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00:00In 524 BCE, an army of 50,000 for Cambyses II set out to conquer Egypt, only to vanish in the western desert.
00:11The sands swallowed Cambyses' ambitions, leaving behind only questions and legends.
00:19The greatest mystery of the Devil's Bible, the largest surviving medieval manuscript, lies not in what remains, but what is missing.
00:27Ten pages, meticulously cut out and deliberately removed.
00:33What secrets were these pages meant to conceal, and why were they erased from history?
00:40Thousands of hours of secret voice recordings within President Richard Nixon's administration,
00:46and subsequent erasure of 18 and a half minutes, results in one of the biggest political scandals of all time.
00:53Who erased the tape, and what exactly were they so desperate to hide?
01:01The chain of history has many missing links.
01:07Prominent people, priceless treasures, extraordinary artifacts.
01:13Their locations still unknown, lost to the fog of time.
01:18What happens when stories of the past become vanished history?
01:27In 524 BCE, Cambyses II, Persia's conqueror of Egypt, dispatched 50,000 soldiers from Themes
01:49into the merciless western desert to silence the Oracle of Amun.
01:54Cambyses II was the son of the famous Persian king of kings, Cyrus the Great, founder of the Achaemenid Empire.
02:06Cambyses was named crown prince as early as 539 BCE, and seems to have served as co-ruler.
02:13But when Cyrus died, his son officially took the throne.
02:17Cambyses reigned from 530 to 522 BCE, and was determined to expand the empire, carrying on his father's ambitious campaigns of conquest.
02:29By 525 BCE, Cambyses had set his sights on Egypt, attracted by its abundant resources and strategic importance.
02:40As he marched along the Mediterranean coast, he secured water supplies through alliances with Arabian chieftains.
02:47The decisive battle of Pelusium opened the gateway to the Nile Delta, and by that summer, Memphis, Egypt's capital, fell to Persian forces,
02:57marking the start of the 27th dynasty under Persian rule.
03:01But victory brought defiance.
03:06Many Egyptians viewed Cambyses as a foreign usurper.
03:11One particularly potent symbol of resistance lay deep in the western desert, the Oracle of Amun at Siwa.
03:20Revered by Egyptians and Greeks alike, the Oracle was a temple and sanctuary in the Siwa oasis,
03:26where a priesthood served as intermediaries between the god Amun and those seeking divine guidance.
03:32It refused to legitimize Cambyses' rule, a public slight against the new pharaoh king.
03:42Determined to crush this affront, Cambyses dispatched 50,000 soldiers westward from Thebes.
03:50Their mission? To subjugate the Amunians at Siwa and destroy the Oracle.
03:57Greek historian and geographer Herodotus, later dubbed the father of history, helped pioneer Greek trade with Egypt.
04:06He wrote detailed accounts about the lives of prominent kings and famous battles.
04:11But according to Herodotus, the troops vanished without a trace, never returning to Egypt, nor reaching the Amunians.
04:21So what happened to this massive force?
04:24The western desert, spanning nearly 40,000 square miles across western Egypt and eastern Libya,
04:38is one of the most inhospitable landscapes on Earth.
04:43In this desolate expanse, described by Herodotus as a place where even powerful armies can vanish,
04:51Cambyses' ill-fated expedition began.
04:54Herodotus is our main source for the story.
04:59He writes about the force leaving Thebes in Upper Egypt and stopping at the Harga Oasis after a seven-day's march.
05:08That much seems to check out.
05:10Thebes and Harga are about 150 miles apart,
05:13and his timeline matches the estimates for how long it would have taken to travel across that much desert.
05:19From there, the army continued on a route towards Siwa, home of the Oracle of Amun.
05:27But no corroborating records detail the exact path or what truly befell the soldiers of Cambyses.
05:33Siwa was critical.
05:37Beyond its religious standing, it was a strategic desert oasis that dared question Persian authority by refusing Cambyses' legitimacy.
05:48In sending an army across the desert, Cambyses sought not just conquest, but symbolic dominance,
05:55an attempt to erase any lingering doubt of his right to rule Egypt.
05:59The western desert spared no one.
06:04Reliable water sources were scarce and hidden,
06:08making each new stretch of desert more perilous than the last.
06:11Without the Arabian chieftains who had once supplied water,
06:16the army moved forward with only limited provisions.
06:20Somewhere between Kirga and Siwa, the sands swallowed Cambyses' ambitions,
06:27leaving behind only questions and legends.
06:33Herodotus gives us a chilling tale.
06:36He says that as the army of Cambyses stopped to eat, a wind whipped up from the south,
06:43strong and deadly, bringing with it vast columns of whirling sand.
06:48And that storm swallowed up the troops.
06:51The dunes rose in the place where men had stood just moments earlier.
06:55But Herodotus' account raises questions.
07:01Could a storm even of such ferocity obliterate an entire army of 50,000 soldiers without a trace?
07:11Experienced armies like Cambyses' would have been prepared for harsh desert conditions.
07:17And a sandstorm, no matter how powerful,
07:20would likely not have been enough to overwhelm them entirely.
07:24The desert's silence may be masking not a natural calamity,
07:33but the echoes of an ancient rebellion,
07:36one that toppled an army and rewrote the narrative of a pharaoh's conquest.
07:42Some historians think that the army of Cambyses might have come to an end in battle
07:47against an Egyptian rebel called Petubastus IV.
07:51He declared himself pharaoh around 522 BCE and led an uprising against Persian rule.
07:59This theory gained momentum thanks to the work of a Dutch archaeologist
08:05who uncovered inscriptions referencing a pitched battle in the remote western desert.
08:10According to his findings, the temple blocks at Amida revealed Petubastus IV possessed enough power
08:18and resources to erect a major monument in honor of the god Thoth.
08:23An undertaking that implies a stable administration rather than a fleeting revolt.
08:28It was proposed that the lost army legend may have originated as Persian propaganda,
08:37a fabricated sandstorm tale to mask a humiliating defeat.
08:41The evidence points to Cambyses dispatching a large contingent from Thebes to quash Petubastus IV's rebellion
08:49in or near the Dakla oasis.
08:51But instead of returning victorious, the force vanished from the historical record.
09:02The simplest explanation is that Petubastus ambushed them, won decisively, and capitalized on the victory to consolidate his authority.
09:11If it's true, that story helps explain why Petubastus IV appears on ancient lists of Egyptian kings.
09:21That his rebellion wasn't just symbolic, but successful enough to secure territory, build temples,
09:27and maybe even briefly rule from Memphis, which the Persians used as their administrative capital for the area.
09:35Another possibility is that the western desert itself inflicted a slow, crushing defeat on combisement
09:41the oasis army. Even without direct combat, crossing hundreds of miles of featureless dunes and sweltering heat
09:49could doom a force of this size.
09:56Rather than taking the coastal path where Arabian chieftains had previously provided water,
10:01Cambyses allegedly sent his soldiers southwest from Thebes through oasis like Kerga and possibly Dekla,
10:11then onward toward Siwa. This route required precise navigation and reliable wells,
10:19both of which were in critically short supply.
10:26If the army of Cambyses veered even slightly off established caravan paths, they would have lost access to crucial water supplies.
10:33Dehydration, not just sandstorms, likely sealed their fate.
10:43After decades of exploration across Egypt's western desert, a surprising new route for Cambyses' ill-fated army was discovered.
10:51This research is pivotal.
10:53This research is pivotal. Cambyses' army may have veered onto an alternative track deep within the Great Sand Sea,
11:01bypassing the more established oases, which might still have been under Egyptian control.
11:07In doing so, the army sacrificed short-term security for the element of surprise,
11:13hoping to catch the defenders of the Amman temple off guard.
11:17Based on this research, Cambyses' army must have set out from Thebes along a lesser-known corridor,
11:27one that earlier archaeologists had not examined.
11:31Their geological surveys over these unchartered swaths of terrain revealed dried-up wells and fragments of earthenware pottery matching Persian water pots.
11:47Local Bedouin legends of an entire valley filled with bleached human bones fueled suspicions.
11:56A big discovery was made not far from Siwa by a pair of filmmakers.
12:00A grave littered with skeletal remains, which included a horse's bit, said to have maybe been used by the Persian cavalry.
12:10Some believe it might be tangible evidence that the forces of Cambyses met their end there in the Great Sand Sea.
12:18Scattered bronze arrowheads, fragments of Persian pottery, and human remains suggest the soldiers dispersed under brutal conditions.
12:28Some seeking shelter behind dunes, others wandering off in a desperate search for water.
12:34The western desert's dunes can bury artifacts and skeletons for centuries before revealing them again.
12:43Such intermittent rediscovery explains why we've only encountered scattered finds instead of a single conclusive burial site.
12:53Nature's forces have continuously rearranged the remnants.
12:57In all likelihood, Cambyses' army didn't vanish in one massive storm, but gradually disintegrated in a logistical nightmare.
13:08An episode few ancient chroniclers saw fit to document in detail.
13:13The fate of Cambyses' lost army is a haunting mystery etched into the unforgiving sands of the western desert.
13:26Over 2,500 years later, the desert refuses to yield the truth of what happened to 50,000 men.
13:37The account of Herodotus is as much a carefully crafted narrative as it is a historical source.
13:45The lack of physical evidence raises questions about how much of a story is fact and how much is fiction.
13:55For now, the legend of the lost army of Cambyses stands as a potent reminder that even the grandest armies are not invincible.
14:07Time, shifting sands, and the unyielding desert continue to obscure the truth.
14:14In the shadowy heart of medieval Bohemia, a colossal manuscript emerged, a towering compendium of sacred scripture, esoteric knowledge, and an unsettling portrait of the devil.
14:39Known as the Codex Gigas, or the Devil's Bible, it was intended to contain all the world's knowledge.
14:51The Codex Gigas is the largest surviving medieval manuscript.
14:54It weighs 165 pounds, stands some three feet tall, and was crafted from the skins of over 160 animals.
15:02Encased in leather and ornate metal, it aimed to gather every kind of knowledge, spiritual, historical, medicinal, even magical, within one binding.
15:11The Codex was created in the early 1200s, period shaped by the Fourth Lateran Council.
15:20The church was cracking down on heresy, books were being destroyed, scribes were carefully watched.
15:27Producing a manuscript that included both scripture and magic formulas must have been inherently risky.
15:34An inscription on the first page suggests that the Codex originated at the Benedictine monastery of Podladice in Bohemia, now the Czech Republic.
15:47But this impoverished monastery lacked the resources for such an ambitious project.
15:52Over centuries, the Codex changed hands, purchased, pawned and prized by collectors like Emperor Rudolf II, and seized by Sweden as war booty.
16:03The journey leaves behind more questions than answers.
16:07The greatest mystery of the Devil's Bible lies not in what remains, but in what's missing.
16:13Ten pages meticulously cut out and deliberately removed.
16:17This wasn't the result of accident or decay.
16:20What secrets were these pages meant to conceal?
16:23And why were they erased from history?
16:26The Codex Gigas is a window into the medieval world, reflecting a time of religious devotion, intellectual ambition and social upheaval.
16:40Over the centuries, it has been prized as a spiritual treasure, a financial asset and a source of fascination.
16:51Forensic analysis suggests the Codex was produced by a single scribe over as many as 20 to 30 years.
16:57This is a lifetime's work considering the average lifespan at the time was roughly 30 years.
17:02Its uniformed script and illustrations show no breaks in style and no sign of aging in handwriting.
17:07This consistency defies easy explanation and fuels legends that the scribe achieved the impossible with supernatural help.
17:17Legend says the Codex was ridden by a monk called Herman the Recluse, who broke his sacred vows and was condemned to death by being walled up alive.
17:29To save his life, he promised to write a book that would glorify the monastery by compiling all human knowledge and to do it in a single night.
17:39By midnight, he was so desperate, he struck a deal with the devil, selling his soul in return for finishing the book.
17:48And in thanks, Herman included the devil's portrait.
17:51The contents of the Codex are fascinating.
17:58Half of its pages contain the Old and New Testaments, while the remainder overflows with other texts like Isidore of Seville's Edemalia,
18:08Josephus' histories, medical remedies, exorcism rituals, magical formulas, and lengthy sinful confessions.
18:15It also contains an extensive list of rarities, like alchemical and scientific sketches, and even a 12-page calendar.
18:24Among its most arresting images is that of the devil himself.
18:29This full-page portrait of the devil is unlike anything else in medieval manuscript art.
18:36He's depicted with massive horns, twin tongues, and crimson claws, draped only in an ermine loincloth, a fabric worn exclusively by royalty.
18:47This underscores his status as the Prince of Darkness.
18:50Directly opposite this infernal figure is an unsettling depiction of the heavenly city, empty of life.
19:01This juxtaposition highlights the era's spiritual tension, pitting eternal salvation against the threat of damnation.
19:08It's interesting to note that these are the only full-page illustrations in the manuscript,
19:12and part of the reason why the Codex earned its nickname, The Devil's Bible.
19:15The Codex Gigas is missing pages, and there are lots of theories about what was on them.
19:23Some people even like to say they might have included a secret devil's prayer, the power to end the world.
19:34While tales of occult secrets and forbidden knowledge persist, the missing pages may have a far more pragmatic origin.
19:41In medieval Europe, monasteries were not only spiritual centers, but also land managers.
19:49They constantly struggled to sustain their existence financially.
19:53Parchment made from animal skin, known as vellum, was incredibly expensive.
19:58And by 1295, Podlavice Monastery was so desperate for funds, it had to pawn the Codex Gigas just to survive.
20:06It's possible that monks or later custodians removed certain pages, perhaps containing valuable illustrations or rare texts, to sell individually for much-needed income.
20:19By the early 1400s, Bohemia was engulfed by religious upheaval that led to the Hussite Revolution.
20:31Monasteries became battlegrounds over ideology, including the one where the Codex was written, which was destroyed.
20:39Libraries were raided and books were burned for being politically dangerous, denounced as heresy.
20:45If the Codex Gigas contained sensitive material, prophecies, inflammatory rhetoric, or ideas challenging prevailing doctrines,
20:56removing select pages could have been a calculated move to shield its custodians from heresy charges.
21:02As speculation swirls around political intrigue and doctrinal strife, some believe the explanation is tied to the devilish imagery within these pages,
21:15and that what vanished may have been too unsettling to remain on record.
21:18Some people have suggested the missing pages might have been removed because they crossed a line, that they could have been seen as heretical or even outright satanic.
21:30The Codex Gigas is famous for its full-page portrait of the devil directly opposite the image of an empty, silent, heavenly Jerusalem.
21:41It's an eerie pairing that reflects medieval obsessions with sin and redemption.
21:46And when you add the exorcism rituals with magic formulas included in nearby sections,
21:51some wonder if the manuscript might have already been pushing the limits of what the church would allow.
21:56If those missing pages went deeper into demonology, like detailing unholy invocations or even diabolical pacts,
22:07they would have been seen as a serious challenge to the church's authority.
22:11Taking them out would have been a quiet way to keep the Codex within acceptable limits to protect both the manuscript and anyone connected to it.
22:19The Codex Gigas eventually became part of Emperor Rudolf II's prized collection in Prague.
22:31The palace was a magnet for philosophers, alchemists, astronomers and artists,
22:36and filled with treasures that reflected Rudolf's profound fascination with the occult, astrology and the pursuit of forbidden knowledge.
22:48Under Rudolf's reign, Prague became a Renaissance heart of arts and sciences, where curiosity and fear intertwined.
22:55His collection brimmed with exotic artifacts and esoteric texts, pushing the boundaries of knowledge while walking a fine line between discovery and looming threat of condemnation in an era of devout suspicion.
23:10In Rudolf's court, any page explicitly detailing unholy invocations or demon summoning rituals could have invited immediate scrutiny.
23:19Religious authorities and political rivals alike would have seized upon this kind of material as evidence of heresy.
23:25Removing these pages may have been a calculated move to shield the Codex and its guardians from the heir's harsh consequences for perceived transgressions.
23:32There's no proof the missing pages had anything to do with satanic worship.
23:40And other surviving sections do include exorcisms and magic spells.
23:45Medieval depictions of demons were often a warning.
23:48They didn't glorify evil, they cautioned against sin.
23:52The devil's portrait is unsettling, it still fits into that tradition.
23:56But whatever happened with the Codex, we know that in a world haunted by real fear of diabolical influence, some knowledge was thought to be too dangerous to preserve.
24:10Its survival alone is remarkable, but the real mystery is those missing pages.
24:16Whoever removed them didn't just tear them out, they did it carefully, leaving no clear evidence behind.
24:22That kind of precision suggests whatever was on those pages was incredibly significant.
24:29The Codex Gigas now rests in Stockholm's National Library.
24:35Advances in modern technology like digital imaging, ultraviolet analysis or even DNA testing of the parchment might one day reveal traces of what was lost.
24:46Or even those new insights might just deepen the mystery.
24:49The mystery.
24:52The missing pages leave the devil's Bible shrouded in eternal mystery.
24:57Their absence, a void where the sum of all knowledge was once meant to reside.
25:02June 17th, 1972.
25:17In the early hours of the morning, five men were arrested inside the Democratic National Committee headquarters at the Watergate Complex in Washington, D.C.
25:27What first seemed like a botched burglary would ignite a political firestorm, shaking the very foundations of American democracy and leading to the first resignation of a U.S. president.
25:40President Richard Nixon was a complex figure, brilliant, yet deeply paranoid.
25:47His obsession with control and his legacy drove him to extraordinary lengths.
25:53To document his administration, he installed a secret voice-activated recording system that automatically captured every conversation in the Oval Office, the Cabinet Room and even at Camp David, the presidential retreat.
26:06Among the thousands of hours recorded, one tape stood out, not for what was said, but for what was missing.
26:15This conversation, just three days after the Watergate break-in recorded a meeting between Nixon and his chief of staff, H.R. Haldeman, in what would become one of the most scrutinized and infamous moments of his presidency.
26:26The conversation probably included critical details about the administration's plans to handle the fallout, maybe even evidence of an early cover-up.
26:38But when investigators listened to the tape, they didn't find answers.
26:43Instead, they found that it had an 18 and a half minute gap.
26:47It had been erased.
26:48Who erased the tape?
26:54And what exactly were they so desperate to hide?
26:57The roots of Watergate trace back to 1971, when a Nixon official leaked the Pentagon Papers, a 7,000-page classified report that exposed government deception about the Pentagon Papers.
27:17It came at a time when public anger and doubt over the U.S. role in Vietnam was already at a boiling point.
27:29Nixon was so enraged by the leak that he created a covert unit called the Plumbers, aptly named in reference to their job of plugging leaks.
27:37But things escalated quickly.
27:38The Plumbers resorted to break-ins and illegal surveillance, all in the name of protecting the administration.
27:44On June 17, 1972, five men broke into the Watergate complex in Washington, D.C.
27:53The burglars, dressed in suits, carried sophisticated recording equipment, lock-picking tools, and wads of sequentially numbered $100 bills.
28:04It was obvious these weren't petty crooks.
28:08One was James McCord, a security coordinator for Nixon's reelection campaign, ironically nicknamed Creep.
28:14The operation was led by G. Gordon Liddy, a former FBI agent, and E. Howard Hunt, a CIA veteran.
28:20It would prove to be one of the most infamous cases of political espionage in history.
28:27And as the investigation deepened, it became clear that the motives behind the break-in went all the way to the top.
28:34By February of 1973, the U.S. Senate had formed a committee to investigate the Nixon campaign.
28:43Meanwhile, Nixon and his aides were amid a desperate cover-up involving discussions of million-dollar hush payments,
28:50using federal agencies to block the investigation, and coaching aides to lie.
28:55The real turning point came in July 1973, during the live Senate Watergate hearings,
29:02when Alexander Butterfield, Nixon's deputy assistant, dropped a bombshell.
29:07Nixon had a secret recording system.
29:10This was a major breakthrough.
29:13Those tapes held the potential to prove, without a doubt, what the president knew about Watergate and when.
29:25In 1974, under mounting pressure from federal investigators,
29:30Nixon released dozens of White House tapes and thousands of pages of transcripts.
29:37One of the key revelations in the smoking gun evidence was tape 342,
29:41a recording of a meeting between Nixon and his chief of staff, H.R. Haldeman.
29:45This was the first time Nixon was recorded discussing the Watergate break-in, just three days after it happened.
29:50Thanks to Haldeman's handwritten notes from that meeting, we know he and Nixon talked about Watergate,
29:59and probably about using the CIA to thwart the FBI's investigation.
30:03But there's no audio to back it up.
30:06Eighteen and a half minutes had vanished, replaced with an ominous patch of clicks and buzzes.
30:13Nixon went to extreme lengths to keep the tapes hidden.
30:23And after two years of public scrutiny and growing calls for his impeachment,
30:27President Nixon resigned in disgrace.
30:30By taking this action, I hope that I will have hastened the start of that process of healing,
30:41which is so desperately needed in America.
30:45In a White House gripped by chaos and paranoia,
30:48some believe the answer to the missing minutes lies not in deliberate sabotage,
30:53but in an unintentional act of loyalty.
30:58Rosemary Woods, Nixon's fiercely loyal personal secretary,
31:02claims she accidentally erased the 18 and a half minutes.
31:06According to Woods, she was transcribing the tapes for prosecutors when the phone rang.
31:11In her rush to answer, she said she pressed the wrong button,
31:15which caused her to delete part of the original conversation.
31:18In her grand jury testimony, Woods explained that when she went to answer the phone,
31:24she reached for the stop button on the Oval Officer's UR 5000 reel-to-reel recorder,
31:30but instead she accidentally pressed her foot into the pedal of the machine,
31:34which would cause it to record over the conversation.
31:38To defend her version of events, Woods reenacted the incident in front of reporters.
31:43In her now infamous pose, dubbed the Rosemary Stretch,
31:47you can see her awkwardly stretching her leg to press the pedal
31:50while leaning far back to grab the phone behind her.
31:54The mechanics of the UR 5000 recorder in question
31:58cemented the initial doubt many had over Woods' story.
32:03The machine didn't even work the way Woods said it did.
32:07To erase the audio, someone would have to press both the play and record buttons at the same time.
32:13You couldn't do that with the pedal.
32:15And the erasure wasn't a single act.
32:19It was done in at least five separate segments.
32:22The idea that Woods could hold such an awkward physical position for over 18 minutes made her story virtually impossible to believe.
32:33Woods' explanation was riddled with flaws.
32:36Despite thorough investigations, there's no evidence she erased the entire 18 and a half minutes.
32:42The forensic findings proved this was a deliberate act, but one that was most likely carried out by someone else.
32:53One of the most prominent theories is that President Nixon, or someone in his inner circle,
32:57intentionally erased the tape to hide evidence of a Watergate cover-up.
33:02The timing is key.
33:03This was Nixon's first meeting with H.R. Haldeman after the break-in, and it likely focused on how to manage the fallout.
33:09If the tape revealed early steps in the cover-up, it would have been devastating.
33:18Nixon's chief of staff, H.R. Haldeman, was in a prime position to erase the evidence.
33:23Only three days after the conversation with the missing minutes, Nixon was recorded ordering Haldeman to tell the FBI not to go further into the case, period.
33:34Haldeman was deeply involved in the cover-up and had every reason to protect both Nixon and himself.
33:41Or it could have been others in the president's inner circle, like John Ehrlichman, who was instrumental in creating the Plumbers
33:47and orchestrated many of the administration's covert operations.
33:50Or campaign director John N. Mitchell, who approved the plan for Watergate.
33:54They had similar access and motives.
33:56Since Nixon wasn't good with technology, it does seem unlikely he would have done the erasing himself.
34:03And since there are more than 3,700 hours of recordings, you have to wonder why his team targeted just those 18 and a half minutes.
34:13One name that often comes up is General Alexander Haig, who took over as Nixon's chief of staff after Haldeman resigned.
34:23Haig famously called the erasure the work of a sinister force, a cryptic remark that some interpreted as an attempt to deflect blame,
34:32or perhaps a subtle nod to internal sabotage.
34:36Another possibility points to an unknown secret service agent or a technical staffer, someone with the access and technical know-how to manipulate the tapes.
34:47If they believe the June 20th conversation posed a significant threat, whether to national security or Nixon's presidency,
34:53they might have taken matters into their own hands.
34:55There have been years of speculation, but no one's ever been identified as the sinister force.
35:05There have been extensive investigations by the FBI and by Congress, but no concrete evidence of a rogue agent.
35:12So it's just one more piece of the enduring mystery surrounding those missing minutes.
35:18The fallout from Watergate was unlike anything in American history.
35:26Nixon became the first and only president to ever resign.
35:30The Watergate burglars served time for conspiracy, burglary and wiretapping,
35:35while 48 others, including Haldeman, were convicted of crimes like obstruction of justice, conspiracy and perjury.
35:42Watergate set a new tone for American politics.
35:47It led to sweeping reforms aimed at restoring trust in the government.
35:51The Supreme Court's unanimous decision to order Nixon to release the tapes reshaped the presidency
35:58by affirming that no one, not even the president, is above the law.
36:02That limit on power is just as relevant today.
36:07The missing minutes remain one of the most profound puzzles in American political history.
36:14Despite advancements in technology, experts have been unable to recover the missing audio.
36:20It's a mystery that remains locked away for now.
36:24Maybe one day, the right tools will finally bring those lost moments to light.
36:30He was the leader of Jesus Christ's twelve disciples and the first pope of the Catholic Church.
36:51As such, St. Peter's sacred remains have been a precious and revered relic,
36:56kept in the watchful care of the Catholic Church and venerated for the better part of two millennia,
37:02less than a thousand feet from where he was martyred.
37:07The first basilica of St. Peter was built in the fourth century right over the resting place of the Apostle Peter's remains on Rome's Vatican Hill.
37:19The spot for the basilica wasn't chosen for any other reason than that's where Peter's bones were.
37:28The site has been venerated for about 1,800 years.
37:32For the long succession of popes and any other worshippers fortunate enough to have the opportunity,
37:37venerating Peter's remains has been a deeply meaningful practice.
37:42But in 1950, Pope Pius XII's Christmas radio address contained an,
37:48I've got good news and bad news kind of announcement.
37:51What the pontiff said was that during the excavations carried out beneath St. Peter's Basilica some years prior,
37:56human bones had been found.
37:58But he said it wasn't possible to say with certainty that the bones were St. Peter's.
38:03Catholics had been paying their respects in the basilica for centuries,
38:10confident the Apostle Peter's remains were nearby.
38:13But if those discovered bones might have belonged to someone else,
38:17then where were St. Peter's bones?
38:22It's believed that sometime between 54 and 68 CE,
38:27the Apostle Peter came to Rome,
38:29where in the absence of any Christian churches,
38:32he preached in private homes around the city.
38:35This was in the time of Rome's fifth emperor, Nero,
38:39infamous for his public persecution of Christians.
38:44According to the accounts of the Roman historian Tacitus,
38:48Christians were killed by burning or crucifixion
38:52or being devoured by wild animals in front of crowds of a chariot racing circuit
38:58known as the Circus of Nero outside Rome's city walls.
39:04It's believed that around 67 CE,
39:07Peter became one of these martyred victims.
39:13Peter was reportedly buried in a Roman necropolis or city of the dead,
39:17known as the Vatican necropolis.
39:19This site didn't have any Christian significance at the time.
39:23It was merely an area adjacent to the Circus of Nero,
39:26where many Romans were buried.
39:28About a century and a half later, in 313 CE,
39:33Rome's then emperor Constantine converted to Christianity
39:36and ordered a great basilica to be built over the place where Peter's tomb was believed to lie.
39:40Within the basilica, a monument eventually called the Trophy of Gaius was built directly over the tomb.
39:47There was a lattice door that supposedly led to Peter's remains.
39:52The basilica was rebuilt and expanded about 1,200 years later in the 1500s and 1600s,
39:59including the addition of the iconic dome designed by Michelangelo.
40:04Vatican Hill was completely transformed.
40:07The high altar was built above the Trophy of Gaius and St. Peter's tomb,
40:12and it has stood there ever since as a symbol of Christian devotion.
40:17So according to tradition,
40:19there was no reason to question that the faithful were venerating Peter's actual remains
40:25until that papal address in 1950.
40:28If St. Peter's remains are gone from their original resting place,
40:35some historians believe they may have been lost about five centuries ago
40:40during a senseless and traumatic event.
40:43St. Peter's bones could have been lost or destroyed in May of 1527 during the sack of Rome.
40:51The forces of Charles V, the Holy Roman Emperor and King of Spain,
40:57hadn't been paid in some time, so they were angry.
41:02About 20,000 of them stormed into Rome, looting and pillaging
41:07and indiscriminately murdering military defenders and civilians alike.
41:13Merchants were ransomed, tortured or murdered for their money.
41:17This went on for a month.
41:19But the thing is, the violence also took on religious overtones.
41:23Many of the attacking soldiers felt a particular hatred of Catholic Rome
41:28and expressed their disdain with great cruelty.
41:32Accounts also say that churches were ransacked
41:35and that relics of Peter and other saints were trampled and destroyed.
41:38But it's the very possibility that St. Peter's bones were removed long ago
41:45that gives some modern believers and researchers hope for the bones' safety.
41:51In the fourth century, at a time when Christians faced intense persecution,
41:57some followers may have moved Peter's bones to protect them from theft or intentional destruction.
42:04And one theory as to where they'd moved them to is the Roman catacombs.
42:13Catacumba comes from two ancient Greek words meaning, at the quarry.
42:17Rome's first catacombs were just tunnels dug to quarry volcanic stone.
42:22Once those tunnels were no longer being quarried,
42:24the Christians started using them as underground cemeteries and expanded and extended them.
42:30Later, tunnels were dug expressly to be used as underground cemeteries.
42:37It was common for Christians to move relics to secure locations for their protection.
42:41And the idea that this may have been done with St. Peter's bones
42:44is one of the more accepted theories today.
42:46The chronograph, the Roman calendar of 354 CE, actually supports this,
42:51saying that from 258 CE, Peter's remains were ad catacumbus, at the catacombs, and not at Vatican Hill.
43:02Rome's catacombs are some of the oldest and longest in the world.
43:07There are hundreds of miles of burial tunnels beneath the city and the surrounding area.
43:12Some have been opened to the public, but many of them still haven't been properly explored.
43:17And there could be even more waiting to be discovered.
43:20So if Peter's remains are down there somewhere, they would be very hard to find.
43:26But some experts believe St. Peter's bones may be hiding in plain sight.
43:33It's possible that St. Peter's remains have already been found,
43:38and that they've been in the Vatican all along.
43:44In 1939, it was decided that the Vatican grottoes,
43:47an ancient complex of chambers and chapels that lie beneath the floor of the basilica,
43:52should be opened to the public.
43:54Creating access required some excavation work.
43:57And in the course of that, workers came across Roman tombs,
44:01the ancient Vatican necropolis.
44:03Materials were removed and put into a Vatican warehouse and forgotten about.
44:10As these excavations continued, a Catholic mystic claimed to have had several visions
44:14in which Jesus told her Peter's remains weren't on Vatican Hill,
44:17but had been interred miles from there in the catacombs of Marcellinus and Peter.
44:22Years after the excavations began, a worker who was involved told one of the archaeologists
44:29that some of the materials discovered early on had been bones,
44:33and that they had been removed and were now in a Vatican warehouse.
44:40The bones were pulled from the Vatican storehouse and sent for forensic testing.
44:45The analysis said the bones belonged to one man, heavy set,
44:51who had been about 60 or 70 years old at the time of his death,
44:55which matched Peter's approximate age when he was martyred.
45:00And there were traces of wool dyed purple and interwoven with gold thread,
45:05suggesting the bones had been wrapped with great care before being interred.
45:10This was enough for the Catholic Church.
45:16In 1968, Pope Paul VI announced officially that Peter's bones had been found,
45:22so they ended their temporary stay in the Vatican warehouse
45:25and at the forensic labs, and were venerated privately,
45:29until 2013 when Pope Francis displayed them publicly in St. Peter's Square.
45:36So it's a neat, happy ending.
45:38As long as you believe that the results of the forensic testing on the bones
45:41were sufficient to prove the bones really were St. Peter's.
45:43Many experts still have their doubts.
45:45Peter's bones may have been lost to history,
45:50or they may be safe and secure in the Vatican.
45:53But if neither of those is true,
45:55there are still many miles of unexplored, unexcavated catacombs
46:00that may still hold Peter's remains.
46:03Until Peter's bones are verified or located,
46:08believers may have their faith tested,
46:11while scientists and skeptics may keep searching for the truth.
46:15And it's possible both will one day find what they are looking for.
46:19What they are looking for.
46:20What they are looking for.
46:21What they are looking for.
46:26What they?
46:32What they are looking for.
46:36Last minute.
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