Ancient Aliens: The Vittala Temple's Puzzling Pillars (Season 12, Episode 8) | History

NARRATOR: Hampi, India. Here lie the ancient ruins of Vijayanagara believed to have been constructed between the 14th and 16th centuries AD. At its center stands the Vittala temple complex, a masterpiece of Indian architecture and the largest and most revered temple in the city. DEEPAK SHIMKHADA: Vittala temple was built with the mind of creating a celestial palace here on earth. With that in mind, the king assembled the great architects, and great engineers, and then great craftsmen to create this wonderful building that can also have a wonderful sound that will please God. LAYNE LITTLE: Attached directly to the temple is what is called the Ranga Mantapa, or the stage pavilion. Here there are many pillars, some reaching to a height of nearly 12 feet. There's a series of what are called compound pillars, where you have a central pillar surrounded on all sides with smaller colonnettes. These colonettes are famous because when they're struck they emit beautiful and haunting sounds. [music playing] NARRATOR: According to the local guides at the temple, the 56 pillars are individually tuned to one of the seven notes of the Sarigama, an ancient Sanskrit musical scale dating back thousands of years that is still predominant in Hindi music today. LAYNE LITTLE: Certain groups of these pillars have been crafted to represent the tonal vibrations of the scale for different instruments. [music playing] Some being crafted to represent Woodwinds, some being crafted to represent percussion instruments, et cetera. JONATHAN YOUNG: The British, when they were in charge of India, were mystified by this amazing quality, and actually cut one of the pillars to see how it was done. But it was just granite and it was just very careful workmanship. NARRATOR: While the stone pillars themselves seem like simple technology, recent analyzes have revealed they may be comprised of an advanced geopolymer blend of granite with silicate particles and metallic alloys. But what continues to puzzle scientists is that the first basic geopolymers were invented in the Soviet Union during the 1950s, hundreds of years after these pillars were crafted. ROBERT SCHOCH: As a geologist, how this was done is really baffling and amazing. I've heard reports of people trying to mimic it in modern times to try to just do a little section of it, even one pillar. [music playing] And people just haven't been successful. So what were they doing back then? We just don't know. According to Hindu priests, each of these pillars was specifically tuned harmonically in order to communicate with the gods. [music playing] So you have to wonder, did extraterrestrial beings come down and give instructions on creating these specific frequencies?

Channel: HISTORY

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Keywords: history, history channel, history shows, history channel shows, full episodes, episodes, clips, original series, sneak peeks, ancient aliens, ancient aliens full episodes, ancient aliens clips, aliens, aliens video, extra terrestrials, extraterrestrials, ufo, ufo video, ufo videos, ufo video clips, ancient ufos, ancient ufo video, Ancient Aliens Season 12 Episode 8, Ancient Aliens S12 E8, Ancient Aliens 12x8, Ancient Aliens S12 E08, Ancient Aliens Season 12, The Alien Frequency

Id: GYHu0ivfR_o

Length: 3min 53sec (233 seconds)

Published: Thu Sep 13 2018