Top 10 Mysteries of Ancient or Lost Civilizations
Published on October 31, 2008 - 125 Comments
Understanding our past is what historians and anthropologists seek to do. Looking back we will witness civilizations rise and fall, as humanity walks down a very repetitive path of construction and destruction. Still, there are some ancient cultures that seem incredibly alien to us, legends and strange encounters cast nothing but shadow over some of these peoples. Some are said to be very advanced and tranquil only to vanish with some cataclysm and others, despite stories and accounts of encounters, never seem to have existed. Here is a list of mysteries surrounding ancient peoples.
Most Egyptologists believe the Great Sphinx on the Giza plateau is about 4,500 years old. But that number is just that - a belief, a theory, not a fact. As Robert Bauval says in ‘The Age of the Sphinx’, “there was no inscriptions - not a single one - either carved on a wall or a stela or written on the throngs of papyri” that associates the Sphinx with this time period. So when was it built? John Anthony West challenged the accepted age of the monument when he noted the vertical weathering on its base, which could only have been caused by long exposure to water in the form of heavy rains. In the middle of the desert? Where did the water come from? It so happens that this area of the world experienced such rains - about 10,500 years ago! This would make the Sphinx more than twice its currently accepted age. Bauval and Graham Hancock have calculated that the Great Pyramid likewise dates back to about 10,500 B.C. - predating the Egyptian civilization. This raises the questions: Who built them and why?
I’ll just point out that the general sphinx shape is a natural formation in that part of the world, due to winds + sand. Egyptologists point out that the Egyptians would have noticed the cat-like shape, and then carved in the features.
The famous Nazca lines can be found in a desert about 200 miles south of Lima, Peru. On a plain measuring approximately 37 miles long and one mile wide are etched lines and figures that have puzzled the scientific world since their discovery in the 1930s. The lines run perfectly straight, some parallel to one another, many intersecting, making the lines look from the air like ancient airport runways. This prompted Erich von Daniken in his book Chariots of the Gods to suggest that they actually were runways for extraterrestrial craft. More intriguing are the gigantic figures of 70-some animals carved into the ground - a monkey, a spider, and a hummingbird among others. The puzzle is that these lines and figures are of such a scale that they can only be recognized from a high altitude. So what is their significance? Some believe they have an astronomical purpose, while others think they served in religious ceremonies. A recent theory suggests the lines lead to sources of precious water. The truth is, no one really knows.
There are many, many, many theories as to the true location of Atlantis. We get the legend of Atlantis from Plato who wrote about the beautiful, technologically advanced continent-sized island back in 370 B.C., but his description of its location was limited and vague. Many, of course, conclude that Atlantis never really existed. Those who think it did exist have sought evidence or at least clues in almost every corner of the globe. Edgar Cayce’s famous prophecies said remnants of Atlantis would be found around Bermuda, and in 1969, geometric stone formations were found near Bimini (a.k.a. The Bimini Road) that believers said confirmed Cayce’s prediction. Other proposed locations for Atlantis include Antarctica, Mexico, off the coast of England, possibly even off the coast of Cuba (see below). The controversy and theories will likely continue until someone uncovers a sign saying: “Welkommen zu Atlantis! Eat at Joe’s.”
There’s been a lot of hoopla over the supposed prophecies of the Mayan calendar. More people fear it, perhaps, than feared the predicted catastrophes of the year 2000. All the fretting is based on the finding that the Mayan “Long Count” calendar ends on a date that corresponds to our December 21, 2012. What does this mean? The end of the world through some global cataclysm or war? The beginning of a new era, a new Age for mankind? Such prophecies have a long tradition of not coming to pass. But the only way we’ll find out for sure is to wait and see. Just in case, however, in 2012 you might want to do your Christmas shopping early.
In 1940, husband-and-wife archaeological team, Sydney and Georgia Wheeler found a mummy in ‘Spirit Cave’ thirteen miles east of Fallon, Nevada. Upon entering Spirit Cave they discovered the remains of two people wrapped in tule matting. One set of remains, buried deeper than the other, had been partially mummified (the head and right shoulder). The Wheelers, with the assistance of local residents, recovered a total of sixty-seven artifacts from the cave. These artifacts were examined at the Nevada State Museum where they were estimated to be between 1,500 and 2,000 years old. 54 years later in 1994, University of California, Riverside anthropologist R. Erv Taylor examined seventeen of the Spirit Cave artifacts using mass spectrometry. The results indicated that the mummy was approximately 9,400 years old — older than any previously known North American mummy. Further study determined that the mummy exhibits Caucasoid characteristics resembling the Ainu (an Ethnic Japanese people), although a definitive affiliation has not been established.
The April 5, 1909 edition of the Arizona Gazette featured an article entitled “Explorations in Grand Canyon: Remarkable finds indicate ancient people migrated from Orient.” According to the article, the expedition was financed by the Smithsonian Institute and discovered artifacts that would, if verified, stand conventional history on its ear. Inside a cavern “hewn in solid rock by human hands” were found tablets bearing hieroglyphics, copper weapons and tools, statues of Egyptian deities and mummies. Although highly intriguing, the truth of this story is in doubt simply because the site has never been re-found. The Smithsonian disavows all knowledge of the discovery, and several expeditions searching for the cavern have come up empty-handed. Was the article just a hoax? “While it cannot be discounted that the entire story is an elaborate newspaper hoax,” writes researcher/explorer David Hatcher Childress, “the fact that it was on the front page, named the prestigious Smithsonian Institution, and gave a highly detailed story that went on for several pages, lends a great deal to its credibility. It is hard to believe such a story could have come out of thin air.” Supporters also claim that the restricted areas (of which even workers at the Canyon) are evidence of the cover-up.
The legendary lost world of Mu, sometimes call Lemuria is nearly as famous as Atlantis and indeed, parallels it closely at times. According to tradition among many Pacific islands, Mu was an “Eden-like” tropical paradise located somewhere in the Pacific that sunk, along with all of its beautiful inhabitants, thousands of years ago (sounds familiar). Like Atlantis, there is ongoing debate as to whether it really existed and, if so, where.
Christopher Columbus is said to have “discovered” America, but of course we all know better than this, as long before him people/peoples had been there, even settled. Native Americans arrived there many centuries before Columbus, and there is good evidence that explorers from other civilizations beat Columbus here, too. Artifacts have now been found suggesting that ancient cultures explored the continent. Greek and Roman coins and pottery have been found in the U.S. and Mexico; Egyptian statues of Isis and Osiris were found in Mexico as well as evidence of Egyptians in the Grand Canyon (see above). Ancient Hebrew and Asian artifacts have also been found. Stories of travellers from distant lands in native myths and folklore also suggest probability.
The truth is, we know very little about early, far-traveling cultures.
In May 2001, an exciting discovery was made by Advanced Digital Communications (ADC) who were mapping the ocean bottom of Cuba’s territorial waters. Sonar readings revealed something unexpected and quite amazing 2,200 feet down: stones laid out in a geometric pattern that looked very much like the ruins of a city. “Nature couldn’t have built anything so symmetrical. This isn’t natural, but we don’t know what it is.” said Paul Weinzweig, of ADC. A great sunken city? National Geographic showed a great deal of interest in the site and was involved in subsequent investigations. In 2003, a minisub dove down to explore the structures. Paulina Zelitsky of ADC said they saw a structure that “looks like it could have been a large urban center. However, it would be totally irresponsible to say what it was before we have evidence.”
Off the southern shore of Okinawa, Japan, under 20 to 100 feet of water lie enigmatic structures that may have been built by some ancient, “lost civilization”. Skeptics say the large, tiered formations are probably natural in origin (which seems crazy looking at the pictures). “Then, in late summer of the following year,” writes Frank Joseph in an article for Atlantis Rising, “another diver in Okinawa waters was shocked to see a massive arch or gateway of huge stone blocks beautifully fitted together in the manner of prehistoric masonry found among the Inca cities on the other side of the Pacific Ocean, in the Andes Mountains of South America.” This seems to confirm that these are manmade ruins. The architecture includes what appear to be paved streets and crossroads, large altar-like formations, staircases leading to broad plazas and processional ways surmounted by pairs of towering features resembling pylons. If it is a sunken city, it is huge. It’s been suggested that it might be the lost civilization of Mu or Lemuria (see above).
This article is re-produced with permission from About.Com
Contributor: The Doppleganger
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1. cb - November 1st, 2008 at 2:05 am
Awesome!
2. astraya - November 1st, 2008 at 2:06 am
10 Aliens!
9 Aliens!
8 Aliens!
7 Aliens!
6 Aliens!
5 Aliens!
4 Aliens!
3 Aliens!
2 Aliens!
1 Um - er - Aliens!
3. Maazin - November 1st, 2008 at 2:19 am
Its soo cool about like the thing like a about atlantis and stuff and for example Why whould they build the atlantis hotel If it didnt exist and is still such a controversial subjet Oh and one question jamie can you make a list about i dont know somthing completley weird
4. jajdude - November 1st, 2008 at 2:20 am
mmm…mysterious
5. I45 Start - November 1st, 2008 at 2:35 am
Why would you suggest that the city of Mu or Lemuria is nearly as famous as Atlantis? I have never heard of either of these two cities.
6. Sandra - November 1st, 2008 at 2:36 am
astraya– i agree, it was all aliens!!
I’ve heard about most of these, but i didn’t know about the Sphinx. Weird. Great list!!!!!!!
7. I45 Start - November 1st, 2008 at 2:38 am
Sorry, should have included……pretty good list, you got me to read the whole thing.
8. jajdude - November 1st, 2008 at 2:53 am
Crisp guns on the list, g. More history if ya can…
…and mystery!
9. Oz - November 1st, 2008 at 2:57 am
Wow, this list is AMAZING!
…too bad its plagiarized.
Search “The 10 Most Intriguing Mysteries of Lost Civilizations” at about dotcom
http://paranormal.about.com/cs.....020204.htm
10. Tom - November 1st, 2008 at 3:06 am
Great list. It’s amazing to think that even now, there’s real mystery about the world that we will probably never find the truth about.
11. Ali hayat - November 1st, 2008 at 3:12 am
Oz: NICE FINDING
i thought the indus valley civilizations sudden & abrupt disappearance from the pages of historywould be featured, mistaken i was, though ….
12. andyMc - November 1st, 2008 at 3:44 am
I remember watching a documentary on google vids a while back on the subject of ‘esoteric egypt’, I think it was narrated by john Anthony West. He goes into some depth about the age of the sphinx. I was actually convinced until I read that last paragraph that the egyptians used an already sphinx like shape as the foundations for their sculpture. This seems more plausible to me.
13. Somewhat there - November 1st, 2008 at 3:48 am
Great list… but quoting Graham Hancock won’t score too many historical points. Not many take him serious, but very entertaining reading. “The Message of the Sphinx” covers his take on it in detail.
14. ronsantohof - November 1st, 2008 at 3:56 am
About #7; if the world is going to end on Dec. 21, 2012, why would I want to do any Christmas shopping at all? So far all of the end of the world propechies have been wrong. I predict someday one of them will be right.
15. McSquida - November 1st, 2008 at 4:33 am
I love this sort of stuff. Good list.
And if the Mayans were so brilliant to be able to see in to the future and know when the end of the world was coming, I wonder why they couldn’t see their own impending doom
16. McSquida - November 1st, 2008 at 4:35 am
@ I45 Start: It’s not AS well known, but still, most people have heard of Mu. Hell, they even referenced Mu in a computer game on the SNES, ‘Illusion of Time’. Actually covers quite a lot of this sort of stuff, great game if anyone has a SNES - they go to Mu, the Nazca lines, Egpyt, the Great Wall… very interesting historical RPG.
17. Hayzeus - November 1st, 2008 at 4:38 am
Errm… Plato explicitly said that Atlantis wasn’t real, that he was making it up for the purpose of philosophical analogies.
So Atlantis no more a lost civilization than Middle Earth or the Discworld are.
18. astraya - November 1st, 2008 at 5:10 am
The Mayan calendar doesn’t end on that date. The current cycle of the Mayan calendar ends on that date. There’s nothing in Mayan calendarology that precludes the next cycle of the Mayan calendar from starting pretty much without incident, just as the previous cycles of the Mayan calendar have started pretty much without incident, possibly except for a few New Cycle’s Eve’s parties.
The Gregorian calendar “ends” on 31 Dec 2008. I expect that 1 Jan 2009 will happen pretty much as planned.
19. The_Patient - November 1st, 2008 at 5:48 am
Hmmm, very interesting.
20. deepthinker - November 1st, 2008 at 6:23 am
These are my favorite kinds of lists! What about Amazon Women? Or Easter Island?
21. Spence425 - November 1st, 2008 at 6:25 am
jajdude…i’ve got to ask again, because you didn’t answer last time. what does “Crisp guns on the list, g.”? you say it on almost every list, and i don’t get it.
on to the list…good list…these are my favorites, mysteries, history and the like. i’d love to have the money to just travel around and investigate things like these.
22. Spence425 - November 1st, 2008 at 6:28 am
I45 Start: i too have never heard of Mu.
McSquida: maybe “most people” is a bit of a stretch. it’s not only that i don’t know of it, but i’ve never even heard the name Mu or Lemuria.
23. Anon - November 1st, 2008 at 7:06 am
‘Nazca’ by Jim Woodman (1980), floats the intriguing possibility that those people accidentally discovered and developed hot-air balloon flight. He went on to speculate that the giant *line drawings*, which can only be appreciated and discerned for what they are from altitude, had religious significance. He thought that perhaps their shamans, or more likely their dead, were involved in ritual flights.
Like Thor Heyerdal, Woodman did not stop short at *hot-air* speculating. He put his hypothesis into practice. It was founded on the basis that the Nazca people had developed among the finest and closest-woven textiles prior to the Industrial Revolution. So, reconstructing identical cloth, he built himself primitive craft based only on the materials and technologies that would have been available and feasible, including hot-air fire pìts. Apparently remnants of what might be their equivalent exist. First came models, then a full-size man-lifter (Woodman!). It worked spectacularly.
Your choice to accept. We might only wonder why there are no representative images of the *flying machines* themselves in the culture. Nevertheless, true or not, Woodman made an undeniable point that the possibility of early flying Peruvians can be put to the positive test. The existence of aliens from millions of light years away in space can’t!
Worth more than a mention here are the Inca stones. No one knows how walls of different-sized irregular rocks have been trimmed to flat-edges of different lengths so that all fit together so perfectly and in depth jig-saw puzzle-wise, that a knife cannot be inserted between them. If memory serves, there is one exceptionally large example in Cuzco with 11 faces! If you think that’s easy, try taking a large number of pieces of paper, cut one into an irregular pentagon, match another irregular pentagon to one of its sides, then (by eye only) fit a third between them, and so on, and so on. You’ll end up with confetti and a very bad temper, I promise! And that’s just working with small bits of paper and effectively in two dimensions.
Thanks for an interesting topic.
24. grok - November 1st, 2008 at 7:09 am
i am the descendant and the last of ORC TRIBE i suld be this list… grg.
just kid, good list
25. Daithi - November 1st, 2008 at 7:19 am
St Brendan the Navigator from Ireland was sailed to America some time between 500-577 AD.
26. segue - November 1st, 2008 at 7:49 am
The Doppleganger: Nice work!
I’ve heard of all of these places, but putting them all together, as you did, makes more of an impression than does each one separately.
I’ve always harbored a slight bias toward Mu ( Lemuria) and Atlantis being one and the same, though I believe neither existed. I think of them as parables; teaching stories for the masses.
Egyptian culture has always fascinated me. That they could have made it to the North American continent, and as far inland as the Grand Canyon, is by no means a stretch of the imagination. They were an intelligent and resourceful people, far ahead of their time in comparison to what other peoples around them were doing.
The sphinx? The pyramids? The magnificent buildings and statues, some of which still stand, all prove their greatness.
Yes. They accomplished it all with slave labor,but they conceived them, drew up the plans, knew beforehand how everything had to be done. Because they did not have slaves in abundance, means they had to treat the ones they did have carefully, with respect. Forget “Ben-Hur”, and slaves being lashed to within an inch of their lives while on the job. A man had to be healthy and strong to do that kind of work. So slaves, if slaves there were, were well fed and well cared for.
The Maya are another people I’ve always been fascinated by. To have done so much, built such amazing cities in the jungles, to have constructed such accurate calendars, all without the benefits of the Egyptians is just mind-boggling.
I have visited Chitzen-Itza and Tulum, both are amazing although Chitzen-Itza blows everything else out of the water! There’s something there. I don’t mean something spiritual, although I suspect if someone was so attuned it would come across that way, and it’s something I can’t describe. Just walking through the rooms, passing through the spaces, there is a feeling, almost a presence left behind. I know it’s your mind playing tricks, but it plays them well.
I’ve already told the story of watching the sunrise from atop the great pyramid at Chitzen-Itza, so I won’t repeat myself, but do yourselves a favor, if you live in North or Central America, and visit there.
You won’t be sorry.
27. Mom424 - November 1st, 2008 at 7:56 am
Hopefully Doppleganger is Steven Wagner, the original author of this article.
Anon; I can believe that hot air balloons were discovered and used by the ancients. A lot easier to believe though is their use of plumb bobs mounted to a tall cross shaped device called a groma. Like a T with the weights hanging off it, use 2, make sure they are level, line ‘em up, you have a straight line. They had wheels that were used to measure distance quite accurately. Wouldn’t be that difficult to enlarge a drawing to giant proportions.
I’m also pretty sure the city off the coast of Japan has been proven to be a natural occurrence. Sedimentary rock splits along straight lines; any vertical shifting, you’re going to get something that looks like stairs.
28. Ghidoran - November 1st, 2008 at 8:24 am
You should reverse the order, it was kinda a disappointment at the end. Also, ‘Osis and Isiris’ should be ‘Isis and Osiris’.
29. DA - November 1st, 2008 at 8:28 am
isn’t when a calendar cycle ends, a new one starts?
like, after 31 december > 1 january.
what’s the big deal?
30. artmadd - November 1st, 2008 at 8:33 am
Number 3 is preposterous. Stating matter-of-factly that egyptian,roman and greek artifacts have been found doesn´t make it any more true. Links, please.
What makes it worse is that it doesn´t talk about Vikings who seem to have really discovered America before Columbus.
31. bottledwater - November 1st, 2008 at 9:12 am
very interesting list. someone should make a list of out-of-place-artifacts, like the starchild skull or the baghdad battery.
32. Dawn Bearer - November 1st, 2008 at 9:16 am
One of the best lists!
I believe that every thing has an origin, nothing comes out of nothing, and a row of dominos doesn’t fall by itself, it need the push!
Like the story of the Flood and Noah’s Ark, many say it didn’t happen, but haven’t any one notice that the story of a flood, an arc, and a Noah figure is in many culters and share many similarites, Matsya in the Hindu Puranas, Deucalion in Greek mythology, Utnapishtim in the Epic of Gilgamesh… and many others.
33. Randall - November 1st, 2008 at 9:37 am
Not these mysteries again…. *sigh.*
Okay. Debunking time. I love mysteries as much as the next guy–in some instances more–but these particular ones need some thumping, because they keep rising up even though largely discredited or solved.
Let’s begin with this: Your humble Randall himself once debated with Robert Schoch, the geologist who supports (or supported–he may have since drawn back from it a bit) the notion of an older age for the Sphinx. We were actually debating another topic (Randall does not pretend to know more than an accredited geologist, it not being his field), namely pre-Columbian “evidence” (so-called) for non-Native American cultures and people in North America, as well imagined “evidence” for a “shared culture” between various Pre-Columbian South and Central American native cultures and Old World cultures such as the Egyptians. Shoch was stepping outside of his field of expertise, I felt, in supporting the idea of shared culture, and I opposed the notion. I humbly feel I won the exchange. This doesn’t mean that I feel it was impossible that there was some kind of Pre-Columbian contact between the Old World and the New; I simply find it to be unlikely, and do not find the “evidence” impressive… nor do I believe that what little of it there is cannot be explained by other, more reasonable means.
Mysteries 3, 5, and 6 can fall under this heading. The question of contact between the two “worlds” is open, yes. But don’t fall into the trap of thinking there is any REAL evidence for it, anything solid. There isn’t. CERTAINLY not the “evidence” propounded by people who are NOT archeologists, anthropologists, or historians, who believe that because the Mayans, for instance, built pyramids, and the Egyptians did too, then there must be a connection. Nope. Sorry. A) The two pyramid styles are entirely different–the Egyptian pyramid evolved from a long series of previous incarnations beginning with the mastaba tomb, and built up from there. In short, they were always tombs. New World pyramids were only tangentially used as tombs, and were from the beginning mainly temples. Their designs were also entirely distinct. B) They are separated not only in distance but TIME. The evolution of the Egyptian pyramid dates back to the pre-dynastic period of Egypt, when mastaba tombs first appeared. That is some 6000-6500 years ago. The earliest—EARLIEST—pyramidal structures in the New World date back, if I recall correctly (Randall’s expertise is in the Old World, not so much the New) to at best 1000 BC, or some 3000 years ago. Big difference. IN FACT… by that time the Egyptians had LONG SINCE stopped building pyramids in the true sense–the primary styles are mainly a product of the Old Kingdom–and had long moved to smaller, more modified types and eventually gave up the pyramid altogether. That’s a LONG time for a hand-me-down influence.
The Egyptian treasures in the Grand Canyon? Certainly a newspaper hoax VERY typical of the day. We’re used to the idea of journalism being (basically) an objective, truth-honoring profession. It wasn’t, always. It was common habit up until about the 1920s or 30s for provincial newspapers in particular to mix “invented” news stories with honest to goodness reporting. The lines, you see, between straightforward journalism and entertainment being more blurred back in the day than we realize–more so than even we think of our media today. This led to the invention of “crashed spaceships” (the famous Aurora, Texas tale) and “airship scares” (a broad hoax of the turn of the century midwest) and the like, and often included these types of “out of place” archeological tales–some also calculated to serve–or make fun of–the ideas of religious zealots.
But we need to get this straight–the Egyptians were never a sea-faring people. They navigated the Nile and the shores of their world, venturing out no further than the Aegean on diplomatic and trade missions. When they needed sea-faring or exploration done, they hired others, such as the Phoenicians or the Greeks. The possibility, then, of Egyptian missions to the New World is so extremely remote as to be impossible. In fact it is HIGHLY unlikely that ANY culture of the ancient world possessed the sailing and navigational technology necessary to traverse the ocean. Of course, the Polynesians did it thousands of years before, in the Pacific–so it isn’t impossible. But there is also no evidence for a flourishing or even slight trade of goods or ideas between the New World and the Old.
As for the Spirit Cave Mummy—the features of the reconstruction are, to my eyes, debatable. I’ve seen many an artifact that was supposed to “blow the lid off” the idea of no New World involvement in the Old, prior to Columbus, by claiming that depictions of faces were negroid, Chinese, Semitic, etc. While I admit these things often look quite startling, there is A) not a one that can’t be explained by variations in features within native Americans–race is not a science folks, nor is it an accepted scientific notion–and B) some are not even proven to actually BE pre-Columbian. As for this mummy–if he IS related to the Ainu, this would not be terribly surprising as the Ainu WERE native (it’s theorized) to the Siberian region. (And it is therefore their cousins who migrated to North America). It is only out-dated racial conceit that holds them (the Ainu) to be “caucasion”–in fact they are perfect proof that there is so much overlap and blurring between the “races” that the concept of race is virtually worthless scientifically.
So much crap has been said and written about Atlantis over the centuries that it’s hard now to even pick out the gems from the manure. Edgar Cayce… Please! The simplest explanation is that Atlantis was a sort of half-recalled legend which Plato embroidered to make the philosophical points he intended to convey in his dialogues and in the Republic. If it has any basis in truth at all, it obviously hearkens back to a memory of the Minoan civilization of Crete and the Aegean in the Bronze Age, just prior to the ascendancy of Greek (Mycenean) civilization in the region. Clearly the Egyptians knew of the Minoans, and it is in Egypt where Solon supposedly heard the legend of Atlantis, and from whence it was passed down in retellings to Plato. It perfectly fits the combined picture of the Minoan civlization coupled with physical descriptions of the island of Thera (today’s Santorini) before it blew up in the most massive volcanic eruption in the prehistoric age of mankind. At any rate, there is no possibility of a sunken continent in the Atlantic—the seafloor of the Atlantic is spreading, building, and in places rising—not sinking–due to the processes of the mid-Atlantic ridge.
As for Mu/Lemuria… the two are NOT the same, really. One–Mu–is more or less the *invention* of a 19th century antiquarian who thought he saw similarities between the ancient civilizations of the region. The mystic Madame Blavatsky also took it up as the supposed home of another Atlantean type “mother culture.” Nonsense. As is Lemuria, supposed to explain the presence of similar animals in both Africa and Asia. Today we know that this is explained by continental drift, not sunken continents.
34. segue - November 1st, 2008 at 9:58 am
Well, that puts me in my place, as it should, ancient history not being my area of expertise.
Re: the Egyptian artifacts in the Grand Canyon. I’d forgotten, or put into the back of my mind, the “yellow journalism” of the 1920’s -1930’s. The seedbed of Charles Fort!
My other errors; I’ll take responsibility for my own enthusiasm overcoming common sense.
I still stand by my exhortation to visit Chitzen-Itza. It is magnificent, and should be on everyone’s bucket list.
35. billyrules! - November 1st, 2008 at 10:21 am
On number 3, its Osiris, and Isis, not Osis and Isiris.
36. Skellieu - November 1st, 2008 at 10:45 am
Interesting.
37. drmos - November 1st, 2008 at 10:50 am
Randall…could you please turn your superior analytical powers upon yourself and provide the rest of us an answer to the following question? Why do people like you suck the life out of harmless entertainment by being so smug and overbearing? Nowhere in this list does the author state any of these as being FACT. Is it really necessary for you to nitpick this list and ridicule it all in the name of trying to impress the rest of us with intellectual prowess. Maybe you should go out on a date or something and loosen up. Its just for fun…try having some.
38. Juliet - November 1st, 2008 at 11:06 am
Golly, there’s a tremendous amount of snarky, pompous people on here. Why not enjoy civil debate instead of trying to decimate and belittle those around you? (Not directed at you drmos).
39. Cedestra - November 1st, 2008 at 11:14 am
Jamie, the allegations of plagiarism really do need to be looked into. The link Oz provided was the same material, only reversed order. The Doppleganger even kept the spelling mistake on the original one: “Egyptian statues of Osis and Isiris were found in Mexico”.
Doppleganger, I seriously hope you wrote the original. If not, you should feel pretty ashamed of yourself.
40. Rennix - November 1st, 2008 at 11:16 am
Aliens.
41. drmos - November 1st, 2008 at 11:27 am
Juliet..no problem. I normally do not say things like that. But I had had enough of the self appointed experts. This is a FUN and ENTERTAINING site…I would like to continue to enjoy it.
42. goof_ball - November 1st, 2008 at 11:32 am
interesting list =)
43. BrotherMan - November 1st, 2008 at 11:44 am
I agree with Cedestra. This list is plagiarised.
Just in case people are wondering about this: There is a link at the very top of the page that says Hotlinks. If you find a cool list like this one then submit it there rather than passing it off as original material.
44. Blogball - November 1st, 2008 at 12:22 pm
Nicley done and entertaining list. I’m hoping that The Doppleganger and Steven Wagner are the same guy too.
45. Juliet - November 1st, 2008 at 12:22 pm
Drmos: I agree, this site is supposed to be fun and entertaining.
46. Baxter - November 1st, 2008 at 12:32 pm
Awesome list! It’s lists like these that keep me addicted to the site…
47. Anon - November 1st, 2008 at 12:38 pm
drmos,
“This is a FUN and ENTERTAINING site…I would like to continue to enjoy it.”
As a point of fact, that’s not how the topic is specifically presented at all. It’s your personal interpretation. It is actually *subtitled* - A list of mysteries surrounding ancient peoples.
“But I had had enough of the self appointed experts.”
Is there not room for a variety of perspectives, not to mention tolerance? Seems to me one can have a giggle at one comment and learn from the next. Or am I just a LV butterfly? There’s a technique called *skipping*. It can be used to avoid (in particular long) comments which don’t interest one (but which may well interest others). To plough through an entire comment that pisses you off and then post a complaint about it rather smacks of …
48. sidvish - November 1st, 2008 at 12:44 pm
to Drmos and Juliet: I consider this list and Randall’s comment to be fun and entertaining.
49. Blogball - November 1st, 2008 at 1:02 pm
Come on, what would a mystery list be without a Randall debunking? It’s part of listvese’s short but rich history.
50. Juliet - November 1st, 2008 at 1:16 pm
Sorry, I guess I’d been visiting too many other lists previous to this one where there were outbreaks of ad hominem attacks in comments and lots of sniping, so I was referring to the site in general, or at least to some of the contributions in comments. I’m not suggesting that everyone skips laughingly hand in hand through the tulips with ne’er a disagreement, but jaded put-downs aren’t necessary.
Just can’t stand those people who have to show off with pompous psuedo-intellectualism in order to make themselves feel superior. They cross the line between what constitutes debate and veer into the territory of sheer rudeness. Disclaimer: Not counting Randall among those types.
51. Kittykat73 - November 1st, 2008 at 1:21 pm
Wow, I love lists like this. Such interesting subject matter and really well explained in the short space available. Well done The Doppleganger!
A lot of these I hadn’t heard of, but was very interesting to read about.
Thanks!
52. Shadow - November 1st, 2008 at 1:24 pm
In number three, “Osis” and “Isiris” are used instead of “Isis” and “Osiris”.
53. DiscHuker - November 1st, 2008 at 1:34 pm
drmos: wait for randall’s response to your criticism. that will be fun and entertaining. at least for the rest of us.
54. Pwnstar - November 1st, 2008 at 2:04 pm
Being Peruvian myself, Im always amazed to hear about the Incas technology and cool stuff they did.Incredibly massive spans of roads, terrace farming, skull surgery,the aformentioned masonry work,and all without a writing system!
55. erasmus - November 1st, 2008 at 2:15 pm
what i love about lists like this, accurate or not, is that they point me to doing more research on things i find interesting. this list is great. thanks.
56. simuun - November 1st, 2008 at 2:19 pm
Not for anything but why all the talk of plagiarism with this list? I’m not denying that this wasn’t his own work but almost every other list has most of its descriptions taken directly from wikipedia. So thats people plagiaring work that has already been plagiarised. Basically the internet is full of stolen work, just copy and repaste it somewhere.
57. Shadow - November 1st, 2008 at 2:54 pm
Now it says “Isis” and “Isiris”.
58. jfrater - November 1st, 2008 at 2:59 pm
shadow: oops I didn’t notice that while I was editing. I am out at lunch so will fix it when I get home
59. Rising Falls - November 1st, 2008 at 3:31 pm
You can take large quotes off this list, and do control f, control v to cut and paste it into a quick search of Oz’s link and it matches except for a few wording changes.
60. ringtailroxy - November 1st, 2008 at 3:31 pm
Randall~ I have researced some of these fantastic claims as well and without a doubt debunked them for myself. It’s nice to see your input on these “history mystery” lists. It’s endearing how you speak of yourself in 1st person…
oh-and drmos, there are quite a few individuals who would be more than delighted to be Randall’s date for an evening…(me!me!me!) just seems like the time would be more intellectually stimulating than hearing someone criticize another person’s critique…
rtr
61. Du - November 1st, 2008 at 4:01 pm
number 8 sais see below. Where is this “below” you speak of?
62. Renegade - November 1st, 2008 at 4:16 pm
I gotta disagree with ya too drmos. Randall’s not exactly sitting there flexing his intellectual muscles to make everyone else feel stupid, he’s just doing it to offer what he believes the truth on the matter. Just about every thing he says is sensible and, frankly, very difficult to deny without manipulating his comments to mean something else it didn’t. Don’t worry so much about it, I’ve had him correct a few errors on my part, and honestly, I’m glad he does. If he didn’t I would be continuously running around spewing out a few things that are incorrect.
In a nut shell, good job on the debunkage Randall. I’m actually interested in your opinion on another mystery I’m pretty surprised isn’t on this list, and the one it was apparently plagiarized off of, Stone Henge. That one has had me rather curious for a while and since it branches into your field of expertise I’d like to here what you think.
63. jackit - November 1st, 2008 at 4:35 pm
drmos, to be honest I find comments like yours to be the real killjoys. Listverse is not cracked.com, I don’t know where you’re getting this idea that the site is here for your entertainment only. LV has plenty of factual lists, as well as humourous ones, and a lot of opinion-based lists. For a lot of us, the myth-busting IS part of the fun. It’s what gives dimension to these lists.
Frankly, Randall’s comments add far more to the discussion than your bashing of other people’s interpretations.
Anyway, we need a list of SOLVED historical mysteries… so the paranoid among us can stop looking nervously over our shoulders
64. jackit - November 1st, 2008 at 4:41 pm
Oh - and maybe Mu is just a phonetic equivalent of Mew, from whom all living things descend! You know, what with being shaped like a fetus and being able to learn any tm/hm and all.
65. Kaf - November 1st, 2008 at 4:43 pm
The image used for the mayan calendar thing, is not mayan, but of the Aztec Solar Calendar.
66. BooRadley - November 1st, 2008 at 5:03 pm
Kudos to Randall!
67. Anon - November 1st, 2008 at 5:22 pm
Mom424, (27),
The essential point of Woodman’s Project Nazca speculations, investigation and experimentation was TO WHAT END the lines were created, not HOW.
Naturally there are alternative possibilities which don’t involve hot air balloons or even airborne humans or mortal remains. Two obvious examples are the souls of their dead ancestors in the heavens looking down and their gods, also beholding from on high. The point he makes is that such massive symbols, quite meaningless at ground level, must have been intended for interpretation from above. Hot air ballooning was proven as one very feasible and practicable option. Believe me, it would be a lot easier to come up with a hot air balloon from scratch than figure out how to plan, dress and fit those Inca stones!
68. warningdontreadthis - November 1st, 2008 at 5:36 pm
Randall: I just wanted to address something from this list http://listverse.com/people/to.....ommanders/ cause I thought you might have forgotten about it.
I didn’t mean to attack you. I don’t even know the hell I was talking about. I was pissed that day because my dad is a jerk (not that you care). I have no problems with you and your mythbusting. Keep up the good work, I probably learn as much form your comments as the actual lists.
69. warningdontreadthis - November 1st, 2008 at 5:42 pm
drmos: We learn alot from Randalls comments.
I think the real mystery is how the hell someone can have all that information in their head.
70. Blogball - November 1st, 2008 at 6:47 pm
warningdontreadthis, I agree, I have enough trouble just remembering my bank pin number.
71. k1w1taxi - November 1st, 2008 at 6:48 pm
simuum (58)
The problem is that in most of the lists where wikipedia is quoted it is made clear that the info source is wikipedia, which a) covers wikis usage rules and b) acknowledges the list authors original source.
This list has not been similarly credited as coming from anywhere else let alone the cited link. Said link states explicitly that all rights are reserved. Perhaps we should contact Mr Wagner and see whether he agrees with you or the rest of us who dislike this plagiarism.
drmos (37) Apart from your silly comments about Randall spoiling the list for you (and apparently only you). Checking the original source of this article as linked by Oz one finds the following comments on Mr Wagner’s bio page ( http://paranormal.about.com/mbiopage.htm )
This website is your gateway to the fascinating world of ghosts and hauntings, strange creatures, psychic phenomena, lost worlds, other dimensions, and the unexplained. Here you’ll quickly learn that there is far more to our existence on this planet than is currently explained by science. I welcome your feedback and your true encounters with the unknown.
This would clearly imply that the list was not written as ‘a bit of fun’ but as an article to be taken seriously. Therefore Randall’s debunking is not only justified but required.
Cheers
Lee
72. greenhoops - November 1st, 2008 at 7:19 pm
ringtailroxy ~ Don’t get your hopes up. You’ve published pictures of yourself on the site.
Incidentally, Randall likes to speak of himself in the third person, not the first. This is popularly believed to be a symptom of mental disturbance.
73. segue - November 1st, 2008 at 8:11 pm
71. warningdontreadthis: I think the real mystery is how the hell someone can have all that information in their head.
****
One word: Education.
Randall probably has a PhD. Anon probably has one, too. Both my husband and I have MFA’s, my children all have MFA’s and my daughter-in-law will have her PhD by year’s end.
The brain is a funny thing. The more you use it, the more information you cram into it, the more information you *can* cram into it. It would seem to have an infinite capacity.
I have had a habit since the age of sixteen or so. I *have* to be reading three non-fiction books simultaneously, usually two sciences and a history or biography.
When I say I *have* to be reading them, I mean I get actually anxious, nervous, if I’m not learning something. It’s not even stuff I’ll ever use. It’s just stuff I want to know.
I admire Randall because he has the patience to teach. I know I don’t.
I admire Anon because he has the patience and the discipline to work at a vocation which requires great rigor, mental and physical.
I admire Vera Lynn because she has the patience to teach.
These are people who found education to be important enough to continue on until they had sufficient knowledge to give it back to others.
I stand in awe.
74. llamee - November 1st, 2008 at 8:29 pm
#3 - i am jewish and im glad to hear we were one of the first residents of new york
hell we were there before john mccain, it seems, and he’s old as fuck
but one question - ive been doing some research, and the last ice age ended in 10,000 bce, at least 5000 years before egypt. how did they get over there? there was no land bridge and no way in hell did they cross the pacific in those tour boats they had. did they sail over to north america, using that short distance between russia and sarah palin’s house? does anyone have a plausible explanation for this?
75. Renegade - November 1st, 2008 at 9:04 pm
Well that one should be relatively simple to explain. Just because the Egyptians weren’t sea faring people themselves doesn’t mean that they didn’t do trading with any sea faring peoples at all. They simply could have traded their own artifacts for materials or other supplies that they may have been unable to obtain in their desert covered lands. These artifacts were then continuously traded so on and so forth until eventually they found themselves in the hands of a seafaring people who had routes going to the New World. I don’t know if this is a correct assumption for the time period, but it’s a possible explanation.
76. Profeh - November 1st, 2008 at 9:33 pm
Totally support ya, Randall. I was glad to read the retractions, you know for a moment there it was like hearing a couple of harpies start to moan and carp and fault-find the second any lady more attractive than themselves shows up. It’s good to smarten up discussions, you know… Love the site, but the whole plagiarism thing (and the fact that it’s such downright… unskilled plagiarism, at that) is a buzzkill. Still, I get more reading in at this site than I do in newspapers most days, and the comments are a huge part of it. I don’t even especially care about these particular ancient mysteries, come to think of it…
77. arjaythejive - November 1st, 2008 at 9:46 pm
I am a geologist and a geophysicist. Many of the things on the list are good for musing and debunking, in short they’re fun…but the underwater ruins near Okinawa are another matter. They have not been “proven” one way or the other. I’ve seen many unusual formations and rock structures and you can imagine all kinds of fantasy shapes in them, a bit like seeing an old man’s face in a cloud or a sex act on an ink blot. However, it is HIGHLY UNLIKELY that what you see in that picture or what I’ve seen in the TV coverage is natural rather than manmade.
78. The Anachronism - November 1st, 2008 at 11:48 pm
Thanks, Randall, for the analysis.
I can’t imagine why people seem to object to your comments. I’d rather have the option whether or not to view it than not to have any option at all.
Keep posting.
79. Jono - November 2nd, 2008 at 12:23 am
Atlantis, such a strange place. Just to add one thing, Plato only wrote about Atlantis something like 250 years after it had supposedly disappeared. I don’t remember the exact number of years, but it definitely puts a large amount of doubt over that story.
Furthermore, I think the most likely place they have found for it was Akrotiri, a settlement in the Mediterranean on Santorini.
Anyway, I didn’t know about the “ruins” off Cuba. Thanks for that information, and also the Egyptian presence in the US. I’d not heard of that before. Very interesting. However, just the presence of mummies seems to debunk that all in itself. I somehow can’t imagine an exploratory voyage bringing a mummy with, they’re people and in order for proper entry into the afterlife they needed to have a proper funeral. Also, why would they bring materials to mummify someone while travelling? Seems odd. That, and the Egyptians didn’t do any sailing other than their Nile crossings and such. It also seems odd that the Grand Canyon would be picked as well. it’s quite far inland. Seems odd to me anyway.
80. Sean - November 2nd, 2008 at 12:54 am
His name IS the doppleganger, you kinda have to expect him to plagiarize.
Interesting read, even if you didn’t write it.
81. beyondinvisible - November 2nd, 2008 at 5:39 am
Nice list. The picture of Atlantis seems to have been lifted off the Enigma video ‘From the deep’ though.
82. jajdude - November 2nd, 2008 at 6:16 am
Spence425:
If you must know there are two “jajdudes” posing as one, with me being the real one and my sick friend being the other who started the “guns” comments, a running joke we have. Yeah, it makes no sense, but we’re childish enough to enjoy seeing what adjective the other guy used with “guns.”
83. Ghidoran - November 2nd, 2008 at 7:22 am
I agree with Randall, except I believe there’s a high probability that there was an ancient civilization we don’t know about. It would explain many things, such as the pyramids(both in Egypt and Mesoamerica), the Nazca lines, Stonehenge(Atlantis I’m not sure about).
84. Shadow - November 2nd, 2008 at 12:30 pm
I just read Randall’s rebuttal to the contents of the list. I have to agree with his opinion on Atlantis myself. I’ve read a lot of the same stuff, and to me it reeks of Plato to embroider fact to make a philosophical point.
As for the rest, Randall, great job with your rebuttal.
Drmos - You’re right, this site is supposed to be fun… so why did you bother posting a comment that showed your hypocrisy so clearly?
85. Shadow - November 2nd, 2008 at 12:38 pm
Segue - Wow! I was unaware that I stood in the presence of greatness! I doubt that I’ll ever attain anything so lofty asa Ph.D., primarily because of some of the educational requirements the Feds put into place here that grate on my freedom-loving nerves so much that I chafe just thinking about them.
Personally, my “expertise” is in the criminal justice system, its processes, laws, and other related materials. What I aspire to be though, is a modern day Ombudsman. Unfortunately I am seriously behind on that due to having to attain some paper that says that I can be indoctrinated and trained to think a certain way - even though I really can’t be.
You, Anon, Randall, and the others here have my respect, both for your accomplishments, and the wealth of knowledge between your ears.
86. angryfeet - November 2nd, 2008 at 12:44 pm
I’m kind of troubled that the accusation of plagiarism hasn’t been addressed yet. What’s the deal? If this was ripped off, and it seems to have been, then it shouldn’t be still up.
I do love the comments, though. They’re more informative than the actual list!
87. Leonardo Antonio - November 2nd, 2008 at 3:33 pm
21 december 2012 is something very simple:
All planets line up, changes and re-orders the earth magnetic directions, as well as from the other solar system planets. It’s a freak ocurrence that takes place every 4300 years or so. The mayans are just the descendants of lost civilizations such as egyptians (the religious gatherings, not the pharaohs). They knew that this happened from time to time. That is why Syberia was once a hot desert, Australia was once under the ocean and Egypt was once like today’s Amazon - greenscaped. Once this ocurred, the Pyramids region became hot and deserted. The civilized gatherings moved out… to Southern America, where the greenscape popped out. As soon as they reach 2012, december 21, they have to move out again!
This is also the reason why you find so many remnants of lost civilizations: descendants of these gatherings, shaping small areas into their culture (reason why you find so many pyramids along with other similarities scattered all over the globe).
Pure and simple.
Want to know where these gatherings are nowadays? Ask the “guys” upstairs who label the dollar bills and rule the planet. They might know.
88. Jono - November 2nd, 2008 at 4:29 pm
/\
Nice load of speculation you have there.
Also, I don’t think it’s been pointed out, but the general consensus with most scientists in the field is that the end of the Mayan calender signals…..
When they decided not to write anymore of the calendar!
89. Precision - November 2nd, 2008 at 5:51 pm
Interesting list, even if it was written by someone else! Credit to the original author, whoever it is
One thing that always makes me laugh about “end of the world on date xx” predictions is that some parts of earth arrive at said date before others.
For those of us in Australia, this means that OUR world will end while countries to our west are still sitting happily in the 20th of dec. Sucks to be us! (although it sucks more for the nice folk over in NZ)
90. k1w1taxi - November 2nd, 2008 at 6:04 pm
Not really because all these dates are made by people who are Western centric so the time is usually European or US. You us Antipodeans will actually get one more day than they will
Cheers
Lee
91. Muttley - November 2nd, 2008 at 7:49 pm
West is a hack and a wanker! And so is the compiler for giving him any creedence or credibility. The vertical weathering is typical of ANY sandstone/limestone massiff which sits in a ‘bowl’ or ‘hollow’ as the sphinx does - the weathering presents as ’scalloping’ which is consistent with strong, sand-laden, cross-winds (the sphinx sits lateral to the prevailing wind on the Giza Plateau). Strong water-created weathering would have caused greater and deepwer LENGTHWISE erosion which is not even remotely evident. West is a hack in the same mould as Eric (Chariots of the Gods) von Daniken and is even regurgitating the theories that have already seen von Daniken discredited - HE ISN’T EVEN ORIGINAL !!!!!
As for the Great Pyramid - you (and your source [West again???]) Seem to be forgetting (or simply ignoring) the hundreds of heiroglyphic inscriptions on stones INSIDE the pyramid identifying work crews by their ‘nicknames’: ‘Friends of Menkaure’ and the ‘Drunkards of Menkaure’ and so on. There is also the cemetery nearby for workers who died during the building of the pyramids - the skeletons date to the correct time (4th Dynasty) and we KNOW they were builders because the hieroglyphs on stele buried with them TELL us who they were and how they died and what they were doing WHEN tthey died - i.e. building the pyramid of Khufu (Cheops) etc!!!
There are enough REA mysteries around without having to manufacture them.
92. maximuz04 - November 2nd, 2008 at 8:42 pm
Quick notion about the Mayan calendar.
1) The posted picture is what is commonly called the “aztec calendar”.
2) The “aztec calendar” isnt even aztec at all, nor a calendar, I happened to visit the anthropology museum in mexico city this june and learned that. I didnt know and I am mexican, desendant of cortez.
3) The mayan calendar has a very good reason why is ends the day it does. It is 10 or 12,000 yrs long (forgot the actual time) and is exactly the time of a planetary “wooble”. Some theorize the poles will switch in this time. So there is a scientific reason for their calendar. What is amazing is, how the hell did they know how long a wobble is? Europeans solved this one in the late 19th to early 20th century!
Great list overall, I didnt know some of them.
93. Leonardo Antonio - November 2nd, 2008 at 8:54 pm
Yes, the theory isn’t mine. I like to listen to theories and decide which makes more sense. I wouldn’t have the time or patience to really originate one like. It takes life times! Hard study!
Maximuz04, do you really think europeans solved “that one” only in the late 19th century? gimme’ a break. And a planetary “wooble” is every 26.000 years and is not even planetary… it is solar (all suns in the center of the milky way line up).
PS: I didn’t mean to offend the australians. I was talking about some several million years ago, not thousands. I was referring to massive climate changes millions of years ago. 2012 is just a balancing date of the planet’s climate system. Trust me. Nothing else.
94. segue - November 2nd, 2008 at 9:04 pm
85. Shadow: Segue - Wow! I was unaware that I stood in the presence of greatness!
****
lol!
It’s less greatness than persistence.
You mention your expertise in criminal justice, laws, etc.
I had an embarrassing (and funny in retrospect) experience with the CHP a few years ago.
I was involved in a multi-car accident on the freeway in L.A., the car I was driving was totaled, as was the car ahead of me. Several other cars were involved to lesser extents.
No one was injured, but the cars were littering the approaching rush-hour freeway. All of the drivers sat on the side of the road talking until the CHP showed up.
He spoke with everyone, giving a few roadside drunk tests.
He gave me one.
I hadn’t had anything to drink, of course, but he asked if I’d taken any drugs.
“Just my scripts. Oxy…”, at the word Oxy his eyes bugged out of his head! He started giving me a full-on drunk test; close your eyes and touch your nose, balance on one foot, a few others…then the one I can’t even do at my Neurologist’s office, the heel to toe walk.
I failed.
He cuffed me. He took me to the CHP headquarters, the jail, and held me for 6 hours, re-testing me every hour, every hour was exactly the same.
Finally, he gave me my ticket and let me go.
I fought the ticket, my doctors wrote letters to the court telling them that I’d been on those med.’s for 10 years and was perfectly capable of driving under their influence.
I not only won, the entire accident was purged from my record.
95. Lordofreimes - November 2nd, 2008 at 10:10 pm
Oh my god! It’s Lemuria from Golden Sun (the greatest GBA game ever).
I always thought it was based on just Atlantis but now I know why it was located in the middle of the Pacific. =D
96. Muttley - November 3rd, 2008 at 3:05 am
Just realised I accidentally ’switched off’ and forgot to finish reading the list after the Pyramid/Sphinx debunk - thanks to that, I missed ‘Good Old Atlantis’
To throw another spanner in the works - Atlantis was so named because Plato mistakenly placed the ‘Lost Continent’ in the Atlantic “West of the Pillars of Heracles”. He also mis-calculated his distances. In fact, the original account from which he drew his findings actually stated that the cataclysm occurred EAST of the Pillars and the distance was much much less - on top of all this, the history Plato referred to was mistranslated as well in that the Lost Continent SHOULD have been interpreted as ‘Lost Civilization’. Thus it is that the archaeological community at large NOW tend to believe that a) not only was Atlantis a factual place and b) its demise an historically factual event; they now - by following Plato’s actual timeline accept that Atlantis was the island of Thera in the northern Agaean Sea and that the civilisation lost was that of the Minoans which was by far THE most advanced civilisation of its time - a civilisation it would take the Golden Age of Greece itself to reproduce!
Ancient Thera was a volcanic island which literally exploded and threw up 18 cubic miles of ejecta (Krakatoa only threw up ONE cubic mile of ejecta in 1883 and Mt.St.Helens even less) - the resultant ‘fallout’ literally buried and extinguished the Minoan Culture / Civilisation then living on Crete - in fact Crete was buried to a depth of many tens of feet in places! VERY few towns oir cities survived even PARTIALLY intact.
Whay IS theorised (and has as yet no proof) is that certain leading groups of Minoans managed to either survive the cataclysm or were absent during its occurrence - the Minoans were sea-farers and traders as well - and thus resettled in places like Egypt and Greece giving impetus to the rise of both od these great civilisations which came after the Minoan!
Hang in there Randall - you did a sterling job on the list as well
97. Phil - November 3rd, 2008 at 3:49 am
This stuff is always interesting. Makes me realise the impermenance of historical records opening intrigue, speculation and debate. All these theories are fair game and open to criticism, makes for good comments. Cheers.
98. Anon - November 3rd, 2008 at 6:30 am
drmos,
Well, my good soul, now you have it.
“Après moi le (quality LV) deluge” …
99. Randall - November 3rd, 2008 at 6:59 am
Thanks to everyone for A) showing your appreciation for what I wrote, and B) for speaking out against the short list of critics who railed against me.
100. Randall - November 3rd, 2008 at 7:39 am
Muttley:
Thanks for the support on this, and for expanding on my brief statements regarding the “true nature” of Atlantis… Just a few points to add:
We of course have no real proof that the conversation between Solon and the Egyptian priests ever happened. On the other hand, there’s no reason in particular to *doubt* the story, either. The Greeks (of the classical period) and Egyptians were on friendly terms (and there is even evidence that they viewed each other rather affectionately–the Egyptians chiding the Greeks good-naturedly as “children” and the Greeks, in turn, coming to the Egyptians’ aid during the invasions of the country during the late New Kingdom) and it’s perfectly reasonable that a Greek citizen and gentleman of Solon’s import would be received with at least some small honor in Egypt.
But then if we assume Solon DID hear the story of Atlantis from the Egyptians, it might be false conjecture to assume that it was Plato who made the error in time and distance computation. Rather, it makes more sense to assume that the Egyptians screwed up in regards to distance and locale, and that a bad translation caused Plato to screw up Atlantis’ place in TIME. Recall that what Solon was supposedly told was that Atlantis had existed some 9000 years prior to his time. But this is simply the addition of a single place keeper, because the truth is, if we assume Atlantis to have been the Minoan civilization, then it existed only *900* years before the time of Solon. The synchronicity is too good. Further, the Egyptian description of the location of Atlantis could still easily refer to Crete–but would reflect a vague memory of the island which the Egyptians of Solon’s day would not recognize. Remember that to the Egyptians even the nearby Aegean was “foreign,” and to a large extent unfamiliar. Their grasp of its geography would, therefore, be little better than the Greeks’ grasp of the geography of, say, the southern frontiers of Egypt. Easy then to see how the Egyptian’s description of the precise location of Atlantis could have been muddled and magnified. On the other hand, the Straits of Gibralter were also not the ONLY “pillars of Hercules” known to the ancient world—there was in fact a lesser known site bearing the same name just northwest of the shores of Egypt. It’s a stretch to say that this is the one actually meant in the original tale–but it IS interesting that this would, then, point to Crete even more forcefully.
We do know this: The Egyptians had close contact with the Minoans during the period of about 2000-1500 BC, and clearly the Minoans show the cultural influence of Egypt in their art and architecture. The Egyptians quite obviously had diplomatic relations with the island–Keftiu, the Egyptian name for Crete, is mentioned many times as a stopping off point in Egyptian diplomatic missions of the day, and there is evidence of Cretan diplomats in Egyptian Thebes (the capital) as well. But then, suddenly, this civilization which the Egyptians knew vanished–and the evidence we have for this is that “Keftiu” then seems to cease to be mentioned as a separate cultural entitity in Egyptian records, and becomes merely a place–and a rarely mentioned one, at that.
There’s no doubt that some Minoans must have survived–Knossos, the chief city of Crete, was spared the ravages of the tsunami from Thera–but they altogether cease to appear as an influence and even almost disappear as a memory, in short order. But we must remember that Mycenean Greece already existed at this time–influenced by the Minoans–and it the Mycenean Greeks who step in to Crete and the Aegean to fill the power vacuum left by the destruction of the Minoan civilization. They may, therefore, have hastened the Minoans on their way. At any rate, by the end of the Bronze age it is Greek that’s being spoken in the halls of Knossos and the other cities of Crete, and the Minoan culture and language was so utterly obliterated that it became nothing more than a barely-recalled legend—and the language remains undeciphered to this day.
101. Brg - November 3rd, 2008 at 7:39 am
Maximuz is right about the image that is displayed is not mayan. I disagree on the rest of what he says. And by the way, I am Mexican too, but have studied Aztec, Mixtec and Mayan cultures for a long time. And when you have done that, hearing about Mayan prophecies and woobles and whatnot just sounds preposterous. Mayans were obsesed with cyclic time, but also on war and other not so scientific endevours. They organised wars in certain dates because of there had been previous wars on those dates which had ended with a victory; that is why they needed to keep track of time and to have such long calendars. As for the famous end-of-calendar date, there was a poster who said what it really is about: just another day following another day, just as January 1st follows December 31. Also, the Mayan Long Count Calendar (because they used another one for religious purposes) goes way beyond that date. As a matter of fact, there are inscriptions mentioning that king Pakal’s ascension to his throne will be celebrated on 4772 AD, way beyond 2012 “predicted” end of the world.
By the way, there are no Mayan prophecies. I know for sure because I happen to have copies of the 4 remaining Mayan Codex, and not even one of them mentions any prophecies.
As for people from other cultures visiting America before Columbus: http://www.econ.ohio-state.edu/jhm/arch/calix.htm
Is this story true? Well, a friend’s father works at the Instituto Nacional de Antropolgia e Historia as an investigator. I asked him once about this Roman figurine. And he told me that it was true, and that they have it in the museum’s basement. I asked him why they didn’t display it or make more publicity. He told me that it was such a delicate subject that no one wanted to put his reputation on the line on this yet.
Brg
102. cparker - November 3rd, 2008 at 8:37 am
AWW man I can’t believe the whole thing was copied from another site. No matter what the content is, it takes the fun out of it for me. Anyone can cut and paste…what a bummer.
103. Randall - November 3rd, 2008 at 9:21 am
arjaythejive:
I confess that I am NOT a geologist, but it’s my understanding that most geologists who have viewed the underwater “ruins” off Okinawa are of the opinion that they ARE in fact natural in origin–even the aforementioned Robert Shoch maintains such.
104. Cedestra - November 3rd, 2008 at 9:39 am
102. cparker: I’m still waiting to hear about that. I doubt Jamie would keep up a plagiarized list, but The Doppleganger is supsiciously absent. Now, he does come and go- there are periods of weeks when I haven’t seen him, so I’m not assuming that he’s saying nothing because he’s guilty. I just really wish he could pop on here for a minute and say, “Hey, I am the guy who originally wrote this. No worries.” I worry mostly due to lawsuits and the fact that it would be quite hypocritical of Jamie to suggest us readers check other sites for plagiarism when we are hosting it ourselves! To state again, though, my faith is in JFrater and The Doppleganger.
105. psychosurfer - November 3rd, 2008 at 9:50 am
Does this mean that doppleganger dopplegangs every list he´s posted?
Anyway, cool list.
106. copperdragon - November 3rd, 2008 at 12:44 pm
You can actually see the Nazca lines on Google’s map page.
Type in Nazca, Peru and view just south of the town of Estudiantes (which is slightly north of the town of Nazca).
Very cool.
107. jfrater - November 3rd, 2008 at 1:23 pm
Okay - thanks for the comments guy - especially those relating to plagiarism. After some investigating I have been told that permission is granted for reproducing. I am sorry that I didn’t act on this sooner as I have been away for most of the weekend and was unaware of the debate. I have modified the “sources” line.
108. arjaythejive - November 3rd, 2008 at 2:21 pm
“…a massive arch…of stones beautifully fitted together” and “…pairs of towering features resembling pylons…” do not suggest natural geological features.
109. Randall - November 3rd, 2008 at 2:53 pm
arjaythejive:
Well you’re the geologist (so you say… which is not to mean that I doubt you, merely that i have only your word to go on in regards to that claim). I would agree that an “arch” of stones “beautifully fitted together” would suggest something non-natural… (I don’t see how “pairs of features *resembling* pylons” does, however) …but surely in your field you’ve seen all kind of examples of naturally-formed and eroded features that looked very nearly man-made, yet you knew not to be. (I could not, by the way, find any pictures online of this arch—can you direct me to any?)
Relying on someone else’s description of something does not strike me as a very scientific means of assessing its status as natural or man-made, however. I’d rather see pictures and hear from professionals who have been on the scene–geologists and archeologists, and oceanographic experts in undersea rock formations. Wouldn’t you?
It’s not that I say any of this is impossible. But let’s be clear-headed about this. The structures are MASSIVE, and would have to be phenomenally old. On that basis alone they go against the prevailing archeological paradigm which states that the earliest civilizations date back only to about 5000 BC, give or take a few hundred years and depending on how one defines “civilization.” The finds going back that far, in Turkey, on the Danube, and at Jericho (and other sites in the Levant) do not by any means suggest a culture capable of or even interested in megalithic building or carving–and certainly not on such a grand, super-Egyptian-type scale. Yet the ruins off Okinawa would have to be far older still.
Again, I don’t say this is impossible. But remarkable claims require remarkable evidence. And I don’t see it as yet, from this site.
As I said, even Robert Shoch himself has come out and said that he believes the formations to be natural.
I just feel the jury’s out until the evidence is more substantial, before we go positing unknown civilizations that have left no names or traces, long before any of the known and long-accepted “first” civilizations on record. And especially in regards to civilizations that old, that would be capable of something like this.
110. arjaythejive - November 3rd, 2008 at 3:50 pm
Randall,you are selectively quoting Schoch. He stated that the Yonaguni ruin “…is a fundamentaly natural stucture that was UTILIZED,ENHANCED AND MODIFIED BY HUMANS IN ANCIENT TIMES”.
Dr Masaaki Kimura, PhD in Marine Biology, discoverer of the Yonaguni Ruins, has declared them to be man-made and dating back 6000-10000 years. I find this more compelling. Also, this would fit the 5000 BC time frame you offered.
111. Akhenaten - November 3rd, 2008 at 5:32 pm
It’s not all plagiarised.
He rearranged the items, removed the jamaca sunken city, added the sprit cave mumy, wrote a new intro and the extra note on the age of the sphinx.
112. mick - November 3rd, 2008 at 6:56 pm
you also forgot to mention the sealed door in one of the ventilation shafts of the great pyramid and the secret room that is believed to lie under the sphinx
http://www.geocities.com/TheTr.....ystery.htm
113. Smily - November 3rd, 2008 at 8:18 pm
You should have mentioned the ancient cities in India, which have carvings of helicopters, aliens, and ufo’s and has a very high radiation level.
114. Ghidoran - November 5th, 2008 at 7:41 am
The Mayan calendar does not necessarily mean the ‘end’, but a new beginning. And it’s not just the Mayans. The Indian calendar has the same thing.
115. Polly Odyssey - November 5th, 2008 at 2:38 pm
Never heard of the underwater Japanese ruins. That is interesting.
116. ancient - November 6th, 2008 at 7:29 am
Good selection. And suggestion to improve with “What happened to the Thracians?
The oldest civilization in Europe, the most numerous and advanced in ancient times but about 400-500 year have disappeared without a trace. Where, why, how!?
see more for The ancient Thracians here: www.traki.hit.bg/index_en.htm
117. Monkey222 - November 8th, 2008 at 12:54 am
Great List
118. maximuz04 - November 9th, 2008 at 6:57 pm
Well for those who are refuting that this isnt even aztec, heres pics from my trip to mexico, see pics #19 and the last one has the text of the museum of Anthropology in mexico city.
http://www.facebook.com/album......id=6005465
Now about the wobble, it was explained to me by my 11th grade history teacher, but ur right, I should have double checked for verification since HS teachers are hardly authorities. I didnt know it was an alignment, I assumed it was when a planet literally wobbles on its own axis but if you have better evidence I withdraw that point.
119. Char - November 13th, 2008 at 8:41 am
Great list, but surely, if they have just discovered some amazing sunken city off peru, then why doesnt it seem like its been investigated all that much? i tried to find out some more about it but its all dated back to 2001. Anybody know if it has been looked into further at all??
120. Randall - November 13th, 2008 at 10:51 am
Char:
Are you referring to the sunken “city” off Cuba? (I don’t know of any off the coast of Peru, unless you’re referring to finds a while back under the surface of Lake Titicaca). The problem with the Cuban “city” is that it lies at such a great depth—2200 feet is far too deep for human divers and requires the use of minisubs or remotely-controlled vehicles. At any rate, it’s a prohibitively expensive venture—especially when weighed against the unlikelihood that this IS in fact some kind of city–it is far too deep to be even a sunken remnant from the last Ice Age, and I’m not even sure any oceanographers or geologists have been able to determine when such a site *could* have been above sea level. Given that, and the scarcity of evidence, it just isn’t cost effective for anyone to mount an expedition at present.
121. Lilith Hel - November 15th, 2008 at 1:09 am
since this list is about ‘mysteries of ancient or lost civilizations’, you really should’ve only included civilizations that we know for fact have existed. the pyramids and the mayan calender fit the bill, but atlantis and lost egyptian gold in the grand canyon (which has only been mentioned by one source) have no scientific evidence to support them at all.
and in response to what #3 wrote about why would they name a hotel after atlantis if it never existed; i really hope you weren’t serious about that b/c the same agruement could be made for everything that’s ever been named ‘el dorado’ and we know there is not city made of solid gold…unless you think enough people talking about it makes it real.
122. DeKLiNe0fMaN - November 22nd, 2008 at 11:15 pm
McSquida they did predict their own doom. That’s why they rolled up camp and disappeared into a “new” civilizations its called “forced disappearance” go hear to wiki to read http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forced_disappearance. And as for aliens..good 4 laughs but they’re like the witches of old , or the dragons before that, or every other superstition.. aliens are just the modern version in a technology world. Amazing how we can pick up a quarter of the sidewalk using google world but the best photo of a ufo is some blurred crap from a redneck in arkansas. Love the lists’ tho i just found this site…
123. Hmmm - December 7th, 2008 at 7:36 pm
How about a massive expulsion of magma that displaced enough water to submerge the now sunken cities? I would say a shift in plates: pacific I could buy, but cuba too? Either way, they are fun to think about!
124. Lindita - December 16th, 2008 at 9:17 am
that picture that you put in there below the “mayan calendar” is not a picture of the mayan calendar; that is an aztec calendar, which is based in the mayan one tough.
125. segue - December 16th, 2008 at 5:35 pm
124. Lindita:…that is an aztec calendar, which is based in the mayan one tough.
****
one tough what? What did I miss? Who was tough? What was tough?