Ignatius Donnelly
Selected Bibliography
Atlantis: The Antediluvian World (1882)
Ragnarok: The Age of Fire and Gravel (1883)
The Great Cryptogram: Francis Bacon’s Cipher in the So-Called Shakespeare Plays (1888)
Caesar’s Column (1890)
The Golden Bottle or the Story of Ephraim Benezet of Kansas (1892)
The Bryan Campaign for the American People's Money (1896)
The Cipher in the Plays, and on the Tombstone (1899)
Ignatius Donnelly (November 3, 1831-January 1, 1901) grew up in Philadelphia and studied law. Donnelly moved to St. Paul in 1857 to plant a frontier town with John Nininger. The community collapsed after a few years, but Donnelly remained in Minnesota and entered politics. He entered politics with the Democratic Party, but frequently changed party affiliations. He was elected lieutenant governor in 1960 and served in Congress from 1863-1869. Politically, Donnelly was interested in women’s suffrage, the Freedman’s Bureau, and Populism.
In 1882, Donnelly published his first book, Atlantis: The Antediluvian World. In this book, Donnelly theorizes that Atlantis was an antediluvian civilization. He followed this book with other theoretical writings such as Ragnarok: The Age of Fire and Gravel and The Great Cryptogram: Francis Bacon’s Cipher in the So-Called Shakespeare Plays, in which he posits the idea that Francis Bacon wrote Shakespeare’s plays. Though he has now been discredited as a pseudo-scientist and pseudo-historian, Donnelly’s works were popular when first published.