🌍 Where Myth Meets Reality: Exploring Ancient Wonders Awaiting Your Visit!

Last week we wrote about our recent trip to New Zealand. People have asked me, “Are there any places left that you haven’t visited?” Well, Antarctica is one, and we plan to go there next January. Russia is another, although that might have to wait awhile. There are some places out of mythology that we never thought could ever be visited, if they really existed, but that’s changing.

            My husband, Dave, is a history buff, and occasionally we’ll watch a movie that takes place in ancient times. Much of the ancient world is still shrouded in myth and legend, but in recent years, archaeologists have started to think that there are certain places from those times that we’ve always considered to be mythical, but may actually have really existed. The Smithsonian magazine recently told about nine of the most mysterious:

·         Troy. Made famous by Homer’s Iliad and Virgil’s Aeneid, the city of Troy actually did exist in what is now western Turkey. But was there really a decade-long war between the Greeks and the Trojans over the Greek princess Helen, who had eloped across the Aegean with a Trojan prince? Legend says that the demi-god Achilles fought on the Greek side until he was killed by an arrow to his heel, the only vulnerable part of his body. This was after the Greeks tricked the Trojans into opening the city gates to bring in the “Trojan horse.” Excavations have been ongoing since the late 19^th century, proving that Troy was indeed a city-state that existed for some 4,000 years on the river now known as the Karamenderes, and whoever controlled the mouth of the river was a force in the Aegean. Researchers now think that hard evidence of the epic conflict will eventually be found under the old riverbed.
·         Medusa’s Cave. Now known as Gorham’s Cave, it’s a natural cavern at the base of the Pillars of Hercules in the Strait of Gibraltar. Ancient mariners considered it to be the edge of the known world. Archaeologists recently retrieved, from deep within the cave, fragments from the head of a large, ceramic Gorgon dating to the 6^th century BC. Legend says the Gorgons were three monstrous sisters who terrorized Greek sailors by turning them to stone with a single glance. The Greek hero Perseus was said to have beheaded the most evil of the sisters, Medusa, while she slept in the cave. The British territory of Gibraltar now offers summer tours of the cavern.
·         Tintagel Castle. The ruins of this 13^th-century castle are on the rocky shores of Cornwall in England. It is said that this site was where King Arthur was conceived, although that would’ve been several hundred years earlier. A recent research project has uncovered evidence that the castle was built on the site of a bustling town that was a center of trade from as far away as the Mediterranean. Richard of Cornwall built the castle in part, records say, to maintain the site’s connection to Arthur, whose existence has never been proven.
·         Vinland. Greenland has been much in the news lately, but its importance goes back a long way. Legend has it that Norse explorers, led by Leif Erickson, sailed west from Greenland to what is now called Newfoundland, on the east coast of Canada. Evidence of the Vikings in Newfoundland was first found back in the 1960s, and research continues today. It’s now part of L’Anse aux Meadows Historical Site and includes reconstructions of the original sod dwellings where the Vikings lived for a few decades around 500 years before Columbus made his first voyage to the New World.
·         El Dorado. The Spanish conquistadors who followed Columbus westward were drawn in large part by reports of massive quantities of gold. There was said to be a kingdom in South America ruled by El Rey Dorado, a 16^th-century chief whose initiation rites included covering himself in gold dust and ceremonially dropping treasure into the center of a sacred lake. Explorers searched throughout the northern regions of the continent but never found such a place. Colombian researchers think there’s good reason to believe that Lake Guatavita was a place of such offerings during the Muisca period, which lasted a thousand years until around 1600. Over the past few centuries, many artifacts have been raised from the lake, including gold alloys, emeralds and evidence of animal sacrifice.
·         Solomon’s Temple. The ongoing civil war in Syria destroyed Ain Dara, a 3,000-year-old temple, in 2018. Some thirty years earlier, many archaeologists had identified the site as the biblical Solomon’s Temple. The site had much in common with the description from the Book of Kings in the Old Testament, including a courtyard paved with flagstones and a monumental staircase guarded by sphinxes. Some of its most important artifacts are on display in the National Museum of Aleppo.
·         Minotaur’s Labyrinth. Workers building a new airport on the Greek island of Crete recently uncovered what could be the site of the Minotaur’s labyrinth. The central circular building surrounded by eight stone rings intersected by walls resembles the style of tomb constructed by the Minoan civilization around 1800 BC. The Minotaur, according to Greek myth, was a ferocious creature with the head of a bull and body of a human male and was trapped in a maze built by the Greek architect Daedalus. Every seven years, Athens sacrificed seven young men and seven young women to the Minotaur, until Theseus, a prince of the city, volunteered to go inside and kill it. He succeeded, using a ball of thread to mark his way inside and find his way out. The site is still being studied, but there is evidence to suggest it was part of the myth’s origins.
·         Steinkjer. The Norse sagas tell of an ancient trading center that was for a time the largest in the Viking world, but nobody really knew where it might’ve been, or if it even existed. But in 2013, in preparation to expand a modern highway near the Norwegian city of Steinkjer, archaeologists discovered intriguing evidence in the form of two separate boat graves associated with a wide variety of high-status trade goods. The find added to previous research in the area that showed it to be a hotbed of Viking activity around a thousand years ago.
·         Pool of Siloam. In the Gospel of John, Jesus is reported to have restored the sight of a blind man at the Pool of Siloam in Jerusalem. The actual site was finally uncovered in 2004 when repair work on a water pipe south of the Temple Mount revealed two ancient stone steps. In the excavation that followed, researchers discovered a 2,700-year-old, 225-foot-long trapezoidal pool, which they identified as the Pool of Siloam. It would’ve been an important part of ancient Jerusalem’s water system, as well as a ritual bath used by visiting pilgrims. It opened to the public last year as part of the City of David National Park.

Whew! That’s quite a list, and I’m sure many of our clients will want to visit some of the sites, as well as other landmarks of the ancient world. We can get you there. Give us a call!