Inside the "Mouth": Rereading Plato's Pillars of Heracles as a Navigational Gate

A semiotic, philological and pilotage-based interpretation, with an application to the Kangean Mouth/Java Sea

A research by Dhani Irwanto, 26 August 2025

Abstract

This essay re-reads Timaeus and Critias through the literal Greek στόμα [stoma, “mouth; opening; entrance”] and argues that “Pillars of Heracles” in the Atlantis passage is a Greek nickname for a functional sea entrance rather than a fixed strait. It reconstructs a pilot’s sequence—outer sea → mouth → inner sea → local canal → ringed salt-water basins—and situates the terminology within Aegean seamanship and Cretan myth. The discussion then applies this framework to the Kangean Mouth and Java Sea interior as a testable case, without relocating the Pillars into Atlantis. The result is a navigational, not monumental, reading that clarifies “beyond/within” and provides concrete criteria for evaluating proposed geographies.

This article also makes explicit the method by which meaning is recovered. We treat στόμα [stoma, “mouth; opening; entrance”] as a sign whose meaning is to be sought in context rather than presumed. The inquiry proceeds by (i) semiotics (Saussure’s signifier/signified; Peirce’s icon/index/symbol; Barthes’ Orders 1 – 3), (ii) linguistics (syntagmatic chain, paradigmatic choice, commutation tests, pragmatics), and (iii) philology (ancient Greek usage and intertexts). Read this way, the text yields a two-threshold pilotage sequence: outer sea → sea-mouth → inner sea → local canal → ringed basins.

Within this framework, the priest’s phrase Ἡρακλέους στήλαι [Herakleous stelai, “Pillars of Heracles”] functions as a Greek ethnonymic label for the sea-mouth, not as a monument located inside Atlantis. The “beyond/within” pair—πρὸ τοῦ στόματος [pro tou stomatos, “before the mouth”] vs. ἐντὸς τοῦ στόματος [entos tou stomatos, “within the mouth”]—is thus doorway language, not a trick of bearings.

We also make explicit a crucial context clue in the dialogue: the Egyptian priest’s audience-accommodation when naming the gateway. He says, in effect, “the entrance which you Greeks call the Pillars of Heracles” (Greek: ὃ παρ’ ὑμῖν … Ἡρακλέους στήλαι [ho par’ hymin … Herakleous stelai, “what among you is called the Pillars of Heracles”]). This phrasing signals that the navigational gate has no fixed Greek technical term in the source tradition; instead, the priest borrows the Greek sailors’ ethnonymic label so the Athenian audience will recognize the function being discussed. Semiotics and pragmatics therefore support reading the Pillars here as a Greek name for a sea-mouth (στόμα, stoma), not as a monument inside Atlantis.

Finally, we treat the Kangean Mouth/Java Sea as a Barthes Order-3 application (an assembled structured object). The question is empirical: does the Kangean–Java setting instantiate the full pilotage sequence and its landscape cues? The approach invites consilience—independent lines of evidence must converge if the model is to be preferred over rivals.

Keywords

Atlantis; Plato Timaeus Critias; Pillars of Heracles; sea mouth interpretation; Cretan navigation; Kangean Mouth Java Sea; Sundaland hypothesis; ancient Greek pilotage.

Most modern readings of Plato’s Atlantis begin at a celebrity landmark. This essay starts with the words themselves. In Timaeus and Critias, the mariner first passes a στόμα θαλάσσης [stoma thalasses, “mouth of the sea; sea mouth”], which the Egyptian priest says the Greeks call the Pillars of Heracles; only then does he work an inner sea, and only then a narrow canal into ringed harbor basins. Treating “Pillars of Heracles” as the Greek nickname for the mouth—not a monument in Atlantis—restores the helmsman’s course and clarifies “beyond” and “within”. Set against Aegean seamanship and Cretan myth, this reading supplies clear criteria that can be applied to real geographies. Here I apply it to the Kangean Mouth and the Java Sea interior, without claiming the label itself ever stood in the Indies: the point is the function, not a fixed latitude.

1. A discursive reading of Plato’s route

Plato narrates a course rather than a map. The sailors begin in the open ocean and sight a recognized entrance, the στόμα θαλάσσης [stoma thalasses, “mouth of the sea; sea mouth”], or sea mouth. In his wording, what lies πρὸ τοῦ στόματος [pro tou stomatos, “before the mouth”] is the true, outer sea, with long fetch and swell; what lies ἐντὸς τοῦ στόματος [entos tou stomatos, “within the mouth”] is a calmer interior: a navigable basin enclosed by continental-scale land. Only once that interior is reached does the focus narrow to an island with engineered works. A second, local threshold appears here: a διώρυξ [dioryx, “canal; cut”] that admits ships into concentric basins. Because θάλασσα [thalassa, “sea; salty water”] can mean salty water as well as the sea at large, Plato can call those basins “seas” without contradiction. The full sequence is: outer sea → sea mouth → inner sea → local canal → ringed basins.

Plato cue: Timaeus 24e–25a evokes the outer vs inner contrast; Critias 115d–116d describes the canal and the ringed basins.

2. Why the word “mouth” matters and what the Pillars are (and are not)

The key noun in Plato is στόμα [stoma, “mouth; opening; entrance”] in the phrase ἐντὸς τοῦ στόματος [entos tou stomatos, “inside the mouth”], set over against ἔξωθεν … ἐκ τοῦ Ἀτλαντικοῦ πελάγους [exothen … ek tou Atlantikou pelagous, “from outside, out of the Atlantic sea”]. Taken literally, Plato frames the approach as passing a sea‑mouth (gateway) from the outer sea into an inner one; translating στόμα as “strait” is an interpretive narrowing, not a requirement of the Greek. The Egyptian priest then clarifies that this gateway is “what you Greeks call the Pillars of Heracles” (Greek: Ἡρακλέους στήλαι [Herakleous stelai, “Pillars of Heracles”]), which reads naturally as a Greek sailors’ label for the entrance under discussion, not a feature inside Atlantis. This keeps two thresholds distinct—(i) the sea‑mouth (“Pillars”) between outer and inner seas and (ii) the later διώρυξ [dioryx, “canal; cut”] into the ring‑harbours—without importing extra geography into the sentence.

Note. For an Athenian audience, “Pillars of Heracles” ordinarily evoked the western world‑gate. Here the term functions first as a label for the στόμα in Plato’s syntax; comparative geographic anchoring is evaluated separately in the application.

3. A functional label in Greek literature, not a fixed monument

Greek authors often use the Pillars of Heracles as a limit-name, a proverbial boundary of sailing rather than a set of stones in a city. In Pindar the Pillars mark the farthest reach of human endeavor; in Isocrates (Philippos 111–112) Heracles sets up trophies that define the boundary of the Hellenes. Geographers like Strabo record competing identifications for the Pillars—temple columns at Gades, islets, or facing capes at an ocean mouth—which shows that even in antiquity the label was not static.

Independently of the heroic label, Greek prose routinely calls chokepoints στόμα [stoma, “mouth; opening; entrance”]. One speaks of the στόμα Πόντου [stoma Pontou, “mouth of Pontus (Black Sea entrance)”] for the Black Sea entrance. In everyday pilotage, multiple mouths mattered to Greek seafaring: the Hellespont into the Propontis and onward to the Black Sea; the Cretan approaches into the Aegean; the Strait of Messina and the Sicily Channel between the Ionian and Tyrrhenian or the eastern and western basins; and, more peripherally, the Atlantic mouth at Gibraltar. The point is functional: a mouth is a gateway between water bodies, often carrying a culturally loaded name.

4. Pre-Solon seamanship and a gradient of knowledge

Classical memory credits early Crete with a thalassocracy and imagines Minoan power as maritime. Whether in empire or in everyday cabotage, Aegean pilots learned by repetition at major mouths—Hellespont, Cretan approaches—collecting rules of season and wind, lee and eddy. That is the core of Greek nautical experience.

Beyond the Aegean, Greek knowledge stretched west through the Ionian and Tyrrhenian and toward the far Atlantic mouth, often by way of Phoenician mediation. Those thresholds were real and named, yet less routine for many Aegean sailors. This gradient explains why a Greek narrator would naturally speak in mouth/inside terms while leaving the exact identity of any far-west gate more fluid in literature.

5. Why a Cretan lens strengthens the sea-mouth reading

In mythic geography Crete is the island of Zeus and a stage for Heracles, whose capture of the Cretan Bull links the hero to the island. In such a world, naming a gate after a hero is both memory and signal: a way to imprint a threshold in a sailor’s mind. The toponym Heraklion shows how the hero’s name endures in Cretan space.

From this lens, the phrase “which you Greeks call the Pillars of Heracles” reads like a mariner’s nickname for a mouth at the relevant stage of a voyage. The sequence Plato gives—mouth, interior basin, second local entrance, rings—matches a helmsman’s logic for approaching a fortified island port on the lip of a plain.

Figure 1. Aegean/Cretan context for a “Pillars of Heracles” gate-name. Dashed arc marks a conceptual sea mouth; the label is a Greek nickname for an entrance, not a fixed monument.

6. “Beyond” and “within”: a semantic discussion rather than a direction-finding trick

The contrast between πρὸ τοῦ στόματος [pro tou stomatos, “before the mouth”] and ἐντὸς τοῦ στόματος [entos tou stomatos, “within the mouth”] is doorway language. The doorway is the στόμα θαλάσσης [stoma thalasses, “sea mouth; mouth of the sea”], the sea mouth. Read this way, “beyond” means ocean-ward of the entrance currently being worked; “within” means basin-ward. Fixing the Pillars at a single western landmark is a later habit that need not control Plato’s phrasing in this passage.

7. From outer sea to ringed harbors: Plato’s wording in sequence

The narration flows without a break when read as pilotage. First comes the outer sea and the recognized mouth: “Outside the entrance lies the true sea; but the sea inside the mouth is enclosed, and the land around it may most truly be called a continent” (Timaeus 24e–25a). Then comes the interior geography of islands leading toward a larger land: “Opposite the mouth there lay an island, from which you could pass to other islands, and from them to the whole of the opposite continent” (Timaeus 25a–b).

Only inside the basin does the narrative narrow to engineered features: διώρυξ [dioryx, “canal; cut”] for a canal from the sea to the outer ring and κύκλοι θαλάσσης καὶ γῆς [kykloi thalasses kai ges, “rings of sea and land”] for rings of sea and land, bridged so ships could pass below (Critias 115d–116d). The large entrance and the local canal are distinct thresholds.

8. A Semiotic Lens on στόμα and the “Pillars of Heracles”

Sign and task. In this reading, στόμα [stoma, “mouth; opening; entrance”] is treated as a sign whose meaning is to be sought in context rather than presumed. Its phrase στόμα θαλάσσης [stoma thalasses, “sea mouth; mouth of the sea”] cues a functional gateway within a navigation narrative.

Context clue (pragmatics): audience accommodation in the priest’s phrasing. The Egyptian priest frames the entrance as “what among you is called the Pillars of Heracles” (Greek: ὃ παρ’ ὑμῖν … Ἡρακλέους στήλαι [ho par’ hymin … Herakleous stelai, “what among you is called the Pillars of Heracles”]).

• Transliteration and literal sense. Ἡρακλέους στήλαι [Herakleous stelai, “Pillars of Heracles”] is the Greek label; παρ’ ὑμῖν [par’ hymin, “among you (Greeks)”] marks audience-specific naming.
• Semiotic force. Pragmatically, the priest code-switches to a Greek exonym for an entrance whose native (Egyptian/Atlantean) term is not shared. As a symbol, the phrase invokes a conventional Greek gateway-name; as an index, it points to a functional sea-mouth; as an icon, “mouth” evokes the form (narrowing/widening) that pilots recognize.
• Inference. If the meaning were a universally fixed Greek proper name with no ambiguity, the accommodation “what you Greeks call …” would be unnecessary. The wording therefore supports treating Pillars here as a Greek ethnonymic label for the στόμα, not as a feature located inside Atlantis.

Saussure (dyadic). The signifier is the sequence of sounds/letters στόμα; the signified is the seafaring entrance/gateway that separates the outer (ἔξωθεν … ἐκ τοῦ Ἀτλαντικοῦ πελάγους [exothen … ek tou Atlantikou pelagous, “from outside, out of the Atlantic sea”]) from the inner (ἐντὸς τοῦ στόματος [entos tou stomatos, “within the mouth”]). Choosing στόμα rather than a stricter “strait” term preserves the doorway metaphor and the two-threshold logic.

Peirce (triadic).

• Icon: the mouth’s form (bottleneck widening to basin).
• Index: hydrodynamics (swell attenuation, tidal jets, lee and eddy) that pilots observe at entrances.
• Symbol: Ἡρακλέους στήλαι [Herakleous stelai] as a conventional Greek name for a sea gate.

Barthes (orders of signification).

• Order 1 (denotation): στόμα, στόμα θαλάσσης—a mouth/entrance.
• Order 2 (connotation): Aegean pilotage culture, Cretan mythic lens, and the contrast πρὸ τοῦ στόματος [pro tou stomatos, “before the mouth”] vs. ἐντὸς τοῦ στόματος [entos tou stomatos, “within the mouth”] shape “beyond/within” as doorway language.
• Order 3 (assembled object): the pilotage sequence—outer sea → sea-mouth → inner sea → local διώρυξ [dioryx, “canal; cut”] → κύκλοι θαλάσσης καὶ γῆς [kykloi thalasses kai ges, “rings of sea and land”]—yields a structured model to test against real coasts.

Linguistic tests.

• Syntagmatic chain: preserves the pilot’s order of operations (outer sea → mouth → inner sea → local canal → rings).
• Paradigmatic choice: explains why στόμα fits better than “strait.”
• Commutation: replacing στόμα with “strait” collapses the two thresholds.
• Pragmatics: the speaker–audience alignment (priest → Solon → Critias → Athenians) explains the ethnonymic “what you Greeks call …”.

Reconstruction and consilience (Puzzle model; Orders 2 → 3). We treat each navigational and topographical cue as a single “puzzle piece” fixed at Order 2; these pieces are assembled with additional “property pieces” into a fully reconstructed structured object at Order 3, which is then tested by consilience.

Order‑2 pieces (signs with constrained meanings):

• Sea-mouth (στόμα [stoma, “mouth; opening; entrance”]) in phrase στόμα θαλάσσης [stoma thalasses, “sea mouth; mouth of the sea”]; priest’s accommodation ὃ παρ’ ὑμῖν … Ἡρακλέους στήλαι [ho par’ hymin … Herakleous stelai, “what among you is called the Pillars of Heracles”] as Greek ethnonymic label.
• Doorway opposition: πρὸ τοῦ στόματος [pro tou stomatos, “before/beyond the mouth”] vs. ἐντὸς τοῦ στόματος [entos tou stomatos, “within the mouth”].
• Inner sea as basin: θάλασσα [thalassa, “sea; salty water”] can denote salty water at harbor scale as well as the sea at large.
• Local canal: διώρυξ [dioryx, “canal; cut”] connecting inner sea to harbor works.
• Ringed salt‑water basins: κύκλοι θαλάσσης καὶ γῆς [kykloi thalasses kai ges, “rings of sea and land”] with bridges for ship passage.
• Route logic: island(s) opposite the mouth (νῆσος [nēsos, “island”]) leading toward a greater land called continent (ἤπειρος [ēpeiros, “continent”]).

Additional “property” pieces integrated at assembly:

• Island facing the sea‑mouth (νῆσος [nēsos, “island”]) opposite the gateway.
• Towering mountain on the ocean side (ὄρος/ὄρη [oros/orē, “mountain/mountain ranges”]) shaping lee/swell and visual pilotage.
• Boundless continent surrounding the inner sea (ἤπειρος [ēpeiros, “continent”]) consistent with a shelf‑rimmed basin.
• South‑Kalimantan level plain (πεδίον [pedion, “plain”]) with canals open to the sea at the south and protected by mountain ranges at the north.
• Capital‑island south of the plain: Atlantis‑time functionality includes controlled channels (διώρυξ [dioryx, “canal; cut”]) and ringed salt‑water basins (θάλασσα; thalassa) for harbor operations.
• Post‑destruction overprint (non‑contemporaneous): coral‑reef accretion during sea‑level rise renders the sunken city’s approaches unnavigable except via channels. This is a later overprint, not a feature of the functional city.

Temporal coherence of pieces. Atlantis‑time pieces (including the ≈ −60 m shoreline) govern the functional reconstruction: sea‑mouth, inner sea, capital‑island, plain, canals, and ringed θάλασσα. The coral‑reef barrier is explicitly a post‑event transgressive overprint; it should not be used as a controlling feature for the Atlantis‑time harbor design, but as an explanatory layer for present‑day unnavigability of the ruins.

Consilience and falsifiability. Order‑3 assembly is a testable model: independent lines of evidence (linguistic, hydrodynamic, geomorphic, engineering) must converge on the same configuration. Failure on any core piece weakens or falsifies the assembly; convergence strengthens it. Note that this remains an application, not a relocation: the phrase Ἡρακλέους στήλαι [Herakleous stelai, “Pillars of Heracles”] is a Greek label for the στόμα; the geographical testing happens at the level of the assembled object (Order 3).

9. Applying the sea-mouth reading to the Kangean Mouth/Java Sea

Method note. This section is an application, not a relocation claim. It tests whether any real coastline instantiates Plato’s full navigational sequence (outer sea → mouth → inner sea → local canal → ringed basins) and associated landscape cues.

On the Indian Ocean approach, the Kangean passages behave like a named mouth: ocean-ward of them is the long-fetch exterior; basin-ward lies the Java Sea. This cleanly fits the “beyond/within” semantics and preserves the two-threshold logic. Once within, the Java Sea functions as an interior basin oriented toward chains of islands and a continental shelf rim, a Sundaland-flavored analogue to Plato’s interior sea.

The local entrance is then a separate matter: διώρυξ [dioryx, “canal; cut”] or constrained cut at the island port that controls access to staged, protected basins. Because θάλασσα [thalassa, “sea; salty water”] can name salty water in general, ringed harbor pools remain consistent with Plato’s diction. Two objections are common: first, that “Pillars of Heracles” must mean Gibraltar; second, that the numerical scales in the Atlantis story resist any Southeast Asian setting. The functional, ethnonymic use of “Pillars” in Greek literature answers the first; the second concerns the genre and calibration of Plato’s figures, and need not overturn the doorway reading.

In short, the Kangean Mouth → Java Sea interior satisfies the narrative sequence without forcing the Pillars into Atlantis or anchoring them permanently at the Atlantic mouth. It offers a testable geography aligned with the helmsman’s perspective that Plato’s words suggest.

Invitation. Competing geographies that satisfy the same sequence are welcome; whichever model best fits the full set of constraints should be preferred.

Figure 2. Kangean Mouth and Java Sea interior: conceptual placement of the regional mouth, inner basin, plain, canals, port-side island entrance, and reef-limited approaches (schematic).

Order‑3 Consilience & Predictions (Addendum)

The semiotic lens turns scattered signs into a structured model that can be tested against a real coastline. The assembled pilotage sequence is: outer sea → sea-mouth → inner sea → local διώρυξ [dioryx, “canal; cut”] → κύκλοι θαλάσσης καὶ γῆς [kykloi thalasses kai ges, “rings of sea and land”]. Each step is a claim about function, not a fixed monument.

This addendum sets out an Order‑3 consilience checklist with explicit temporal handling. Atlantis‑time pieces (including the ≈ −60 m shoreline) govern the functional reconstruction—sea‑mouth, inner sea, capital‑island, plain, canals, and ringed θάλασσα. By contrast, the coral‑reef barrier that renders the present‑day ruins unnavigable is a post‑destruction transgressive overprint during sea‑level rise; it must not be used as a controlling feature for the city while it was operational.

Order‑3 summary (Puzzle model). We assemble constrained Order‑2 pieces—στόμα [stoma, “mouth; opening; entrance”], στόμα θαλάσσης [stoma thalasses, “sea mouth; mouth of the sea”], doorway opposition πρὸ τοῦ στόματος [pro tou stomatos, “before/beyond the mouth”] vs. ἐντὸς τοῦ στόματος [entos tou stomatos, “within the mouth”], local διώρυξ [dioryx, “canal; cut”], ringed basins κύκλοι θαλάσσης καὶ γῆς [kykloi thalasses kai ges, “rings of sea and land”], route logic with island(s) opposite the mouth—together with geomorphic/hydrodynamic “property pieces” into a single structured object to be tested.

Temporal framework for testing.

Atlantis‑time pieces (epochal constraints):

• Paleo‑shoreline ≈ −60 m relative to present mean sea level: a puzzle piece that positions the sea‑mouth, inner sea, capital‑island, and plain during the narrative epoch.
• Functional gateway behavior at the sea‑mouth (outer → inner) consistent with beyond/within doorway language.
• Local harbor engineering at the capital‑island: controlled channels (διώρυξ [dioryx, “canal; cut”]) and ringed salty basins (θάλασσα; thalassa).
• Post‑destruction overprints (not contemporaneous with the functional city):
• Coral‑reef accretion during sea‑level rise (e.g., barriers like Gosong Gia) producing present‑day unnavigability of the sunken ruins.
• Coastal transgression and lagoonal infill modifying shoreline and access after the city’s destruction.

Consilience checklist & predictions (Kangean Mouth/Java Sea)

1. Gate behavior (sea‑mouth piece):
• Prediction 1. Clear swell attenuation and energy break across the Kangean passages, distinguishing “before the mouth” (outer sea) from “within the mouth” (inner sea) in wave climate and current signatures.
• Prediction 2. Seasonal lee/calm inside relative to the outer sea, aligning with practical pilotage into an enclosed basin.
2. Route logic (island facing the mouth):
• Prediction 3. Presence of an island (νῆσος; nēsos) facing or opposite the mouth in a configuration a pilot would describe relative to the στόμα; charted stepping toward a greater land (ἤπειρος; ēpeiros).
3. Inner‑sea morphology (enclosure and continent):
• Prediction 4. The Java Sea behaves as a navigable inner basin whose perimeter can most truly be called a continent (ἤπειρος), i.e., enclosed relative to the outer sea, once the −60 m shoreline is applied.
4. Plain, shelter, and canals (South Kalimantan):
• Prediction 5. A level plain (πεδίον; pedion) open to the sea at the south and protected by mountain ranges (ὄρη; orē) to the north, with evidence/potential of canalization and sea‑opening channels in planform and sediments at Atlantis‑time elevations.
5. Paleo‑shoreline coherence (≈ −60 m):
• Prediction 6. Reconstructed bathymetry and coastal outlines at −60 m produce connectivity among mouth, inner sea, plain, and capital‑island consistent with the pilotage sequence; modern depths reflect later transgression and must not be used in place of epochal shorelines.
6. Harbor control and ringed basins (local διώρυξ and θάλασσα rings):
• Prediction 7. Narrow cuts or engineered‑scale passes (διώρυξ; dioryx) regulating entry into protected basins; ring‑like “sea and land” features (κύκλοι θαλάσσης καὶ γῆς) where θάλασσα is manifest as salt water at harbor scale.
• Temporal note: reef barriers do not supply the control for the operational city; they are expected as later accretion after sea‑level rise.
7. Capital‑island approach constraint (reef hazard timeline):
• Prediction 8. Present‑day unnavigability near the ruins owes to post‑destruction coral‑reef accretion (e.g., Gosong Gia). Independent dating (e.g., U/Th coral ages) should place reef growth after the destruction horizon; the functional city’s access must be explained by channels (διώρυξ) rather than by reefs.

Falsifiability rule. If any single core piece (gate behavior, inner‑sea enclosure, plain/canal geometry, −60 m shoreline coherence, harbor control) systematically contradicts measurements at the correct epoch, the assembly should be revised or rejected. Convergence across independent lines strengthens the application relative to rival models.

Context-clue consequence. Because the priest accommodates the audience with “what among you is called the Pillars of Heracles” (Greek: ὃ παρ’ ὑμῖν … Ἡρακλέους στήλαι [ho par’ hymin … Herakleous stelai, “what among you is called the Pillars of Heracles”]), the Pillars in this passage operate as a Greek label for the στόμα. The application question is therefore functional: does a real gateway behave as the required sea-mouth connecting an outer to an inner sea, after which a distinct local canal admits ships to ringed salty basins?

Gate identification (Kangean). On approach from the outer sea (Indian Ocean), the narrow seas about Kangean Island behave as a sea-mouth: ocean-ward lies long-fetch swell; within the mouth—ἐντὸς τοῦ στόματος [entos tou stomatos, “within the mouth”]—lies the Java Sea as the inner sea. This respects the “beyond/within” pair—πρὸ τοῦ στόματος [pro tou stomatos, “before the mouth”] vs. ἐντὸς τοῦ στόματος—as doorway language.

Local engineering scale. The διώρυξ [dioryx, “canal; cut”] belongs to the local island-port approach rather than the oceanic gateway, and the “rings”—κύκλοι θαλάσσης καὶ γῆς [kykloi thalasses kai ges, “rings of sea and land”]—remain consistent because θάλασσα [thalassa, “sea; salty water”] can denote salt water at harbor scale.

Application, not relocation. This addendum clarifies that Kangean/Java Sea is a model-test of the Order-3 assembly derived from Plato’s language. The Pillars remain a Greek label for a sea-mouth, not a monument placed “in” Atlantis.

Conclusion

This article has argued that στόμα [stoma, “mouth; opening; entrance”] in Plato should be read as a sign whose meaning is determined by narrative function and context. The Egyptian priest’s phrasing—ὃ παρ’ ὑμῖν … Ἡρακλέους στήλαι [ho par’ hymin … Herakleous stelai, “what among you is called the Pillars of Heracles”]—is a context clue that adopts a Greek ethnonymic label for the sea-mouth (στόμα θαλάσσης), rather than locating pillars inside Atlantis. This preserves the text’s two-threshold structure: a large-scale sea-mouth (outer vs inner sea) followed by a local διώρυξ leading into ringed salty basins (κύκλοι θαλάσσης καὶ γῆς).

By setting the method explicitly—semiotics (Saussure/Peirce/Barthes), linguistics (syntagmatic/paradigmatic/commutation/pragmatics), and philology—the reading becomes both conservative on the Greek and productive as a testable model. The Atlantis-time reconstruction relies on the ≈ −60 m shoreline and associated geography (sea-mouth, inner sea, plain, canals, capital-island, ringed θάλασσα). The post-destruction coral-reef overprint during sea-level rise explains the present-day unnavigability of the ruins and must not be used as a control on the functional city’s harbor design.

Treating “Pillars of Heracles” as a functional gateway label enables an application, not relocation: the Kangean Mouth/Java Sea can be evaluated against the assembled Order-3 object. The approach requires consilience: hydrodynamics (swell attenuation and lee inside the mouth), geomorphology (inner-sea enclosure under −60 m outlines), engineered access (narrow διώρυξ-style passes and ring-basin analogues), route logic (islands opposite the mouth toward a greater land), and stratigraphy/chronology (reef accretion dated after the destruction horizon). Failure on any core piece should trigger revision; convergence strengthens the application relative to Atlantic or other alternatives.

The next step is comparative: a transparent “scorecard” testing each candidate coastline against the same pilotage sequence and temporal constraints. The best model will not be the one with the most striking single match, but the one with the most independent pieces interlocking at once.