ABSTRACT
Why is there such confusion on such a simple subject? Perhaps, because the event was such an extraordinary one, the epistemological problem is fundamental. If so, then it behooves all writers on the subject to start from the beginning with a careful analysis of the terms of the debate and proceed from that point to the events themselves. This is what I propose to do in this essay. I do not hope to exhaust the possibilities of the subject. It is too vast. Hence my essay is suggestive rather than comprehensive. It ventures a series of hypotheses rather than expounds a point of view. I hope it will suggest further study of the problem by specialists in the cartographic, linguistic, literary, nautical, and historical fields. Perhaps such research will reveal elementary aspects of the problem, which I have overlooked. Perhaps it will show new approaches which I have not followed.
