How Did Mulek Get to the Land of Promise? Part I

There are only four ways Mulek could have reached the Land of Promise by sea. The first of these is covered below:

1. He sailed out of the Mediterranean and across the Atlantic Ocean to land on the east coast of the Land of Promise.

We have already discussed that if a course was taken across the Atlantic, the group with Mulek would have been stopped at one of the coastal ports along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean, which were all under Babylonian control at that time, with the exception of Tyre, which was under Babylonian siege and did not fall until a few years after. But even if in some way Mulek and his friends were able to manage to gain a ship, the Mediterranean Sea during this period of time was busily involved in the merchant shipping and trading of the Phoenicians, the military movement of the Greek fleets, the military movement of the Egyptian fleets, and the trading and merchant shipping of the western powers situated along the east and southern coast of Spain, incuding the major city-state of Tertessia.
The Mediterranean Sea. White line shows a course from the eastern shore across the Sea to the Straits of Gibraltar. The yellow circles show areas where the ship could be spotted from shore. Any passage through this area would have drawn a lot of attention, especially in 600 B.C. when the entire Mediterranean was involved in conflict, trading, and protection of trading routes.

Situated on the southwestern shore of Spain, Tartessia at the time of Mulek dominated the Mediterranean trade with their direct route overland to “las islas Casitérides,” the British Isles, and the trade in tin. Often referred to as “La ruta del estaño,” the Tin Route, the valuable trade in tin was a commodity, when mixed with copper, that created bronze. Huge profits were realized by shipping bronze into the eastern interior, along Mesopotamia, Persia, and China. This control of the tin trade enabled Tartessia to reap great profits and grow to a major power in the Western Mediterranean.

Both suspicious and overly protective of their dominance in the Western Mediterranean, and their control of the tin trade from Pretainia (Britain), the Tartessia allowed no shipping to move up the western coast of Spain and France and to England and back. In fact, any vessel leaving the Mediterranean would have been under their direct observation and, obviously, followed to see where it went.

Now what many Mesoamerica scholars and theorists forget is that in leaving the Mediterranean Sea and heading out into the Atlantic, a ship had to pass through the Pillars of Hercules, what is today the Straits of Gibraltar. Not only does this mean passing by the observation from the island of Malta, passing between the narrow waters between Sicily and Tunisia, and also between Sardinia and Algeria, as well as passing through by the Balearic Islands, a ship then headed down the straits toward Gibraltar. Passing through the Strait of Gibraltar, which runs about ten miles before reaching the end of the strait between Tarifa and Ksar es Srhir and entering into the Atlantic, the ship would pass through a narrow strait barely nine miles wide where a person, ship or lookout on one shore could easily see across to the other shore, thus seeing any ship passing through the Strait and out into the Atlantic. This creates three very important problems:

a) Any ship large enough to breach the Atlantic would have been noticed more than once by those sailing the Mediterranean at the time—either to see where merchant traders might be going, or to keep ships from making contact with other powers that might prove a problem for Greece or Egypt. In addition, such a ship would certainly have been detected by the Tartessians who would have stopped any Phoenician ship passage through the straits and into the Atlantic because of their fierce competitive dominance and control of merchant trade routes.

b) Such a passage of a ship into the Atlantic would have aroused the curiosity of the other powers within the Mediterranean. Any ship large enough and designed for deep ocean sailing would certainly have brought the attention of other nations out to see where such a ship would be sailing. Certainly, once it left the Straits and headed out to sea, would have caused others to see where it might be going.

c) Other nations sailing the Mediterranean would have followed such a ship as mentioned above simply for their protective and security concerns. Ships did not simply sail the Mediterranean unobserved, nor did they sail without other shipping and ports becoming very curious because any oddity could signal war, an invasion, or attack. From about 1100 B.C. until the Romans completely dominated the Mediterranean and inland areas, this entire area was one of constant uprisings, unsettlement, and attacks.

To think that any ship could sail out through the narrow Pillars of Hercules without raising such concerns is simply without merit. In addition, for other nations to notice such a ship would run contrary to the Lord’s promise to Lehi that his Land of Promise would be kept from the knowledge of other nations. Thus, such a course would not have been the way Mulek reached the Land of Promise.

(See the next post, “How Did Mulek Get to the Land of Promise? – Part II” for the other three ways Mulek could have reached the Land of Promise)