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00:00A dozen mysterious vessels appear on a Japanese shore after volcanic activity in the area.
00:06None of them have propellers or engines, so they look like normal ships, but they have no means of propulsion.
00:12A dozen of them strewn along the coastline as though some gigantic toddler got bored of playing with them and
00:18tossed them.
00:19But how did they really get there?
00:21A fierce storm in the North Sea unearths a mysterious discovery from the cliffs of England's coastline.
00:27It's an area of about 130 square feet with many dozens of oblong hollows or what looks like impressions distributed
00:34over its surface.
00:36They're short, pronounced depressions oriented in different directions. So could these be paw prints from some ancient creatures?
00:42A hurricane in Guatemala reveals ancient hieroglyphics that could rewrite history.
00:47So could these newly discovered hieroglyphics provide new information or more insight into the life and times of the ancient
00:53Maya?
00:53All over the world, incredible discoveries are being revealed by devastating events.
01:00Floods, earthquakes, droughts, hurricanes, volcanic eruptions. Trails of destruction expose long lost mysteries.
01:11This is discovered by disaster.
01:25In October of 2021, a burst of heightened seismic activity rocked the Japanese-governed volcano islands in the Northwestern Pacific
01:33Ocean.
01:34The event caused significant tectonic shifts and undersea ruptures of molten rock.
01:41The three islands are sparsely populated and with good reason.
01:44This area lies right along what's known as the Ring of Fire, an unstable geologic zone where there's a great
01:49deal of volcanic activity.
01:51Mount Suribachi, on the central island here, is the dormant vent of an active volcano, recognized as one of Japan's
01:59most dangerous.
02:01Experts are dispatched to conduct aerial surveys of the islands to assess whether or not evacuations are necessary and find
02:08no immediate danger.
02:10But they do discover something alarming on one of Ioto's western beaches.
02:15A string of hulking ships, a dozen of them, strewn along the coastline as though some gigantic toddler got bored
02:22of playing with them and tossed them there.
02:25But how did they really get there?
02:28Images of the ships are splashed all over Japan's news media, who breathlessly report them as ghost ships that have
02:35risen from the seabed.
02:37Now, I don't know how many people actually believe that these were ghost ships, but the dramatic emotional reaction to
02:43these sudden experiences was understandable.
02:47Ioto has only officially been called that since 2007. Up till then, it went by a better known name, the
02:52one it had during World War II, Iwo Jima.
02:59Until the war, Iwo Jima was just this tiny, barren island, only about three miles wide, five miles long, way
03:06off in the ocean.
03:07It's almost 700 miles away from the closest part of any of Japan's main islands.
03:14But during the war, Iwo Jima's location suddenly made it a great strategic advantage for Japan.
03:21The United States operational base for its B-29 bombers was at Tenian, in the Mariana Islands, 1,400 miles
03:29from Japan's main islands.
03:31The B-29 could fly 4,000 miles fully loaded, so the distance alone was not a problem. Something else
03:38was.
03:40Iwo Jima was right in the middle of that 1,400-mile distance.
03:44Japan had built two airfields on the island, and they were actively constructing a third.
03:49And they were very successful at intercepting American B-29s that were on their way to bomb Japan's main islands.
03:56It was deadly. The United States realized that it had to take Iwo Jima.
04:05American forces bombarded Iwo Jima relentlessly from the air and from the water for nine months before making a beach
04:10landing,
04:11which resulted in the hellish and bloody 36-day-long battle at the Battle of Iwo Jima.
04:16So could these ships be casualties of the United States bombarding Iwo Jima before the battle?
04:25I think that's unlikely. They don't show any evidence of lethal damage.
04:28None of the sort of damage you would expect to find if they'd been destroyed in battle.
04:33Oddly, eight of the twelve vessels don't seem to have names.
04:37The names of the other four can be made out.
04:40The Chevertchi Krebelov, the Giliak, and the Kalish.
04:44And one with a Japanese name, the IGN Toyotu Maru.
04:49The Krebelov was a British-built ship that had at one time been lent to Russia, which is why it
04:56has a Russian name.
04:58The Kalish was an old American-built cargo ship, while the Giliak is a bit of a mystery.
05:05But what's strange is that records indicate the Toyotu Maru was bombed and sunk by the United States on February
05:121, 1942,
05:14long before the naval bombardment of Iwo Jima.
05:17And the really odd thing is the Toyotu Maru was sunk at Tanapag Harbour in Saipan, over 700 miles from
05:26where it is now.
05:27So how does a ship that was sunk 700 miles away end up washed up on a beach here three
05:33-quarters of a century later?
05:34A closer look at the unnamed vessels reveals one remarkable thing that they have in common.
05:41None of them have propellers or engines.
05:44So they look like normal ships from that era, but they have no means of propulsion.
05:50The other odd thing is that the hulls of all eight aren't steel. They're concrete. It's like they're giant ship
05:57decoys or something.
05:58A search of declassified Navy documents reveals information about one of the ships, the Giliak.
06:05A document dated June 1, 1945 says, Giliak sunk in modified position none, South Breakwater Line, Iwo Jima.
06:16So it seems the United States was building a breakwater at the beach.
06:21A breakwater is a coastal structure, usually a rock or rubble mound that runs parallel to the coast.
06:29They reduce incoming wave energy, protect beaches, and shelter vessels from waves and currents.
06:35But what does the construction of a breakwater have to do with these ships?
06:41After the Battle of Iwo Jima was over, the United States turned the island into a base for its own
06:46aerial operations.
06:47And to build that base, they'd have to get a constant flow of personnel, supplies, and building materials onto the
06:53island.
06:54The best way to do that was by using a vehicle that was capable of beach landings, the DUKW, or
07:01DUCK.
07:03The DUKW was a low-draft amphibious truck with six drive wheels.
07:08They were virtually disposable, built to last just long enough to get personnel and gear into battle.
07:14But the military wanted to put them into extended use at Iwo Jima.
07:19This presented a problem because DUCKs were very heavy, even when empty.
07:24So they had trouble in rough waters, which were a regular occurrence at Iwo Jima.
07:30They were pretty much useless, so the decision was made to use a dozen ships to build a protective breakwater
07:37on the beach.
07:39So all these ships were placed here intentionally by the U.S. military.
07:46Eight of them were actually concrete barges, originally built to carry material and supplies.
07:51They weren't the flat-bottom kind of barge many of us think of today.
07:55They had hulls shaped like regular seagoing ships, but no power of their own.
08:00They had to be towed, which explains the lack of propellers and engines.
08:05And during the war, steel was a precious commodity.
08:08So Americans made the barge's hulls out of reinforced concrete.
08:12And being barges, they weren't christened like ships would be.
08:15They were only identified by letters and numbers.
08:17So concrete 11, concrete 29, concrete 30. No names.
08:22But none of this explains the mysterious reappearance of the Toyotu Maru,
08:27700 miles away from where it had been bombed and sunk.
08:31Further analysis of the naval documents reveals more details about the doomed ship.
08:37During the war, materials were especially valuable.
08:40So the U.S. Navy actually refloated the Toyotu Maru at Saipan in 1944.
08:48And then in March of 1945, the decision was made to tow it to Iwo Jima,
08:54intentionally sink it there and use it as part of the breakwater.
08:58Mystery solved.
09:00Records show that on June 13, 1945, concrete 30 was sunk,
09:06completing the third and final leg of the breakwater at Iwo Jima.
09:10But disaster struck.
09:13Late that same month, two typhoons swept close by Iwo Jima.
09:16One after the other.
09:17Breaking the ships free and sweeping them out into the waves.
09:20The improvised harbor was destroyed even before it could be put into full use.
09:25By that point, it was decided that Naha port in Okinawa was more strategically important.
09:30And the breakwater at Iwo Jima was never rebuilt.
09:33The ships stayed where the typhoons had scattered them in the waters offshore.
09:38So how did they make this reappearance eight decades later?
09:42According to research, Iwo Jima is known to rise between about 10 and 30 inches per year because of volcanic
09:49pressure.
09:50The strip of beach where American troops made their landing in that 1945 battle is now more than 50 feet
09:57above sea level and still rising.
10:00So along with the seabed, the ships have slowly been rising up all this time.
10:05The big spike in seismic activity in 2021 simply accelerated the ship's reappearance.
10:10The United States returned Iwo Jima to Japan in 1968 and the only people living on it now are a
10:16small company of Japan's armed forces.
10:18Visitors are allowed only once a year and that privilege is reserved for servicemen and their families.
10:26Seismologists say there is the possibility of another large eruption.
10:30But even in the meantime, as the island slowly rises, these ghost ships will continue to work their way up
10:37the beach and they'll eventually be completely out of the water.
10:42Many of the more than 21,000 ducks that were manufactured are still being used for tourism.
10:51Some World War II era concrete barges built at the same shipyard as those at Ioto have had a more
10:57positive, hopeful end to their story.
10:59One concrete barge, YOGN 82, ended up as part of a breakwater in British Columbia for decades.
11:05And when that breakwater had served its purpose, YOGN 82 was the first ship to be scuttled to become an
11:11artificial reef and a home for sea life.
11:14While the 12 ships at Ioto may be necessary reminders of the tolls of war,
11:20it's good to know that decades after a tragic and bloody battle, life can find its way back again.
11:36For centuries, the medieval English cliffside town of Haysborough has been waging a precarious battle against an adversary it cannot
11:45beat, the North Sea.
11:48In May of 2013, the sea unleashed a fierce windstorm that tore huge swaths of earth from the town's cliffs.
11:55These storms are getting worse.
11:59Sometimes many tons of coastline are eaten up by the waves overnight.
12:05Houses that seemed safe the day before are hanging over the beach by morning.
12:12The Haysborough cliffs are made of glacial sands, silts and clay.
12:16They're soft and have been eroding steadily for centuries.
12:20Between the years 1600 and 1850, the cliff edge was known to recede over a yard every year.
12:29But with climate change, erosion has accelerated.
12:32It's more than three yards per year now, which has tripled the previous rate.
12:35And it's even more than that in some places.
12:38So the math is not complicated.
12:40If things keep going at this rate, the entire town should be gone in about 30 years.
12:44The day after the storm, two people brave enough to venture out onto the beach below Haysborough spot something.
12:52It's a large rock slab lying flat on the beach where the sand was washed away the night before.
12:57It's an area of about 130 square feet with many dozens of oblong hollows or what looks like impressions distributed
13:05over its surface.
13:06It's very strange. What on earth is going on here?
13:11The cliffs are the product of glaciation that occurred about 450,000 years ago.
13:16But the layers below the cliffs at sea level, where the slab is, were built up well before that.
13:22Out of silt that was deposited in an estuary where an ancient river met the sea.
13:27What you can get in some instances is a preserved ancient riverbed with evidence of patterns forged over the course
13:35of thousands of years.
13:37Ripples form in the silt at the bottom of the water.
13:41And if the river's water level drops, the exposed silt dries and hardens in the sun.
13:48Then other sediments are deposited on top.
13:51And over millennia, as the silt turns to rock, the wavy pattern in the original layer may be preserved.
13:58So is that what we're seeing here?
14:02But the pattern that a stream's currents might produce would be a gently undulating series of mostly parallel ripples.
14:09Not like the oblong imprints found at Haysborough.
14:12A team of archaeologists is called to the site to investigate.
14:16And they will have to work quickly.
14:18The storm swept vast amounts of sand off the beach.
14:21But they know that in subsequent days, wave action will deposit fresh sand overtop the rock slab.
14:28Their initial examination of the imprints reveals surprising details.
14:32They're short, pronounced depressions oriented in different directions.
14:36So they're not all lined up together, but they're not random either.
14:39So could these be paw prints from some ancient creatures that are preserved in the silt?
14:45Maybe, but these don't really look like paw prints.
14:48They're elongated, whereas many paw prints tend to be about as wide as they are long.
14:53Unless the animal drags its foot forward after each step.
14:57In which case, the impression will be deep where the paw was placed.
15:00And then slope upward as the foot is pulled forward.
15:04The impressions on the beach at Haysborough are relatively equal in depth at both ends, and if anything, shallower in
15:11the middle.
15:12As the team continues to examine the depressions, they make a startling discovery.
15:17At the end of one of them, there's this little row of indentations.
15:20Their toes.
15:22These are human footprints.
15:24But to be preserved in rock like this, they would have to be very, very old.
15:29But it's unclear how old and whose footprints might these be.
15:35Skeletal remains of giant elk have been found near here, at about the same depth.
15:41And mammoth meridionalis have also been discovered.
15:44An early form of mammoth that's known to have gone extinct around 800,000 years ago.
15:49So could these prints be that old?
15:53No early human skeletal remains anywhere near that old have been found anywhere in the UK.
15:58So how do you estimate the age of these footprints when no evidence of the people who made them are
16:03present?
16:04Palynology is the study of microorganisms and microscopic fragments of organisms that might be found in sediments or sedimentary rocks.
16:15Basically, if you can find pollen in a layer of prehistoric mud or dirt and you can figure out what
16:19kind of flower it came from,
16:21you can tell exactly when that layer was formed.
16:24Locked in the same layer as the footprints, the researchers discover a rich variety of flora and fauna.
16:31Pollen, wood fibers, even insect parts, including the remains of beetles.
16:36An analysis of the samples yields stunning results.
16:41They date back to between 850 and 950,000 years ago.
16:46So the Haysborough footprints must be just as old.
16:51This is the first evidence of people, in this case some species of earlier hominin, living at the most northerly
16:58edge of habitation in Europe.
16:59Not only that, but these are the oldest known hominin footprints anywhere outside of Africa.
17:07So now that we know the age of the prints, we can zero in on what species of hominin made
17:12them.
17:12The constant influx of new sand being swept in by the waves makes it impossible for the archaeologists to take
17:20measurements of the footprints,
17:21which may provide vital clues as to what species of early man created them.
17:26So they turn to a computer-assisted process known as multi-image photogrammetry.
17:32Multi-image photogrammetry, or MIP, involves taking pictures of a subject from multiple positions.
17:39In this case, around and above the stone slab.
17:44The images are then digitally processed and combined into one three-dimensional virtual model.
17:52The MIP scan shows a total of 152 usable footprints that vary in size between 5 1⁄2 and 10 inches
17:59long, and 2 1⁄2 and 4 inches wide.
18:02These dimensions are consistent with the sizes and shapes of prints we'd expect from a species called Homo antecessor,
18:09or pioneer man, whose skeletal remains were found in Spain.
18:14That is what we know of the dimensions of Homo antecessor's feet, based on these skeletal remains from Spain.
18:21It matches these Haysborough prints perfectly.
18:25Homo antecessor looked pretty similar to a modern human, but a little different.
18:29It had a low forehead and a marked double brow ridge.
18:32They are the first known human population on the European continent, having existed there between 800,000 and 1.2
18:39million years ago.
18:40And they've been found in what is now Spain.
18:43So it's totally plausible that the footprints at Haysborough belong to Homo antecessor.
18:49Fossil skeletal evidence of middle Pleistocene hominins found elsewhere in the world have all conformed to a foot length to
18:56stature ratio of 0.15.
19:00This means that if you know an individual's foot length, you can multiply that by 6.67 to calculate their
19:07height.
19:09Using that formula, the various individuals within our Haysborough hominin group had heights that ranged between just over 3 feet
19:17tall to about 5 foot 8.
19:21The Homo antecessor skeletons found in Spain tell us that the adult males had an average stature of around 5
19:27foot 8 and adult females were around 5 foot 4.
19:30That suggests that the tallest individuals in our Haysborough group was probably adult male, and that there are smaller prints
19:38that could have belonged to adult females, and you've also got smaller prints that could have been younger individuals of
19:43both sexes.
19:45An obvious interpretation would be that this was a family group.
19:48But where were they going, and what were they doing on this ancient stretch of mud about 900,000 years
19:53ago?
19:55When you look at the orientation of the footprints, there's a general movement toward the south.
20:02But many of the prints seem to wander about changing directions.
20:08And this makes perfect sense.
20:10There were children in this group, roaming around, playing, following their curiosity, exploring and learning.
20:17This group, this family, may have been out collecting shellfish and seaweed for food, and the kids were just roaming
20:24about.
20:25By the end of May 2013, within a couple weeks of the storm, the Haysborough footprints had been taken back
20:32by the sea.
20:33They were destroyed by the same tides and waves that had revealed them to us.
20:38A family had wandered along a riverbank, their footprints hidden and preserved for the better part of a million years.
20:44And now, they're truly gone.
20:47Homo antecessor eventually became extinct in Europe, and was believed to have been replaced by another early human, Homo heidelbergensis.
20:56Then, when the climate changed around 400,000 years ago, they were replaced by the Neanderthals, who were eventually replaced
21:03by us, Homo sapiens.
21:05How long will last remains to be seen.
21:21In 2001, an enormous hurricane made landfall and swept across an area of northern Guatemala, home to an ancient Maya
21:30city-state known as Dos Piles.
21:35Guatemala ranks among the top five countries in the world most impacted by natural disasters.
21:41That's sort of mind-blowing when you consider how small it is, and yet, it gets hit by everything you
21:46can imagine.
21:46Floods, hurricanes, earthquakes, they even have a few volcanoes.
21:51At Dos Piles, the hurricane's extreme winds of up to 100 miles per hour left some serious wreckage in their
21:58wake, including trees that were entirely uprooted.
22:02One tree growing at the base of some temple ruins lay basically upside down.
22:08When inspecting the site after the hurricane had passed, caretakers working at the ancient ruins discovered that the toppled tree
22:16had revealed a set of stairs long since covered up by its roots.
22:20The uprooted tree had exposed an ancient staircase.
22:24This is like an open sesame moment.
22:26Imagine if all of a sudden, a secret door opened, exposing you to information about the past in a way
22:31you never thought possible.
22:33Well, this is what seems to have happened here.
22:36The staircase was located next to other steps that archaeologists had long been aware of.
22:41However, the hurricane revealed a total of ten new steps, all decorated with hieroglyphics that date to the time of
22:48the ancient Maya.
22:50The eight other steps next to this new discovery discussed the important events of their time.
22:55So could these newly discovered hieroglyphics provide new information or more insight into the life and times of the ancient
23:01Maya?
23:02To this day, the Maya still inhabit the land of their ancestors.
23:06Their culture is thought to have originated thousands of years ago.
23:10But the peak of the ancient Maya civilization began around the third century CE and continued for about another 700
23:18years.
23:19Now, this was a long time ago, but this civilization was sophisticated.
23:23You can see that in the engineering of their immense pyramids, in their well-organized agricultural practices, in their social
23:30structure, their sophisticated numbering system, and a really strong understanding of astronomy.
23:37Their territory was largely concentrated in what is today Guatemala, Belize, and southern Mexico.
23:43We can still see the magnificent remains of their cities in places like Chichen Itza, Calakmul, and Tulum.
23:50Archaeologists curious about what they might learn from the newly discovered hieroglyphics at Dos Pilas begin the painstaking work of
23:58excavating the stairs and deciphering the symbols inscribed on the stone.
24:03There are 912 different signs on the steps, one of the longest Maya texts ever discovered.
24:09In general, Maya hieroglyphics cover the dynastic history and the accomplishments of their rulers.
24:16Not surprisingly, these are often war, alliances forged, victories won, religious ceremonies, and important familial events.
24:25The same kind of things chronicled by civilizations around the world.
24:29The newly discovered stairs are separated into three sections, east, central, and west.
24:35On the sixth step of the central section, they're discussing a certain ruler named Malaja Chankowil.
24:42The Maya have a different calendar from us, but the glyphs say he was born on the corresponding date of
24:48the 15th of October, 625 CE.
24:52On the fourth and fifth steps, it's written that he came to the city of Dos Pilas at the age
24:55of four and ascended to the throne as its ruler at the age of 11 in 636.
25:02For the people of Dos Pilas, the seventh century was defined by a long-term war with the city-state
25:06of Tikal, situated 73 miles to the west.
25:10Tikal was one of the largest Maya urban centers and a major power at the time.
25:15At its peak, the city covered approximately six square miles, with an outlying population totaling about 50,000.
25:24There's no question Tikal is bigger than Dos Pilas and that it was definitely the more powerful of the two
25:30cities.
25:31The next piece of text deciphered by the archaeologists leaves them stunned.
25:37It says that Dos Pilas was in fact created by the city-state of Tikal in 629 CE in order
25:43to function as a military outpost.
25:45This means that in a sense, Dos Pilas was under the thumb of Tikal and it would definitely have to
25:50take orders from its king.
25:52So why would Dos Pilas have gone to war with its ally and the very power that created it?
25:58The rulers of the two warring cities were actually brothers.
26:00Balaja Chan Kawil ruled Dos Pilas and his older brother Nun Ujul Chak ruled Tikal.
26:08Now why they were fighting, we have no idea, but these new clues unearthed by the hurricane might answer that
26:14riddle.
26:16Dos Pilas sits really close to the middle section of one of the only major rivers in the area.
26:21the Rio de la Pasión.
26:23So it makes sense that Tikal would want to establish a military outpost there from which they could control all
26:30trade between the Maya highlands and lowlands.
26:33On step five of the eastern section of the staircase, archaeologists interpret the glyphs to say that when the ruler
26:40of Dos Pilas was in the stirties,
26:43Kaleqmul, the region's other major power, attacked and defeated Dos Pilas before it had gone to war with Tikal.
26:51Until now, we never knew Kaleqmul was involved in the fighting with Dos Pilas, never mind that it had attacked
26:56it.
26:57We'd assumed that the war between Dos Pilas and Tikal was limited to them only.
27:01But now it appears another major power was pulling the strings too.
27:04Because Tikal and Kaleqmul were rivals, maybe Kaleqmul attacked Dos Pilas in order to seize control over the Rio de
27:13la Pasión.
27:14Because if Tikal couldn't control the trade, political and economic clout would be ceded to Kaleqmul.
27:21The deciphering of the entire script on the steppes threatens to rewrite the history books.
27:27After Dos Pilas was defeated by Kaleqmul, the leader of Dos Pilas, Baalaj-Chan-Kawil, is not killed.
27:35Instead, he gets sent into exile for five years.
27:38And then he returns as ruler of Dos Pilas, but now as the ally of Kaleqmul, meaning these two former
27:46enemies are now allies.
27:48It's not too surprising that Baalaj-Chan-Kawil accepted this arrangement.
27:53After all, he would have been sacrificed to the gods.
27:55But what it did was pit him against his brother.
27:59So before, we assumed that the rivalry and wars between the brothers weren't caused by anything external.
28:04But we now know that it was actually because Dos Pilas had become a pawn in a greater geopolitical game.
28:11This will rewrite the history books because what we thought we knew was that Tikal and Kaleqmul were two regional
28:17Maya powers that weren't directly rivaling each other for superpower supremacy.
28:21But in fact, they were.
28:23This new information could help us understand why ancient Maya civilization collapsed.
28:27It's wildly believed that it wasn't just one factor that led to the demise of the ancient Maya.
28:33A perfect storm of events which included environmental factors, crop failures, and wars all led to the eventual dysfunction and
28:42downfall of the civilization.
28:44What we thought was that the Maya city-states descended into warfare where local or regional rivals fought each other,
28:51causing a chain reaction of chaos leading to collapse.
28:53But what these newfound hieroglyphics indicate is that there was competition between major powers and that the little city-states
29:00were simply pieces on a chessboard.
29:02And what a chess move it turned out to be by Kaleqmul.
29:05With Dos Pilas on their side, they went to war against Tikal.
29:09Step three on the west section of the stairway proclaims the victory of Kaleqmul and Dos Pilas over Tikal.
29:15And because we don't see Baalaj Chankawil's brother's name mentioned in texts or glyphs from this point on,
29:22it's assumed that he met his end, likely sacrificed to the gods.
29:26He would have been one of many though.
29:28The glyphs on the stairway read, blood flowed and the skulls of the peoples of the Tikal place were piled
29:35up.
29:36The glyph doesn't reference the ruler of Tikal at all by name and only speaks about the victims as being
29:42from the Tikal place.
29:44One likely interpretation is that they massacred the people of the city along with the entire ruling class.
29:52That would have been a strong way of ensuring that Baalaj Chankawil was the uncontested ruler of Tikal.
30:00But that isn't the end of the story. Despite having been defeated, Tikal rose again.
30:06Within a little over a hundred years, it had rebuilt its forces back up and went to war against Kaleqmul,
30:13resulting in a resounding victory.
30:15It would appear that there was no true decisive winner in the conflict between Kaleqmul and Tikal.
30:20These tit for tat campaigns eventually weakened both of them, meaning that they couldn't control their allies.
30:25This led to greater fracturing of ancient Maya society into more regional powers who fought each other until they were
30:30no longer able.
30:32We don't know exactly what happened to it or when, but there are some glyphs on a stairway in Tamarondito,
30:38a Maya ruin nearby, that say that Dos Pilas was never heard from again after 761.
30:44This timeline more or less coincides with the fact that in the early 9th century, many Maya cities and towns
30:50along the Rio de la Pasión were abandoned.
30:53But thanks to these glyphs, we know that it wasn't a result of petty warfare between small cities, but rather
31:00the result of a major war involving two of their most powerful city-states going toe-to-toe.
31:05Maya populations residing in this region eventually migrated to the northeast and established themselves in a place called Canquén.
31:13Any desired stability didn't last long, and within about a hundred years, the final drop of chaos caused the glass
31:21to spill over, and the ancient Maya civilization came to an end.
31:37On the west coast of the largest island of the Orkney archipelago lies a beautiful sandy beach presiding over the
31:44pristine waters of the Bay of Scale.
31:47This Scottish island is relatively far north, and you can tell by where it's located that living here would require
31:52serious resilience.
31:53The next stop west of here is Canada, so the entire North Atlantic just dumps its tremendous energy onto this
32:00part of the island chain.
32:01For this reason, disastrous erosion is a pretty significant problem.
32:05In January of 2021, horrible winter weather contributed to a large amount of erosion along the shoreline, resulting in its
32:13partial collapse.
32:14Shortly after, a beachgoer was out on a leisurely stroll when he discovered some curious items at the north end
32:20of the bay.
32:22There are what looks like teeth lying in the ground.
32:25They actually kind of look like house shingles, but they're quite short, broad, and relatively bulky.
32:31They're obviously too small to be house shingles, and they're too square to be some sort of mollusk.
32:38What are these things?
32:39Closer inspection reveals a boomerang-shaped, leathery-looking piece of material.
32:45A large amount of erosion had dragged it out of the earth and deposited it on the beach.
32:50This house shingle shape indicates that it's the tooth of a bovine animal.
32:55And based on that shape and its size, it probably came from a cow.
32:58So that boomerang-shaped piece is likely a cow's mandible or lower jaw.
33:06Emerging from the eroded shoreline is also stone piled on stone.
33:11Although it's been pretty damaged, it must be an ancient wall.
33:17Are we looking at some kind of old pasture?
33:20As the beachgoer continues to explore the immediate vicinity of where the wall and jawborne were found,
33:27he spots a peculiar stone emerging from the eroding shoreline.
33:31The stone is pretty big, 34 inches long and 21 inches thick, so it's heavy.
33:37It's hard to see at first, but there are faint lines running in seemingly random directions all over the stone's
33:42surface.
33:42These markings are definitely made by human hands, there is no doubt about it.
33:47It actually reminds me of some ancient art that was discovered about six miles away at the Ness of Brodgar.
33:53The stones from the Ness of Brodgar date back to the Neolithic period, which was from around 7,000 to
34:001,700 BCE.
34:03Neolithic is another term for the Stone Age, a time that saw the domestication of animals,
34:08as well as the adaptation and use of more and more sophisticated stone tools.
34:14But the markings on the stone found here at the Bay of Scale are nowhere near as precise as the
34:19ones from the Ness of Brodgar.
34:21They're way shallower, they don't look like they were made with intent.
34:24Maybe this is the result of a blade striking a stone when somebody's using it as a butcher's block or
34:30something like that.
34:31Maybe, but when you look closely in good light, you can make out a pair of triangles and two rectangular
34:36bands running across the stone.
34:38So someone actually appears to have decorated it.
34:42But what is it? And could it be related to the cow's jaw?
34:45At the southern end of the Bay of Scale lies Skara Bray, an ancient Neolithic village dated to 3100 BCE.
34:54A vast amount of artwork has been found here.
34:56Skara Bray is a gem. Kind of a funny way to refer to a Stone Age village, but it really
35:03is.
35:03It's considered the best preserved Neolithic village in all of Western Europe.
35:08Since its discovery in 1850, it has provided a treasure trove of artifacts and information.
35:17The site consists of nine houses all built of flat stone slabs that are linked by covered passageways.
35:23Each house measures about 400 square feet and consists of one single room.
35:29What's also interesting is that some of the artifacts found in the Bay of Scale also have geometric patterns similar
35:37to those found at Skara Bray.
35:39So could the two locations be related?
35:42The village of Skara Bray was also discovered as a result of a powerful storm that tore at the coast
35:48foundations, revealing the cultural remains of Scotland's Neolithic past.
35:53The artifacts and organic remains here have been dated to a period ranging from about 3200 to about 2200 BCE,
36:00which means people lived here continuously for at least 1,000 years.
36:05It's actually older than Stonehenge and the Great Pyramid of Giza, both of which were built at roughly the same
36:12time in the middle of the 2000s BCE.
36:16Boar tusks were also found at Skara Bray.
36:19And one year prior to the discovery of the carved stone at the Bay of Scale, a boar tusk was
36:24found in the same place.
36:26It could be that this discovery site is covering up more than meets the eye.
36:31If what was found at Skara Bray is anything to go by, it could be another archaeological treasure chest.
36:38Skara Bray was a well-built and planned settlement with a sewage system leading out from individual homes.
36:44There were also stone beds of varying sizes.
36:48The graves of two women were even discovered beneath one of them.
36:52The graves appeared to have been there prior to the construction of the house.
36:56So it's possible that this was some sort of foundation ritual.
37:00But for what specific purpose?
37:03We can't really say.
37:06Archaeologists also found very intricate pottery, flat-based and decorated with grooves, incisions and impressions.
37:14It's thought that this form of pottery is indigenous to Orkney.
37:17But what's even more interesting here is that the pottery is ornamented with similar shapes and geometric patterns
37:22that we see on the stone discovered at the north end of the Bay of Scale.
37:26If you consider the fact that the remains of a wall have emerged from the earth just a little farther
37:30north from Skara Bray,
37:31it's completely plausible that a settlement could have existed here too at some point.
37:38So chances are that these two sites were contemporaneous to each other.
37:42Not only would they have existed around the same time, but the villages probably even looked the same.
37:49Seeds of barley and wheat grain have also been found on the grounds of Skara Bray, indicating that agricultural activity
37:55was taking place.
37:57So even though this was a stone age, people here were pretty sophisticated.
38:03Despite living in an unforgiving part of the world, it seems they had taken the leap into agriculture
38:09and were no longer surviving solely on hunting and gathering.
38:13A reddish, hard and heavy mineral has also been found at Skara Bray,
38:18a material not available anywhere else on mainland, the island where Skara Bray is located.
38:24Its brownish-reddish color actually gives it away.
38:27This is hematite. And back in the day, it was used for making fire and for polishing leather.
38:33To find it, you have to go all the way to the island of Hoi, directly south of mainland.
38:38The discovery of hematite means that there were local trading networks operating across the area,
38:44networks that the communities at the Bay of Skale and Skara Bray would have been part of.
38:50So this little village by the Bay of Skale was doing very nicely for itself for a very long time,
38:56roughly a thousand years, which really makes you wonder,
39:00if they could sustain themselves that well for that long, why was this place ever abandoned?
39:07At Skara Bray, archaeologists have also found ornate jewelry made of bone and ivory.
39:13In this case, it helps to look at what is here versus what isn't.
39:18If you plan to leave a place, then you pack and bring the tools and valuables that you need to
39:23live,
39:23and that are important to you.
39:25The fact that there was jewelry left at the site can mean that the occupants left this place in a
39:30hurry.
39:31That's true, but they may just be offerings left in a form of a closing ceremony.
39:38Meaning that when they decided to abandon Skara Bray and the other site, they left objects of value intentionally.
39:47Whether it's intentional or not, it's possible that some sudden or long drawn out disaster caused the abandonment.
39:53This part of Orkney is vulnerable to massive storms that cause an enormous buildup of sand.
39:57This would have rendered the area uninhabitable because it would have destroyed their crops.
40:02It's also possible that some cultural transformation caused people to leave and seek opportunities elsewhere.
40:08The fact of the matter is, we don't really know, and we have really no way of knowing at this
40:13point.
40:14The only thing that is certain is that people did live here for an impressive length of time.
40:21With the constant erosion and storms that are wearing away the Orkneys coastline,
40:25it's perhaps only a matter of time before more of its Stone Age secrets spill out into the open,
40:31giving us insight into Scotland's Neolithic history.
40:34Maybe one day, we will be able to answer the question as to whether it was a terrible disaster
40:39or some other cultural shift that brought this settlement to an end.
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