From cities with mysterious origins, to ones that were nearly wiped off the map forever,
Here are 9 ancient ruins that have defied history.
No matter what they’ve been through, they are still here!
9.
Çatalhöyük, Turkey Built in what was once Mesopotamia, the city
of Çatalhöyük, which now resides in Turkey, is easily one of the biggest mysteries of
the ancient world.
I mean reaaaallly ancient, it reached its heyday around 7000 BC!!
This place makes ancient Rome look modern!!
These tightly clustered mudbrick houses kind of look like honeycombs, don’t you think?
Every single house in this city shares a wall or two with another house, just like how honeycomb
is connected in a hive.
To get out of their houses, the people would use ladders and cut doors in the roofs.
The people would actually walk across the roofs like we would walk across the street.
The Neolithic residents left behind paintings, plaster reliefs, and pottery.
As well as their dead which they buried in the floors!
At one time, this thriving ancient metropolis had about 8,000 residents and archaeologists
are still uncovering thousands of mysterious objects.
There are many skulls found that have the same type of head wounds in the skulls that
later healed (so they were non fatal).
This has led archaeologists to believe that they might have been an egalitarian society
but that they used controlled violence to keep everyone in check.
We are still trying to understand how these people lived, and why things eventually fell
apart.
8.
Palenque, Mexico Mexico is a land of many mysteries and lost
people and cities.
But easily the biggest civilization, with the biggest mystery surrounding them, are
the Mayans.
This tribe came from an unknown area, arrived in Mexico, and set up an empire that lasted
over 3000 years.
Then they were gone.
To this day, many still study the Mayans in order to find out more about them, and especially
what happened to them.
One of their most well-preserved cities that they made was Palenque.
Palenque is a prime example of how well the Mayans could plan and construct their cities.
This place not only had temples, but other massive public and ceremonial buildings, and
texts inscribed in various places that help tell the tales of the empire.
So here's the question, if the Mayans were so powerful, and Palenque was so advanced,
why did they abandon it?
Most historians note that the city was abandoned around the 1400's, much like various other
Mayan cities.
But why?
Why did they leave such wonders behind?
Were they driven out?
Did they have to flee to survive?
Or were they all affected by a disease?
No one knows the answers to these questions, but there are many expeditions going on to
try and figure out the answer.
And now for number 7 but first be sure to subscribe if you haven't already!!
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7.
Cahokia, United States This one might come as a surprise.
In the United States, there is an old city that used to be the biggest city in North
America at one point in time.
This was the city of Cahokia, a pre-Columbian Native American City.
It was founded around the year 600 and lasted until the 14th century.
You can still go there today, it's across from St. Louis on the other side of the Mississippi
river.
The builders of Cahokia were very talented and their gigantic mounds still exist today.
Although they didn’t leave behind any written records, the urban planning and agricultural
evidence tells scientists that Cahokia was once home to around 40,000 people, which baffles
scientists.
Some estimates claim that in the 13th century, the population of Cahokia was equal to that
of London in the same century!
The people would use the Mississippi River to water their crops, and created tributaries
that would make the water go where they needed it to.
While it's not known exactly who lived there, many guess that there were members from several
different tribes and the people later became known as the Mississippians.
It’s hard to say what happened to these people.
When the French arrived in the 17th century, the mounds were already there.
Archaeologists are wondering what happened to everybody and they believe that they may
have run out of food, or had difficulty battling contamination in these city-like conditions.
Just like the Maya, the city was abandoned.
6.
Derinkuyu, Turkey Turkey is home to another ancient, fascinating
and mysterious place: Derinkuyu.
The concept of making underground cities may seem like something from fantasy television
shows, or Fraggle Rock, but many cultures have made very grand underground cities.
Turkey has a lot of ancient cities like this, and not just underground, but in caves.
But, when it comes to Derinkuyu, it's honestly a whole other story.
This city is ancient, and can be traced back to the 8th century BC.
Christians took over and expanded the underground caverns.
It reached its peak during the earliest days of the Byzantine Empire when it was used by
the Christians as a hideout during the Arab-Byzantine wars At its peak it held about 20,000 people,
a very impressive number for that many people to be living, and thriving, underground.
And remember, this is before the year 1000, so they didn’t have all the modern advances
we have.
They had to worry about sanitation, ventilation, safety, and general health.
To be clear, this wasn't a slum, or a makeshift city, this place had churches, and kitchens,
and areas for livestock, it even had a place to make wine!
This truly was a civilized and fully realized city under the earth.
Why was the city underground?
It was meant to be a safe haven for people.
It was a dark time in this period of history, and there was a lot of warfare going on above
ground.
Later on it was used by Christians and refugees to hide from the Ottomans.
This place was a safe haven with secret entries and exits where people could bring in goods
and provide services and live their daily life in relative safety.
Weirdly enough, later on the city was sealed off for some reason, and it wasn't opened
again until 1969, by accident.
Over 200 underground cities have been discovered in the region.
5.
Yonaguni Monument, Japan Off of the coast of Japan, there is a place
called Yonaguni Island which was famous for hammerhead sharks.
Now, people are more intrigued by some unnerving formations in the water that were found by
a diver in 1987.
The Yonaguni Monument is a series of rock formations that has the scientific world split
as to whether this is a natural design, or something made by humans.
And it's a debate that continues on to this day.
It looks like a lost city that sunk into the ocean.
The monument: is characterized as having clear right angles and the largest structure is
about 90 feet tall.
It seems like there are stone pillars, a wall, a road and a star-shaped platform.
There is evena rock protrusion that looks like the carving of a human face.
But there are a lot of theories as to how this happened.
For example some think that it was a real city that was built above the water when the
ocean level was lower.
It was then later slowly swallowed up by the rising waters.
However, there's no definitive proof that this is the case.
Many others think it is just limestone rock which tends to break off at sharp angles,
and that it was never a city at all, but geological formations.
No one has a clear answer to what this monument really is.
What do you think??
Let me know in the comments!!
Or we could plan a diving expedition and go see it for ourselves!!
I’ve heard the currents are very strong though, but in any case, it would still be
cool to see those hammerheads!
4.
Machu Picchu, Peru Machu Picchu is arguably one of the most interesting
and revealing places in the world.
Why?
Because it's through this city that we got to take a look inside the Incan Empire.
This civilization ruled a lot of South America for quite some time, and their territory included
Peru, Bolivia, Chile, Argentina, and more.
And yet, for a while, we didn't know that much about them, until we found Machu Picchu.
This was one of the biggest cities in the empire, and as such, we're able to learn a
lot from it.
One of the most shocking discoveries of the city is that it was missing one of the most
common aspects present in all other civilizations in the world.
It didn’t have a marketplace.
In this city, and apparently in all the other cities in the empire, they didn't have marketplaces.
Which makes you wonder how they bought food, traded items, or even just interacted with
one another.
Numerous civilizations built their cities around a central marketplace, yet the Incas
didn't, why?
We are still trying to understand their civilization and how they were able to build their cities
and monuments in such high places.
3.
Thonis, Egypt If you're big into history, then you knew
that it was only a matter of time before Egypt showed up on my list.
And as you know, it is home to many ruins and mysteries, and the main topic of several
videos on this channel!!
Be sure to check them out when you finish this video!!
One of the biggest mysteries in the past was what had happened to Thonis, also known as
Heracleion.
It was a port town in Egypt, and was literally viewed as a gateway into the country itself.
It had massive buildings, and monuments to show off their culture and power to the Mediterranean.
Then, one day, it sank into the Mediterranean Sea, where it remains to this day.
It took a loooong time to find it again!!
It didn’t seem to disappear in the blink of an eye either.
This apparently happened over time.
But no one is really sure of the cause.
Many speculate that earthquakes, or liquefaction could be the cause of its demise, but no one
can say!
It could be the waters just changed their course.
Needless to say, Egypt had to adapt big time after the loss of Thonis.
2.
Great Zimbabwe, Zimbabwe Sticking with Africa, let's head to Zimbabwe,
which holds one of the biggest mysteries of the continent.
It's called...
Great Zimbabwe.
Yeah, doesn't really sound mysterious, does it?
But don't let that fool you, there's more to this than you might think.
From 1200-1400, Great Zimbabwe was a major point of trade, people came from all around
including from India and China!!
The city was very wealthy and had many different industries including farming, livestock, and
mining.
It was a true crown jewel of the region.
Yet, like just about all cities or monuments on this list, its success led to ruin, and
no one is exactly sure why?
Some think that Great Zimbabwe grew so big that its resources began to dwindle, forcing
the people to move away in order to survive.
Like Cahokia and maybe even Palenque, they may have run out of food.
Others speculate that cultural changes led people away from this trade haven.
Either way, it's now a ruin, and many archaeologists and researchers are trying to figure out what
happened!
1.
Pompeii, Italy There are many scary stories in history, but
the story of Pompeii is one that we just can’t get over.
This is the city that was built in the fertile valley near a volcano, Mt. Vesuvius.
When it erupted, it caught people by surprise and buried the city in soot and ash and left
it covered and perfectly preserved for hundreds of years.
Now much of it has been uncovered and it is a sad historical marvel and many people were
frozen in time forever.
As people continued to uncover the ancient city, some oddities began to emerge.
Because of how it was buried, everything that survived is actually in pristine shape, which
is a miracle in many ways.
The fun part though, is that there are many interesting "items" that you can see in the
city that have many wondering what was going on in Pompeii.
For example, there are statues of reproductive organs, graffiti that makes no sense, arrangements
of items that make even less sense, and the list goes on and on.
What does it all mean?
Why did the citizens of Pompeii have all of this in their city?
It's certainly not documented in any of the history books, but it was believed that the
people of Pompeii were being punished by the Gods.
While there are stories and some documents of Pompeii, it just goes to show that while
history may be written by those who have survived it, that doesn't mean they're telling everyone
everything.
Thanks for watching!
What did you think of these cities in ruins?
Would you like to visit any of them?
Let me know in the comments below.
Be sure to subscribe and see you next time!