Well done. I spent a college semester in Rome in the 70's, and we lived in the hotel that faces the n/e corner of the Pantheon. The Pantheon went through a great cleaning and general digging around the foundation then, into the 1980's. They found a great amount of things below street level around the base of the Pantheon. It was wonderful drinking $1 wine and watching them bring items up from below street level. Ah, the good ole days. We're headed back for our last trip this fall after COVID...to celebrate 50 years of travel to Rome.
Rome is an interesting place. We visited in 2011 and stayed at a "new" apartment building from the 1500s or 1700s, I forget. A 30 second walk from the front door and you stepped into the open area in front of the Pantheon.! Much more interesting than Florence. I'd love to go back.
There are entire cities buried under the sand in Egypt. I watched a documentary a few years ago and they used satellite thermal imaging over much of the Eqyptian desert and scanned it. They found hundreds of cities, and the ancient capital of Tanis, completely buried under mountains of sand dunes. Its amazing to think how much stuff must be buried under all that sand waiting to be discovered.
It really is. When I visited Egypt, I remember looking out over the desert beyond the Theban Necropolis and wondering what those cliffs and dunes were hiding.
@@toldinstone You should analyse why today there is so much land near the site of ancient battle of Thermopylae the most famous battle of Spartans. In the past there was a narrow pass. Today the pass is very wide because land was raised from the sea. You will find the main reason why ancient buildings are buried so deep.
This effect is huge in Europe already, just general soil and dirt rising up. Even here there must be a lot of buildings and towns and cities still buried somewhere, especially if they're older than Rome. But in deserts? Man that would go even quicker, seeing as sand dunes form much easier.
Dust, dead plants, and debris - Sounds like my Gran's living room. She's been wondering why the door won't open properly lately too but this explains why.
Oh, God. That’s funny! And I bet she knows where everything is! 😹By the way! Perhaps you and I should get married! I could be Winnifred Wibblesworth. Think of the fun we could have introducing ourselves to people! Just a thought.
You forgot one of the key mechanisms, erosion. Hills and mountains gradually get worn away, and the soil is transported to lower lying areas by wind and rain. This “levelling out” occurs quickly on farmland with higher areas being flattened by the plough, an effect visible within a single lifetime.
It's true that erosion did play a significant role, particularly around the Forum, where huge quantities of soil washed down (and in some cases, slid down) from the Palatine Hill. In most parts of the city, however, the accumulation of debris from collapsing buildings was a much more significant culprit.
@@sirrathersplendid4825 Buildings, cities and landmass will generally sink everywhere at different rates. A single stone will sink. Even bedrock slowly sinks into the mantle as the land works to reach equilibrium. Of course land also rises due to tectonics and volcanism as well.
@@billa8083 More or less, but its not quite that straight forward. It depends heavily on what depth the bedrock is located at, and what its made of. Nothing will "Sink to the mantle" but it may get closer in some places than others. Instead, It will over time be covered and dragged with the bedrock to a subduction zone (likely at the bottom of the ocean) where it will then be fed into the mantle. To follow this process would take us eons longer than the gap between the Ancient Romans and iphones.
I must say you are a legend for giving “the short answer” literally the very first thing, even before voicing the question. Honestly, thank you! This is 100% anti-clickbait
There’s a theory that for those whom believe in Aliens 👽 that there’s a group of them than have been visiting Earth for the past 10,000 - 20,000 years and that they basically have what we would call today high definition ‘video’ across our entire modern evolution. Some think that it’s even possible that they’ve been here longer and could have perfect video of the time of the dinosaurs 🦖. Imagine that!
Live in Pontiac. Got to see my old elementary school abandoned after it closed down while I was in 4th grade. It was demolished after like 3-4 years of being abandoned. I’ve also seen Packard, it’s a sight to behold. I wanna go to Belle isles zoo but pretty sure gangs run that area
Same here, but it's sweet it's not just Detroit. All over michigan you find "life after people" looking senerios. I found an abandoned house once with all the appliances still intact, but the house was covered in plants and moss, and had at least a foot or more dort inside. You could see the fridge poking out!
Also, Rome was built in between the famous ancient "7 hills" and centuries of dust and debris were washed away from these mounds down in the streets. Centuries of neglected behaviour of post-imperial inhabitants did the rest
It was also simply impossible for a city of 50,000 inhabitants to properly tend to the remains of a city of over 1 million inhabitants. Even if they wanted to clean it all they didn't have the manpower.
As I was walking through Rome last year, looking at the ruins in a lower ground level, I couldn't help imagine what else is lying and waiting underneath the road or a building
I just saw a story about the Vatican and how that was built over top of other structures that were even later forgotten. Forgotten in time and they came across a vast catacomb structure sometimes in the 1700s that ??? they had not known was there. or something. Dates wrong
Also, hot sirocco winds blowing north from Africa , from the Sahara , are extremely dry and dusty. A layer of fine dust can settle on Roman tables and chairs in just a few minutes if the winds are blowing. That dust can add up in a day, let alone a 1500 years. In just 100 years a Roman paved street would be transformed to a muddy path.
@@AndrewBlucher Even by the 5th Century roman roads and streets were getting lost under the accumulating dirt and dust. Paved roads became dirt paths, and fine marble floors were buried because there was no way to shovel them out.
@@MACTEP_CHOB not necessarily, as Sahara has been cycling between desert and savanna for longer than humans have existed and the dust coming from there has always existed. Although perhaps the climate change may change how far Sahara will expand.
People underestimate how quickly things pile up when no one is maintaining it, my current house was empty for 4 years and the entire rear garden was covered in around 5cm of soil and plant debris.
I live in what was a Greek, and later Roman village. It is very windy and we get much dust from the Sahara. Last year, about 100 feet from my house, archeologists dug up 2 Roman stone caskets that were surprisingly deep - about 20 feet! Also, this village was burned to the ground 3 times. There are 12th century scorched roof tiles just below the surface of our barn floor. Parts of the barn brickwork date to the 11th century.
If it's "legal" you should see if some artifacts are on your property, dig them up and sell them online. Of course if you make a large discovery bring in the experts. Then you can charge an access fee. There's your free money idea.
@@chefscorner7063 We invited the state archeologists to dig our 11C barn, before we were to pave over it. Thay came, they dug, they found. I wished they had dug-up the whole thing, but they had rules. So they found evidence of the 3 Xs burned village - lots of old, burnt roof tiles. They dug further - past ten feet down, they found large stone walls and the pattern of a living space. They dug past the Romans, past the Iron Age and into the Bronze (at this point using something called a carrot). There was someting at every layer. They removed some shards, but the main find was a large 20+ inch clay jar that they reconstructed and placed in the museum. Then they refilled the hole - rules again. Happily, archeologists are brought in before any public dig. When they found the dead Romans, they were changing the city pipes. They were happy to do a private dig, and dedicated a whole professional magazine about it. The barn is paved now, except the very back, the oldesst part. My big dog is digging a nice hole, and bits of pottery, glass, metal, a 15C. horse shoe, and something shoe-like in thick leather have come out. I put them aside for the archeologist, whom I see from time to time.
The Christian archeologist is confounded by two miracles: of being the only cult in history failing to build temples or churches for 300 years, and then building in the same style as the pagan basilica of 300 years before. In the XII century significant events take place, as described in the Gospels: the coming of Jesus Christ, his life and crucifixion, although the existing text of the Gospels was edited and most likely dates to the XIV-XV cc. In the mid XII century, in the year 1152, Jesus Christ is born. In secular Byzantine history he is known as Emperor Andronicus and St. Andrew the Apostle the First-Called in Russian history he was portrayed as the Great Prince Andrey Bogolyubsky. To be more specific, Andrey Bogolyubsky is a chronicler counterpart of Andronicus-Christ during his stay in Vladimir-Suzdal Rus’ of the XII century, where he spent most of his life. In fact, the Star of Bethlehem blazed in the middle of the XII century. This gives us an absolute astronomical dating of Christ’s Life. [ЦРС], ch.1. ‘Star of Bethlehem’ - is an explosion of a supernova, which at present is incorrectly dated to the middle of the XI century. The present-day Crab Nebula in the Taurus Constellation is the remnant of this explosion. Enigmatic timber scarcity in Late Antiquity and Early Middle Ages as first recognized by dender-pioneer Ernest Hollstein (1918-1988) "No sites exist anywhere with uninterrupted timber specimen from about 1000 CE backwards to Imperial Antiquity(1st-3rd c.). which is why the dendro-chronologies for Ancient Rome and, thereby the entire first millennium are in disarray. Since the very existence of the chronology periods without wood samples was never doubted by the researchers, nobody started to question our textbook chronology. Instead, out of stratigraphic context, scholars searched for wood samples in wells or moors to fill the irritating gaps. In addition, identical reign sequences were used twice in a row to gamer more years. Therefor, "all dendrochronological datings done on West Roman time wood is wrong by some unknown number of years"(") th-cam.com/video/c876lPZ-UZU/w-d-xo.html&ab_channel=PlanetAmnesia
I love this! I've always wondered why so many historical ruins are buried, or partially buried underground. I'm a history junkie and your channel is a wonderful resource.
Another thing people forget is that ancient builders often didn't excavate DOWN before they built to create a solid foundation. They just leveled the ground, maybe compacted the soil a bit, and then they built. The entirety of many heavy stone buildings have just slowly sank into the soil over the centuries. I watched a new airfield being built in a desert. The sand there was more like a fine dust and if concrete was poured in slabs over it, they would have cracked under the weight of the aircraft, or perhaps even just under the weight of the concrete itself. The construction team dug way down, quite a few feet, hauled out all the regular fine dust sand, and then brought in special construction sand that compacts and stays very stable. Then they actually set up all the rebar and molds, and poured the concrete. It took them about a year to do it all, and it was fine work that held up well.
@@oftin_wong, there is a big difference between taking extra time and care on a large public works and the average building. Indeed, what buildings are typically found to still be standing? Those large public works, not so many regular houses.
@@kirkmooneyham well of course ordinary humans didn't go to great lengths on their foundations sure ...but the knowledge was there like always ...they understood why 'foundations'
Maybe you are amazed because it doesn't add up, illogical statements bring confusion. How did it get buried, who decides to abandon the lower story to the dirt and just live upstairs?
Rome was originally built on a swamp. It took massive drainage works to drain out places like the forum & the colosseum. Once those drains weren’t maintained, natural processes would return .
@@gottaproxy8826 I'm within walking distance of Detroit right now and it's a total disaster. Thanks to Obammy, half of Detroit spilled into neighboring cities between 2008-2012, destroying homes, business districts, and instigating an unprecedented crime wave in cities that were immaculate, thriving and safe prior to 2008. If Chicago, LA, Vegas, Portland, Minneapolis and Seattle are even worse, that merely confirms the total collapse of Western Civilization Democrats have fomented. Nice try.
always wondered, I get how the Roman empire collapsed and all but how come whole towns, cities, and villages were completely abandoned at the end, places like Ostia Antica, preserved because it was completely abandoned?
Ostia was abandoned because of its location. The surrounding marshes became malarial, the harbor was repeatedly raided by pirates, and the shrunken city of Rome no longer needed a major port.
He used a great example in the beginning of the video. Look at Detroit as an example, I bet you didn't know Detroit was one of the nicest and most bustling cities in America in the 50s. It only took 3 decades for Detroit to become the forgotten city it is today. When the opportunity and royalty left Rome for Constantinople, so did all the commoners. Less work means the city was on a huge decline and everyone just left for a better city or town.
There's loads of reasons why. Rome suffered numerous plagues, and one so severe that it decimated the population of Italy to such an extent that entire towns and cities were completely depopulated. The city of Rome went from a population of over a million to 50,000 in the space of a year during a great plague epidemic. Add on to that waves of Gothic invasions that displaced the original Roman inhabitants as well.
@@justinwbohner Exactly, a lot of people don't talk about how Rome was built in a terrible location. They literally built the city on a swamp that was infested by mosquitoes and could easily be plagued, which is what happened on dozens of occasions throughout Romes history.
Imagine 1,000 years from now, people actually getting to watch time-lapses or compilations of pictures showing certain cities of ours slowly being buried (and, alternately, ancient cities slowly being unburied).
I just assumed that a big part of it was that which is left behind by horses, cattle, sheep, pigs and humans. I grew up on a dairy farm and can assure you that this stuff piles up quickly!
It piled up in Rome, too, not least in the Forum (which became a pasture for cows and goats). But the numbers of animals kept in the medieval and Renaissance city were relatively small, which limited the amount of manure.
@@toldinstone - Well into the 20th century every town was heavily reliant on horse power for transport. These horse, mules, donkeys, and in some places oxen, all deposited vast amounts of dung in urban areas. Many trades sprang up whose only function was to remove this stuff from the city streets and transport it for use as fertiliser.
The basements of ancient cities go very very deep. Its so intriguing what could be down there. Perhaps thousands of unread documents lie hidden in waiting
@@aeliusdawn maybe - but there's very few ancient cities in the sahara desert - on account of it being not a great place to build a city due to the lack of water - you'll find that most cities throughout history were built next to rivers or some other fresh water source - for pretty understandable reasons
I've often wondered, what happened to all of the historic noble families of Rome? i.e. during the late empire, did most of them slowly move to Byzantium, or did they hang around and get killed in the sacking of Rome?
Some families run in Greece or in the countryside. There were still families of senators who crowned Charlemagne Emperor of Occident. Others runaway in Greece and some even became Emperor of The Roman Byzantine Empire like Phokeas which Kalergi is a famous descendant, or the Bavarian King of Greece in XIX century, which came from Greece...
Thank you for a short, concise video instead of the nonsensical 10-15 minute videos running rampant that also could be shortened to just a few minutes.
Thank you for this video. As an Italian, I've been to Rome many times and I should know my country, but you learn new facts every day. I knew that in Rome, during the centuries, ground and other stuff came down from the surrounding hills, but it's the first time I see that doors example in ancient buildings.
Mario, look into the "Mud Flood" Theory, it's a more entertaining theory about burried buildings (and windows and doors). Just stay away from the channels that sell t-shirts and mugs...
That reminds me of how the Laocoön was found in a building, that was itself unearthed (from the roof, no less)... from a vineyard! and *that* was during the renaissance. You don't place such a large sculpture into a small bulding either... so yeah, that's a lot of dirt.
Great videos! 👍 The drawings and descriptions of the Roman buildings before being restored/rebuilt in the form we see them today is particularly fascinating!
The grass-covered "Quadrangle" at my private high school was reserved only for masters (teachers) and it was board-flat, and 80-metres on a side. The grass surface was roughly 15cm above its concrete curbing. My Dad once showed me a photo of him wearing the same uniform next to the same Quad, and I was surprised to see the Quad's lawn was the exact same height as the curbing. That was just 30 years of ordinary accumulation on a lawn.
The city I live in was known to regularly flood in the early 1800s whenever the river burst its banks. The solution back then, was a massive project to cart in clay soil to raise the street level by one to two floors. Consequentally, a lot of the stone remnants of buildings from the early years were buried over & forgotten, and only recently discovered when they built a new underground train line.
Great video and very informative, you’ve just answered a childhood question. It’s always the most simplest of questions that have the most interesting answer. Keep up the good work 👍
The burial of Rome was also facilitated by the scirocco winds that blow up from Africa. The hot, dry and very dusty winds are generated over the Sahara Desert and spread vast quantities of dust over the Mediterranean to Italy, Southern France and Greece. Who knows, that layer of dust on your cafe table might once have been part of an ancient empire.
Mysteriously, the ground has risen all over the world. There are cities in the U.S with buildings that are partially buried by 10-30 ft., or more in some cases. None of these cities have been abandoned, and many of the buildings still stand. It's the same in countries all over Europe. Entire Roman cities have been buried in England. Something happened, and it wasn't garbage and building debris. Some of the statues on Easter Island are partially buried under 20-40 ft. of earth. Some of it can be attributed to erosion, but not nearly all of it. It's a fascinating topic.
we see that plants and trees are able to grow on top of abandoned buildings. it's not totally inconceivable that they can grow over mounds of dirt built up over centuries.
Can you explain why Sydney the youngest major city apparently in the world has photos from the early 1900s that show the same amount of build up and rubble around buildings which supposedly were constructed only 40 years earlier in the mid 18oo's.
Mentioning how the wood decays, apparently a lot of medieval European castles had a great deal of wood structure to them. And some castles, I think the majority, were completely wood. But we think of castles as these huge stone buildings because the stone is all that survived.
This answers a lot of questions I've been speculating about for nearly three years when applied to early photography of cities around the world, magnificent, overgrown buried structures and people filing in on the abandoned muddy streets. The term "mudflood" has been thrown around so much lately with no explanation for a cause. Thank you so much and keep crushing!
I live in a fairly small city called Lancaster which is situated in Northern England and I believe it was first settled by the Romans with the ‘caster’ part of city’s name referring to the old Roman castrum. Where the military camp used to be there is now a castle though the Roman baths can still be seen along with the forts agger which I think is an earthen mound that would have been on the outer side of the forts boundaries. Just south of the city lay the ruins of Cockersand Abbey which was dissolved in 1536. I mention this abbey because two Roman statuettes were found nearby, suggesting that there was once the presence of a Roman shrine. I find this pretty cool because this place is in the middle of nowhere, out on the coastline and to think that the Romans may have established a shrine of sorts which may have influenced the later placement of the Abbey fascinates me.
@@jeremyd1869 I would go check out Lindybeige’s video on St. Mary’s Chapel I believe he touches on the Chapel’s placement being influenced by a previous pagan site I don’t think he mentions the Romans but it’s still pretty interesting to watch if you’re interested in that sort of stuff :)
I recall some documentary about a very old parish church in England that had some small statues in alcoves in the wall, and people thought they were statues of Christian Saints. They were actually small Roman statues of pagan gods.
@@dariusanderton3760 I wonder how long the belief in the Roman Gods and Goddesses was held by some Britons once the Romans stopped governing the region. I mean the Roman Goddess Britannia is still used today in British culture though obviously not for the purpose of worship. I might look into it a bit more - it seems interesting.
It’s the same in Bath England. Roman ruins 20 feet below street level. A street level cathedral, or large church across the street which itself is hundreds of years old. This explanation doesn’t make sense to me.
@@storrho true, but it’s across the street from the ruins. Doesn’t seem like enough time for this amount of buildup. Perhaps the mudflows/flooding is a part.
@@bugrilyus The guy is wrong. No way would debris and soil bury things 20 to 30 feet. Mud flood is a better explanation particularly as it can be seen everywhere in the world
City of London seems to have been built on top of old Roman buildings. When digging deep to lay down foundations for tower Blocks, the Construction workers keep finding old Roman remains, pottery, tiles etc. Wonder if there was a mud flood, river Thames rose high and left behind miles and miles of mud ?
All of this is very true. But you should also mention that Rome was virtually uninhabited for several centuries running. That gave a lot of time for debris to pile up and nobody to do anything about it
My first thought was the mud and floods. There are MULTIPLE black and white photos of buildings in mid 1800’s showing big buildings like cathedrals in good shape but the roads were full of mud covering up to the FIRST ROW OF WINDOWS. also noticed that there were NO SIGNS OF LIFE in any of these black/white photos all over the world. Mystery.
Early photography had an exposure time measured in minutes so in many cases people crossing a road would not show in the photo, if they paused for a few seconds you could find a ghostly remnant in the picture. Photography rapidly cut the exposure time to seconds so you'll find photos which seem to make those cityscapes look like they were inhabited by ghosts. By about 1900 most photographs had cut it down to under a second that is when most photos of cityscapes are finally populated with people, although if you look closely you will notice many people with blurred heads or hands which shows where they moved during the exposure. Hope that this help explains the mystery.
@@jefferyindorf699 I understand the concept of long exposure in photography. Even if there many people in the streets , we should be seeing multiple blurs in the streets. There’s no way that these photos of these large cities would have no images of humans in the streets based on your statement about long exposures . There are other photos earlier years with lots of people in streets , obviously they did not stand still for 5 minutes???
I have a question about Rome’s walls. There’s a short section of the southern Aurelian walls rebuilt as Renaissance trace italienne with artillery bastions. Why only this section? Is it a woefully incomplete upgrade project for the entire circuit of ancient walls, or was this section regarded as critical?
That is called the Bastione del Sangallo from the name of the architect who built it,approximately in the year 1535 under the papacy of pope Paul the third,the construction implied the demolition of about 400 meters of the ancient walls included a gate(Porta Ardeatina). Due the extreme cost and the mutation of the political agenda,the building of a new city walls was shelved.
Not sure if you are still wondering…. But those aqueducts were first purposefully damaged by the invading barbarians ( goths); to cut the water supply to the city they were besieging. Some were repaired but subsequent invaders did the same thing!
To see Rome in about say 800 AD would have been interesting. Unfortunately it's marble burnt for lyme. I walked today from Metro Octaviano to Furio Camillo. I love walking Rome.
@@toldinstone There are infinite details here and once a person has the historical chronology down they can start to make a little sense of it. Piece it together. I have a BA in geology and Rome is like one big sedimentary structure. Just the evolution of the Aurelian Walls is a study. I come here every year for 3 months and even longer. Ciao
@@williamshepley9054 that is true regarding Rome and I always regarded this city as really special especially if you have a good historical background like yourself! I've been traveling in many countries and places but I always come back, also because my son lives there so everytime I go to Rome I always made sure to take my son to show him something special and try to teach my son, he is 16 years old, a good dose of history and architecture but unfortunately it is months I have not been able to see both him and Rome because of the bloody Covid.
I remember the anecdote about a tourist's question to a guide in Jerusalem: "Is it possible that this is the same road that Jesus walked on, Via Dolorosa?" The guide answered: "Well, no. That street would be 9 meters (30 feet) below us." In my childhood town Turku I have to dig 2-3 meters to reach the streets of the late Middle Ages.
0:15 How can that be right when the drawing shows the three windows. Clearly the center window was not the renaissance door, the door and windows appear to be in exactly the same place, just with a raised ground level and a path down to the door.
Was in Rome, asked myself the question. Was in Greece asked myself the question. Live in Vienna, ask myself the question. I googled it, but you did a better job in 3 minutes. Subscribed :)
The answer is. All over Turkey, they have an incredible amount of Roman and Greek ruins and not an as wealthy history as Europe so they haven't excavated anything but the most obvious ones.
What about buildings settling? Even with modern building techniques and boring for soil information, it can be an issue. Although, maybe their foundations were way over designed to make up for a lack of specific knowledge.
Settling certainly happened - we see plenty of cracks in the walls of ancient buildings - but it was rarely serious enough to cause structures to actually sink into the earth.
Excellent video. Question: If one could travel back in time to ancient Rome, would the question "what year is this?" or "what year were you born?" be understood in the same way it is today? In other words, was there a universal calendar across the empire? Would love to know - thanks!
Hi, I think they meassured the time in years with the reign of their consuls. This means the romans would have said something like this: 'I was born in the year of the consulship of Cicero and Hibrida', which is 63 b.c.
OMG thank you. I never understood this and I studied abroad in Rome. They’d always say “Rome is built on top of the old Rome”. Which you can clearly see when you’re at the ruins or on the River. I just didn’t understand why.
In Britain there are mosaics and remains of villas and other Roman buildings less than a meter under the soil. Farmers accidentally find them when they're plowing their fields.
Erryday, look into the "Mud Flood" Theory, it's a more entertaining theory about burried buildings (and windows and doors). Just stay away from the channels that sell t-shirts and mugs...
Doesn't really make sense. If today an area is flooded, like what happened to Libya recently and a layer of mud is deposited in towns, streets and even inside houses, it will be cleared. People need to live in these places so they remove the mud and debris. Your theory only works if the place is abandoned after a flood and after that more dust and sand goes on top over the years. But that did not happen in Rome and it has been continuously inhabited for he last 2000 years at least. So no, not convinced. Also almost all archeological sites are buried under sand and mud across the world. not only Rome.
I think one reason our modern mind is so dumbfounded by this issue is that today we (usually) have coordinated city employed cleaning crews to keep things tidy. We normally even clean up after a flood.
People still lived and worked there, but there were far fewer of them - as few as 20,000 in some periods. The suburbs and villas around the city became wastelands infested by bandits.
The reason why they stopped believing in their many gods, is because they really didn't believe in them in the first place. That's why it was so easy to substitute paganism for monotheism. People wanted freedom from choice. Believe in only one ,and unite under only one and move forward.
If the addition of material was so slow, it seems like it would have been easier to just sweep away that layer of dust instead of waiting hundreds of years and then cutting in a new door. The idea that the door was cut in seems to lead to the idea that the accumulation of the material was rather quick.
That’s because this short video was made entirely for the Masses, who lack the attention span to ask deeper questions like you just did. The Masses are Asses.
this would mean the whole worlds ground level has risen.So start digging and see what you find and then again the sphinx was only buried up to its head and it is much older then rome
Ground level typically rises in inhabited places. People just throw away stuff to streets and empty lots are used as dumping grounds. In many places ground erodes.
Nice video. It answered my queries in a short and precise manner. Read about Renaissance in school and college text books. But reading through the replies here had been very educative for me. Developing properties in a city with historical ruins underneath brings out interesting challenges for both government and property owners. For a student of history, this is an interesting angle to the story of conservation.
This 'buried building' issue is all over the world. You can see buildings with half windows on the same level as the floor all over the place. I think they're not telling us something! 🤔
@@ApeX-pj4mq what do you think it is when we are talking about rome being buried and not knowing why ... yeah mudflood all day, it's not the only city at all buried like that undrgound. Every major cities is buried like the sky fall on our head lmao
@@Frenchy78ify Sediment piles up INCREDIBLY fast in large metropolitan cities. Roads are built over old roads and structures are built over destroyed or pre existing ones. This is very normal and the entire process of this happening has been documented in Rome
I have always been amazed at how multiple levels of ruins have been found under current structures and believe you may have answered this very question!
They say that Rome wasn`t buried in a day.
groan :)
lol
Good'un
I see what you did there. Brilliant.
Ha, ha. Great comment award. 👍
Well done. I spent a college semester in Rome in the 70's, and we lived in the hotel that faces the n/e corner of the Pantheon. The Pantheon went through a great cleaning and general digging around the foundation then, into the 1980's. They found a great amount of things below street level around the base of the Pantheon. It was wonderful drinking $1 wine and watching them bring items up from below street level. Ah, the good ole days. We're headed back for our last trip this fall after COVID...to celebrate 50 years of travel to Rome.
Glad you liked the video. I hope you enjoy your trip.
That's awesome
Lucky you, I saw last week that they are digging there again :D
Rome is an interesting place. We visited in 2011 and stayed at a "new" apartment building from the 1500s or 1700s, I forget. A 30 second walk from the front door and you stepped into the open area in front of the Pantheon.! Much more interesting than Florence. I'd love to go back.
The eternal city
EVERY VIDEO ON TH-cam SHOULD START WITH THE SHORT ANSWER. You got a well deserved like, sir.
Much appreciated!
I gave a like because of this comment. Well deserved like lol
Totally agree! Great idea
Agreed, and I still enjoyed the entire video.
@@toldinstone Yes, that was incredibly satisfying. The short answer made me feel physical relief, catharsis from a tension I didn’t know existed.
There are entire cities buried under the sand in Egypt. I watched a documentary a few years ago and they used satellite thermal imaging over much of the Eqyptian desert and scanned it. They found hundreds of cities, and the ancient capital of Tanis, completely buried under mountains of sand dunes. Its amazing to think how much stuff must be buried under all that sand waiting to be discovered.
It really is. When I visited Egypt, I remember looking out over the desert beyond the Theban Necropolis and wondering what those cliffs and dunes were hiding.
@@toldinstone You should analyse why today there is so much land near the site of ancient battle of Thermopylae the most famous battle of Spartans. In the past there was a narrow pass. Today the pass is very wide because land was raised from the sea. You will find the main reason why ancient buildings are buried so deep.
This effect is huge in Europe already, just general soil and dirt rising up. Even here there must be a lot of buildings and towns and cities still buried somewhere, especially if they're older than Rome. But in deserts? Man that would go even quicker, seeing as sand dunes form much easier.
@@ZZubZZero You reminded me of all the pyramids they keep founding in Mexico, where only the very top would be visible today
But why is it buried and how did it’s inhabitants allow for it to happen?
Dust, dead plants, and debris - Sounds like my Gran's living room. She's been wondering why the door won't open properly lately too but this explains why.
Soon you'll need a trowel to get around in there
@@toldinstone We've already bought her a _Bagger 288_ excavator machine, that should do the trick.
When my mother died and I had to clear her house she had 264 toilet rolls.
Ну да, в Риме жили только старушки
Oh, God. That’s funny! And I bet she knows where everything is! 😹By the way! Perhaps you and I should get married! I could be Winnifred Wibblesworth. Think of the fun we could have introducing ourselves to people! Just a thought.
You forgot one of the key mechanisms, erosion. Hills and mountains gradually get worn away, and the soil is transported to lower lying areas by wind and rain. This “levelling out” occurs quickly on farmland with higher areas being flattened by the plough, an effect visible within a single lifetime.
It's true that erosion did play a significant role, particularly around the Forum, where huge quantities of soil washed down (and in some cases, slid down) from the Palatine Hill. In most parts of the city, however, the accumulation of debris from collapsing buildings was a much more significant culprit.
Structures also sink over time.
@@devkrovil - In places like Venice, yes. And also where the water table gets over-exploited for human consumption.
@@sirrathersplendid4825 Buildings, cities and landmass will generally sink everywhere at different rates. A single stone will sink. Even bedrock slowly sinks into the mantle as the land works to reach equilibrium. Of course land also rises due to tectonics and volcanism as well.
@@billa8083 More or less, but its not quite that straight forward. It depends heavily on what depth the bedrock is located at, and what its made of. Nothing will "Sink to the mantle" but it may get closer in some places than others. Instead, It will over time be covered and dragged with the bedrock to a subduction zone (likely at the bottom of the ocean) where it will then be fed into the mantle. To follow this process would take us eons longer than the gap between the Ancient Romans and iphones.
I must say you are a legend for giving “the short answer” literally the very first thing, even before voicing the question. Honestly, thank you! This is 100% anti-clickbait
the only channel on youtube that values giving out information over draining your lifetime
NO! Not anti-click bait! I always click to find out the story😝
Can you just imagine a time lapse from it being built to today?! That’s what makes history so amaze
I'd watch that video!
With all the sackings and rebuilding, hell yeah
There’s a theory that for those whom believe in Aliens 👽 that there’s a group of them than have been visiting Earth for the past 10,000 - 20,000 years and that they basically have what we would call today high definition ‘video’ across our entire modern evolution. Some think that it’s even possible that they’ve been here longer and could have perfect video of the time of the dinosaurs 🦖. Imagine that!
XB W i hope that’s real
All we can do is imagine
I live near Detroit and have seen the old Packard plant. Your analogy is spot on.
You live in Detroit? Poor man
@@Teddy-rv8iw take him to detroit.
Live in Pontiac. Got to see my old elementary school abandoned after it closed down while I was in 4th grade. It was demolished after like 3-4 years of being abandoned. I’ve also seen Packard, it’s a sight to behold. I wanna go to Belle isles zoo but pretty sure gangs run that area
Same here, but it's sweet it's not just Detroit. All over michigan you find "life after people" looking senerios. I found an abandoned house once with all the appliances still intact, but the house was covered in plants and moss, and had at least a foot or more dort inside. You could see the fridge poking out!
@@gavinleahy1682 Belle Isle is a tourist location...
Also, Rome was built in between the famous ancient "7 hills" and centuries of dust and debris were washed away from these mounds down in the streets. Centuries of neglected behaviour of post-imperial inhabitants did the rest
It was also simply impossible for a city of 50,000 inhabitants to properly tend to the remains of a city of over 1 million inhabitants. Even if they wanted to clean it all they didn't have the manpower.
so famous nobody ever heard of them.
@@EresirThe1st Revelation chapter 17 seven mountains.
DC has seven hills as well
@gottaproxy8826 I bet you heard some of them without even knowing. The Vatican hill for example 😊
As I was walking through Rome last year, looking at the ruins in a lower ground level, I couldn't help imagine what else is lying and waiting underneath the road or a building
I just saw a story about the Vatican and how that was built over top of other structures that were even later forgotten. Forgotten in time and they came across a vast catacomb structure sometimes in the 1700s that ??? they had not known was there. or something. Dates wrong
@@outoftheforest7652I believe they just opened those tombs up to the public
Shortest answer: because at some points, the romans just stopped cleaning their streets
Garbagemen in Rome are always on strike, so that's true... 😆😆😆
oh boy, every summer the streets looks like Naples a decade or so ago.
U mean Italians since romans are extinct
@@Ginnpis if u consider lombards , goths ,franks and other germanic people as romans i won't argue with u
Roman's didn't clean their streets?
Someone get Jordanius Petersonicus of Torontonia!
Also, hot sirocco winds blowing north from Africa , from the Sahara , are extremely dry and dusty. A layer of fine dust can settle on Roman tables and chairs in just a few minutes if the winds are blowing. That dust can add up in a day, let alone a 1500 years. In just 100 years a Roman paved street would be transformed to a muddy path.
365,241 days, if my math is correct.
That could be a lot of dust!
Also pollen from the trees. I have to clean the chairs, tables on my balcony and my windows ever so often...
@@AndrewBlucher Even by the 5th Century roman roads and streets were getting lost under the accumulating dirt and dust. Paved roads became dirt paths, and fine marble floors were buried because there was no way to shovel them out.
@@robertlimestone6248 Was was that from? Climate change?
@@MACTEP_CHOB not necessarily, as Sahara has been cycling between desert and savanna for longer than humans have existed and the dust coming from there has always existed. Although perhaps the climate change may change how far Sahara will expand.
People underestimate how quickly things pile up when no one is maintaining it, my current house was empty for 4 years and the entire rear garden was covered in around 5cm of soil and plant debris.
I live in what was a Greek, and later Roman village.
It is very windy and we get much dust from the Sahara.
Last year, about 100 feet from my house, archeologists
dug up 2 Roman stone caskets that were surprisingly
deep - about 20 feet!
Also, this village was burned to the ground 3 times. There are
12th century scorched roof tiles just below the surface of our
barn floor. Parts of the barn brickwork date to the 11th century.
If it's "legal" you should see if some artifacts are on your property, dig them up and sell them online. Of course if you make a large discovery bring in the experts. Then you can charge an access fee. There's your free money idea.
@@chefscorner7063 We invited the state archeologists to dig our 11C barn, before we were to pave over it. Thay came, they dug, they found. I wished they had dug-up the whole thing, but they had rules.
So they found evidence of the 3 Xs burned village - lots of old, burnt roof tiles. They dug further - past ten feet down, they found large stone walls and the pattern of a living space. They dug past the Romans, past the Iron Age and into the Bronze (at this point using something called a carrot). There was someting at every layer.
They removed some shards, but the main find was a large 20+ inch clay jar that they reconstructed and placed in the museum. Then they refilled the hole - rules again.
Happily, archeologists are brought in before any public dig. When they found the dead Romans, they were changing the city pipes. They were happy to do a private dig, and dedicated a whole professional magazine about it.
The barn is paved now, except the very back, the oldesst part. My big dog is digging a nice hole, and bits of pottery, glass, metal, a 15C. horse shoe, and something shoe-like in thick leather have come out. I put them aside for the archeologist, whom I see from time to time.
The Christian archeologist is confounded by two miracles: of being the only cult in history failing to build temples or churches for 300 years, and then building in the same style as the pagan basilica of 300 years before.
In the XII century significant events take place, as described in the Gospels: the coming of Jesus Christ, his life and crucifixion, although the existing text of the Gospels was edited and most likely dates to the XIV-XV cc. In the mid XII century, in the year 1152, Jesus Christ is born. In secular Byzantine history he is known as Emperor Andronicus and St. Andrew the Apostle the First-Called in Russian history he was portrayed as the Great Prince Andrey Bogolyubsky. To be more specific, Andrey Bogolyubsky is a chronicler counterpart of Andronicus-Christ during his stay in Vladimir-Suzdal Rus’ of the XII century, where he spent most of his life. In fact, the Star of Bethlehem blazed in the middle of the XII century. This gives us an absolute astronomical dating of Christ’s Life. [ЦРС], ch.1. ‘Star of Bethlehem’ - is an explosion of a supernova, which at present is incorrectly dated to the middle of the XI century. The present-day Crab Nebula in the Taurus Constellation is the remnant of this explosion.
Enigmatic timber scarcity in Late Antiquity and Early Middle Ages as first recognized by dender-pioneer Ernest Hollstein (1918-1988) "No sites exist anywhere with uninterrupted timber specimen from about 1000 CE backwards to Imperial Antiquity(1st-3rd c.). which is why the dendro-chronologies for Ancient Rome and, thereby the entire first millennium are in disarray. Since the very existence of the chronology periods without wood samples was never doubted by the researchers, nobody started to question our textbook chronology. Instead, out of stratigraphic context, scholars searched for wood samples in wells or moors to fill the irritating gaps. In addition, identical reign sequences were used twice in a row to gamer more years. Therefor, "all dendrochronological datings done on West Roman time wood is wrong by some unknown number of years"(") th-cam.com/video/c876lPZ-UZU/w-d-xo.html&ab_channel=PlanetAmnesia
I love this! I've always wondered why so many historical ruins are buried, or partially buried underground. I'm a history junkie and your channel is a wonderful resource.
Another thing people forget is that ancient builders often didn't excavate DOWN before they built to create a solid foundation. They just leveled the ground, maybe compacted the soil a bit, and then they built. The entirety of many heavy stone buildings have just slowly sank into the soil over the centuries. I watched a new airfield being built in a desert. The sand there was more like a fine dust and if concrete was poured in slabs over it, they would have cracked under the weight of the aircraft, or perhaps even just under the weight of the concrete itself. The construction team dug way down, quite a few feet, hauled out all the regular fine dust sand, and then brought in special construction sand that compacts and stays very stable. Then they actually set up all the rebar and molds, and poured the concrete. It took them about a year to do it all, and it was fine work that held up well.
Ancient engineers understood very well the need for proper foundations
@@oftin_wong, understanding the need for, and being able to create a foundation that would support massive stone weight, are too different things.
@@kirkmooneyham check out the temple at Baalbek as a fine example of over engineered foundation stones
Built by the Romans
@@oftin_wong, there is a big difference between taking extra time and care on a large public works and the average building. Indeed, what buildings are typically found to still be standing? Those large public works, not so many regular houses.
@@kirkmooneyham well of course ordinary humans didn't go to great lengths on their foundations sure
...but the knowledge was there like always ...they understood why 'foundations'
It's amazing how entire landscapes in general change in such a short period of time.
i think about that with the stars too, It makes sense why our ancestors were so amazed
Maybe you are amazed because it doesn't add up, illogical statements bring confusion. How did it get buried, who decides to abandon the lower story to the dirt and just live upstairs?
Rome was originally built on a swamp. It took massive drainage works to drain out places like the forum & the colosseum. Once those drains weren’t maintained, natural processes would return .
best answer
Just like St Petersburg then. And Venice too? Strange location choices.
So there is subsidence as well?
@@arkybeagle6159 it’s more that as low lying areas with very little water flow they will be prone to keep the silt from any water flowing into them.
@@arkybeagle6159 imagine a thousand years of a blocked drain
“Why is Rome buried? Let’s look at how shitty Detroit is to inform our assertion.”
I used to work in Detroit; the Packard Plant was just the first example that came to mind. I'm not trying to bash the city.
Detroit is a nightmare and has been for over 50 years. It richly deserves to be exemplified as decay personified.
@@GLC2013 I'm 30 minutes from Detroit right now and I can tell you it's in better shape than Chicago, LA, Vegas, Portland, Minneapolis, and Seattle.
@@gottaproxy8826 I'm within walking distance of Detroit right now and it's a total disaster. Thanks to Obammy, half of Detroit spilled into neighboring cities between 2008-2012, destroying homes, business districts, and instigating an unprecedented crime wave in cities that were immaculate, thriving and safe prior to 2008. If Chicago, LA, Vegas, Portland, Minneapolis and Seattle are even worse, that merely confirms the total collapse of Western Civilization Democrats have fomented. Nice try.
@@GLC2013 muricans be like
always wondered, I get how the Roman empire collapsed and all but how come whole towns, cities, and villages were completely abandoned at the end, places like Ostia Antica, preserved because it was completely abandoned?
Ostia was abandoned because of its location. The surrounding marshes became malarial, the harbor was repeatedly raided by pirates, and the shrunken city of Rome no longer needed a major port.
He used a great example in the beginning of the video. Look at Detroit as an example, I bet you didn't know Detroit was one of the nicest and most bustling cities in America in the 50s. It only took 3 decades for Detroit to become the forgotten city it is today. When the opportunity and royalty left Rome for Constantinople, so did all the commoners. Less work means the city was on a huge decline and everyone just left for a better city or town.
There's loads of reasons why. Rome suffered numerous plagues, and one so severe that it decimated the population of Italy to such an extent that entire towns and cities were completely depopulated. The city of Rome went from a population of over a million to 50,000 in the space of a year during a great plague epidemic. Add on to that waves of Gothic invasions that displaced the original Roman inhabitants as well.
@@toldinstone Malaria isn't talked about much....it had a massive impact on history.
@@justinwbohner Exactly, a lot of people don't talk about how Rome was built in a terrible location.
They literally built the city on a swamp that was infested by mosquitoes and could easily be plagued, which is what happened on dozens of occasions throughout Romes history.
Citzens of the eternal city:
"We've found Rome a city of marble and left it a city of rubble"
Imagine 1,000 years from now, people actually getting to watch time-lapses or compilations of pictures showing certain cities of ours slowly being buried (and, alternately, ancient cities slowly being unburied).
One can already watch the Great American Empire slowly being buried in real time right now.
avec les gratte ciel ,ça va prendre du temps!
@@shastasilverchairsg i dont think crumbling and burning counts as buried
I just assumed that a big part of it was that which is left behind by horses, cattle, sheep, pigs and humans. I grew up on a dairy farm and can assure you that this stuff piles up quickly!
It piled up in Rome, too, not least in the Forum (which became a pasture for cows and goats). But the numbers of animals kept in the medieval and Renaissance city were relatively small, which limited the amount of manure.
@@toldinstone - Well into the 20th century every town was heavily reliant on horse power for transport. These horse, mules, donkeys, and in some places oxen, all deposited vast amounts of dung in urban areas. Many trades sprang up whose only function was to remove this stuff from the city streets and transport it for use as fertiliser.
A farm it is not Roma !
Mudflood 600 years ago.....
The basements of ancient cities go very very deep. Its so intriguing what could be down there. Perhaps thousands of unread documents lie hidden in waiting
probably not unless they have zero moisture down there
@@DazBochiz Then there must be a ton of those under the Sahara Desert
@@aeliusdawn maybe - but there's very few ancient cities in the sahara desert - on account of it being not a great place to build a city due to the lack of water - you'll find that most cities throughout history were built next to rivers or some other fresh water source - for pretty understandable reasons
@@aeliusdawn Wonders a Wait..
flooded & moldy tunnels sad to say.... " From Russia with Love "...
The same thing has happened to a mausoleum in my home town in western Canada in little over 100 years.
I've often wondered, what happened to all of the historic noble families of Rome? i.e. during the late empire, did most of them slowly move to Byzantium, or did they hang around and get killed in the sacking of Rome?
Now that is an interesting question. Don't bother trying to find any Julians or Claudians though. You have Nero to thank for that.
An excellent question! I'll put it on the list.
th-cam.com/video/QHaQpS3VpZo/w-d-xo.html this might be a useful video!
Short answer -- anyone who has money can buy their way out of trouble.
Some families run in Greece or in the countryside. There were still families of senators who crowned Charlemagne Emperor of Occident.
Others runaway in Greece and some even became Emperor of The Roman Byzantine Empire like Phokeas which Kalergi is a famous descendant, or the Bavarian King of Greece in XIX century, which came from Greece...
Thank you for a short, concise video instead of the nonsensical 10-15 minute videos running rampant that also could be shortened to just a few minutes.
This is what I call quality content.
How utterly refreshing! No clickbait! Just a short explaniation, just as promised! 👏👏👏
Thank you for this video.
As an Italian, I've been to Rome many times and I should know my country, but you learn new facts every day.
I knew that in Rome, during the centuries, ground and other stuff came down from the surrounding hills, but it's the first time I see that doors example in ancient buildings.
You're very welcome
Mario, look into the "Mud Flood" Theory, it's a more entertaining theory about burried buildings (and windows and doors).
Just stay away from the channels that sell t-shirts and mugs...
People used to just toss their chamber pot contents out the windows, and don't forget horse hockey pucks. Until 1920 streets were well fertilized.
Always wondered this. Thanks for finally making sense of it for me ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️
My pleasure!
Chad, look into "Mud Flood Theory", it's more fun, but avoid the channels that sell t-shirts and mugs...
That was very interesting. Thank you for the video.
That reminds me of how the Laocoön was found in a building, that was itself unearthed (from the roof, no less)... from a vineyard! and *that* was during the renaissance. You don't place such a large sculpture into a small bulding either... so yeah, that's a lot of dirt.
There are some excellent photos taken 100 years ago on TH-cam showing the excavation of dirt around the Colosseum. The dirt is about 15 feet high.
Great videos! 👍 The drawings and descriptions of the Roman buildings before being restored/rebuilt in the form we see them today is particularly fascinating!
The grass-covered "Quadrangle" at my private high school was reserved only for masters (teachers) and it was board-flat, and 80-metres on a side. The grass surface was roughly 15cm above its concrete curbing. My Dad once showed me a photo of him wearing the same uniform next to the same Quad, and I was surprised to see the Quad's lawn was the exact same height as the curbing.
That was just 30 years of ordinary accumulation on a lawn.
The city I live in was known to regularly flood in the early 1800s whenever the river burst its banks. The solution back then, was a massive project to cart in clay soil to raise the street level by one to two floors. Consequentally, a lot of the stone remnants of buildings from the early years were buried over & forgotten, and only recently discovered when they built a new underground train line.
wow. whats the name of the city?
@@ada0015 Melbourne, in Australia
I love this format of starting with a very short answer, and then giving a longer short answer.
Your videos are so great. I hope this channel gets some more exposure going foward, it has genuinely sparked my interest in Antiquity.
Thank you. I've very glad that you've enjoyed my videos!
Straight to the point, informative content, and zero fluff: THIS is quality content and you have my respect!
Great video and very informative, you’ve just answered a childhood question. It’s always the most simplest of questions that have the most interesting answer. Keep up the good work 👍
I'm very glad you enjoyed the video.
The burial of Rome was also facilitated by the scirocco winds that blow up from Africa. The hot, dry and very dusty winds are generated over the Sahara Desert and spread vast quantities of dust over the Mediterranean to Italy, Southern France and Greece. Who knows, that layer of dust on your cafe table might once have been part of an ancient empire.
Mysteriously, the ground has risen all over the world. There are cities in the U.S with buildings that are partially buried by 10-30 ft., or more in some cases.
None of these cities have been abandoned, and many of the buildings still stand. It's the same in countries all over Europe. Entire Roman cities have been buried in England.
Something happened, and it wasn't garbage and building debris. Some of the statues on Easter Island are partially buried under 20-40 ft. of earth. Some of it can be attributed to erosion, but not nearly all of it. It's a fascinating topic.
Mudflood theory 🤔
we see that plants and trees are able to grow on top of abandoned buildings. it's not totally inconceivable that they can grow over mounds of dirt built up over centuries.
Can you explain why Sydney the youngest major city apparently in the world has photos from the early 1900s that show the same amount of build up and rubble around buildings which supposedly were constructed only 40 years earlier in the mid 18oo's.
Mentioning how the wood decays, apparently a lot of medieval European castles had a great deal of wood structure to them. And some castles, I think the majority, were completely wood. But we think of castles as these huge stone buildings because the stone is all that survived.
This answers a lot of questions I've been speculating about for nearly three years when applied to early photography of cities around the world, magnificent, overgrown buried structures and people filing in on the abandoned muddy streets.
The term "mudflood" has been thrown around so much lately with no explanation for a cause.
Thank you so much and keep crushing!
Very glad you enjoyed the video!
Thank you so much for this History lesson. I love Ancient History.
You're very welcome
I never think about what stuff looked like before it was excavated. The visual in this video was really cool!
I live in a fairly small city called Lancaster which is situated in Northern England and I believe it was first settled by the Romans with the ‘caster’ part of city’s name referring to the old Roman castrum. Where the military camp used to be there is now a castle though the Roman baths can still be seen along with the forts agger which I think is an earthen mound that would have been on the outer side of the forts boundaries. Just south of the city lay the ruins of Cockersand Abbey which was dissolved in 1536. I mention this abbey because two Roman statuettes were found nearby, suggesting that there was once the presence of a Roman shrine. I find this pretty cool because this place is in the middle of nowhere, out on the coastline and to think that the Romans may have established a shrine of sorts which may have influenced the later placement of the Abbey fascinates me.
Roman ruins show up in all sorts of unexpected places
Maybe the placement of abbies and churches on or near Roman structures was influenced by the proximity to building materials.
@@jeremyd1869 I would go check out Lindybeige’s video on St. Mary’s Chapel I believe he touches on the Chapel’s placement being influenced by a previous pagan site I don’t think he mentions the Romans but it’s still pretty interesting to watch if you’re interested in that sort of stuff :)
I recall some documentary about a very old parish church in England that had some small statues in alcoves in the wall, and people thought they were statues of Christian Saints. They were actually small Roman statues of pagan gods.
@@dariusanderton3760 I wonder how long the belief in the Roman Gods and Goddesses was held by some Britons once the Romans stopped governing the region. I mean the Roman Goddess Britannia is still used today in British culture though obviously not for the purpose of worship. I might look into it a bit more - it seems interesting.
I like this style; giving the short answer then elaborating it. This needs to become a regular series.
Glad to hear it! I hope to keep making "short answer" videos.
It’s the same in Bath England. Roman ruins 20 feet below street level. A street level cathedral, or large church across the street which itself is hundreds of years old. This explanation doesn’t make sense to me.
The churches were maintained and tended to by medieval and Renaissance inhabitants. The Roman ruins weren't.
Mud flood seems like a more likely explanation
@@storrho pourtant le temps ne s'est jamais arrêté! il y a toujours eu des populations pour continuer d'habiter partout!
@@jeannesandner1918 je ne parle pas Française tres bien.
Pardon.
@@storrho true, but it’s across the street from the ruins. Doesn’t seem like enough time for this amount of buildup. Perhaps the mudflows/flooding is a part.
I’ve always wanted an authoritative answer to this question. Thank you Toldinstone man! You’re the best!!
The coolest thing is reading disenchanted medieval accounts of the ruins.
Any links??
@Tiberius I'mserious @First Last I'm specifically thinking of Du Bellay's Regrets.
Lovely short little video & very well illustrated. Thank you.
I have been to Rome, I was at a loss when taking the tours of the ancient sites and trying to understand how buried. I still don’t.
Mud flood reset of tartaria. Forbidden history. World reset 1800s. Look it up.
@@MatthewB-Kornafel-xv6oi Tartaria was much further east
@@nateman10 lol, the guy is an historian.
@@bugrilyus
The guy is wrong. No way would debris and soil bury things 20 to 30 feet. Mud flood is a better explanation particularly as it can be seen everywhere in the world
@@Yorkyscott Mud flow in an active city? dust buildup sounds more reasonable to me until I see more evidence.
I love reading your books.
City of London seems to have been built on top of old Roman buildings. When digging deep to lay down foundations for tower Blocks, the Construction workers keep finding old Roman remains, pottery, tiles etc.
Wonder if there was a mud flood, river Thames rose high and left behind miles and miles of mud ?
Floods,dirt, trash, and debris all accounts for this.
All of this is very true. But you should also mention that Rome was virtually uninhabited for several centuries running. That gave a lot of time for debris to pile up and nobody to do anything about it
Dust, Dead Plants and Debris is the name of my next album
I ask only for a shout-out in the liner notes
Something from a BBC narrated by Sir David Attenborough: "Casualties of Decades".
Maybe replace "Casualties" with "debris" or "remains".
You will go far with this format
My first thought was the mud and floods. There are MULTIPLE black and white photos of buildings in mid 1800’s showing big buildings like cathedrals in good shape but the roads were full of mud covering up to the FIRST ROW OF WINDOWS. also noticed that there were NO SIGNS OF LIFE in any of these black/white photos all over the world. Mystery.
Early photography had an exposure time measured in minutes so in many cases people crossing a road would not show in the photo, if they paused for a few seconds you could find a ghostly remnant in the picture. Photography rapidly cut the exposure time to seconds so you'll find photos which seem to make those cityscapes look like they were inhabited by ghosts. By about 1900 most photographs had cut it down to under a second that is when most photos of cityscapes are finally populated with people, although if you look closely you will notice many people with blurred heads or hands which shows where they moved during the exposure.
Hope that this help explains the mystery.
@@jefferyindorf699 I understand the concept of long exposure in photography. Even if there many people in the streets , we should be seeing multiple blurs in the streets. There’s no way that these photos of these large cities would have no images of humans in the streets based on your statement about long exposures . There are other photos earlier years with lots of people in streets , obviously they did not stand still for 5 minutes???
Thank you for new to me photos of Roman ruins and a good answer to how once fabulous buildings in the city became so ruined. 😊
I have a question about Rome’s walls. There’s a short section of the southern Aurelian walls rebuilt as Renaissance trace italienne with artillery bastions. Why only this section? Is it a woefully incomplete upgrade project for the entire circuit of ancient walls, or was this section regarded as critical?
I plan to make a video on the walls of Rome in the relatively near future; when I do, I hope to address your question.
Thanks!
That is called the Bastione del Sangallo from the name of the architect who built it,approximately in the year 1535 under the papacy of pope Paul the third,the construction implied the demolition of about 400 meters of the ancient walls included a gate(Porta Ardeatina).
Due the extreme cost and the mutation of the political agenda,the building of a new city walls was shelved.
Heyyy toldinstone
Thanks for such engaging clarity, that was a pleasure
That's my question that needs a quick answer: Did the Romans allowed the aqueducts to get into disrepair (and how did they manage without them)?
Not sure if you are still wondering…. But those aqueducts were first purposefully damaged by the invading barbarians ( goths); to cut the water supply to the city they were besieging. Some were repaired but subsequent invaders did the same thing!
idk how I wasn’t subbed already been watching your vids for a couple months thank you for posting!
To see Rome in about say 800 AD would have been interesting. Unfortunately it's marble burnt for lyme. I walked today from Metro Octaviano to Furio Camillo. I love walking Rome.
Rome is probably my favorite city anywhere to just wander.
@@toldinstone I agree fully with you, often I have been wandering for hours as it I always find something interesting to see ...
@@toldinstone There are infinite details here and once a person has the historical chronology down they can start to make a little sense of it. Piece it together. I have a BA in geology and Rome is like one big sedimentary structure. Just the evolution of the Aurelian Walls is a study. I come here every year for 3 months and even longer. Ciao
Lucky lucky people! Good for you.😁👍👍👍
@@williamshepley9054 that is true regarding Rome and I always regarded this city as really special especially if you have a good historical background like yourself! I've been traveling in many countries and places but I always come back, also because my son lives there so everytime I go to Rome I always made sure to take my son to show him something special and try to teach my son, he is 16 years old, a good dose of history and architecture but unfortunately it is months I have not been able to see both him and Rome because of the bloody Covid.
I remember the anecdote about a tourist's question to a guide in Jerusalem:
"Is it possible that this is the same road that Jesus walked on, Via Dolorosa?"
The guide answered:
"Well, no. That street would be 9 meters (30 feet) below us."
In my childhood town Turku I have to dig 2-3 meters to reach the streets of the late Middle Ages.
0:15 How can that be right when the drawing shows the three windows. Clearly the center window was not the renaissance door, the door and windows appear to be in exactly the same place, just with a raised ground level and a path down to the door.
I wondered the same thing
Fantastic that answers the question that has been puzzling me for years
Commenting solely for the algorithm: you deserve it. Truly appreciate the excellent content. Wish the best for you.
Thank you!
Was in Rome, asked myself the question.
Was in Greece asked myself the question.
Live in Vienna, ask myself the question.
I googled it, but you did a better job in 3 minutes.
Subscribed :)
This is an amazing channel. You're going to BLOW UP soon
I sure hope so!
It is very interesting how that affects Rome when considering people still lived in the general area for CENTURIES after.
where are those ruins you showed at the end of the video? its amazing they arent excavated yet!
The answer is. All over Turkey, they have an incredible amount of Roman and Greek ruins and not an as wealthy history as Europe so they haven't excavated anything but the most obvious ones.
The Roman Bath is in Magnesia, near Ephesus. The gate is at Laodicea, not far from Pamukkale.
@@toldinstone thanks!
@@toldinstone the ruins behind pammukale are amazing too hieropolis
many moons ago i visited miletus which was a swamp in many areas
@@fanroche8573 I once made the mistake of visiting Miletus during a very rainy May, and had to almost swim around the site.
I've been wondering about this for a long time. Great video, many thanks.
My pleasure
What about buildings settling? Even with modern building techniques and boring for soil information, it can be an issue. Although, maybe their foundations were way over designed to make up for a lack of specific knowledge.
Settling certainly happened - we see plenty of cracks in the walls of ancient buildings - but it was rarely serious enough to cause structures to actually sink into the earth.
This is also fantastic info regarding the history of A Song of Ice and Fire. Nice video!!!!
Excellent video.
Question: If one could travel back in time to ancient Rome, would the question "what year is this?" or "what year were you born?" be understood in the same way it is today?
In other words, was there a universal calendar across the empire?
Would love to know -
thanks!
In the Republican Era, events were described as happening 'In the year of' whoever were the Consuls at the time.
Hi, I think they meassured the time in years with the reign of their consuls. This means the romans would have said something like this: 'I was born in the year of the consulship of Cicero and Hibrida', which is 63 b.c.
Glad you enjoyed it!
And I can certainly do a video on dating systems in the classical world. I'll put it on the list.
OMG thank you. I never understood this and I studied abroad in Rome. They’d always say “Rome is built on top of the old Rome”. Which you can clearly see when you’re at the ruins or on the River. I just didn’t understand why.
I often wondered about that, seeing beautiful mosaics buried under metres of soil.
In Britain there are mosaics and remains of villas and other Roman buildings less than a meter under the soil. Farmers accidentally find them when they're plowing their fields.
Erryday, look into the "Mud Flood" Theory, it's a more entertaining theory about burried buildings (and windows and doors).
Just stay away from the channels that sell t-shirts and mugs...
Short and to the point. Gotta love this kind of videos.
Excellent work !
Doesn't really make sense. If today an area is flooded, like what happened to Libya recently and a layer of mud is deposited in towns, streets and even inside houses, it will be cleared. People need to live in these places so they remove the mud and debris.
Your theory only works if the place is abandoned after a flood and after that more dust and sand goes on top over the years. But that did not happen in Rome and it has been continuously inhabited for he last 2000 years at least. So no, not convinced.
Also almost all archeological sites are buried under sand and mud across the world. not only Rome.
I absolutely love your channel!
Me encanta la cantidad de información útil para comprender la Historia. Muchas gracias.
I think one reason our modern mind is so dumbfounded by this issue is that today we (usually) have coordinated city employed cleaning crews to keep things tidy. We normally even clean up after a flood.
So informative about a fascinating subject that I have never seen explored before anywhere. Thank you! Will be back for more!
Short logical answer: mud flood
Years ago I asked this question of a lecturing archaeologist. Now I get an answer. Thanks!
What happened to Rome after it fell? Was it just a lawless slum or didn’t people actually live and work in the city
People still lived and worked there, but there were far fewer of them - as few as 20,000 in some periods. The suburbs and villas around the city became wastelands infested by bandits.
This reminds me of Futurama where New York is buried beneath New New York
Great channel!
Q: when did Greeks and Romans stop believing in many gods and why?
The reason why they stopped believing in their many gods, is because they really didn't believe in them in the first place. That's why it was so easy to substitute paganism for monotheism. People wanted freedom from choice. Believe in only one ,and unite under only one and move forward.
Glad you enjoy the videos! I'll put your question on the list.
Constantine converted in the early fourth century:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constantine_the_Great
There was a moment when Constantine turned away publicly from the Pagan gods. Ordered his chariot to stop and turn away during a public ceremony.
@@robertdavis3433 thats an extremely bad take on the subject, considering how much religious the romans where
If the addition of material was so slow, it seems like it would have been easier to just sweep away that layer of dust instead of waiting hundreds of years and then cutting in a new door.
The idea that the door was cut in seems to lead to the idea that the accumulation of the material was rather quick.
That’s because this short video was made entirely for the Masses, who lack the attention span to ask deeper questions like you just did. The Masses are Asses.
this would mean the whole worlds ground level has risen.So start digging and see what you find and then again the sphinx was only buried up to its head and it is much older then rome
Ground level typically rises in inhabited places. People just throw away stuff to streets and empty lots are used as dumping grounds. In many places ground erodes.
Nice video. It answered my queries in a short and precise manner. Read about Renaissance in school and college text books. But reading through the replies here had been very educative for me. Developing properties in a city with historical ruins underneath brings out interesting challenges for both government and property owners. For a student of history, this is an interesting angle to the story of conservation.
This 'buried building' issue is all over the world. You can see buildings with half windows on the same level as the floor all over the place. I think they're not telling us something! 🤔
I swear to the sky fairy, this better not be another mudflood theory
Your parents never explained erosion and gravity to you? So sorry you have been deprived of such knowledge.
@@ApeX-pj4mq what do you think it is when we are talking about rome being buried and not knowing why ... yeah mudflood all day, it's not the only city at all buried like that undrgound. Every major cities is buried like the sky fall on our head lmao
@@Frenchy78ify Sediment piles up INCREDIBLY fast in large metropolitan cities. Roads are built over old roads and structures are built over destroyed or pre existing ones. This is very normal and the entire process of this happening has been documented in Rome
I have always been amazed at how multiple levels of ruins have been found under current structures and believe you may have answered this very question!
AND IT PRESERVED WHAT WE CHERISH TODAY