[music playing]
NARRATOR: Sicily, 2015,
archaeologist Sebastiano Tusa
excavates a shipwreck
less than a mile
off the coast, which
has remained undisturbed
for more than 2,600 years.
His team dredges up an ancient
payload of 39 metal ingots.
Interestingly, spectrographic
analysis of the recovered alloy
reveals the compound is
unlike anything ever found
in the ancient or modern world.
The interesting
part about this
is the composition of the
ingots that they found.
The metal is 80%
copper and 20% zinc.
There were other
things found in it,
but that's the majority
of the opposition.
Now zinc only occurs in
nature as sphalerite.
It's a zinc-sulfur complex.
In order to create zinc, which
didn't come around till about
1,000 years ago, you
have to actually process
the zinc out of this sulfide.
They didn't have that
technology back then.
DAVID WILCOCK: What was someone
doing blending together copper,
zinc, lead, nickel, iron?
This is a complex alloy.
This is nothing easy to do.
It suggests the
possibility that it
could have special electrical
or energetic properties
that we don't even know about.
People would not be
expected to be making
such a complex alloy back then.
NARRATOR: How is it possible
that such an advanced alloy was
manufactured over 2,600 years
ago, centuries before man
had the technology to manipulate
elements like zinc into metals?
And what was its purpose?
Based on the composition
of this alloy,
scientists believe
what they have found
is orichalcum, a
metal associated
with the legendary
continent of Atlantis.
According to Plato's
fourth-century dialogues,
"The Timaeus" and
"Critias," Atlantis
possessed a power and
technology greater
than any other
civilization on Earth.
It was founded and ruled over
by the Greek god, Poseidon,
whose temple was covered
in a precious metal
called orichalcum, which
translates to mountain copper.
The composition of the alloy
is not specified by Plato.
But based on its electrical
properties, color, and luster,
scientists suggest that
if it really did exist,
it most likely consisted
of copper mixed
primarily with zinc,
just like the metal
found in the shipwreck.
It was said that the temple
of Poseidon on Atlantis
flashed with the red
light of orichalcum.
The copper tint of
this metal caught
the attention of the seekers
that came to this sacred place.
This is not just an
attractive color.
This has spiritual implications.
There was something about
this metal that was said
to resonate with the divine.
Perhaps it was its origin,
that it had come from heaven.
It fell out of the sky.
NARRATOR: According
to Plato's story,
the Greek god, Cadmus,
son of Poseidon,
came down from Mount
Olympus and gave orichalcum
to the people of Atlantis.
An important figure
in early Greek mythology
was Cadmus, a divine
character, the first hero,
fifth in the lineage from
Zeus of the Greek gods.
It was Cadmus that brought
the making of bronze.
He knew how to make alloys,
special metals, which
in the early days
of civilization,
was the beginning of technology.
So Cadmus is the
one who shows us
the divine nature of metalwork
and gives this as a gift
to the generations.
DAVID WILCOCK: Why are we so
quick to dismiss the underlying
stories in those myths?
Those stories talk about
extraterrestrials coming
and visiting our culture.
They talk about gods
that walked among us
and interacted with
humans, but with a severely
advanced technology beyond
anything that we have today.
Ancient astronaut theory
says that the legends
of these Greek gods are
not just mythological,
but they're actually
rooted in actual events.
