The underwater “Stonehenge” off the shores of the Mediterranean Sea is rewriting the history of mankind again
Welcome to the iCover Blog Pages . Our publication today will be a small digression now in the updated history of mankind. Hidden behind the veil of millennia, it sometimes presents the scientific community with surprises that make it fundamentally revise the seemingly unshakable scientific concepts. It was this surprise that the discovery of Italian oceanographers and marine geologists, made in August this year off the coast of Sicily, was. On the results of further research conducted on the basis of the facts and curious conclusions of the leading experts on the planet ...
Conducting scientific research in August 2015, the coastal part of the Mediterranean basin, at a distance of 60 km south of the island of Sicily, researchers discovered a gigantic structure related to civilization, whose age, according to preliminary estimates, amounted to 10,000 years. It is noteworthy that the existence of this civilization, as DailyMail notes , was not suspected in the scientific world until the discovery. Geological and geophysical studies conducted since the time of discovery have now made it possible to accurately confirm the initial assumptions of scientists: the historical chronology will again have to be rewritten again.
“Archaeologists quite rightly assumed that the Mediterranean coast is the cradle of civilization,” says Emmanuel Lodolo, professor at the National Institute of Oceanography and Experimental Geophysics (Trieste).
- At the same time, despite large-scale theoretical and practical studies, it was not possible to find traces of the most ancient civilizations. And why? Yes, because 12-15 thousand years ago, the coastline was not at all in the place where it is located now. Therefore, the search for ancient civilizations should not be carried out on the coast, but at the bottom of the sea - summarizes Lodolo.
As Professor Emmanuel Lodolo and Zvi Ben-Avraam from Tel Aviv University noted in the journal of archaeological science: “... Found at a depth of 40 meters, we can safely consider man-made, since natural tectonic processes that could lead to the formation of such a formation on this bottom section not possible. ”
The find confirmed the hypothesis of researchers who proceeded from a simple and obvious premise: 20 thousand years ago, the sea level was 120-130 meters lower than today. Thawing of giant ice massifs, 3-4 km thick, hid under water the territory that previously occupied up to 40% of the mainland of present-day Europe. Many “shelf” seas did not exist at that time - the Baltic Sea was a gigantic lake, and a trip from Eurasia to Alaska could be made along the Bering Isthmus even without “soaking your feet”. The waves of the Mediterranean Sea in those distant times rolled on the coastline, which was located tens of kilometers from the present. And the width of the strait between Tunisia and Sicily was 50 km - 110 km less than today.
In the period under consideration, it was a shallow site with many coastal islands. And in all likelihood, it was there that the path connecting Europe and Africa passed, says Lodolo. - In this regard, we decided to explore the seabed in this place with a sonar, which ultimately led to the discovery in the area of Pantelleria Vecchia Bank of an amazing find - a broken column in twelve meters high. She lay on the seabed at a depth of 40 meters, which made it possible to conduct detailed surveys using divers and a small underwater vehicle.
Studies have led scientists to conclude that they have the oldest port facilities built 6500 years before the known Stonehenge by representatives of civilization, about which science had not known anything up to this point.
Column weight - 15 tons. Length - 12 meters. As a comparison, the stones used in the construction of Stonehenge weigh 25 tons at a height of 4.1 meters. The average weight of the stone blocks of the Cheops pyramid is 2.5 tons.
Three holes of artificial origin are clearly visible on the surface of the column, one of which, with a diameter of 60 cm, is through and located on top (see. Fig.).
The other two holes are drilled from the sides of the monolith and have a diameter of about 50 cm. The
age of the column, according to further results Research - over 10,000 years.
A likely destination is a port lighthouse.
In the course of research, a place was discovered from where a giant pillar was cut off. It turned out to be an underwater ridge located 300 meters south of the find. The remains of the pier defending the ancient harbor were discovered, representing an even ridge of half-meter stones. Estimated age of the mall is 9800 years.
As it is not sad to admit to the apologists of traditional historical concepts, the found stone column once again completely destroys the idea of the image of our distant ancestors, as some hunter-gatherers possessing extremely primitive technological thinking. - says Professor Lodolo. Imagine, the construction of such structures was possible 11 thousand years ago, when, according to our existing ideas, there was even no ceramics, there was no cattle breeding and agriculture, not to mention metal tools. The found column, however, was cut down in solid rock, delivered and installed in a new place.
Most likely, a society that could afford the construction of structures of this magnitude to equip port facilities was prosperous. - the scientist considers. The idyll ended at the turn of 9200 BC. e. with the onset of the melting of glacial masses and a rise in the level of coastal waters that flooded the island by 40 meters.
It is expected that the conclusions drawn on the basis of the results of studies conducted by Italian experts from the time of the August discovery will make a splash in the scientific archaeological environment, since they will allow “delaying” the alleged beginning of the technological revolution on the time scale for several millennia.
The layout of port facilities. The monolith is located in the upper right corner between the numbers 8A and 2A. The harbor pier consists of two embankments and is designated as INNER RIDGE and OUTER RIDGE .
The island before and after flooding
Having studied the monolith and the site of the ancient quarry where it was cut, scientists came to an unambiguous conclusion: its creation, movement and installation are impossible without the use of complex technological operations.
"The opening of an underwater site in the Sicilian Canal can significantly expand our knowledge of early civilizations in the Mediterranean basin, and fundamentally change our views on the technological level of development reached by the Mesolithic inhabitants," said Herald Sun. The nearby islands of Malta are the cradle of the mysterious megalithic temples, created presumably 5600 years ago. And the oldest structure is the stone complex of Gebekli Tepe in southeastern Turkey. The data from radiocarbon analysis suggest that manually-processed stone structures, including 200 pillars weighing up to 20 tons, are about 11,600 years old.
The oldest temple complex in the world - Hebekli Tepe Temple
There is a lot of evidence for the version of scientists about the technological capabilities of people of the past. To their number, for example, it is quite possible to attribute the later ancient Roman cup - the Lycurgus Cup dating from the 4th century AD. er, demonstrating an amazing optical effect: when viewed from the front, the bowl has a jade hue, when turning it slowly changes its color to blood red.
Another brilliant example is the Uunartok Disk, an ancient Viking compass whose accuracy is almost as good as that of a needle magnetic compass, allowing you to navigate in the open sea even in cloudy weather and after sunset. The Scandinavian sagas mention the mysterious sun stones. A group of scientists came to the conclusion that we were talking about calcite crystals. The position of the sun was determined by the orientation of the light waves.
Calcite is a birefringent crystal: passing through it, the light flux is divided in two. The brightness of two outgoing rays relative to each other depends on the polarization of light. It is only necessary to turn the stone so that the rays are equally bright, and then to find out the position of the star is not difficult. But this is in theory.
To test a methodin practice, the physicist Guy Ropard of the First Rennes University (France) and colleagues took a piece of Icelandic spar (most likely, the Vikings used it) and placed it in a simple wooden device: light falls through the hole on the crystal, and on the other hand you can see two beams and compare their brightness. Then the researchers waited for a cloudy day and went to where the celestial trajectory of the sun is well known.
Their analogue of the device with “built-in” quartzite was able to determine the position of the sun with a 1 percent error.
The Temple of Gebekli Tepe, as well as the column found now for the archaeological world, are discoveries of the same order, radically changing traditional ideas about the time point of reference in the development of human civilization.
The discovery of Italian scientists once again confirms the hypothesis of the existence of highly developed ancient civilizations that have technologies that are difficult to reproduce by any modern methods.
Dear readers, we are always happy to meet and wait for you on the iCover Blog Pages! We are ready to continue to please you with our publications and will try to do our best to ensure that the time spent with us is pleasing to you. And, of course, do not forget to subscribe to our rubrics and we promise - you won’t be bored!
Our other articles and events
Conducting scientific research in August 2015, the coastal part of the Mediterranean basin, at a distance of 60 km south of the island of Sicily, researchers discovered a gigantic structure related to civilization, whose age, according to preliminary estimates, amounted to 10,000 years. It is noteworthy that the existence of this civilization, as DailyMail notes , was not suspected in the scientific world until the discovery. Geological and geophysical studies conducted since the time of discovery have now made it possible to accurately confirm the initial assumptions of scientists: the historical chronology will again have to be rewritten again.
“Archaeologists quite rightly assumed that the Mediterranean coast is the cradle of civilization,” says Emmanuel Lodolo, professor at the National Institute of Oceanography and Experimental Geophysics (Trieste).
- At the same time, despite large-scale theoretical and practical studies, it was not possible to find traces of the most ancient civilizations. And why? Yes, because 12-15 thousand years ago, the coastline was not at all in the place where it is located now. Therefore, the search for ancient civilizations should not be carried out on the coast, but at the bottom of the sea - summarizes Lodolo.
As Professor Emmanuel Lodolo and Zvi Ben-Avraam from Tel Aviv University noted in the journal of archaeological science: “... Found at a depth of 40 meters, we can safely consider man-made, since natural tectonic processes that could lead to the formation of such a formation on this bottom section not possible. ”
The ends - into the water!
The find confirmed the hypothesis of researchers who proceeded from a simple and obvious premise: 20 thousand years ago, the sea level was 120-130 meters lower than today. Thawing of giant ice massifs, 3-4 km thick, hid under water the territory that previously occupied up to 40% of the mainland of present-day Europe. Many “shelf” seas did not exist at that time - the Baltic Sea was a gigantic lake, and a trip from Eurasia to Alaska could be made along the Bering Isthmus even without “soaking your feet”. The waves of the Mediterranean Sea in those distant times rolled on the coastline, which was located tens of kilometers from the present. And the width of the strait between Tunisia and Sicily was 50 km - 110 km less than today.
In the period under consideration, it was a shallow site with many coastal islands. And in all likelihood, it was there that the path connecting Europe and Africa passed, says Lodolo. - In this regard, we decided to explore the seabed in this place with a sonar, which ultimately led to the discovery in the area of Pantelleria Vecchia Bank of an amazing find - a broken column in twelve meters high. She lay on the seabed at a depth of 40 meters, which made it possible to conduct detailed surveys using divers and a small underwater vehicle.
Studies have led scientists to conclude that they have the oldest port facilities built 6500 years before the known Stonehenge by representatives of civilization, about which science had not known anything up to this point.
Find
Column weight - 15 tons. Length - 12 meters. As a comparison, the stones used in the construction of Stonehenge weigh 25 tons at a height of 4.1 meters. The average weight of the stone blocks of the Cheops pyramid is 2.5 tons.
Three holes of artificial origin are clearly visible on the surface of the column, one of which, with a diameter of 60 cm, is through and located on top (see. Fig.).
The other two holes are drilled from the sides of the monolith and have a diameter of about 50 cm. The
age of the column, according to further results Research - over 10,000 years.
A likely destination is a port lighthouse.
In the course of research, a place was discovered from where a giant pillar was cut off. It turned out to be an underwater ridge located 300 meters south of the find. The remains of the pier defending the ancient harbor were discovered, representing an even ridge of half-meter stones. Estimated age of the mall is 9800 years.
Superlative
As it is not sad to admit to the apologists of traditional historical concepts, the found stone column once again completely destroys the idea of the image of our distant ancestors, as some hunter-gatherers possessing extremely primitive technological thinking. - says Professor Lodolo. Imagine, the construction of such structures was possible 11 thousand years ago, when, according to our existing ideas, there was even no ceramics, there was no cattle breeding and agriculture, not to mention metal tools. The found column, however, was cut down in solid rock, delivered and installed in a new place.
Most likely, a society that could afford the construction of structures of this magnitude to equip port facilities was prosperous. - the scientist considers. The idyll ended at the turn of 9200 BC. e. with the onset of the melting of glacial masses and a rise in the level of coastal waters that flooded the island by 40 meters.
It is expected that the conclusions drawn on the basis of the results of studies conducted by Italian experts from the time of the August discovery will make a splash in the scientific archaeological environment, since they will allow “delaying” the alleged beginning of the technological revolution on the time scale for several millennia.
The layout of port facilities. The monolith is located in the upper right corner between the numbers 8A and 2A. The harbor pier consists of two embankments and is designated as INNER RIDGE and OUTER RIDGE .
The island before and after flooding
Having studied the monolith and the site of the ancient quarry where it was cut, scientists came to an unambiguous conclusion: its creation, movement and installation are impossible without the use of complex technological operations.
"The opening of an underwater site in the Sicilian Canal can significantly expand our knowledge of early civilizations in the Mediterranean basin, and fundamentally change our views on the technological level of development reached by the Mesolithic inhabitants," said Herald Sun. The nearby islands of Malta are the cradle of the mysterious megalithic temples, created presumably 5600 years ago. And the oldest structure is the stone complex of Gebekli Tepe in southeastern Turkey. The data from radiocarbon analysis suggest that manually-processed stone structures, including 200 pillars weighing up to 20 tons, are about 11,600 years old.
The oldest temple complex in the world - Hebekli Tepe Temple
There is a lot of evidence for the version of scientists about the technological capabilities of people of the past. To their number, for example, it is quite possible to attribute the later ancient Roman cup - the Lycurgus Cup dating from the 4th century AD. er, demonstrating an amazing optical effect: when viewed from the front, the bowl has a jade hue, when turning it slowly changes its color to blood red.
Another brilliant example is the Uunartok Disk, an ancient Viking compass whose accuracy is almost as good as that of a needle magnetic compass, allowing you to navigate in the open sea even in cloudy weather and after sunset. The Scandinavian sagas mention the mysterious sun stones. A group of scientists came to the conclusion that we were talking about calcite crystals. The position of the sun was determined by the orientation of the light waves.
Calcite is a birefringent crystal: passing through it, the light flux is divided in two. The brightness of two outgoing rays relative to each other depends on the polarization of light. It is only necessary to turn the stone so that the rays are equally bright, and then to find out the position of the star is not difficult. But this is in theory.
To test a methodin practice, the physicist Guy Ropard of the First Rennes University (France) and colleagues took a piece of Icelandic spar (most likely, the Vikings used it) and placed it in a simple wooden device: light falls through the hole on the crystal, and on the other hand you can see two beams and compare their brightness. Then the researchers waited for a cloudy day and went to where the celestial trajectory of the sun is well known.
Their analogue of the device with “built-in” quartzite was able to determine the position of the sun with a 1 percent error.
The Temple of Gebekli Tepe, as well as the column found now for the archaeological world, are discoveries of the same order, radically changing traditional ideas about the time point of reference in the development of human civilization.
The discovery of Italian scientists once again confirms the hypothesis of the existence of highly developed ancient civilizations that have technologies that are difficult to reproduce by any modern methods.
Dear readers, we are always happy to meet and wait for you on the iCover Blog Pages! We are ready to continue to please you with our publications and will try to do our best to ensure that the time spent with us is pleasing to you. And, of course, do not forget to subscribe to our rubrics and we promise - you won’t be bored!
Our other articles and events