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00:01We have looked for it deep in the Amazonian jungle.
00:05We've followed South America's most dangerous rivers
00:08to the continent's most remote mountains.
00:11El Dorado, a lost city grimming with riches.
00:16A place said to be made of gold.
00:20Over the centuries, the myth has evolved and theories on its location have changed.
00:26To discover it, thousands of adventurers have faced the most hostile places in South America.
00:32What could be more logical than a dense, dangerous and almost impenetrable jungle
00:39to safeguard a legendary and fabulous treasure?
00:43Where do the first mentions of El Dorado arise?
00:47And what do they refer to?
00:49Which civilization might have had enough wealth to build a city of gold?
00:57Who knows what else is buried deep in the Amazon?
01:01Fantasy or reality?
01:03An investigation into El Dorado.
01:05An obsession and the most coveted treasures in history.
01:14El Dorado, or the Golden One.
01:17It's the name given to a place hidden somewhere in South America that's said to be made of gold.
01:25A mythical city that gave rise to one of the bloodiest treasure hunts in history.
01:34This legend originated in 16th century Colombia.
01:38Even today, 500 years later, in Bogota, the country's capital, the existence of El Dorado is still the subject of
01:47many theories.
01:53The famous gold museum houses more than 35,000 gold objects.
01:59Ornaments, necklaces, bracelets, all dating from before Christopher Columbus and the first Spanish settlers arrived in the Americas.
02:09These precious relics are proof of the wealth of the people that lived in the region at the time.
02:14An abundance of gold that fueled the legend of this mysterious city of gold.
02:19A place that no one has yet managed to locate.
02:22To investigate its existence, we have to go back to the origins of the myth.
02:29Christophe Colomb a besoin d'argent pour financer son premier voyage vers les Indes.
02:33Il cherche une nouvelle route vers ce qui correspond pour nous aujourd'hui à l'Asie et plus précisément Ã
02:39l'actuel Japon.
02:41Pour convaincre les rois catholiques Isabelle Ier de Castille et son époux Ferdinand II d'Aragon de financer son expédition,
02:50Colomb leur promet de leur ramener de l'or, beaucoup d'or.
02:53Les souverains catholiques en ont besoin, notamment pour mettre sur pied une nouvelle croisade
02:58afin de reprendre Jérusalem au Sultan Mamluk d'Egypte qui règne sur la ville depuis plus de deux siècles.
03:07To secure this patronage, Christopher Columbus used the lure of gold,
03:12relying on the tales told by Marco Polo during his travels in Asia at the end of the 13th century.
03:18During his visit to Burma, Marco Polo recounted his fascination with the golden pagodas in Buddhist temples.
03:29Columbus convinced his patrons of the existence of similar treasures to be found on his voyage
03:34and launched his first expedition on August 3rd, 1492.
03:39Two months after his departure, on 12 October 1492,
03:44Christopher Columbus landed not in Japan as he had expected, but in the Caribbean.
03:49First in the Bahamas, then in Cuba, and finally on the island of Hispaniola, present-day Haiti.
04:02He looked for gold immediately, but found only a few gold mines with very limited yields.
04:09Undaunted, he was convinced that great sources of gold existed.
04:13He just had to keep looking.
04:20Christopher Columbus subscribed to ancient beliefs that gold, like silver or precious stones,
04:27obeyed specific laws well known to alchemists.
04:31Gold was considered a living thing, and to grow, it depended on the sun.
04:36So, it was logical to look for gold in the hottest regions of the planet,
04:41the intertropical zones on either side of the equator.
04:46The stories told by Christopher Columbus gave rise to what quickly became known as the myth of the cities of
04:53gold.
04:54According to the explorer, these cities must exist, and that place must be in America.
05:01It wasn't yet El Dorado, but the cities of gold Columbus spoke of were a beginning.
05:06This was the fertile ground for the seed of the El Dorado myth,
05:10which, in a few years, would become an obsession for the conquistadors, including Hernan Cortes.
05:20Almost 30 years after Christopher Columbus's expedition, and still on behalf of the Spanish crown,
05:26Hernan Cortes set off in search of new riches that were increasingly coveted in Europe.
05:36Leaving Cuba in February 1519, by April he landed in Veracruz, on the coast of what is now Mexico,
05:45right in the heart of Aztec territory, one of the most advanced civilizations in the Americas.
05:51Its leader was Montezuma II.
05:56The Aztec people had occupied the region for several centuries.
06:01They built cities with religious temples and majestic palaces,
06:04the remains of which can still be seen today.
06:12The capital of the empire was called Tenochtitlan, which is now Mexico City.
06:18Hernan Cortes and his men arrived there in November of 1519.
06:24They were welcomed with great pomp by Emperor Montezuma II, who gave them a tour of his sumptuous palace.
06:36During their visit to the palace, the conquistadors were captivated by one room in particular.
06:42This episode is recounted by Bernal Diaz de Castillo, a traveling companion of Hernan Cortes.
06:54Hernan Cortes and some of his captains went in first, and they saw such a number of jewels and slabs
06:59and plates of gold that they were quite carried away and did not know what to say.
07:06It was the first time that the Spanish had been confronted with such a large quantity of gold in the
07:12New World.
07:13And according to the only existing accounts of the Spaniards' arrival in Aztec territory,
07:18Hernan Cortes and his men were soon obsessed with this treasure of Emperor Montezuma II.
07:27All sources claim that Montezuma II graciously offered it to Cortes as a sign of goodwill, peace, or perhaps submission.
07:36But these accounts come from the point of view of the conquistadors.
07:40One thing is certain, the situation quickly deteriorated.
07:48While the first contacts between the Aztecs and the conquistadors were friendly,
07:53curiosity soon gave way to mistrust and war soon followed.
07:59In the spring of 1521, after several months of fierce fighting,
08:04the city of Tenochtitlan fell to the Spanish invaders, precipitating the end of the Aztec Empire.
08:13It was a bloody period during which the booty that Hernan Cortes is said to have recovered simply vanished.
08:21Even today, the mystery of this disappearance remains unsolved.
08:29After Hernan Cortes' expedition to the Aztec Empire in Central America,
08:33Francisco Pizarro, another famous conquistador, was taken in by the myth and began a quest further south.
08:41Setting out from Panama in 1532, he landed in what is now Peru and entered Inca territory,
08:48which was now one of the largest kingdoms in America.
08:51It stretched over 3,500 kilometers down the Pacific coast and 800 kilometers across the Andean mountain range.
09:00Pizarro and his men decided to carry out a surprise attack on the town of Cayamarca,
09:06one of the largest Inca cities in the region.
09:13The Inca are divided in proies to the intestine.
09:17Pizarro takes advantage of the situation.
09:20And with less than 200 soldiers, he managed to capture the emperor Inca at Tawalpa
09:25during an embuscade that took place on November 16th of the same year.
09:41L'Empereur Inca remarque vite que les conquistadors sont obsédés par les métaux précieux.
09:49Alors, en échange de sa liberté, il propose de leur payer une rançon faramineuse.
09:56The episode is recounted by the Spanish historian Gonzalo Fernández de Oviedo
10:01in his work on the history of the conquest of the Americas.
10:08He said that he would give the gold contained in a room that was 22 feet long and 17 feet
10:13wide,
10:13and that he would have it filled up to a white line drawn with lime that was halfway up,
10:18that he would fill this room twice with silver, and that he would keep his promise within two months.
10:29According to historian Gonzalo Fernández de Oviedo,
10:33the Inca emperor pledged to deliver more than six tons of gold and twice as much silver.
10:40For weeks, precious metals were delivered from every corner of the empire,
10:45a treasure estimated at over 350 million euros.
10:53Pizarro and his men sent a fifth of the horde back to Spain and split the rest.
11:00But in a worrying trend, the conquistadors reneged on their agreement
11:06and ended up murdering Attawapa.
11:16And the treasure they recover in Kayamarca will prove to them just how rich the region is.
11:24Their thirst for gold has not been sated.
11:27They are now more convinced that the region could well be home to the famous El Dorado.
11:35In November 1533, they reached Cuzco,
11:39one of the oldest Inca cities located in the south of present-day Peru.
11:45Once again, Pizarro and his men were struck by the riches of the Inca,
11:49especially the literally dazzling temple of the sun.
11:52The most sacred site of the empire, dedicated to the sun god Inti,
11:57was considered to be the center of the world.
12:02The temple is part of a larger religious complex called the Coricancha,
12:06which in Quechua, the language of the Inca, means enclosure of gold.
12:12The walls of the Coricancha were adorned with a gold cornice,
12:17and the interior was said to be studded with emeralds.
12:20In this sanctuary dedicated to the greatest Incan divinities,
12:24the buildings glistened with a thousand lights.
12:27Their walls, both inside and out, were covered with 700 sheets of gold.
12:32A large gold disk was centrally located and reflected the sun's rays.
12:44But the temple also contained something even more special,
12:47a jewel-encrusted gold statue, the Pun Chao.
12:56The Pun Chao, which can mean daylight or dawn, was one of the most important Inca idols.
13:04It represents their supreme deity, the sun god Inti.
13:09From his royal headband stream rays of sunlight,
13:12and from his body lions symbolize humanity, the world of the living,
13:17and snakes symbolize the afterlife, the world of the dead.
13:27Inside the Coricancha, a sumptuous garden was dedicated to the god Inti.
13:32Everything was made of gold and silver.
13:34There were sculptures of llamas, jaguars, monkeys, and birds.
13:39There were jars encrusted with precious stones, all set in the middle of a cornfield.
13:49Part of this fabulous treasure had already been stripped,
13:53to buy the freedom of the Inca emperor, Atahualpa.
14:02When Pizarro and his men arrived in Cusco,
14:04they plundered what remained, and desecrated the mummies of the Inca emperors.
14:19The capture of Cusco by the Spanish was one of the events that precipitated the fall of the Inca empire.
14:25Peru's gold reserves, plundered by the conquistadors, were soon exhausted.
14:38And it was around this same time that a new legend began to circulate to the north of the Inca
14:44territory,
14:44among the conquistadors stationed in Quito, the capital of what is now Ecuador.
14:49In his book, the historian Gonzalo Fernández de Oviedo recounts that the conquistadors had heard that in the dense forests
14:57around Bogota,
14:58in what is now Colombia, there was a man called El Dorado.
15:04The Golden One, a king who was permanently covered in gold.
15:14When I asked why this prince was called the golden chief or king,
15:19the Spaniards who went to Quito said that, according to what they understood from the natives,
15:24this great lord covered himself with gold powder as fine as ground salt,
15:29without wearing any other clothes or dress over it.
15:31So every morning he would coat himself with a golden liquid.
15:35And on top of this anointing, the gold is ground as fine as needed.
15:39His whole person is covered in gold from the soles of his feet to his head,
15:44and shines like a piece of gold worked by the hand of a great craftsman.
15:48I think that if this chief uses this, he must have rich minds with this quality of gold.
15:56At the time, the legend was enough to make the conquistadors dream.
15:59And again, they decided to launch an expedition to find this city of gold that still evaded them.
16:11The conquistadors had heard that in the dense forests around Bogota,
16:15in what is now Colombia, there was a man called El Dorado.
16:19The Golden One, a king who was permanently covered in gold.
16:24At the time, the legend was enough to make the conquistadors dream.
16:28And again, they decided to launch an expedition to find this city of gold that still evaded them.
16:38The expedition was launched in 1536.
16:41It was led by Gonzalo Jimenez de Quesada.
16:44From the Atlantic coast of Colombia, he set off up the Magdalena River towards the interior,
16:49accompanied by around 800 men and 3500 indigenous people.
16:58The torrential rains made the food rot, and Quesada and his men were reduced to eating their horses,
17:05and then the corpses of starving natives.
17:13One year later, only 179 of the 800 Spaniards involved in the expedition managed to reach the Colombian highlands.
17:22Near present-day Bogota, the survivors entered a territory inhabited by the Chibcas, also known as Moiscas,
17:29a region where gold seems to flow freely.
17:35The Moiscas were living in central Colombia, on the eastern branch of the Andes mountain range.
17:41Far less well known than the Aztec, Maya or Inca civilizations,
17:46the Moiscas were nevertheless a very prosperous civilization.
17:50For almost a thousand years, they flourished between the 7th and 17th centuries CE.
17:59For the Moiscas, gold wasn't a currency.
18:03It had no economic value, only religious significance.
18:08The Moiscas reserved gold for their gods.
18:11And since the gods are everywhere, the Moiscas put gold everywhere.
18:17This astounded the conquistadors, who assumed the Moiscas had access to vast stores of it.
18:27An object found in 1969, and preserved in Bogota's gold museum, seems to make the link with the legend of
18:34the famous El Dorado.
18:36The golden kings saw it by the conquistadors.
18:40This unique piece has been dubbed the Moiscas raft.
18:47This artifact, made between the 11th and 16th centuries, is a true work of art.
18:53A closer look reveals 11 figures standing on what appears to be a raft, hence the name of this work.
18:59The most important figure is in the center.
19:03Clearly taller and wearing elaborate jewelry, the others seem to be his entourage.
19:07He is certainly a cacique, the tribal chief.
19:13On their arrival in Moiscas territory, the conquistadors also learned of the existence of a ritual.
19:19Some details of which seem to correspond to the accounts given in Gonzalo Fernandez de Oviedo's book on the Golden
19:26King.
19:32Each time a new cacique, or a tribal chief, came to power, an enthronement ritual took place at dawn on
19:40Lake Guatavita, some 60 kilometers north of the capital.
19:46This ceremony is recounted in detail by the 17th century Spanish chronicler, Juan Rodriguez Frail, who lived in the Bogota
19:55region for several years.
19:57The heir to the throne was stripped naked, then smeared with sticky earth and sprinkled with gold, so that he
20:04was completely covered in the metal.
20:06He was then placed on the raft, and a large pile of gold and emeralds were placed at his feet.
20:11He was to offer it to his god, and he made this offering by throwing all the gold at his
20:16feet into the middle of the lake.
20:22When they reached the middle of the lake at sunrise, and light illuminated his golden body, he would plunge in
20:30while offerings to this water-dwelling god were thrown in after him, including large quantities of gold.
20:40Could El Dorado be a man and not a place?
20:44At the time, these stories of men covered in gold aroused the curiosity of the greedy conquistadors.
20:51They tried to dig up the bottom of the lake in search of the treasures that had been thrown into
20:55the water during the Muisca ceremonies.
21:01The first to try to study the lake of Guatavita is the brother of the explorer Gonzalo Jiménez de Quesada.
21:09Malgré his efforts, he récupèrent that 4000 pesos.
21:12Years later, Antonio de Sepulveda, a rich rich merchant of Bogota, envisage to completely vider the lake.
21:19He obtained an official authorization of the crown to launch this titan-esque operation.
21:26Of very numerous Muiscas are then surrounded by force to perform this task.
21:35Lake Guatavita lies at the heart of a crater.
21:38It measures 800 meters in diameter and in places is 50 meters deep.
21:46To drain it, Sepulveda decided to break through the ridge surrounding the lake to allow the water to flow naturally
21:52into a canal built into the side of the mountain.
21:57The work took over 10 years.
22:00And it seems to be working.
22:05As the water level drops, golden emeralds appear.
22:09But just as the workmen reach a depth of only seven meters disaster strikes, the walls of the canal give
22:16way under the pressure of the water, which rushes down the slope, swallowing everything in its path.
22:27Hundreds of Muisca workers drown.
22:34The remains of this tragic episode can still be seen today in a hollow on the ridge surrounding the lake.
22:44Further attempts were made to drain the lake up until the middle of the 20th century, but to no avail.
22:51But for the first Spaniards that arrived in the region, the ritual practice on Lake Guatavita was proof that the
22:58Muisca's gold resources were immense.
23:02Inexhaustible even.
23:05And they were determined to plunder it all.
23:10Every time they discover a treasure, they're convinced there's an even bigger one somewhere else.
23:20Given the abundance of gold, the conquistadors were convinced that there were gold mines in the area.
23:26And they wouldn't take no for an answer.
23:36In the space of a few decades, the conquistadors' insatiable quest for wealth brought this civilization to its knees.
23:44In addition to pillaging, massacring, and raping, they imported diseases.
23:51And despite the sacrifices and years of searching, the conquistadors never found the gold mines from which the riches of
23:58the Muiscas were extracted.
24:00There was a simple reason for this. The gold didn't come from the region.
24:21The gold had been traded for their salt, their real treasure.
24:32You can live without gold, but not without salt.
24:35And the Muiscas had a monopoly on it, exchanging it for gold to honor their gods.
24:42The conquistadors did not find El Dorado in Muisca territory.
24:49The Spanish then turned their attention to another region west of the Pacific coast.
24:56A previously unexplored territory, which could also be full of unsuspected riches,
25:02and perhaps home to the famous El Dorado that everyone hopes to discover.
25:13In February 1541, a mission led by the explorer Francisco de Oriana set off from Quito towards the interior of
25:22the continent.
25:23The men managed to cross the Andes amidst extreme conditions and reach the Napa River.
25:35But while many members of the expedition died during the journey, Oriana decided to continue his quest to trace the
25:43river's source.
25:47After several long weeks, he and 57 of his men came upon an immense river, which would later be christened...
25:55The Amazon.
26:01Their journey was to continue for many long months.
26:05But these gold-hungry adventurers managed to cross this hostile and totally unknown environment.
26:11After traveling 4,800 kilometers, the few remaining survivors finally reached the Atlantic Ocean on the 24th of August 1542.
26:22They became the first Europeans to traverse the South American continent from west to east.
26:28The lure of gold was proving a powerful motivator.
26:34In the heart of the Amazon rainforest, Oriana claims to have come across a population that lived in large fortified
26:42cities and practiced agriculture.
26:46During their journey, they claimed to have encountered large settlements on the shores of a lake called the Land of
26:54the Omaguas.
26:55Its inhabitants were highly skilled in working precious metals, which they exchanged for common tools.
27:02What could be more logical than a dense, dangerous and almost impenetrable jungle to safeguard a legendary and fabulous treasure?
27:15The Amazon rainforest quickly became a new obsession.
27:20In 1560, the Pérou is a vice-royalist of the Spanish colonial empire.
27:26The vice-roi of Pérou confie to Pedro de Oursua the care to lead to this new expedition.
27:32Officially, he is appointed by the vice-roi of Pérou to expand the domain of the crown.
27:38Officially, it is to finally find the Eldorado to be based on the stories of Oriana.
27:44After building boats to sail upriver, Governor Ursua and his men embarked on the Rio Marignan on September 26th, 1560.
27:54But trouble followed.
27:57Ursua was authoritarian to say the least, ignored the opinions of his men, worked them mercilessly, so trouble was definitely
28:06brewing.
28:08Murders between companions, lost boats, mutiny.
28:11In the heart of the Amazon rainforest, the expedition quickly turns into a fiasco.
28:19Governor Pedro de Oursua is murdered by his own men, who end up killing each other.
28:26And not a single discovery will be recorded during the course of the adventure.
28:30The quest for Eldorado will continue the darkest passions of the conquistadors.
28:39After searching for Eldorado in Aztec territory, within the vast Inca Empire, on the high plateau of Colombia, occupied by
28:48the Muiscas, or in the heart of the Amazon rainforest among the Amaguas, European adventurers now turned their attention to
28:56another region that was yet to give up all its secrets.
28:59The Guyanan plateau, this immense area covers Western Venezuela and the territories that would later become Guiana, Suriname and French
29:10Guiana.
29:11At the heart of this area flows the Orinoco, an immense river rising in what is now the Venezuelan rainforest
29:18and emptying into the Atlantic Ocean.
29:44It was now the turn of an Englishman, Sir Walter Raleigh, who became one of the most fervent supporters of
29:51the Guyanan.
29:51The theory that Eldorado was to be found in the region.
29:58It was now the turn of an Englishman, Sir Walter Raleigh.
30:02It was now the Frenchman, Sir Walter Raleigh, who became one of the most fervent supporters of the theory that
30:05Eldorado was to be found in the Guyanan plateau.
30:10On his return from his first expedition to the Americas in 1595, he wrote a book with an edifying title,
30:17The Discovery of the Great, Rich and Beautiful Empire of Guiana, with a report of the Great Gold City of
30:25Manoa, which the Spaniards call Eldorado.
30:28In it, Walter Raleigh accurately described everything he had heard about the region during his trip.
30:33And as I have been assured by such of the Spaniards, as have seen Manoa, the imperial city of Guyana,
30:41which the Spaniards call Eldorado, that for the greatness, for the riches, and for the excellent seat is far exceedeth
30:48any of the world.
30:49At least of so much of the world as is known to the Spanish nation, it is founded upon a
30:54lake of salt water of 200 leagues long, like unto Caspian seam.
30:59Like many before him, he needed to convince the British Crown to entrust him with the mission of discovering Manoa
31:06and the lake called Parame, around which Eldorado is said to lie.
31:14And by fanning the flames of greed, Sir Walter Raleigh will achieve his goal.
31:22In 1616, the Crown of England commissioned Walter Raleigh to explore the Orinoco River.
31:27Between Venezuela and Guiana, in search of gold.
31:31By now, the Spanish attempts to find Eldorado were well known in England, and interest in the resources of the
31:38American continent was growing.
31:40But Raleigh was warned not to provoke a war with Spain.
31:47On the 7th of November 1617, the British explorer landed on the island of Trinidad in search of the gold
31:55he had promised to bring back to the King of England.
31:58But the expedition was to be a total failure.
32:00Not only did Walter Raleigh make no discoveries, but his expedition sparked off a conflict with the Spanish colonists.
32:08He was forced to return to England, where he was arrested and beheaded on the 29th of October 1618.
32:18Paradoxically, despite his failures, Walter Raleigh helped to burnish the European notion of Eldorado, even though his was the last
32:26great expedition to look for it.
32:31In the 18th century, reason and rationality overtook fantasy and myth.
32:37The conquistadors gave way to Enlightenment scientists looking for facts and evidence.
32:42Among them was Charles-Marie de la Condamine, a French encyclopedist and astronomer.
32:51In 1743, de la Condamine took part in a major scientific expedition to the equator to determine whether the Earth
32:58was perfectly spherical or flattened at the poles.
33:01His account would become a veritable gold mine of information on the region.
33:07On his return, Charles-Marie de la Condamine published details of the discoveries made during his mission.
33:18Zoology, botany, medicine, hydrography and astronomy.
33:25He was also one of the very first to survey the Amazon River and its tributaries.
33:31It included an investigation on where the famous Eldorado might be hiding.
33:36In his book, the French scientist mentions the existence of an Amazonian tribe called the Manos,
33:42who extracted gold from a river called the Equiari, and who lived in a region where there was a lake
33:48called Parahai.
33:51It seems highly likely that the town of Manoa was forged from the capital of the Manaus.
33:57The Manaus bordered a large lake.
33:59They mined gold from the Equiari and made small blades out of it.
34:04These are true events which, with the help of exaggeration, gave rise to the fable of the city of Manoa
34:09and the Golden Lake.
34:13While Charles-Marie de la Condamine does not state with certainty that Eldorado is just a myth,
34:19he does make it clear that the information that spread among the conquistadors may have been distorted.
34:29In his view, Eldorado was the project of European greed combined with the mischief of the Amazon's indigenous peoples,
34:38who, to avoid being massacred, sometimes led the Europeans on a nice little boat trip,
34:44dangling the promise of Eldorado in front of them.
34:51Despite this age of reason and the skepticism of scientists of an Eldorado teeming with riches,
34:58the thirst for gold only continued to grow and soon spread throughout the Americas.
35:09South America was abundant with veins of gold that seekers would rediscover centuries later.
35:16Until 1820, before the discovery of other major gold deposits around the world,
35:22Brazilian gold accounted for nearly 80% of world production.
35:26From the very end of the 19th century, and especially in the 20th,
35:29New magnetic methods revealed numerous gold mines in South America, many are in Mexico and Peru.
35:35This is hardly surprising, given that the Aztecs and Incas reigned in these two territories.
35:40Archaeological digs and analysis of the gold objects revealed that the Incas most certainly exploited some gold mines in the
35:47Andes
35:47as early as the second half of the 15th century, just before the conquistadors arrived.
35:56Many explorers continued to believe in the existence of lost cities containing fabulous treasures.
36:02And in 1839, the discovery of a mysterious document in the archives of the National Library of Brazil
36:10relaunched this age-old investigation.
36:13Its name, Manuscript 512.
36:18This ten-page text, whose author is unknown, recounts how in 1753, Portuguese gold seekers discovered a lost city
36:29in the middle of the Amazon rainforest, in what is now the province of Bahia.
36:33It describes the city's architecture as reminiscent of the Greco-Roman cities of antiquity,
36:40with their triple arches, obelisks and statues of men wearing laurel wreaths.
36:47The author of the manuscript gives a detailed description of the abandoned town
36:51and recounts what the Portuguese gold diggers discovered there.
36:58There is a river beside the square, and after following it, the group reaches a collection of mine shafts
37:04where they find rocks encrusted with silver and undeciphered inscriptions.
37:09They test the ground near the river, looking for traces of gold, which they find in abundance.
37:20The authenticity of this manuscript has been the subject of much debate among scholars,
37:25and cannot be considered a reliable historical source.
37:29Its unknown author and picturesque writing style raises a lot of questions.
37:33Some think it could be a variation on the myth of El Dorado.
37:39Nevertheless, naive adventurers and greedy fortune hunters will always believe the story.
37:47In 1925, the British explorer Percy Fawcett, one of the greatest explorers of the 20th century,
37:54was convinced he could find the abandoned city mentioned in manuscript 512,
37:59in the heart of the Amazon jungle.
38:09According to him, it is located in the Sierra do Roncador, the Snoring Mountain.
38:17A mountain range in the eastern part of the state of Mato Grosso in Brazil.
38:25At the source of the Zingu River, in his notes, he refers to it as Z.
38:37The story of his expedition will be told in a film entitled The Lost City of Z.
38:49But Percy Fawcett never found the lost city, and never returned from the jungle.
38:55He was allegedly murdered by local tribesmen, and his body has never been found.
39:06In the decades that followed, other adventurers have tried their luck.
39:12All in vain.
39:19But thanks to new detection methods, archaeologists are continuing to carry out research in the region.
39:28In 1999, two researchers from the Ibero-American Institute in Finland spotted strange geometric shapes,
39:36known as geoglyphs, in the upper Amazon basin, on the border between Brazil and Bolivia.
39:45Four years later, satellite detection helped them to refine their observations.
39:56They counted no less than 281 giant geoglyphs, stretching over a region of more than 250 kilometers.
40:07According to scientists, these are the remains of a gigantic pre-Columbian city that thrived between the 3rd and 13th
40:15centuries.
40:15The foundations would have been built from networks of trenches 11 meters wide and several meters deep, bounded by 1
40:23meter high embankments.
40:25This mysterious city could have housed up to 60,000 inhabitants.
40:30By way of comparison, the inhabitants of medieval towns in Europe at that time generally numbered between 5,000 and
40:3810,000.
40:41The settlement's precise geometry indicates that they were fine builders.
40:46The city also boasted a carefully designed road network.
40:50The two researchers believe that more than 2,000 structures remain hidden beneath a thick curtain of jungle.
40:56The extraordinarily fertile soil there suggests that the inhabitants could grow rich and diversified crops.
41:04One of the hallmarks of great civilizations.
41:09In a region further south, on the banks of the river Jinku, archaeologists have uncovered a complex comprising 20 towns
41:16and villages the same size as Israel and home up to 50,000 inhabitants.
41:21And this may just be the beginning.
41:23Who knows what else is buried deep in the Amazon.
41:28Recent discoveries in Amazon prove that our knowledge of the civilizations that developed in America long before the arrival of
41:36Europeans is still very much a work in progress.
41:39And that many mysteries still lurk in the forests or in the mountains.
41:47The myth of El Dorado and the quest for gold and treasure lost to the jungles of America will continue
41:54to inspire generations of adventurers for a long time to come.
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