Legendary island-kingdoms in the Atlantic Sea in 30 BC

ONCE upon a time there existed three separate islandkingdoms in the Sea of Atlantis in 30 BC. They were the Dutsburgh, ruled by King Atlas; the Davantis, governed by muscular Prince Rodvanov; and the Limasville, administered by an athletic Princess Laiana.

Dutsburgh, being the biggest island having the biggest number of prosperous subjects and inhabitants, its monarch, King Atlas, was also the recognized supreme ruler of the two smaller fiefdoms.

Historians of yore called each of the three monarchies thriving since they had sufficient food, cavernous castles, and fierce armies. But Dutsburgh was the largest empire with contented families as loyal subjects.

While both Davantis and Limasville had blooming populations, they had what we might call today, a social problem. Why? Because their leaders accused each other of engaging in immoral dalliances with their subjects. How did this come about?

You see. the former had an allmale population, and the latter, an all-female community. So it was not unusual for natives of Davantis to engage in homosexual relationship, and, similarly, subjects in Limasville, in lesbianism.

Both Prince Rodvanov and Princess Laiana had been condemning each other of tolerating their subjects to engage in abnormal relations, to the consternation of King Atlas who abhorred the situation. But deep inside him, the supreme ruler had nothing but pity for the people of Davantis and Limasville.

This kind of inter-personal, samesex situation genuinely posed a problem to inhabitants in both fiefdoms. And they themselves were aware of such an inconvenient homosexual partnership. And how they envied the natives of Dutsburgh because they enjoyed the normal man-woman relationship!

King Atlas himself realized the unfortunate scenario, and volunteered to remedy the agony of Davantis and Limasville natives. And being a just king, he came up with a solution that posed a challenge to both Prince Rodvanov and Princess Laiana.

King Atlas summoned his two well-fit underlings and made a royal offer: To climb barefoot the 10,000foot Mount Valsuvius, an active volcano, from the base as soon as the sun rose from the nearby hills, and return back to base when the sun was perpendicular to everyone’s head.

If both leaders would accomplish the feat, here was the king’s reward – male natives of Davantis could marry the maidens of Limasville.

Similarly, all the women in Limasvilles had the free choice of the men in Davantis. All to their hearts’ content!

Challenge accepted. Promptly, Prince Rodvanov and Princess Laiana struggled in their strenuous climb, and reached the peak of the already ash-spewing Mount Valsuvius.

Just as the two were starting their way down, the volcano exploded with such deadly ferocity, burying the three island-kingdoms, along with thousands of their respective inhabitants, in molten lava and fiery stones, and smoldering rocks. * * *

‘INCORRIGIBLE DIGONG.’ In an informal gathering of soldiers in a military camp in Cebu recently, ‘DU30’ again repeated a gaffe in his SONA last July 25. He mentioned that Magellan first landed in Leyte.

Sadly, the same blunder came out again in his chat with military personnel in Catbalogan City and in Cagayan de Oro City first week of this month, retelling about the Leyte landing of the Spaniards.

The President must have mistaken it for the Leyte landing of Gen. Douglas MacArthur, leading the Allied Forces in the Pacific, on October 17, 1944, that saw the initial phase of the Liberation of the Philippines. History books and newspaper articles called it “The Leyte landing of the Liberation forces.”

Almost five centuries earlier, the Magellan three-ship armada dropped anchor at Homonhon island, off Guiuan, Eastern Samar, on March 16, 1521, that marked the discovery of the Philippines.