The Lost City of Nan Madol: Atlantis of the Pacific, Mystery of the East
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- Опубліковано 6 кві 2023
- In the remote Pacific, on the island of Pohnpei, lies what has been called the "eighth wonder of the world", and the "Atlantis of the Pacific". Once thought to have been lost city, the ruins of Nan Madol continue to fascinate all who see them. What was this mysterious complex of buildings? Pohnpeian oral tradition records that around the year 1200, the island was conquered by a group who would become known as the Saudeleur, and who enslaved the local population & constructed Nan Madol, a floating city perched atop artificially constructed islets, as their palatial center and power base. From here, they controlled the island and extracted tribute from the local population.
SOURCES:
Upon a Stone Altar, Handlon
Entangled Biographies Western Pacific Ceramics & the Tombs of Pohnpei, Rainbird
The Prehistoric Pacific, Terell
Micronesia's Breadfruit Revolution & the Evolution of a Culture Area, Petersen
Uncovering Pacific Pasts, Howes et al
Airborne LiDAR Reveals a Vast Archaeological Landscape at Nan Madol World Heritage Site, Comer et al
A Brief History of Pottery in the Pacific, Grainger
Every time I hear "Pohnpei" my brain thinks you're saying "Pompei" for a second lmao
Same!
His pronuncation of "Campbell" is also distracting. I can't work out if it is an affectation or he just doesn't know how to say it properly.
@@Simon.the.Likeableea
Yes,👍 He is struggling with some of his pronunciations. The "Pompeii" thing was annoying.
I never heard about Nan Madol until now. Thanks for sharing some more niche history topics with us!
You’re welcome!
Not saying he's right, but graham hancock visited there in the 90s and dived in the waters around the ruins on land, he believes he found stone pillars or something some feet under water. But I cant remember everything about it. It was the first time I heard about it thought.
@@cognitivedisability9864
Sadly that particular guy is full of nonsense. but it's true that he brought some (negative) attention to the site.
@@cognitivedisability9864 I don´t trust Hancock.
@@adb4522 Lets not throw the baby out with the bath-water though, his early work was rooted in pure investigation..the ideology that followed is questionable.
But he filmed the dive here for a tv show, and there are ruins 100- 200 ft below the water.
I wish there was more interest in this place and its secrets.
I studied Anthropology in the the late 1980's at Western Wyoming college. The professor Charlie Love taught an ethnology course focusing on the Pacific and he spent extensive time on Easter Island. We made a replica of a small Moi head and tried to move it. InWyoming.
Somewhere in the library of books I inherited from my mother, there is one about Nan Madol. I think the title was LOST CITY OF STONE.
She learned about it from a guy she worked with at the USPS, who was born and raised on the island.
One of my archaeology professors at Sonoma State was one of the archaeologists who originally worked on the site. It was awesome to learn about his perspective and experience on the island.
I had a Prof at University Oregon that did extensive work there, he was obsessed by the place
It’s 4 am and I can’t explain my excitement of this so I’m just going to say thank you ❤❤❤ lol.
This is a very cool topic thanks. It'd be cool to see an in-depth video about the settlement of the Pacific ocean islands, in my opinion one of the most impressive things humans ever did before the modern era. There is also the possibility they reached South America
Genetic evidence points to Polynesians reaching the Americas around 800 years ago. There's even genetic evidence for Aboriginal Australians reaching the Americas far earlier, before what we consider native Americans arrived. The history of the Americas is far more complex than what we currently understand, with Europeans and Africans only being the last big wave of peoples arriving out of a number of various waves of migration.
The _marae_ of French Polynesia are a great example of the achievements of Polynesian civilisation - the biggest temples on Tahiti were deliberately destroyed by Christian missionaries (along with the suppression of other elements of indigenous culture like tattoos, mahus, traditional kinship polities and the Tahitian language) but there are extensive temple complexes on Raiatea whose ruins at least survived colonialism.
All those failed human splicing experiments that were put out to stabilize before the good one came out are covered by Sumerian Genesis. If the guys doing it were human, THAT would be the most impressive singular experimental series humans ever did....
@@DrCorvid Hilarious. This is about real civilisations that actually existed in the real world - not the delusional fairytales of Bronze Age peasants and the cretins who believe them
The Polynesians were to the Pacific what the Phoenicians were to the Mediterranean and the Atlantic.
My eldest daughter was born on Guam, but most likely conceived on Pohnapei. We traveled to Nan Madol, a bit of an overland trip from the capitol city.
I had heard of it from the works of Lovecraft and was interested to see it up close. It’s a spooky place, a stone fortress on a peninsula… guarding nothing. It’s as if whatever they were worried about came from the ocean.
The locals will tell you it’s haunted and often see strange lights/ orbs moving around the place.
It might have been built with the threat of a seaborne invasion in mind since the people who are responsible for it conquered the island in exactly that way.
I've been there. The authorities discourage people from spending the night at the site. I hope to return someday.
Fascinating. The architecture of Nan Madol looks remarkably sophisticated - with buildings made from dressed, quarried stone blocks that are long and smooth. Interesting construction technique.
It's very good building, but the stone you mention are basalt columns; they fracture like that naturally when cooling.
@@abandoninplace2751 Thanks. Was wondering how they would've quarried and shaped the stone so beautifully.
@@emperorofpluto It's still a lot of work. Basalt is very dense, so those columns would be really heavy.
@@abandoninplace2751 its not that heavy.
@@johndavies4801 I tried lifting one my balls almost exploded, they're about five up to more than fifty tons each stone. FYI I was born and raised on this island.
So they used the natural shape of basalt columns to build structures? Interesting bit of archeology.
I think it's kinda neat that the structures are built similar to traditional log cabins but they just used columar basalt instead.
Micronesian native here. Thanks for sharing in a more well-researched and presentable manner. I wonder if you have anything on Yap, the western-most island state of the federated states of Micronesia 🤔
Hi! You’re very welcome! I don’t have anything on Yap yet, but I would like to do a video at some point
Appreciate everything you do, hands down this is my fav UA-cam history channel. 👍🏻
Great to see new content from this channel. Hands down my favorite history channel on UA-cam. My wife and I have our teenage sons watching all of your content on late antiquity. To say their high school teachers cannot keep up with them is an understatement. Hope all is well for you and yours.
I've popped back to UA-cam every so often, searching "Nan Madol" hoping there would finally be a decent video about this fascinating place....Thank you for doing it!
You’re very welcome!
It's a fascinating place that doesn't really get enough notice (usually if you hear anybody mention Nan Madol it's part of some crackpot theory about Atlantis or Lemuria). If I recall correctly the architecture of the site is quite distinct, which might indicate that the Saudelair were not part of the local cultural sphere but came from somewhere further off, but as far as I know we still don't know where exactly they did live before invading Pohnpei.
It does appear to be distinct for the area, yeah. Certainly it’s the first of its kind, as far as we’re currently aware. That’s an interesting point about the Saudeleur, though. From the literature I read in doing this video it seems that the main idea is that they were from a nearby island but it would interesting to find evidence that they were from farther afield
Crackpot? Because you don’t agree? Cool story
@@TheFallofRome I figured they might be native men who’d traveled to and from South America, who’d witnessed the large stone houses of far-off peoples, and realized they could use this to take over when they came back home.
@@zacktimmons2886 No, crackpot because geological evidence disproves them thoroughly enough.
@@bendover9813 South America is probably the wrong direction to look in. Micronesia is pretty far away from South America and there are a lot of other islands that are closer by, migration patterns in the Pacific also tended to go from west to east. Also you don't need to go all the way to South America to find megalithic construction like this, you can find it in other parts of Polynesia.
Well, that's something new. Great information thank you. These topics fascinate me
Fascinating! I'd never heard of this location. It's got one up on both Atlantis and Lemuria in that it actually... y'know... exists. 🤣
Sadly no Lemurs though.
First heard about that place when playing Civ VI, but it is great to get more background information on it.
This is a great video! It's about time that reasonable explanations and folklore described as such, replaced the superstitions, myths and outright lies so common on UA-cam and elsewhere. Kudos 🏆🏅
Thanks, I’m glad you liked it! So many of the videos on Nan Madol on YT, when I did a cursory search, were very heavy on the ancient aliens stuff
@@TheFallofRome Yes, Yes I saw some of those. Thanks to the infamous Error von Dummkopf, his number one student Hancock and copy cats like Unhinged X, the Internet is awash with pseudoscience and ahistoricity. Keep up the good and necessary work of producing and publishing real history.
Really fascinating, would love to see more pacific island history in the future!
This is amazing! Great video. Please more
I’m really loving these videos, I like how he goes through each phase of discovery, mythology and history. I love archaeology and history, can’t get enough of this.
It's amazing the amount of controversy, fighting etc, that we associate with huge land areas such as Europe, Asia, Middle East etcetera, are found, in miniature, on an island 10 miles by 13 miles in the middle of the Pacific. Even in what was Paradise there is always someone who thinks he has to run everything. As the archeologists become more adept in their studies, the idea that the White Europeans destroyed the peace loving people is put into perspective. Humans have been fighting each other for as long ago that we can study.
Great vid man, legit never heard about any of this before. Looking forward to future content and would love to see more vids on obsucure civilisations like this and the Oxus one u did a vid on a few months back.
You’re welcome! Hopefully this one gains traction and more people hear about Nan Madol!
@@TheFallofRome I hope so u deserve the views and appreciation 👊🏾
wow, that history of Nan Madol is absolutely mesmerising. Thank you for making this video!
You’re welcome!
Only heard about this via "conspiracy" videos, glad to see there's more to it
I’m happy this was helpful then!
You had me for a minute there thinking you were talking about Pompeii 😂
At the start there is a map and there is a Sea Turtle beside the N. Does this symbol mean anything? And then you go on to mention briefly the people identifying themselves as Turtles. This caught my eye because there is a similar Sea Turtle symbol on the Anaweka Waka, which is a very sophisticated part of a boat found in NZ and dated to around 1200AD. The Sea Turtle being an interesting symbol to find on a sea faring vessel because Sea Turtles are known to travel very long distances, floating on the surface much like a boat, it would make sense that it was an important part of a sea faring culture. The tools also look very similar to early Maori tools in NZ, which were not far from where the Waka was found.
This is amazing stuff. Thank you for sharing.
I'm hoping to focus on Australian and pacific archaeology for my career! Thanks for these awesome videos :)
You’re welcome! Best of luck!
I never heard of this before, this is great info. Thanks man!
thanks for the video on this really interesting subject. I had no idea this was even a thing.
Thank you. A bit of history that had escaped me. Fascinating.
Love these obscure topic videos
I had no idea about any of this! This is so cool.
Incredible story! Thanks.
I had heard of Nan Madol, but little more than their being ruins asociated with majic and curses. This was most informative, good to hear reseachers have been hard at work documenting it's history. I don't know why the inclusion of Lidar surprised me as it's such a useful tool for exploring these ancient sites. Thanks!
That may not have been a flight from oppression but a flight from justice.
Like Mutiny on the Bounty...
@@bokrugthewaterserpent3012 like a Chinese billionaire in Los Angeles.
Those kinds of details are basically impossible for us to know and don't really matter anyways, it could have been the result of a power struggle for all we know.
I had heard of Nan Madol butit meant nothing to me. Coming across this video has opened my eyes to real history in a microcosm, so to speak. My concentration was on megalithic, Egypt to Peru, Turkey to Mesoamerica. I'm truly grateful to you for this opportunity to broaden my knowledge. Your delivery is smooth and professional. Thank you.
An amazing overview of an incredibly obscure topic for modern Westerners - thanks as always, Mike, and hope that you have a Happy Easter!
Same to you!
never knew about this, dope video
Fascinating. I had no idea. Thanks.
Looks more like reusing, maintaining and maybe slight enlarging of pre existing structure than one made by scratch so to speak by the locals. Radiocarbon dating helps to find when the site was occupied by realatively recent arrivals but not when the stone was moved and worked in such astonishing as both quality and quantity manner presented.
Very little was known about Nan Midal back then so thank you very much you did a great job of explaining a very complex area of the planet
Very intriguing story. I heard of the Nan Madol ruins but didn't know much about them. I got wiser today.
I am from Federated States of Micronesia. its cool to see you covering our little isolated nation in the middle of nowhere. We are known for amazing seafaring skills and our flying proa. also our stone money.. you could say it was an early form of bitcoin.
I have been there. Building that structure in that location is awe inspiring.
thank you. Very interesting and well researched!
Glad you enjoyed it!
When I worked at Walmart I met and worked several ladies from this island. They all chewed Tobacco (it's cultural thing they told me) and were very proud of their island 🏝.
Very interesting. Thanks.
Wow! Never heard about Nan Madol before! Never seen that kind of construction method! Wow
Great video about something I’ve always been a little curious about but also knew very little.
Glad you enjoyed!
Wow, great video! Probably the best treatment of Nan Madol I've ever watched. 😎🔥🙌
Thanks Rob!
Love seeing videos of my Homeland of Pohnpei.
I recall well that in the early 70's there were authors claiming Nan Madol as the remains of some inexplicable ancient and advanced civilization.. It was sensationalized by the Eric Von Daniken types.
Great video
Fantastic video man
Thank tou
Wow, great video. I got the opportunity to visit this place years ago when in Micronesia with the U.S. Coast Guard. It's incredible.
Years back when I was working for a defense contractor in the Marshall Islands, I took a couple of trips to Pohnpei. Beautiful Island and friendly people with a cheap, legal narcotic drink that added to the fun. Also visited Nan Madol.
Anyway, great time and great place. Hiking, drinking, diving and other activities made it a great time.
The diving there was pretty unreal when I went like 10 years ago! Just healthy coral as far as you could see
so, where did all that basalt come from, again?
14:40 there is a bread fruit tree right there above the stairway.
One thing we do know about Nan Madol is that it gives +2 Culture to districts on or bordering coasts.
Interesting video.
Very interesting!
This story can make a really good collection (movies)❤
I really hope to hear more about Nan madol… I’m from there and still a mystery to me
good stuff
Good video.
Wow!
One of the most thorough accounts of this island I've ever heard or read. Can you share more on the archaeology reports?
Sumerian was a language isolate. Some think they may have arrived via the sea.
Oral tradition has it that the man who ruled Nan Madol had the body of a man and a head of a bird. Where do we see men with bird heads?
That was a head dress, he's Apache.. lol ikin kamwan
Nan Madol has the same construction method as Gunang Padang in Java (Indonesia).
There is another UA-cam channel into megalithic structures and giants who found a similar style of columns out in Africa.
@@4literv6 When vulcanic basalt cools down quikly, it form those hexagonal columns. When people take those columns and build a structure with them, you can clearly recognize them as a man made structure.
@@arthurfleck1554 so you've witnessed this first hand and can say confidently without any doubt that is what those columns are? 🤔
@@4literv6 google 'columnar basalt'.
@@arthurfleck1554 just as I thought then. 🤔
Interesting,and also interesting iron processing and possibly manufacture,implying a vast trading network of iron ,but with who?
Civ 6 brought me here. 🏝🎯 of the pacific! Paneeraq 👋
I knew about this place playing EU4, but its history is amazing
The island is now only a crop of rocks and some accent markers its under the sign of the humming bird in the stars it's in the Hawaiian island chain. Some of the Moari people say they came from there .there are no humming birds in NewZealand but the knew about them?
3 am :)
Fortunate to have visited Nan Madol.
Mystified? Come to the Federated States of Micronesia and visit all of the fours states (Pohnpei, Chuuk, Yap and Kosrae) and learn about an unreal past each share. You wont regret it!
I was able to visit all of FSM in 2008 and had a great and intriguing time. Did a kayak tour of Nan Madol and was amazed.
I was here in 1986, the locals didnt like to speak about it much.
I did visit the ruins and some things occurred that I still cannot explain.
That sounds interesting, what kind of things?
clipped by the Burckle Crater Event with the Pacific impacts at the same time?
The quarried stone looks a lot like that which was used at Gunung Padam.
Stone altar of an octopus? R’lyeh?
Great video!
Cthulhu waits dreaming
I'd like to see you do a video on the paleolithic ruins on Yap
One thing missing from the conversation concerning what could have destroyed the islands(mostly) and their inhabitants...a super typhoon similar to the one that hit the Philippines a few years ago. That could have done it in one fell swoop. Or Tsunami. Or Earthquake,etc.
13:02 lol "type to enter text" just below the fruit on Marshall Island.
Whoops lmao
I learned about this through Civ 6 of all things.
I can imagine a band of seafaring Maori warriors chancing upon a far off island. It's people and clans already divided and at war amongst themselves. It would have been the perfect opportunity to conquer the island and form a warrior aristocracy. Subjugating and enslaving the natives. The Maori do have a historical precedent for colonisation in the South Pacific around the same time in history.
I know nan modal, its tough to conquer and give a good culture boost as a suzerain
So interesting how so many islands stopped using pottery.
I understand that a ship carrying numerous items (which were located during an expedition when the site was first investigated) SUNK somewhere off the coast of the site. I don't understand why an in depth search for this ship and the items within has not been done or at least an effort made. If and when the ship is found...no doubt we will find items that could amaze the archeological world and verify what Ancient Alien believers adhere to.
Hey, thoughts on creating a discord servers for the viewers and subscribers?
Discord is Woke shit
I would like this.
That’s quite the detailed oral history. I thought the mainstream universally frowned on trusting these?
Not necessarily. Oral histories are sources like anything else, they have to be used with care. There are some fields of study, like the US Civil Rights Movement, which actually have oral histories making up one of their major source bases. But, the important thing is to cross reference them, and when that isn’t possible, to just take a greater degree of caution with it. What I’ve presented here in the video is more or less taken pretty well by anthropologists and historians, ignoring of course the more mythological parts
Lmao
This is a monument in the popular game EU4 which is the only reason I’ve read about it.
Don't know what you mean, it's almost lunchtime over here
The title really puts the boot to historic sensibilities right off the bat, kinda like the provable multiple Edens claim....
Just a portuguese fort build by naturals, when they were discovering the globe in tha zone, to help and support them on the big voyages across the globe.discovering it .
Call it a variation of Venice, it was intentionally underwater mostly. It is NOT an atlantis