Slashdot Mirror


Finding Genghis Khan's Tomb From Space

rossgneumann writes Genghis Khan really, really didn't want anyone to know where he was buried. The soldiers escorting his body to its final resting place killed everyone they passed, killed the people who built the tomb, and then were killed themselves. An elegant solution to this problem bubbled up from two unlikely sources: a man described as a "modern day Indiana Jones" and amateur archaeologists.

11 of 166 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Killed, killed, killed by Chrisq · · Score: 1, Interesting

    What a bastard.

    I'd count him along with Hitler, Stalin, and Muhammad.

  2. Next up, finding Atlantis from Space by T.E.D. · · Score: 3, Interesting

    ...and then Narnia and Oz.

    The Mongols didn't bury their dead. Their religion (like that of many nomadic pastoral societies) relied on open-air burials. The whole "tomb" myth was most likely invented by their Chinese neighbors.

  3. Re:History Channel by gstoddart · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Yeah, History Channel has turned into a rather pathetic shell of its former self.

    It's aliens, ghosts, and various other bits of crap and conjecture.

    They should really stop calling themselves "History", and move onto "speculative fiction".

    History is facts and reality, most of the crap on History Channel is anything but.

    --
    Lost at C:>. Found at C.
  4. Re:History Channel by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    An MIT guy figured out what is there. Its a ship, that sank into the swamp bow first. They used coconut fibers for seating of the rowers back then. Explains the "evenly spaced wood platforms" as well. I remember the show back in the 80s "In Search of" when Lenard Nimoy talked about it.

  5. Re:History Channel by Charliemopps · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I happen to know a couple of people that are involved in Cable contract discussions. From what they tell me (and hey, they could be totally wrong but it does make sense) the industry generally thinks that Discovery networks (discovery channel) is soon going to get cut from a lot of networks, soon followed by A&E (History channel) because people are getting fed up with the price of the different tiers. Cable companies have to cut something and those 2 networks are nothing more than reality show dustbins. Just like Fox is losing networks left and right now because the fact of the matter is most people just want a "news channel" and CNN is just fine for that and doesn't have a giant group of people that hate them like Fox does. These networks have to drastically cut their price or improve their content or they're not going to get carried anymore.

    The companies themselves may be fine... they are making a lot of money in other things. Discovery holds patents on ebooks for some crazy reason. But the times of filling your entire channel with reality TV that costs you virtually nothing and has no depth is over. AMC has proven that even a small investment can have huge returns.

  6. Re:His legacy is 2% by jbmartin6 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    It is a lot more than that, the article only covers "direct" male descendants. i.e. son of son of son of son of son of son of son. If you were the son of one of his daughters you wouldn't count. So 17.5 million men should have the same last name as him, if he had one. Maybe someone else can do the math, I wonder what the number would be if you accounted for females, and how that would compare to any other person from the same time period.

    --
    This posting is provided 'AS IS' without warranty of any kind, implied or otherwise.
  7. Re:History Channel by Charliemopps · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Oak Island? WTF is that?

    Admittedly it's been a few years since I had cable TV, but have they really fallen that far? Back when we got rid of cable, the History Channel was more like The WWII Channel.

    Oak Island is supposed to be a Mystery... and if you read many of the sensationalized accounts of it from many disreputable reporters that conveniently leave out certain facts about the place it sounds very intriguing. But the fact is, the place isn't a mystery at all.

    Some kid swam out to it and found a tree with a pulley hanging from a branch a long time ago. That bit is likely true. But then, a guy heard about it and went out there. He was a Free Mason. And now, I don't mean the ones that rule the world. I mean the real ones that are basically like the Shriners that ware funny hats, drive gocarts and throw candy to kids in parades, and more importantly absolutely love secrets, mysteries, puzzles and hidden treasure. It's their bread and butter. They also like to relate all these mysterious stories to non-members to try and get you to join. If you ever meet someone at a party that starts talking about the Free Masons, run away. They'er either not a Free Mason and a conspiracy nut... or they are a Free Mason and a conspiracy nut.

    Anyways, from that guy on, every single person to investigate or own the island was a free mason. Including Franklin Roosevelt! You cannot trust anything they say about the place. The crazy thing about free masons is that they are usually conspiracy nuts, and their conspiracies always involve their own club. Once you realize that every single person to investigate the island was a conspiracy theorist, and that you can't trust any of their accounts, it makes a lot more sense. I'm pretty sure every rumor about the free masons ruling the world was likely started by an actual Free Mason. Not only that, they do things to make themselves even more mysterious because they think that's cool. That rock kind of looks like a skull? Well, they'll report it as 100% a skull and they're pretty sure the shape of the eye sockets indicate it's a model of the first popes skull... clearly leading to some secret of the ages.

    Long story short, Oak Island is what happens when you take a couple dozen conspiracy nuts and let them dig in the same hole for over 200 years and give them lots of media attention. The only thing buried on that island is all hope that those men would ever have to face reality.

  8. Bullshit for Betas by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Five seconds of thought on the laughable legend of Khan's 'burial' immediately exposes the moronic lies- but the lies were concocted to meet the world view of Betas.

    I am reminded of the excellent recent TV show Spartacus. As the end approached, endless dribblers speculated about what the story would to with the 'demise' of Spartacus. I pointed out to friends and family that since, rarely, the show had INTELLIGENT writers, they would end with Spartacus's allies ensuring he had an anonymous burial so the Romans could never have the satisfaction of exploiting his 'capture' alive or dead- and the legend of Spartacus would have its greatest possible beginning.

    Ghengis Khan almost certainly went the same way, but for different reasons. The Mongols had religious beliefs derived from early Christianity (not the Jewish based Modern Christianity created by Roman leaders centuries after the death of Christ). Khan was a hard, intelligent, ruthless leader from a philosophy that respected the bleak land, and what it meant for a person to flourish is such an inhospitable place. He conquered because he was good at conquering, and for no other reason. He was, in fact, simply PLAYING a giant, real game of Civilisation IV. As the end approached, he could easily have ordered his people to construct for his tomb a structure as grand as anything seen since the time of the Great Pyramids- but his personal philosophy was the diametric opposite of such pathetic grandiose.

    His REAL burial site was as modest and anonymous as that of Spartacus- and for exactly the same reason. TRULY 'great' people never crave an impressive tomb, but they frequently like to create a mythology that lives on- often for the ongoing benefit of the legacy/family/dynasty.

    Ghengis Khan allowed himself to APPEAR as a 'god' for the sake of the inheritors of his kingdom, because he KNEW that Human Betas (like you lot reading Slashdot) operate at the level of myths, so for his kids to continue their conquest of the world the leaders of the Mongols had to seem 'special'. Look at the braindead Yanks are told that Obama (who can't even speak without an autocue, and has stated on multiple occasions that his favourite pastime is murdering first responders with a second round of drone strikes) is a VERY special American.

    It is telling that the Mongols faded back into History astonishingly quickly, although the impact of their conquests lived on long after true Mongols ceased to rule over their captured lands. Where the Mongols came from was where the Mongols returned, and still live to this day. Their dedication to the land was FAR greater than their interest in riches and power over other men. After spanking the Chinese in order to satisfy a long standing grudge, they lost interest.

    Anyone here really interested in the subject should make themselves aware of the astonishing battle that halted the movement of Mongols into West Europe. The Mongols had found themselves fighting at a time when their opponents were vastly inferior to the Ancient Romans from 1000 years early. The sick corruption of organised religion had encouraged vile rulers to de-skill their populations, so the churches (of the East and the West) would dominate unopposed. The Mongols thus found themselves up against TINY poorly conceived, infinitely vicious forces that were created entirely to suppress the ordinary unarmed Humans of those nations.

    The Mongols would have been easily THRASHED by Rome, had the two co-existed in History, and the Mongols were well aware of this. After victory after victory in the West, Khan felt obliged to force the heart of the New Roman Empire- the leaders of the Roman Catholic church, to capitulate. But in the true birthplace of so many of Man's religious systems, Egypt, Khan suffered his first loss and any chance of taking West Europe ended.

    Ghengis Khan and the Mongols proved the societies of East and West at the time were significantly flawed- a single PRIMITIVE force with absolute military intent was able to easily dominate the so-

  9. Re:History Channel by aaron4801 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I remember when TLC would show various surgeries and walk the viewer through every step. All the gory details from cataracts procedures, breast reconstructions, and other voluntary operations. That was nearly 20 years ago, but it hasn't always been crap.

  10. Re:His legacy is 2% by 140Mandak262Jamuna · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Our family follows patronymic system. My last name, as recorded in my passport, is my dad's first name. My wife and daughter use my first name as their last names. We used to follow the system of village_name fathers_name given_name caste_name. But urbanization made the village name quaint. Caste names have become taboo in the last few decades. Leaving us with just a dad's name + given name.

    --
    sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
  11. Re:History Channel - Real History costs too much. by MarkvW · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Get four history professors who have divergent viewpoints and hate each other. Get somebody cool for a moderator, like Jon Stewart. Then let those boys go at it.