12 Most Mysterious Ancient Artifacts Finds

scientists and archaeologists sometimes have a tendency to dismiss things they don't understand as hoaxes or frauds we understand why they do that but not everything they don't understand is a hoax there are plenty of ancient artifacts out there that are every bit as mysterious as they are real and we're going to take a look at a few of them now [Music] by the time the spanish conquistadors and other europeans had finished conquering the americas there wasn't much left in terms of original authentic manuscripts or documentation only 20 indigenous manuscripts are known to have survived the assault five of which are mixed tech codices the best known of them codex selden was made somewhere around the year 1560 and was thought to have been studied and understood to its fullest extent until 2016. that's when a new study revealed a hidden set of pages hidden under chalk and plaster at the back of the manuscript that's an amazing discovery but sadly we don't yet know what it means the scenes shown on the pages are confusing even to people who've spent their whole professional lives studying documents like these seeming to show women sitting in the king's council and a repeated glyph of a twisted cord accompanied by a flint knife the symbol doesn't appear anywhere else on any known mix tech manuscript bearing in mind the fact that the pages were concealed deliberately this might be top secret information unfortunately that means we might not ever be able to understand it our next discovery is a far more recent one and happened in tenocity mexico in august 2022 there archaeologists have found a set of massive olmec monuments including a pair of carved limestone reliefs the reliefs depict olmec rulers in a ritual contortionist pose which is said to have reduced oxygen levels in the brain and thereby induced a trance-like state the olmec believed this to be a divine process such depictions are extremely rare discoveries so archaeologists in the country are excited each of the reliefs is large around five feet in diameter and also depict large faces wearing diadems and mirrors with olmec crosses in their center it's very hard to say how old these ancient works of art are but this part of tenocike close to the usa masinta river was an important olmec population center during the olmec formative period of around 2 900 years ago experts in ancient south american art say that the style of the reliefs may have been influenced by the early maya but that's a controversial claim for which there isn't yet enough evidence to support it the mayans eventually became dominant in this part of the country around 2500 years ago our next discoveries aren't technically artifacts in the true sense of the word because they weren't shaped by human hands but we're including them anyway because they're ancient and fascinating it's been more than 13 years since glass beads started showing up inside clam shells in sarasota county florida usa and scientists have been trying to work out where this phenomenon came from ever since the latest theory is that the beads are actually micro tectites and are byproducts of meteorite impacts that happened more than two million years ago if the theory is correct it would be the first time that fragments of celestial bodies have been found inside clam shells it's hard to see how the beads could have been formed any other way they're the products of an impact so enormous that the meteorite vaporizes when it hits the ground as does the rock and soil that it strikes the melting debris flies through the air and gains an aerodynamic shape as it does so before cooling down and raining back to the surface 83 beads have been found in the area thus far mostly at the site of an old quarry there's no other evidence of a meteorite strike in the area but identifying such a thing after 2 million years is no easy task [Music] in ancient times kings and leaders liked to record their achievements in stone so that future generations would be aware of their greatness that's what the stone prism of sr hadden is it's a permanent written record of the restoration of babylon as performed under the guidance of king esserhaden who sat on the throne almost two thousand seven hundred years ago in some ways it was probably intended as an apology esserhaden's sinashareb was the person responsible for the destruction of babylon in the first place the cuneiform inscriptions that cover the stone would have been considered archaic even for the time they were written which was presumably a stylistic choice made by sr hadn't to convey wisdom and authority what's odd about it aside from the choice of lettering is the fact that the stone it's made from doesn't occur naturally in mesopotamia experts believe it's black basalt although they can't be sure just as interesting is the fact that it doesn't appear to be finished why would the king go to the trouble of restoring babylon and then leave this monument incomplete it's a mystery lost to time the larabanga mystic stone is one of the strangest mysteries in ghana legend has it that if someone tries to move the stone it returns to its original position of its own accord the stone can be found appropriately enough in the small community town of larabanga while ghana was subject to british rule in the 1950s the country's british authorities decided to build a road straight through the town the stone stood in the path of the road so they moved it the next morning local folklore says it had moved back the contractors moved it again but the same thing happened after the stone seemingly returned to its original perch by magic for the third time the brits decided to leave it alone and change the direction of the road official records from the time don't say anything about the stone's stubborn refusal to move but we do know for certain that the path of the road was suddenly altered to make a route that appears to be far less convenient perhaps there's something to this strange old tale after all nobody knows how long the stone has been there but it's mentioned in the records of indiura jakpa leader of the gonjas in the 17th century it was already ancient by then the orkney islands off the north coast of scotland have been inhabited for thousands of years there's some evidence that humans may have settled there before they arrived on the uk mainland in december 2019 archaeologists working through a dig site ahead of the planned construction of an electrical substation in finnstown orkney found nine extremely rare carved stones that may have been buried there for four thousand years the carvings on the stones are more than decorative experts think they might have been used to tie off mooring ropes that would have helped to secure the roof to a building that once stood here the artifacts have been artificially shaped to give them the appearance of having a head neck and shoulders in the middle of the stones were the remains of an ancient hearth and in the earth were some small stone boxes that looked a little like coffins but didn't contain any human remains archaeologists are also interested in some trenches close to the place where the stones were discovered as the trenches were full of long marks cut into the clay subsoil it's likely that the marks were made by ards a type of ancient plow which would confirm that farming took place on orkney in prehistoric times the lamashtu plaque has a somewhat troubling alternative name it's also known as the hell plaque that name rather implies that it was made for nefarious purposes but that isn't the case instead it's actually said to possess supernatural healing powers around 2800 years ago plaques like this were supposed to protect and heal the sick during bouts of illness it would be hung above someone's bed and territories across the assyrian empire the example we see in these images is made of bronze and is one of the best preserved plaques of its kind the name lamashtu comes from the demon it said to protect people from not the deity represented on it lamash ii preyed upon the sick according to the myths and legends of the assyrians and could only be driven out by way of special prayers in christian terms you'd probably describe the process as an exorcism in some cases including this one a representation of lamashtu's husband was added to the plaque in the hope that it would appeal to the demon's better nature who knew demons even had one much of what we know about the gods rituals beliefs and culture of the ancient south american tribes is down to the discovery of the codex borgia this is arguably the most important pictorial manuscript ever to be found on the continent but it isn't on display inside a museum instead it's held in the archives of the vatican in italy the manuscript is pre-columbian dating to the 16th century and takes its name from stefano borgia who is an italian cardinal of the 18th century the cardinal didn't discover the codex though he merely owned it before it was acquired by the vatican library following the cardinals death in 1804 rather than being a single cohesive document the codex borgia is a collection of manuscripts covering topics like divination rituals iconography and even calendars it's one of the very few codices that weren't deliberately destroyed by the barbaric spanish invaders during their 16th century conquest the authorship of the manuscripts is unknown it may have been created by the talks of caltech people but it could just have easily been produced by the mixtec or the chololteca sadly we'll probably never know why did the vikings seem to make such an easy job of conquering other european countries and races were they really that good on the battlefield or did they just have the best swords it might have been a bit of both but their swords helped they were of such outstanding quality that they effectively became the world's first branded product you knew you were buying a genuine ulf bear sword 1000 years ago because the maker's name was stamped on the blade historians believe that olf baird's swords were the first in the world to be made by casting with melted iron and carbon poured into a mold and left to cool thus doing away with the impurities that often weakened the ancient swords of other races this method of sword manufacture wasn't mastered by any other european race for 200 years after the vikings came up with it in the 11th century which begs the question of where they got the idea from some experts suggest they acquired the secret from a small asian tribe after conquering them but there's no direct proof of any such event perhaps they came up with it themselves and we should admire the vikings for their brains as much as they're brawn it's likely that we'll never know all there is to know about the great pyramid of giza and the structures that stand around it especially when new mysteries come to light all the time in 2018 24 solid as one granite boxes were found inside a series of hillside caves just south of the pyramid each one weighing more than 100 tons there's something a little foreboding about the casket-shaped boxes perhaps it's the fact that they're a morbid shade of black or maybe it's the fact that we have no idea how the ancient egyptians could have created such geometrically precise shapes symmetrically perfect to a degree of a small number of microns the hieroglyphs on their sides offer no clues as to their purpose and may even have been added years after the boxes were created as an early form of graffiti the site is now known as the sarapium of saqqara and is thought to date back approximately 3 300 years to the time of ramses ii the boxes are so well made that they're still airtight even after all these years but it's thought that they might contain the mummified remains of apis bulls which were worshipped by ancient egyptians as earth-bound representations of the depictions of the female form are among the oldest and most repeated forms of art known to humankind humans have been attempting to replicate female beauty with paint clay and stone for almost as long as they've been able to manipulate tools and these sculptures from a mine in france illustrate that point perfectly the statues are known as the venus figurines and over 15 of them have been found so far the most recent of them came to light in november 2014 and is believed to have been carved around 23 000 years ago during the paleolithic era as you can see from these images the statues focus only on the female torso there are no heads or faces and in some cases there are no limbs either that's led some experts to classify them as fertility totems but there may be another explanation the women of the time wouldn't have had access to mirrors and so wouldn't have known what their own faces looked like it's possible that these statues crude as they might be are early examples of self-portraits made from limestone [Music] archaeologists are used to finding animal-shaped pots and vases inside ancient chinese tombs but this swan-shaped pot came with a riddle that experts are yet to get to the bottom of the previously undisturbed pot contains a 2 000 year old liquid and we currently have no idea what the fluid is the discovery arrived almost by accident it came when construction workers in san mateo in the hennan province came across a previously unknown grave and called in the experts to take a closer look along with the swan pot they also found a bronze helmet an iron sword and a jade ceremonial sword so this was likely the final resting place of a soldier or warrior the pot though is somewhat incongruous with the rest of the discoveries it's the only bronze pot ever found in this part of china and so that coupled with the fact that it contains an unidentifiable liquid has got archaeologists very excited the fluid of which there was around three thousand milliliters has been described as yellowish brown and containing impurities it could be anything from ancient wine to the fabled and long sought-after chinese elixir of life subscribe to the channel and turn on notifications and you will be the first to know when a new video comes out thank you for watching and see you soon

Channel: Amazing Stock

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Keywords: 12 Most Mysterious Ancient Artifacts Finds, mysterious finds, mystery, artifacts finds, mysterious artifacts, archaeological finds, archaeological mystery, 12 most, top 12, most amazing

Id: elnTVHK6Hac

Length: 16min 4sec (964 seconds)

Published: Tue Sep 13 2022