10.
Troy In the 1870s, an amateur archaeologist by
the name of Heinrich Schliemann discovered the lost city of Troy.
However, he also inadvertently almost destroyed it.
Heinrich was a German businessman with a taste for archaeology.
In 1873 he discovered a lost cache of artifacts in the Turkish town of Hisarlik.
He immediately identified these treasures as having belonged to king Priam, the mythical
king of Troy.
This led to the theory that Hisarlik was in fact the location of Troy, the city from Homer’s
great story the Iliad.
But here’s the incredible thing about what happened.
Yes, Heinrich got lucky when he identified Hisarlik as the real city of Troy, but the
treasure he discovered actually had nothing to do with it.
Archaeologists dated the treasure to 1250 years before the Trojan War even started.
It had come from a totally different civilization, one that had lived a millennium before the
Trojans ever came around.
Now here comes the destruction.
Archaeologists assumed Trojan treasure would be at the lowest level of the archaeological
site.
And so, even though they knew there was lots of archaeological evidence from other civilizations,
they dug it all up trying to find riches!
The discovery of Troy was a huge fiasco, and basically just a 19th century treasure hunt.
By the time Heinrich was done pillaging the gold and other goods from Troy, he had destroyed
almost every trace of the ancient city he'd originally wanted to find.
9.
Ancient Tomb of Secrets A mysterious ancient tomb belonging to a dignitary
at the highest level of government, has just been discovered in Egypt.
This guy was kind of like the director of the FBI, or maybe the CIA.
Whichever one has access to all the juiciest and most secret documents.
He had full entry to all the forbidden mysteries of the pharaohs, and was charged with protecting
that information with his life.
This was about 4700 years ago.
According to the hieroglyphs found in the man's tomb, his name was Mehtetju.
The hieroglyphs also said that he was a top official with access to royal sealed documents.
And this explains why the tomb was discovered right next to the Step Pyramid of Djoser.
The Step Pyramid was the very first one to be built by the ancient Egyptians, constructed
as a monument to the dead king Djoser.
Centuries after Djoser was dead, the tradition of burying high-level officials near the pyramid
continued.
Mehtetju lived during the first three pharaohs of the 6th Dynasty.
That includes Teti, Userkare, and Pepi I.
We don't know how many of these pharaohs he served, but it was at least two or three of
them between 2323 and 2255 BC.
You could think of him like Jaffar in the Aladdin movie, as the advisor to all the rulers
of Egypt.
His other names included "inspector of the royal estate" and he was also a priest of
the mortuary cult of Pharaoh Teti.
He did it all!
Sadly, we don't actually know what kind of secrets he was keeping.
None of those documents have been found, and researchers are still combing through the
tomb looking for more evidence.
8.
Lovelock Cave In the legends of the Native American tribes
of Nevada, the Paiute, they speak of giants.
The Paiute once told stories to the early white settlers about a mysterious race of
barbarians which they called Si-Te-Cah.
They described these giants as being extremely unfriendly, unnecessarily aggressive, and
horrifyingly cannibalistic!
According to the legend, there was a great battle between the regular humans and the
giants, and it took place at Lovelock Cave.
Now here's where things get really interesting.
In the early 20th century, archaeologists stumbled upon Lovelock Cave, the site of the
great giant extinction.
Much to their surprise, they found thousands of artifacts within the cave.
It was enough for the superstitious and easily excitable 20th-century folks to believe the
story was real.
The artifacts uncovered included weapons, bones, baskets, and tools.
It was enough evidence to show that people did indeed live in the cave for a very long
time, starting somewhere around 2000 BC.
Occupation lasted for about 3000 years.
There was an actual culture that lived inside of this cave, not at all related to the Paiutes.
And so, the consensus is that the legend was most likely very real, although the people
in the cave weren’t actually giants.
They were probably just a different tribe, maybe a tribe of cannibals, that the Paiute
hunted to extinction. 7.
The Colossi of Memnon The Colossi of Memnon were built to represent
the great Pharaoh Amenhotep III, who ruled Egypt for a brief time in the 18th Dynasty.
The enormous statues were completed in 1350 BC.
They are truly massive titans, rising 60 feet(18 m) above the ground, with each statue weighing
720 tons(720,000kg).
They were carved from single pieces of sandstone, making them some of the biggest and most impressive
sculptures ever.
But it's not only the size of the colossi that makes them so fantastic, it’s the legend
behind them.
The statues were originally meant to be guardians for Amenhotep III’s Mortuary complex, which
once stood directly behind them, but has since been destroyed by floods and earthquakes.
Almost nothing remains today, nothing except the colossi.
Almost 3500 years later, they are still sitting patiently on their thrones outside the city
of Luxor, watching over the Nile River.
When the Greeks came to Egypt and saw the colossi, they named them after their own hero,
Memnon.
Memnon was an Ethiopian king who fought in the Trojan War and died at the hands of the
champion Achilles.
When Greek tourists saw the huge statues, they immediately associated them with the
Ethiopian king instead of the Egyptian pharaoh they were actually modeled after.
And now here comes the strangest part about the colossi.
Sometime around the year 20 AD, a Greek historian by the name of Strabo wrote that the statues
used to sing at dawn.
Early in the morning, one could hear a kind of gentle humming noise coming from the statues,
as if a woman was quietly singing.
This phenomenon was heard by Roman emperors and even regular people for hundreds of years
– yet for some unknown reason, it seems to have stopped in modern times.
And now for number 6, but first it’s shout out time!
Big thank you to Sean Barnes and B Quiet for supporting this channel!
Be sure to subscribe if you haven’t already to join the OE family!
6.
The NYC of Canada The Mantle Site was founded roughly between
the years 1500 and 1530.
It was, for its time, the biggest and most cosmopolitan settlement in north Canada.
It sat on the shores of Lake Ontario, and was kind of like the original New York City.
The Huron Native Americans created the settlement, which was about the size of Manhattan.
By the time the Europeans arrived, there were about 1800 people living at the site.
That's not much more than a few city blocks these days, but was unheard of in Canada 500
years ago.
The Native Americans usually lived in very small tribes of nomads, and typically traveled
place to place instead of settling in one large community.
Researcher Jennifer Birch described Mantle as more of a medieval town than an old Native
American community.
Because even though the cultures were wildly different, the formation of society was almost
exactly the same.
Sadly, there isn't a lot left of Mantle these days.
Even though it's a huge site, it remained hidden underneath vegetation for hundreds
of years while the archaeological evidence decayed and vanished.
Researchers have uncovered the remains of 98 longhouses, but only the imprint of them
left on the ground.
5.
Nalanda 1000 years before today, there was a university
called Nalanda.
According to the legends, this great school of learning, which was located in India, attracted
students from all over the world.
Young people from Persia, Greece, Tibet, and China – they all came to this university
to study in its famous library.
Subjects such as theology, logic, metaphysics, and philosophy were all taught here.
The school really was the pride of ancient India.
One could almost compare it to the Library of Alexandria in Egypt.
But just like the great library, this mysterious school came to an abrupt and violent end.
In the year 1193, an army of Turks showed up.
They ransacked the school, burned the Buddhist monks alive, beheaded the students, and left
the people and their beloved university in shambles.
The library was burned down, and all traces of the school vanished until the 19th century.
In fact, legend says the library contained so many books and manuscripts that the fire
raged on for three months!
And while that may not actually be true, it goes to show just how prestigious of an institution
Nalanda really was.
These days, Nalanda is nothing of its former self.
All that’s left are high stone walls that weren't torn down, staircases that wouldn't
burn, and floors of brick that were lost under wild growth.
The most famous part of Nalanda is its giant stupa.
Surrounding the main stupa are several smaller stupas, containing the remains of the monks
and scholars who once resided at the university.The current archaeological park is about 14 hectares,
although researchers say that only represents 10% of the original area of the school.
It was truly a massive and unrivaled place in the ancient world.
4.
The Themistoclean Wall In the year 479 BC, the Persians attacked
Athens.
It was a brutal fight, but the Greeks managed to push the Persians out of their territory.
Following the fighting, Themistocles urged the Athenians to fortify their city.
His suggestion was to build great walls to keep the Persians out.
However, the Spartans didn't think it was a good idea.
They believed that if the Persians ever came back, they would simply occupy the city itself
and use its walls against the Greeks.
Despite the warning of the Spartans, the Athenians went ahead and built the wall anyway.
Within just a few years, Athens was surrounded by one of the greatest walls the ancient world
had ever seen.
It was about 8 feet(2.4 m) thick, 24 feet(7.3 m) tall, and 8 meters long . They even dug
themselves a moat around the wall to help defend themselves from any potential invasion.
Alas, the great wall turned out to be completely useless.
In the year 86 BC, the Romans snuck into the city one night under the cover of darkness,
and smashed the wall to pieces!
Emperor Hadrian rebuilt the wall, but later raids on Athens saw it destroyed yet again.
And today, there is very little trace of the walls which once protected the city.
Only a few chunks of it have been found, with the best-preserved section near the Holy Gate,
where the Romans once held the procession to the Eleusinian Mysteries.
3.
Romano-British Trading Center Archaeologists in England recently stumbled
upon a mysterious trade center from the days when Rome occupied the British Isles.
Researchers with Oxford Archaeology were performing excavations at Bishop’s Stortford, a historic
town located in the heart of Hertfordshire.Hertfordshrr etc
The commercial center was built alongside what was once an ancient Roman highway.
In fact, it was almost like a rest stop.
It was here they discovered evidence of various businesses that had been set up in the town
specifically to serve the needs of travelers.
Sure, they found a Roman cemetery, plenty of Roman coins and smashed pieces of pottery.
But the really interesting discoveries were in the form of facilities, evidence of an
ancient inn where merchants and adventurers would have stayed the night.
They found a blacksmith facility right next to the inn, where those same travelers could
have had their wagons mended and their armaments improved.
There was even a religious temple for villagers to pray or meditate depending on which gods
they worshiped.
Archaeologists say the town was likely founded around the year 43 AD, and continued to function
as a waypoint for weary wanderers up until around 410 AD.
Then, for an unknown reason, the site was abandoned.
2.
Settlements Under the Amazon Just recently, researchers used specialized
lasers to penetrate the dense jungle canopy of the Amazon.
They did this to map out the land beneath.
Thanks to these special lasers, scientists discovered 11 previously unknown settlements
deep in the Amazonian jungle.
These settlements were complete with pyramids, waterways, highways, and so much more.
This new discovery has revealed an entirely unknown world in South America, one occupied
by an unknown, but seemingly advanced race of humans.
The researchers examined 6 specific areas within a region of 1737 square miles(4499
square km).
They did this in the Bolivian part of the Amazon using special laser equipment fixed
to a helicopter.
They found two main settlements, which were about the size of large prehistoric cities.
And then they identified 24 smaller sites, although 15 had already been known.
Now, these weren't just a bunch of jungle huts.
These were big communities with water-managing infrastructure, complex canals and reservoirs,
pyramids of over 70 feet(21 m) tall, and everything else you would expect from an ancient society
anywhere in the Mediterranean.
It’s believed this part of the Bolivian Amazon was home to the Casarabe culture, although
almost nothing is known about these people.
They occupied the region from 500 to 1400 AD – yet all of their settlements and villages
have already been eaten up by the jungle.
This discovery is even bigger than it might sound.
Because until recently, no respectable archaeologist believed that a complex culture was living
in the Amazon.
It was always thought the jungle was too dense, and that the people were too primitive.
But as we can see now, that wasn't the case at all.
The biggest mystery is trying to figure out where these people came from, and why they
seemingly faded into oblivion while their cities were swallowed by nature.
1.
Wyoming Quarry A red ochre quarry has been discovered in
Wyoming and it’s 13,000 years old!
It was found in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains, buried underneath a large, forested
hill.
According to archaeologists, it’s indisputable proof that professional quarrying was happening
12,840 years ago to be exact.
In Wyoming, the Paleoindians dug the very first mineshaft in North America to bring
out raw red ochre for use in all kinds of things.
It's a pretty incredible timeline when you consider that humans weren't even supposed
to have arrived in North America until 13,000 years ago.
It seems unusual that in such a short amount of time, they made it down to Wyoming and
became amateur miners.
Still, there's no arguing with scientific dating.
They were definitely here, and they were definitely using the red ochre for everything from pigments
for rituals to cave paintings.
And to make the discovery even more amazing, it's the only ancient red ochre quarry ever
identified north of southern Mexico.
Thanks for watching.
Be sure to subscribe and come back soon for more awesome videos of the ancient world!
See you then, bye!