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[Graham] Are we a species with amnesia?

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Could we have forgotten
a vital part of our own story?

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I'm Graham Hancock,

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and many archaeologists
hate me for trying to find out.

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The notion of a lost
advanced civilization of the Ice Age

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is extremely threatening
to mainstream archaeology

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because it rips the ground out
from under that entire discipline.

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It removes the foundation.

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I don't care about that.

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There's people that come along
and because of their impact,

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it changes the way people look at things.

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Graham Hancock is a man who,

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despite all of the insults,

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and all of the people disparaging his work

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he has trekked on and on and on.

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What I care about
is learning the lessons of the past

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in order to clear away that fog
that surrounds prehistory.

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And it's a fog
because there's no documents.

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We have to build our picture of the past
from fragmentary evidence.

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Folk stories, legends, myths.

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These for me are all important evidence.

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And one of the most mysterious
and revealing mythologies in prehistory

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comes down to us
through the ancient cultures of Mexico.

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[Graham] In my search
for a lost civilization,

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I've come to a land of fertile valleys
and simmering volcanoes.

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This is the Puebla region,
east of Mexico City.

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The site of this country's oldest
continuously inhabited city, Cholula.

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Today, a modern metropolis
of over 100,000 people,

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it holds an ancient secret at its heart.

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History is written by the victors.

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That's especially true in Mexico.

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When the Spanish conquistadors
arrived in Cholula in 1519,

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they massacred its inhabitants,

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obliterating not only their culture,

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but also almost all traces

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of the more ancient cultures
that had preceded them.

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But the invaders
couldn't erase everything.

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The conquistadors had first assumed
this hill was just that, a hill,

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and they built a church on top of it.

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But this hill isn't the natural feature
it's often mistaken for.

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In fact, it's the most massive monument
ever built anywhere in the world.

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And yet, chances are
you've never heard of it.

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This is the Great Pyramid of Cholula.

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After centuries of neglect and pillaging,

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it's impossible to understand

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the sheer enormity
of what once stood here.

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But we do have some idea of what
it must have looked like in its prime.

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It's estimated that
the Great Pyramid of Cholula

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rose to at least 213 feet, 65 meters.

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Evidence suggests
it was originally dedicated

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to the ancient Mexican god
of rain and floods,

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whom the Aztecs
knew by the name of Tlaloc.

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Built mostly with
mud and straw adobe bricks,

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it wasn't as tall
as Egypt's Great Pyramid of Giza,

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but it was larger
with nearly three times the footprint,

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measuring 400 by 400 meters at its base,

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roughly 30 football fields,

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making this the largest monument

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ever constructed
by any civilization anywhere.

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Archaeologists quickly established

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that work on the pyramid
was completed around eight centuries ago,

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1200 AD or thereabouts.

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But when they began cutting tunnels
through the body of the structure,

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they were stunned
by what they discovered inside.

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It's a surreal feeling

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descending into
the largest pyramid on Earth.

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Within are beautiful murals

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depicting mythological scenes
and creatures…

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and tantalizing glimpses
of many layers of construction.

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Do they offer clues
to this site's biggest mystery?

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Could it be part of a global legacy

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left behind by an ancient,
advanced civilization of prehistory?

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I'm joined by one of the world's leading
experts on the Great Pyramid of Cholula,

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University of Calgary anthropologist
and archaeologist, Geoff McCafferty.

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We're in the heart
of the most massive monument

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ever built anywhere in the ancient world.

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You get almost the same sense
as when you go into a church.

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You know, there is a tangible sense
of an aura of that power.

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These tunnels were excavated
by Mexican archaeologists.

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There are a total of
eight kilometers of tunnels.

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-That's extraordinary. Eight kilometers?
-Yeah.

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[Graham] Using these tunnels,

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archaeologists made
an astounding discovery.

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The Pyramid of Cholula
is simply the latest

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in a whole series of
more ancient pyramids hidden beneath.

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Inside is an even older pyramid,

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dating back to 800 AD or so,

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and beneath that, another one

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dating at least 200 to 500 years earlier.

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Until like a series
of Russian nesting dolls,

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we get to what's thought to be
the first and oldest pyramid built here,

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still an impressive 120 meters square
and 17 meters or 56 feet high.

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When did construction first begin here?

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So, the earliest evidence
of construction of the ceremonial zone

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dates to about 500 BC.

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It was a good size pyramid.

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Then, over time, it was expanded,

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sort of larger construction
over the top of the other.

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[Graham] So this pyramid-building project

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must have been carried out
by multiple generations

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over a span of 1,700 years,
and possibly longer,

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a fact now acknowledged by archaeologists.

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Yet modern scholarship

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knows next to nothing
about the original architects

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or why they chose to build a pyramid here.

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Precisely the mysteries
that most interest me.

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Do you get the sense
that something may be missing

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from the archaeological
and historical story of ancient Mexico?

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[Geoffrey]
Well, not to be overly dramatic,

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but I think that
a better understanding of Cholula

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would fundamentally change
the perception of Mesoamerican history.

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It is a black hole.

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It is a black hole in Mexican history.

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Do you think there was something here
before that first pyramid was built?

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The pyramid was built over
an important spring.

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[Graham] Yeah.

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The spring represents
a passageway into the underworld…

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-Mmm.
-…so it was clearly an important

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sacred space
as well as a ceremonial focus.

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The fact that
the pyramid was the structure

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that was chosen to be
built upon that site is not accidental.

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On the contrary,
I believe it's a critical clue

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to understanding the motivations
of the original builders,

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because that repeats a theme
that we find all around the world.

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We've already uncovered evidence

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of a similar terraced pyramid
in Indonesia at Gunung Padang

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that also has
a sacred spring at its heart.

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It's a pattern found
not just in Mexico or Indonesia.

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That's the case
with the subterranean chamber

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beneath the Great Pyramid of Giza.

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In my view, that is the first sacred place
on the Giza plateau,

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and the pyramids are later
built on top of it to honor it.

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The Pyramid of the Sun in Teotihuacán
sits on top of a natural cavern.

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They modified it somewhat

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and then,
they built a pyramid on top of it.

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But the first thing was the place itself,

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the sacred place,
and the pyramids mark this.

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You start off with a place

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that for one reason or another
is regarded as sacred,

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that had a special magnetism
that people could sense

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that made it important
and that made it matter.

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The Great Pyramid of Cholula
shares another key feature

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with ancient pyramids
all around the world.

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Hints of hidden chambers.

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Not long after
the Spanish conquest of Mexico,

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a reliable eyewitness,
Father Bernardino de Sahagún,

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reported that the Great Pyramid of Cholula
was full of mines and caves within.

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Today, modern investigators
have confirmed that observation.

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One of the former archaeologists found,
somewhere inside the pyramid,

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an open room.

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And there were tunnels leading into it.

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It's never been published.

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I don't know
what the current situation is.

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-That's a very tantalizing hint.
-You think so?

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Has that room ever been excavated?
Has it ever been revisited?

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Not that I know of.

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[Graham] Why hasn't this inner chamber
ever been revisited?

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What secrets could it hold

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about the intentions
of the original builders?

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Regardless, the fact that
the Great Pyramid of Cholula

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has a hidden inner chamber at all,

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like its cousins
in Gunung Padang and Giza,

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is yet another striking feature
shared by these structures.

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And there's more.

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So it's pretty well established
that the structure

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is oriented to the setting sun

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-on the summer solstice.
-That's correct.

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The sun is setting
between the two volcanoes to the west,

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so it's very much
a solstice-related orientation.

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We know that the indigenous Mesoamericans
were very clued into astronomical cycles.

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[Graham] As were the ancient Egyptians,
who built their Great Pyramid of Giza

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to align precisely
to true astronomical north.

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The fact that these ancient pyramids,

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whose builders supposedly
had no contact with one another,

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have so much in common is a mystery.

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Is it just coincidence?

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I don't think so.

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The general view
that archaeology puts forward,

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is that pyramids
were built in the form that they have

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'cause that's the easiest way
to make a high building.

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The problem is that these structures
are universally associated

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with very specific spiritual ideas.

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What happens to us after death?

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This is always connected
with pyramid structures,

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and that's the case
whether you find them in Mexico

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or whether you find them in ancient Egypt

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or whether you find them in Cambodia
or whether you find them in India.

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It's a detail that defies
the accepted mainstream view

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that various human civilizations
around the world,

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independently invented pyramids.

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What it suggests to me

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is that something else
was going on behind the scenes.

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Could we be witnessing the unfolding
of some extraordinary master plan?

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A shared legacy
from a lost global civilization

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that provided the seeds
and the spark of inspiration

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from which many later civilizations grew.

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It's a possibility that leads me to ask

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whether the pyramid-building project
at Cholula

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could have much older origins
than most archaeologists want to believe.

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What about the dating of the structure?

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Are there carbon dates
from the earliest phases?

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No. We've had ceramics that are similar
to ceramics from the basin of Mexico

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dating to, like, 1000 BC.

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Does that give us enough
to be confident about the whole story?

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No. No, I would say absolutely not.

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And there's a tremendous amount of work
that needs to be done

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-throughout the prehistory of Mexico.
-Yeah.

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I'm not disputing
the archaeological evidence

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that dates
the first monumental construction

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on the site of
the Great Pyramid of Cholula

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to around 2,300 years ago,
but there are older pyramids in Mexico.

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And what really interests me
are the ideas that underpin them all.

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By 1519,
when the Spanish conquistadors arrived,

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Cholula's Great Pyramid
had fallen into disrepair.

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But when they realized
it was much more than just a hill,

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and asked who built it,

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the locals regaled them
with a fascinating legend.

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According to myth,

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the Great Pyramid of Cholula
was the work of a race of giants.

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Once upon a time,
there were giants in ancient Mexico,

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until the rain god Tlaloc grew angry
and sent a great flood to destroy them.

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Only seven survived the cataclysm.

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Fearing that a second deluge might follow,
the giant Xelhua, known as the architect,

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went to Cholula,

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and with the help of its people

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built a massive artificial mountain
out of bricks,

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a pyramid,

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and dedicated it
to the worship of Tlaloc, the rain god.

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Archaeologists regard this
as just a fanciful tale,

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but I think
that by ignoring it completely,

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we're in danger of missing
some important clues

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to the origins of this incredible place.

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Perhaps that architect

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who appeared in Cholula
after a great flood,

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wasn't a physical giant,

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but one of the intellectual giants

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of an advanced civilization
lost to history.

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We shouldn't expect
the evidence to be easy to find,

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precisely because, as at Cholula,
ancient monuments are often located

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directly on top of
still older constructions,

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obscuring their origins.

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About a two-hour drive to the northwest,

243
00:16:54,403 --> 00:16:57,443
another remarkable site
offers me my next clue.

244
00:17:04,563 --> 00:17:07,523
Perched atop this uniquely-shaped hill

245
00:17:07,603 --> 00:17:11,203
is an ancient Aztec complex
known as Texcotzingo.

246
00:17:19,963 --> 00:17:23,122
Here at Texcotzingo,
we encounter a pyramid again,

247
00:17:23,723 --> 00:17:26,603
this time a creation of the Earth herself.

248
00:17:28,003 --> 00:17:29,923
It's easy to understand why this place

249
00:17:30,003 --> 00:17:33,203
could have exerted
a powerful magnetism on the ancients.

250
00:17:35,203 --> 00:17:38,043
Pyramids clearly mattered
in ancient Mexico.

251
00:17:39,403 --> 00:17:41,563
Here, in the 15th century,

252
00:17:41,643 --> 00:17:46,123
the Aztecs built a remarkable network
of garden terraces and pools

253
00:17:47,483 --> 00:17:50,203
fed by cleverly constructed aqueducts

254
00:17:50,283 --> 00:17:54,523
that carried water down
from a reservoir at the mountain's top.

255
00:17:56,243 --> 00:18:00,683
It's like the Hanging Gardens of Babylon,
Mesoamerican style.

256
00:18:02,963 --> 00:18:06,003
But intriguingly, from my investigations,

257
00:18:06,083 --> 00:18:09,603
all of it was dedicated
to the same ancient god

258
00:18:09,683 --> 00:18:12,763
associated with
the earliest pyramid at Cholula…

259
00:18:14,523 --> 00:18:21,123
Tlaloc, the god of rains and floods,
whose cult long predated the Aztecs.

260
00:18:24,003 --> 00:18:25,963
Archaeologists believe that the Aztecs

261
00:18:26,043 --> 00:18:28,923
were the first
to pay attention to Texcotzingo,

262
00:18:29,803 --> 00:18:32,483
but could this incredible site
be much older?

263
00:18:36,803 --> 00:18:39,163
The Spanish conquistadors
took it for granted

264
00:18:39,243 --> 00:18:42,563
that Texcotzingo was entirely
the work of the Aztecs,

265
00:18:44,283 --> 00:18:47,603
and that is what
most archaeologists will tell you too.

266
00:18:48,963 --> 00:18:53,523
But what if the Aztecs
simply renovated and added to a site

267
00:18:53,603 --> 00:18:56,803
originally created
by a much older civilization?

268
00:18:59,843 --> 00:19:05,403
Author Marco Vigato believes the evidence
suggests that's exactly what happened.

269
00:19:06,803 --> 00:19:10,323
This site was clearly reworked
over a very long period of time.

270
00:19:10,403 --> 00:19:13,363
The rock was
a very hard type of porphyry stone.

271
00:19:13,443 --> 00:19:15,483
If you look around at the site here,

272
00:19:15,563 --> 00:19:18,963
you see that some of the stone surfaces
are very heavily weathered.

273
00:19:19,603 --> 00:19:22,683
Some parts of the site
that clearly show evidence of erosion

274
00:19:22,763 --> 00:19:24,683
must have continued
for thousands of years,

275
00:19:24,763 --> 00:19:28,163
taking into account
this is an extremely hard type of stone.

276
00:19:30,243 --> 00:19:32,123
[Graham] Right.
So in your view, the Aztecs,

277
00:19:32,203 --> 00:19:34,123
well, we know they were latecomers,

278
00:19:34,563 --> 00:19:39,403
but they found this site
at least partially worked already

279
00:19:39,483 --> 00:19:41,003
and they took it over

280
00:19:41,083 --> 00:19:42,843
-and developed it further.
-Right.

281
00:19:43,723 --> 00:19:45,443
[Graham] It's a radical thought.

282
00:19:47,003 --> 00:19:49,723
Could a much older culture have carved out

283
00:19:49,803 --> 00:19:53,283
some of the more unusual features
on the side of the hill?

284
00:19:55,603 --> 00:19:58,683
Like these deeply-weathered megaliths
strewn on the ground.

285
00:20:01,883 --> 00:20:04,923
And this chamber
carved out of the bedrock.

286
00:20:07,643 --> 00:20:09,883
This was almost certainly
a pre-Aztec site.

287
00:20:09,963 --> 00:20:12,843
-Mmm-hmm.
-It was simply reoccupied and reused.

288
00:20:14,723 --> 00:20:17,883
[Graham] It's a conclusion
archaeologists would dispute,

289
00:20:17,963 --> 00:20:20,283
but there's some
relevant evidence to consider.

290
00:20:22,363 --> 00:20:26,443
Not far away, in a dried-up riverbed
at the foot of a mountain,

291
00:20:26,523 --> 00:20:29,963
a huge statue
of the rain god Tlaloc was uncovered.

292
00:20:31,763 --> 00:20:35,923
The largest single cut stone
in the entire Americas.

293
00:20:40,243 --> 00:20:44,083
Archaeologists have dated it
to around 700 AD,

294
00:20:45,763 --> 00:20:48,603
long before
the Aztecs dominated these lands.

295
00:20:51,123 --> 00:20:53,963
It's proof that Tlaloc, the rain god,

296
00:20:54,043 --> 00:20:57,683
had already been worshipped
in this area by earlier cultures,

297
00:20:57,763 --> 00:21:00,603
perhaps under several different names,

298
00:21:00,683 --> 00:21:04,163
for nearly a thousand years,
and maybe longer.

299
00:21:08,963 --> 00:21:12,363
In fact, Tlaloc,
as a mythological character,

300
00:21:12,443 --> 00:21:13,803
goes back all the way

301
00:21:13,883 --> 00:21:16,803
to the earliest known cultures
of prehistoric Mexico.

302
00:21:20,243 --> 00:21:21,523
And he's not alone.

303
00:21:23,323 --> 00:21:26,883
The global floods
sent by the rain god sets the stage

304
00:21:26,963 --> 00:21:31,043
for the appearance of the most intriguing
character in Mexican mythology…

305
00:21:33,003 --> 00:21:34,403
Quetzalcoatl.

306
00:21:38,163 --> 00:21:39,883
After the Great Flood,

307
00:21:39,963 --> 00:21:43,443
a stranger from the east
landed on Mexico's shores

308
00:21:44,163 --> 00:21:49,163
riding on a boat with no paddles,
said to be carried by serpents.

309
00:21:50,803 --> 00:21:53,123
His name was Quetzalcoatl,

310
00:21:53,683 --> 00:21:55,603
meaning, "the feathered serpent."

311
00:21:56,403 --> 00:22:01,003
He and his followers taught the locals
how to grow crops and domesticate animals.

312
00:22:02,963 --> 00:22:04,403
He gave them laws

313
00:22:04,483 --> 00:22:08,123
and instructed them in the ways
of architecture, astronomy and the arts.

314
00:22:08,763 --> 00:22:10,523
They worshipped him as a deity.

315
00:22:13,083 --> 00:22:17,203
But after being violently ousted
by the followers of a Mexican war god,

316
00:22:17,843 --> 00:22:23,443
Quetzalcoatl sailed away towards the east,
promising one day to return.

317
00:22:24,043 --> 00:22:26,043
[drums beating]

318
00:22:27,003 --> 00:22:29,323
[native music playing]

319
00:22:29,923 --> 00:22:35,203
The legend of Quetzalcoatl has been told
for generations, even down to today.

320
00:22:36,043 --> 00:22:38,003
[man singing in Nahuatl language]

321
00:22:38,083 --> 00:22:41,443
We get a description
of a heavily bearded individual.

322
00:22:42,003 --> 00:22:46,043
He sounds a bit like a foreigner
from across the ocean,

323
00:22:46,123 --> 00:22:49,363
and he brings the gifts of civilization.

324
00:22:49,443 --> 00:22:53,323
[man continues singing]

325
00:22:53,403 --> 00:22:57,643
[Graham] What I find so astonishing
is how often we've heard this story

326
00:22:58,483 --> 00:23:02,523
from cultures that supposedly
had no connection with ancient Mexico.

327
00:23:03,523 --> 00:23:04,643
[blowing conch shell]

328
00:23:08,163 --> 00:23:10,883
The setting is always the same.
There has been a giant cataclysm.

329
00:23:12,403 --> 00:23:17,643
The world has been plunged into darkness,
floods, chaos everywhere.

330
00:23:17,723 --> 00:23:19,163
Society is collapsing.

331
00:23:20,123 --> 00:23:21,403
[thunder rumbling]

332
00:23:23,283 --> 00:23:27,723
And then out of the darkness
appears a figure who has knowledge

333
00:23:27,803 --> 00:23:31,043
of what is necessary
to make a civilization.

334
00:23:31,923 --> 00:23:35,643
And that figure teaches
the demoralized survivors of the cataclysm

335
00:23:35,723 --> 00:23:37,603
how to start civilization again.

336
00:23:39,963 --> 00:23:43,883
In ancient Greek mythology,
it's the Titan Prometheus

337
00:23:44,443 --> 00:23:48,763
who, after a great flood,
shares with humans the secret of fire.

338
00:23:51,283 --> 00:23:53,123
In the South American Andes,

339
00:23:53,203 --> 00:23:58,163
pre-Inca civilizations describe a robed,
bearded figure named Viracocha,

340
00:23:59,163 --> 00:24:01,283
who emerged from a great lake

341
00:24:01,363 --> 00:24:05,403
and taught the local people
how to create amazing works of masonry

342
00:24:05,483 --> 00:24:07,163
that still exist today.

343
00:24:08,563 --> 00:24:12,963
Even in the Pacific,
Polynesian legends talk of Maui,

344
00:24:13,043 --> 00:24:16,763
who created their islands
by pulling them up from the ocean floor,

345
00:24:17,763 --> 00:24:21,243
and then taught the islanders
to work with stone tools

346
00:24:21,803 --> 00:24:23,323
and to cook their food.

347
00:24:27,003 --> 00:24:29,723
Archaeologists say
that these civilizing heroes

348
00:24:29,803 --> 00:24:33,923
are just inventions
of the ancients' elaborate fictions,

349
00:24:34,643 --> 00:24:37,483
but I find the similarities
hard to ignore.

350
00:24:38,163 --> 00:24:42,683
What if these accounts describe
the survivors of an advanced civilization

351
00:24:42,763 --> 00:24:45,563
that was lost in the great cataclysms
of flood and fire

352
00:24:45,643 --> 00:24:48,043
that we know occurred
near the end of the last Ice Age?

353
00:24:55,643 --> 00:24:57,323
The myths of Mexico

354
00:24:57,403 --> 00:24:59,963
and the story
of Quetzalcoatl in particular,

355
00:25:00,523 --> 00:25:03,723
are tied to
just such an apocalyptic moment.

356
00:25:05,363 --> 00:25:08,243
And Marco believes there's a record of it

357
00:25:08,323 --> 00:25:10,843
just a few hours' drive
south of Mexico City,

358
00:25:12,643 --> 00:25:14,923
amongst the ancient temples of Xochicalco.

359
00:25:18,803 --> 00:25:22,763
Like Cholula, this city was
originally built by an indigenous culture

360
00:25:22,843 --> 00:25:26,483
we know little about
in the 7th century AD.

361
00:25:28,203 --> 00:25:30,923
Here, you'll find the remains
of two large pyramids.

362
00:25:32,283 --> 00:25:34,483
One dedicated to the rain god,

363
00:25:35,163 --> 00:25:41,363
and the other dedicated
to Mexico's civilizing hero, Quetzalcoatl.

364
00:25:44,443 --> 00:25:49,043
I've come here to learn more
about these so-called mythical characters.

365
00:25:51,043 --> 00:25:55,243
For archaeologists,
myths are fanciful and fragmentary.

366
00:25:56,043 --> 00:25:59,523
They ignore them completely
in their attempts to reconstruct the past.

367
00:26:00,883 --> 00:26:03,963
But here at Xochicalco,
some researchers see an attempt

368
00:26:04,043 --> 00:26:05,683
to create a permanent record

369
00:26:05,763 --> 00:26:08,723
of one of the most important myths
in ancient Mexico.

370
00:26:09,683 --> 00:26:13,843
A record they believe that preserves
a forgotten episode in prehistory.

371
00:26:16,883 --> 00:26:20,083
Wrapped around the four sides
of Quetzalcoatl's temple

372
00:26:20,163 --> 00:26:22,483
are intricate carvings of this deity

373
00:26:22,563 --> 00:26:25,323
in his manifestation
as the feathered serpent.

374
00:26:28,123 --> 00:26:32,403
Clearly, he was an important figure
even back in 700 AD.

375
00:26:34,763 --> 00:26:39,043
But Marco believes
these glyphs carved in stone

376
00:26:39,123 --> 00:26:42,523
may reveal missing details
from his origin story.

377
00:26:43,723 --> 00:26:45,443
What's special about this temple?

378
00:26:45,523 --> 00:26:48,883
So what you have
on the lower tier of the pyramid

379
00:26:48,963 --> 00:26:52,923
is really a representation
of the arrival of Quetzalcoatl

380
00:26:53,003 --> 00:26:55,443
that unfolds on the three sides…

381
00:26:55,523 --> 00:26:57,083
-Yeah.
-…of the pyramid

382
00:26:57,163 --> 00:27:01,403
until we get here
to the first significant glyph, here.

383
00:27:01,483 --> 00:27:04,723
And what you see there
is a flaming temple.

384
00:27:04,803 --> 00:27:07,123
You have these scrolls of smoke or fire.

385
00:27:07,203 --> 00:27:09,643
-[Graham] As though it's on fire.
-Right. Exactly.

386
00:27:09,723 --> 00:27:12,083
What about the coils
of the serpent around it?

387
00:27:12,163 --> 00:27:14,363
How do you read those in this context?

388
00:27:14,443 --> 00:27:16,683
[Marco] Right, well, this is
the tail of the serpent.

389
00:27:16,763 --> 00:27:19,603
-Yeah.
-So, it wraps around this flaming temple.

390
00:27:19,683 --> 00:27:22,203
It almost looks like a wave hitting…

391
00:27:22,283 --> 00:27:24,603
-Okay.
-…the temple from the side.

392
00:27:24,683 --> 00:27:28,563
You could almost see that
as a representation of an island.

393
00:27:29,203 --> 00:27:31,843
So, we have a temple which is on fire

394
00:27:31,923 --> 00:27:34,043
and waves are
washing over it in your reading?

395
00:27:34,123 --> 00:27:35,443
-Exactly.
-Yeah.

396
00:27:38,243 --> 00:27:40,683
Give me your interpretation
of this scene, Marco.

397
00:27:40,763 --> 00:27:43,723
[Marco] Well, you have this
clearly powerful sitting figure

398
00:27:43,803 --> 00:27:46,523
who looks like on a raft of snakes

399
00:27:46,603 --> 00:27:51,123
that's almost heading away
from the direction of this flaming temple.

400
00:27:51,803 --> 00:27:54,963
[Graham] What you're seeing here
is the depiction of a cataclysm

401
00:27:55,043 --> 00:28:00,403
which occurs in a certain place,
which Quetzalcoatl then is a survivor of.

402
00:28:00,483 --> 00:28:05,483
You have this idea of the god
coming from a land that was destroyed.

403
00:28:05,563 --> 00:28:09,763
And what you have is the arrival
of the god Quetzalcoatl here in Mexico

404
00:28:09,843 --> 00:28:12,363
as a founder of Mesoamerican civilization.

405
00:28:13,363 --> 00:28:16,443
It's a chronicle that goes back
to a very remote past.

406
00:28:22,403 --> 00:28:25,003
[Graham] Marco's reading
of the temple's glyphs

407
00:28:25,083 --> 00:28:27,683
as a depiction of an ancient apocalypse

408
00:28:27,763 --> 00:28:30,283
flies in the face
of all archaeological opinion.

409
00:28:31,563 --> 00:28:34,643
But that doesn't
necessarily mean he's wrong.

410
00:28:36,523 --> 00:28:40,243
The Temple of The Feathered Serpent
is about 1,300 years old,

411
00:28:40,323 --> 00:28:42,643
and archaeologists are right to say

412
00:28:42,723 --> 00:28:45,723
that there was
no global cataclysm in that epoch

413
00:28:45,803 --> 00:28:48,403
that could have inspired
the Quetzalcoatl myth.

414
00:28:48,963 --> 00:28:50,763
This misses the point.

415
00:28:50,843 --> 00:28:54,003
The tradition is certainly
much older than the temple.

416
00:28:54,083 --> 00:28:56,043
How much older? No one knows.

417
00:28:56,123 --> 00:29:00,243
But there's one period of prehistory
that fits the bill perfectly.

418
00:29:02,163 --> 00:29:06,683
Geologists have confirmed that there was
an ancient apocalypse of some kind.

419
00:29:07,523 --> 00:29:10,123
A period of great cataclysms and floods

420
00:29:10,203 --> 00:29:14,683
that had as big an impact here as it did
nearly everywhere else in the world…

421
00:29:16,883 --> 00:29:22,803
sometime at the end of the last Ice Age,
around 12,800 years ago.

422
00:29:23,643 --> 00:29:28,523
Could the story of Quetzalcoatl's arrival
date back as far as that?

423
00:29:34,603 --> 00:29:38,483
I do not question
the age of the structure itself.

424
00:29:38,563 --> 00:29:42,963
What you have here is just the telling
of a story that is in fact much older.

425
00:29:43,763 --> 00:29:46,083
So, perhaps
what's sadly lacking in archaeology

426
00:29:46,163 --> 00:29:47,603
is an archaeology of ideas.

427
00:29:47,683 --> 00:29:51,323
Perhaps they focus too much
on the dates of a particular construction

428
00:29:51,403 --> 00:29:53,403
and don't consider the ideas
that it's expressing.

429
00:29:53,483 --> 00:29:54,483
[Marco] Right.

430
00:29:56,643 --> 00:29:59,563
[Graham] If we're willing to look back
beyond the artificial horizons

431
00:29:59,643 --> 00:30:01,683
that archeology sets,

432
00:30:01,763 --> 00:30:04,523
then the myth at once
begins to make sense,

433
00:30:04,603 --> 00:30:07,283
not as a fanciful account
of imagined events,

434
00:30:07,363 --> 00:30:10,283
but as a true record
of a lost and forgotten past.

435
00:30:14,443 --> 00:30:17,923
Archaeologists reject any such suggestion,

436
00:30:19,763 --> 00:30:21,923
but I find it impossible to ignore

437
00:30:22,003 --> 00:30:25,883
how widespread
these tales of civilizing heroes are.

438
00:30:27,443 --> 00:30:29,843
Sometimes speaking of gods,
sometimes of humans,

439
00:30:31,043 --> 00:30:33,883
who come in a time of chaos
after the great cataclysm.

440
00:30:35,603 --> 00:30:37,283
Teaching the skills of agriculture,

441
00:30:37,363 --> 00:30:40,843
architecture, engineering
and astronomy to the survivors.

442
00:30:42,603 --> 00:30:43,523
In these traditions,

443
00:30:43,603 --> 00:30:47,403
I believe the fingerprints
of a lost civilization are to be found.

444
00:30:49,043 --> 00:30:54,483
So, where was this lost civilization based
before the cataclysm that destroyed it?

445
00:30:55,523 --> 00:30:59,403
There are many possibilities
that have never been properly considered.

446
00:30:59,483 --> 00:31:02,803
Because, as we've seen,
at the height of the last Ice Age,

447
00:31:03,723 --> 00:31:05,763
the planet looked very different.

448
00:31:07,123 --> 00:31:10,643
But further clues await us
a quarter of the way around the world.

449
00:31:11,683 --> 00:31:14,003
There, just as in Cholula,

450
00:31:14,083 --> 00:31:17,163
dozens of immense temples
were believed to have been built

451
00:31:17,243 --> 00:31:19,003
by an ancient race of giants,

452
00:31:20,243 --> 00:31:26,163
on islands that once weren't islands,
in the heart of the Mediterranean Sea.

453
00:31:26,243 --> 00:31:28,923
And that's where my journey takes me next,

454
00:31:29,003 --> 00:31:31,483
to a gigantic riddle in stone.

455
00:31:32,323 --> 00:31:35,283
The mysterious megaliths of Malta.