Earth or on Mars.
• Mars: Document any pre-1940 or obscure reference that identifies Atlantis with Mars or with a body “above” the Pole (for correlation with paradigm-threat Mars = Atlantis thesis).

PART TEN: OPEN THEORIES

XIV. Interpretive frameworks (unproven; for investigation)

The following are open theories — not asserted as fact, but proposed as lenses for interpreting the hollow-earth literature and the motives for its suppression.

1. Breakaway civilisation. The so-called “advanced” civilisation in Hollow Earth is not a separate species or lost root race, but another breakaway civilisation from a once unified earth. The same human (or human-related) culture that was suppressed, reset, or overwritten on the surface survived and continued inside.

2. Tartarian / Atlantian technology. The technology described or implied (advanced civilisation, habitations, shipping, tropical habitability) is advanced Tartarian/Atlantian technology that used to exist everywhere on Earth. It was simply never suppressed there (in the interior). The hollow interior thus preserves a technological and architectural baseline that was deliberately removed or hidden on the surface.

3. Ungovernable space. The hollow earth is very difficult to manage from the perspective of any central authority. There are an infinite (or effectively unbounded) number of hiding locations. Control and surveillance of the interior cannot be totalised in the way the surface has been; this makes the interior both a refuge and a threat to any regime that depends on controlling narrative and technology.

4. Why pre-WW2 authors say nothing about Nazis. No pre-1940 hollow-earth authors mention Nazis or Nazi expeditions (e.g. to Antarctica, Agartha) because they hadn’t arrived yet — the literature predates or is contemporary with the build-up to WW2. Later narratives (Nazi hollow earth, U-209, Berann reinterpretation) add the Nazi layer; the core hollow-earth thesis (polar openings, inner life, concentric shells) does not depend on it.

5. Containment and suppression: population and knowledge. The need to contain and suppress the hollow earth has less to do with the interior per se and more to do with controlling the surface population and all technological knowledge. If the public knew that (a) the interior is habitable and inhabited, and (b) advanced technology persisted there, the legitimacy of surface institutions (scientific, historical, political) would be undermined. Suppression is therefore about maintaining the surface narrative and monopolising or destroying evidence of the prior unified/Tartarian/Atlantian world.

6. Deep State and polar access. Contact between planes (surface and interior) is deliberately suppressed by the Deep State (or equivalent power structure). Venture to the poles is off limits — not only because of “ice” or “weather,” but because discovery of entrances and contact with inner-world populations would break the control of information and technology. Polar expeditions (Byrd and others) are either censored, reframed, or classified so that no authorised narrative confirms hollow earth or inner-world civilisation.

7. First contact is far more common than we imagine. If the earth is hollow and inhabited, then “first contact” scenarios (surface humans stumbling into the interior, or encountering inner-world life in caves, polar approaches, or other thresholds) cannot be rare — they are likely far more common than official history or media suggest. Most would be suppressed, discredited, or reframed (accident, rescue, ritual, psychosis). High-profile “rescues” or disappearances in deep caves or polar regions may often be contact-and-containment events rather than simple emergencies.

8. Control by punishing returnees; HE seals the openings. One of the most obvious systems of control on the surface would be to punish anyone who ventures into the hollow earth and returns (or can be brought back) — whether by discrediting them, silencing them, hospitalising them, or worse. That would (a) deter others from trying, and (b) over time convince the hollow-earth inhabitants themselves to secure the openings and restrict access from the surface. From the inner-world perspective: wandering surface humans who get back would be harmed by their own side; the surface would appear to be in a 500–600 year state of constant warfare; the rational response would be to close the doors and avoid drawing the curious into a zone where they are punished or disappeared. So both sides have an incentive to minimise contact — surface powers to protect the narrative and monopoly on knowledge, inner-world inhabitants to protect the curious and to isolate from what they could only imagine as endless surface violence.

Use: These open theories can guide further investigation — e.g. searching for evidence of suppression of polar exploration, correlation between “Tartarian” or “Atlantis” claims and hollow-earth life descriptions, and the timing of when “Nazi hollow earth” enters the literature versus the older Symmes/Gardner/Reed/Culmer tradition.

XIII. References (External)

• Library of Congress: Hollow Earth Theories: A List of References, Books, Theory books.
• Wikipedia: Hollow Earth, John Cleves Symmes Jr..
• Halley: Royal Society papers 1681/1692; Euler central sun.
• Lost Cartography: Hollow Earth Theory Maps, Map of Agartha.
• Vril/Berann/Nazi maps: vril-society; Hollow Planet blog (Berann 1966); BetweenTwoPines, Ancient Code (Nazi maps).
• Jan Lamprecht: Hollow Planet Seismology (A.md source).
• Thunderbolts: Atlantis: The Disappearing Homeland.

Keywords: #Hollow #Sources #Maps #Books #Atlantis