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Graham Hancock’s Ancient Apocalypse 2: When One Apocalypse is Not Enough - Pseudo 151
487 Plays14 days ago
I have watched all episodes of Ancient Apocalypse 2: The Americas. It’s the same as the first one, just with different places. Overall it makes me sad, but not for the reasons you may think….
Now you have to listen to find out my reasons! I’m sorry for playing with your emotions.
Transcripts
- For rough transcripts of this episode go to https://www.archpodnet.com/pseudo/151
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Transcript
Introduction to the Podcast and Episode
00:00:00
Speaker
You're listening to the Archaeology Podcast Network. You are now entering the pseudo-archaeology podcast, a show that uncovers what's fact, what's fake, and what's fun in the crazy world of pseudo-archaeology.
00:00:23
Speaker
Hello and welcome to the pseudo archaeology podcast episode one hundred and fifty one. I am your host, Dr. Andrew Kinkella. And tonight, ancient apocalypse to the Americas for when one apocalypse is not enough.
00:00:44
Speaker
So hey, everyone, welcome back. I thought I'd do another special edition of the pseudo archaeology podcast, because aren't all the addition special? It's just a different levels of special. This one's extra special or maybe, you know, you can have your own vote. Maybe it's moderately special. Just depends. Just depends.
00:01:05
Speaker
And
Graham Hancock's Ancient Super Civilizations Series
00:01:06
Speaker
of course, I got to do Graham Hancock just did ancient apocalypse, too. Right. And this is a six episode series. I think the other one was the other one only six episodes. I feel like the other one was a bit more, but it doesn't matter. ah This is going to be, of course, more of the same with some different.
00:01:30
Speaker
View points by me and I'll get there as I get there. First off, what's funny is this is the third podcast I'm recording today. It started early in the morning.
00:01:42
Speaker
with a podcast called Screens of the Stone Age. And I really like those guys. They do like kind of a YouTube channel, too, at the same time. but So ah Screens of the Stone Age, of course, is is several archaeologists who get together and talk about mainly movies, right? Like movies and how close or how far away they are from archaeological reality. That's fun, right?
00:02:05
Speaker
Josh and Ross and and Kim like doing that show. I always enjoy doing it with those guys and they had said, hey, we should do ancient apocalypse. season two, but just the sixth episode, just the last one. So I had I had already just talked with them about that. And I'm like, dude, I should do the whole thing for my podcast. Actually, between then and now, though, I also just recorded the CRM archaeology podcast and now my third and last podcast of the day. Good God. ah This so. I had touched on some of this on the the screens of the Stone Age, but
00:02:44
Speaker
What I will say, of course, is I'll start at the end and just say that this show.
Critique of Hancock's Narrative and Production
00:02:52
Speaker
Unfortunately, is just pushing that same overarching narrative that Graham Hancock always does, this idea that there was an ancient super civilization at the end of the last ice age. And this is going to be around 13000 years ago, give or take right in there.
00:03:08
Speaker
And there was this one super civilization that had, you know, kind of all the answers and all the technology and all that good stuff wiped out by a common impact that never happened. And they were wiped out because not only was there a common impact, but the common impact enabled a giant flood, which never happened. And after this flood,
00:03:34
Speaker
The stragglers just thought, hey, we're the few stragglers of an ancient super civilization. Let's split up and move all around the world and teach the lowly tribal level societies about real civilization. Right. Because we, as we all know, other societies around the world could never figure this out for themselves.
00:03:57
Speaker
So that is always his underlying story. And it's it's just a 10 degrees barely of different from the Atlantis myth. We're just going on with the Atlantis and myth. But now instead of saying the words Atlantis, you go ancient super civilization. Right. And that whole thing is just ludicrous and tired, as we'll see, though.
00:04:20
Speaker
this This series made me extra sad, actually. And it's not sad in terms of archeology. It was sad in terms of the resources spent toward this. And honestly, Graham Hancock's talents as a host and and just how all of that is so wasted. And let me explain. I'm going to start out. Let's start out with some positive things.
00:04:45
Speaker
What did Graham Hancock do in this series that was positive? It's largely very similar to what he did last time in terms of the positivity. I can say that the production value of the show, very high. I can say that the writing of the show is quite good, even though some of the stuff they say is, of course, ludicrous. The overall organization of the writing, the flow of the writing through the episodes. Dude, not like good for that. There's obviously total professionals who are working on this show. The animation, they do these little animation bits where they try they explain things like maybe it's the Maya numbering system or these kind of stuff. Their animations are great. And actually, as we'll dive into in a minute, the setup of their stories tends to be quite good. My meaning there is, you know, Graham Hancock will talk about something like the ancient Maya. And the setup backstory.
00:05:42
Speaker
might be totally fine. You know, it'll be like, oh yeah, that's actually correct. But then of course his conclusions are terrible. Graham Hackett is a fine host and a good narrator and he knows how to keep his audience hooked. So he is a he is a skilled, you know, narrator and host. So like good for him. Oh, I will also say in this entire show, I don't think there were any aliens whatsoever. So again, you know, no aliens.
00:06:10
Speaker
OK, the downsides are always the same. It's like the probably the worst part is just the idea of the stupid super civilization thing and the idea that of extreme diffusion. This is the idea that, you know,
00:06:24
Speaker
all cultures on Earth have some sort of influence from one central spot, which is just utterly not true, right? So this idea of extreme diffusion is just foolish. The comparisons he makes between different cultures, it'll be like, oh, this God is just like this God over here.
00:06:45
Speaker
No, they're not. They're very, very different. And just to compare them is stupid. It's extreme cherry picking, right? This is taking little bits of data, but it's so extreme that. that I think many people of the sort of general public just watching the show will be like, I don't know how much sense that makes. And then use of dating throughout this, too, is really terrible. It it has nothing to do with reality. There are dates that he'll sneaky on out that actually don't relate to what you're seeing on screen. But you'll it seems like it's supposed to, but it doesn't. And it's really it's it's it's sneaky and it's unfair to the audience. So you do have that part, too.
00:07:26
Speaker
As I go through this, I'll just talk about little bits and bobs that that I thought were interesting or that I can kind of talk about. I can give a point counterpoint to I'm not going to try and explain every single thing that he does wrong here because it's not worth it. We'll be here all day, you know, and it's no fun. You understand that I know that there was no such thing as some freaking disaster around 13000 years ago where a great flood came and knocked out a super civilization. My big point on that, too, is always.
00:07:57
Speaker
Super civilizations only lived on beachfront property, you know, just not a fan of the mountains. What? ah the The idea that they're, you know, everything they once did is completely gone. Just foolish has nothing to do with reality or how archaeology or how. Archaeological sites are formed over time, you know, how things fall apart and aren't used anymore. It's there's no way that there would be nothing left. Makes no sense. Anyway, let's get into the episodes. In general,
New Discoveries: Human Footprints and Lidar Data
00:08:30
Speaker
I find that the first handful of episodes are not nearly as bad and then it falls off a cliff. Episode one. So, of course,
00:08:43
Speaker
Graham Hancock is going to start with mainstream archaeology is closed minded. They deny his ideas. They don't like him. He always has to set it, set that up, you know, as just to tell the audience, hey, what you think are facts. Oh, those aren't facts. That's just done by big archaeology, right? He always has to set the stage with that, which he does. And then.
00:09:07
Speaker
goes on and talks about a site called White Sands, which is in New Mexico. White Sands is a very cool site. White Sands does have some dates that, if they ultimately end up being true, does change our view on peopling of the new world a little bit. like That's a fair ball.
00:09:29
Speaker
So his setup, his exclamation of white sands, what they found at white sands are basically ah possibly human footprints that are with giant sloths. Like that's cool. You know, and they're dating to 23,000 years or so. That is correct to some of the stuff they're they're finding. So that's all good. i And I will say that the peopling of the new world.
00:09:52
Speaker
And you you you guys have probably heard me say this before, peopling of the new world is the single hardest question to answer in all of archaeology. I pick it as number one.
00:10:02
Speaker
Now, a classic reading of people of the new world today, I think most archaeologists agree that about 17000 years ago or so is the earliest, right? The idea being that people first came in to North America from Asia, about 17000 years ago, give or take it. We have decent evidence up through 15, 15 and a half, you know, and then once you get you and you may be add on a little, OK, 16 and a half, maybe 17 is probably when they first did this.
00:10:31
Speaker
That's really what it looks like. White Sands bumps that out to 23. So it's not insane, right? It's it's cool. Now there are... In the behind the scenes, archeology world, there's little bits and bobs of problems like, oh, is the dating completely correct? Or is this site is are the footprints actually human for sure? For sure. yeah there's There's these little bits and bobs that still have to be figured out. But this is not a fake site, you guys. Like White Sands is real. And I'm really excited to see what ultimately comes from it. It's new. Archeology has to be slow in terms of the sort of looking at the dates and sort of comparing it to other things and stuff. So, itll you know, it'll take some time. But
00:11:13
Speaker
to do a show and talk about White Sands at 23,000 is not crazy. It's totally fine. Again, this is the part that makes me sad because I think that overall Graham Hancock and the ancient apocalypse team did a great set up of White Sands, a great little vignette on this is the site. Isn't it awesome? Shouldn't you be interested in this?
00:11:36
Speaker
It's all great. But then, of course, they add in stuff like, oh, but then the comets came 13,000 years ago and killed off all the megafauna, which isn't true. The megafauna didn't all die like one year on a Tuesday. It's much more varied. And, you know, adding it into a proof of the super civil dammit, you know, so it's it's sad. It's sad.
00:12:01
Speaker
Right after this point, he brings out Keanu Reeves. Keanu Reeves is honestly not in it that much. They make a big thing about this. But whatever, you know, Keanu Reeves is just like he says some very vague stuff, which is that's his job. He just kind of goes, well, that's interesting. So I don't Keanu Reeves being in it or out of it or whatever. It's just it's just kind of silly. But but, you know, that's the that show biz man.
00:12:31
Speaker
Then he goes to the Amazon. And this is another moment where pretty good and and they do this thing on the episodes between each episode where they kind of start their next theme that they're going to talk about in the next episode. So episode one is really White Sands. And then they go to new finds in the Amazon just as a teaser. And then ah episode two is really on the Amazon. So.
00:12:56
Speaker
As they talk about the Amazon, this is the other one where I'm like, this is really not bad. You know, it's like, this is a setup of current information on the Amazon. They talk about Lidar data, which has really expanded our views on some of the Amazonian stuff. They do talk about archaeology of like, they don't make it explicit because they want it to sound bad, but archaeology of like 50 years ago. Yeah, they did.
00:13:23
Speaker
poo-poo the Amazon a little too much. You know, they were a bit too conservative. the The idea being that, oh, no, no complex societies could really live there. It's just sort of hunters and gatherers. But the LIDAR data and the settlement data really show that it's not, that there's more there. Now,
00:13:40
Speaker
Well, I said the setup is good. They really did a good job of showing the LiDAR data, showing all these mounds and stuff that are actually in the Amazon and showing these evidence of these older cultures that were there that would have been complex to to a degree. They incorrectly, I would say, call them like cities. They're not cities. They're like kind of what we would call kind of low density urban areas. But like they're like a.
00:14:07
Speaker
very complex village, I would say, or or this this kind of thing, which does make a difference because I don't want people to be thinking there's like huge pyramids in the middle of the Amazon because it really looks like there's not right. This is more. Oh, to get to get into the bits and bobs that kind of achieve them level society, you know, it reminds me of the very early Olmec stuff in the Maya area. So it's not as complex, not as huge as the Maya, but it's they're sort of starting to get it together.
00:14:36
Speaker
And they have the geoglyphs that they found all really, really cool stuff. But I also want to talk about in terms of these mound groups and these geoglyphs, which is just sort of large, often kind of rectangular or circular earth and structures, right?
00:14:53
Speaker
that these things all date but often within the last thousand years. Like, like if you have one reaching out to maybe 2000 years old, that's pretty old, right? They, but they have these times where they're sort of built and not built and then kind of built again, but it's in that range. Let's say last 2000 years, they then cut over to a rock art site called the Sarah day day Petunia, I believe, or something similar to that where there's this rock art, right? And it's in, it's in the Amazon area.
00:15:23
Speaker
And he says that there's stuff around there that's dated to 13,000 years. Yes. I'm sure you could find some burned piece of charcoal under the ground deep enough that dates to 13,000 years. But though that rock art is not 13,000 years old. Just so you're not is not that is definitely from the last thousand years. And this is this is rock out just.
00:15:47
Speaker
This is rock art just out on a stone, right out on sort of a cliff face in the middle of the elements. Like that stuff is not going to last. So I would even think it was from like the last 500 years or so. I would think it would be quite recent. so But they make this connection, like somehow it's ancient. And of course, the idea is that this.
00:16:08
Speaker
this this art is is somehow from these, you know, ancient peoples or something. It's just all BS. So that's sad. Again, I get sad. You know, I get sad when I see these great setups made by obviously good people on the production company, on the writing side and everything. And with the great camera work and the the sights, the stuff looks great.
00:16:31
Speaker
And and even the people they interview half the time, they're kind of silly, but the other half the time, they're pretty cool. ah But then to add this, you know, and therefore it was just there's an ancient super civilization. It's so sad. It's such a waste of time. But speaking of sad, when we come back, let's fall off a cliff and talk about Easter Island.
Critiquing Claims on Easter Island and Sacsayhuamán
00:16:56
Speaker
Hello, and welcome back to the pseudo archaeology podcast. I am your host, Dr. Andrew King Keller, and we have been discussing ancient apocalypse to the Americas, the new Graham Hancock special on Netflix. And we are now up to episode three. So episode one was White Sands, episode two is the Amazon. And again, both those episodes in terms of Graham Hancock world are a bit more of a light touch. He did this same thing in season one.
00:17:22
Speaker
First two episodes, not so bad. And then it falls off a cliff. So in season three, he goes to Easter Island. Right. And this is going to be the idea that the Moi are like actually super a ancient, or at least the platform that they're built on is, you know, multi, multi thousands of years old.
00:17:45
Speaker
It's all connected to an ancient flood. It's all connected to other worldwide myths, which it's not. This is just extreme diffusion at its worst. And what I see is Graham Hancock's at his worst when he's talking about old stuff he's talked about before.
00:18:05
Speaker
So we're going to get into, you know, like Easter islands and God, what else comes up? Oh, and then the Andes in a minute. It's just all total crap. Like these are the worst episodes. He's at his best when he's talking about new stuff. You know, like White Sands is new.
00:18:22
Speaker
And I think it's because there just hasn't been time to have ingrained bullshit. So they have to set up with kind of the facts because that's the story. You know, so I really notice a difference there. So it's pointless to really go in too much to the Easter Island thing. It's just.
00:18:42
Speaker
totally dumb. And to add idiocy to more idiocy, he trots out Thor Heyerdahl at the end, and Thor Heyerdahl's whole thing, the contiki, you know, I covered that in another episode. Thor Heyerdahl, I thought was really interesting when I was a kid, you know, I was like, wow, this is awesome, because the guy did make this funky, weird balsa raft and sail it from South America out towards the Pacific Islands going the wrong way that Polynesians wouldn't have gone. But It is definitely true to say that Thor Heyerdahl pushed a extremely racist ideology of like the people of Easter Island are white where or had white ancestors. This idea of like the white culture coming, I think, ultimately from didn know crossing the world in their whiteness. And and they don't.
00:19:34
Speaker
delve very deep into that stuff because, you know, Graham Hancock is smart enough not to not to touch on that. So he he kind of skirts around it. But what a pointless waste of time. Like there's no reason that to even bring that up. The whole Thor hired all thing isn't even really very scientific. It's just kind of silly. But it was very interesting for the time. So as we cruise through episode three, um,
00:20:01
Speaker
They talk about how plants move throughout the world, how human beings, you know, can bring certain plants for certain uses. That's totally that happens and and you can.
00:20:14
Speaker
look towards plants or domesticated plants, get an idea on age and this kind of thing. I don't know any of the specifics about the Easter Island stuff, but like the um I do know that, of course, some of the first colonizers to Easter Island, probably from Hawaii or other Polynesian islands like that would, of course, brought some of their own stuff to plant and eat. So. Anywho, that moves on.
00:20:43
Speaker
where he then, of course, from Easter Island jumps over to the Andes and to Perot. This part sucks, too. Like this is again, it's old and this brings in the awful, tired, stupid, pointless waste of time. Can you tell him a little negative on this of the stones at Saxa woman that are so formed and sculpted so well, carved so well by the ancient craftsmen that nobody knows how it was done. We know exactly how it was done by carving.
00:21:23
Speaker
really carefully. Like it's like it's I'm so tired of this crap, right? This it's like, why not just bring out puree's map or something else like that or stones of Atlantis just to kill me right here, right? This this stuff is just bottom of the barrel horse shit, which I guess he had to do, you know, maybe it's episode three and episode four. So he's like, this is like a lull.
00:21:46
Speaker
He has this idea that these various places were called navel of the earth and they're everywhere. It's just app god like God is pointless. It's funny. I have notes, you guys, that I kind of note little things as I'm watching this. I kind of will stuff to myself, you know, to remember. I wrote sucks and underlined it. Then I wrote boring.
00:22:11
Speaker
And it's unfortunately that is true just from a narrative sense. whatever you believe. I would say episode three and episode four are very slow and just like a little convoluted and odd and strange. It doesn't make much sense. You'll also see every so often he'll interview someone, always look close what they write under them. There's a guy they interviewed who's just a researcher of archaeology. That of course means they have no real training in archaeology that anyone could be a researcher.
00:22:41
Speaker
Check out an archeology book right now from the library. You're now a researcher of archeology. And that's, of course, the people that get to say the more outlandish, weird stuff. So at this point. I was like. I'm going to have some fun and write down the quotes that you would use if you were having a drinking game, watching ancient apocalypse, and you're like, drink every time Graham Hancock says this now.
00:23:10
Speaker
I don't condone this game, mainly because you'll get way too drunk, way too fast. So here's the quotes. Watch for these, friends. I can't figure it out. It's not possible or it's impossible. It's a mystery. It doesn't make sense. It's lost technology. We must acknowledge.
00:23:39
Speaker
open minded and it's very enigmatic. Right. There you go. Oh, I also have did I do it's a mystery and contradiction. And also they're very simple. We don't know.
00:23:57
Speaker
So these come up so often, and I would say it's a double whammy for the word mystery. It's a mystery. It's a mystery. It's a mystery. So if your drinking game was simply the word mystery, you still probably wouldn't make it to episode three. And that just gives you an idea. It's this constant, like, we don't know who knows archeologist fact. They don't have facts. What do you mean facts? They don't know. Right. And it's that's where it gets very tired. So I just started to do that for a while, although I did pay attention. I totally did. I watched the whole thing.
00:24:29
Speaker
They jumped back to the Amazon again in episode four, and they they go a little deeper in actually the soil out
Ancient Agricultural Practices in the Amazon
00:24:40
Speaker
there. And again, some of this is like is is real. There is this black soil, the sort of black Amazonian soil that that portions of it are probably largely human made, meaning that that over the centuries and millennia, people who lived there amended their soil to make it better. And of course they would do it by using like vegetable waste they put in there, human waste they'd put in there. They would probably um do a little bit of slash and burn all this kind of stuff to make the soil better. Cause there are some areas where the soil is pretty crappy. And this stuff reminds me so much of the Maya. It's very similar to the, to the Maya world. So I got, I mean, I got no problem, you know, talking about that. They do do these overarching. It's so sad. They don't need to do this.
00:25:26
Speaker
where they say, you know, the Amazon is planted. It's like, no, that's not right. The ancient people did not just like plant all the trees. It wasn't a savanna. And then they like amended the soil and planted huge trees. They lived with their environment. They lived with the jungle and they they would do the equivalent just like the Maya.
00:25:48
Speaker
where they would manage the jungle, you know, cut out the weeds, but leave the nice big trees and that kind of stuff, leave the plants that are good, cut out the plants that are bad, just like you do in your backyard today. But they would do that. And then on top of it, have some sort of horticulture or simple agricultural thing. That's kind of the next step that that archaeologists can really look at, like how complex was there?
00:26:14
Speaker
system of planting crops, right? It can be more of a gardening kind of thing, or it can be a bigger, like, agriculture thing. I think it's a bit more simple, then more complex, but that's cool. And then, of course, you got to throw this in. And this next bit, Graham Hancock actually talks about this a lot. And I'm surprised it wasn't in the first season of ancient apocalypse, but or it was so little, but now he really busts out and explains this is all about drugs, right? The idea that all complex cultures have drugs. You got to do drugs to expand your minds, man. And because of these drugs, it shows you that all the squares and circles that everyone draws all around the world, their squares and circles,
00:27:08
Speaker
they're all interrelated, man. Because, you know, when I'm really high, we're just, we're all one. You know, don't you feel me? on I feel it. Did you? I can't see right now. You know, and I just, the whole drug thing is There's a happy meeting where you can say, yes, all cultures have and drugs and, you know, have stuff they partake in to kind of change their mindset a little bit or, you know, make a Saturday night a little more interesting. But this overcooked idea of like, oh dude, if you don't have shaman with drugs, well, you just.
00:27:48
Speaker
yeah civilization is just not going to work, you know, and it's he way over does it. And of course, saying that once you're high, and you go draw like some rock art, that somehow that's literally the circles and like the triangles are like all related, you know, around the world that oh that had to be a super civilization that taught everyone circles and triangles when they're high.
00:28:11
Speaker
And then, and then in a real low point, he also relates it to the Amazon geoglyphs saying like, Oh dude, when you're, you know, when you're high on Athawasca or ayahuasca, I should say, when you're high on ayahuasca, that just, that means you're going to go out in the jungle and make big like squares and circles. Cause that's what I want to do when I'm high, when I'm high, I'm like, I got to get out there and just like make a berm of dirt.
00:28:40
Speaker
And it again, I know I'm... having a laugh, but ah it's it's just it's silly. It goes on too long. Let's talk about how ayahuasca is made. OK, they Graham talks on touches on the idea of like indigenous science. The words use science there is kind of a slippery slope. But what you would say is traditional ecological knowledge, which is very cool. Right. And very interesting. and That is something very worth studying. It's really fascinating. Like I learned a bunch of interesting stuff.
00:29:12
Speaker
in Belize, you know, in the jungle with like the local Belizean guys who really knew a lot about, about the jungle and about the plants, you know, that that's fascinating. And that's something that we can really, we can use traditional archaeological knowledge in archaeology to explain, you know, certain things, things we find. So that's awesome. It's like what I call it science in a Western sense. Not, not not exactly. I'm not poo-pooing it though. You know what I mean? It's a, it's a, we're splitting hairs.
00:29:40
Speaker
He then, because the Amazon has these geoglyphs or these earthen, really these earthen mounds, he then relates that to like Ohio and in the United States, to the mound builders, and then cruises through Chaco Canyon, relates in Gobekli Tepe.
00:29:59
Speaker
and And again, one of the more dopey ass ideas. So in the Southwest, they have Kivas, which are these circular semi subterranean locations, right? Which are very like ritual things. The idea that because these are semi underground, the idea that they're symbolic of when their ancestors had to go underground to protect themselves from the comet. Oh, dude, you know what's happening?
00:30:32
Speaker
Which, of course, is a hop, skip and a jump to alignments ah in in terms of what how these buildings align, North Star, Equinox, Moonrise, Sunrise, or all that kind of good stuff. And then we'll take us into our final phase of the ancient Maya more when we return.
00:30:59
Speaker
Hello and welcome back to the pseudo-archaeology
The Maya City of Palenque and Celestial Alignments
00:31:01
Speaker
podcast. I am your host, Dr. Andrew Kinkella, and we have been discussing ancient apocalypse part two, and we have flown through it. We are now to episode six. Episode six is upon us, the last episode. And again, what they've done is the end of episode five, they've introduced the Maya, right?
00:31:22
Speaker
And they are focused on the city of Palenque. Palenque is an awesome archaeological site. I recommend everyone see Palenque before they die. It's definitely in my top like three.
00:31:39
Speaker
ancient Maya city centers to see, to call would probably be number one. The Palenque is right in there. It's really pretty. It's really just astonishing, you know, when you walk there. So I would agree with Graham Hancock. Graham Graham does a great job of kind of showing his astonishment, you know, walking around Palenque, especially like in the during sunset or during kind of a golden hour. It's really cool. I mean, dude, we're all going to agree on that. That's awesome.
00:32:10
Speaker
So Graham goes there and he is. Sort of talking more about various alignments, you know, alignments where the end by alignments, I mean, where buildings at Palenque will align to like spring equinox and there'll be others, you know, aligned to summer equinox, summer summer summer equinox, spring equinox, fall equinox, summer solstice, winter solstice, and so on and so forth.
00:32:38
Speaker
certain places where the moon rises, you know certain moments, sunrise, position of Venus. These are all really obvious, important celestial right alignments.
00:32:53
Speaker
Now, many of those are are true and a fair ball. right And again, Palenque is a classic myocyte. It's going to be built and used anywhere from, oh, right around the time of Christ. Maybe it took before it really becomes what we think of as Palenque in the Maya classic period from like 250 to around 900 AD. And then it is abandoned after the Maya collapse around 900. Anyway, at around 600 AD or so, it's cooking on ah all cylinders. And Graham goes to the temple of the sun, talks about these alignments that Palenque has a temple of the sun.
00:33:33
Speaker
which is not its largest temple, but it's it's it's got a great name and and and it's a name that makes makes a lot of sense because there's alignments with the with the sun. He talks about how ancient Maya pyramids or or cities kind of connect The world of Danad land, you know, to the sky. That's all very fair. You know, he he does the setup of these alignments. I will throw the ancient Maya under the bus a little, as I will do with all ancient cultures, just to remind us that making alignments is easy. OK, you can do it in your backyard. You can like set up like a chair to sit in. You can take some sticks. You can put the stick in front of you wherever the sun is rising towards the horizon.
00:34:17
Speaker
And then just keep doing that all day for like a year. And then you have a line of sticks and you're going to know exactly the angle of where the sun, where the equinox, where the summer winter solstice, et cetera. It's easy. We many of us have done this as kids at school, you know, you're just making alignments. So it's cool. I love archaeoastronomy. I mean, I'm a not very closeted total astronomy nerd, but I don't want people to have this idea of like,
00:34:46
Speaker
How did they do it? It's unknown. No, no, no. It's known. And it's pretty easy. It's just that when you align something big, like a pyramid, you're like, wow. you know But it's easy if you just stay with it. You're like, we're going to build this pyramid at exactly this angle. And it's going to be great. So they did that. Good for them.
00:35:05
Speaker
He then moves on and actually talks about something that I think is kind of fun is that there's this tower at Planck in the Acropolis area. it's It's like it's like tall and skinny. And he Graham talks correctly about when it was found that it didn't have a roof. And when you look at it today, there's a roof they reconstructed on it years ago, like 70 years ago or something or longer. They had no idea what the roof is supposed to look like. So the roof looks like.
00:35:32
Speaker
the top of every California Spanish mission ever. It's weird. It's like when you look at it, you're like, why is there a Spanish mission bell tower at the top of this Maya pyramid? You know, like it's strange and it's definitely wrong. And he's a fair ball to say that. And he talks about how The tower may have been an observatory. I don't know if there's really much evidence one way or another for that, but, you know, what? OK, whatever. Where he starts to go down the whole of doom and gloom.
00:36:05
Speaker
As you said, there's some Venus glyphs that were found up there, which is fine if there were. That's some the Venus was one of the most important celestial objects to the Maya, both as morning star and evening star. So just that it's there, it's in a lot of places.
00:36:23
Speaker
You see the relation to the Venus tables, Venus, Venus, Venus, lots. So just as there doesn't necessarily mean it was an observatory, but then he takes another step and says, oh, and that relates it to Kukul Khan, which is the Maya, basically the Maya version of Quetzalcoatl, the plumed serpent. And that has nothing to do with nothing. Now, yes, you can find times when Quetzalcoatl is related to that. And from now on, I'll just say Quetzalcoatl. I also mean Kukul Khan or any other forms of the plumed serpent.
00:36:51
Speaker
But there's no reason to connect that to. Quetzalcoatl or anything else, if you just find if you just find some Venus glyphs that doesn't then add up to that. And then it goes on this whole thing about how Quetzalcoatl is related to Chichen Itza, which it is Chichen Itza is another site in the north, a post-classic site.
00:37:15
Speaker
where actually you would see much more plume-surfing imagery. It's much more of a post-classic thing. And by post-classic, I mean like from 950 AD until Spanish contact in the 1500s. It's almost more of a central Mexican deity that's kind of has moved into the Maya world for the post classic. The post classic Maya world is a bit different than the classic Maya
Misinterpretations of Quetzalcoatl and the Maya Calendar
00:37:39
Speaker
world. and So first, just relating that to Palenque is just so kind of a waste of everyone's time. And then, of course, he goes down this rabbit hole of Quetzalcoatl being this bearded guy from across the seas who comes to the Maya world to show them
00:37:56
Speaker
how to be civilized, which is just a just a big crock of dumbness. Now, there are bits and bobs of a story like this. It gets kind of complicated, but there's you can so there is possibly a figure that came to Chichen Itza near the beginning of the post plastic period from Tula, which is a place in central Mexico when this person may have been like referred to as Quetzalcoatl or something like this. That's not the end of the world. There could be this real person, but that's not from overseas. That's from
00:38:30
Speaker
another place in Mesoamerica. It makes sense. And we see a lot of Tula influence in the post-classic Maya world. So that's fine. But I think when we hear this story, it's a bastardization of it that the Spanish kind of it's gone through Spanish conquest. And it's like, oh, no, no, no, it wasn't it wasn't a ruler or an important person from Tula. oh It was it was Cortez or Phil and your conquistador of the day.
00:38:56
Speaker
from a wall beyond the seas and he came. No, you know, no. That that whole Quetzalcoatl esque Cortez thing is a very obviously contact period. It doesn't have the depth of these stories. And then Graham relates Quetzalcoatl to like Osiris in Egypt.
00:39:18
Speaker
There's no relation between these two gods. It's just apples and oranges. I don't, it's like, what? You know, that, that was just senseless meant nothing. Oh, I will say let's learn something real for a second and just say Quetzalcoatl is, it's kind of a hard God to Pinned down. Because like in the my world, you'll have something like chalk. Chalk is the rain god. That's easy, right? Chalk controls like lightning and rain and you get it. You know, it's like, oh, you want chalk to come to bring the rain. Understood. So what's Quetzalcoatl's job?
00:39:58
Speaker
Quetzalcoatl, the plume serpent, to me, he's mostly known for kind of a wind god. And because if you're a wind god in the Maya realm, you're going to have aspects of rain and thunder and this kind of stuff. But you're mainly the wind god. And it feels weird to us because we're like a wind god. What's that? Who needs it? But if you're living and working in the jungle in the Maya lowlands,
00:40:24
Speaker
It's almost never windy. There's certain times when there's just no wind. It's totally still. When the rain comes, what happens is everything's still and then a cold wind whips up.
00:40:38
Speaker
And you're like, oh, no, because you know you have 20 seconds before there's going to be a downpour. And that is Quetzalcoatl, right, whipping his serpent tail and that having the wind go before Choc's going to come and downpour and dump on you. So that makes way more sense to me, you know, having worked in the jungle. And I get that.
00:41:00
Speaker
Quetzalcoatl's been around so long, though, that he kind of morphed a little bit. And there's other aspects that they tacked to him, which is fine because it's a long time between the classic period and the post-classic. You know, we're talking thousands of years, beliefs and symbolism changes.
00:41:17
Speaker
So that's what I think of when I think of the Quetzalcoatl, the plume serpent, and also very central Mexico. Quetzalcoatl has his own temple at Teotihuacan, which is in the Mexico City area. It was huge. It was the biggest site of the kind of pre-Columbian world, the earlier pre-Columbian world.
00:41:36
Speaker
so there's that, which ends with the Osiris silliness. And then Graham interviews and my archeologist Ed, uh, Ed Barnhart and Ed just does, it does a fine job of just going through like the Maya number system, the Maya calendar system, you know, the Maya number system in base 20, the Maya calendar system being basically three calendars in one. I've described this in other podcasts, but I have no problem. And, and this,
00:42:04
Speaker
As as Ed describes things, this is the moment when I think some archaeologists will get really down on Ed. Like, how dare you? How dare you even be a part of ancient apocalypse? I don't mind it. Like, it goes back to my theme of like, look, we as archaeologists have lost The pseudo archaeology crowd has all media outlets and controls it all and controls the public idea of archaeology. So we need to meet them where they're at. So I'm really happy that Ed was a part of this and I thought really sort of held his own and and said the facts. So while ancient apocalypse is obviously full of shit and stupid and the whole like like ancient civilization at the end of last ice age thing, it's just ludicrous and boring.
00:42:51
Speaker
at least people watching this get a fair shake on how the calendar works and how the mind numbering system works. And, and Ed cruises around and talks about some more esoteric stuff, like the ruler Pakal at Palenque, who's like the biggest one of all time and his son, Khan Balam.
00:43:08
Speaker
which that's a whole big thing talks about the world tree talks about how the Milky Way is symbolic of kind of the road to the afterlife, all good, all fair, all true, all fine facts and ideas from archaeology. So I got no problem that he did that. And there were one or two things that he said that I think we're maybe taking out of contracts a little bit. He like Ed pushes that ragged edge of like, well, you know, we in archeology, I think he said that very few facts. And the way that came out, it's like, I wouldn't have said that. You know, I'd be like, no, we have, you don't, we don't want to put us on the same level as pseudo-archaeology because we're not, we have facts. They don't, you know? So I wouldn't have said that. That's the only thing I would really hit him for. The rest, you know, Hey, do the setup. Tell me how the numbers work. He did.
00:43:59
Speaker
He did talk about how the Maya sometimes refer to really old stuff. I believe he brought up like 33,000 years ago or like five million years ago. When the Maya do that, I think it's more reasonable and real to say the reason they do that is they're starting a story and saying something like it happened five million years ago is the equivalent of saying.
00:44:24
Speaker
A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away, this happened. The Maya are setting the story to be like, no, no, no, this was in the ancient past. This was in the time of the gods. This was in the before time. That's what that means. So it's not a literal like, oh, we've been counting this for five million years. No, no, no. It's like when we say, you know, it's an overstatement. It's like when we say, dude, that was like a million years ago. It wasn't literally a million. years You know, that's what they're doing. So there's that as well. But overall,
00:44:53
Speaker
Whatever he again, they go on. They talk about the Maya. They talk about how the idea of the Milky Way or or sort of.
00:45:05
Speaker
souls going up. That is a Pan American belief, like all cultures believe that they don't. There's a lot of variety in that. So that that was that wasn't correct. And Graham ends up the whole like they're all connected. They're not. That's that's incorrect. He doubles down at the very end going back to that rock art site in the Amazon and is like And, you know, so basically and therefore this stuff has been around for 13,000 years based on my false date of this rock art site, which of course he doesn't say this, but it's that that ending is just sort of silly. You know, oh, it must just be the only way for this to be true is through extraordinary coincidence. No, it's not. Yeah. So it sort of ends with
00:46:00
Speaker
That sort of want wall. I think he walks out with Keanu Reeves one more time. Yeah. OK, whatever. But it sort of ah does that end in in a whimper. So that's it. He does do this little credit at the very end where he's like, you know, and I have to credit scientific archaeology for some of these breakthroughs. I was nice. OK, thanks, man. But at the end,
00:46:30
Speaker
As of course you've been able to figure out from my rants. It's. It's just all incorrect and what's sad. I keep coming back to this. It's just, man, what a waste of time and money and.
00:46:46
Speaker
Graham shows us that if he did this for real, if he did a real show, he could totally do it and kick ass. He totally could. He could do a real show just on White Sands. He could do a real show just on the Amazon and make a real show where it's still like fascinating. I think his favorite. I think the best parts were actually White Sands in the Amazon.
00:47:10
Speaker
And if I had some sort of dare or some sort of point to make the Graham Hancock, I would just say this. I'd be like, hey, man, instead of doing this and rehashing this stuff, here's what my dare would be. I'd be like, Graham, you have access to a lot of money and a lot of people in in this world of bringing like archaeology to the public.
00:47:40
Speaker
Why don't you pay or get a company of some kind to pay for some new Lidar to be done in the Amazon? Because there's huge swaths of the Amazon where Lidar still hasn't been done. There's so much more to do. Why don't you do a strip, a big strip of Lidar? Have it done. And we'll see what structures come up and just give the data to me or people like me and you do it. And we both give our translations of what happened.
00:48:07
Speaker
Therefore, like no matter what, you can say whatever. There's actual real data that you've added to the archaeological past. I just think that would be really, really cool if he just went like, you know what, I'm going to do like a, you know, like 500 square kilometer swath of new LiDAR data. That
Potential for Fact-Based Archaeology Shows
00:48:28
Speaker
would be awesome for everyone. You know, like we could really do something good with that. So that's where I would land.
00:48:35
Speaker
It's, you know, do you guys need to watch this now? I do think there's less interest in this than there wasn't the first one. And it's sort of even for myself. I knew I had to watch it and I was kind of like, huh, you know, I just it it wasn't something I felt like really wasn't really into. But hey, man, we did it. We made it to the end. There was no super civilization. And I think we're all fine with that. And with that,
00:49:05
Speaker
I'll see you guys next time.
00:49:10
Speaker
for listening to the pseudoareology podcast please like and subscribe wherever you like and subscribe and if you have questions for me dr andrew kkella feel free to reach out using the links below or go to my youtube channel kinkela teaches archaeology see you guys next time
00:49:31
Speaker
This episode was produced by Chris Webster from his ah RV traveling the United States, Tristan Boyle in Scotland, DigTech LLC, Cultural Media, and the Archaeology Podcast Network, and was edited by Rachel Rodin. This has been a presentation of the Archaeology Podcast Network. Visit us on the web for show notes and other podcasts at www.archpodnet.com. Contact us at chris at archaeologypodcastnetwork.com.