All language subtitles for Expedition.Files.S04E09.1080p.WEB.h264-EDITH_track3_[eng]

On this episode of
"Expedition Files"...

In 1696...

Fire!

[Josh]
...Captain Henry Avery is
hailed King of the Pirates when

he pulls off an estimated
400-million-dollar heist

on the high seas.

But after the raid,
Avery and his loot disappear.

Now, experts may have finally
cracked the code,

revealing the fate of this
legendary buccaneer

and his vast treasure.

Then, around 1153 BC,
Egyptian pharaoh Ramses III

dies under
mysterious circumstances.

Ancient records hint at
a deadly palace conspiracy led

by his own queen.

More than 3,000 years later,
modern scientific technology

could solve one of history's
oldest cold cases.

And since the 8th century BC,
mythological female warriors

known as Amazons have inspired
everything from

South American rivers

to the iconic superhero,
Wonder Woman.

But did the Amazons
really exist?

New evidence suggests these
legendary fighters were real.

In the corridors of time...

are mysteries that
defy explanation.

Now, I'm traveling through
history itself...

on a search for the truth.

New evidence.

Shocking answers.

I'm Josh Gates.

And these...

are my "Expedition Files."

Have you ever met someone
who's larger-than-life?

I'm talking about a person
whose charisma could be

measured in megawatts,
lighting up every room

they walk into.

Well, tonight, you'll need your
sunglasses to investigate some

of the most powerfully
captivating characters in

history, squinting to discover
the real people

and real mysteries behind
their luminous lives.

We begin in 1696 aboard a ship
called The Fancy.

But don't let the sweet-sounding
name fool you.

It's manned by a crew
of killers.

The captain here is
Henry Avery, the so-called

King of the Pirates.

And right now, he's divvying up
the score that earned him

that name, a massive treasure

snatched from
the Mughal Empire of India.

It will go down as the largest
pirate heist in history,

estimated to be worth
a staggering

$400 million today.

But Captain Avery and all this
loot will soon vanish,

never to be seen again.

So what happens to these
incredible spoils?

The long-buried secrets of
Henry Avery

are about to be revealed.

[ocean waves swishing]

Henry Avery is born around 1659
near Plymouth, England,

the same rugged port
where the Pilgrims

had departed from
just a few decades earlier.

The ocean is in his blood
from the start.

As a young man,
Avery goes to sea,

earning his place as he learns

the ropes of life
aboard a ship.

He begins his career
the respectable way,

serving in the Royal Navy,

then he moves on
to privateering.

That is, piracy with
a government stamp of approval.

As long as you fly the right
flag, the crown is happy to

let you rob its enemies blind.

For a while, Avery plays by
those rules, but rules at sea

have a way of slipping.

By 1694, Avery is a hardened
sailor and the chief mate

aboard the Charles II,
a sleek, heavily-armed vessel

tasked with hunting French
ships across the Atlantic.

But before long,
the voyage stalls

due to bureaucracy.

The ship sails into a Spanish
port to receive important

legal documents
authorizing their mission.

And there it sits.

The documents fail to arrive,
and the crew is all

but trapped, unpaid,
restless, and forbidden

from going ashore.

The captain promises that money
is coming, but tensions are

on the rise.
Avery has had enough.

One night, he leads a mutiny,
seizing the ship,

renaming her The Fancy,

and cutting all ties to
the British crown.

From this moment on,
Henry Avery is

no longer a privateer.
He's a pirate.

The Fancy leaves port,
setting course

for the richest waters on Earth.

[indistinct battle cries]

Along the way, Avery and
his crew raid and loot roughly

a dozen ships as they sweep
down the West African coast,

round the Cape of Good Hope,
and push into the Indian Ocean,

the vital trading artery of
the mighty Mughal Empire.

The Mughals are a powerful
Islamic dynasty that rules

across much of what is
now India.

And their ruler at this time,
Aurangzeb, is quite possibly

the richest man on Earth.

Naturally, that makes his trade
route irresistible for

the eyepatch and cutlass crowd.

But Mughal ships
are famously well-armed

and fiercely protected.

And as a vital trading partner
with Avery's former employers,

the British Crown, an attack on
a Mughal ship would make Avery

the most wanted pirate
on Earth.

September of 1695,
as The Fancy sails toward

the Arabian Peninsula,
Captain Avery launches

a high-seas heist so bold,

it would make
the "Ocean's 11" crew seasick.

He convinces other nearby
pirate captains to join forces

and attack not just one vessel,
but a whole fleet,

25 Mughal ships.

But Avery and his crew set
their sights on

one particular target --
a massive,

heavily-armed treasure ship
called the Ganj-i-Sawai.

It's a floating fortress with
62 guns and 400 guards aboard.

It's armed to the teeth for
good reason.

The ship is owned by
the Mughal emperor himself,

filled with his vast
personal riches.

[explosion bangs]

Fire!

[explosions continue]

[Josh] After a volley of
Avery's cannonballs takes out

the Indian ship's mast,
the pirates storm the decks.

[grunting]

[splash]

[Josh]
When the battle comes to
an end, Avery's men claim

a treasure estimated to nearly
half a billion dollars today.

As captain, Avery gets
the lion's share, receiving not

just hundreds of thousands of
gold and silver pieces,

but priceless artifacts too.

Suffice to say, Avery is now
a very, very rich man.

With this victory,
his reputation grows rapidly,

earning him the nicknames
the Arch Pirate

and the King of the Pirates.

But before we break out
the celebratory rum,

it should be mentioned that
no treasure is valuable enough

to merit what Avery and his men
do to claim it.

The pirates torture and butcher
everyone aboard the ship,

allegedly including women
and relatives of

the royal family.
-[indistinct shouting]

[Josh]
The Ganj-i-Sawai becomes
a bloodbath.

[indistinct shouting]

[Josh] The fallout is
swift and worldwide.

Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb is
outraged and mistakenly blames

his trading partners in
Great Britain for the attack.

He threatens to shut down
all trade with

the British East India Company,

a move that would spell
economic disaster for England.

The Brits promise to
pay Aurangzeb what he's owed

and to bring the pirates
to justice.

The search for Henry Avery is

the first global manhunt
in history.

The navies of the British
and Mughal empires

independently scour the seas
for any sign of Avery's ship,

The Fancy,
but the King of the Pirates

somehow escapes them.

Avery sets The Fancy on
a course for the Bahamas,

at that time
a sparsely populated,

loosely-governed
British colony.

It's believed that Avery
and about 100 crewmen arrive in

New Providence in
April of 1696.

[metal clinking]

There, Avery allegedly split
shares of the treasure

between his men.

As for The Fancy,
her fate is also unknown.

Some say Avery handed her over
to the authorities in

New Providence.

Others believe he may have
scuttled her.

But either way, Avery and
his crew scatter to the winds.

Some stay in the Caribbean,

some head for
the American colonies.

Others head for home in hostile
British waters.

Where Avery went, well,
that's the mystery.

As many as 24 of
The Fancy's crew are arrested

within the year.

Five are hanged at London's
infamous Execution Dock.

Avery isn't one of them.

After 1696,
the so-called Pirate King

appears to simply vanish,
along with any trace of

his stolen fortune.

So what became of history's
most successful pirate?

Over the last 300 years,
there have been

numerous theories.

One of the oldest dates to
1709, when a printed pamphlet

circulates a rumor that
Henry Avery took his riches

to Madagascar,
married the daughter of

a local ruler, and established
a pirate kingdom.

Another enduring theory,
drawn from the 1724 book,

"A General History of
the Pirates," says Avery

returned to England only to be
cheated by merchants

who refused to pay fair value
for his treasure.

Stripped of his riches,
he allegedly dies a beggar.

But there's zero evidence to
back up either of

these bold theories.

In the centuries since,
the legend of Henry Avery

and his massive
undiscovered treasure

has only continued to grow.

He's been the subject of books,
stage plays,

even video games
like "Uncharted."

And while his myth
has heated up,

his trail has remained
ice cold.

But now, an incredible string
of discoveries

is quickly changing that.

In 1695, Henry Avery pulls off
the greatest heist in

pirate history, when he steals
$400 million worth of treasure.

For the next 300 years,
the fate of the stolen riches

remains a mystery.

But then comes
a remarkable find.

In 2014, a metal detectorist
scanning an orchard in

Middletown, Rhode Island,

discovers something
extraordinary --

a silver coin engraved with
Arabic script

and minted in Yemen in 1693.

Over the next few years,
similar coins turn up across

New England and as far south as
North Carolina.

All of them are dated
before 1695,

which means
they could have been

on the Ganj-i-Sawai when
Avery raided it.

In other words, this could be
part of the lost loot.

The find was compelling,
but it was far from

definitive proof that Avery
and his treasure

made it to America.

And meanwhile, other leads
elsewhere in the world emerged

as to where the Pirate King may
have ended up.

In 2023, I joined an expedition
to find the treasure,

not in the New World,
but in the Old one.

I traveled to Cornwall,
England to meet a team of

treasure hunters following
cryptic clues from

an old letter
that may reveal

some of Avery's
long lost fortune.

"On his return from India,
either landed or was

"shipwrecked near the Lizard,
where he buried three chests

or boxes full of treasure in
the sands of the seashore."

We're off to a good start.

We're literally talking about
buried treasure here.

I also explored a sea cave
straight out of "The Goonies."

And narrowly avoided
a one-way trip to

Davy Jones' locker.

And I dived a shipwreck site
rumored to have ties to

the Pirate King's lost fortune.

The results?

[explorer speaking]

[Josh speaking]

[explorer] This is just amazing.

[Josh] This is Arabic script
here, yes?

[explorer] This is, isn't it?
Yeah.

This is definitely Mughal.
There's no two ways about it.

-This is a Mughal coin?
-That is a Mughal coin.

[Josh] This is as good close to
a smoking gun...

-[explorer] That is.
-...as we've seen.

We may have found some of
Avery's treasure, but if so,

it raises a question.

Could Henry really have
returned to the country that

he'd made his enemy

and be allowed to live there
happily ever after?

Well, a remarkable new theory
developed by Dr. Sean Kingsley

may be able to explain how

the Pirate King managed to
make peace.

[Sean]
In December 2020, I was doing
some writing about pirates.

I hook up with an old friend,
Rex Cowan.

He's a wreck hunter,
an encyclopedia.

So he gets super excited
and gives me this letter that

says, "Avery the Pirate,
December, 1700."

And I go, "Hello!"

You know, this is very clearly
four years since he was

last seen in November 1696.

And it's shocking.

You know, if this letter is
real, the Pirate King is back

from the dead.

[Josh]
The letter is a copy of
an older document and therefore

hard to authenticate,
but Kingsley suspected

it might be the real deal,

calling it
a once-in-a-lifetime

historical treasure and one that
may totally rewrite

the final chapter of
Henry Avery.

[Sean]
Henry Avery says he's just
come back from a journey.

He's incredibly wary.

He's about to go off on
another mission.

He's waiting to receive
his instructions

and he'll report back
imminently.

But all these lines are kind of
intercut with this sort of code

in numbers and letters, so it
makes it impossible to

actually realize
what the content is about.

In the late 17th century,
codes like this were only used

by ambassadors,
diplomats, and spies.

I think we can cut out
the possibility that he became

an ambassador or a diplomat,
which really only points

in one specific direction --
Henry Avery,

on His Majesty's
Secret Service, a spy.

[Josh] Kingsley is arguing
something remarkable.

He's saying that Henry Avery,
the pirate who was England's

enemy number one,
had an about-face and was now

part of a British spy ring that
included, of all people,

the guy who wrote
"Robinson Crusoe," Daniel Defoe,

and the Archbishop
of Canterbury,

all to protect the country from
a French Catholic invasion.

But if so, how had Avery
managed to get back on

good terms with England?

Well, it turns out
everybody's got a price.

I think that Henry Avery gave
a large chunk

of his Mughal treasure
to pay for his "freedom."

Avery's got all this cash,

but there's no way of
spending it.

The authorities are gonna find
him and eventually hang him

by his neck.

He's in his 30s,
he's a young man,

and he's got this
incredible resume of skills

which are transferable.

What's he gonna do?

I imagine that he fixed it with
the King of England,

that he could come on
His Majesty's Secret Service as

a spy in return for
these incredible life skills

which he'd developed and for
a king's ransom pile of cash.

[Josh] There was
a big problem, though.

He couldn't make heads or tails
of the code.

Could it be the location of
Avery's lost treasure?

The only way to find out
would be to crack it.

Easier said than done.

I contacted academics,
mathematician,

even an advisor to the FBI.

And they all told me one thing,
that there are ciphers

and there are codes.

Ciphers, you can actually hope
to read them,

because there's
an internal logic

within the rhythm of a letter.

And if there is enough
repetition of words and letters

and sequences,
you can crack the cipher.

But this was not a cipher,
it was a code.

And to be able to crack that,
you had to have a code book.

And you'd have your book,
and you'd go down it,

and you'd look at a number,
and it would revert to a word.

For instance, 131 might mean
the French king, 249 might mean

Secret Service.
Those are real examples.

So you've got to be really
lucky to actually find one of

the original keys to the code.

[Josh]
The way these codes work is
that the author would reference

a standalone codebook to
disguise sensitive messages

in the correspondence.

The recipient would have been
issued an identical codebook,

so the secret message
could be deciphered.

That way, if the document fell
into the wrong hands,

it would be impossible
to understand.

[Sean]
The largest collections of
these codebooks exist in

the British Library in London.

And I spent many days and weeks
stuck in the archives going

through these volumes,
hoping to discover

the Holy Grail, uh,
but without luck.

The hunt for the elusive
codebook continues.

Unless it turns up,
the letters' strangest passages

will remain secret.
My personal favorite?

Quote, "I'm not
the least concerned for tank 29

of B26 being
out of the T9211597."

Whatever the hell that means.

One thing we do know is that if
the letter is authentic,

it rewrites Avery as less
Jack Sparrow

and more James Bond.

Kingsley believes more clues
could be buried in archives

across Europe,
and he's still on the trail

of the world's
most wanted pirate.

So watch this space,
because who knows,

maybe the next treasure isn't
sunk beneath the waves,

but locked away
in a forgotten filing cabinet,

just waiting to be plundered.

It's around 1153 BC.
The place?

Ancient Egypt.

And the pharaoh, Ramses III,
has held his empire together

for three decades with
an iron fist.

But tonight, this warrior
king's grip is slipping.

Before the sun rises,
Ramses will be dead.

How does he die?

And was it,
as many will argue, murder?

Well, that will become
the foundation of

history's oldest cold case.

But 3,000 years on,
modern science will help

explain the death of
the last great pharaoh.

Ramses III grows up during one
of the most dangerous moments

in Egypt's history.

His father, Setnakhte, seizes
the throne around 1186 BC,

at a moment when Egypt is
coming apart.

[horse neighing]

[Josh] Foreign rulers are
chipping away

at its borders.

Vital trade routes are
under attack.

The kingdom is in chaos.

While his father struggles to
restore order,

the young Prince Ramses is
sent to govern

the Sinai Peninsula,

Egypt's volatile frontier.

There, he learns how to command
troops, protect trade routes,

and defend the fragile empire
he may one day inherit.

It's a harsh training ground,
but Ramses proves himself

a strong leader
and fierce warrior.

His father saves the kingdom,
but his reign is brief,

just three years.

And when he dies
around 1184 BC,

Ramses III,
as he'll come to be known,

assumes the throne.

He inherits a kingdom restored
by force, but surrounded by

enemies on every side.

The young pharaoh now carries
the responsibility

of holding Egypt together.

And almost immediately,
he is tested.

Libyan tribes invade
from the west.

Then an even greater threat
arrives from the sea.

Mysterious maritime raiders
known as the Sea Peoples,

whose attacks are helping to
topple civilizations

across the ancient world.

Ramses fights back.

[horse neighing]

Against overwhelming odds,
his armies defeat the invaders

in one of the most decisive
battles of the age.

The victory is immortalized

on temple walls,
showing the pharaoh as

Egypt's defender, standing
between his civilization

and destruction.

But decades of war
takes its toll.

The treasury is drained.
Workers go unpaid.

Nearly 30 years into his reign,
laborers building

the royal tombs lay down
their tools in protest.

It is the first recorded
labor strike in history.

[indistinct shouting]

[Josh] The empire Ramses fought
so hard to defend

is beginning to weaken.

And inside the royal palace,
an even more dangerous threat

begins to emerge.

The pharaoh has designated
his eldest son,

Ramses IV,
as his successor.

But that plan doesn't sit well
with some of the royal family,

particularly with one of
Ramses' three wives.

A betrayal is brewing.

Queen Tiye believes
her own son, Prince Pentawer,

should take the throne instead.

But Tiye is only
a secondary wife

with far less power
at court.

She does not hold
the prestigious title of

Great Royal Wife,

the rank reserved
for a pharaoh's

principal queens,
whose sons typically

had the strongest claim to rule.

Born a commoner, Queen Tiye
lacks royal blood,

and her lower status leaves
her son far down

the line of succession.

But that doesn't stop her from
trying to seize power.

According to surviving papyrus
records, Tiye begins secretly

organizing a plot to
assassinate Ramses III...

Kill the Pharaoh.

[Josh]
...and place Prince Pentawer
on the throne.

If she can gather enough
support, she could overturn

the royal line of succession.

Tiye and Pentawer recruit
several of Ramses' inner circle

to aid their plot,

including a chef,
a butler,

and an overseer of
his harem,

exploiting growing
dissatisfaction with

the pharaoh from within
his own household.

History will remember this as
the Harem Conspiracy.

Some loyal officials may have
tried to warn the king.

But if they did,
the warning came too late.

Not long after, Ramses III,
the warrior pharaoh who spent

his life defending Egypt
is found dead.

Father!

[Josh]
Whispers of betrayal
spread through the palace.

Had the king been murdered by
his own family?

His body is embalmed
and wrapped in layers of linen,

then buried in a tomb in
the Valley of the Kings.

For more than 3,000 years,
the truth about what happened

to Ramses III remains
buried with him.

Thanks to modern science,
we now have the answers.

All will be revealed.

Egyptian pharaoh Ramses III is
dead, but was it murder?

And if so, was his plotting
wife, Queen Tiye, responsible?

Well, there is a fascinating
document that's key to

understanding the truth.

Writings known as
the "Judicial Papyrus of Turin,"

which describe the trial of
assassins of Ramses in

the so-called Harem Conspiracy.

But it is frustratingly vague
on the details.

Here's what we do know.

The trial consists of
12 judges and is overseen by

21-year-old Ramses IV,

the late pharaoh's
designated heir.

The fact that he presides
and not Pentawer,

tells us that although
Queen Tiye

may have succeeded in
arranging Ramses' death,

her plot to install Pentawer
as ruler failed.

The new pharaoh,
Ramses IV,

shows little mercy in exacting
revenge on those

who are seemingly implicated in
his father's death.

The papyrus lists an astounding
28 people who were executed for

their roles in the conspiracy.

As for Tiye and Pentawer
themselves, the papyrus states

Pentawer is allowed to take
his own life.

Though the method of execution
isn't mentioned,

scholars believe he most likely
hanged himself.

But the papyrus tells us
nothing about what happened to

Queen Tiye,
the apparent instigator of

the Harem Conspiracy.

Many believe she was executed,

perhaps by burning,
erased from royal memory.

The papyrus was discovered in
the 1820s by Italian diplomat

and antiquities collector
Bernardino Drovetti,

who shipped the documents
and crates of Egyptian

treasures to the Turin Museum.

The papyrus sat there
for decades

until Egyptologist, Adolf Erman
finally translated it

around the turn of the century.

And while the details
it revealed gave us

a revolutionary look into
the Harem Conspiracy,

some key questions
remain a mystery,

namely how Ramses III died
and who killed him.

But then in 2012,
a team of researchers

led by Dr. Zahi Hawass decides
to take another look

at the pharaoh's remains

using modern
forensic techniques.

When archaeologist
Nicholas Brown

saw the results,
he was stunned.

The findings that
Dr. Zahi Hawass

and his team made
broke open this whole mystery.

They actually used modern
technologies like CT scanning

to virtually unwrap the mummy
of Ramses III.

Underneath the bandages,
the king's throat had actually

been slit with a knife.

This wasn't just
a surface wound that

the king had experienced.

This cut had run deep
and actually severed

his windpipe
and several arteries.

[Josh]
Nearly 3,200 years after
the brutal deed,

we finally know how
the pharaoh died.

This new forensic evidence now
proves the pharaoh was

assassinated, just as
Queen Tiye had planned.

But one question remains.

Who could have gotten close
enough to Egypt's most

protected man to
slit his throat?

The ancient Egyptians' access
to the king would have been

really limited and restricted,
which means it must have been

somebody close to the king,
either in his court

or even his harem, who was able
to accomplish something like

an assassination plot.

[Josh]
Dr. Hawass's team believed
they may have found

the murderer by examining
another mummy discovered near

Ramses in the pharaoh's tomb.

At first, this mummy appeared
to be an anonymous young man

who had been mummified without
the usual care and respect

afforded to royalty.

But then DNA analysis showed
he was far from unknown.

The DNA analysis that Zahi
performed on this unknown mummy

and the mummy of Ramses III
found that the two

were very closely related.

It's possible that this mummy
could, in fact, be Pentawer,

the son of Ramses III
and Queen Tiye.

Some Egyptologists have
suggested that the way this

mummy looks, right,
with its mouth wide open

and it looks like he's screaming
in pain, that perhaps this

indicates that
he was killed by hanging.

38 people are accused as being
involved with the assassination

attempt against Ramses III.

It's really unlikely that all
38 of those individuals

actually had direct access to
Ramses and therefore

would have been the one
to kill him.

[groan]

Access to the king would have
been really

limited and restricted.

It's more likely that as
the son of Ramses III,

Pentawer would have had closer
access to the king than most

other people in the court,
and could have been the one

who actually assassinated him.

Modern forensics has unwrapped
the millennia-old mystery of

the death of Ramses III.

We now know that his throat
was slit.

There's even circumstantial
evidence suggesting Ramses' own

son carried out the deed.

Not bad analysis for

a 3,000-plus-year-old
crime scene.

Today, visitors to Ramses'
temple can still see

the magnificent reliefs

showing him as
a triumphant warrior king.

But it now seems this famed
pharaoh's greatest battle

wasn't against foreign armies,
but with his very own family,

who thirsted for the throne.

Welcome to the ancient world,
and a place made famous

by the Greeks.
We're not in Greece, though.

We're in a place beyond
its borders,

a place where women rule.

This young fighter is training
to join an all-female army in

a society said to be so
powerful its name will echo

through time,
inspiring everything from

the name of a mighty river to
our most iconic superheroine,

Wonder Woman, because this
warrior is an Amazon.

Now, in time, scholars will say
these fearsome females are

simply the stuff of myth.

That is, until new evidence
suggests something incredible,

that the Amazon
might just be real.

[horse neighing]

The Amazons are first mentioned
by name in "The Iliad,"

written in the 8th century BC.

In Homer's famous epic,
King Priam of Troy mentions

that he, quote, "Once fought
alongside the Amazons,

women the equal of men."

It's barely more than a name
drop, but their mystique

is firmly established.

Over the next few centuries,
Greek storytellers return to

the stories of the Amazons.

They write about a tribe of
fierce warriors existing in

a female-only society beyond
the borders of Greece in

the area of the Black Sea.

They procreate with men from
neighboring communities,

then raise only the daughters,

sending male children back
to their fathers.

According to legend,
Amazon women are,

almost from birth, trained
in hand-to-hand combat,

as well as
horseback riding and archery.

They also expertly
wield battle axes and spears.

Their strength is beyond
compare, warriors so fierce

they blur the line between
mortal and mythic.

Ultimately, the Amazons are
said to go head-to-head

with the greatest heroes of
Greek mythology.

And I promise you, this is
a fight you don't want to miss.

[Josh]
Legends of female fighters
known as Amazon warriors have

endured for thousands of years,
stemming from stories left by

the ancient Greeks, known for
their lethal skills as archers.

Some stories even describe them
cutting off one of

their breasts to better steady
their bows or hurl

deadly javelins.
They're nearly unstoppable.

That is, unless
they're squaring off against

mythical Greek heroes.

In tales recorded
in the 8th century BC,

Queen Penthesilea of
the Amazons

faces off alone
against the Greeks

and the greatest warrior in
Greek mythology, Achilles.

[guttural screams]

[Josh]
They engage in a savage battle.

And while she's a nearly even
match for Achilles,

he ultimately slays her.

Afterward, he's struck by
Penthesilea's valor and beauty,

ironically falling in love with
the very foe he kills.

In another famous story,
the queen of the Amazons,

Hippolyta, sister of the slain
Queen Penthesilea,

is about to come face to face
with the one man in

Greek mythology you don't want
to pick a fight with,

because sailing into the harbor,
is Hercules.

As the half-mortal,
half-divine son of Zeus,

Herc is on a roll,
tackling 12 lethal labors,

including the slaying of
a giant lion,

a pesky Hydra,
and the infamous Minotaur.

It's the ninth of these deadly
missions which pits

him toe-to-toe,
or sandal-to-sandal,

against the Amazons.

Hercules is tasked
with claiming

the queen's golden war belt,
the symbol of her power.

To his surprise,
Hippolyta doesn't resist.

She meets him peacefully
and even offers the belt as

a gift and a show of mutual
respect between warrior equals.

Believing it too good to be
true, Hercules turns on

the queen and strikes
her down dead.

He escapes with the belt
and his life.

Notice a pattern?

In myth after myth,
an Amazon queen dies by

the hand of a Greek male hero.

It is no coincidence that
the stories of Amazon warriors

being defeated by Greek heroes
were written by Greek men,

men with a patriarchal
worldview to defend.

So were the Amazons just a myth
shaped by male imagination?

Or is there any truth to
the stories of

these proud warrior women?

Well, there's at least one
historical source which

suggests they may have
actually existed.

In the 5th century,
the historian Herodotus

documented an account of
Amazon warriors captured by

the Greeks, who later escaped
by seizing their captors' ships

and settling among
the Scythians in what is now

Ukraine and Russia.

For millennia,
Herodotus' account is

written off by scholars as
imaginative storytelling,

not credible history.

But now there's extraordinary
new evidence that the Amazons

may have been so much more
than myth.

For centuries, historians
have debated,

were the Amazon warriors of
Greek legend

real or fantasy?

In the 5th century,
Herodotus claimed they hailed

from the ancient region of
Scythia, a vast swath of

territory stretching from
Ukraine to Turkey around

the edge of the Black Sea.

Professor of anthropology
Marin Pilloud

reveals that recent
discoveries about the Scythians

may help solve the mystery
of the Amazons.

So, some 30 years ago,
some interesting discoveries

were found in the Caspian Pontic
steppe region.

They found around 19 mounds
that were large burial tombs.

And in 2019, in one mound,
they found the remains of

four female skeletons.

And it's dated to around
2,500 years ago.

This date of about 2,500 years
is important because it places

the culture in the area.

So, we know that around that
time, the Scythians were in

this region, and we know
the Scythians to be a group

that had women warriors that

predominantly traveled around
via horseback.

Within this mound,
with the skeletons of these

four women, were multiple iron
arrowheads, spears,

artifacts associated
with horse riding, and knives.

The oldest woman also had
a golden headdress

around her head.

It was intricate and could have
also suggested something about

her position in society.

Not only was she the oldest
individual, but also had

the most elaborate
grave goods with her,

with the golden headdress.

These were things that were
placed there to honor

the dead amongst the living.

The women who were buried in
these mounds would have held

an elevated place in society.

Just like the Amazons of
legend, these women from

the late 4th century BC,

were apparently
part of a family dynasty,

buried with the honor one would
expect for revered warriors.

[Marin] In fact, there is some
skeletal analysis of other

Scythian remains that suggests
that there could be

battle wounds on women
that's very similar to men.

Based on some of these recent
archaeological findings,

we can see that it was quite
normal for women to engage in

warfare activities
amongst the Scythians.

As a nomadic tribe,
they would need to, at times,

defend their areas.

[Josh]
Trained from youth in
horseback riding

and mounted combat,
much like the Amazons of legend,

Scythian women were
adorned with animal tattoos

meant to imbue them with

magical protection and strength
in battle.

These tattoos mimicked
the striking gold and bronze

animal art also found
in their graves.

This find adds to growing
evidence that women had

strong roles in the past.

This is a notion that we have
been at times reluctant to

embrace based on our own
sort of conceptions of

gendered roles in the present.

And so, we infer those onto
the past, but there's such

a growing body of evidence to
suggest that women were in fact

engaged in all levels of
society, including warfare.

And with discoveries like this
one in 2019 of women buried

with grave goods indicative of
being a warrior,

it seems highly probable that
the Scythian warrior women were

the inspiration for
the Amazon women

that the Greeks
wrote about.

The archaeological findings are
revealing that the Amazons

may be a legendary echo of
historic female fighters.

The very name, Amazon, is now
attributed to the old

Persian word Hamazan,
meaning "equal warrior."

After all, who needs
Wonder Woman

when you've got
the real-life action heroines

of the Scythians?

I'm Josh Gates, and I'll see
you on the next expedition.