In Paris Before the Deluge (1866), Hippolyte Mettais, the author of The Year 5865, displays his imaginative reach, creating a novel that incorporates the lost city of Atlantis, the biblical story of the Flood, and the founding of Paris. Set more than four thousand years in the past, Paris Before the Deluge is a lesson about the rise and fall of civilizations with its credible mixture of exotic locales, spurned lovers, power grabs, lost dynasties and the constant quest for the favor of ancient gods. Within this mythological antediluvian world, Mettais unfolds a tale of religious and revolutionary sentiments that remains an important document in the history of French speculative fiction as well as the modern development of the Atlantis legend.