A very popular recurring theme within the world of Forteana and paranormal phenomena is that of what are called out of place artifacts, those anomalous objects that should not exist, defying understanding and inducing amazement and bafflement. A branch of these phenomena are those objects that seem to suggest that humans once lived side by side with dinosaurs, and as absurd as that may seem to many there is a shocking amount of supposed “evidence” put forward, which is enough to keep debate and discussion going on the matter. One such controversial collection of artifacts is a series of bizarre figurines that were allegedly found in remote wilderness, crafted by an unknown civilization and supposedly showing humans and dinosaurs living together.

In July of 1944, a German immigrant and shopkeeper named Valdemar Julsrud was allegedly out riding his horse in the wilds near Acámbaro, in Guanajuato, Mexico, when something strange caught his eye. There strewn upon the dry earth of a riverbed were several clay figurines that upon closer inspection turned out to be very bizarre indeed, depicting what seemed to be strange beasts, humans wrestling or riding atop reptilian creatures that looked very much like dinosaurs, and with others shaped like anomalous discs or people of various races. Intrigued, he called in help in the form of a local farmer to help him dig for more, of which they would find many. By the time they had finished their makeshift dig they had supposedly unearthed over 30,000 of these outlandish, out of place figures, astounding everyone who saw them.

What would come to be called the Acámbaro figures depict all manner of strange things, including the aforementioned “dinosaurs,” as well as odd structures and people dressed in clothing that seems to be from several far flung places and time periods, including what appears to be ancient Egyptian and Sumerian, as well as some that appear to be some sort of humanoid entities. That these things should be out there in the wilds of Mexico was bizarre to say the least, and so the figures began generating international attention and great interest among archeologists and researchers, most of whom immediately assumed that they must be fakes. Investigations were carried out, and these would only muddy the waters further and divide opinions.

Acámbaro figures

One of the first to investigate the claims was Los Angeles Times writer Lowell Harmer, who in 1951 ventured to Julsrud’s home to find it absolutely stuffed from floor to ceiling with thousands of the figures. Harmer was impressed by the odd figurines and believed them to be real, but he did admit that he was not an expert in his article on the matter, sensationally entitled Mexico Finds Give Hint of Lost World: Dinosaur Statues Point to Men Who Lived in Age of Reptiles. In 1953 all of the coverage the figures were getting convinced the Mexican government to send in four archeologists to investigate the site where they had allegedly been dug up. Over the course of a few days they claimed they had found more of the figurines, even a couple of dinosaurs, about 2 meters underground. They estimated that the figures dated to around as early as 800 BC, but dismissed the actual ones that featured dinosaurs as being a hoax. The excavation ended and the government rather ominously closed the area down to further digs from then on.

At around the same time, American anthropologist Charles Di Peso was sent to Mexico by the Amerind Foundation to analyze the figures. Di Peso had been skeptical of the claims from the beginning, and was not surprised to find that, in his opinion, they were most definitely faked. He cited the lack of any physical signs of wear and tear or discoloration due to centuries of the elements or dirt packed within the cracks and crevices, as well as the fact that they seemed to have been haphazardly inserted into the surrounding archaeological layers as evidence of this, and he further stated:

None of the specimens were marred by patination nor did they possess the surface coating of soluble salts. The figures were broken, in most cases, where the appendages attached themselves to the body of the figurines. No parts were missing. Furthermore, none of the broken surfaces were worn smooth. In the entire collection of 32,000 specimens no shovel, mattock, or pick marks were noted. Thus the investigation ended:  it seems almost superfluous to state that the Acámbaro figurines are not prehistoric nor were they made by a prehistoric race who lived in association with Mesozoic reptiles.

Acámbaro figures in 1971

Di Peso suspected that the figures had been crafted by local farmers in modern times and then planted as a hoax and publicity stunt. Yet, as damning as this verdict was, there were others that were less convinced that it was all a sham. Archeologist Charles Hapgood was intrigued by Di Peso’s dismissal of the figures, and decided to launch his own expedition in 1954. Hapgood would disagree that the figures had been made by locals, partly because there were just too many of them, and also because these were poor, uneducated people who had no frame of reference for what dinosaurs should look like, with many of them not even aware of what a dinosaur was. Hapgood came away under the impression that the figures were genuine, a sentiment that would be echoed in 1969 by his friend, author Erle Stanley Gardner, who also examined the collection and wrote:

I don’t believe that it would have been at all possible for any group of people to have made these figures, to have paid for the burro-load of wood necessary to ‘fire’ them, take them out and bury them, wait for the ground to resume its natural hardness which would take from one to ten years, and then ‘discover’ these figures and dig them up—all for a gross price of twelve cents per figure. It is absolutely, positively out of the question to think that these artifacts which we saw could have been planted.

Hapgood was so sure that the figures must be the real deal that he sent some samples to be tested by radiocarbon dating, which showed a range of ages from 3,500 to 6,500 years old. The figures were later subjected to a more accurate dating method called “thermoluminescent dating,” which put their origins at around 2,500 BC, and a follow-up analysis by a Dr. Froelich Rainey produced the same results, but at the time this technique was not yet refined, and so could not be considered completely reliable. These findings were dashed when scientists Gary Carriveau and Mark Han used thermoluminescent dating on 20 of the figures in 1976, but were unable to get useful readings and came to the conclusion that the figures had been made as recently as the 1940s. In the end, there has been no reliable, agreed upon dating of the figurines.

Acámbaro figures

The Acámbaro figures have gone on to be discussed and debated to this day, with both sides of the debate offering up heated arguments. Skeptics point out that the more recent dating is undeniable, that Di Peso’s arguments still stand, and that it is simply impossible for two species separated by millions of years in the geological record to have ever co-existed. Proponents of the figures as being real point out that the locals had no way to depict dinosaurs and that the manufacture of them was on too large a scale for them to pull off, with no one really seeming to make any money off it all, including Julsrud himself. If they are real, then it has been suggested that they represent depictions of surviving dinosaurs or some other large undiscovered reptiles, or perhaps just fantastical creatures of myth. Of course young Earth creationists have jumped on it all as evidence of their literal interpretation of the Bible’s record of human history. What do these figures mean and who made them? As of now the mystery of these strange figures has not totally been solved, and until it is there is bound to be plenty of discussion on the matter, with their true meaning and history shrouded in enigmas, whether they are real or not.

Overlooking the Konya Plain of Turkey, which sprawls out over hundreds of square miles of remote, desolate wilderness, and just about 30 miles from the regional capital of Konya near a river that dried up millennia ago is a mysterious ancient settlement called Çatalhöyük. Long vanished from the face of known history, it was unearthed in 1958 when archeologist James Mellaart and his team began investigating two foothills that seemed to show promise of archeological finds, but when they began digging it would turn out to be far older and more bizarre than they had ever imagined, their excavation slowly bringing into the light one of the most ancient, unusual, and indeed mysterious cities on the face of the earth, challenging our ideas on prehistoric people in the process.

The first intriguing aspect of this forgotten city is its incredible age, which dates back to at an estimated roughly 7500 B.C., making it around 9,500 years old and making the other Roman ruins of the region seem positively modern by comparison. It is so old, in fact, that Çatalhöyük is believed to be one of the oldest known organized settlements in the world, earning it the nickname “The World’s Oldest City,” in an era when humanity was still largely nomadic wanderers. Outside of the city limits was found evidence of agriculture, which would have been a revolutionary concept for these hunter-gatherers and very experimental in nature, as well as millions of bones from sheep, cattle, goats, horses, dogs, boar, fox, deer, hare, and many other species that suggest they were practicing herding and keeping livestock rather than hunting.

All of this is not even the most unique thing about this mysterious city. Mellaart and other archeologists over the years have found that it follows a very unusual lay out, in that it had no roads, with the mud brick and plaster windowless houses arranged in tight clusters right up against each other with no footpaths between them and holes in the roofs of the dwellings instead of doors. It is thought that there was once a network of ladders that spanned the honeycomb-like structure of the place and that the residents would navigate this web to access buildings and enter through the roof, although no one is really quite sure why this should be. It is all a very unique organization and construction style that hasn’t been seen before or since, and it is not understood why it should have been built this way.

Çatalhöyük

There are other oddities as well. The houses are adorned with various paintings and the skulls of bulls prominently displayed, the significance of these skulls still a mystery, as well as littered with various objects fashioned of obsidian and numerous figurines of advanced craftsmanship. There have been some rather anomalous objects found here as well, such as a mural which is believed to show an overhead view of the village and the Hasan Daği volcano 80 miles away, making it what is believed to be the world’s oldest map, as well as a head fashioned out of plaster and adorned with inscrutable obsidian eyes that had been set up near a storehouse almost as if it were watching over it.

Most of the homes were equipped with a sort of crude hearth used for warmth, ventilation, and cooking, and the dead were buried not in a communal cemetery, but beneath the hard-packed earth of the homes themselves. Again, why the dead should be buried like this is, like much of the rest of this fascinating place, unknown. In some cases, the bodies were found to have had skulls that had been removed and then reburied for reasons unknown, possibly for ritualistic purposes, skulls that had been hit with rocks but not fatally, and most of the bodies held evidence that they had been kept out in the open air for a time before burial. Why? Who knows? There is also the oddity that in many cases the remains buried within a single house are not biologically related, making it even more bizarre. Despite this odd burial method, the houses and indeed the city itself all demonstrate an unusual level of cleanliness, with waste burned and buried and the buildings constantly re-plastered to a smooth finish to maintain a new look, and it is believed that the residents were remarkably healthy for the era due to this cleanliness, making it all the more impressive for that period of history.

At its peak, the ancient city of Çatalhöyük is estimated to have had around 10,000 residents, making it not only one of the oldest cities, but also the largest for the era. For the time this would have been a bustling urban metropolis, and just as amazing is that it had extreme longevity, with the city believed to have been inhabited over a span of 2,000 years and covering 18 layers of dwellings as it evolved and was built up over the millennia. Also rather impressive is the structure of the society itself. Although there are no written records here, study of the remains shows very little difference in quality of life or workloads between men and women, and the homes are all nearly identical, with no obvious societal gaps, all of this suggesting that this was a remarkably egalitarian society. There doesn’t even seem to be a base for any type of leading government. Everyone seems to have had the same quality of life, the same access to goods, and the same level of health, and it would have been almost a utopia. However, there might have been some drawbacks to this, as current chief archeologist Ian Hodder has said:

We believe people in Çatalhöyük were quite equal, but it might not have been the nicest society to live in. Residents had to submit to a lot of social control — if you didn’t fit in, you presumably left. What Çatalhöyük may show is that such a society only works with strong homogeneity. For many generations, it was very unacceptable for individual households to accumulate [wealth]. Once they started to do so, there is evidence that more problems started to arise.

It is perhaps this emerging inequality that led to this civilization’s doom. It has long been a mystery as to what happened to the city of Çatalhöyük, as it was continuously inhabited for 2,000 years and then seemingly overnight it was just abandoned. Theories have ranged from some pestilence to an invasion, to a volcanic eruption, but there is no real evidence for any of this. More likely is that the growing social divide and rise of different classes in their previously egalitarian society caused rifts between the people and unrest, causing it all to deteriorate and crumble. There is a chance that we will eventually learn more about this once great city that was well ahead of its time. Only a small fraction of it has been unearthed to date, so it is quite possible we will uncover answers lying there under the earth. However at the moment no one really knows, and the fall of Çatalhöyük, and almost everything else about it, remains just as shrouded in mystery as ever.

In 1988, construction workers in the Aydıntepe district of Bayburt Province, Turkey, were doing work on a site when they accidentally stumbled across a rather strange discovery. Meandering off into the ground was some sort of passageway that down into the gloom right under a major residential area, and when it was explored it was found to be quite the amazing sight indeed. More than just a series of passages, it turned out that this was an entire ancient subterranean city carved directly into the rock, its creators a mystery, and it what has gone on to become known as the underground city of Aydıntepe has become one of Turkey’s most mysterious and archeologically important sites.

The city itself lies an average of 2 to 5 meters (6.5-8.2 feet) under an area full of houses, offices, and streets, where it long lay undetected coexisting with a modern world that didn’t even know it was there. It is a vast complex, which features a network of chambers, corridors, galleries, and hallways, and various other rooms such as cellars, storage rooms, water source and even a pool, all hewn directly into the rock, which is a type of volcanic tufa rock formation. Most of the chambers, galleries, and halls have ceilings at a height of 6.6 feet, and the halls themselves are an average of 1 meter (3.2 feet) wide, making them very tight and difficult to navigate for the average person. The rooms range in dimension from 2 meters by 1 meter (6.5 feet in length, 3.2 feet in width), to the larger chambers that are much more spacious. Oddly, above the hallways are conical shafts with purposes unknown, although they are thought to have been perhaps used for ventilation or keeping an eye on visitors. At the entrance to the whole thing is a round slab of rock that can be moved to position itself as a sort of door barring entry.

A corridor in the underground city

It has been estimated that the structure dates back to around 3,000 years ago in the Late Roman or early Byzantine era. What makes it all particularly impressive is that none of it uses any building materials, with all of it expertly carved into the stone displaying an incredible engineering prowess for the time. Aydıntepe District Governor Yeliz Yıldızhan has said of this amazing construction:

The most important feature of the city is that it was created without using any construction material. It was carved out of the main rock. The opposing chambers, galleries, water ditches, observation spots, ventilation pipes and holes on the walls for lighting amaze us with the engineering and architecture skills of the era [it was created]. How the bedrock was carved to form that work of art, how this structure is made with human labor astonish people today.

While we know when it was built and how it was built, a big mystery of the underground city is what purpose it served or why it was built underground. There seems to be no evidence of permanent habitation or religious imagery, making it unlikely it was used for rituals or as a dwelling, and there are no tombs within it. One idea is that it might have served as some form of prison or dungeon, which would explain why there are openings over the halls that could have been used for surveillance of prisoners, and still another idea is that it might have been used as a shelter in times of need, although a shelter from what is unclear. One archeologist working on the site has said of this theory:

The mechanisms to close the doors of the city in entrance and exit, the shapes of the ventilation windows and the locations of the rooms show us that the city served as a shelter. Some experts say that people used this place as a settlement since the winter is so cold in the region. Of course, further examinations are needed to make these theories clear.

Another mystery is that no one is even really sure how big it is, with new galleries and passages uncovered all of the time, and although 1,200 square meters (13,000 sq. feet) have been unearthed so far, it is thought to span a much vaster area, perhaps even all the way to the city of Bayburt, around 25 km (15 miles) away, and the use of ground penetrating radar has become commonplace in investigations of this mysterious place. The entire site was put under protection by the Cultural and Natural Heritage Preservation Board in 2008, and in addition to ongoing archeological studies to uncover its true size, origins, and purpose, it has also become a popular tourist attraction in the region, drawing in an estimated 16,000 visitors in 2018. Perhaps as we learn more the secrets of this magnificent buried place will be gleaned from it, but for now it remains as much a mystery as it always has been, and a tantalizing peek through time at a civilization long lost.

History is far from completely chronicled. For as much as we know there is much that still remains in the shadows, and popping up from time to time to remind us of this fact are the various anomalous objects that we dig up that jolt out preconceptions and show us that ancient peoples were much more complex and stranger than we had ever thought before. One of these objects was found in the country of Germany in the 1990s, and it has proven to be a conundrum that defies our knowledge of the people of the time, and has gone on to become an intriguing historical anomaly that remains unsolved.

The artifact could have very well remained hidden away from the eyes of humankind forever if it hadn’t been for some illegal treasure hunters snooping around. In 1999, Henry Westphal and Mario Renner were hunting for treasure with metal detectors in Ziegelroda Forest, of the German state of Saxony-Anhalt, near a town called Nebra, when they stumbled across two bronze swords, two hatchets, a chisel, some fragments of what appeared to be bracelets, jewelry, and most interesting of all, an anomalous bronze, disc-like object measuring 30 cm across, weighing about 5 pounds, and covered with strange inscriptions and cryptic diagrams and writing, some of which was inlaid with gold leaf, as well as gold circles, crescents, and bands upon it, the significance of it all unknown.

Now, none of this was legal at all. Not only were Westphal and Renner operating without a license, but they were using metal detectors, which was not allowed, and also any treasure found in the area is automatically the property of of the state of Saxony-Anhaltof, but they had no intention of handing their hoard over. The two illegal treasure hunters had no idea what the disc was, only that it was old, had gold in it, and was therefore potentially valuable. The very next day after making their find, the two sold the whole lot on the black market, and the mysterious disk would sort of disappear into the world of illegal treasure trading for the next few years. The disk and its mysteries might have disappeared forever, just as elusive as it had been when buried under the earth, if it wasn’t for a black market police sting operation carried out in February of 2002, during which it was confiscated and found its way into the hands of the German archeologist Harald Meller. Only then would it become clear just how bizarre the discovery actually was.

The two original treasure hunters were tracked down and arrested, and under a plea deal they agreed to disclose where they had found the disc. It turned out to be some sort of ancient burial mound thought to date back to the 2nd millennium BC, within which were found various other bronze artifacts and which was found to be situated on the hill in just such a way as for the sun to set behind a high peak called the Brocken during every solstice. However, even more exciting than the site where it was found was the disk itself, which had golden arcs that aligned with these solstices, and this was only the beginning of its mysteries. The symbols inscribed upon it were found to be depictions of the sun, moon, and a constellation of stars thought to be Pleiades Constellation, and when aligned correctly it was found that the disk could be used to calibrate the solstices and provide accurate representations of the night sky over the course of the year. Using two arcs on the edges of the disk, it was found that they span an angle of 82°, which accurately indicates the angle between the positions of sunset at summer and winter solstice at the latitude of the Mittelberg.

The disk was also able to correctly calculate moon phases and the location of stars in the sky, and all in all it was an amazingly accurate tool for its apparent age, perhaps the oldest known depiction of the universe. Of course,  considering its accuracy, age, and the fact that its artistic style was not consistent with what was known from the era it supposedly belongs to, it was thought that what has come to be known as the Nebra Sky Disk was nothing more than a hoax or forgery, and prehistory professor at the University of Bristol, Richard Harrison, would say of it:

When I first heard about the Nebra Disc I thought it was a joke, indeed I thought it was a forgery. Because it’s such an extraordinary piece that it wouldn’t surprise any of us that a clever forger had cooked this up in a backroom and sold it for a lot of money.

The Nebra Sky Disk

However, analysis showed that it indeed seemed to be authentic, dating back to at least 1600 BC, quite likely much older, and likely a creation of the Bronze Age Unetice culture, and it was also found that it had been modified and tweaked over the centuries, adding new holes, crescents, arcs, and bands, perhaps as the creators attempted to calibrate it more precisely. If the calculated age is correct, then this would make it the oldest known and most accurate portable astronomical tool in the world for its era, and demonstrates that the people who made it had a shockingly sophisticated understanding of the cosmos and cycles of the night sky.

One of the biggest mysteries of the Sky Disk is not only how these ancient people knew so much about the night sky, but also what exactly it was used for. Ideas include that it was an item of religious significance, that is was used to anticipate seasonal phases for planning harvests and other agricultural purposes, or that it was used for shamanic rituals, but no one really knows for sure, and there is absolutely no written record of the disk having been made or where it came from. We are still not sure how these ancient people had this knowledge all the way back in the Bronze Age or even exactly who mad it in the first place, and the Nebra Sky Disk has gone on to be a much discussed historical anomaly. How did they have all of this information in a violent era when most of the artifacts found are weapons? Was it aliens? It was aliens, wasn’t it?

Whatever the answers may be, it is often considered as being one of the most important archeological finds of the century, and in 2013 was in the UNESCO Memory of the World Register. Nowadays the Nebra Sky Disk has remained on permanent exhibition at the Halle State Museum of Prehistory (Landesmuseum für Vorgeschichte), in Halle, Germany, and it is considered a priceless artifact of German archeology. For now the Nebra Sky Disk keeps its mysteries close, but it provides a rare glimpse into ancient peoples and their understanding of the cosmos, which has proven to be much more complex than ever thought before.

Throughout history there have been those great figures whose names everyone seems to know, regardless of whether they actually know anything about them. These are the big hitters of history, seemingly larger than life, almost transcending the bounds of physical entities to become legends. Yet for as well known as they are and for as much as historians might know about their deaths, some of these legendary figures have managed to pose great mysteries in their passing, leading mighty lives only to vanish without a trace after death, only their memories remaining.

Going back into the mists of time we have the great Egyptian ruler Cleopatra, the last active ruler of the Ptolemaic Kingdom of Egypt, and her Roman General lover Mark Anthony. When Antony and Cleopatra were defeated in a massive naval battle against Octavian’s forces the during at the 31 BC Battle of Actium, Octavian moved to invade Egypt in 30 BC. Antony’s forces were crushed, and in defeat he committed suicide, likely by stabbing himself, although no one is quite certain. When Cleopatra learned of this death and was faced with being brought in before to a Roman triumphal in celebration of the loathed Octavian’s victory, she too killed herself in a fit of depression and defiance.

Mysteries have long swirled ever since around Cleopatra’s death, and despite the fact that she is one of the most recognizable, iconic, and well-known rulers in history, even all the way up into modern times, there is much we still don’t know about her last days and moments. One persistent mystery is how she died in the first place. The most common theory is that she killed herself by enticing an asp or other venomous snake to bite her arm, but there are all sorts of other ideas, including that she used a poison loaded hairpin she is said to have carried at all times, that she applied some sort of poisonous ointment to her skin, or that she simply overdosed on opium. No one really knows. We also don’t know where her final resting place is, as it was never recorded, although it was written that she was buried together with Mark Antony.

It has been theorized that Cleopatra would have had a tomb prepared for herself in some form, probably near Alexandria, but where it could be is anyone’s guess. There have been many digs trying to find the lost tomb of Cleopatra, and in 2009 archeologists investigated a promising site at the Taposiris Magna temple in Abusir, Egypt. Here there were found mummies, busts featuring her visage, a mask believed to have belonged to Mark Anthony, and coins with their likenesses, all of which seemed to suggest that Cleopatra and Antony were not far away, but the dig was ultimately unsuccessful. In more recent years it has been suggested that her tomb in fact might now lie under the sea, and in the end the lost tomb of Cleopatra is one of the holy grails of archeology.

Just as famous as Cleopatra was the iconic Alexander III of Macedon, more popularly known as Alexander the Great, who ruled from 356 BC to 323 BC and is well-known for his reign of stunning conquests spanning an empire from Greece to India and covering large swaths of Asia and northeast Africa. His inexorable, unstoppable path of victory came to an end in 323 BC, when he was killed in Babylon. His body was then supposedly placed within an opulent sarcophagus fashioned of solid gold and filled with honey, all of which was then placed within a golden casket and put on display in a tomb in Alexandria, where the sarcophagus was visited by such notable historical figures as Julius Caesar, Augustus, Cleopatra, Octavian, Caligula, Hadrian, Severus, Caracalla, and many others. The tomb was finally sealed after it was plundered for gold and Alexander’s breast plate was stolen, and it remained that way until Christianity came to the region in the 4th century and paganism was outlawed. After this, Alexander the Great’s tomb and casket just sort of vanished off the face of the earth. To this day no one has any idea where Alexander the Great’s tomb and sarcophagus are, with it being theorized to rest at a variety of places including Alexandria, Greece, or even all the way over in Venice, but despite countless expeditions it remains one of the great historical mysteries.

Speaking of empire building warlords, here we have the founder and first emperor of the Mongol Empire, Genghis Khan. During his reign and ruthless expansion across vast areas he would conquer regions sprawled out from the Caspian Sea to the Pacific and encompassing large portions of Eurasia and most of Central Asia and China. It would become one of the largest empires the world has ever known, all fashioned through a brutal and bloody campaign, and all darkly shadowed by a cloud of violent genocide and punctuated by the merciless massacres of countless innocent people. Genghis Khan is one of the most notorious, vicious, and feared tyrants in history, and upon his death on August 18, 1227 during a military campaign in China it is probably safe to say that there was no love lost among the cowering populace of the lands he had held in an iron, ravenous grip. However, for as much as we know about his specacular life, his death and final resting place remain complete mysteries.

Genghis Khan

One mystery is his exact cause of death, which has been variously theorized to have been dying in action, falling from a horse, or succumbing to some illness or infection of a wound, or even being murdered by his own men, but no one really knows. What we do know is that Genghis Khan had stipulated to his men that upon his death he was to be buried in an unmarked grave and its location kept a total secret. To this end, his closest men really went overboard. It is said that the location where he was buried was intentionally trampled over by nearly a thousand horsemen in order to mask its location, after which every single one of the horsemen was killed. Even as the body was being moved to its final resting place it is believed that his personal funeral escort had everyone who witnessed their movements executed, as well as the ones who dug the grave, to keep it all secret, with the final result being that no one has a clue as to where one of the most fearsome warlords in history is buried.

Of course with such a veil of secrecy there are other legends surrounding the grave of Genghis Khan as well, such as the legend that a whole river was diverted over the burial site to hide it. Although there is a mausoleum with some of Genghis Khan’s possessions located in the town of Ejin Horo Banner, Inner Mongolia, this is not his actual resting place, and archeologists have scoured the world trying to locate it, utilizing ground penetrating radar, satellite imagery, and all manner of cutting edge technology, but it has evaded all attempts to find it and remains lost to history.

Quite similar is the lost grave of another great ruler, Attila the Hun, who ruled the Huns from 434 to 453, and was the head of a great empire of tribes that stretched across large swaths of Central Asia, the Caucasus, and Central and Eastern Europe. He was known as a fearsome conqueror and plunderer who sought to spread out across Europe and Persia seeking to invade and dominate new lands, constantly battling the Romans and establishing himself as one of the Roman Empire’s greatest foes. In 453 Attila the Hun would according to records die a rather unusual death when he purportedly choked on a nosebleed at his own wedding feast, an odd end to such a ferocious and feared conqueror. Upon his death, it is said that Attila the Hun was buried within a coffin lavishly covered with gold and silver and filled with gems and other treasure, and that just as with Genghis Khan a river was diverted to hide the grave, and everyone who dug it was mercilessly killed to preserve its secret. Attila the Hun’s grave has never been found, and both he and even the Hunnic people themselves largely remain mysteries.

Attila the Hun

In later eras we have other tyrants and rulers who are known for their mysterious graves. Between 1448 to 1476, the area of modern day Romania known as Wallachia was ruled by Vlad III Dracula, also known as Vlad the Impaler, and perhaps even more known as the inspiration behind Bram Stoker’s Dracula, as well as for his infamous cruelty and his gruesome habit of impaling enemies on spikes. Vlad the Impaler was killed in battle against Ottoman forces and his body supposedly decapitated and chopped into pieces, but where his final grave is has remained a mystery. It was long thought that he was interred in the Monastery of Snagov outside of Bucharest, with an unmarked tombstone long thought to be his. However, in the 1930s this grave was dug up only to find the bones and jaws of horses. Since then there have been many proposed sites for Vlad the Impaler’s final resting place, but so far it has not been found, and the grave of the real life Dracula remains steeped in mystery.

It is not only rulers and warlords who are well known for their elusive final resting places, and some of the more famous mysterious lost graves belong to well-known artists. Perhaps the most famous of all of these is that of the great artist, inventor, overall polymath and master of the Renaissance, Leonardo Da Vinci. After dying in 1519 at the age of 67, which was quite old for the era, Da Vinci was supposedly interred beneath a church that was destroyed during the French Revolution in 1789. When workers rebuilding the site went through the rubble, they are said to have found some human remains and a part of a demolished headstone that were believed to have belonged to Da Vinci, and that these were brought to another chapel. Although his official resting place is France’s Chateau d’Amboise, it is still unknown if these remains and the piece of headstone kept there are really his at all, and even the description displayed at the grave explains it as merely the “presumed remains” of Da Vinci.

Leonardo Da Vinci

There is also the story of the grave of one of history’s great composers, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, who died in 1791 at the age of 35 from an unidentified illness. Considering how incredibly famous Mozart has become over the centuries, one would think that his grave would be known as well, but this does not seem to be the case. One of the problems is that in life he was not nearly as well-known as he would go on to be, after his death, and so his burial was not all that big of an event. In fact, it seems what has gone on to be considered one of the greatest composers of all time was rather unceremoniously put in a cheap wooden coffin and buried in a cemetery in a common, unmarked grave, possibly even buried in a sort of mass grave with others. Making things even more difficult is that in that era it was common to remove all of the graves to make way for new ones every 10 years, so Mozart’s remains could have gone anywhere, possibly even crushed or cremated and otherwise destroyed. In 1801, a gravedigger came forward to claim that he had in his possession the skull of Mozart, but DNA tests in later years have cast doubt on this. Where are Mozart’s remains? Ideas range from that they have vanished forever to that fans of the composer had them moved to a safe location, but in the end no one really knows.

Here we have looked at only a few of the lost graves and tombs of some of history’s most important people. Where did they go? How could such prominent, larger than life figures in life figures just disa ppear in death? Some of these lost graves have gone on to become some of the most highly sought after treasures in archeology, yet they remain hidden and evasive, keeping their secrets close. One day we may find the answers we seek, but for now these spectacular historical figures remain enigmas in death, seemingly eveporating into the mists of time.

Among the oldest city sites found in Mesoamerica is the enigmatic cultural center of Monte Albán, the ancient political hub of the Zapotec people. This remarkable cultural group, who during their reign were called Be’ena’a, or “The People” in the indigenous Zapotec language, ruled from around 700 BC–1521 AD. Monte Albán served as the hub of a loosely-knit alliance of several Zapotec groups that had been rivals up until around 2000 years prior to the arrival of the Spanish.

Monte Albán is a structural marvel in itself, resting atop and artificially leveled hilltop in Mexico’s Oaxaca Valley. The city rests between the confluence of the Rio Atomic and the Rio Salado rivers, and quickly became the economic anchor of the region, promoting trade and craftsmanship that may have attracted more than 30,000 residents at the height of its growth and political influence over the region.

However, what has remained among the site’s most famous—and curious—attractions are not just the building structures that were once the great city of Monte Albán, but also the famous carvings that adorn the site, known today as Danzantes.

Danzantes on display at Monte Alban; note that many of the stone slabs on display are replicas, with the originals kept inside the complex for protection

(Credit: Anagoria/Wikimedia Commons).

The Danzantes are a remarkable collection of carved stone slabs that feature bas-relief art depicting humans in various striking poses. Their name (“Los Danzantes” in Spanish) means “the dancers,” in reference to the curious gestures and contortions many of the figures on the stone faces depict, which are reminiscent of dancers. This early interpretation of the nature of these images may have given rise to their name, but little else about the Danazntes suggests dancing or festivity; as a result, the meaning behind these images has remained an item of debate among archaeologists for decades.

One peculiar feature of many of the Danzantes bas-reliefs is the presence of facial hair in the form of long beards worn by many of the figures. Facial hair is not common among the indigenous peoples of the region, which makes the images all the more curious; could this mean that some of the Danzantes actually depict foreigners?

Bearded figure depicted on one of the Danzantes slabs; note the curious positioning of the figure’s hands

(Credit: Anagoria/Wikimedia Commons).

This may provide a clue to the meaning behind the images, since another problem with the “dancer” theory has to do with the fact that most of the Danzantes are also depicted nude. Dancers, whether male or female, would not have been depicted nude by the cultures of Central Mexico during this period, as it was considered disgraceful. However, nudity does appear in art from other locations in the region, generally in depictions of captives from warfare who have been stripped in humiliation, often prior to their execution. The fact that many of the Danzantes appear to be foreigners would make sense, particularly if these figures represent the captives of war.

Other peculiarities in the appearance of the Danzantes include the fact that their feet appear to be placed at vertical angles, which has led some to theorize that the movements represented by the posing of the figures could actually denote swimming, as proposed by Augustín Villagra in the 1939, within a report he produced for the International Congress of Americanists in Mexico City.

While it is true that certain art depicting the Danzantes does appear to imply curving lines and similar features that might represent water, the “swimmer” theory has its own problems. Some of the figures appear to possess genital mutilation, as well as the appearance of glyphs, scrolls, or perhaps even tattoos adjacent to the apparent emasculations. Some have interpreted this as possible evidence of shamanic practices, where “ecstatic emasculation” might have served some kind of ritual purpose with the characters, especially if they might represent priests. Further, the notion of emasculation could be consistent with the bearded depiction of some of the characters, which might convey accelerated aging after castration has occurred.

Stelae depicting Danzantes figure with possible entrails spilling from the abdomen region

(Credit: Anagoria/Wikimedia Commons).

Altogether, the best theory appears to be that of prisoners, or perhaps even slain bodies lying on the ground; this would appear to reconcile most, if not all of the features associated with the Danzantes, from the mutilations and placement of the limbs, to the fact that the feet do not appear to convey that they stand on level ground.

In John F. Scott’s 1978 The Danzantes of Monte Albán, he noted the likelihood that the images depicted slain bodies:

The Danzantes have contorted and highly asymmetrical postures; their arms sprawl in front of their torsos or over their heads. Most significant are the leg positions, which usually avoid any suggestion of resting on a ground line; quite possibly the Danzantes should be seen as if lying on the ground. The position of the limbs, the frequent indication of closed eyes on the grimacing faces, and the horizontal placement of slabs with elongated figures, all indicate that they represent slain victims lying on their sides or backs.

However, if the images of the Danzantes actually do illustrate slain enemies, what message was this intended to convey about Monte Albán to those who came there at the height of the Zapotecs?

Danzantes stela depicting scroll-like glyphs and symbols, some of which overlay the body of the character; note the placement of the limbs, suggesting a prostrate position of an individual lying on the ground

(Credit: Anagoria/Wikimedia Commons).

“This is the kind of propaganda that one associates with an emerging state that is fighting to take control over previously autonomous regions and wants to discourage resistance,” wrote Joyce Marcus, a Latin American archaeologist and professor in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.

Marcus continues:

“Of the shared conventions in Mesoamerican iconography some of the most widespread are those depicting captives. Prisoners are displayed in humiliation: they are stripped naked and bound, and their posture is awkward. The captors, in contrast, are dressed in elegant regalia and are posed in rigid dignity. If a prisoner has been sacrificed, he is  shown with his eyes closed and his mouth open, and in many instances with flowery scrolls, presumably representing blood, issuing from his wounds.”

It would indeed seem likely that this is the best explanation for the enigma that is the Danzantes imagery at Monte Albán. In any case, their name appears to be a misnomer, as they certainly don’t seem to be dancers. And yet, unraveling the significance of these strange and, at times, rather grisly images tells us much about the politics and practices of this region of the ancient world. Nonetheless, Monte Albán and its curious stone stelae is a place that–to the modern observer–is, and probably will remain quite mysterious.

Pareidolia: the tendency to interpret a vague stimulus as something known to the observer, such as seeing shapes in clouds, seeing faces in inanimate objects or abstract patterns, or hearing hidden messages in music.

72°00′ 36.00” S , 168° 34′ 40.00” E: location of what many pareidoliacs see on Google Earth as a gigantic “grey alien face” bulging out of the ice in Antarctica.

Credit: Google Earth

Pity the poor person who finds an amazing likeness of Jesus burnt into their tortilla or toast. They can’t get anyone to pay attention to them now that Google is making satellite images available of the surfaces of the Earth, the Moon and Mars where anyone can piece together enough rocks, shadows and wind-blown sand or snow to see aliens, space ships, giant faces or any number of out-of-place images that put the burnt toast back in the toaster where it can get 15 minutes of flame instead of fame.

The latest example comes from the craggy white surface of Antarctica, where the anonymous owner of the ufo _scandinavia account posted a Google Earth image of what they describe as an “grey alien face.” While one can certainly find evidence of each of those things individually, is it that collectively? And if so, what if anything does it mean?

Credit: Google Earth

“GIGANTICA! Ancient Alien [NEW] Discovery “THE FACE” Antarctica? 2019-2020”

The YouTube channel thirdpahseofmoon managed to fill a 10-minute video (see it here) with as much as they could possibly come up with on the Google Earth image. The comments on the video and on the image posted by ufo_scandanavia are proof that imagination is not dead. On the other hand, if that’s a giant grey alien trying to chew its way to the surface of Antarctica, it definitely is dead. Is it a giant statue? If it is, it puts Mount Rushmore to shame. Or is it a message to future extraterrestrials visiting Earth, like “Kilroy was here”? Maybe the mouth opens and reveals an alien base?

Makes about as much sense as leaving messages with circles in a cornfield or lines in a desert, doesn’t it?

What do YOU think it is?