100 Ancient Graves That Turned Out to Be Nothing Like They Seemed

KirTop Top 100

Dive into the world of ancient mysteries with Kir Top as we uncover 100 burials that turned out to be WAY more than meets the eye! From "alien" mummies to royal conspiracies, preserved bog bodies, and vampire legends—these stories will blow your mind. Don't miss the twists, turns, and wild discoveries! Subscribe for more jaw-dropping history and tell us in the comments which tale fascinated you most! #history #archaeology #mystery #ancient #discoveries  👉 This channel was created in collaboration with https://www.youtube.com/@kirtop-100samyh  0:00:00 - Ancient Burials and Mysterious Deaths 0:06:19 - Notable Archaeological Discoveries and Investigations 0:14:52 - Lost Civilizations, Ancient Humans, and Intriguing Artifacts 0:21:01 - Unsolved Mysteries and Markers of Early Societies 0:30:08 - Wonders and Misinterpretations in Burial Practices 0:41:21 - Ancient Crimes, Tomb Robberies, and Rituals 0:51:38 - Extraordinary Finds and the Stories Behind Them 1:03:34 - From Forgotten Cemeteries to Murdered Royals  We're now available on Spotify! Listen now https://open.spotify.com/show/03446rMw7NEQKZvD764T3X

Transcript

00:00:00I'm Keir Top and these are 100 ancient burials that turned out to be nothing like what they seemed.

00:00:10The preserved body in 1719 at the Thalon copper mine in Sweden, miners made a sinister discovery.

00:00:18They brought out the body of a man without legs from a flooded section, but it was surprisingly well preserved.

00:00:24Judging by his clothes and appearance, it seemed that he had died just a few days ago.

00:00:28This looked very strange, considering that the abandoned shaft hadn't been used for many years.

00:00:34The body was put on public display in hopes of finding relatives or acquaintances.

00:00:39Soon, Margareta Olsdeter appeared, claiming that the man before her was her fiancé who had disappeared 42 years ago.

00:00:46When the water was pumped out, it turned out that the deceased had been soaked in a solution of vitriol,

00:00:51copper sulfate,

00:00:52which had preserved his remains from rapid decomposition.

00:00:55However, as the body dried out, this natural preservation began to petrify the body, and then it started to disintegrate.

00:01:01Alas, the fate of the unfortunate man did not end with a simple burial.

00:01:05The local residents, shocked by such a rare phenomenon, kept his body on display for another 30 years for the

00:01:11amusement of the public.

00:01:12Only later was he buried in a church.

00:01:14After some time, during another reconstruction, the body was discovered again.

00:01:17This time, they decided to finally lay him to rest in the city cemetery.

00:01:22The mysterious disappearance of the mummies.

00:01:251932, the San Pedro Mountains.

00:01:27Wyoming, USA.

00:01:29Two prospectors, Cecil Main and Frank Carr, are searching for gold.

00:01:33They blast the rock, and behind it, a small sealed cave is revealed.

00:01:38Inside, on a stone ledge, sits a tiny figure with crossed legs, about 15 centimeters tall in a sitting position.

00:01:45The face is not childlike at all.

00:01:47A flattened head, a mouth full of teeth, some of them sharp, dark wrinkled skin like that of an old

00:01:51man.

00:01:52He was nicknamed Pedro, and immediately, an old legend comes to mind.

00:01:55Among the Shoshone Indians, stories about little people were passed down from generation to generation.

00:02:00Nimirigar.

00:02:01Tiny, evil little people who lived in these mountains.

00:02:04They shot poisoned arrows, and in the morning, they finished off their sick and elderly.

00:02:09With a blow to the head.

00:02:10And here, in the cave, sits a creature exactly the same height as in the legend.

00:02:13And it even has a fractured skull.

00:02:15In the 1940s and 1950s, the mummy was x-rayed, and scientists were divided.

00:02:20Some said it was an adult.

00:02:22Others said it was an infant with a severe congenital defect, where the skull doesn't develop,

00:02:26and the newborn looks like a little old man.

00:02:29In the end, science leaned toward this version.

00:02:31The child died immediately after birth, and the dry air of the cave dried and preserved him.

00:02:36And it seems like the argument is settled.

00:02:38But then comes the reason why the story isn't closed.

00:02:41The mummy was taken around fares, passed from hand to hand.

00:02:45The last owner took it to Florida and died there.

00:02:48And Pedro disappeared without a trace along with his x-rays.

00:02:51It's no longer possible to examine him with modern methods.

00:02:53There's nothing left to examine.

00:02:55A reward of $10,000 was even offered for the find.

00:02:58But it was never found.

00:02:59However, in the 1990s, a second similar mummy appeared.

00:03:02A smaller.

00:03:03They called her Chiquita.

00:03:05They managed to study her properly.

00:03:06X-rays, DNA, dating.

00:03:08It turned out she was an infant girl of Native American descent.

00:03:11With the same defect.

00:03:13She died several centuries ago.

00:03:15But her owners soon took her from the lab and hid her as well.

00:03:18And she disappeared too.

00:03:20These mummies vanished exactly when they could finally be properly studied.

00:03:24As if someone really didn't want the truth to be discovered.

00:03:27The skull from the Chaklavina Cave.

00:03:31Let's start with the coldest case in all of human history.

00:03:35The skull was found back in 1941 in the Chaklavina Cave in southern Transylvania.

00:03:41It was accidentally dug up by workers mining phosphates for fertilizers.

00:03:47This is one of the oldest and best preserved skulls of the first modern humans in Europe.

00:03:52It is about 33,000 years old and is associated with the Orgnatian culture.

00:03:58That is, with those Stone Age hunters who left behind the first European cave paintings and bone flutes.

00:04:05For almost 80 years, this skull served science as a valuable anthropological object.

00:04:10It was measured and described in works on human evolution.

00:04:14And the two noticeable cracks on it were considered ordinary post-mortem damage.

00:04:19The kind any bone gets after lying in the ground for tens of thousands of years.

00:04:23This case was only reconsidered in 2019.

00:04:26A team led by paleoanthropologist Katerina Harvati from the University of Tübingen.

00:04:31And forensic anthropologist Elena Craniotti published a paper in the journal PLOS ONE.

00:04:37They treated the skull as physical evidence in a violent death case.

00:04:41First, they created an accurate 3D model of the bone.

00:04:43And then they conducted a series of impact experiments on synthetic skulls.

00:04:48By repeating different scenarios, from falling from a height to being struck with a heavy object,

00:04:53and comparing the types of fractures each caused, the result was unambiguous.

00:04:58Both injuries were sustained at the moment of death, when the bone was still fresh, not centuries later in the

00:05:03ground.

00:05:03The first is a long fracture at the base of the skull.

00:05:06The second is a dent on the right side, a section of bone that was literally pushed inward by the

00:05:11blow.

00:05:11It was inflicted with an object that had a rounded striking surface, something like a club.

00:05:16There are several indications that this was a blow to the head while the person was still alive, not damage

00:05:21that occurred in the ground.

00:05:22A bone fragment is pushed inward, small fragments remained in place,

00:05:26and one of the radiating cracks went exactly along the groove where a thin blood vessel passed through the bone.

00:05:31There is no sign of healing anywhere, which means the person did not survive after these blows,

00:05:35and experiments on models ruled out both a simple fall and the appearance of cracks after death.

00:05:40Next comes what can no longer be proven, and the authors honestly acknowledge this.

00:05:45Based on the location of the depressed fracture on the right side,

00:05:48they suggested that the victim was facing the attacker at the moment of the blow,

00:05:52and the attacker could have been left-handed, or was striking with both hands.

00:05:56This is a working hypothesis, not an established fact.

00:05:58Who these two were and what happened between them we will never know,

00:06:01because only the skull remains of the victim, and it's impossible to determine or read the wounds on the rest

00:06:06of the body.

00:06:06But one thing is firmly proven.

00:06:08The earliest murder in human history was committed about 33,000 years ago with a blunt blow to the head,

00:06:14and the evidence was able to be analyzed more than 300 centuries later.

00:06:19Infant Warriors

00:06:20In the south of Italy, in the municipality of Ponte Cagnano Faiano,

00:06:25builders began digging a foundation pit at a former tobacco factory and called in archaeologists.

00:06:29They arrived and discovered 34 tombs from the 4th and 3rd centuries BC.

00:06:35Left behind by the Samnites, an ancient Italian people who fought with Rome for several centuries,

00:06:41and were eventually absorbed by it.

00:06:43Samnite tombs themselves are regularly found in Campania, and there's nothing sensational about that.

00:06:48But when they began to examine the contents, one detail kept bothering them.

00:06:5115 out of 34 tombs belong to children from newborns to 10 years old, which is rare in itself.

00:06:58Children's burials are usually less well-preserved, but that's not the main point.

00:07:02In several children's tombs, they found bronze belts, wide and well-preserved.

00:07:06Among the Samnites, such belts were a symbol of an adult male warrior.

00:07:09They were worn as a sign of status and belonging to the military class.

00:07:13For a 5-year-old, a belt like that is the wrong size, inappropriate for the age, and symbolically out

00:07:17of place.

00:07:18So why is it in a child's grave? Scientists offer two explanations.

00:07:22The first explanation is that the belt was a symbol of who this child was supposed to become.

00:07:26He died before his time, but his parents buried him as a warrior.

00:07:30As if they gave him in death what he didn't have time to receive in life.

00:07:33The second explanation is even more interesting.

00:07:36It's possible that the Samnites had a custom of initiating children as warriors from a very early age,

00:07:41long before a child could even hold a weapon.

00:07:44Something like an oath from the cradle. Neither version has been proven.

00:07:47But both point to the same thing.

00:07:49These people had a completely different view of childhood than we do.

00:07:52In men's tombs, there are spear and javelin tips.

00:07:55In women's, there are rings and jewelry.

00:07:57All the burials are arranged in family groups next to each other.

00:08:0134 tombs.

00:08:02And in half of them, there are children with adult warriors' belts on their tiny skeletons.

00:08:07A child with a lock on his leg.

00:08:09Poland, the village of Pen, 17th century archaeologists are exploring an abandoned cemetery and find a child's skeleton.

00:08:15The child was about five to seven years old.

00:08:17The body is lying face down.

00:08:19There is a massive padlock on the leg.

00:08:21Old.

00:08:21Made of iron.

00:08:22Not everyone was buried this way.

00:08:24Only those who were feared.

00:08:25Could people in ancient times really be afraid of a child?

00:08:28In folk beliefs, it was thought that a body placed face down would not be able to rise.

00:08:32And the padlock was a kind of magical seal, so that the soul would not leave, not return, and not

00:08:37cause harm.

00:08:37Nearby, there is another well-known burial of a dead witch.

00:08:40A woman who had a sickle placed on her neck.

00:08:42So that if she tried to rise, she would decapitate herself.

00:08:45This child is most likely part of the same tradition.

00:08:4818 gold bracelets in one hoard.

00:08:51Near the village of Bunyutyche in Poland, a man with a metal detector, who had official permission from the Monument

00:08:58Protection Authorities, found a hoard of Bronze Age jewelry.

00:09:02There were 18 items in the hoard in total, mostly bracelets and anklets, with a total weight of about 3

00:09:08.6 kilograms.

00:09:10All the jewelry was lying together in a small pit, about 30 centimeters below the surface of the ground.

00:09:17After the specialist carefully cleaned them, it turned out that many items were preserved in excellent condition,

00:09:22and over time they would be able to display them in a museum.

00:09:25Some of the bracelets are smooth, while others are covered with detailed patterns.

00:09:29The diagonal notches, repeating lines, and ornamentation resemble spruce branches.

00:09:33Some of the pieces are part of complete sets,

00:09:35and the quality of the work speaks to the high skill of the local craftsmen of that time.

00:09:40Experts linked this find to the Lusatian culture,

00:09:43and ancient people who were known for their fortified settlements and bronze working skills in the territory of modern-day

00:09:49Poland.

00:09:50Archaeologists from the city of Zamosht, as well as the specialist Wojciech Bleier from Kraków,

00:09:55took part in the study of the hoard.

00:09:57They dated the jewelry to the period between 550 and 400 BC.

00:10:01Such large groups of bronze jewelry are found very rarely in this area of Poland.

00:10:05Usually archaeologists come across only individual items or broken fragments, not an entire hoard at once.

00:10:11Soon all the finds will be transferred to the museum of the city of Zamosht.

00:10:14There, they will be further cleaned, the composition of the bronze will be studied,

00:10:18and the exact age and origin of each item will be determined.

00:10:21Who killed Ötzi?

00:10:24In September 1991, two tourists were walking along the icy ridge in the Utztal Alps, on the border of Italy

00:10:32and Austria, and noticed a body in the meltwater.

00:10:35At first, everyone thought it was a dead mountaineer, maybe someone who had gone missing a couple of years ago.

00:10:40When the body was recovered and shown to specialists, it turned out to be one of the most well-preserved

00:10:46mummies of antiquity.

00:10:47This man died here about 5,300 years ago, which means before the first pyramid appeared in Egypt, he was

00:10:54named Ötzi after the valley.

00:10:56At the time of his death, he was about 45 years old, and the ice preserved him so well that

00:11:03scientists got his skin, hair, and even the contents of his stomach.

00:11:07I want to point out that archaeologists would be horrified if they saw a video of how carelessly and disrespectfully

00:11:14Ötzi's remains were handled and how they were damaged.

00:11:17One of the discoverers even stepped on him, hacked around him with a pickaxe, and scattered the artifacts like trash.

00:11:23Of course, at first they didn't know how old he was, but even if he died relatively recently, preserving the

00:11:29evidence is crucial.

00:11:31There's another point that's shocking.

00:11:33Italy and Austria didn't want to take the body because of bureaucratic issues, but when both sides learned the exact

00:11:39age of the mummy, a struggle began over which country he was actually in.

00:11:43The first theory about his death was peaceful.

00:11:46It was believed that Ötzi simply froze in the mountains, caught in bad weather at the pass.

00:11:50This theory lasted for ten years and was shattered in a single day in 2001, when an x-ray revealed

00:11:57a stone arrowhead in his left shoulder.

00:11:59At that time, an entry wound was also found on his back.

00:12:02The case instantly shifted from an accident to a murder investigation.

00:12:05The decisive evidence was provided by a CT scan.

00:12:08In 2005, a group led by Franco Rulli from the University of Zurich, together with doctors from the Bolzano Hospital,

00:12:15scanned the body with a CT scanner and saw the most important thing.

00:12:18The arrowhead passed under the left shoulder blade and tore the subclavian artery.

00:12:22It's a major vessel under the collarbone that carries blood to the arm.

00:12:25To give you an idea of what that means, with an injury like this, blood drains from the body very

00:12:30quickly.

00:12:30And according to doctors' estimates, a person loses consciousness and dies literally within a few minutes.

00:12:35This was indirectly confirmed by the blood chemistry as well.

00:12:38In the tissues around the wound, they found a protein that triggers clotting and appears in the first minutes after

00:12:44the injury, then quickly disappears.

00:12:46Since it was preserved, it means Ötzi died almost immediately after the shot.

00:12:49And now, here are the details that turned this discovery into a real investigation.

00:12:53The arrow was fired from behind and below.

00:12:55That means, the shooter was hiding behind the victim and shot him in the back.

00:12:59The arrowhead itself, made of flint and smaller than a coin, remained in the body.

00:13:03It was just a few millimeters from the raptured vessel.

00:13:06And it's still there to this day.

00:13:08But someone pulled out the shaft of the arrow.

00:13:10The blood around the wound channel shows that the shaft was removed while the person was still bleeding.

00:13:15And it's possible that the killer himself did this, so the arrow couldn't be traced back to him later.

00:13:19On Ötzi's right hand, there's a deep cut between the thumb and index finger.

00:13:23You get a wound like that, when you defend yourself against someone else's blade with your bare hand.

00:13:27And it appeared shortly before his death.

00:13:30A heavy meat meal was preserved in his stomach.

00:13:33Alpine ibex meat and a bit of grain were eaten about an hour before death.

00:13:37That's evidence in itself.

00:13:39After all, a person who feels he's being chased doesn't sit down calmly to eat.

00:13:44It seems the attack was sudden.

00:13:45He was caught off guard while resting.

00:13:47On top of everything else, Ötzi also had a severe head injury.

00:13:50It was sustained around the same time.

00:13:52From a fall or from a blow.

00:13:54Some aspects of this story are still debated by scientists.

00:13:58For many years, the arrow wound was considered instantly fatal and the sole cause of death.

00:14:03A recent 2025 study published in the International Journal of Legal Medicine reexamined the same scans.

00:14:10And with the help of three-dimensional reconstruction of the posture,

00:14:13it suggests that the vessel damage might not have killed as quickly as previously thought.

00:14:16And that blood loss, shock and the mountain cold all play the role together.

00:14:20This doesn't affect the fact of the murder itself.

00:14:22Only the details of his final minutes are being clarified.

00:14:25But we don't know the motive and we will never be able to find out.

00:14:28Whether it was an ambush due to an old feud, a robbery, a quarrel on the road or something more,

00:14:33it's impossible to tell from the body.

00:14:34All we know is that this person was shot in the back.

00:14:37Then he was finished off or someone tried to finish him off.

00:14:40And after that, the killer even took the time to pull the shaft out of the wound.

00:14:44The killer of Ötzi was eventually forgotten.

00:14:46But Ötzi, lying there murdered, continued to tell his story to the world.

00:14:53The Starman

00:14:54In the Rising Star Cave in South Africa in 2013,

00:14:57a team led by Lee Berger discovered the remains of more than 15 members of the species Homo naledi.

00:15:04This discovery is the largest collection of a single species of ancient humans ever found in Africa.

00:15:10Unexpectedly, another 133 Homo naledi specimens were found in the neighboring Lisedi chamber,

00:15:16belonging to at least three individuals, two adults and one child.

00:15:19And this was accomplished in just one expedition.

00:15:23Interestingly, the teeth of Homo naledi are different from those of other Homo species that live during the same era,

00:15:28which may indicate a different lifestyle and environment.

00:15:33An alien's hand

00:15:34While walking along the beach in Brazil, you can find seashells, pebbles, little crabs and an alien's hand.

00:15:42That's exactly what happened to a couple who decided to take a romantic walk along the shore of the Atlantic

00:15:46Ocean.

00:15:47The bony hand with long fingers looks like the friendly alien from Steven Spielberg's movie E.T. The Extraterrestrial.

00:15:54It would seem that this is real proof of an alien's presence on our planet, even if it's not the

00:15:59whole alien.

00:16:01Leticia Gomez-Santiago and her boyfriend Devan Yersuza took lots of photos and posted them online.

00:16:06After all, where can you find the best experts on any topic?

00:16:09Of course, on the internet.

00:16:11Marine biologist Eric Comin came across the photos and debunked all the myths about the discovery.

00:16:17He believes that the hand belongs to a member of the cetacean order of mammals, which includes whales, dolphins and

00:16:23porpoises.

00:16:24And its terrifying appearance is due to the stage of decomposition, which lasts about a year and a half.

00:16:30For many years, people have been trying to find any clear evidence of extraterrestrial life.

00:16:35But scientists always come along who can explain this or that artifact from a scientific point of view.

00:16:40In this case, the discovery indicates that cetaceans, which now live in seas and oceans, used to walk on land

00:16:4650 million years ago.

00:16:48Under the webbed skin of a whale's or dolphin's flipper, there are five fingers or a five-fingered limb.

00:16:54This is also found in humans, amphibians and a number of other animals, which points to their common ancestor.

00:16:59Besides taking photos, the couple also filmed the hand on video to show how big it is.

00:17:04The biologist believes that this is part of a dolphin, which are very common here.

00:17:08Usually, such bones shouldn't be removed from the beach, so as not to disrupt the natural nutrient cycle in the

00:17:14ecosystem.

00:17:15However, scientists are quick to study recently deceased animals to determine the exact cause of death.

00:17:20After all, it might not be just the accidental death of a single dolphin, but the start of a widespread

00:17:25epidemic

00:17:25or the extinction of animals due to the release of harmful substances into the water.

00:17:29A family crypt in the city center.

00:17:32In the British town of Martock, next to the All Saints Church, the ground suddenly collapsed.

00:17:36At first, people thought it was just a regular sinkhole caused by heavy rains.

00:17:40But when the workers cleared the edge of the pit, it became clear.

00:17:44Beneath the surface was a stone chamber.

00:17:46An 18th century family crypt that no one had seen for about 300 years.

00:17:50The crypt is built from local hamstone, the very same that is now quarried in only two places in England.

00:17:55Inside, there should be shelves with four burials from one family.

00:17:58Who exactly was buried here is still unclear.

00:18:00The church records are currently being reviewed.

00:18:02But nearby, there is a tomb from 1760.

00:18:05And by the style of the masonry, it is clear that this belongs to the same period.

00:18:10Priest Paul Filler said that the rains washed away the foundation and the crypt's ceiling simply couldn't hold.

00:18:14No human remains are visible yet.

00:18:16Everything is covered with a mixture of gravel, soil and debris.

00:18:19But the very fact that the crypt stood for several centuries unnoticed in the center of the village surprises even

00:18:25archaeologists.

00:18:27Terms of this type were a sign of status.

00:18:29The family it belonged to was most likely wealthy.

00:18:32Perhaps the Tanners and the Petardis who were well known in this area.

00:18:36A dwarf or another type of human.

00:18:39If I open any textbook, it says in black and white that there is only one type of human on

00:18:43the planet.

00:18:44And humans have always been like us.

00:18:46Of course, there's Darwin's theory that our ancestors were apes.

00:18:49Some believe we came from another planet.

00:18:51But I want to tell a story that's more down to earth.

00:18:54Flora's Island in Indonesia.

00:18:57Liangboa Cave, 2003.

00:19:00Archaeologists who were looking for something completely different found the skeleton of an adult woman.

00:19:04She was just over a meter tall.

00:19:06Her brain was the size of a grapefruit.

00:19:08About a third the size of ours.

00:19:10At first they thought it was a child or a large dwarf.

00:19:13But then from the same layer they uncover a second person just like that.

00:19:16Then a third.

00:19:17And it becomes clear that this was an entire people of tiny humans who made tools, built fires and hunted.

00:19:23They were called hobbits.

00:19:25And here's the most interesting part which is why I started this channel.

00:19:28At first it was thought that these dwarfs survived almost until our time.

00:19:33They lived only 12,000 years ago.

00:19:35It turns out we could have encountered them alive just yesterday, historically speaking.

00:19:39But in 2016 the cave was excavated again.

00:19:42They double checked the age.

00:19:43And it turned out that the hobbits went extinct much earlier.

00:19:461,015 years ago.

00:19:48Right when our ancestors first arrived on the island.

00:19:50So we almost encountered them.

00:19:53And maybe that's exactly why they're gone now.

00:19:55And their life was far from easy.

00:19:57On that same island there were dwarf elephants there which they hunted.

00:20:01And a three meter monitor lizard.

00:20:03The very same Komodo dragon that still lives there to this day.

00:20:06And given the chance it attacks people.

00:20:08Just imagine a person the height of a five year old child.

00:20:11Who goes up against a lizard as long as a car with a stone spear.

00:20:15And yet somehow he managed to survive for thousands of years.

00:20:18And I'll say this without any fairy tales.

00:20:20These aren't elves or aliens.

00:20:22This is a real human species.

00:20:23Recognized by science and named Homo floresiensis.

00:20:26Scientists only argue about why they became so small.

00:20:28One theory is that the island itself is to blame.

00:20:31There was little food and no enemies.

00:20:32And over thousands of years animals also become smaller.

00:20:36That's why even the elephants there were dwarfs.

00:20:38But as you've already understood it's not about the height.

00:20:41It turns out we weren't alone on this planet.

00:20:43There was a completely different kind of people living next to us.

00:20:45And apparently we had a lot more of these neighbors than we were told in school.

00:20:49The priestess from Peru.

00:20:51Archeologists in Peru found the burial of a woman that's over a thousand years old.

00:20:56She was lying in a grave surrounded by important items, vessels, jewelry, and fragments of fabrics.

00:21:01These items indicate her high status.

00:21:03Most likely she was a priestess.

00:21:05The burial was arranged with attention to detail.

00:21:07Her body was carefully laid out.

00:21:09And around her were objects related to rituals.

00:21:11Or worship.

00:21:12They helped preserve her memory and status.

00:21:14Even after death.

00:21:16This is not just a grave.

00:21:17This is a sign of respect and honor.

00:21:19Interestingly, despite its age, this find is quite well preserved.

00:21:23The fabric, the jewelry, even the bones are all in good condition.

00:21:26The sand and dryness help preserve details that usually disappear over centuries.

00:21:32The legendary golden horse not long ago.

00:21:35News once again spread on social media that near Annapa, Russia,

00:21:38the legendary golden horse of King Mithridates Yupater was supposedly found.

00:21:43It is noteworthy that similar reports had already appeared in 2021 turning out to be an April fool's joke.

00:21:49Now, however, the excavations taking place near the Anapskaya Stanitsa have once again sparked discussion about this story.

00:21:55During rescue operations at the site of a future kindergarten,

00:21:58archaeologists discovered a burial ground about 2000 years old.

00:22:01In one of the graves they found not only human remains but also those of a horse.

00:22:05In others they found horse skeletons, glass and ceramic dishes, various beads, as well as weapons and harnesses.

00:22:11The items, including beads made of amber, carnelian, and faience,

00:22:15indicate connections between the local tribes and the ancient world.

00:22:18Among the finds was a scarab, a symbol of rebirth for the ancient Egyptians.

00:22:23The glass vessels attracted particular interest as they were widespread throughout the periphery of the Roman Empire

00:22:28due to advancements in glass-blowing techniques.

00:22:31Despite the excitement, there is no direct evidence that this is actually Mithridates' golden horse.

00:22:37Scientists emphasize that legends can easily grow

00:22:39and the rich burial of a noble person may well acquire fantastic features over time.

00:22:45A mass grave in ancient times

00:22:49In 2011, near the village of Koszyzy in southern Poland, archaeologists excavated a mass grave about 5000 years old.

00:22:57And it immediately became clear that this was an unusual burial.

00:23:00There were 15 people lying in the pit.

00:23:03There were five adult women, four adult men, two girls, and four boys here.

00:23:09All of them died from a blow to the head.

00:23:12The burial belongs to the so-called globular amphora culture to the late Stone Age farmers

00:23:17who were named this way because of their distinctive stone vessels.

00:23:21According to the dating, it's around 2800 BC.

00:23:26The most terrifying thing about this discovery didn't become apparent right away.

00:23:30But only when an international team led by Hannes Schroeder from the University of Copenhagen got involved.

00:23:35The scientists sequenced the DNA of all 15 skeletons, added radiocarbon analysis and isotope studies,

00:23:41and realized that they were looking at one big family spanning three generations.

00:23:45Mothers were lying next to their children, brothers and sisters next to each other.

00:23:49This work was published in 2019, in the Journal of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA.

00:23:54From the bones, it's clear that almost everyone received a blow to the head.

00:23:58And at the same time, there are almost no defensive wounds on their arms.

00:24:01This can mean only one thing.

00:24:03The people didn't have time or simply couldn't protect themselves from the blows.

00:24:07Most likely, they were taken by surprise, captured, and killed quickly, all with the same type of weapon.

00:24:12Possibly a stone axe.

00:24:14And here, the story takes a turn that's hard to comprehend.

00:24:18These people were killed brutally, but buried with great care.

00:24:21The bodies weren't just thrown into a pit, they were laid out carefully,

00:24:25and they were arranged according to family ties, a mother with her children, relatives next to relatives.

00:24:30Along with them, rich burial goods, dishes and jewelry were placed in the grave,

00:24:34as is done only for those who are sent off with respect.

00:24:38Only someone who knew the deceased well and truly cared about them could have done this.

00:24:42And here, genetics revealed another detail.

00:24:45Some of the murdered women and children in the grave did not have their husbands and fathers with them.

00:24:50It seems that these men simply were not at home at the time of the attack.

00:24:54They had gone out on errands or hunting, they returned, found their relatives murdered, and buried them themselves.

00:24:59Imagine coming home to that for a moment, and you'll understand why archaeologists call this discovery a family tragedy.

00:25:05We don't know who attacked this family.

00:25:07The author of the study cautiously links the massacre to the large migrations of that time.

00:25:11It was during that era that people from the east, from the steppes, were moving into Europe, bringing another culture,

00:25:17the Corded Ware culture.

00:25:18And genetically, it's clear that the inhabitants of Kosis were unrelated to them.

00:25:22They have no steppe admixture.

00:25:24Perhaps the conflict happened precisely because of this, over land and resources.

00:25:28But this is just one possible explanation, not a proven fact.

00:25:31There are no names of the attackers, and we don't even know for sure whether these were outsiders or people

00:25:36from their own group.

00:25:37But there is something we know for sure.

00:25:395,000 years ago, an entire family, mostly women and children, were killed by blows to the head in a

00:25:45very short period of time.

00:25:46We will never find out who killed them.

00:25:48But these 15 people, even in death, remained together, and modern science was able to explain who they were to

00:25:55each other.

00:25:57Human Figures with Giant Eyes

00:26:00On Nuku Hiva Island, one of the Marquesas Islands in French Polynesia, stone carvings from around the 11th century AD

00:26:09have been preserved.

00:26:10A whole row of figures, with huge round eyes and elongated, stylized bodies, is carved on a large stone block.

00:26:18At first glance, these figures don't look human at all.

00:26:22Huge, empty eyes, elongated heads, slightly hunched postures.

00:26:26But in fact, this style was typical for the local Polynesian stone carving tradition,

00:26:30where important ancestors and spirits were deliberately depicted as exaggerated and unusual.

00:26:35Such figures were usually associated with the veneration of ancestors and spirits,

00:26:39who, according to local beliefs, continued to influence the life of the island even after death.

00:26:44Large eyes in Polynesian art often signified the ability to see more than an ordinary living person could.

00:26:50Something like spiritual vision.

00:26:53Nuku Hiva Island has always been a hard to reach place, cut off from the rest of the world by

00:26:57thousands of kilometers of open ocean.

00:27:00It was this remoteness that helped local artistic traditions remain almost unchanged for many centuries,

00:27:05without strong influence from other cultures of the world.

00:27:09The Bronze Heads of Ife

00:27:11The bronze heads from Ife were created between the 12th and 15th centuries in what is now Nigeria.

00:27:17These sculptures are made using the lost wax casting method and are distinguished by their high accuracy in depicting facial

00:27:22proportions.

00:27:23Fine lines, repeating scars, ornaments, and elements of headdresses can be seen on the surface.

00:27:28The holes on the tops of the heads indicate the installation of crowns or other symbols of authority.

00:27:34Most researchers associate these heads with rulers or ritual images of the elite.

00:27:38Their production required temperature control, high quality alloys, and complex molds.

00:27:43The finds demonstrate advanced metallurgy and a stable artistic tradition that existed in Ife long before contact with Europe.

00:27:50These heads were not portraits in the modern sense, but they reflected a person's status and sacred role.

00:27:55A tomb that no one was looking for.

00:27:58In Saqqara, right next to the pyramid of Yuzerkath, a small tomb was found.

00:28:03It was squeezed between other buildings, with no paintings, no bas-reliefs.

00:28:08Just a limestone sarcophagus, a few vessels, and a plaque with a name.

00:28:11According to the inscription, this is the son of the Pharaoh.

00:28:14But everything around suggests otherwise.

00:28:16The burial is not marked, it's not visible from the outside.

00:28:19Even the workers who have been digging here for decades have never heard of it.

00:28:22It feels like he wasn't just buried, but erased.

00:28:24It's as if something didn't go according to plan.

00:28:27As if he died at the wrong time, for the wrong reasons.

00:28:29Or maybe he wasn't who he was supposed to be.

00:28:31No obvious traces.

00:28:33But the very lack of attention is itself a trace.

00:28:35And such discoveries are remembered not for who lies in them,

00:28:38but for the fact that people tried to turn away from them.

00:28:41A terrible death of a child.

00:28:43In China's Henan province, archaeologists found the remains of a child

00:28:47who lived 8,000 years ago.

00:28:49Judging by the fragments of leg and rib bones,

00:28:51the age at the time of death was between 8 and 10 years old.

00:28:55Remarkably, there are marks on the leg bones in six places,

00:28:58presumably made by tools.

00:29:00Why the ancient inhabitants performed such a procedure is unknown.

00:29:03It is possible that this was a ritual related to the child's illness

00:29:06or preparing the bones to make some kind of objects.

00:29:09The remains were discovered at the Jiahu site,

00:29:12which belongs to the Neolithic Pelegan culture.

00:29:15During the excavations, hundreds of graves were found here,

00:29:18along with many artifacts,

00:29:19from bone fluids to traces of a fermented drink

00:29:22made from rice, honey and plant ingredients.

00:29:24In total, scientists studied 109 individuals,

00:29:27but such notches were found only on this child.

00:29:30Signs of inflammatory processes were also detected on the bone,

00:29:33which could indicate chronic diseases.

00:29:37Paleopathologists were unable to make an exact diagnosis.

00:29:39Scientists suggest that the sick child might have received special attention.

00:29:42It is possible that the special incisions were believed to relieve him from suffering in the afterlife.

00:29:47However, this remains only a hypothesis,

00:29:50since the skull, vertebrae and other parts of the skeleton have not been preserved

00:29:54and it is difficult to determine the real reason for such a practice.

00:29:59Lacquered Coffin

00:30:00In 2018, archaeologists in China's Jiangsu province

00:30:03discovered a unique 700-year-old lacquered coffin from the Yuan dynasty.

00:30:09Its bright red surface has been perfectly preserved

00:30:11thanks to the multi-layer lacquer coating

00:30:13which protected the wood from moisture and decay.

00:30:16Lacquered Coffins were a symbol of high status in China

00:30:19and their creation required sophisticated techniques.

00:30:23The lacquer was applied in several layers and then polished to a shine.

00:30:26This method of preservation allowed the coffin to survive for centuries with almost no damage.

00:30:30The discovery is also important because the Yuan dynasty left relatively few burials

00:30:35and this coffin can tell us a lot about the burial traditions of that time.

00:30:41Elements of life in asteroid samples

00:30:43NASA analyzed samples from the asteroid Bennu

00:30:46delivered by the OSIRIS-REx mission

00:30:48and found organic compounds in them

00:30:50which are key for the origin of life.

00:30:53Among the findings are amino acids, ammonia and formaldehyde

00:30:56which could have participated in chemical reactions that led to the emergence of proteins and DNA.

00:31:02Scientists confirmed that the samples contained 14 out of 20 amino acids

00:31:05used by living organisms on Earth.

00:31:07Minerals indicating the possible presence of water were also found.

00:31:11This data strengthens the hypothesis that asteroids like Bennu

00:31:15could have delivered important components necessary for the origin of life to Earth.

00:31:20A panda in the tomb.

00:31:22The great Chinese Emperor Wen, who lived 2,200 years ago, passed away.

00:31:28And here's what's interesting.

00:31:30Next to his final resting place, archaeologists discovered the remains of a giant panda and a tapir.

00:31:35Until that moment, scientists didn't even suspect that tapirs could have lived in China during the Emperor's reign.

00:31:42And many other animals were also found near the tomb.

00:31:45From mighty tigers to peacocks and golden snub-nosed monkeys.

00:31:48Unfortunately, many of them are now endangered.

00:31:53The oldest known Homo sapiens remains.

00:31:56Under the Moroccan sky, in a place called Jebel Erhoud,

00:32:00archaeologists made an amazing discovery.

00:32:03They found the oldest known remains of Homo sapiens.

00:32:06That is, our direct ancestors.

00:32:08It turns out that these remains and the stone tools found nearby

00:32:13date back to a period between 350,000 and 280,000 years ago.

00:32:19That's a whole 100,000 years older than the oldest Homo sapiens specimens we knew about until now.

00:32:27The most just court in the world.

00:32:30About 3,870 years ago in Mesopotamia, a murder took place and the records of it have come down to

00:32:37us in full.

00:32:39This is the oldest court record of a murder trial that we know of.

00:32:42And it was written in cuneiform, with signs and dashes pressed into a wet clay tablet.

00:32:49Scholars assembled the text from several fragments found in the ancient city of Nippur,

00:32:53located in present-day Iraq.

00:32:55And they were deciphered and translated by one of the leading experts in the Sumerian language,

00:32:59Samuel Kramer, together with his colleagues.

00:33:02Today, this tablet is kept in a museum.

00:33:05It contains the complete record of a criminal case that is almost 4,000 years old.

00:33:09Here is the essence of it.

00:33:11Three men, named Nana Sik, Ku Enlil, who was a barber by trade,

00:33:16and Enlil Enam, a gardener, killed a man named Luenana.

00:33:19He was not just an ordinary citizen, but a temple servant, a prominent figure at that time.

00:33:24And after the murder, these three went to his wife, named Nindada,

00:33:28and told her themselves that her husband was dead.

00:33:30And this is where the part of the story this case is still remembered for begins.

00:33:34The wife did not say a word to anyone.

00:33:36She kept the murderer secret and did not go to the authorities.

00:33:40The case reached the king himself, named Urni Nurta, who ruled from the city of Isin.

00:33:44The king did not judge the case himself, but handed over the investigation to the assembly of the city of

00:33:48Nippur,

00:33:49which acted as a court in such cases.

00:33:51And then a real legal dispute unfolds, almost like in a modern courtroom.

00:33:55Nine people acted as prosecutors.

00:33:58And from the tablet, it is clear that these were ordinary citizens.

00:34:02Among them were a birdcatcher and a potter.

00:34:04They demanded death not only for the three murderers, but also for the wife.

00:34:08They considered her an accomplice.

00:34:09After all, she knew about the crime and kept silent.

00:34:12Then two people stood up and defended the woman.

00:34:14Their argument was simple and sounds quite modern.

00:34:17She herself did not participate in the murder.

00:34:19She didn't lay a hand on anyone.

00:34:21So there is nothing to punish her for.

00:34:24Essentially, we are looking at a trial.

00:34:26Some demand execution, others act as the defense.

00:34:29And all this happened thousands of years before courts appeared in the form we know today.

00:34:33The decision of the assembly has reached us and it is harsh.

00:34:35The court decided that the wife's silence was not just silence.

00:34:38And that she was, in one way or another, involved in her husband's death.

00:34:42In the end, all four were sentenced to death.

00:34:45They were to be executed in front of the empty chair of Louis Nana,

00:34:48in the very place where he used to sit during his life.

00:34:51Historians don't argue about who the killer is.

00:34:53All the names are written plainly on the tablet.

00:34:55The controversy is about the murdered man's wife.

00:34:58Is she guilty for knowing and staying silent?

00:35:00At this point, the tablet can be read in two ways.

00:35:03According to one reading, all four were executed.

00:35:05According to the other, the woman was eventually released.

00:35:08Both versions are still seriously discussed to this day.

00:35:11And if you think about it, the question is still interesting even today.

00:35:14Is someone guilty if they didn't do the killing themselves,

00:35:16but knew everything and stayed silent?

00:35:18The Sumerians struggled with this question almost 4000 years ago,

00:35:22and they never reached a consensus.

00:35:24Honestly, neither have we. What do you think?

00:35:26Should the wife be punished equally with the murderers

00:35:28for covering for them and staying silent?

00:35:30Write your opinion in the comments.

00:35:33An untouched tomb with jewelry.

00:35:36During excavations in the northern part of Budapest,

00:35:39archaeologists came across a stone sarcophagus

00:35:41that looked as if it had been sealed just yesterday.

00:35:44No signs of break-in or attempts at reuse,

00:35:47a rarity for the 4th century Roman Empire

00:35:49where tombs were often opened and reused.

00:35:51Here, however, the lid was sealed so securely

00:35:54that no one doubted the archaeologists were in for a surprise.

00:35:56Inside the sarcophagus

00:35:57lay the neatly arranged skeleton of a young woman.

00:36:00Nearby were glass vessels,

00:36:02delicate bronze figurines,

00:36:03a bone hairpin,

00:36:04an amber pendant,

00:36:05and about 140 coins.

00:36:07Even remnants of fabric with gold thread were preserved.

00:36:10It's an extremely rare case

00:36:11when ancient clothing survives for centuries.

00:36:13The archaeologists immediately realized

00:36:14that they were looking at the grave of someone important.

00:36:16The young woman belonged to the wealthy strata of society,

00:36:19possibly to the family of an administrator.

00:36:21Quincum, a Roman city on the Danube.

00:36:24In ancient times,

00:36:25legions were stationed here,

00:36:26trade routes passed through,

00:36:28and life thrived on the border of the empire.

00:36:30The sarcophagus was found among the ruins of houses,

00:36:32next to the aqueduct and several other burials.

00:36:34But none of them can compare in wealth and preservation to this tomb.

00:36:37When clearing the bottom of the sarcophagus,

00:36:39specialists found a 4 cm thick layer of dirt.

00:36:43They carefully sift through it

00:36:44because miniature ornaments are often left in such places.

00:36:47Earrings, buckles, pins.

00:36:49Perhaps some of them are still hidden there.

00:36:51But after 1,700 years,

00:36:54it is clear that the girl was buried with great care.

00:36:57Such finds remind us

00:36:58that behind every ancient tomb

00:36:59there is a real life and people who loved her.

00:37:02They found the remains of D'Artagnan.

00:37:05The real D'Artagnan's name was Charles de Baths de Castelmore.

00:37:09And he really existed.

00:37:11He served in the Royal Musketeers under Louis XIV.

00:37:14He was close to the king and died in 1673

00:37:19during the siege of the Dutch city of Maastricht.

00:37:22According to historical sources,

00:37:23he was killed right on the battlefield.

00:37:25His body was buried somewhere in the city,

00:37:27but no one recorded exactly where.

00:37:28Or maybe the records just didn't survive.

00:37:30For almost 400 years,

00:37:32hardly anyone knew anything about his grave.

00:37:34Then, during restoration work in one of the old Maastricht churches,

00:37:38workers stumbled upon a skeleton.

00:37:40Fragments of a musket ball were found in the chest area.

00:37:44A French coin was found next to the body.

00:37:46And the age of the burial

00:37:47matches the date of D'Artagnan's death in every respect.

00:37:50DNA samples have now been taken and sent for analysis.

00:37:53There is no official confirmation yet.

00:37:55Science is in no hurry to make bold statements without definitive proof,

00:37:58but researchers say there are too many coincidences to consider this a mere accident.

00:38:03Think about this.

00:38:05Alexandre Dumas wrote The Three Musketeers in 1844.

00:38:09170 years after the real man's death,

00:38:12the novel became one of the most widely read in the world.

00:38:15Billions of people know the name D'Artagnan from movies, television series and plays.

00:38:20And yet, no one knew where his remains were buried until last year.

00:38:23If you've come across a similar story, a random discovery that turned out to be a huge breakthrough,

00:38:28write about it in the comments.

00:38:30It would be interesting to make a full video about such stories.

00:38:36In a cave in Thailand, archaeologists discovered a burial site that's almost 30,000 years old.

00:38:41The child was about 4 years old.

00:38:43At first glance, nothing unusual, children's burials do occur.

00:38:47But this particular case raised many questions.

00:38:49The child's body was placed in a hollow curve directly into the rock.

00:38:52Carefully, almost like in a cradle, the face and chest were covered with red blood-like ochre.

00:38:57A pigment that in many ancient cultures was associated with blood, birth and the transition between worlds.

00:39:03There were objects nearby, stone tools, shells, ornaments.

00:39:06This was not just a random assortment.

00:39:08This is a set of items most often found in the burials of chiefs, shamans or people of special status.

00:39:13And certainly not in the burial of a child.

00:39:15Scientists did not find any traces of a mass burial or a settlement in the cave.

00:39:19Only one grave, one child, and an entire ritual built around him.

00:39:24This made us wonder who he was. Why was he buried like this?

00:39:27There is a theory that this was an expression of an early religious tradition.

00:39:30Or a sign that children in that society were not seen as weak and helpless, but as bearers of something

00:39:36important.

00:39:36But there is another thought. Maybe he was the only child in the group, or he died in a special

00:39:41way, in his sleep, during a ritual, or in the course of a ceremony.

00:39:45And then his death gained significance.

00:39:47Not because he was a chief, but because he became a symbol.

00:39:50In any case, this burial site is not just archaeology.

00:39:52This is one of the oldest reminders that death, even the earliest, could be a reason for a ritual.

00:39:57And a ritual that was complex, deliberate, with details that have survived to this day.

00:40:02People make money off them.

00:40:05Peru, Paracas Peninsula.

00:40:07Where, in 1928, an archaeologist excavated an ancient cemetery and took skulls from there.

00:40:13But the skulls were somehow unusual.

00:40:16They were stretched far back.

00:40:17Long, like a melon.

00:40:19With an unusually large volume.

00:40:21And they found not just one or two of them.

00:40:23They found more than 300 of them.

00:40:24This is where the part begins that makes me both love and hate this topic at the same time.

00:40:28Because there is an honest explanation, which I actually kind of like.

00:40:32Many peoples around the world deliberately elongated the skulls of infants.

00:40:36The head of a newborn, while the bones are still soft, was simply wrapped with cloth and squeezed between boards.

00:40:42And in a couple of years, it would become elongated.

00:40:45This was done to show noble origin.

00:40:47Like, I'm not a commoner.

00:40:48Royal blood runs in my veins.

00:40:50They did this in Peru, in Africa, and even in France, up until the 19th century.

00:40:54At the same time, the brain itself didn't change only the shape of the skull.

00:40:58But there's another explanation, and people make good money off it.

00:41:02Videos are going viral on the internet, where people seriously tell you that they supposedly found unknown non-human DNA

00:41:08in these skulls.

00:41:10That it's an alien hybrid.

00:41:12And here's what annoys me.

00:41:13Under every such video, there's always a promotional link urging you to buy a book, support the research, or fund

00:41:19the next expedition.

00:41:20Ancient customs have been turned into a way to make money off naive viewers.

00:41:24I believe there's no alien DNA there at all.

00:41:27None of those sensational analyses have ever been repeated or confirmed by any independent geneticist.

00:41:32And the skull deformation has long been explained.

00:41:35Especially nowadays, people change their appearance beyond recognition themselves.

00:41:38They lengthen their necks, insert implants, fix them in place, they inject oils under their skin, enlarge their lips.

00:41:45So we ourselves have no idea what we will look like in the near future.

00:41:49But I'll finish the story about the skulls with something interesting.

00:41:52A couple of specimens from Paracas still stand out from the rest.

00:41:55Binding changes the shape of the head.

00:41:57But it shouldn't change the volume and weight of the bone itself.

00:42:00And there are skulls that are heavier and larger than normal.

00:42:04And science still doesn't have a clear answer for this.

00:42:08A conspiracy against Ramses III.

00:42:11Ramses III was one of the last great pharaohs of ancient Egypt.

00:42:16He ruled from around 1186 to 1150 BC.

00:42:22Historians have long known that a conspiracy was being plotted against him.

00:42:26This is because a court document has survived, which is called the Turin Judicial Papyrus.

00:42:31This is essentially the court record of the trial of the conspirators.

00:42:34From it, we know that the assassination attempt was planned by one of the lesser wives named Thea.

00:42:40Ramses had many wives and sons.

00:42:42And by law, the throne was supposed to go to the heir from the chief wife.

00:42:46Thea was not satisfied with this.

00:42:48She wanted to remove the ruler and put her own son named Pentor on the throne.

00:42:52More than 40 people were drawn into the conspiracy.

00:42:55Among them were officials, the chief of the palace guard, women from the harem,

00:43:00and even priests responsible for magical rituals.

00:43:03Essentially, this was a palace coup.

00:43:05It was being prepared inside the pharaoh's own household, right behind his back.

00:43:10For a long time, there was a huge gap in this case.

00:43:12The papyrus described in detail who was plotting the conspiracy and how these people were later punished.

00:43:17Some were executed, while others were forced to commit suicide.

00:43:20But it never directly stated whether they actually managed to kill the pharaoh himself.

00:43:24His mummy was examined back in the 19th century.

00:43:26However, the thick burial bandages and the wide collar on his neck made it impossible to see any signs of

00:43:31a fatal injury.

00:43:32And the matter remained unresolved for nearly 30 centuries.

00:43:35The pharaoh died around the same time that the trial of the conspirators was taking place.

00:43:39But exactly how remained a mystery?

00:43:41The answer only came in 2012.

00:43:44A team that included the Egyptologist Zahi Hawass and radiology specialist Sahar Salim decided to study the mummy again.

00:43:52Without unwrapping it.

00:43:53So they wouldn't damage it.

00:43:54They placed Ramsey's in a modern CT scanner.

00:43:57The very same machine that scans the body in layers in hospitals.

00:44:00And they looked under the bandages without touching them even once.

00:44:04And here is what was hidden there.

00:44:06Under the collar made of dense layers of linen fabric, there was a deep cut in the throat about 7

00:44:10cm wide.

00:44:11Almost the entire width of the neck.

00:44:13It cut through the windpipe, esophagus and major blood vessels all the way to the vertebrae.

00:44:19No one survives such a wound.

00:44:21A person dies within moments.

00:44:22A CT scan of Ramsey III's mummy showed that the pharaoh's throat was cut.

00:44:26It was a wound he could not survive.

00:44:29And modern technology after 3000 years has finally solved this mystery.

00:44:33The embalmers hid this wound.

00:44:35They covered it with a collar.

00:44:37They even placed an amulet shaped like the eye of the god Horus inside.

00:44:40So that the body could be healed in the afterlife.

00:44:43That's why no one saw the wound for so long.

00:44:45It was deliberately hidden during embalming.

00:44:47The results were published in a British medical journal.

00:44:51And it was a real sensation.

00:44:52A few years later the same researcher studied the mummy's feet.

00:44:55And she found another important detail.

00:44:57The big toe on the left foot had been cut off.

00:44:59And it was done with a different weapon.

00:45:02Not the one used to cut the throat.

00:45:04From this, they concluded that several people attacked the pharaoh at once.

00:45:07And from different sides.

00:45:09Someone attacked from the front.

00:45:10Someone from behind at the same time.

00:45:12So, it wasn't a single attack.

00:45:14It was a coordinated assault by a group of killers.

00:45:16They cornered the ruler and struck to make sure he wouldn't survive.

00:45:20And yet, some things in this case still remain hidden.

00:45:23We know who was behind the conspiracy.

00:45:25We know the court's verdicts.

00:45:27We now also know that the pharaoh was indeed killed.

00:45:29His throat slit.

00:45:30But who exactly held the knife and delivered the fatal blow?

00:45:32We will never know.

00:45:33The names of many participants were deliberately erased from documents and monuments as part of their punishment.

00:45:40To erase even the memory of them.

00:45:42The trial of the conspirators, by the way, was not conducted by Ramses III himself.

00:45:46But by his son and heir, Ramses IV.

00:45:48On behalf of his murdered father.

00:45:50There is also the so-called screaming man among the Egyptian mummies.

00:45:53His face is frozen in a terrifying grimace with his mouth wide open.

00:45:56He was clearly buried as a punishment.

00:45:58His body was wrapped in a goat skin, which was considered impure by the Egyptians.

00:46:01And he was placed in a simple coffin, without a single inscription.

00:46:05Without a name.

00:46:06As if they were deliberately erasing him for all eternity.

00:46:08When a DNA analysis was done, it turned out that this was the biological son of Ramses III.

00:46:13It seems very likely that this is Penchure himself.

00:46:15The one for whom his mother started the whole conspiracy.

00:46:18And who, after the trial, was forced to take his own life.

00:46:22The Pit of the Headless

00:46:24In Slovakia, archaeologists have excavated a burial site over 7,000 years old.

00:46:28Almost 40 bodies, and all of them except for one, are missing their skulls.

00:46:32The bodies are laid out neatly.

00:46:34No signs of violence.

00:46:35No chaos.

00:46:36Everything is too calm.

00:46:37As if someone knew exactly what they were doing.

00:46:39And they did it according to a plan.

00:46:41Only one child's head was preserved.

00:46:43No one understands why.

00:46:44Maybe the child was spared, or maybe left as a sign.

00:46:47There are theories.

00:46:48A ritual.

00:46:49An execution.

00:46:50Or maybe an attempt to erase a person so completely, that not even their shoes remain.

00:46:54A family of warriors from the 9th century.

00:46:57In Hungary, archaeologists discovered three warrior burials dating to between 920 and 930 AD.

00:47:04At first glance, these seemed like ordinary graves from the early middle ages.

00:47:07But analysis revealed a detail that drastically changes the picture.

00:47:11All three were related through the mail line.

00:47:12Most likely it was a father and two sons.

00:47:15The burial inventory indicates a high status.

00:47:17A saber.

00:47:18A bow with a quiver.

00:47:19Decorated harness and silver and gold elements of clothing.

00:47:22Dozens of coins.

00:47:23One of the young men died at 17 or 18 years old.

00:47:26The other even earlier.

00:47:28The eldest died at around 30 years old.

00:47:30All three mainly ate meat, which confirms their belonging to the military elite.

00:47:35The coins found in the graves come from northern Italy and date back to the reign of King Berengar.

00:47:40This coincides with the period of the Hungarian military campaigns to the west.

00:47:44Most likely that's where the family obtained their loot.

00:47:46The burial reflects a stable military lineage connected with origin, campaigns and power.

00:47:51The weapons, jewelry and the composition of the grave goods indicate belonging to the elite and participation in further campaigns.

00:47:56The coincidence of dates, kinship through the mail line and the nature of the burials

00:48:01identify a family integrated into the military structure of the early state.

00:48:05An alien who turned out to be a child.

00:48:07Chile.

00:48:08The Atacama Desert.

00:48:10The driest place on the planet.

00:48:12Here, corpses don't rot.

00:48:13They dry out and can lie for centuries.

00:48:16In 2003, a man named Oscar Muñoz was wandering through the abandoned mining town of La Noria and found a

00:48:22leather pouch.

00:48:23And inside, wrapped in cloth, was a tiny body only about 15 centimeters long.

00:48:28Roughly the size of a human hand.

00:48:31And it looks so strange it makes you want to cross yourself.

00:48:34The head is elongated and pointed.

00:48:36The eye sockets are huge and set at an angle.

00:48:39The teeth are like those of an adult.

00:48:40And there are 10 pairs of ribs instead of the usual 12.

00:48:43He called him Eta.

00:48:45And honestly, just look at him.

00:48:469 out of 10 people would say he's an alien.

00:48:48In 2013, a UFO film called Sirius was released, where the American Steven Greer announced to the whole world that

00:48:55this is a mummy and that there is evidence of aliens.

00:48:58The video spread all over the world.

00:49:00But it was this film that led to the solution.

00:49:02People watched it.

00:49:03Gary Nolan, a professor from Stanford, watched it and he decided to investigate.

00:49:07According to him, he didn't go there to debunk anything.

00:49:10On the contrary, he admits that at some point he got excited himself.

00:49:13What if it really was an alien?

00:49:15He took a sample from the rib and decoded all the DNA.

00:49:18But in reality, it's a human.

00:49:19A girl.

00:49:20Most likely from Chile.

00:49:21And all the frightening appearance is due to mutations.

00:49:24In her genes, they found 64 mutations that had never been seen in humans before.

00:49:28And they were located exactly in the genes responsible for bone growth and the number of ribs.

00:49:32Because of them, the bones aged prematurely.

00:49:35And by looking at them, it seemed like the child was 6 or 7 years old.

00:49:38Although in reality, this is a premature infant.

00:49:41And the mummy itself is only about 40 years old.

00:49:43That means she is our contemporary.

00:49:45They don't know exactly why this child had so many DNA mutations right from the start.

00:49:49But there were abandoned mines nearby, where Saltpeter was extracted.

00:49:52And doctors think that the mother ingested these chemicals during pregnancy.

00:49:55And as usual, there were those who didn't believe it and started shouting about the conspiracy.

00:49:59They say Nolan was bribed.

00:50:00The whole team was forced to keep quiet.

00:50:02And he answered calmly.

00:50:04And in my opinion, brilliantly.

00:50:05The louder and more unbelievable the sensational claim, the more often it turns out to be nothing.

00:50:10And that's exactly why it has to be pushed aside.

00:50:13Because when you clear away all that trash, sometimes you find something underneath that truly turns science upside down.

00:50:20And do you know what that little Ada ended up doing?

00:50:22It proved that we still don't really know our own bodies.

00:50:25They found mutations in an ordinary human child that science didn't even know existed.

00:50:29It's not an alien.

00:50:31And yet, it's still an incredible discovery.

00:50:35Papyri about tomb robberies.

00:50:37At the end of the New Kingdom era, during the reign of Pharaoh Ramses IX, something unfolded in Thebes that

00:50:43can quite accurately be called a real criminal investigation, with written records, searches, interrogations, and a trial.

00:50:50A whole group of documents has come down to us, which are called papyri about tomb robberies.

00:50:56Among them are the Abbot Papyrus, the Amherst Papyrus, also known as the Leopold II Papyrus.

00:51:03And a few more scrolls, which are now kept in the British Museum and several other collections.

00:51:08They date back to around 1110 BC, and they tell how in Thebes royal tombs and temples were broken into

00:51:16and looted.

00:51:17Imagine a real criminal case that's over 3000 years old, with a list of the accused, testimonies, and records of

00:51:24interrogations.

00:51:25The beginning is like a detective story.

00:51:27Two high-ranking officials, responsible for different sides of the city, quarreled with each other and began publicly accusing one

00:51:34another.

00:51:34One claimed that the royal tombs on the West Bank had been looted.

00:51:37The others strongly denied it and said that everything was in place.

00:51:41To find out who was right, the authorities assembled a commission and conducted an actual inspection right at the royal

00:51:46cemetery.

00:51:47Abbot Papyrus describes this in detail.

00:51:49The inspectors inspected several royal tombs and the tombs of priestesses, and they carefully recorded the condition of each one.

00:51:55Some of the burials turned out to be intact.

00:51:57The seals at the entrances were untouched, but others had been broken into.

00:52:01And the traces of the crime were obvious.

00:52:03The thieves used torches to burn their way in, to make it easier to break the stone.

00:52:07They scooped gold and jewels out of the sarcophagus.

00:52:09And the disturbed bodies of the pharaohs themselves were thrown aside right there.

00:52:13Next come the interrogations.

00:52:14And this is the harshest part of the story, which should be told honestly.

00:52:18The Leopold II Papyrus preserved the confessions of eight people who broke into the tomb of Pharaoh Sebekamsaf, who ruled

00:52:25several centuries earlier.

00:52:26The robbers broke into the tombs of both the king himself and his wife, Queen Nobkava.

00:52:30They stripped the mummies of gold, amulets, and jewelry.

00:52:33Then they set fire to what was left.

00:52:35The document also describes in detail how the investigation itself was conducted.

00:52:40Testimonies were extracted through beatings.

00:52:42People were struck with sticks on their arms and legs.

00:52:44They were forced to reenact the crime at the scene.

00:52:46And the suspects were kept locked up at the temple.

00:52:49One of the robbers, a stone mason named Amenpanufer, openly described how he and his accomplices broke into tombs on

00:52:55the west bank of Thebes year after year and divided the loot among themselves.

00:52:59These documents reveal much more than just isolated thefts.

00:53:02Behind them lies an entire system of corruption.

00:53:04Most of the robbers turned out to be from the community of workers who themselves built these tombs from the

00:53:10famous village of Deir el-Medina and the surrounding villages.

00:53:13In other words, the tombs were broken into by those who knew better than anyone else in the world where

00:53:17the entrance was hidden, where the traps were, and where the most valuable items were kept.

00:53:21And behind them there was clearly cover-up from officials of the highest rank up to the city governor, those

00:53:27who were supposed to be protecting all of this.

00:53:30At the same time, the court, however it may look by today's standards, did not function as a simple act

00:53:35of reprisal.

00:53:36Not all of the accused were found guilty, and the punishments varied significantly in severity.

00:53:41The confessions, which we largely rely on, were extracted under torture.

00:53:45Therefore, we should treat them with caution.

00:53:47After all, under beatings, a person will say almost anything just to make them stop.

00:53:51Historians still dispute the exact date of the thefts and the full extent of the looting.

00:53:54After all, over time, thieves reached most of the royal tombs of thieves, and almost all of them have come

00:54:00down to us already empty.

00:54:02But the very fact is still astonishing.

00:54:04More than 3,000 years ago, there were already investigative commissions, crime scene visits, interrogation protocols, and courts for cases

00:54:11of tomb robbery.

00:54:12And records of all this have come down to us almost in their entirety.

00:54:16A seated burial and a children's necropolis.

00:54:19In the French city of Dijon, archaeologists have discovered a unique burial site of the Gauls, more than 2,000

00:54:26years old.

00:54:26The unusual thing about the find is that all the deceased are sitting facing west.

00:54:31This rare ritual is known from only a few sites in France and Switzerland.

00:54:34The excavations were carried out in the garden of an old monastery, where archaeologists came across 13 burials.

00:54:40The deceased are sitting with their hands on their thighs and their legs arranged asymmetrically.

00:54:45The burials are dated to the period between 450 and 425 BC.

00:54:49Researchers suggest that these graves may have contained priests, chiefs, or members of the same family.

00:54:55Next to these burials, a children's necropolis from the 1st century AD was found, where two people were buried.

00:55:01They were infants, many of whom did not live even a year.

00:55:05Some children were buried in wooden coffins, as evidenced by the nails that were found.

00:55:09Coins and ceramics were also discovered in the graves, probably as burial offerings.

00:55:13However, part of the cemetery was destroyed due to agricultural work.

00:55:17The reason for the seated burial remains a mystery.

00:55:20One theory is connected to a belief in the afterlife.

00:55:23Perhaps the deceased were supposed to enter the afterlife in a special posture.

00:55:27Other researchers believe that this is part of a spiritual practice.

00:55:31The posture could have symbolized meditation or eternal peace.

00:55:34This is supported by Celtic figurines found in different parts of Europe.

00:55:39The Burial of the Celestial Guest

00:55:42In 1901, an expedition of British archaeologists led by Lord Williams Campbell conducted excavations in one of the ancient tombs

00:55:51in the desert, near the Pyramid of Giza.

00:55:54When they opened the massive sarcophagus the researchers made a sensational discovery.

00:55:58Inside was a mummy that was significantly different from all known remains of ancient Egypt.

00:56:02The height of the being exceeded 2.5 meters, and its skull was unusually elongated and narrow, resembling the depictions

00:56:08of gods on the walls of Egyptian temples.

00:56:10The bones turned out to be significantly denser than those of humans, and their structure indicated increased strength, as if

00:56:17they were meant for life in different conditions.

00:56:19The strangest thing was that there were no traces of embalming or autopsy on the body, yet it was perfectly

00:56:24preserved as if it had been in stasis.

00:56:26On the sarcophagus archaeologists discovered engravings that mentioned a messenger from the stars who arrived during the time of the

00:56:32pharaohs.

00:56:32The hieroglyphs hinted at beings who descended from the sky, and taught the ancient Egyptians architecture and astronomy.

00:56:38Some of the symbols resembled star maps, and on the inner walls of the tomb, there were images of flying

00:56:44disc-shaped objects.

00:56:46This discovery gave rise to many theories, from alternative histories about Egypt's connection with extraterrestrial civilizations,

00:56:52to speculations about a loss suffered by the human race.

00:56:55However, shortly after the excavation, the artifact disappeared without a trace.

00:56:58It was sent to a private collection, and mentions of it were quickly erased from official reports.

00:57:04The remains of a human over one million years old.

00:57:08Archaeologists discovered unique remains of an ancient human in the Spanish cave of Sima del Elefante,

00:57:15who lived about 1,400,000 years ago.

00:57:18The discovered skull fragment is the oldest ever found in Western Europe,

00:57:22and represents a previously unknown human species to science.

00:57:26A part of the face, nicknamed Pink by scientists after the band Pink Floyd,

00:57:31preserved the left cheek and upper jaw with teeth.

00:57:34According to experts, this ancient human was very different from the later inhabitants of the region,

00:57:39known as Homo antecessor.

00:57:41For example, Pink had a flatter nose shape, more similar to Homo erectus,

00:57:46the first species that left Africa about 1,800,000 years ago.

00:57:51At that time, the climate of Europe was much milder,

00:57:53and the valleys in the Sima del Elefante area were covered with dense forests,

00:57:57and inhabited by hippos, bison, and deer.

00:58:01Vampires in Poland

00:58:02At an archaeological site in Poland,

00:58:05the remains of a 17th century child were found with a lock on the leg.

00:58:10Researchers believed that the locals were afraid that this child might come back to life as a vampire.

00:58:15In the Middle Ages in Europe, many people believed in vampires,

00:58:18and used various methods to keep the deceased in their graves.

00:58:22Recently, archaeologists, including Dariusz Polinski, from Nicolaus Copernicus University,

00:58:28discovered an unusual burial near Dombrova Czominska in Poland.

00:58:32It was a woman with a lock on her leg and a sickle around her neck.

00:58:35And now there's a new discovery, a vampire child.

00:58:38The child was only five or seven years old when they passed away.

00:58:41He was buried face down, as if people were afraid he might still be active even after death.

00:58:46In the Middle Ages, such burials were done so that the deceased would bite the ground and not pose a

00:58:50threat to people.

00:58:50They also found a cluster of skeletons of other children nearby and a fragment of a jawbone with a greenish

00:58:55tint.

00:58:56Most likely, a copper object was placed in the mouth of the deceased.

00:58:59That's where the color comes from.

00:59:02Remains of people with huge heads

00:59:04Scientists from the University of Honolulu and the Chinese Academy of Sciences made a unique discovery.

00:59:10By discovering the remains of a previously unknown species of ancient humans, Homo juliensis,

00:59:16this species is believed to have gone extinct about 200,000 years ago.

00:59:19At the Shuja Yao site, archaeologists found 16 skeleton stone tools and animal remains.

00:59:24A distinctive feature of the new species is their massive skulls,

00:59:28with a volume of 1,600 to 1,700 cubic centimeters, which is significantly larger,

00:59:33than that of Homo sapiens, which is about 1,300 cubic centimeters, or Neanderthals, which is about 1,400.

00:59:38However, scientists emphasize that a large skull does not always indicate higher intellectual abilities.

00:59:45Instead, it could have been an adaptation to the conditions of the Ice Age when the climate became cooler and

00:59:51harsher.

00:59:52Homo juliensis hunted wild horses, ate their meat, and used their hides to make clothing.

00:59:59They lived in small groups, which made them vulnerable to climate changes and other external threats.

01:00:05Interestingly, the dental structure of Homo juliensis is similar to that of the Denisovans,

01:00:10another hominid lineage that existed in the late Quaternary period, about 300,000 years ago.

01:00:16However, like many other ancient species, Homo juliensis likely disappeared due to the emergence of Homo sapiens,

01:00:22who genetically displaced the local populations in Europe and Asia.

01:00:35Scientists led by Dr. Johannes Haile Selassie have discovered a new species of human ancestor,

01:00:41dating back 3.3 to 3.5 million years.

01:00:44These are very ancient and unique discoveries.

01:00:48After studying the jaws found in the Afar region of Ethiopia,

01:00:51scientists named them Australopithecus diaramida.

01:00:54Interestingly, this ancestor lived at the same time as the well-known Lucy.

01:00:58Lucy's species, or Australopithecus afarensis, existed from 2.9 to 3.8 million years ago.

01:01:06Its lifespan overlapped with the new species.

01:01:09Australopithecus diaramida differs from Lucy's species in the shape and size of its teeth and jaws,

01:01:15which tells us that they ate different foods.

01:01:17Scientists have long debated whether only one species of human ancestor could have existed at a time between 3 and

01:01:234 million years ago,

01:01:25which then evolved into another new species.

01:01:27But this new discovery changes everything.

01:01:30This finding is important for our understanding of the ecology of early human ancestors.

01:01:36Now we have new questions about how different human ancestors living at the same time and in the same geographic

01:01:42area

01:01:42could have used the same territory and available resources.

01:01:47A 3,000 year old mummy.

01:01:50Amazing archaeological discovery was made right on a soccer field in Peru.

01:01:54And this is no joke.

01:01:56Imagine a stone tomb discovered on top of a hill near the training grounds of a soccer team in Lima,

01:02:02Peru.

01:02:03And inside it, a mummy that's 3,000 years old.

01:02:06And this is not just a random burial.

01:02:09Just think about it.

01:02:10These people who lived 3,000 years ago sacrificed one of their own right here in the temple.

01:02:16Specialists from the University of San Marcos and local researchers came across hair remains and a skull in a cotton

01:02:21bundle during the excavation.

01:02:23Miguel Aguilar, archaeologist and head of the Rimac Historical and Cultural Center,

01:02:28stated that the mummy belongs to a pre-Hispanic culture that flourished in the valleys of Lima between 1500 and

01:02:351000 BC.

01:02:36But it seems there is something even more astonishing.

01:02:39Coca-leaves and shells were found together with the mummy.

01:02:43And this indicates that all of this was part of a ritual sacrifice.

01:02:47Just think, this person was sacrificed during the construction of this temple.

01:02:52The fact is that in Peru, sacrifices have a long history,

01:02:55dating back even before the arrival of the Spanish in the 19th century.

01:02:59Many indigenous peoples, such as the Chavin, the Moche and the Inca,

01:03:03believed that offering humans, animals and objects as sacrifices helped them communicate with the gods.

01:03:08In conclusion, we can say that the mummy from Peru is a window into the past

01:03:13that helps us better understand the history and culture of our ancestors.

01:03:17And I assure you, we will return to this fascinating discovery in future videos.

01:03:22In the meantime, you can write in the comments about which famous archaeological find you would like to hear about

01:03:27in detail in the next video.

01:03:29Subscribe to the channel if you haven't done so already and I will continue.

01:03:34A cemetery for the poor!

01:03:36Have you ever heard about mysterious underground discoveries accidentally found by construction workers?

01:03:42So, right under the streets of the ancient city of Lubeck, known for its charitable traditions, a cemetery was discovered.

01:03:48And not just any cemetery. This city of the dead was used for more than 200 years.

01:03:53This cemetery belonged to a shelter that helped those in need.

01:03:55In the Middle Ages, during the times of knights and castles, the people of Lubeck took care of the poor,

01:04:02the sick and those left homeless.

01:04:04And although historians knew about the existence of this cemetery, its exact location remained a mystery until today.

01:04:10The researchers were shocked to learn how many people found their final resting place here.

01:04:14The remains of 200 people, including children, have already been unearthed.

01:04:18And this is just the beginning.

01:04:20Many of those buried here were not just ordinary townspeople.

01:04:23Among them were city officials, teachers and doctors.

01:04:26Some of them were even buried in expensive coffins.

01:04:29One of the most intriguing discoveries is the remains of a person with a bullet hole in the skull.

01:04:37Lindo Man. In August 1984. Workers extracting peat at Lindo Moss in Cheshire, England.

01:04:48Notice the human leg on the conveyor belt. This is how one of the most famous bog bodies in Europe

01:04:53was found.

01:04:54Who was named the Lindo Man.

01:04:57He was jokingly nicknamed Pete Marsh, which sounds like Pete Marsh in English.

01:05:03The salty, acidic, almost oxygen-free water preserved the body quite well.

01:05:08Down to the skin, the reddish stubble on his face and the contents of his stomach.

01:05:13This man lived about 2000 years ago in the Iron Age, although the exact date could not be determined.

01:05:19Different laboratories gave a range of several centuries.

01:05:21He was a young, strong man, about 25 years old, well-groomed, with trimmed nails, clearly not someone who toiled

01:05:29in the fields.

01:05:29And that alone already hints that he was not an ordinary person.

01:05:33When forensic experts examined the body, the method of murder turned out to be frighteningly complex.

01:05:40First, the person was struck hard on the head twice, with such force that a bone fragment went straight into

01:05:46the brain.

01:05:46Then a cord made of sinew was tightened around his neck, and from this strangulation, two of his cervical vertebrae

01:05:52broke, and to top it off, his throat was cut.

01:05:54Just imagine the cruelty with which they killed this poor man.

01:05:57After all, any one of these blows would have been enough to kill, but here they happened one after another.

01:06:02After all that, the body was lowered face down into the bog water.

01:06:05Archaeologists call this kind of excessive cruelty a triple death.

01:06:08And it's precisely around this that the main debate of the case has unfolded.

01:06:11The debate is no longer about who killed, but about why.

01:06:16One group of researchers, and this is a long-standing influential theory, sees this as a ritual sacrifice.

01:06:22The logic is this. An ordinary murder or execution usually involves just one way of killing a person.

01:06:28After all, both the executioner and the murderer only need to do their job once.

01:06:32But here, the victim was killed as if three times in a row.

01:06:34It's as if each blow was a separate necessary step of a ritual.

01:06:37The location itself also supports the ritual theory.

01:06:39After all, for the people of the Iron Age, the bog was the edge of the world between water and

01:06:44land.

01:06:45It was the boundary beyond which the realm of the gods began.

01:06:47The victim's last meal also speaks to this.

01:06:50A piece of burnt barley bread. And also mistletoe pollen found in the stomach.

01:06:53Mistletoe was a sacred plant for the Druids, the Celtic priests.

01:06:57And for some scholars, this is further evidence that we are not looking at an executed man, but someone who

01:07:01was sacrificed.

01:07:02But there is a completely different interpretation as well.

01:07:04And this view is held by quite serious experts.

01:07:07In their opinion, the triple death may not be a ritual at all, but simply a very brutal murder or

01:07:13an execution for a serious crime.

01:07:15Some scholars even doubt that all these wounds were inflicted intentionally, one after another.

01:07:20In their opinion, some of the injuries could have appeared later, under the weight of compressed peat over 2000 years.

01:07:26And some may have occurred in our own time, when the body was struck by a peat cutter during extraction.

01:07:31One of the curators of the Iron Age collection at the British Museum once noticed an interesting thing.

01:07:37Lindo was a remote deserted place, not suitable for a public ceremonial ritual or for a quiet ordinary murder.

01:07:43The Lindo man is now on display at the British Museum and much is known about him.

01:07:47Except for the most important thing.

01:07:48You can see how he was killed, in what order the blows were delivered and what was used to strangle

01:07:53him.

01:07:54The only thing that's unclear is why.

01:07:56Was it a sacrifice to the gods or an execution for a crime?

01:07:59Scientists are still debating this.

01:08:01And this question remains unanswered.

01:08:05The burial of a female shaman.

01:08:07On the banks of the Tigris River in Turkey, archaeologists discovered a 12,000-year-old burial that may belong

01:08:13to a female shaman.

01:08:15Her remains were found in the Neolithic settlement of Kemkahuyuk.

01:08:18Next to her were the skeletons of wild animals, partridge wings, marten paws, bones of goats or sheep, and an

01:08:25auroch skull.

01:08:25Researchers suggest that the woman may have been a mediator between the world of humans and spirits.

01:08:30Shamans played an important role in ancient societies, conducting rituals related to nature and supernatural forces.

01:08:37The burial was carefully sealed with a limestone slab, which may indicate a fear of the possible return of the

01:08:43deceased.

01:08:43There is a theory that she was considered special or even dangerous to society.

01:08:48Archaeologists will conduct DNA and isotope analysis of the bones to find out who she was, what she ate, and

01:08:54what role she played in her tribe.

01:08:57Mysterious work.

01:08:59This photo raises many questions and debates.

01:09:02It shows two mysterious figures, and some consider them proof of the existence of extraterrestrial beings.

01:09:07On the left, there is a tiny creature with thin limbs, a large head, and characteristic almond-shaped eyes.

01:09:14Its skin has a strange color, as if covered with a shimmering film.

01:09:18On the right, there is another figure preserved in a vessel with liquid, resembling exhibits that can be found in

01:09:24scientific laboratories or anatomy museums.

01:09:27Such findings are often associated with conspiracy theories about UFO crashes, secret laboratories and experiments.

01:09:33Some claim that this is evidence of extraterrestrial life, while skeptics consider them to be skillfully made dummies or anatomical

01:09:41models.

01:09:42Whether these are real artifacts or just skillful forgeries remains an open question.

01:09:47But one thing can be said for sure.

01:09:49Such images fuel interest in the mystery of extraterrestrial intelligence and make us wonder, what if we are not alone

01:09:55in the universe?

01:09:57A place of great magnitude.

01:09:59In the Tollens Valley, Germany, archaeologists discovered one of the oldest battlefields in Europe, which is about 3,250 years

01:10:09old.

01:10:10It all began in 1996 when researchers found the bones sticking out of the riverbank.

01:10:14This became the starting point for the discovery of a real burial ground for warriors.

01:10:18So far, more than 12,500 bones have been found, belonging to hundreds of people who fought, as well as

01:10:25about 300 bronze and stone artifacts.

01:10:28Among the finds are arrowheads, spears, swords, clubs and protective gear.

01:10:33The uniqueness of the discovery lies in the fact that weapons are often still embedded in the skeletons, confirming just

01:10:38how brutal the battle was.

01:10:40Many warriors died right in the water or on the shore, and their bodies remained untouched for centuries.

01:10:46This place reveals an unknown chapter of Bronze Age history.

01:10:49It is possible that a battle took place here between different tribes fighting for territory or resources.

01:10:54Tollens proves that wars were fought long before antiquity, and that ancient armies were more organized than previously thought.

01:11:04The man of metal, back in 1719, in the ordinary mining town of Falun in Sweden, everything was going as

01:11:10usual.

01:11:12Until the miners, starting their shift, stumbled upon a strange discovery.

01:11:16It was a human body. The young man looked as if he had just died moments ago.

01:11:21In general, corpses are a common part of life, and no one is surprised by them.

01:11:26But this corpse turned out to be made of both flesh and metal at the same time.

01:11:31As if every millimeter of his body had been treated with something and coated with the thinnest layer of metal.

01:11:36Not even a skilled craftsman could do something like that, since every single hair on his body was covered with

01:11:42metal.

01:11:43The mind management didn't know what to do with the unusual find.

01:11:46The corpse was put on display in the local museum where visitors saw the unusual exhibit as a miracle,

01:11:51believing that the man had been metallic even during his lifetime.

01:11:54Almost like the Tin Woodman, or a Terminator.

01:11:57One day some grandchildren brought an elderly lady to the museum.

01:11:59She stood in front of the exhibit for a while, clutched her chest, because she recognized her fiancé, Mats Israelsson,

01:12:06in the display.

01:12:07About 40 years had passed since their last meeting.

01:12:09The young man was hurrying to a date with his fiancé, but he never showed up.

01:12:13For a while, people searched for Mats. Gradually, his parents calmed down and accepted it.

01:12:18His friends forgot about him. The girl married someone else.

01:12:21Most likely, on the way he encountered criminals who killed him and threw his body into the mine.

01:12:27The proper thing would have been to bury the body, but the local authorities realized they could make money from

01:12:32this.

01:12:32There were huge number of people wanting to visit the museum, and tourists came from neighboring countries.

01:12:38As they say, money doesn't stink, but the exhibit started to...

01:12:40The metallic layer began to thin and evaporate under the influence of air, and the organic matter simply started to

01:12:47decompose.

01:12:48In 1749 the body was buried, but 10 years later it was dug up again and returned to its previous

01:12:54place.

01:12:55Only in the 1930s was he finally buried for good, leaving a wax copy in the museum.

01:13:00But it turns out that the victim of a random killing is not the only such case.

01:13:04There were other finds as well, representing a combination of organic material and metal.

01:13:09In science, this phenomenon is known as pseudomorphism.

01:13:12It's an effect where some minerals replace others while preserving their external shapes.

01:13:16It's problematic to reproduce this in a laboratory.

01:13:19It's too expensive, takes too long, and is pointless.

01:13:23The case with mats went down in history precisely because the process affected a human body,

01:13:28not the remains of a small animal, an insect, or a shell.

01:13:34Ocean Phantoma

01:13:35At the end of November 1896, two boys were riding their bicycles along the beach of Anastasia Island,

01:13:41and suddenly saw something in the sand that made them drop their bikes.

01:13:45On the shore lay a carcass, the size of a boat, shapeless, pale pink, as if it were made of

01:13:51rubber.

01:13:52No bones, no eyes, no head, just a huge dense mass of flesh that looked as if the ocean had

01:13:57washed up a creature from a nightmare.

01:13:59The local doctor, Dr. Webb, arrived at the scene the next morning, and immediately realized that it wasn't a whale.

01:14:05But what was it then?

01:14:06The carcass was elastic, heavy, and by his estimate weighed about 5 tons.

01:14:10He decided that they were looking at a gigantic octopus unknown to science.

01:14:13Later, the photographs were sent to the university, and Professor Verrill, the leading expert on cephalopods,

01:14:18at first confirmed the guess, and then went further, and named the creature a new species, Octopus Giganteus.

01:14:24The carcass was dragged away from the water with the help of six horses so that the waves wouldn't take

01:14:28it away.

01:14:29It became a local sensation, and people came to see the Florida monster,

01:14:32which seemed to have stepped right out of the pages of maritime legends.

01:14:36But decades later, when the preserved tissue samples were studied under an electron microscope, everything fell apart.

01:14:41There was no giant octopus. The tissue was made up of pure collagen.

01:14:46It was whale skin, decomposed to a state where both the shape and the bones had disappeared.

01:14:50Today, scientists call such finds globsters dense lumps of organic matter that the ocean washes ashore,

01:14:57turning an ordinary carcass into something resembling a mythical monster.

01:15:01The Taung Child

01:15:03This is the story of a little child from Taung, whose skull was found in 1924.

01:15:10It became one of the first ancient human fossils in Africa.

01:15:14The uniqueness of the Taung Child's skull lies in its structure.

01:15:17For the first time, scientists saw evidence of upright, bipedal walking in ancient humans.

01:15:24It's all about the hole, called the foramen magnum, through which the spinal cord connects to the brain.

01:15:30In this child, it is located at the front of the skull, which is typical for creatures that move on

01:15:35two legs,

01:15:36unlike apes, whose foramen magnum is positioned further back.

01:15:41We learned about the age of the Taung Child by studying its teeth.

01:15:44The first molars were just beginning to erupt, which indicates that the child was very young, a little over three

01:15:50years old.

01:15:52Scientists believe that the child was attacked and killed by an eagle.

01:15:56This conclusion is based on unique marks found at the bottom of the child's eye sockets.

01:16:00They are very similar to the marks left by an eagle's claws and beak when they attack monkeys.

01:16:06This hypothesis is also supported by the discovery of eggshells and an unusual collection of animal bones at the site,

01:16:12mostly from small animals that are often preyed upon by modern birds of prey.

01:16:17The mysterious grave, 157, during excavations in the eastern part of Croatia, in the settlement of Racesha,

01:16:25archaeologists discovered a mysterious medieval burial.

01:16:28It was named Grave 157.

01:16:31It attracted attention because of its unusual location and terrifying ritual features.

01:16:36The tomb was located under the floor of an ancient church along the southern wall

01:16:40and massive stones were placed on the remains of the deceased.

01:16:43According to researchers, these stones may have been placed there deliberately to prevent his possible resurrection.

01:16:50This fact, as well as the unusual position of the body,

01:16:53led to the assumption that the burial was connected to a belief in vampires.

01:16:57Anthropological analysis showed that the remains belonged to a man aged 40-50

01:17:01who had performed hard physical labor during his lifetime.

01:17:04However, the most mysterious thing is the deliberate damage to the skeleton.

01:17:09His torso was facing downward and his head was separated from his body.

01:17:12Such unusual burial practices have previously been found in Europe

01:17:16and are often associated with the fear of the dead who might come back to life.

01:17:21The historical context also adds special significance to the discovery.

01:17:25The settlement of Racesha existed from the 13th to the 16th century

01:17:29and initially belonged to the Templars, then to the order of Hospitallers,

01:17:32and later passed into the hands of the local nobility.

01:17:35Archaeologists have discovered 181 burials here over the past 15 years.

01:17:40In some graves, traces of unusual burial rituals were found,

01:17:44including decapitated bodies and dislocated bones,

01:17:47which indicate ancient superstitions and fears.

01:17:50Analysis of historical sources confirms that even after the adoption of Christianity in Slavic countries,

01:17:55belief in evil forces continued to persist.

01:17:59A goth cemetery with treasures

01:18:01In Poland, in a quiet corner of a nature park, archaeologists discovered a real historical treasure,

01:18:08a 2,000-year-old goth cemetery.

01:18:12It was there that the Goths were buried, key figures in the events that led to the fall of the

01:18:16vast Western Roman Empire

01:18:17and the beginning of a new era in medieval Europe.

01:18:20The first to come across this site was the archaeologist Olaf Papkevich,

01:18:24near the village of Sturea Arjeka.

01:18:27Immediately after that, scientists rushed to study an area of about 250 square meters

01:18:32and found as many as 50 burials.

01:18:34The Goths are ancient Germanic tribes who left a huge mark on the history of Europe.

01:18:38During the excavation, archaeologists discovered amazing items.

01:18:43A shiny silver necklace, jewelry with snake motifs and even an entire urn.

01:18:47Scientists are sure that this is just the tip of the iceberg.

01:18:52Thailand's oldest child

01:18:54In the Thamdin cave in Thailand, archaeologists made an incredible discovery.

01:18:59They found the remains of a child who lived about 29,000 years ago.

01:19:04This find became the oldest human burial in the country

01:19:07and opens up a completely new page in the history of ancient Thailand.

01:19:11Excavations in the cave began back in 2020,

01:19:14but only recently were they able to discover a fully preserved skeleton of a child buried in a special ritual

01:19:21pose.

01:19:22The arms and legs are tightly pressed to the body, which indicates the use of bandages or ropes.

01:19:26Traces of a fire were found around.

01:19:28Ancient people would light a fire during the burial ritual, probably believing in its purifying power.

01:19:33Interestingly, archaeologists found ancient rock paintings, animal bones and stone tools near the burial site.

01:19:40This suggests that the cave was an important place not only for burials,

01:19:44but also as a dwelling place for prehistoric people for thousands of years.

01:19:48It is possible that the first cultural traditions of the ancient inhabitants of Southeast Asia originated right here.

01:19:55Kabayan mummies?

01:19:56We usually associate mummification primarily with ancient Egypt, but this practice also existed in other cultures.

01:20:03One of the most unusual methods was used by the ancient Filipinos who mummified their dead with the help of

01:20:09smoke.

01:20:09Their method had nothing to do with bandages or the traditional embalming of the Egyptians, but it was no less

01:20:15effective.

01:20:16One of the largest burial sites of this type was discovered at the end of the 20th century in a

01:20:20cave in the province of Kabayan, which gave the name Fire Mummy.

01:20:23According to scientists' estimates, the age of the remains found is between 500 and 700 years.

01:20:29The mummification process began while the person was still alive.

01:20:32The dying person was given a very salty drink to dehydrate the body.

01:20:36After death, the body was placed in a sitting position and slowly smoked over a fire.

01:20:40This process could last several months, after which the mummy was placed in a pine coffin and left in a

01:20:45cave.

01:20:46This method allowed the bodies to be preserved in remarkably good condition even after centuries.

01:20:52It is believed that this practice had not only a ritual, but also a spiritual meaning.

01:20:56The souls of the deceased remained part of their people.

01:21:00The mystery of the mummified bishop revealed.

01:21:04Today we have an unusual story from the 17th century.

01:21:08A small mummified fetus was found between the legs of the distinguished bishop, Peter Winstrup.

01:21:14Bishop Winstrup was a prominent figure in the Lutheran Church.

01:21:18And after his death in 1679, he was buried in the crypt of the Lund Cathedral.

01:21:23For several years, scientists tried to figure out who this child was.

01:21:27And thanks to DNA analysis, they determined that he was most likely the bishop's grandson.

01:21:32The boy was not fully developed.

01:21:34And researchers suggest that his mother had a miscarriage in the sixth month of pregnancy.

01:21:39The bishop and the child share 25% of their genetic material, which indicates a second-degree relationship.

01:21:46After analyzing the baby's DNA and Winstrup's family tree, scientists concluded that the boy is the son of the bishop's

01:21:53son.

01:21:54The grandson was buried together with his grandfather.

01:21:58This case, once again, highlights how extraordinary and fascinating the study of the past can be through archaeology and genetics.

01:22:05Because this is exactly how we can reconstruct stories that have remained untold for centuries.

01:22:12Dog sacrifice.

01:22:15Archaeologists have found evidence of dog sacrifice near the Wulsong Palace,

01:22:19which was the royal residence of Silla in modern-day Gyeongju, South Korea.

01:22:24Silla was one of the three kingdoms of Korea, which existed from 57 BC to 935 AD.

01:22:30The city of Senor Abeol, now Gyeongju, was the capital where a crescent-shaped fortress palace complex was built.

01:22:37Previously, human and animal remains were found at the main entrance of the palace, likely used in rituals.

01:22:42A recent expedition discovered a circular structure on the outskirts of the ancient settlement to the southwest of the palace.

01:22:48Inside, archaeologists found the bones of two dogs placed symmetrically, as well as a knife, a wooden comb, shark teeth

01:22:55and a crystal necklace, all placed in a wooden box.

01:22:58Analysis of the artifacts showed that the find dates back to the 3rd century BC traces of fire around the

01:23:04site suggest that the place may have been burned after the ritual.

01:23:06At that time, the region was part of the Jinhan Confederacy, the predecessor of the Silla Kingdom.

01:23:12The case of the dismembered prince.

01:23:15The last case is the closest to us in time, and the richest in evidence.

01:23:20Because here, bones, DNA and old written chronicles all work together.

01:23:26In November 1272, in Hungary, the young prince Bela of Makso, a man about 25 years old, was killed.

01:23:33Royal blood flowed in his veins from both sides.

01:23:36On his mother's side, he was the grandson of the Hungarian king Bela IV from the Arpad dynasty.

01:23:41And on his father's side, he was descended from the Rurikids, the very dynasty that ruled Rus for many centuries.

01:23:47After the death of King Istvan Veth in the summer of that same year, the country plunged into turmoil.

01:23:53The very young Laszlo IV ascended the throne.

01:23:55And the noble families immediately began to fight for power under the young king.

01:24:00Bela was one of the few adult men of the royal house, and had a claim to the throne himself,

01:24:04which meant he was an obstacle to someone.

01:24:06According to 13th century chronicles, he was summoned to a council on an island that was then called Zaichi, and

01:24:11today is Margaret Island in the very center of Budapest.

01:24:14There, a trap awaited him.

01:24:15As soon as Bela arrived, he was attacked right in the monastery courtyard and killed on the spot.

01:24:21His body was mutilated so badly that it was almost impossible to identify him.

01:24:24According to legend, his remains were taken by his own sister, who was later canonized by the church as Margaret

01:24:31of Hungary along with her niece, and secretly buried him in the sacristy of the Dominican monastery in the women's

01:24:36convent on the same island.

01:24:37In 1915, during excavations of this monastery, archaeologists found three graves in the sacristy, and in one of them lay

01:24:45the dismembered skeleton of a young man covered in traces of blows.

01:24:48Even then, the scientists counted more than 20 cuts on the bones, and suggested that this was the missing prints

01:24:55himself.

01:24:56But later, the bones were lost to science for decades.

01:24:59During the war, they were considered irretrievably lost, and only in 2018 were they unexpectedly found in the museum and

01:25:06university collections of Budapest.

01:25:08A large international team immediately took up the case, and their findings were released only recently.

01:25:14In Jovember 2025, in the scientific journal, Forensic Science International Genetics.

01:25:20And here's what they managed to extract from these bones.

01:25:22Radiocarbon analysis pointed to the mid-13th century. The timing matches.

01:25:26Dental calculus, the hardened plaque on the teeth, revealed the diet of a wealthy person.

01:25:30A lot of meat, bread, porridge. Ordinary people couldn't afford such things.

01:25:36Isotopes, that is, chemical markers from food and water that accumulate in bones and teeth, even revealed the geography of

01:25:43his life.

01:25:43He spent his childhood in the south, in the lands that are now Serbia and Croatia, in the very region

01:25:48of Macio.

01:25:48Later, he moved closer to the center of Hungary, just as it should have been for the real Bela.

01:25:52But the final word came from the DNA.

01:25:55Geneticists proved that this man is a directed descendant of King Bela III, through the Arpad line.

01:26:00And at the same time, he carries the male line of the Rurikids.

01:26:03So the nameless mutilated skeleton got the name again.

01:26:06They also reconstructed the murder itself.

01:26:08They counted 26 fatal wounds on the bones, inflicted at the moment of death.

01:26:12Just so you understand, two or three would have been enough to kill a person.

01:26:15By the nature of the cuts, it's clear that at least three people attacked, and they struck with different swords

01:26:20at the same time.

01:26:21Bela tried to defend himself.

01:26:23But when he fell to the ground, the attackers didn't stop and kept hacking at him.

01:26:27They finished him off with blows to the head and face.

01:26:29You don't need that many wounds just to take a person's life.

01:26:32Researchers say that this was driven by rage and personal hatred.

01:26:36The authors even made the title of their work a question.

01:26:38Was this a cold-blooded calculation?

01:26:40And they themselves answered that it was not.

01:26:42The attack was indeed planned in advance.

01:26:44But Bela was not hacked to death in cold blood, it was done in a real frenzy.

01:26:48There are also things that couldn't be proven.

01:26:50No witnesses to the massacre survived.

01:26:51And the order of the blows was reconstructed by scientists only from the bones.

01:26:56The name of the main instigator is known from a famous medieval chronicle.

01:26:59It was the influential nobleman Henrik Kössigy with his men who supported the young king.

01:27:03But that's the word of the chronicles, not evidence from the ground.

01:27:07And yet something almost impossible happened.

01:27:09After 750 years a pile of nameless hacked bones became a person again.

01:27:14He has a name again.

01:27:15A lineage tracing back to the very kings.

01:27:17We know where he grew up and what he ate.

01:27:19Even his last day has been reconstructed up to the moment he fell and was finished off on the ground.

01:27:24Bela was once hacked to pieces to be removed forever and forgotten.

01:27:28But archaeology and science brought him back and found out almost everything about him.

01:27:33Only the killers who surrounded the prince that day in the monastery courtyard remain unknown.

01:27:37The eight killers were counting on the same thing.

01:27:40That with the body the crime itself would disappear.

01:27:44That a hundred years a thousand would pass and there would be no one left to ask or to answer.

01:27:51They were wrong in all eight cases.

01:27:52The bone recorded the trace of the blow.

01:27:54The eyes preserved the lodged arrow.

01:27:56The clay remembered the names of the killers.

01:27:59And DNA after 700 years returned both the face and the lineage to the murdered person.

01:28:04Archeology really can't put anyone in jail.

01:28:07All these killers are long beyond anyone's reach.

01:28:10But it does something else.

01:28:13It doesn't let the crime be buried along with those who committed it.

01:28:16And it makes the victim speak even after thousands of years of silence.

01:28:21Subscribe to the channel and turn on notifications because a new video is coming soon.

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