Archaeological discoveries never cease to shock us. Sometimes the finds are so fantastic that they cause many years of controversy among scientists and acquire an ambiguous assessment.
1. Rosetta stone
The Rosetta Stone is a stone slab. It is usually taller in size than wider. In ancient Egypt, slabs were popular as ritual signs for the deceased.
2. The Dead Sea Scrolls
For several years, historians have believed in the existence of biblical and non-biblical documents concerning the ancient Jewish sect of the Essenes. Concrete evidence emerged in the 1950s. The manuscripts are written in Hebrew, Greek and Aramaic.
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3. Pompeii
The fury of Mount Vesuvius buried the ancient Roman city of Pompeii in 79 AD. e. The volcanic eruption was so powerful that over time, memories of the city were erased from public consciousness, like the city itself.
4. Altamira cave
Altamira was discovered by amateur archaeologist Marcelino Sans de Sautuola. Genuine Paleolithic art was born in the cave.
5. Tutankhamun's tomb
"Gold … Everywhere the glitter of gold … I was amazed and numb with amazement" - these are the words of Howard Carter, the man who discovered the tomb of Pharaoh Tutankhamun.
6. Goddess of motherhood
One of the oldest man-made human figurines depicts an obese woman with full saggy breasts. The figurine symbolizes fertility, pregnancy and the roundness of the female figure. The statue is approximately 26,000 years old.
7. City of Knossos
The Bronze Age archaeological site at Knossos was an important moment in the restoration of Greek civilization almost 3,500-4,000 years ago. The city built around the city of Crete reflects references to ancient Roman texts and coins.
8. Antikythera Mechanism
When this mechanism was discovered among common shipwrecks off the coast of Greece in 1901, it did not seem important. However, today he is considered the father of modern computing devices.
9. Stone of Pilate
Pilate's stone is perhaps the first reliable evidence of a biblical reference to Pontius Pilate. Discovered in the region of Caesarea (Judea), the stone was allegedly used as a material for a staircase built in the 4th century. n. e.
10. Olduvai Gorge
Oldyulvai Gorge may be one of the oldest known human creations. It was inhabited by primitive people millions of years ago and contains tools and hunting items.
11. Hagar-Kim
While the oldest of the Egyptian pyramids dates from around 2670 BC. e., the megalithic temples of Hagar-Kim (Malta) anticipate it by almost 600-1000 years.
12. Terracotta army in Xi'an
The funeral army of Qin Shi Huang, China's first emperor, includes a massive collection of terracotta statues. It was created in tribute to one of the most influential historical figures.
13. Tomb of Philip II of Macedon
In 1977, an expert on Greek archeology, Manolis Andronix, announced the discovery of the burial place of the Macedonian kings in Vergina (Northern Greece). Later, in 1990, tombs were also found. One of the burials belongs to Philip II, the father of Alexander the Great.
14. Staffordshire treasure
In July 2009, a collection of gold, silver and metal objects from the collection of the Anglo-Saxon era of the 7th-8th centuries was found in the village of Hammerwich in Lichfield (Staffordshire, UK).
15. Baghdad batteries
The found jars of the Parthian era during the Sassanid period (1st-3rd centuries AD) have a cylindrical iron shell with a copper peak enclosed inside. Electrochemical vapor in the cans generated voltage potential.
16. Roman dodecahedrons
The Roman dodecahedron is a small hollow object with twelve flat pentagonal faces, each containing a circular hole of different diameters. The object dates from the 2nd and 3rd centuries. n. e. Its purpose is still unclear.
17. Ancient antibiotics
Early signs of tetracycline use are found in bones excavated in Nubia, Sudan. The tetracycline-producing yeast may have been an ingredient in ancient Nubian alcoholic beverages.
18. Stone spears
Sharp spearheads are found in South Africa. They have been made for almost 200,000 years. This forced the history of human hunting to be attributed to an earlier period.
19. Ancient chemical warfare
In 1933, Robert du Mesnil du Buisson uncovered a startling archaeological fact. The excavation contained the remains of 19 Roman soldiers and several Persian soldiers. The Persians set a trap for the hordes of the Romans - the enemy was met with sulfur vapor.
20. Spheres of Dickis
The perfectly round spheres in Costa Rica were carved out of stone. They date back to 600-1000. n. e. Banana plantation workers discovered the bizarre figures in the 1930s.
21. Miracles of Sanxingdui
Sanxingdui (China) contains artifacts from the Bronze Age (c. 2800-800 BC). The finds are recognized as one of the most important due to their enormous size and long period of existence.
22. Rapa Nui
Better known as Easter Island, it is located thousands of kilometers from the Chilean coast in the South Pacific. However, the most incomprehensible thing is not how people found it and mastered it, but the fact that the inhabitants erected huge stone heads around the island.
23. Piri Reis Map
Dating from the early 1500s, this map shows the coastlines of South America, Europe and Africa with astonishing accuracy. Apparently, it was created by the general and cartographer Piri Reis from fragments of dozens of other maps.
24. Nazca Lines in Peru
Although the Nazca Lines have been the subject of archaeological research for hundreds of years, they are almost impossible to see unless you are directly above them. Geoglyphs in the desert remain a mystery to this day and represent the Inca city of Machu Picchu in Peru.
25. Mount Owen Moa
In 1986, a New Zealand expedition stumbled upon a huge claw at Owen Moa Cave. During excavations and inspection, it was established that the find belongs to a large prehistoric bird.
26. Voynich manuscript
This mysterious manuscript dates back to the beginning. XV century Italy. Despite the fact that most of the pages are filled with herbal recipes, none of the plants match the known species, and the language remains illegible.
27. Gobekli Tepe
The ancient settlement was discovered in 1994. It was built about 9000 years ago. The building appeared thousands of years earlier than the Egyptian pyramids.
28. Sacsayhuaman
The walled complex, located near Cuzco, Peru, is part of what used to be the capital of the Inca empire. The stone slabs adhere to each other so tightly that even a hair cannot slip between them.
29. Headless Vikings of Dorset
The digging of the railway by Dorset workers led to the discovery of a small contingent of Viking warriors buried in the ground. They were all beheaded. The work was done filigree, and from the front, not from the back.
30. Tomb of Sunken Skulls
During excavations of a dry lake in Motal, Swedish archaeologists came across several skulls. As if nothing surprising, but one of them was stuffed inside with parts of other skulls. Whatever happened 8000 years ago, the picture looked terrible.
31. Marcahuasi
Marcahuasi is a plateau in the Andes, located east of Lima (Peru). In 1952, Daniel Ruzo made a remarkable discovery in the area. He found hundreds of stone figures similar to human faces and animals. Many argue that they were formed by natural erosion.
32. Boat of Galilee
The Galilee boat is an ancient fishing vessel from the 1st century BC. n. e. (the time of Jesus Christ), discovered in 1986 on the northwestern coast of the Sea of Galilee in Israel. The remains of the ship were found by amateur archaeologists brothers Moshe and Yuval Lufan.
33. Andrewsarhus
In the summer of 1923, archaeologist Roy Chapman Andrews began his third Asian expedition to the Gobi Desert in Mongolia. One of his team members discovered a huge skull of an unidentified mammal. The creature's lower jaw has not been found. The animal was named Andrewsarhus.
34. The victim of Teotihuacan
Although it has been known for many years that the Aztecs made numerous shocking sacrifices, in 2004 a terrible discovery was made outside of modern Mexico City. The numerous decapitated and mutilated bodies of humans and animals have shed light on how terrible the rituals were.
35. Venetian Vampire
Although the surest method used to kill a vampire today is a stake stuck in the heart, hundreds of years ago this was not considered sufficient. An ancient alternative is a brick through the mouth. The skull was discovered by archaeologists near Venice in a mass grave.
36. Shipwreck at Uluburun
The shipwreck at Uluburun is a tragic event of the late Bronze Age dating back to the 14th century BC. The sunken ship was discovered in the southwest of Turkey. It transported the cargo of nine cultures of the world.