In early Egyptian and Mesopotamian thought, the world was portrayed as a disk floating in the ocean. įurther information: Egyptian mythology and Biblical cosmology Imago Mundi Babylonian map, the oldest known world map, 6th century BC Babylonia Despite the scientific fact and obvious effects of Earth's sphericity, pseudoscientific flat-Earth conspiracy theories are espoused by modern flat Earth societies and, increasingly, by unaffiliated individuals using social media. This myth was created in the 17th century by Protestants to argue against Catholic teachings.

It is a historical myth that medieval Europeans generally thought the Earth was flat. By the early period of the Christian Church, the spherical view was widely held, with some notable exceptions. Knowledge of the Earth's global shape gradually began to spread beyond the Hellenistic world. By about 330 BC, his former student Aristotle had provided strong empirical evidence for a spherical Earth. In the early 4th century BC, Plato wrote about a spherical Earth. However, most pre-Socratics (6th–5th century BC) retained the flat-Earth model. The idea of a spherical Earth appeared in ancient Greek philosophy with Pythagoras (6th century BC). Many ancient cultures subscribed to a flat-Earth cosmography. The map contains several references to biblical passages as well as various jabs at the 'Globe Theory'.įlat Earth is an archaic and scientifically disproven conception of the Earth's shape as a plane or disk. ( August 2023) ( Learn how and when to remove this template message)įlat Earth map drawn by Orlando Ferguson in 1893. You may improve this article, discuss the issue on the talk page, or create a new article, as appropriate. The examples and perspective in this article deal primarily with Europe in the lede and do not represent a worldwide view of the subject.

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