10: Amaterasu’s Cave The Awano Iwato Shrine is a very real place,
despite being straight out of Japanese mythology.
It's located inside a larger area called Takachiho, which is somewhat similar in concept to the
Japanese version of Mount Olympus.
According to legend, it was the Shinto sun goddess Amaterasu who came to this place after
her brother played a cruel prank on her.
She was so upset by her brother that the goddess hid inside of a cave in Takachiho, thereby
depriving the world of sunlight.
The other gods and goddesses realized this was not ideal for the world.
So, they came to this place and gathered together to lure her out of the cave.
But Amaterasu was still too upset to leave, and so the world remained in darkness.
It wasn't until one of the goddesses performed a dance to make the gods laugh that Amaterasu
finally came out to see why everyone was having so much fun.
See the FOMO was real!
Once out of the darkness of the cavern, the light was once more shining in the world.
This is definitely just a mythical story, but the cave Amaterasu took shelter in is
a real place.
The Amano Iwato Shrine was built just outside its entrance, a truly breathtaking piece of
ancient Japanese architecture.
You can look directly inside the cave, to the dank alcove where the goddess had once
hidden the sun.
9: The Hill of Uisneach The Hill of Uisneach was once considered to
be the center of Irish mythology.
It's located in the barony of Rathconrath, and currently has the status of being a protected
monument.
The hill consists of megalithic tombs, several burial mounds, the ruins of stone walls, holy
wells, and even an ancient road from medieval times.
It's also quite close to the geographical center of Ireland, which may explain why it
was the sacred core of the island for thousands of years.
In Irish mythology, the Hill of Uisneach is supposed to be the burial place for several
different Irish gods, including the Dagda Mor.
He was the king god, ruler and protector of the Irish Celts.
The Irish believed he came from a giant race of people called the Tuatha De Danann, the
most important ruling clan of gods in Ireland.
There are plenty of myths about the Dagda Mor.
He was a warrior, a father figure, he fought the forces of evil, and his bones are under
the Hill of Uisneach.
There are other strange mythological stories surrounding this hill as well.
It's said to be a meeting place between the earthly realm and that of the Otherworld.
There was supposedly a sacred fire that blazed on its peak for seven years.
And once, long ago, there was a great hailstorm over the hill, which created the 12 great
rivers of Ireland.
No matter where you look in Irish mythology, the Hill of Uisneach is going to be mentioned
somewhere, and this incredible mythological location is one you can actually visit today
in the real world.
8: Sodom and Gomorrah When archaeologists were looking through the
ruins of a town from the Bronze Age called Tall el-Hammam, they discovered something
unbelievable.
The town had been destroyed in the year 1650 BC.
At that time, this was one of the three biggest cities in the region, even larger than Jerusalem.
It had mudbrick buildings over 5 stories tall, temples, places of learning – it was a true
metropolis.
But what archaeologists were stumped about was the fact that it seemed to have been completely
melted by fire in a single day.
It didn't look like the destruction seen through warfare, but by some kind of cataclysmic event.
It's now believed Tall el-Hammam was destroyed by a fireball from the sky.
An exploding space rock fell upon the city with the force of 1000 atomic bombs, likely
inspiring the mythical story of Sodom and Gomorrah.
The city of Sodom and Gomorrah is mentioned in the Book of Genesis as a place of great
sin.
The people in the city were so sinful and hedonistic that God rained upon them brimstone
and fire.
The Bible literally describes fire and sulfur coming from heaven and destroying the city
in a great blazing inferno.
Scientists can confirm that this really did happen.
According to Christopher R. Moore, archaeologist at the University of South Carolina, it was
an airburst from a meteor that destroyed Tall el-Hammam, aka Sodom and Gomorrah.
It likely exploded about 2.5 miles (4 km) above the tops of the buildings, creating
a blast force 1000 times more powerful than the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima.
The air temperature rose to 3600 degrees Fahrenheit. (1982 degrees Celsius) People’s clothing
burst into flames.
Wood was scorched and turned to ash.
Swords and pottery melted.
Then, a shockwave ripped through the city at over 740 mph (1190 kph) reducing every
man-made structure to a pile of rubble.
The ancient people who learned what happened here were so shocked, the only way they could
make sense of the devastation was by attributing it to an angry act of god.
7: The Killing Stone The Sessho-Seki is a stone from ancient Japanese
mythology.
It's also known as the Killing Stone.
Legend has it that anyone who touches the stone will die immediately.
The reason for the deadly quality of the stone?
According to the mythology, the boulder supposedly held an evil spirit.
The spirit is that of a nine-tailed fox who transformed itself into a beautiful woman
named Tamamo-no-Mae, with the intention of killing Emperor Toba.
However, the wily fox was no match for the emperor and was defeated.
Upon its defeat, the evil fox was put into the stone and dropped on a volcanic mountain.
And there the stone has stayed for centuries.
It was even registered as a historical site in 1957.
But in 2022, something unthinkable happened.
Visitors to the popular site were stupefied to see that the Killing Stone had split in
half.
Yes, the legendary stone containing the spirit of the nine-tailed fox broke apart, releasing
the evil spirit back into the world!
For those who really believe in Japanese mythology, this was not a good day.
There are some who still think the old tales are real.
These people are currently under the impression an evil spirit has been released from its
prison and is about to start causing serious problems.
On the other hand, the cracked stone was probably a natural occurrence caused by cold weather.
Rain and freezing temperature caused the stone to crack, not an angry spirit.
What do you think?
Let me know your thoughts in the comments!
6: The Hanging Gardens Out of all the ancient wonders of the world,
there is only one that's never technically been found.
The Hanging Gardens of Babylon have reached a mythical status in history because no one-
historians, archaeologists, researchers, and scientists alike, can figure out if the place
ever really existed.
The Hanging Gardens were described as a remarkable feat of engineering, a series of tiered gardens
with trees, shrubs, and all the wild plant life you can imagine.
The gardens were supposedly constructed alongside a grand palace by the Babylonian king, Nebuchadnezzar
II.
This was around 2500 years ago.
The biggest issue is that nobody has found archaeological proof of the Hanging Gardens
of Babylon.
There are also no ancient Babylonian texts that so much as mention the gardens.
Either this place was mythical, or there was some other garden that was greatly exaggerated
by Greek and Roman writers.
The third and final option is that the Hanging Gardens were built somewhere else altogether
– not in Babylon!
5: Sherwood Forest When somebody says Sherwood Forest, the first
thing that pops into your head is probably the famous outlaw Robin Hood.
But what you may not know is that Sherwood Forest is a very real place in England.
The existence of Robin Hood is highly debatable, but there's no arguing Sherwood Forest is
a real and very magical place.
So who was Robin Hood?
The truth is that Robin Hood was a common nickname given to any petty criminal starting
around the 13th century.
There were probably men just like Robin Hood who lived in the forest, hiding from the king
and his court.
They were definitely criminals, and the peasants probably looked up to them.
But nobody thinks there was one real Robin Hood.
Instead, the name first appears in a poem in 1377, then gets blown out of proportion
in 1521 by Scottish historian John Mayer.
From then on, Robin Hood was the medieval Batman.
As for Sherwood Forest, its history goes back to the days of prehistoric hunters.
Flint tools have been found belonging to Stone Age people.
Farmers cropped up in the Iron Age, and the Romans crept into the forest in the early
part of the Common Era.
It was once the biggest forest in England, with 100,000 acres in the 1200s.
This was during the rumors of Robin Hood, when real thieves lived in the woods and attacked
travelers.
Sadly, the forest has been picked apart and turned into farmland, and now most of it is
gone.
4: Hades We may not have any proof that the legendary
underworld from Greek mythology is a real place, but we do know where there is one supposed
entrance.
I am of course talking about Hades, the place people in the ancient Greek world believed
they went when they died.
Many people believed Hades was accessible through certain caves and tunnels going into
the earth.
Because they believed the underworld was literally under their feet, it only made sense that
you could journey there by finding the right cave.
One of these supposed entrances is at Cape Matapan.
It's here where several stories from Greek mythology took place.
It's where Orpheus entered the underworld to look for his lost love.
It's where Hercules went down into the gloom to fight Cerberus, Hades’ 3-headed dog.
Even the Spartans saw how important this place was and built temples and altars all over
the rocky headland.
There's also a temple here built by the Spartans that still stands, one dedicated to the sea
god Poseidon.
Today, we know the caves at Cape Matapan don’t lead to a terrible underground land of the
dead – but they are still there.
They've mostly flooded by now, and can only be visited by boat.
3: The Newgrange Tomb The Newgrange tomb in Ireland is certainly
one of the more mysterious places in the country.
The tomb dates back 5200 years, to the Neolithic Period.
It's also just one part of a much larger historic site called Bru na Boinne.
Together, there are three major tombs spread across the area: Knowth, Dowth, and Newgrange.
There's no denying the Newgrange tomb is a magical place.
The rocks are carved in strange Celtic designs of spirals.
There are over 97 large stones covered in these designs, used as the building blocks
of the megalithic tomb.
Archaeologists believe whoever made the designs didn't actually build the structure.
The Celts didn't arrive in Ireland for thousands of years after the tomb was completed, so
the strange spirals and other artwork probably came later.
We don't know exactly what ancient myths the Newgrange tomb was connected to.
We do know that it was built to perfectly line up with the sun during the winter solstice.
The sun beams through a box in the roof right above the entrance to the main passage.
On the winter solstice, the sun illuminates the main chamber and turns it into a blinding
box of pure gold for about 15 minutes.
All these thousands of years later, people still travel to the tomb every year just to
experience it.
2: The Fountain of Youth The myth of the fountain of youth has been
around for a very long time, in just about every culture.
There are dozens of legends from Japan to Polynesia about a special source of water
with either unbelievable healing properties, or the ability to make one immortal.
But we're here to talk about one place from myth that really does exist.
The story goes back to the Spanish conquistador Juan Ponce de León.
He heard rumors of a magical fountain and a rejuvenating river north of Cuba.
This was around the second voyage of Christopher Columbus to the New World in 1493.
But it wasn't until after his death that the stories of him and the Fountain of Youth began
being told throughout the empire.
In 1535, there was a rumor that Ponce de Leon was seeking the fountain to cure his impotence.
There are no historical records that show Ponce de Leon ever discovering the fountain
of youth.
There aren't even any records of him arriving in St. Augustine, Florida.
Most historians think he landed about 60 miles (96.5 km) south and missed it altogether.
Nonetheless, the St. Augustine Fountain of Youth is a very real place.
There is a natural spring here that people still believe magically gives them a youthful
appearance.
Rumor says Ponce de Leon was the first European to drink from the spring, but that’s probably
not true.
Either way, it’s been a source of alleged healing for Europeans and their descendants
for 500 years.
1: The Gates of Guinee If you've ever wondered where the mythical
gate to the voodoo underworld is, you're in for a treat.
Legend has it there are seven gates throughout the New Orleans’s French Quarter, all leading
to the land of the dead known as Guinee.
In voodoo teachings, the souls of the dead reside in this dark underworld.
It's not a place of misery and torture, but more like a murky plane of purgatory.
Spirits must wade through this purgatory before they're eventually reunited with their ancestors.
The voodoo underworld is ruled by Baron Samedi, a skeleton in a top hat.
For voodoo practitioners in America, these gates are in New Orleans, scattered at various
points along Canal Street in cemeteries.
One of them is supposedly hidden within the Saint Louis Cemetery, another in the Greenwood
Cemetery, one in the Cypress Grove Cemetery, and another in the St. Patrick Cemetery.
Have you ever been to New Orleans?
Did you see these gates?
Let me know in the comments below!
What’s your favorite ancient mythological place that actually exists?
Let me know about it in the comments and thanks a lot for watching!
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