Problems that are difficult for scientists to understand

Chapter 18 Ancient Civilization Tracing (6)
The fourth type: the impact of climate change on people's lives, which eventually led to the demise of the country. In 1917, Elworth Huntington published the article "Climate Change and Agricultural Decline as the Causes of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire" in the "Economic Quarterly", which gave a good explanation for this.He said that there is a redwood tree in the California area of ​​the United States that is more than 3000 years old or even 4000 years old. This kind of redwood tree has a characteristic, that is, it grows an annual ring every year, and the age of the tree can be inferred from the number of annual rings, and this The distance between the tree ring textures varies with climate.When the climate is favorable, that is, in years with high precipitation, the annual ring texture spacing is relatively large, and vice versa.So based on the spacing of the redwood tree's annual ring textures, the history of precipitation in the area can be inferred.Huntington believes that the precipitation history in California is roughly consistent with that in the Mediterranean during Roman rule.Based on the characteristics of redwood trees and the assumption that the precipitation history of the two places is roughly the same, Huntington believes that the decline of the Roman Empire was caused by insufficient precipitation in the 4th and 6th centuries AD.

Fifth: One of the important reasons that led to the demise of the Roman Empire was wine.It turns out that after the Roman Empire conquered ancient Greece, it brought Greek grape varieties and brewing technology to the hinterland of Europe, and the hobby of wine became a fashionable fashion in the Roman aristocratic Senate.The Romans preferred to drink sweet wine, so they added substances such as aluminum oxide to increase the "sweetness" in the brewing process.This brewing method, which has been used for nearly 300 years until the Roman era, caused the death of thousands of Romans from aluminum poisoning and caused several epidemics of the plague.At that time, no one realized that it was this aluminum-fortified sweet wine that killed countless lives, and when they finally realized, tragedy had already happened.Wine, hailed by the Greeks as the god of fruit and joy, destroyed the mighty Roman Empire with its terrifying rose color.

Sixth: Lead poisoning brought the entire Roman state to its grave.Acute lead poisoning also occurred in ancient Rome.Because the value of lead in the ancient Roman Empire was much higher than that in modern times, the utensils (such as bottles, cups, pots) and lead-containing cosmetics made of it were only enjoyed by the noble class.And the lower class civilians at that time were not completely out of touch with lead. At that time, the water pipes used to transport drinking water in the city were made of lead.According to archaeologists, the remains of the ancient Romans contained a large amount of lead. This is because on the one hand, lead directly entered the human body. On the other hand, the drinking water of the ancient Romans was rich in carbon dioxide, which reacted with lead to form soluble acid Lead carbonate then enters the human body and undergoes a replacement reaction with calcium in the bones, causing various chronic diseases such as digestive disorders, abdominal muscle cramps, anemia, visual impairment, nerve paralysis, mental disorders, etc.More importantly, women in ancient Rome used lead powder to make cosmetics. Lead can make women's skin fair, tender and more beautiful.Therefore, women in ancient Rome enjoyed it and used lead to whiten their skin for a long time, which caused lead to accumulate in bones and soft tissues, especially in the brain, resulting in the decline of human physiological functions, low intelligence and abnormal behavior of children.The lead poison accumulated in the body of the Romans gave full play to its lethality in the next generation.

Half of the 35 married princes and princes of the ancient Roman Trout × nobles were infertile.Although the rest were able to bear children, almost all the children they gave birth to were imbecile and dementia.No wonder the monarchs who ruled ancient Rome in the 1st century A.D. suffered from various chronic diseases and mental illnesses. The average life expectancy of ancient Roman nobles was less than 25 years old!Just imagine, with such a health condition, how can we plan strategies, gallop on the battlefield, and stabilize the country?

Taken together, the above six reasons seem likely to lead to the demise of ancient Rome.But we don't know what caused it. After all, more than 2000 years have passed since this period of history, and it is difficult for us to verify it.

Colossus

Rhodes is an island in the Aegean Sea, famous for the statue of the sun god, one of the seven wonders of the ancient world, built on the island.The statue of the sun god was built in the 4th century BC. It is 32 meters high and consumes 450 tons of bronze.

How was such a huge statue cast?How was it erected in ancient times when there was no lifting equipment?These are unimaginable things.Even more puzzling, however, was the collapse of the statue during a major earthquake in 226 BC.It lay on the original site for nearly a thousand years, and then it disappeared.Some people believe that after the Arabs occupied Rhode Island, they smashed it into small pieces and sold it to a Jewish merchant.It is also said that the colossus of the sun god encountered a storm on the way to Italy by ship and sank to the bottom of the sea.All kinds of speculation about the Colossus of the Sun God continue, and it is still inconclusive.

What is the real history of "City of the Gods"

More than 3000 years ago, when many parts of the world were still in ignorance, a highly developed civilization appeared in the dense rainforest of Central America.Around 1000 BC, a prosperous and magnificent city was built 40 kilometers north of Mexico City today. This is Teotihuacan, known as the "capital of the gods".Teotihuacan is the site of the oldest civilization on the Mexican plateau.Its former prosperity and magnificence left endless mysteries to future generations.

From 300 to 650 AD, the city-state of Teotihuacan was in its heyday. At that time, it covered an area of ​​36 square kilometers and had 12.5 residents.The city center is a north-south avenue, about 3 kilometers long and 40 meters wide.This is the famous Huangquan Avenue.It is said that after the Aztecs captured the city of Teotihuacan, they found that there were platforms at intervals on both sides of this avenue, which looked like tombs, so they named this avenue the Avenue of the Underworld.Scientists have discovered that the layout of the entire Yellow Springs Avenue is actually a microcosm of the solar system.The ruins of the temple are arranged in an orderly manner, but their height rises step by step with the inclination of the avenue.The ratio of the distances between all the temple ruins is the ratio of the distances between the eight planets of the solar system.This is really one of the great mysteries of the "City of the Gods".

At the end of Huangquan Avenue is the world-famous Moon Pyramid.To the left of the Pyramid of the Moon is the Pyramid of the Sun, considered a symbol of Mesoamerica.The Pyramid of the Sun is as high as 64.5 meters, which is comparable in scale to the Pyramid of Khufu.At the southern end of the avenue is a temple dedicated to the rain god Taraloc.The walls around the temple are carved with intricate patterns of feathered snakes, with smooth lines and exquisite workmanship.

Who created the "City of the Gods"?Some thought it was Toltec.They built the city of Teotihuacan in the 6th century, which was later destroyed by the Olmecs, who were replaced by the Aztecs.But later archaeological discoveries, people settled here in the 3rd century BC.Around the 1st century AD, the city of Teotihuacan had already begun to take shape.Some even believe that the city was formed as early as the Stone Age.No one can tell what the real history is like.

The Mysterious History of the Sphinx

In addition to the pyramids, what can be used as a symbol of Egypt is the Sphinx, the Sphinx, which guards the three major pyramids.The legend about the Sphinx has long been known to every household, but who is the builder of the Sphinx is still confusing.

The traditional view is that the Sphinx was built by Pharaoh Khafre according to his own appearance 4500 years ago, because the name of the pharaoh is engraved on the stone tablet between the two claws of the statue.However, some legends mention that as early as the reign of Pharaoh Khufu, the Sphinx already existed.

Later, some researchers found that the tail of the Sphinx was built in a different age from the main body, so Pharaoh Khafre may have only trimmed it, not its builder.The real construction time of the Sphinx was more than 7000-9000 years ago.If this conjecture is correct, it means that before the ancient Egyptian civilization, there was an even older civilization active on this land!

This is truly an unsolved mystery.

The incredible Mayan civilization

The Mayan civilization was mainly distributed in Central America.It seemed to rise overnight in the wild and deep forest, and after thousands of years of glory, it suddenly disappeared without a trace.Although the descendants of the Mayan people still live sporadically all over the Americas, Maya as a culture has long since been interrupted.

The formation of the Mayan civilization has always been a mystery.People only know that as early as 4000 years ago, the dawn of Mayan civilization began to emerge.The Mayans in their heyday built many world-class cities.They also invented their own hieroglyphics and mastered highly developed knowledge of agriculture, mathematics and astronomy.Chichen x Cha is one of the centers of Mayan civilization, where there is a pyramid dedicated to the god of rain, and there are many statues of feathered snakes carved on the steps.Every year at the dawn of the spring and autumn equinoxes, the sunlight will cast the shadows of these statues on the ground, forming a giant snake that slowly descends the ladder.It is impossible to do this without superb geometry and precise astronomical observation knowledge, which makes people wonder whether this is the result of the independent development of Mayan civilization.For there is no evidence of a gradual low-to-high development of this miraculous civilization in the South American jungle.So, who would have taught the Mayans all this?Is it aliens or another intelligent life?All this is unknown.

The disappearance of the Mayan civilization is also a difficult mystery.In 909 A.D., the Mayans scattered in all directions seemed to have received some kind of order in unison, abandoning the camps and temples they worked hard to build, and migrated to the barren mountains.Since then, the Mayan civilization has declined dramatically.

(End of this chapter)