10: The Midnight Terror Cave It was just before midnight on a warm evening
in 2006 when a Mennonite farmer living in western Belize heard the cries of a man in
the distance.
This man had fallen into a cave and was badly hurt.
It turned out he was a looter, and he had been drawn to the cave in search of Maya artifacts
that he wanted to sell on the black market.
Well, he fell into a cave ripe with artifacts.
They just weren't exactly the type he was looking for.
Rather than coming across jewels and pieces of gold, he discovered a treasure trove of
bones and human skulls spread across the cave floor.
These skeletons belonged to humans who had been sacrificed about 1000 years ago.
An archaeological expedition went to the cave in 2008, led by James Brady from California.
The farmer who found the screaming looter had dubbed the place the Midnight Terror Cave,
and that’s what scientists are still calling it.
Not long into their investigation, they realized they were dealing with a major site of ritual
sacrifice in the days of the Maya.
They found what can only be described as an astonishing number of human bones.
Over 10,000 bones were found littering the cave, with many of them having belonged to
children between the ages of 6 and 14.
However, we're not sure why the Midnight Terror Cave was such an important place of sacrifice
for the Maya.
They didn't exactly write down the details of why they were killing so many innocent
people inside the cave, offering the dead to their gods.
But whatever their reason, it must have been intense.
Would you be brave enough to explore this cave?
Let me know if you would dare!
9: Tham Khao Luang The underground sanctuary of Tham Khao Luang
is located in the old Thai town of Phetchaburi.
From the blistering heat of the jungle, one can descend into the depths of the cool, dimly
lit cave.
It's almost like stepping from one world into another.
But it's not the cool shade of the cave that makes it so fascinating, but rather the Buddha
statues that occupy the natural cavities in its limestone walls.
At the bottom of the cave, visitors are faced with rows and rows of buddhas.
And then when they get to the bottom, there's a great hallway carved into the rock, with
rows of even smaller Buddha statues surrounding it, complemented by a massive image of the
Buddha at the very center.
Once a day between February and April, the sun shines directly through a sinkhole on
the roof of the cavern, beaming light directly onto the largest Buddhist statue.
It's quite impressive, especially since the cave is usually empty or watched over by just
one monk.
This ancient sanctuary was built about a century ago during the rule of King Chulalongkorn.
The king originally wanted to build a great temple on the peak of Khao Luang mountain
but decided it would be more interesting to build it deep in the depths of the cave instead.
The only thing we don't know is where all the Buddha statues came from.
Most of them were brought to the site by Buddhist pilgrims and could have come from anywhere
in the world.
8: Cave of Monsters In a horrifying cave that was sealed off from
the outside world for five million years, Dr. Christian Lascu discovered 33 unbelievable
monsters.
These monsters had been sealed inside Movile Cave in Romania since the time prehistoric
beasts still wandered across the Earth.
The cave is nothing short of a natural phenomenon.
Because it was closed off from the world for so long, no fresh air was able to reach its
depths.
Eventually, the air within the cave became toxic and horribly humid.
Humans can't even walk into this cave without protective equipment or they'll suffocate
and die.
As you can probably imagine, the lifeforms that managed to thrive here aren’t exactly
the cuddliest.
So far, scientists have identified 48 different species of creatures living inside the prehistoric
time capsule. 33 of them are found in the Movile Cave and nowhere else on the planet.
I'm talking about spiders, scorpions, and centipedes.
They've existed in a creepy yet peaceful utopia inside the cave for longer than humans have
been alive.
Because there is no natural sunlight, the organisms have developed some pretty weird
features.
Most of them are white or pinkish translucent.
None of them have eyeballs.
And they've all developed extra-long antennae and limbs so they have an easier time moving
about in the dark.
What do you think about these creepy crawlies?
Let me know in the comments below!
7: The Lives of Neanderthals A cave chamber was discovered in Gibraltar
that hadn't been opened for tens of thousands of years.
Now, that’s nowhere close to 5 million – there were no creepy crawly monsters.
But there were some interesting finds involving our friends the Neanderthals.
It was archaeologists with the Gibraltar National Museum who started digging through the chambers
and passages of the Vanguard Cave in 2012.
This cave is part of the larger Gorham’s Cave Complex, which happens to be a UNESCO
World Heritage site.
Just about a decade after they started looking through blocked passages, they came upon the
most interesting chamber yet.
They found a cavern deep in the back of the cave filled with the decayed remains of vultures
and lynxes, as well as scratch marks on the walls made by some kind of mysterious cave
creature.
But they also found the remains of a marine mollusk, which had probably been brought into
the chamber by a Neanderthal who once lived here.
It's interesting because the mollusk’s remains have been dated to 40,000 years ago, the exact
time the Neanderthals disappeared, probably pushed into extinction by modern humans.
This would have been one of the very last remaining Neanderthals, packing his bounty
from the sea back into the deepest and darkest corner of the cave to feast.
But the experts don't know what could have made the strange scratches on the wall, nor
why there were so many ancient remains of vultures!
It's all pretty strange!
6: The Toothy Snail A newly discovered snail inside of a cave
is one of the weirdest scientists have ever found.
In northern Spain, Dr. Adrienne Jochum and researchers from Germany collected information
on 57 gastropod populations.
They went into a variety of Spanish caves and documented and analyzed all the snails
they could find.
And while most of them were already known to science, the one I'm telling you about
now is new!
The snail is from an entirely new genus, discovered in the Cantabrian Mountains in Spain.
They named it Ibero Zospeum.
And while that name is pretty boring, the snail is not.
It stands out because it has a transparent shell and a pair of vampire-like pronged teeth
in its mouth.
But it doesn't use its teeth for killing, it's more like a two-pronged rake to sift
through the mud on the bottom of the cave and slurp up food particles.
Pretty cool huh?
There's lots of creatures waiting to be discovered if you just have the patience to look!
5: The Depths of Mammoth Cave If you've never heard of Mammoth Cave in Kentucky,
you're missing out.
It is the longest cave in the world.
But apparently, it might be even bigger than anyone thought.
We already knew that only a small fraction of the cave has ever been mapped or explored.
And now, researchers believe they've identified an extra 12.9km (8mi) of passages, making
the cave even longer.
As for the history of this ancient place, it was first explored by the prehistoric Native
Americans about 5000 years ago.
Based on archaeological discoveries in modern times, researchers are confident the Native
Americans explored and utilized about 31km (19m) of cave passages.
They didn’t push past the surface, as they had no need to tunnel down into the bowels
of what they must have assumed was hell.
But they did sometimes use it as a burial ground.
In the 19th century, archaeologists came across Native American remains, most of them mummified
by the cold and lifeless air of the cave.
In total, there is at least 600mi (966km) of uninterrupted tunnels and passages leading
through the dark and damp underground.
There are over 200 caves connected via these tunnels and passages, all carved by thousands
of years of soft limestone dissolved by rain and raging underground rivers.
Out of the enormous amount of underground tunnels, 420mi (676k of them are completely
unexplored.
Would you dare explore the depths of Mammoth Cave?
Let me know how far you think you could go in the comments and don't forget to hit subscribe
before the end of the video!
4: The Beer Cave A cave that had been lost to time was just
recently rediscovered in a St. Louis neighborhood.
As you might already know, Missouri is home to 6400 caves.
It's the most famous state for caving and underground adventures.
Plenty of those caves happen to be located right underneath the city streets of St. Louis.
If you're familiar with the city, you'll probably know about its long history of beer making.
So, it only makes sense that brewing and caving go hand in hand.
Bill Kranz of McHose and English Cave Recovery was behind this most recent rediscovery.
He and his team lowered a special LIDAR scanning unit down into the cave to map out its depths.
The issue was that the cave’s entrance had collapsed a long time ago, so there was no
way into the place.
Bill had to drill a hole and stick his scanning device through it.
As it turned out, the cave is quite small, only about 30ft ( 9m) wide and 15ft (4.5m)
tall.
It had been sealed for around 100 years.
But before that, it had a variety of uses.
The team was able to see that the cave had not only been used for storing ale and brewing
beer, but also for farming mushrooms and as a wine grotto.
City records show the cave had even been used as a community garden before it eventually
collapsed.
What's cool is that this is just one of the dozens of caves underneath St. Louis, many
of them used for brewing beer and storing ale.
This goes back to the 1800s when locals in Missouri realized natural caves made great
cellars for beer storage.
There's probably a lot more beer waiting to be found.
3: The Lair of Hercules The Lair of Hercules is supposedly located
in the mysterious Caves of Karaftu in modern Iran.
The caves are over 6500ft (1981m) above sea level and have seen a lot over the years.
They were almost certainly occupied by a garrison of Seleucid fighters from the Seleucid Empire
that ruled the region after Alexander the Great died in 323 BC.
Hundreds of years later, the caves were likely used as rest stops for weary merchants moving
along the Silk Road from China to Europe.
But by far the most interesting thing ever discovered in the Caves of Karaftu is a simple
inscription written in Greek.
It was found in the 19th century by European explorers and was translated to read: “Here
is the home of Hercules.
Whoever enters this cave will be safe.”
It's difficult to know exactly what was meant by the inscription.
Was this the home of a person named Hercules?
Or was this cave somehow tied to the mythical figure of Hercules?
Nobody knows, but it had great significance to someone 2000 years ago.
Do you think Hercules is an actual person or just a myth?
Let me know in the comments!
2: A New Species of Human An entirely new species of human was discovered
deep in a cave in the Philippines.
Foot and hand bones, as well as some teeth and a partial leg bone, were uncovered in
Callao Cave, belonging to a previously undiscovered creature.
This creature lived on the Philippine island of Luzon sometime between 50,000 and 67,000
years ago.
That's about the same time our human ancestors were leaving Africa.
The creatures, ancient offshoots of humans, were very real hobbits like from the Lord
of the Rings.
Based on the bone structure, scientists confirmed them to be a maximum of about 3ft (1m) tall.
They weren't exactly a direct ancestor of humans, but a kind of cousin species.
In other words, they took a slightly different evolutionary route away from ancient primates
on their way to humanity.
But they never made it.
They evolved into human-like dwarves who lived in caves, a kind of pygmy human species.
Then, they went extinct for an unknown reason.
They never even made it off the island, at least not according to the archaeological
evidence.
They appeared to have been restricted to this one small piece of land, which could explain
why they just kind of faded away.
1: The Lascaux Cave Paintings It was in September of 1940 that four French
teenagers wandered into a cave and made a shocking discovery.
It happened in the woods near the village of Montignac when the kids allegedly lost
their dog and went searching for it.
Looking for their lost friend brought them to a secret tunnel and a gaping hole in the
ground, where they thought they might be able to find buried treasure.
What they found instead after descending a narrow shaft about 15m (50ft) into the earth
was a cave with its walls covered in unbelievable paintings.
News of the cave spread, and it wasn't long before archaeologists and anthropologists
started investigating.
The cave turned out to be one of the largest prehistoric galleries on the planet.
Many of the paintings within the French cave date back to 15,000 BC, or 17,000 years ago.
They show extinct species of bulls called aurochs, ancient massive horses, and strange
figures of a man with the head of a bird.
It's believed ancient shamans carried out rituals inside the cave, and the locals left
their knowledge on its walls in the form of paintings.
Sadly, the thousands of early visitors to the Lascaux Cave damaged and erased much of
the artwork.
The atmosphere inside the cave is so thick that many visitors fainted.
All the breathing created moisture, mold developed, and installed artificial lighting caused the
paintings to fade.
The cave was finally closed to the public in 1963, but by then much of the artwork was
already heavily damaged.
Would you ever wander into a strange, dark cave that you found in the woods?
Let me know how brave you are in the comments and thanks for watching!
Hit that subscribe button if you haven’t already, and I’ll see you again soon for
another awesome video.