Original subtitles

what is this strange Roman device

that has been puzzling archaeologists for centuries

the Romans

documented everything very carefully but

there are no records of these objects

was a device powered by leeches

the first weather app now

not all crazy ideas seemed

absolutely crazy back then

these ancient ones can do Scrolls

show the way to buried treasures, an

initial inventory revealed gold and

silver that would be worth billions of dollars today

[Music]

fascinating mysterious objects

long hidden in museums, laboratories and

archives

[Music]

now we can use the latest

technology to reveal their secrets -

we can recreate them

dismantling

and enlarging

and

revealing the forgotten and bizarre

are the strangest things in the world.

This strange bronze culture

embodies one of the greatest mysteries of the

Roman Empire. Its intended use

is still unclear today. There

are no records of these

objects.

We do not know exactly what they

were used for and can only

speculate

because the purpose of the object

was not obvious, scientists

simply named it a Roman

dodecahedron because of its 125s.

If there was only one, you could simply

dismiss it as a curiosity, but a

total of 116 variants of it were found,

none of them exactly the same as the other, some

of them about the size of a fist, others a little

smaller

a Roman dude has twelve sides

a small ball under each corner

so it's easy to stand up and each

side has a hole but holes are

different sizes on the side surfaces

[music]

so it certainly sparkled in the sunlight

and was a real

eye-catcher

have no numbers or

characters that

could explain their function, but there is a new

theory, science was

on the wrong track for centuries,

so what might the dodecahedrons have been used for,

where did they come from, what is the deal

with these strange angular

objects, it

is undisputed that they ancient Romans

were passionate gamers,

perhaps the things were

used for gaming. Arndt Romans loved

dice games. They played constantly, just like

many people do today on the subway

on their smartphones.

During excavations in Rome,

game boards and tables were found in large temples

where people used to play have sat and

rolled dice in Pompeii there is a

well-known mural that

shows men arguing over a game of dice

and before Caesar crossed the Rubicon

he said the famous sentence

the dice has fallen I surrender to

my fate

the Romans had dice in a

wide variety of sizes and shapes

For many different games the

dodekaida are dice but this

theory also has a catch

when you throw them they don't roll well

because the sides are not flat

they don't have numbers and

the holes are different

sizes between 6 mm and 4 cm so each

side has a different weight like a

zinced cube

that doesn't fit so

how about a candlestick

this idea came about because of the

wax residue that was found in one of them

but this theory also depends

if it was a candlestick you would

burn your hands on it

the normal candlestick have a rim at the top

so that the wax doesn't drip onto his

hand

or a children's toy.

If I give my little son something like that to

play with, he puts it in his

mouth, in his ear and probably even in

his nose.

Neither dice nor candlesticks or

children's toys

could possibly be where they were found

Artifacts give an indication of their

function.

The dodecahedrons were only excavated in the north and

northwest of the Roman Empire,

where the weather is often cold

and unpleasant.

In the sunny regions in the south,

however, they have not yet been found. A

theory states that they were used for

knitting gloves were used

to check this, someone

printed a 3D model and used it to knit a five-

fingered glove

[music]

I like that archaeologists are at a loss

and talk to

astronomers and mathematicians for decades then

someone who knows about handicrafts comes along and

says it was done Certainly gloves

were knitted,

but this theory doesn't convince everyone.

I don't rule out that they

were used for that purpose, but gloves are

a universal product and there were

already devices for weaving back then. The idea that

these objects were only intended for knitting

gloves doesn't fit with

the great effort involved which they were

undoubtedly made

almost all dodecahedrons are made of bronze and

it was expensive

money was also made from this material

the Roman method of making objects

that are hollow inside out of bronze

is still used today

it is lengthy and complicated to put

a clay core with wax into it You

mill the mold into which you want to cast the bronze with wax,

then you cover the model again with

clay and fire it. The

wax melts and flows out so that

you want to cast it. You heat the

bronze to over 1000 degrees so that it

becomes nice and liquid and you cast it

It can also splash and

spark into the mold, then you wait until it has

cooled down.

This technology is far too complex for

everyday objects. Economically, it would have been anything but sensible to invest so much time and effort into these beautiful structures as everyday objects for everyday use

They must have been incredibly expensive to make for use,

so it's very unlikely

that they were just candlesticks or

toys.

These theories don't quite fit

together.

All previous theories about the function of

the dodecahedrons have weak points. It's no

wonder that archaeologists

are still puzzled after all these centuries

But there is a new theory that would also

explain the elaborate production of the sophisticated objects.

One thing is astonishing: in the

Roman Empire and especially in

northern Europe, almost all Roman

military camps looked the same, so there must have been

a precise plan for their construction

and for it Did they need the

appropriate measuring devices?

How else could the Romans have

planned and measured their roads and how

else would they have known where to

place the milestones?

For me, the Roman Empire is characterized by the fact

that the Romans

measured distances and marked them accordingly

Roads have milestones on which the

distance is accurately displayed.

The secret of this precision is,

more precisely, the different

sizes of the opposite holes

[music]

when you look through one hole,

the one opposite seems to

be the same size at a certain distance and this distance is

then Regardless of the size,

you only need an

object whose size is fixed and

which is clearly visible from the ground.

A Roman soldier, for

example, could have stood with his standard at

a certain distance

if, when you

looked through it, this standard fit exactly into both holes

the corresponding

distance that would explain the

different sizes of the holes

by turning the thing you could

measure different distances and

when you used it, such a device had to be

easy to handle that would

explain the beads on the corners and the

different sized holes with the

engravings around it, which

may have helped with the alignment,

in terms of function,

such an instrument would have

suited the needs of the Roman army very well.

The greatest need of the Roman army

is to win wars.

They had to know when the enemy

was within range for their arrows and Their

catapults would have been of no use

if you hadn't released them at exactly the right

time.

Such a device would have

been very practical for building

roads and military camps and in

battles to know when the enemy

was within range and then

use the catapults accordingly

Are the dodecahedrons actually

measuring devices used by the ancient Romans?

The theory seems plausible,

but as long as no documentation or new

archaeological evidence emerges,

it will probably never be possible to say with certainty

[Music] In

1952, archaeologists discovered

one of the most

controversial and fascinating

objects ever in a cave in the West Bank ancient

strips of rolled up metal were found, the

copper roll of kuman,

its two fragments are almost 30 cm

long and 5 cm wide, heavily oxidized and

brittle, the engraved text has triggered a

treasure hunt and a discussion

that is still ongoing today

[music]

a treasure map

or the latest Research could help

solve one of the greatest archaeological mysteries of the 20th century

Who made the scroll Where did

it come from Is there really a treasure buried in the desert

or is it just an

adventurous archaeologist's dream

What's the deal with the

Kuman copper scroll

[Music ] In

1947, in the northern West Bank on the

Dead Sea,

a young sheep had discovered some jars with papyrus fragments in a cave through the

stony wilderness near the village of Kuman, a

good 20 km from Jerusalem.

The 2,000-year-old documents are

among the most important archaeological

finds of the present day.

The scrolls from the Dead Sea

a sensation for archaeologists

they contain some of the oldest texts in

the Hebrew Bible

the scientists were enthusiastic about the rolls

now offer you some of

the oldest biblical sources as well as

descriptions of the region and the

customs during a very turbulent

period in Jewish history

Bible archaeologists it was the find

of the century or even a thousand

they describe the time in which parts of

the Bible were written

the scientists got a

clearer picture of an era in which many

religious works and communities were created

[music]

just five years later a team discovered

by archaeologists in a neighboring

cave the copper scroll broken into two parts. It

is immediately clear to them that they have

found something very special.

Now the fragments are not

made of parchment but of metal.

Copper is much more valuable and

more difficult to describe,

an indication that it is the

copper scroll is a very important if

not sacred document

which was so important that someone

took the trouble to hammer it into copper

some words that are printed in mirror image on

the outside of the scroll

attract the attention of

scientists they decipher words like

dig the Unit of measurement elle and gold

some archaeologists draw a

clear conclusion from this

that a book cannot

be judged by its cover but that is

every archaeologist's dream to find a treasure map

this assumption could only be

confirmed by opening the scroll but that is

very risky

the problem is if If copper is left

lying around for thousands of years, it oxidizes and that

makes it brittle.

An expert doesn't want to

admit defeat

precise

cutting so Alice Henry white

Baker asks a professor at the University of

Manchester to develop one specifically for the

copper roll of kuman.

On October 1, 1955 it is ready for use.

A hybrid of a circular saw and a

dental instrument right Baker

begins to cut the priceless

copper fragments into strips.

Any blunder would be catastrophic

[Music]

takes three and a half months to divide the roll

fragments into 23 segments

finally their 2000 year old

secret can be revealed

it is actually a

treasure map

the hint of buried gold on the

outside was just the tip of the

iceberg

when they found the individual parts translated,

they realized it was not just

one but several treasure maps,

the fragments belonged to a

continuous 2.30 m long roll.

There were 64 individual

descriptions and lists of

hidden treasures filled with coins, valuable

metal objects and sacred objects,

it was unimaginable

a first Inventory revealed 200

tons of gold and silver which

would be worth billions of dollars today a huge

buried treasure spread across the desert

the figures are astronomical

how could someone amass such a large fortune 2000 years ago

and keep it secret

is there really a multi-billion

dollar treasure In the desert

some archaeologists find it difficult

to believe that.

The problem is

that the scientists

attributed the scroll to the scenes

Hanna lived ascetically, mystical

fringe group of Judaism,

they were poor, lived in the desert and

had dedicated their lives to the religion from

where They should have gold and

silver worth several

billion dollars today,

like Battle Monks, but they are said to have been

extremely rich. Sounds somehow

unbelievable.

The story of a possible

treasure divides the scientific community.

British archaeologist who had the

scroll opened is convinced

that the treasure really exists The

decisive opponents of his thesis

include a co-discoverer of the scroll,

the biblical scholar and Catholic

priest Josef

[music]

Josef Milik calculated the information

and thought it was far too high.

Something wasn't right.

According to me, the wealth is not

only too great for the scene but for

the entire region around cumbran 2000 years ago

Allegro believes that the information

may be too high

his explanation for this must be

a calculation error

the unit of measurement in the text is talent its

value varied over time in

different eras and

societies

what weight should Now

the value of the

supposed treasures would have been much lower

[music]

the conversion of talent into today's

tons could have been incorrect,

the authors of the scroll could have used

a different measure of talent as a basis

It would be much less

[music]

a treasure worth millions would be more

historically credible than one

worth billions,

but an important question remains open

where this still enormous

wealth should come from

[music] a

good 20 kilometers from Kuman

is the Western Wall in Jerusalem, a

holy place of pilgrimage for the Jews and the

last outline of the second or

Herodesian Temple

the second temple was a sanctuary of

Judea it was their most important holy

cities and contained the treasures and

gold of the Jewish believers it must have been a

very richly furnished building

an explanation for the treasure was

believed to be the treasure The second

temple is said to have been

hidden in the desert during the great Jewish war

[music]

but the treasure never existed

Much to Alegro's frustration, he takes his time with the

publication and for good reason.

EFI cells Battles is

a fake. If he had

been suspected of a cover-up,

the authenticity would have been confirmed. He came to the house

treasure hunt to find the gold and the

other treasures

[Music ]

so a lot of time and delayed

the publication

[music]

accompanied by a great media hype, he

published his own thesis, which

resulted in a bitter and

manageable dispute between the two

scientists

in order to prove his theory. In

1962, Alegro began searching for the

treasure

The search for lost treasures has

fascinated humanity for

centuries and has driven many to ruin.

Not a single piece of gold can be found,

even after decades of searching. Even

by other treasure hunters, the

legendary treasures remain undiscovered.

The treasure is just a legend.

New research could reveal the secret of the

copper roll finally deciphered

in 2051 in 2015 a new theory came

up that said that the copper scroll only

contains a list of all the donations

that the temple has received over the entire time

and that the items were never

there all at once.

Other Hebrew texts tell of

a fictitious treasure that it was never existed of

idealized riches that

may have existed in the past

the idea could go back to the ancient Greeks

this is the country's

temple chronicle a directory of the series

gifts to a temple of Athena 200

years older than the copper scroll of

Kuman

at the beginning of the inscription says Everything

that is listed here wasn't

really there,

maybe the items existed

at some point, but actually

it was about what you would like to sacrifice to the goddess Athena

even if you

didn't have it,

so you wanted to show how much you

love the goddess,

there is one Connection between the

loan lists and the enigmatic

copper scroll of kuman

the scroll is written in Hebrew but

upon closer inspection you can see

Greek letters at the end of some

entries

Greek inventory lists contain

similar symbols they were used like numbers

on index cards for cataloging

[music]

had to the presentation for their God

sensible outlines maybe

you had this with Greek letters

also the copper scroll from kumran could have been

a list of riches

to be displayed in a temple that would

also explain its material

why was the scroll made of copper

maybe it wasn't just about

durability but also my shape During the

presentation,

the scroll may have hung like a

tablet on the wall of a temple and

testified to all the riches that had been

donated to it over the years,

but an unsolved problem remains.

Unlike the Indian

temple chronicle, there are references to locations in the copper scroll

of Kumran where

the treasures mentioned are said to be located,

their authors were not afraid of

attracting the attention of ancient treasure hunters. The answer

can be found in the last textiles.

There is probably another

scroll with the help of which one can find the exact

locations of the treasures mentioned in the copper scroll

of Kumran

So not only have the treasures

disappeared, but also the exact

instructions on where to find them

[music]

As long as there is hope that a

real treasure exists,

treasure hunters will come to Kuman to find it

in the north of England

in the stick's local museum There is

a copy of one of the most bizarre

inventions in history. It is almost

a meter high and resembles a mini

carousel but what does that mean? It is

a

scientific instrument from the

Victorian era. The

device made of mahogany wood, glass, silver

and brass was once supposed to be change the world has

never happened before,

it is the storm predictor, he is supposed to

crack one of the biggest problems of the Victorian era, a

reliable forecast of the weather

and with the help of 12 leeches that

live in glasses filled with water and

are trained to ring a bell to

bring

weather conditions to people The leeches should

swim upwards and thus

indicate a bad weather front.

Around 170 years ago

people took the effectiveness of this device

seriously

[applause]

who came up with this obscure idea,

how should the device work and

can leeches really predict the weather?

Victorian era,

many things suddenly seem possible notices

the ideas had taken off

in the 1850s the British made

significant advances in technology

and science

inventions such as rubber tires photography

and bicycles revolutionized life

work and travel

it was a time of extraordinary

inventions and an enormous social

physical industrial and

economic change, the

speed of which was simply overwhelming,

trade is booming and with it transport,

the weather is also gaining

in importance

[music]

the weather has always

been important for society because the

harvests depend on it, but as is

trade and therefore transport On the

world's oceans it became

even more important to predict storms and storms

if you had a large fleet at sea

instead of just a few small boats. As

trade increased, the weather played

an increasingly important role,

but weather forecasting still takes

place as it did in the Middle Ages

There were all sorts of farmer's rules like

sunset, good weather boat, dawn with

threat of rain.

Such kind of proverbs no longer have a place in the

scientific

Victorian age.

Electricity, magnetism, evolution. The

secrets of nature are being

deciphered. Previously puzzling

connections are being made

Science suddenly seemed to be

able to do everything, including

understanding and predicting the weather, but

meteorological knowledge was

still in its infancy and no one

knew what was possible and what wasn't.

This is the moment when George

Weber enters the scene.

Mary weather was a doctor from Weedby with

numerous interests, among other things,

he was the curator of the local museum there

and he was also a passionate

inventor.

One of his inventions was a lamp

that burned continuously for two weeks,

supposedly with a mixture of pure

alcohol and whiskey.

Unfortunately, it doesn't get through to his

customers It is probably to drink it before the

whiskey instead of burning it. In

1850 his groundbreaking

storm forecaster followed. The basis is formed by

several vessels filled with water and leeches.

At the top of each glass there is a

snap mechanism attached that

is connected to a bell

[music]

there was a small one Lever made of

whale bones when the leeches

got to it, it was triggered and a bell

rang in case a

single bloody leech made a mistake. Mary Weather

had taken precautions, he used twelve of them.

I not only relied on a noble and

his knowledge of the weather, but also relied

on a majority decision

The more bells rang, the more

reliable the forecast

sounds understandable, but how did

Merryweather come to the conclusion that

leeches can predict the weather?

In popular parlance, animals are often the task

of meteorologists. There is

a long tradition of inferring changes in the weather based on the

behavior of animals There are

also good reasons, some animals

react very sensitively to a

change in the weather

[music]

the idea of ​​using the change in behavior of

animals as a tool for

weather forecasting was

ancient and quite common,

for example when cows should

lie down in the pasture, there will be rain,

such farmer rules exist In all

cultures

in Germany there is the weather frog.

In Germany, of course, everyone knows the

weather frog, the frog that sits on the

ladder in a glass vessel like that,

while in the rest of the world this is not

known at all and Germans believe

that the weather frog really determines the

weather through its position On the ladder

Mary can predict that the choice falls on leeches, which had

a special fascination at the time.

He claims that they

would rise to the surface of the water

when they felt the rain coming.

Hedgehogs seem very primitive, like snails,

but in reality they are extremely

complex creatures. There are

no leeches Shell or no

shell are therefore not snails but

are actually worms that live in water.

Some people prefer fish, some horses,

some people. They have a nice

color pattern so they can be colored orange and green.

They are known mainly because of their

favorite food.

Leeches are actually really like

small ones Worm vampires

like

to drink blood. They have

two suction cups,

the other is lined with hundreds of teeth

and bites

while the hedgehogs suck out the blood.

They release two chemicals, an

anesthetic and an

anticoagulant, so that the blood flow

stops

as soon as they are full They

survive for up to a year without having to

eat again

the ability to provide blood makes them noble

particularly interesting. At that time

the prevailing opinion was that human

health depended on four humors:

black bile, yellow bile, mucus and

blood.

Blood was an important component of

one of these Juices, you could

have bad blood, you could have too much

blood and in both cases

the leeches were of course perfect because they

could suck out the blood that was too much or

bad from the body.

Bloodletting was a common

medical treatment method back then. Leeches

are a gentle alternative

For example, you simply

cut somewhere and of course that could

cause people to bleed too much,

especially if you

did it so often, but you could

also get terrible inflammation that

couldn't be treated at the time, which is why

the leeches were there For

many, it was more natural and, so to speak,

gentler and more targeted, the better

method

[music]

that made medicinal leeches very

popular.

They were used for a variety of

diseases. People were

really keen on them. In

1833, over

41 million medicinal leeches were

imported into France alone. In Germany there were Then

farms were quickly bred on which leeches

were bred and to this day there are

still leech farms for

medical commercial production in

Germany.

At that time there were people who

worked as leech collectors, especially

women, who rolled up their arms up

their skirts and waited through

bodies of water which you lived so that they

sucked on your legs

leeches are used so often that

they are almost extinct

[music]

When developing the

storm forecaster, he was inspired by a poem by the

vaccination pioneer and nature observer

Edward Jenner

[music]

the weight is called science of rain and

contains the lines then the call is

offset, the hedgehog climbs up in

his prison all the way up as a

Victorian doctor, Marie has a

weakness for the animals but can they

really predict the weather

[music]

the blood angels rise up when

a rain front approaches that is

Not as crazy as it sounds because in

bad weather

the air pressure usually drops to

reduce the pressure. This is

of course very important for the leeches because there

is different amounts of

oxygen in the water, for example the deeper they

go, the less oxygen there is

and the higher they are The more

oxygen there is, so they have to be

able to perceive the pressure.

In addition to the oxygen coming

out of the water directly through their skin, hedgehogs

react very sensitively to the

concentration of oxygen in the water

and this changes as the

air pressure

falls, the air pressure has less

oxygen in it Water the leeches come

to the surface where there is a higher

oxygen content

they react to this and that is the

basis on which the device is based

but in order for the storm forecaster to

work the leeches have to

trigger a bell every time. Is that

even possible?

I have trained leeches myself

tried to bring the forest to see if

they didn't migrate over a certain height,

how quickly they

forgot certain things and I was

amazed that the leeches

could do more than we expected,

but Mary Weather complained that some

leeches have a difficult character

from today's perspective

Of course it seems a bit strange when you hear

that Mary Weather thought some of

these leeches can predict the future,

some are a bit

smarter, others are a bit stupider,

but I have worked with leeches myself

and I know that you can see the

differences between the

animals remembers and

can then, let's say, imagine that you have the

right personalities and

skills.

Mary wasn't completely wrong,

Dr. Mary weather's idea is

of course not completely crazy, it was

perhaps an experiment that

wasn't particularly accurate and what

no one did after that has pursued more but it

could be that there is a

drop or more truth in it

if his storm forecast

could actually work then why did

n't he get his way then what went wrong was due

to the doctor's lack of self-confidence

it certainly wasn't

[music]

received gave a lecture to the

Whitby Literary and Philosophical Society and talked

for three hours about the success of the

device while comparing himself to

Galileo. The storm prediction was

really that good.

A London newspaper reported

his successful prediction of a

strong storm

51.5 hours before it Elevator a very

comfortable fault tolerance or general

[Music] In

1851, Mary Weather presented his

promising invention at the

World Exhibition in London.

All the important scientists,

inventors and manufacturers of the

time were there. He was a sensation

for the time and in the middle of it all

stood Mary Weather with his leech

successful PR campaign but what

he needs is not only the recognition

of the public but also

government support

he wanted the government to

install his devices along the coast to

help sailors and merchant sleighs

but unlike the leeches the

government doesn't bite

us prognosticator Storm forecaster

wasn't a success, actually not very

surprising. It was expensive to

produce and maintain, among

other things because the leeches kept

dying, and it wasn't particularly

reliable

was developed,

it seemed quite outdated

[Music] At

the beginning and middle of the 19th century,

scientific devices were no

longer allowed to look like aquariums in which

small creatures swam

in an era that wanted to leave superstition behind

and embrace science.

Other inventions

soon predicted the storm In the shadows,

the telegraph brought enormous progress

because

with its help weather stations could exchange

information about the prevailing

weather much more quickly. Using

precise maps, so much more accurate

forecasts could be made than with the

help of the bloody one that

remains of Mary Withers' bizarre

invention Replica in the museum

whose curator he was once, it stands as an

exhibit, but without the

blood-sucking meteorologists