Secret Room Inside the Rock Where Ancient People Lived

Bright Side

In 1907, navigators spotted a big hole inside the fortified rock. For many years, scientists have studied this place and found some traces of Neanderthals. They discovered ancient tools in the cave and bones of old animals. But the coolest thing was that they found four caves inside the rock. It was like a residential complex!

Transcript

00:00A comfortable abode with a gorgeous view of the Mediterranean Sea will serve as a perfect rain shelter.

00:07Well, this is what a real estate advertisement might have looked like for Neanderthals 100,000 years ago.

00:13Welcome to the weird and wonderful caves you could live in. Or not.

00:17Of course, back then, neither real estate and advertising had been invented yet.

00:21Never mind the fact that Neanderthals couldn't build houses and often lived in caves.

00:26Yet, one of those caves looks an awful lot like a residential building.

00:31It's situated inside a high limestone cape called the Rock of Gibraltar.

00:37If the Neanderthals had had an economy, the caves inside this rock would have cost a bundle.

00:42Navigators discovered it in 1907. They just spotted a big hole inside the fortified rock.

00:49For many years, scientists have studied this place and found some traces of Neanderthals.

00:54They discovered ancient tools in the cave and bones of old animals.

00:59But the coolest thing was, they found four caves inside the rock.

01:03It was like a residential complex.

01:06Neanderthals lived alongside neighbors and helped each other hunt and fish.

01:10They created feather decorations and painted abstract drawings on the walls.

01:15Imagine our ancient predecessors hanging out in these caves 100,000 years ago.

01:19And now, scientists hang out there and study the primeval past of Neanderthals in detail.

01:26At the end of 2021, archaeologists uncovered a gap inside one of the caves leading to an unknown tunnel.

01:34They crawled through this hole and opened a new space under the cave roof.

01:38This place has been closed off from the outside world for over 40,000 years.

01:42And it seems it was one of the most prestigious apartments in the entire mountain complex.

01:48It has high ceilings with ancient stalactites.

01:52The ruined stone curtains divided the apartment into several rooms.

01:55Scientists also found the remains of ancient animals and scratches on the walls.

02:00It seems that Neanderthals had never lived here.

02:03But they used to visit this place.

02:06Archaeologists found the shell of a sea snail called dog whelp.

02:09One of the Neanderthals brought it here for some reason.

02:13But the primary owners of this place were hyenas.

02:17These caves show that Neanderthals were closer to humans than to monkeys.

02:21They had a way of life and even some customs.

02:24There's still a lot of work ahead, and scientists hope to find new rooms inside this rock.

02:30Meanwhile, in 2003, archaeologists discovered another early dwelling on the Isle of Flores in Indonesia.

02:37Among the green jungle, they found a cave with ancient tools.

02:41At first, everyone thought the human ancestors lived here.

02:44But then, scientists discovered an unusual skeleton of an adult.

02:49A thorough analysis showed the skeleton belonged to a 30-year-old woman,

02:543 1⁄2 feet tall, just above the waist of an average adult.

02:58The woman's weight was equal to the weight of an adult shepherd.

03:01The skeleton didn't belong to Neanderthals or Australopithecines.

03:06It was a new unknown species, which scientists called Homo fluorosensis, or simply the hobbit.

03:12Also, there were remains of unusual ancient animals in the cave.

03:17It was an elephant the size of a cow, some large storks, and giant rats.

03:22Archaeologists have found out that hobbits were not the owners of this place.

03:26The main inhabitants were the rats the size of a cat.

03:30Maybe they were fighting the hobbits.

03:32Some analysis shows that Homo florenciensis wasn't our direct ancestor.

03:37They were in a separate branch of evolution.

03:39The hobbit skeleton looks more like that of a monkey than of modern humans.

03:44In 2009, in the dense jungle of Vietnam, archaeologists discovered Song Don, the largest cave in the world.

03:51If you go inside the cave and shout, you'll hear your echo a long time.

03:57In some places, the height of this cave reaches half the height of the Empire State Building.

04:02And the total area is larger than one central block of New York.

04:07Song Don is one of the three caves in the Vietnamese jungle.

04:10Many intricate mazes connect these caves.

04:13Inside, you can find unique plants and trees that live separately from the outside world.

04:18It's a real underground jungle.

04:20In some places, you can find collapsed ceilings that let the sunlight in.

04:25Besides unusual trees and plants, ancient stalactites hang there.

04:30Some limestone deposits are more than 450 million years old.

04:34They were here even before dinosaurs appeared.

04:37There are also many rivers in the cave.

04:39Rainwater coming down from holes in the ceiling has formed them.

04:43Fast streams resemble slides in a water park.

04:46They lead to unknown underground labyrinths.

04:48Scientists have studied only a small part of all these caves.

04:52The next unusual cave is in New Zealand.

04:55Hundreds of thousands of fireflies live inside.

04:58Each of them glows with a blue light.

05:01Together, they light up the cave.

05:03It may seem to you that you're on another planet.

05:05But you can't stay there for a long time.

05:07Special air measuring devices are everywhere.

05:11Scientists monitor the level of carbon dioxide necessary for the normal existence of fireflies.

05:17These insects are sensitive to the environment.

05:19If there are many people in the cave, or they stay there too long, the park staff will ask them to leave the place.

05:26It's like you're literally stealing oxygen from the fireflies.

05:29We've seen some pretty amazing caves so far.

05:32But how about a scary one?

05:35We're going to the desert of Yemen's Almara province.

05:38What we're looking for is not a cave.

05:40It's just a black hole in the ground, right in the middle of the desert.

05:44It's big, the size of a basketball court.

05:47It's not its size that could scare you, but what's inside.

05:51Scientists are still not sure what it is.

05:53From the depths of this black abyss, a disgusting smell of rotten eggs constantly comes out.

06:00And sometimes, you can hear some strange, frightening sounds.

06:05The blackness of the giant hole in Yemen absorbs all the sun's rays.

06:10So you won't see what's there even with a powerful flashlight.

06:14People flew over this place by helicopter.

06:16They filmed using drones and the most powerful lenses, but they didn't catch anything except darkness.

06:22It looks like a big ink spot in the middle of golden sand.

06:26The locals are afraid to approach this place.

06:29They believe the cave leads to another dimension where evil creatures live.

06:34At the moment, the giant hole in Yemen is one of the most poorly studied and mysterious phenomenon of nature.

06:41How did it appear?

06:42How old is it?

06:43Where does it lead?

06:44Scientists are trying to find the answers to these questions.

06:48There are theories that the hole appeared because of construction work.

06:51Geologists drilled the soil nearby in search of minerals.

06:55It could have caused fluctuations in the Earth's crust and collapsed the surface.

06:59But no one can prove this theory.

07:02Yet.

07:02And now, imagine a place where sunlight has not penetrated for more than 5 million years.

07:08There's little oxygen, and it's cold and damp.

07:12Still, life is born in this place.

07:14Not only microbes and bacteria, but also something bigger.

07:18The living conditions in this cave are very different from the usual ones.

07:22So, in a sense, this cave is like another planet.

07:26It's the Movil Cave in the southeast of Romania, near the Black Sea.

07:31The entrance is a small hole in the ground.

07:33Inside, a tunnel leads deep below the surface.

07:36The levels of hydrogen sulfide and carbon dioxide are above normal inside the cave.

07:42The air here is half as much oxygen as on the surface.

07:46People can't be here without an oxygen mask.

07:49But other creatures living here can.

07:52The cave is home to 48 species of living organisms.

07:5633 of them are unknown.

07:57Here, you can meet some unusual insects.

08:00White snails and white spiders.

08:03Millipedes with huge whiskers.

08:05Transparent shrimp.

08:06And unique species of leeches.

08:08They all live here, thanks to the little bacteria autotrophs.

08:13They absorb carbon dioxide and release food particles.

08:16Bacteria feed on it.

08:18Other larger organisms feed on these bacterias.

08:21And some bigger organisms eat those little ones.

08:24In the end, everyone gets food.

08:26In this cave, evolution has created a biological system separate from the rest of the world.

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