THE DELUGE IN THE PEOPLES TRADITIONS AND GEOLOGICAL EVIDENCE

In 1992 the geologists Edith and Alexander Tollmann published a  monograph which claimed that the  Noachian Deluge was the consequence of a cometary impact about 9500 years ago. A series of geological facts supported the claim, together with a  critical analysis of mankind traditions. Geological proofs of the impact include a crater with iridium, shatter cones, stress lamination  of minerals, radiocarbon dating, dendrochronology, a  peak of acid in the Greenland ice and so on.

Over a thousand worldwide traditions describe moreover every detail of the catastrophe following the impact and the spiritual consequences on the human  mind.

In our present communication we will add new proofs  of the impact. They include analysis of the Koefels crater in Tyrol and new radiocerbon dating. The hiatus of settlements for this time is recorded from many places in the world, both from villages and  caves. The impact led  to the development of religions, to a confusion of  languages, to the transition from a hunting and  collecting economy to an agricultural and cattle-breeding economy and so on.

Another impact, the {\it Late--Glacial Impact}, occurred as a forerunner about 3500 years before the Noachian Flood. We have been led to its existence by several indications: torrential rainfalls, fallout of nitric acid, the extinction of most the Pleistocen megamammals.... The Late--Glacial Impact is also supported by the discovery of its conflagration (Weltenbrand) horizon, which has been documented by J.B. Kloosterman in more than a dozen countries on three continents. The epoch of this impact is the Allerod time, about 13.000 years BP, still in the younger Paleolithic ({\it Termination IA}), whereas the Noachian Flood Impact occurred in the  Mesolithic ({\it Termination IB}), about 9500 years BP.  The Late-Glacial Impact was caused  by a comet: its fragments  striked the northern hemisphere, in particular the ice of the Canadian Ice Shield,  leading to the giant "Debacle" flood (Ontario, 450 km. wide) and the Spokane Flood, in the Columbia  Basin.