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00:01Archaeologists make a remarkable discovery in Egypt's Valley of the Kings.
00:06They discovered the burial chamber to an undiscovered tomb.
00:12But instead of finding the remains of a burial, the tomb was mostly empty.
00:18Is it possible that this mysterious, empty burial ground was once the final resting place of a female member of
00:25the Egyptian royal family?
00:29Extraordinary structures are revealed in the Jordanian desert.
00:32The sheer scale of them shows that they were clearly important.
00:36But what were they for?
00:38On the outskirts of an Israeli town, excavations unearth a strange complex.
00:44At first glance, it looks like just a low, crumbling wall sticking out of the sand.
00:50But after some digging around, they discover that it's actually part of a bigger complex.
00:55All told, the complex covers roughly 10,000 square feet.
01:02So what was this place?
01:04Ancient lost cities.
01:07Forgotten treasures.
01:09Mysterious structures.
01:11As new technology uncovers remarkable tales hidden beneath the deserts of the world,
01:17The secrets in the sand will finally be revealed.
01:33Spreading over 160 square miles of the Egyptian desert, just east of the Nile River,
01:39The city of Luxor is one of the hottest and driest urban centers in the world.
01:45Summer temperatures frequently hit 104 degrees Fahrenheit.
01:49And its low annual precipitation is on par with the driest sections of the Sahara.
01:54Luxor has a special place in history as the former city of Thebes, the religious capital of ancient Egypt.
02:00It's famous for its ruins of 4,000-year-old temples, palaces, and monuments.
02:05Some of those are still standing today, making the city one of the largest open-air museums in the world.
02:11But the most renowned landmarks are the series of tombs west of the Nile, in an area called the Valley
02:17of the Kings.
02:20The Valley of the Kings was the chosen necropolis for most of Egypt's New Kingdom rulers and pharaohs.
02:27The Valley of the Kings is a small valley surrounded by these steep limestone cliffs.
02:32That is a topography that is perfect for carving individual tombs into the hillside.
02:38And of the 62 tombs that have been found so far, the most famous is that of the boy king.
02:45Tutankhamun discovered with most of its artifacts intact in 1922.
02:53A team of archaeologists is working near the western edge of the valley, about a mile from where most of
02:59the rulers' tombs lay, when they come across a surprising discovery.
03:05They found an entrance to a 32-foot passageway, which was almost entirely filled with debris, so it took a
03:13long time to clear.
03:14When they finally got through, they discovered the burial chamber to an undiscovered tomb.
03:22But instead of finding the remains of a burial, the tomb was mostly empty.
03:29There were fragments of clay vessels scattered on the chamber floor.
03:32One of the pottery pieces bore a label indicating it had contained the substance natron, which was commonly used for
03:39embalming.
03:40So that confirmed a burial did take place, at least initially.
03:45The tomb was discovered in an area mostly reserved for the wives, mothers, and daughters of the pharaohs, the Valley
03:52of the Queens.
03:53So it was suggested that it belonged to a woman.
03:56After all, the closest tombs in the vicinity belonged to the wives of King Thutmose III.
04:01Third, is it possible that this mysterious, empty burial ground was once the final resting place of a female member
04:08of the Egyptian royal family?
04:18In addition to the broken shards of pottery, there were fragments of tiling that had fallen from the ceiling.
04:25After piecing them together like an ancient jigsaw puzzle, a pattern emerged.
04:31It was a painted blue night sky decorated with yellow stars, a design traditionally associated with the pharaoh.
04:42More significantly, the walls were decorated with hieroglyphic scenes from the Amduat.
04:47That's this sacred funerary text that describes the sun god, Ra, as it makes this nightly journey through the twelve
04:55regions of the underworld.
04:56It symbolizes death and rebirth.
04:59And, as with the painted night sky, the Amduat was typically reserved for Egyptian rulers only.
05:07Putting two and two together, this undiscovered tomb was in a section of the necropolis populated mostly by women.
05:14And yet it bore the distinct hallmarks of a pharaoh's funeral rites.
05:19So is it possible that this is the secret tomb of a female pharaoh?
05:25Most of Egypt's rulers were men.
05:27One of the few exceptions was Queen Hatshepsut.
05:30Hatshepsut was the eldest daughter of the 18th Dynasty king Thutmose I.
05:37She was married to her half-brother, Thutmose II, who inherited the throne around 1500 BCE.
05:44Now, when Thutmose II died 13 years later, the throne normally would have just gone straight on to his son,
05:51Thutmose III.
05:52But Thutmose III was still an infant, so his wife and half-sister, Hatshepsut, acted as regent for the young
06:01king.
06:03By most accounts, her reign was a successful and peaceful one.
06:09She defended Egypt's borders, and her foreign policy was based on trade, not war.
06:16Seven years into her reign, Hatshepsut was given a full royal title, essentially making her a female king.
06:23Interestingly, it was at this point that she stopped being depicted as a female.
06:28In paintings and sculptures, she began to appear wearing male clothes and regalia, including a beard.
06:35Scholars believe this wasn't an attempt on anyone's part to pass her off as a man,
06:38but rather to indicate she deserved the respect of a king.
06:43The continued examination and analysis of the tomb's walls and floor results in a breakthrough.
06:51There were small pieces of a broken alabaster jar that probably once contained ointment.
06:57Now, the same jigsaw puzzle approach was used to piece this jar together, but this time it revealed a name.
07:04King Thutmose II.
07:06The sample jar also included his wife, Queen Hatshepsut's name, and the full inscription clearly indicates Hatshepsut buried her husband
07:16right here.
07:20This was an incredible turn of events.
07:24First discovery of a royal tomb in the Theban necropolis in a hundred years.
07:29The implications were enormous.
07:33Egypt was at the peak of its power in the New Kingdom as it continued to amass great wealth along
07:40with its growing empire.
07:43Plus, this discovery presented an opportunity to study a pharaoh about whom very little was known.
07:53Thutmose II was an 18th dynasty pharaoh who came to power in the second millennium BCE.
07:58Some historical records state that during his reign he squashed a rebellious uprising in Nubia, what is now northern Sudan.
08:04There was also an indication that he may have campaigned with his armies to the eastern Mediterranean, as far as
08:10Syria.
08:12But Thutmose II was best known for being the king who married the future female pharaoh of Egypt.
08:18So was Queen Hatshepsut truly instrumental in selecting her husband's tomb, as the inscription suggests?
08:25If that's the case, why did she select an area over a mile away from the traditional burial ground?
08:32The valley of the kings was the main burial ground of the Theban necropolis for New Kingdom pharaohs for just
08:39under 500 years.
08:42According to tradition, the pharaohs, including future pharaohs in line for the throne, planned their own funerary rites, sometimes while
08:51they were still children.
08:52This included choosing the location and overseeing the full construction of the tomb.
08:59So, Hatshepsut may have overseen the actual burial, but it was likely Thutmose who had the tomb constructed here.
09:08It also appeared that Hatshepsut had planned to be buried close by, since an uncompleted tomb just over 1,500
09:16feet away was discovered with inscriptions stating it was intended for her.
09:24But in another twist to the story, when Hatshepsut eventually did pass away, 20 years after Thutmose's death, she was
09:31interred in the Valley of the Kings, along with the other male pharaohs.
09:35This was likely because she had acquired the official title and status of king.
09:40There were likely several factors that played a role in Thutmose's unusual tomb location, and we may never know all
09:47of them.
09:48But one thing was noticeable.
09:50Unlike King Thut's tomb, which was discovered overflowing with trinkets, jewels, and other grave goods, Thutmose's tomb was empty.
09:58So you have to wonder, was it looted by grave robbers?
10:10Tomb Raiders were a persistent problem in New Kingdom, Egypt, and their precious stolen goods were a normal part of
10:18the local economy.
10:19In some cases, they were professionals, organized gangs who knew the tomb's layup, how to access them, and how to
10:26sell them on the black market.
10:28In other cases, it was the families of the deceased who stole from their tombs.
10:36The problem was so widespread that officials took a range of steps to prevent it, such as carving curses on
10:42doors to scare would-be looters away.
10:45But it seldom worked, and the tomb raiders were frequently brazen and highly destructive, smashing sarcophagi and tearing through the
10:52mummy's wrapped textiles to access jewels and amulets.
10:57After a thorough assessment of the tomb, the possibility of a raid was ruled out.
11:03There's no evidence of looting, no signs of forced entry, so if the grave goods aren't there and they weren't
11:10stolen, they must have been moved to a different location.
11:13So the question is, why?
11:17A closer look at the history of ancient Egypt's funerary practices reveals a possible answer.
11:25During the Old Kingdom from approximately 2700 to 2200 BC, the pharaoh's preoccupation with death and the afterlife led to
11:36the creation of the Great Pyramids.
11:39The more valuable artifacts and offerings within the tomb, the better prepared for the afterlife.
11:47But this came at a cost. The mere sight of a pyramid essentially announced the location and the opportunity for
11:53Tomb Raiders to plunder.
11:55Eventually, officials were unable to protect the mummies of the Old Kingdom rulers.
11:59This, in part, is what led New Kingdom rulers to opt for concealment and secrecy by digging hidden tombs deep
12:06in the hills of the Theban necropolis.
12:11Despite the authorities' best efforts to keep the new location of the tombs a secret, looters eventually caught on.
12:18Officials were bribed, and many of the workers who built the graves got conscripted by gangs to help them.
12:24In response, New Kingdom priests and royalty began to secretly remove the mummies from the underground tombs and take them
12:31to a second, even more hidden location, referred to as the Royal Cache.
12:38But the Royal Cache was intended as a temporary hiding place for the mummies.
12:42This wasn't an attempt to reconstruct entirely new tombs for each of the pharaohs.
12:47In the case of Thutmose II, it's hypothesized that an undiscovered second tomb likely does exist somewhere.
12:55And that all those missing, valuable grave goods are probably just sitting somewhere, waiting to be uncovered.
13:04An extended search of the surrounding area leads to a curious discovery.
13:09An enormous man-made mound was discovered not far from the original empty tomb, made up of piles of limestone
13:18rubble reaching 75 feet in height.
13:21It appeared that the mound was deliberately constructed to conceal something underneath.
13:26Could it be the opening to Thutmose's second tomb location?
13:31The excavation of the limestone mound is still pending.
13:35In the meantime, the discovery of Thutmose II's original tomb represents a crucial missing piece in the history of Egypt's
13:4418th dynasty.
13:45And while it helps solve one enduring mystery about the ancient pharaoh, it continues to pose new questions about his
13:53fate and his legacy.
14:05The Basalt Flats of the Arabian Peninsula extend tens of thousands of miles across the borders of Jordan, Syria and
14:14Saudi Arabia.
14:15These basalt fields are known as Harats, which comes from the Arabic for stony area or lava field.
14:22They formed millions of years ago, when the Arabian Plate began to shift away from the African Plate along the
14:28Red Sea Rift.
14:29This gradual movement thinned the Earth's crust and allowed magma to rise from the Earth's mantle to the surface.
14:38An archaeologist conducting aerial surveys above the sprawling lava deserts of Jordan spots something strange.
14:47He began to notice enormous structures stretching across the Harats.
14:51They were relatively uniform in their shape and clearly man-made.
14:55But what stood out the most was their size.
14:59The structures are essentially huge rectangles formed of two thick bands connected by much longer, thinner rows of rock.
15:09Today, we know these structures as mustatils or gates because of their unique shape.
15:17Early surveys of the Harats showed that the gates were often clustered in groups of two or three.
15:23But the total number remained a bit of a mystery until Google Earth changed everything.
15:28With mainstream satellite images available to the public, archaeologists around the world could explore the desert from their own homes.
15:38So far, more than a thousand of these gates have been found.
15:41We can't be sure, but we believe they were built by nomadic tribes thousands of years ago.
15:46The ancestors of the modern-day Bedouin people.
15:51The sheer scale of them shows that they were clearly important.
15:54But what were they for?
15:58These extraordinary gates aren't the only monumental sculptures on the Arabian Peninsula.
16:05South of the Jordanian Basalt Flats lies the Harat Khaybar, one of Saudi Arabia's largest lava fields.
16:13Among the volcanic cones, vast stone shapes known as kites have been sculpted into the landscape.
16:20Over 900 of these kites have been spotted in Harat Khaybar alone.
16:25These structures are even larger than the gates, with some measuring over a quarter of a mile long.
16:32Many of these structures date back roughly to the Holocene humid period, which spanned roughly 9,000 to 5,500
16:41BCE.
16:43Back then, the desert belt of North Africa and Arabia was far greener and more fertile, an ideal hunting ground
16:52for people living in the area.
16:54And these structures weren't just random formations.
16:58They were built with a clear and deliberate purpose.
17:02These kites have been referred to as mega traps, and that's exactly what they were.
17:08It's believed the ancient nomads used the kites' long walls or strings to drive herds of prey toward the head,
17:17where they would become trapped.
17:21The traps would have taken weeks or even months to build and would have required a huge amount of manpower.
17:27Just like the gates, they demonstrate an advanced early engineering, which makes us wonder whether they served a similar function.
17:35Could the gates farther north have also served as huge hunting traps?
17:42When archaeologists on the ground get a closer look at the desert gates, they see just how intricate these structures
17:49are, and they discover a hidden feature.
17:53Taking a closer look at the Mustatils, we can get a sense of how much care was taken in their
17:58construction.
17:59Each of the gates' long bars is made of two parallel lines of specially chosen flat stones placed on their
18:06edges facing each other.
18:08The space between these larger rocks was then filled in with rubble.
18:14At the top of the Mustatils, we find the head, a platform filled with rocks that once stood several feet
18:23high and formed the thickest band in the structure.
18:27At the very center of the heads of most gates lies a hidden chamber.
18:33These chambers are relatively small, typically 10 to 30 feet wide.
18:38While excavating the walls of one Mustatil, a team of archaeologists makes a shocking discovery.
18:52While excavating the walls of one Mustatil, a team of archaeologists makes a shocking discovery.
18:58They began to uncover human bone fragments.
19:03The bones belong to nine separate individuals.
19:06Two infants, one child, a teenager, and five adults.
19:11So could these structures be something other than animal traps?
19:15Could they actually be elaborate funerary monuments?
19:21The search for answers leads to another nearby site, where ancient roadways in Northwest Arabia are flanked by mysterious stone
19:30sculptures.
19:32These aren't gates or kites, but keyholes.
19:35As the name suggests, they're made up of two main components.
19:38A circular section at one end, placed at the point of an elongated triangle.
19:43Nearly 18,000 of these keyholes have been found over roughly 100,000 square miles of the Arabian Desert.
19:52Like the gates, the keyholes are often grouped in elaborate formations leading away from a central corridor.
19:59It's believed that they may have been used to shepherd animals into specific pastures.
20:06But they also serve another more symbolic function.
20:11Inside the circular ends of these structures, we find piles of stones called cairns.
20:17These aren't decorative, they actually mark tombs.
20:22Looking at them from above, you can see that the tombs have been deliberately organized,
20:27with a central roadway running through them near the widest point of the triangle.
20:32Today, we now know these arrangements as funerary avenues.
20:38It could be that people wanted to bury their loved ones on frequently traveled routes,
20:42so that their memory would be kept alive by people passing by.
20:45Could the monumental gates in Jordan have served a similar function?
20:51Excavations of ancient gates in Saudi Arabia unearth yet more skeletal remains.
20:57But these bones point to a different possibility.
21:02It turns out that many of these mustatillos contain thousands of bone fragments.
21:07But the vast majority of these bones aren't actually human.
21:11They're animal bones.
21:13There's evidence that some of these animals were wild, like gazelles, but most appear to have been domesticated.
21:21Radiocarbon dating shows us that they're up to 7,000 years old,
21:27which makes these stone monuments about 2,000 years older than both Stonehenge or the earliest Egyptian pyramids.
21:40Cattle herding would have played a central role in the lives of ancient people living in the region at the
21:46time,
21:46providing a vital source of food.
21:48But why were they buried here?
21:50Why go to the trouble of building such an elaborate burial ground for animals?
21:55As work on the mustatillos continues, researchers working a site at Yemen's Wadaha sub-district within the Sanaha government come
22:03across another remarkable cattle burial.
22:06They found a ring of more than 40 cattle skulls that had been planted nose down in the earth.
22:11At the center of the ring, there was one more skull, also buried facing downwards.
22:18This deliberate arrangement suggests the skulls represented some kind of ritual or symbolic significance.
22:26The cattle remains were found near a stone platform and surrounded by several hearths.
22:32The skulls and hearths combined paint a vivid picture of some kind of ritual feast,
22:39one that seemingly involved the sacrifice of domestic animals.
22:45The discovery of ritual cattle sacrifice in Yemen leads to a revelation for experts working on Arabia's colossal stone gates.
22:55We now believe that these huge stone gates were built to host similar rituals.
23:02Each of the gates has a narrow entrance built into its base.
23:06These are typically less than three feet wide, which may have been to encourage people to enter the structure in
23:14single file.
23:15We can't be sure, but the large courtyards inside the gate could have accommodated lots of people,
23:23perhaps an audience for the animal sacrifices.
23:28It's thought that these mustatillos are some of the oldest monuments built by these Neolithic cattle cults.
23:34They've been found over an area of just under 80,000 square miles,
23:39which tells us that their beliefs and rituals were extremely widespread during the late Stone Age.
23:48Over time, the ritual significance of these sites appears to have changed,
23:52with animal sacrifices slowly giving way to human burials.
23:56There isn't any evidence to suggest that the humans buried here were sacrificed themselves.
24:02Instead, the continued use of these monuments as graveyards only emphasizes how important these spiritual landmarks were to the people
24:10who built them.
24:13Today, work continues to excavate and date even more of these enigmatic gates to chart the lives of the ancient
24:21Arabian cattle cults.
24:23But who or what these cults worshipped remains an enduring mystery.
24:37Around 35 miles southwest of Jerusalem, in Israel's Negev Desert, lies the Bedouin town of Rahat.
24:46With a population of just over 75,000, it's the largest of the Bedouin cities, but roughly 60% of
24:53the people who live there are under the age of 18.
24:55So its nickname is the City of Children.
24:59It's on the edge of a desert, so it has a hot, semi-arid climate, and sees only about 10
25:04inches of rain each year.
25:06The city is surrounded by small rolling hills made up of lois, a fine material comprised mostly of silt and
25:12dust distributed by the wind.
25:16On the southern outskirts of town, a team of archaeologists is carrying out excavations in advance of a future construction
25:24project when they unearth something surprising.
25:28At first glance, it looks like just a low, crumbling wall sticking out of the sand.
25:34But after some digging around, they discover that it's actually part of a bigger complex.
25:41It consists of several rooms of varying sizes joined together, some rectangular, others more square.
25:49And they're all separated by walls made up of stones cemented together.
25:55All told, the complex covers roughly 10,000 square feet, a large area, and looks to be very old.
26:04So what was this place?
26:14Another stone structure was discovered not too far from the complex of Rahat.
26:21Researchers determined it to be one of the oldest rural mosques ever found.
26:28It's mostly just one small square room around 65 square feet, but one of the walls isn't a straight line.
26:34It has a half circle jutting out of the middle of it facing south, the direction of Mecca, the holy
26:39city of Islam.
26:41The half circle is a prayer niche called a mirab.
26:45Using pottery and coins discovered at the site, researchers figure this dates to the late 7th century or early 8th
26:52century CE.
26:53Now, it's known that Islam did originate about 100 years before that in what is now Saudi Arabia, but it
27:00didn't become the dominant religion in this region for at least 200 years.
27:05So finding a mosque this old is rare.
27:10Given the mosque's proximity to the complex and the similarities in construction style, I think it's safe to assume that
27:18the complex was from around the same period around 1200 years ago.
27:23But what was it?
27:28As the team explores the complex further, something strange happens.
27:34When they knock on some of the stones, they hear an echo emanating from beneath the ground.
27:40They're able to create a small hole to lower a camera down and are shocked at what they see.
27:47There's an incredible underground complex of vaults.
27:51They're built out of limestone blocks about 18 feet under the ground and measuring roughly 8 feet tall.
27:58The compartments are linked by tunnels and have arched ceilings, also constructed out of stone.
28:05These vaults were probably used as storage areas.
28:08But for what?
28:11The area around Rahat was once an ancient farming community.
28:15There's evidence to suggest that the Negev had large scale agriculture between the 4th and 11th century CE.
28:23This was no easy task considering the environmental factors.
28:26I mean, there was always the threat of a drought and a drought could last for several years.
28:31But the people who lived here had extremely clever ways of managing water.
28:37They used a damming technique, building stone terraces into hillside plots of farmland, and also had a system of channels
28:44for collecting runoff from slopes.
28:47Using these methods, they were able to grow various legumes and grains, including wheat and barley.
28:52So maybe the structure discovered at Rahat was used for storing food supplies, or even a produce marketplace of some
28:58kind.
29:00Further investigation of the site reveals architectural details that may just support this theory.
29:06The western area has a series of big rooms, and the eastern side contains a large open hall.
29:13These spaces would be ideal for conducting commerce or further storage beyond the underground vaults.
29:20But if the complex was for storing food products or used as a marketplace, there would probably be evidence left
29:28behind.
29:28But all they found in the vaults were some clay shards from oil lamps.
29:33So I think it's unlikely that the structure was used for that purpose.
29:38It must have been for something else.
29:42Given its size and location on the outskirts of the city, maybe the building had a military function for protecting
29:48Rahat from invading armies.
29:50The vaults could have been for storing weapons or a system of defense.
29:54In central Turkey's historic Cappadocia region is Derinkuyu, an ancient city with extensive underground complexes that some experts believe were
30:05vital to its defense.
30:06During the Byzantine period, Christians were under constant threat of attack from the Romans.
30:12And it's thought that these tunnels were built to hide the people of the city from persecution.
30:20Some of the tunnels are not very big, which might appear to be a design flaw.
30:25But it was likely done on purpose so that if attackers tried to enter, they would have to be in
30:32a single row and punched over, making it easier for defending soldiers to kill them.
30:38Maybe the underground system at Rahat served a similar purpose.
30:44But there's no historical documentation to indicate that this was an important town that needed defending back then.
30:51It was a simple, rural, agricultural community.
30:56And there's also no archaeological evidence of conflict.
31:00No military artifacts were discovered.
31:02As the team continues to investigate the site, they find certain items that may just provide some answers.
31:17As the team continues to investigate the site around Rahat, they find certain items that may just provide some answers.
31:26They came across two ovens.
31:27Now that might not sound like a big deal because people had to cook, right?
31:30But these ovens are way bigger than conventional ones.
31:34Too big to be just for preparing regular family meals.
31:37And right next to one of them is a water cistern.
31:41Olive pits were also found at the site.
31:43All of this adds up to one thing.
31:45On top of being a residence, this complex was probably used to manufacture soap.
31:52The ovens were likely used to cook up a mixture of ingredients.
31:56They would have needed olive oil, which explains all the olive pits.
32:00And they would have needed water.
32:01And lo and behold, one of the ovens is right next to a cistern.
32:06This was the perfect location for soap making, with all the necessary ingredients found in the surrounding region.
32:14Old soap recipes require saltwort plants, which are indigenous to the Nejif desert.
32:21And olives were extensively available in the nearby South Hebron hills.
32:28Soap making in the ancient world goes back much farther than the early Islamic period.
32:33Soap first being used for personal hygiene dates back to the ancient Egyptians, around 1550 BCE.
32:40They created a soap-like substance by combining animal and vegetable oils with alkaline salts,
32:46for both cleaning their bodies and treating skin conditions.
32:50As Islam spread to become the primary religion in the Middle East,
32:54an emphasis on hygiene and cleanliness emerged.
32:58Islam is a very ritualistic religion.
33:01And certain hygiene-related customs are expected to be followed.
33:07Muslims are encouraged to perform ablution, known as wudu, before prayers,
33:13which involves washing the face, hands, arms, feet, and rinsing the mouth and nose.
33:21Good grooming and the use of perfumes, tatyib, are also expected.
33:26A devout Muslim should show loyalty to God and respect for his fellow Muslims by smelling good, particularly at group
33:32prayer.
33:33The cleanliness of clothing, living spaces, and the body are a high priority.
33:39Researchers believe that the complex at Rahad may be the oldest soap-making facility ever discovered in Israel.
33:47At the time, family recipes were heavily guarded secrets, handed down from generation to generation.
33:53And as Islam grew in popularity, the demand for soap grew with it, and made some people extremely wealthy, including
34:03whoever lived in this once magnificent complex.
34:15Tucked into the northern reaches of Egypt's western desert lies the Fayum Basin, a vast limestone depression spanning more than
34:236,000 square miles.
34:25The Fayum Basin is incredibly unique because it's home to an oasis.
34:30For thousands of years, humans have been diverting water from the nearby Nile River into the basin to irrigate the
34:37land.
34:37These irrigation systems supported large towns during the ancient Egyptian Middle Kingdom and the Roman period.
34:44There are dozens of well-preserved Egyptian, Greek, Roman, and Coptic Christian sites dotted around the oasis,
34:52making it an archaeological treasure trove.
34:56As extraordinary as these ancient settlements are, the oldest remains in the basin predate humans by millions of years.
35:03One of the best examples is Wadi Al-Hitan, or Whale Valley, a stretch of land roughly 100 miles from
35:10Cairo,
35:10where archaeologists have found fossils dating back more than 40 million years,
35:15to the earliest aquatic whales in the final stages of losing their hind legs.
35:20For years, archaeologists have carefully catalogued the marine mammals of the Fayum Depression.
35:27But during a dig in the arid desert, one team spots an entirely different set of remains.
35:36They had been digging for several days when they spotted a set of huge teeth sticking out of the desert
35:42floor.
35:43They quickly realized the teeth were attached to a nearly perfectly preserved skull.
35:48It's some kind of mammal, and this thing is clearly a predator.
35:52It's got these teeth that are sharp and look like they're perfect for slicing into prey.
35:56Plus, it's got these big crests on the skull that suggest it had really powerful jaws.
36:02Based on the skull's size, we can estimate this animal was about the size of a modern-day leopard.
36:08So, what was it, and how long ago did it roam the Fayum Basin?
36:15The discovery of the predator's skull prompted comparisons to a set of remains unearthed in the region 120 years earlier.
36:24These fossils belonged to a creature known as Secmatops.
36:29Secmatops was a formidable predator, roughly the size of a modern-day lion with a large, heavy head.
36:35It shares many qualities with a newly discovered skull, including its razor-sharp teeth, specially adapted to bring down large
36:41prey.
36:42So, could the creature found in the Fayum Basin be from the same species as Secmatops?
36:55Searching for answers, the team performs a detailed analysis of the skull in the hopes of establishing its age.
37:03And the results are rather surprising.
37:06The skull is around 30 million years old.
37:09This means that this creature is from the Olegocene period, which spanned from approximately 34 to 23 million years ago.
37:17The same time frame as Secmatops.
37:20So, it's entirely possible that the two animals are closely related.
37:27While it might be tempting to think Secmatops and the newly discovered animal belong to the same species, there are
37:34differences between them.
37:35Besides being smaller than Secmatops, the skull has distinctly feline features with a shorter, cat-like snout.
37:43The differences between the remains tell us that we're looking at two distinct species of an order known as Hyenodonta.
37:51Extinct, hyper-carnivorous mammals that lived on virtually every continent.
37:56These animals varied widely in size and shape, from 11 pounds to over 1,000.
38:02The new skull represents an entirely new species of Hyenodont that lived alongside Secmatops.
38:09Following the tradition of naming these ancient carnivores after Egyptian deities, this new species was named Bastetodon in honor of
38:16Bastet, the cat-headed goddess of protection and fertility.
38:21Further analysis of the Secmatops alongside the Bastetodon leads to a breakthrough.
38:27When Secmatops was first discovered, they originally placed the species within a group of European Hyenodonts and assumed that that's
38:35where Secmatops originated before migrating to Africa.
38:39But, using the Bastetodon fossils, that family tree has painted a very different picture.
38:45The results of the analysis proved that the opposite of what we once believed was actually true.
38:52Secmatops and the Bastetodon weren't European in origin.
38:56They represented an entirely new group of African Hyenodonts that originated right where they were found, in Egypt.
39:03But, by the way, they were found, in Egypt.
39:06Hyenodonts lasted as an order for approximately 50 million years.
39:11To survive that long, they had to successfully survive some of the Earth's most dramatic climactic changes.
39:19One of these extreme changes occurred around 34 million years ago, when the planet began to cool.
39:26Ice sheets expanded.
39:28Sea levels dropped.
39:30And forests slowly transformed into grasslands.
39:35Today, we know this period as the Eocene-Olegocene boundary.
39:40This boundary is also known as the Grand Coupure, or Big Break, because of its devastating effects on species across
39:46the world.
39:48On the African and Arabian peninsulas alone, approximately 60% of mammal species vanished.
39:54But Hyenodonts survived, with new species emerging in the wake of the disaster and adapting to the changing environments.
40:01Throughout the Oligocene and the Miocene, African Hyenodonts maintained their position at the very top of the food chain.
40:09And this was in part because of their ability to adapt, and in some cases, become supersized.
40:15The global extinction of the Hyenodonts remains an enduring mystery.
40:21But some experts believe that the answer may lie in dramatic environmental shifts.
40:27During the Oligocene, about 26 million years ago, tectonic shifts pushed the Arabian and Eurasian plates closer together.
40:36Over millions of years, these shifts created new land bridges for ancient species to spread between continents.
40:42So creatures that were previously isolated in Europe migrated south into Africa.
40:48During the Miocene, this faunal exchange really picked up, and we start to see modern-looking predators like cats, dogs,
40:56and hyenas appear on the African continent.
40:59Unlike Hyenodonts, these predators had flexible wrists and forearms that allowed them to adopt new hunting techniques.
41:08We now believe that these new predators began to compete with Hyenodonts for prey.
41:14The very same attributes that once made the Hyenodont so formidable may have accelerated its downfall.
41:21Its dentition was extremely specialized, and the predators' rigid bodies meant that they relied almost exclusively on their huge jaws
41:28and heads to bring down their prey.
41:31When competition increased, these animals may have been physically unable to adapt to different food sources.
41:36Eventually, they went extinct, leaving cats and dogs to take their place at the top of the food chain.
41:44The exact cause of the Hyenodont's extinction remains a complex web of unanswered questions.
41:50But with every new species that emerges, our understanding of this ancient apex predator grows a little clearer.
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