Pyramids Mummies and Tombs Episode 1 Why Build Pyramids
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00:00They're all over the place, in the jungles of Central America,
00:04in the deserts of Egypt, in remote areas of China,
00:08and they're all amazingly similar.
00:11How come?
00:12That's the great pyramid mystery.
00:14And to solve it, we're going to have to go
00:16to some pretty remote places.
00:20Come along with me.
00:21You'll be glad you did.
00:30I've got a question for you.
00:32What country am I in?
00:36I'll give you some clues.
00:38Watch your head.
00:41Here's your first clue.
00:43I'm in the largest pyramid in the world.
00:47Your second clue is that there are more than three miles
00:50of tunnels in our pyramid.
00:52And the first clue is that we're in the middle of a desert.
00:56Is that there are more than three miles
00:58of tunnels in our pyramid.
01:02Our last clue is just around this corner.
01:08This is it.
01:10This is the remains of an earlier pyramid that's buried
01:13inside our huge pyramid.
01:16OK, where do you think we are?
01:19Bet you guessed Egypt.
01:21Nope.
01:21We're in Mexico.
01:30Pyramids are everywhere.
01:32And I'm going to show you pyramids
01:33you're not going to believe.
01:47Everyone knows there are pyramids in Egypt.
01:49Everyone knows there are pyramids in Egypt.
01:51But they're actually all over the world.
01:54From China to Mexico, from Iraq to Central America,
01:57there are hundreds of them.
02:00I bet you didn't know there are more pyramids in Mexico
02:03than in Egypt.
02:06But why did ancient civilizations all over the world
02:09end up building pyramids?
02:11And you know, there's something strange
02:14about all these pyramids.
02:16There are amazing similarities among them.
02:19For instance, both the Pyramid of the Sun in Mexico
02:23and the Great Pyramid of Egypt have almost identical bases.
02:28And that's not all they share.
02:30Both pyramids are oriented to the sun, moon, and stars.
02:36And how about this?
02:38Rising up from the rice fields of Indonesia
02:41is a pyramid that has a twin in Mexico,
02:44thousands of miles away.
02:47How come?
02:49How did ancient peoples, separated
02:51by tens of thousands of miles, end up building
02:55seemingly identical pyramids?
02:58For the answer, we have to look at pyramids all over the world
03:02and look at them closely.
03:04First stop, Egypt.
03:11I don't know how many times I've climbed the Great Pyramid,
03:14but every time, I'm impressed.
03:27In the old days, every Victorian tourist climbed it.
03:30But now, you need special permission.
03:32Too many people have been killed.
03:34So don't even think about doing this when you go to Egypt.
03:37This isn't how the ancient Egyptians saw the pyramid.
03:40When the pyramid was first completed,
03:42it would have been impossible to climb.
03:44It was covered in smooth white limestone that went almost
03:48straight up to the top.
03:51On the top was a golden capstone.
03:54It must have been spectacular.
03:59But King Khufu didn't know how to climb it.
04:03But King Khufu didn't build this pyramid just to impress us.
04:06It had a very specific purpose.
04:10Come with me to another pyramid, and I'll show you.
04:18This pyramid doesn't look like much from above ground.
04:21But beneath it is the heart of the pyramid,
04:24its very reason for being.
04:27It's a tomb intended to protect the mummy of King Khufu.
04:31This place is usually off limits.
04:33I've always wanted to see it.
04:35So now's our chance.
04:38Come along with me.
04:40You'll be glad you did.
04:43Or maybe you won't.
04:52The 19th century excavator who dug this tunnel
04:55was looking for the king's burial chamber.
05:02And when he found it, he must have
05:04thought he hit the jackpot.
05:08But then, disappointment.
05:11The cupboard was bare.
05:12Thieves had been there before him.
05:15You can see where they used levers
05:17to pry open the sarcophagus.
05:20Now I want to show you the only thing the robbers left behind.
05:24Their portraits.
05:25Their portraits.
05:26This one looks like Elvis, complete with sideburns.
05:33I've never seen anything like these hairstyles
05:35in ancient Egypt.
05:36Looks like the thieves were rock and rollers.
05:40Tomb robbers took everything of value.
05:43But to get an idea of what might have been here,
05:46let me show you another tomb.
05:47I'm in Boston's Museum of Fine Arts.
05:49And the things I'm going to show you are not a king's.
05:52But it's as close as we can get.
05:54The objects belong to a governor of one
05:56of the provinces of Egypt.
05:58There he is.
05:59His name is Jehudi Naft.
06:00And you see the little guy there?
06:02He's a servant.
06:03And he's got a little pot with charcoals in it.
06:05And he's dropping an incense pellet right into the pot.
06:08And he's got a little pot with a little incense in it.
06:11And he's got a little pot with a little incense in it.
06:13And he's got a little pot with a little incense in it.
06:16And he's dropping an incense pellet right into the charcoals
06:19for the gods.
06:20It's kind of like the church ritual today.
06:23But look closely at Jehudi Naft.
06:24You see what he's got around his neck?
06:26That's a necklace.
06:28But what's really neat is the necklace he wore
06:31in everyday life is here.
06:36Often, the only thing the thieves left behind was wood.
06:39It had no value to them, like these wooden models.
06:42Jehudi Naft had 60 of them.
06:46And it's not surprising what a king had.
06:49But let me show you my favorite.
06:51It's this procession of servants over here.
06:55The woman at the end is carrying Jehudi Naft's mirror.
06:58It's in a little case, so it won't get scratched.
07:02But let me show you the face that
07:04once looked into that mirror.
07:11This is Jehudi Naft, or at least his head.
07:15He's looking around the body, looking for jewelry.
07:17Remember, a mummy is very fragile.
07:20It doesn't bend.
07:21It breaks.
07:22But still, the head is well-preserved.
07:25Look over here.
07:27You can still see the hair.
07:29And they even painted the eyebrows on the linen.
07:33But there's one thing he doesn't have, a brain.
07:36This is one of the first mummies to have the brain removed
07:39so it would be preserved.
07:41Jehudi Naft was one of the first no-brainers.
07:45This is the tomb of Jehudi Naft.
07:47And this is the tomb of Jehudi Naft.
07:57Like most wealthy burials, Jehudi Naft's treasures
08:00were looted.
08:02But once in a while, the robbers missed something.
08:08In 1894, archaeologist Jacques de Morgan
08:12was in Cairo in search of ancient treasure.
08:17De Morgan knew that two great pyramids at Darsur
08:20had been robbed.
08:21So he was exploring the smaller, less obvious pyramids.
08:28De Morgan discovered several small looted chambers.
08:31The wood beams the robbers had used 2,000 years ago
08:34to pry open the sarcophagi were still in place.
08:43Ah.
08:54When De Morgan got here, he noticed
08:56that the earth at the foot of a sarcophagus had been disturbed.
09:02So he dug down and literally struck gold.
09:07De Morgan had found a cache of royal jewelry.
09:12At the time, his discovery revealed
09:14the most fantastic treasure ever found in Egypt.
09:17Remember, this was 30 years before the discovery
09:20of Tutankhamen's tomb.
09:24The newspapers played up De Morgan's find
09:27for all it was worth, with romantic renditions
09:29of him triumphantly marching across the desert
09:31with treasures.
09:33No one had ever seen such things.
09:36Egyptian royal jewelry, headdresses, necklaces,
09:40bracelets.
09:42OK, pyramid students.
09:44Now you have two clues for solving the great pyramid
09:47mystery, why the pyramids are all so similar.
09:51First, the Egyptians built their pyramids
09:54as tombs for the pharaohs.
09:56And second, though you can climb the pyramids today,
10:00you certainly couldn't in ancient times.
10:02There were no steps.
10:04Don't forget that.
10:07Like I said, everyone knows there
10:09are pyramids in Egypt.
10:10Now I'm going to take you to a place you
10:12never imagined had pyramids.
10:17That's a New York Times headline of March 28, 1947.
10:22Colonel Maurice Sheehan spotted the pyramid
10:25while flying with the fabled Flying Tigers,
10:28and he described it as 1,000 feet tall.
10:31That would make it twice the size
10:33of the Great Pyramid of Egypt.
10:36The pilot said the pyramid was 40 miles southwest of Xi'an.
10:47Xi'an is a terrific city.
10:49It still has the ancient stone walls
10:51that protected it when it was the capital of China.
10:54It's a great mix of ancient and modern.
11:06There's a Muslim quarter full of little shops
11:09selling everything from paintbrushes
11:11to Middle Eastern food.
11:17The Muslims are here because the ancient Silk Road
11:20ended in Xi'an.
11:23Some of the Arab traders stayed, and their descendants
11:26are still Muslims.
11:29But I'm not here for the shish kebab.
11:31I want to find the pilot's pyramid.
11:36He said it was southwest of Xi'an,
11:39so it's quite a way out of the city.
11:42There is, in fact, a pyramid that some people thought
11:45he could have seen, the Emperor Qin's, you know,
11:48the one who had the Terracotta Army guarding his tomb?
11:51It's pretty big.
11:54But that can't be true.
11:56Look at the map over here.
11:57This is Xi'an.
11:58That's the city.
11:59And Qin's tomb is in the northeast.
12:02But the pilot said he went west.
12:04So if we want to find the pyramid,
12:05we've got to head out of Xi'an here and head west to about
12:08here.
12:12In our pilot's day, there were no highways here.
12:15Now there's plenty.
12:20If we take the airport road, it should
12:23put us in the right area.
12:26Now we're getting there.
12:32That's an ancient tomb, nearly 2,000 years old.
12:36But we need something a bit bigger.
12:43That's more like it.
12:45This is probably our pilot's pyramid.
12:48It's the tomb of a Han Dynasty emperor.
12:57Local farmers are still burying their dead near their emperor.
13:01It's certainly no mystery for them.
13:04It's just Westerners who don't know about Chinese pyramids,
13:07because communist China was closed
13:08for so long to the outside.
13:17This is really big.
13:19Our pilot could have seen this baby from the air.
13:22There are loads of pyramids here.
13:24The Han pyramids are about 200 feet high,
13:27half the size of the Great Pyramid.
13:29But they're very different from the Egyptian ones.
13:32They've got a flat area on top.
13:34And that's not the only difference.
13:38This pyramid looks like a natural hill, but it's not.
13:41It's artificial.
13:43Every bit is man-made.
13:50Chinese pyramids aren't made of stone or mud brick
13:53like the Egyptian ones.
13:55They were made by ramming wet earth and straw
13:58into molds and letting it dry.
14:05It works.
14:06In fact, most of the Great Wall of China
14:09was constructed like this.
14:13There were only a few areas where stone was available.
14:17So much of the wall was built of earth.
14:20And it's still standing thousands of years
14:22later with the straw and twigs still visible.
14:27Maybe our flying tiger's mysterious Chinese pyramid
14:30does exist.
14:32It's very different from an Egyptian pyramid.
14:34But it was the burial of a ruler, just like in Egypt.
14:38And it may hold great treasure.
14:41This was an era when rulers were buried in jade suits.
14:47It's not the 1,000 feet tall he said it was.
14:50It's an easy mistake to make from high up.
14:53But incredibly, I can show you a Chinese pyramid that's
14:56way over 1,000 feet tall.
14:59Don't touch that dial.
15:06OK, I said I'd show you a pyramid that's
15:08over 1,000 feet tall.
15:11These are the tombs of the court officials of China's Tang
15:14dynasty.
15:15They wanted to be buried near their emperor's tomb,
15:18that huge pyramid on the horizon,
15:21several thousand feet tall.
15:23But I bet you've already guessed.
15:25It's not man-made.
15:27It's a naturally shaped pyramid.
15:29The emperors of the new dynasty still wanted pyramids.
15:33But they also wanted to save money.
15:35So they dug their tombs hundreds of feet into the mountainside.
15:40The emperor is still somewhere inside that mountain.
15:44No one knows where the entrance is.
15:47But I bet it contains fabulous treasures.
15:51The emperor's tomb has never been found.
15:54But we can get an idea of what his tomb looked like
15:57by looking at the tomb of his concubine, the Lady Wei.
16:02It's only a fraction of the size of the emperors.
16:04But it's neat.
16:05Come on, I'll show you.
16:13You see this goofy looking guy?
16:15He's a foreigner.
16:16And look at the big nose on this guy.
16:19That's not a Chinese nose.
16:20They're Mongolians.
16:22And they're bringing this horse to Lady Wei as a present.
16:30Ah, she's a lady-in-waiting.
16:32But you see those double chins?
16:33That was fashionable in Lady Wei's time.
16:36Chubby was in.
16:40Lady Wei was very special to the emperor.
16:43When his wife, the empress, died,
16:45Lady Wei stepped in and served as the first lady of China.
16:53This is Lady Wei's sarcophagus.
16:55It's designed like a house.
16:57It's got a roof, a door.
17:00There's even a little window for her.
17:03Lady Wei was very special.
17:06And this is a very important tomb.
17:08It's probably as close to a Tang emperor's tomb
17:11as we'll ever see in our lifetimes.
17:15The emperors of the Tang dynasty were
17:17buried in mountains and hills, shaped like a pyramid.
17:20Whatever the culture, Chinese, Egyptian, Mexican,
17:24it seems like the pyramid is the shape of choice.
17:29How come?
17:30Pay attention, class, and you'll find out.
17:32Next stop, Pyramid City, Mexico's Tia Tiwakan.
17:36Fasten your seat belts.
17:40That's Tia Tiwakan's Avenue of the Dead.
17:43And all along it are pyramids.
17:45See?
17:46That's the way it is.
17:48And straight ahead is the Pyramid of the Moon.
17:53The Pyramid of the Sun is the most impressive pyramid
17:56in the Americas.
17:57But archaeologists only recently discovered
18:00why it was built there.
18:03To find out, we've got to go deep beneath the pyramid.
18:07When excavators first discovered this tunnel,
18:09the entrance was completely blocked with debris.
18:19As they went deeper and deeper, they
18:22found 22 walls like this one.
18:24And they found a lot of debris, a lot of rocks, a lot of debris.
18:29And they found a lot of rocks, a lot of rocks, a lot of debris.
18:33As they went deeper and deeper, they
18:35found 22 walls like this one, but completely blocked up.
18:39You know they must have been wondering what
18:41those walls were protecting.
18:49But the treasures were gone.
18:51Looters had beaten them to it.
18:54But what they did find was the most sacred spot
18:57in Central America.
18:59That's why the pyramid is built directly above it.
19:03And why was a battered small cave like this
19:06considered so holy?
19:12You see, caves were entrances to the next world.
19:16So the Pyramid of the Sun guarded access
19:19to the underworld.
19:20That was its secret.
19:26Underground wells were often the only source of water,
19:30the source of life.
19:33This is the well.
19:51You are looking at a natural phenomenon.
19:54It happens every day in this well.
19:58No wonder these places were sacred.
20:00This was the realm of the gods.
20:03I'd worship that.
20:13Not far from the Pyramid of the Sun,
20:15there's another pyramid with a secret,
20:18but a far more grisly one.
20:20More than 100 human sacrifices were found in the Pyramid
20:24of the Feathered Serpent.
20:26In one burial, archaeologists discovered the bodies
20:29of nine young men in warrior's costumes,
20:32with their hands tied behind their backs.
20:40I want to show you something about the kind of person
20:42they sacrificed.
20:44This one was found in the Pyramid of the Feathered
20:47Serpent.
20:50Look closely at the teeth.
20:52They're perfect.
20:54This was a young person in the prime of life,
20:57just the kind of person they wanted for a sacrifice.
21:00And look over here.
21:02This is a necklace that was found
21:04with one of the other victims.
21:06It's carved out of shell, but made to look like human teeth.
21:10They were buried with all their finery,
21:13nothing but the best for the gods.
21:17Why all the sacrifices?
21:20Well, the Pyramid of the Feathered Serpent
21:22has the answer.
21:24The pyramid is dedicated to Quetzalcoatl, the creator god
21:28who made man from his own blood.
21:32These aren't like Egyptian or Chinese pyramids,
21:34built to protect the body of the king.
21:37Mexican pyramids have steps all the way up.
21:40They're platforms on which priests
21:42performed their rituals.
21:44This is where mortals paid their debts to the gods,
21:47where blood was the currency, and prosperity for the kingdom
21:51was the payoff.
21:54OK, class, remember the clue to the great pyramid mystery?
21:57How come the pyramids are all so similar?
22:00The one about Egyptian pyramids not having stairs?
22:03Well, all Mexican pyramids do.
22:06That's your hint for now.
22:09Mexico has loads of pyramids, but it's not just
22:12the number that's impressive.
22:14They've got the biggest one, too.
22:19Remember the pyramid where I asked
22:21you to guess the country, the one with the miles of tunnels?
22:24It's in Cholula, Mexico.
22:26It's the largest in the world.
22:28It's so large that its base covers 45 acres.
22:32That's three times the base of Egypt's Great Pyramid.
22:37When the Spanish conquered Mexico,
22:39they built a cathedral on top of the pyramid,
22:42and you hardly notice it.
22:45OK, smarty, so now you know where the largest
22:47pyramid in the world is.
22:49For extra credit, what country was the first to try to
22:53literally build up to the sky?
22:55I'll give you a hint.
22:57Think of the only pyramid named in the Bible.
23:04What's the only pyramid named in the Bible?
23:07If you look in Genesis, you'll find the Tower of Babel
23:11in ancient Babylon, modern Iraq.
23:15The tower doesn't exist anymore.
23:17Alexander the Great tore it down 2,000 years ago.
23:20But we do have a painting by a 16th century artist.
23:25It might not look like a pyramid, but it is.
23:28It has a broad base and narrows at the top.
23:31But this is just an artist's guesstimate.
23:34If we want to reconstruct what it really looked like,
23:36we're going to have to work hard.
23:39OK, class, get ready for your first field trip.
23:44This is all that's left of the original Tower of Babel,
23:48a muddy moat and the base of the tower.
23:51But at least it gives us an idea of size and shape
23:54at the bottom.
23:56For the upper levels, let's go 100 miles south
23:59to the ancient site of Ur.
24:02Here, in the center of one of the world's oldest cities,
24:06the people built a great pyramid, or ziggurat,
24:09as they would have called it.
24:10It's the best preserved of all Iraqi ziggurats.
24:14It's only half the supposed height of the Tower of Babel,
24:17which gives us an idea of just how huge that must have been.
24:23So it's the Ziggurat of Ur that gives us the best clues
24:27for our own reconstruction.
24:29Well, let's start building.
24:32From the ancient base and muddy moat,
24:34we know that the base was about seven acres.
24:37And from the rubble, we know the tower was made of bricks.
24:41From our ziggurat at Ur, we know that it was stepped.
24:45And given the size of the base, our tower
24:47would have had seven steps and soared 300 feet into the sky.
24:53At the very top was the whole purpose of the pyramid,
24:57a temple near to the gods.
25:00The walls were covered with blue-glazed tiles,
25:03and then the icing on the cake, huge bronze bull's horns
25:08at the four corners of the temple.
25:13It was a massive building with a ramp and steps up to the top.
25:17The walls gleamed with a thick coating of white plaster.
25:22Brilliant blue tiles formed parapets on the tops of the walls,
25:27so it looked something like a huge towering fortress.
25:30This baby would have been considered big
25:32even for an Egyptian pyramid.
25:36Pretty impressive, huh?
25:38Well, God didn't think so.
25:40The Bible says he was ticked off
25:43because man was trying to reach the heavens, God's turf.
25:48So he confused their language
25:50so they couldn't talk to each other.
25:53That's why today, when someone doesn't make sense,
25:56we say he's babbling.
26:00Cigarettes are absolutely unique among the world's pyramids,
26:04and neither the Bible nor archaeology
26:06can fill in the details of exactly how they were used.
26:10But there's a pyramid in South America
26:12that's an even bigger puzzle.
26:14You don't normally expect to find a pyramid by the seashore,
26:18but Peru's northern coast is not your normal landscape.
26:22Right by the sea is one of the driest deserts in the world.
26:26Then, over a hill, we come to the Chasma Valley.
26:31And that's where we find Session Alto,
26:34the granddaddy of all Peruvian pyramids.
26:37Our pyramid is so large that, from a distance,
26:40it looks like a mountain, but it's man-made.
26:46It's only from the air that you can see its true size.
26:51But why did Peruvians build something so huge?
26:55Answering that question isn't easy.
26:58It's so old that it's hard to tell.
27:01It's not just the size of the pyramid.
27:04The answer isn't easy.
27:06It's so old that the people who built it
27:09hadn't invented writing yet
27:11and had just barely created pottery.
27:17You are looking at a pyramid that, for more than 1,000 years,
27:20was the largest building in the Americas.
27:23Its base is as large as 15 football fields,
27:28larger than Egypt's Great Pyramid,
27:30and practically no one knows about it.
27:35At first, it looks like a pile of rocks.
27:37But Pan American University's excavation
27:40is trying to make sense
27:42of the largest archaeological puzzle in the world.
27:45-♪♪
27:55-♪♪
28:033,000 years ago,
28:05a civilization decided to move more than 60 million stones,
28:09some weighing tons, to build Sessionalto.
28:13And we don't know who they were
28:15or why they did it.
28:25Tom and Sheila Pazorski have spent nearly a decade
28:28trying to solve the mystery of Sessionalto.
28:31For me, they are the true heroes of archaeology.
28:35They are tackling one of the most difficult
28:37archaeological riddles of our time
28:40and know they will find no treasures.
28:43The builders of Sessionalto had no metal,
28:46so the Pazorskis will not find gold.
28:49Their rewards will take the form of a stairway
28:52discovered under tons of rock,
28:54a clue to why the pyramid was built.
29:05Can you see what's different about this part of the pyramid?
29:08No rocks.
29:11They brought in 60 million stones to build this pyramid,
29:14but they had to do more.
29:15Come over here.
29:18Can you see what this is?
29:20It's an adobe cone.
29:22The core of this pyramid is made of these cones.
29:25But look closely.
29:26You see the lines?
29:28Those are the finger marks of the man who made this cone
29:313,500 years ago.
29:34It's almost all we have of the people who built this pyramid.
29:38For the Pazorskis, their treasures will be small items
29:42like Fred or Frederica.
29:44They only have the head, one of the few artifacts
29:47the ghost builders have left behind.
29:50No cemetery has ever been found,
29:53so we don't have their bones either.
29:56But in a nearby museum is something very special.
30:00Let me show you.
30:02This is a natural mummy.
30:04Absolutely nothing's been done to preserve it.
30:06It was just buried in the dry desert sands,
30:09and it dehydrated quickly before bacteria could get to it.
30:13She's interesting.
30:15She's probably about 30 years old.
30:17Her teeth are good.
30:19It may look bad because there's a missing tooth here,
30:21but if you look closely at the socket,
30:23that fell out after she died because the socket's still
30:25intact.
30:27This is a mummy of a woman who was buried in the desert.
30:30The socket's still intact.
30:33Let's see what else.
30:35Come very close here.
30:37Look at the kneecap.
30:39If you look very closely, you can see an imprint
30:42of the textile she was wrapped in.
30:44That means when she was buried, she was still moist.
30:47Nothing had been done to her.
30:50And over here by the toes, there's
30:53a thread that ties the toes together.
30:56That's part of the burial ritual.
30:59The really special thing that you can only see in Peru
31:02are these hands here.
31:04They're a very early example of tattooing.
31:10But over here is the special one.
31:13This person was tattooed like a jaguar.
31:16I've never seen that anywhere else.
31:23These mummies are probably 2,000 years
31:27after our pyramid builders.
31:29You can tell that from the ritual,
31:31from the bit of textile here.
31:33So they really don't give us any information about the people
31:35who built our pyramid.
31:37Hardly anything's left of them.
31:41We don't know why they built their pyramid.
31:44We don't even have a name for their civilization.
31:48But we do have a clue as to what happened to them.
31:52About a mile away, we can see what
31:54looks like the beginning of the end
31:56for our mysterious pyramid builders.
32:08I bet you can't guess what this is.
32:11It's a complete digestive tract.
32:13There's the esophagus, stomach, intestines.
32:17Some poor guy has just had his guts ripped out.
32:22There are people who've been cut in half,
32:24and they're not very happy about it.
32:28You see this?
32:29It's not an apartment house.
32:31Those are vertebrae.
32:32That's a human spine.
32:35And you see these severed heads?
32:37The eyes have been gouged out.
32:39And you want to know where they are?
32:41They took the eyes, and they piled them up, right up
32:45to the sky.
32:47Next to all these body parts are fierce warriors.
32:51Someone has lost a battle big time.
32:54And my bet is that it's our phantom pyramid builders.
32:58They were no match for these guys.
33:00Their time had come, and their civilization ended.
33:05We don't know why they built their pyramid.
33:07What we do know is that the Peruvians
33:10kept building pyramids for the next 2,000 years, hundreds
33:14and hundreds of them, and used them for bizarre blood rituals
33:17unique to Peru.
33:19But that's in the next show.
33:22For now, I want to take you to a place you've never been to.
33:26In fact, I bet you've never even heard of it.
33:31Our next stop is way out in the Pacific Ocean,
33:35a place called Nan Madal.
33:37And to get there from New York, I
33:39had to take five airplane flights in 24 hours.
33:42And then, I'm still not there.
33:45That gets me to an island called Panope,
33:48right out in the Pacific Ocean, 1,000 miles east of Guam.
33:54I have a funny feeling I'm not in the Bronx anymore.
33:58This is as close to paradise as I've ever been.
34:02Panope is hundreds of miles from anywhere,
34:05and surrounded by a treacherous barrier reef that closes it
34:09off to the rest of the world.
34:11If you don't know these waters well,
34:13you don't get to the island.
34:19From here, I charter a fast boat,
34:22driven by someone who knows the waters very well.
34:31After about 45 minutes of speeding along the coast,
34:34we're almost there, Nan Madal.
34:44The water's very shallow at Nan Madal,
34:47so we transfer to an outrigger canoe.
34:51And then, the ruins come into sight.
34:56This isn't like any ancient building I've ever seen.
35:00The walls look like an American log cabin,
35:03but built out of huge volcanic stone logs.
35:13And out there facing the open sea
35:15are giant stone seawalls built to protect the island
35:18from the force of the sea.
35:231,000 years ago, these logs were split off
35:26from a mountain on Panope by building a fire,
35:29heating the logs, and then cooling them with water.
35:33Then, they were floated to their final destination.
35:39And all this on a tiny, isolated Pacific island
35:43with a population of 25,000.
35:52But the walls and the stone logs aren't the most amazing part.
35:57These little islands are all man-made.
36:01Remember when I said the water was shallow?
36:04Well, the builders of Nan Madal brought stone logs on rafts
36:09and built the islands from the bottom up.
36:14How many islands are there in total?
36:1592.
36:1692.
36:17And they're all man-made?
36:18Yes.
36:22The people of Nan Madal, without any metal tools,
36:27created one of the most remarkable monuments on Earth.
36:32Hundreds of shallow canals weave their way through Nan Madal.
36:36This is a Stone Age Venice.
36:46For centuries, the islands have been
36:48divided into religious clans.
36:51And my friend Thomas belongs to the eel clan.
36:54For generations, the eel has been sacred to his family.
36:58Whoa.
37:01Well, there's three now, I think, right?
37:02One, two, three.
37:06Can you pick one up?
37:08Sure.
37:08Really?
37:09I want to see one of these.
37:11Let's see this guy.
37:13Oh, they're all over.
37:14So I bet you're wondering what wrestling with sacred eels
37:18has to do with our Pyramids 101 class.
37:21Well, it's a little bit of a mystery.
37:23What wrestling with sacred eels has to do with our Pyramids 101
37:26class.
37:28Well, in all great pyramid building projects,
37:31you need the power of religion to motivate the people.
37:34Be it the ziggurats of ancient Iraq, the pyramids of Egypt,
37:38or the tombs of the emperors of China,
37:40they all required faith.
37:46This was once the most sacred spot on Nan Madal.
37:50Nobody has any idea how many eels were here, huh?
37:53Where high priests used to make their way to this ancient pool
37:57and offer turtle meat to the giant eel that
38:00swam in here through tunnels from the open sea.
38:08We're here.
38:09OK.
38:10Thanks.
38:11It's incredible.
38:13But faith is only half the story.
38:16It takes something else to create
38:18a great pyramid or tomb.
38:20It takes a powerful leader.
38:30This is the tomb of one of the rulers of Nan Madal.
38:35His family unified the feuding clans,
38:39and then they took that labor force
38:40and used it to build palaces and this tomb.
38:44You know, it's the same story everywhere.
38:47It doesn't seem to matter if it's the pyramids in Egypt
38:49or Nan Madal in the Pacific.
38:51It seems to be the tough, ruthless leader that
38:54gets the monuments built.
38:57OK, now you know what it took to build big,
39:00but we still haven't solved the great pyramid mystery.
39:04Why are all the pyramids around the world so similar?
39:07Well, by now you're all junior pyramid experts.
39:10You're very close to being able to figure it out.
39:17Like I said, there are pyramids all over the place.
39:21Peru, China, Egypt, Indonesia.
39:26How come?
39:27There are two reasons, God and the laws of physics.
39:33The cultures that built pyramids believed
39:35their gods were in the heavens.
39:38What better way to reach them than to build up to the sky?
39:42That's why the Tower of Babel was built, to reach God.
39:47So OK, you want to reach the gods
39:49by building to the heavens.
39:51Why build a pyramid?
39:53That's where the laws of physics come in.
39:56You see, we're all governed by the same laws of physics.
40:00Ancient Egyptians, Aztecs, Chinese.
40:04Pyramids were ancient skyscrapers.
40:07But without modern materials like steel beams,
40:10they couldn't go straight up.
40:13So in the ancient world, if you wanted
40:15to build really impressive, it had to have a broad base
40:20and get narrower at the top.
40:22Basically, a pyramid shape.
40:26Just try building a 400-foot column out of stone blocks.
40:30You can't do it.
40:32As you pile the blocks higher and higher,
40:34the bottom blocks bear all the weight
40:37and collapse is inevitable.
40:40The key to success is to distribute
40:43the weight over several blocks so that each stone rests
40:47on several others, which is exactly what a pyramid does.
40:53So if you want to reach your God by building up to the sky,
40:58the laws of physics lead you down one path, Pyramid Lane.
41:03All over the ancient world, people
41:05were building pyramids because they
41:07were people solving similar engineering
41:09problems in similar ways.
41:13And why are the big ones about the same size?
41:16I have an idea.
41:17It's a matter of how big you can build in one ruler's lifetime.
41:25But we still haven't solved the whole pyramid mystery.
41:29Size and shape aren't the only similarities
41:32among the pyramids of the ancient world.
41:35For example, ancient architects all over the world
41:40oriented their pyramids to the four points of the compass.
41:45The Chinese thought evil influences came from the north,
41:49so they oriented their pyramids to avoid them.
41:52Mexico's Pyramid of the Sun was carefully
41:55planned to be exactly 15 degrees east of true north.
41:59Why?
42:00So the sun would rise over the pyramid
42:02in May, the beginning of the rainy season.
42:05The Egyptians oriented their pyramids for another reason.
42:09They were obsessed with eternity and life after death.
42:13The north star never sets, and the pharaohs
42:16wanted to be associated with it.
42:19The Maya were obsessed with time, dates, calendars.
42:24That's why they oriented their pyramids to the heavens.
42:27But Maya pyramids do something no other pyramids in the world
42:30do.
42:31They put on a magic show.
42:36Twice a year, people from all over the world
42:38gather at Mexico's Chichen Itza to see
42:41something really amazing.
42:43The Maya were great mathematicians.
42:46They invented the number zero, and this pyramid
42:48is a coded message written in numbers.
42:53There are 91 steps on each side of the pyramid.
42:5891 times the four sides equals 364.
43:02Plus the temple on top gives you a 365-day calendar.
43:07Now, count the number of terraces beside the stairway.
43:12Nine on each side equals 18, the number
43:16of months in the Maya calendar.
43:18So we've got the number of days and months in a year
43:21built into the pyramid.
43:24The pyramid is your handy-dandy calendar computer.
43:26But don't go away, folks.
43:28The show's not over.
43:32This pyramid is so carefully oriented that twice a year,
43:37on the day of the spring and autumn equinox,
43:39something completely unique happens.
43:43A shadow snake undulates down the staircase, a magic show
43:48from the ancient Maya.
43:50Remember our Indonesian pyramid, the one
43:53that halfway around the world in Mexico
43:55seemed to have an identical twin?
43:58Well, the answer to how come is really quite simple.
44:02But you have to look closely.
44:09The Aztec pyramid was designed to display human sacrifice.
44:13So broad steps go up the outside so the victims could
44:17be marched up for all to see.
44:20Then their still-beating hearts were ripped out.
44:23It's a pyramid designed for a public horror show.
44:29Our Indonesian pyramid is a peaceful place
44:32with just a single narrow set of stairs for the priest to enter.
44:37Nothing else is there.
44:38Nothing bloody or violent took place here.
44:41There's no altar for human sacrifice.
44:43This is a monument built for kinder gods.
44:49OK, class, it's time for your final quiz.
44:53Our Aztec and Indonesian pyramids
44:55hold the answer to the great pyramid mystery.
44:58Why are the world's pyramids all so similar?
45:01The answer is, the pyramids are the most
45:04Why are the world's pyramids all so similar?
45:07The answer is, they're not.
45:10At first glance, they look like twins.
45:14But when you do your homework and look closely,
45:16you see that they're very different.
45:20The more you learn about pyramids,
45:22the less similar they seem.
45:25Each culture was building pyramids in its own way
45:29and for different purposes.
45:31That's why Egyptian pyramids are smooth,
45:34and no rituals took place on the top.
45:36In Mexico, it was just the opposite.
45:39They needed steps to get to the top for their sacrifices.
45:44They're all different.
45:48Let me show you the most exotic one I've ever seen.
45:52Indonesia isn't the most likely place to look for pyramids.
45:55It's the world's largest Muslim country,
45:58and Muslims worship in mosques, not pyramids.
46:02This isolated community is different from its neighbors.
46:06They're Hindus.
46:07They never converted to the Muslim faith,
46:10and it was their Hindu ancestors
46:12who built the pyramid I want to show you.
46:23It's really quite mysterious up here.
46:26This is a Hindu temple.
46:33If you want to see the pyramid,
46:35you have to keep going up, through the gates,
46:38higher and higher on the mountain.
46:48The Hindu community still worships here.
46:53I know, I know. Where's the pyramid?
46:55Well, if you go through all the gates,
46:59past all the shrines, at the very end is our pyramid.
47:08Even on a remote mountaintop in Indonesia,
47:11when people wanted to reach their gods,
47:14they built a pyramid.
47:16So, now we've solved the Great Pyramid mystery.
47:19The pyramids of the world are all very different.
47:22But, you know, they have one thing in common.
47:26They all reach for the sky.
47:29Egyptian pyramids were tombs of the pharaohs,
47:32but they pointed the way to the sky.
47:35The pyramids of the world are all very different.
47:38But, you know, they have one thing in common.
47:41They all reach for the sky.
47:43Egyptian pyramids were tombs of the pharaohs,
47:46but they pointed the way to the heavens.
47:49In ancient Mexico, they built pyramids
47:52so the gods could view their sacrifices.
47:55And when the Babylonians built their Tower of Babel,
47:58they were trying to reach the heavens.
48:01It's really all the same.
48:04They were going for the impossible,
48:06trying to build right up to the sky.
48:09It took a long time to top the ancients.
48:12For 4,000 years, the Great Pyramid of Egypt
48:16was the tallest building on the planet.
48:26380 feet.
48:31390 feet.
48:34420.
48:37435.
48:40440.
48:42We're almost there.
48:47450.
48:48We're almost at exactly the height of the Great Pyramid.
48:52It wasn't until the 19th century
48:54that anything really bigger was built.
48:56And then came this beauty.
49:01It took 4,000 years and iron beam
49:04for Eiffel to build his tower.
49:06And the only reason was to get high.
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