[suspenseful music]
- Across time, there have been objects
and places of unimaginable power, shrouded in mystery
and sought by many.
From sacred relics.
- Some churches actively claim
to have the Grail.
By some counts, there are as many as 200 Holy Grails
across Europe.
- This might be the most desired object in history.
- To mighty strongholds.
- King Herod knows that his enemies
could strike at any time,
and so he decides to build something like a safe house.
- This is a perfect secure refuge,
because it's almost impossible to attack.
- To a fallen angel that personifies evil.
- We see Satan as a tempter,
trying to lure people away from God, even God's own son.
- From there, it gets worse.
- Now, stories of some of history's most formidable,
"Holy Marvels." [intense music]
The Ark of the Covenant is no ordinary object.
Its alleged powers include destroying armies
and bringing down fury from heaven.
So it's no surprise
people have looked for it for centuries.
[intense music]
- There's an argument to be made
that this might be the most desired object in history,
thanks to the phenomenal power it's said to possess.
Millions of people are familiar
with the tales of the Ark's ability to protect its owners
and destroy their enemies.
- The story of the Ark starts around the 13th century BC
with a group of people called the Israelites.
- In the Book of Exodus, with God's help,
Moses leads the Israelites out of bondage
and into the desert,
searching for a place they call the promised land.
Eventually as they travel through the desert,
they reach Mount Sinai, where God appears before Moses
and gives them The 10 Commandments.
- God also tells Moses to build him a holy vessel
to hold the tablets of the commandments.
This is the Ark of the Covenant.
- [Dennis] Once the Ark is ready,
the Israelites carry it with them wherever they go,
utilizing its incredible power.
- In the Book of Joshua, in the Old Testament,
an army of 40,000 Israelites have their sights set
on the city of Jericho.
- The Israelites begin their attack with a siege.
They blow horns and march the Ark
around the entire circumference of the city.
They do this every day for a week,
until on the seventh day, the walls of Jericho fall.
- It's incredible. No catapults, no cannons.
The walls just crumble, as if by magic.
- The Bible makes this very clear.
This would only have been possible
thanks to the power of the object that they have,
this weapon.
Without the Ark of the Covenant, they had no hope,
but with it, they're an unstoppable force.
- [Dennis] Eventually, around 1000 BC,
the Israelites bring the Ark to Jerusalem,
where King Solomon builds a temple for it on Mount Moriah.
It stays there for years, until disaster strikes.
- The Babylonians wage a savage war against Jerusalem.
After a 30-month-long siege,
they completely destroy the city, tearing down the temple
and lighting the whole place on fire.
- As far as the Bible is concerned,
this is the last mention
of the Ark of the Covenant's location.
It's in Jerusalem and then Jerusalem is destroyed.
- [Dennis] But did the Ark somehow survive?
Nazi leaders certainly thought so,
along with many international teams of explorers.
In 1980, one man joins the search,
an amateur archaeologist named Ron Wyatt.
- Wyatt starts out as a nurse anesthetist.
He's an evangelical Christian
and he becomes fascinated by biblical history.
Wyatt focuses his efforts on finding the Ark of the Covenant
under Mount Moriah.
So he starts by exploring some of the tunnels
that enter in from the north,
and Wyatt claims to see the chamber
and tunnel that has remained untouched.
- He takes out his flashlight
and he immediately sees something
on the far side of the chamber.
He realizes he's looking at a large case
that's sitting on a stone platform.
- [Dennis] To get a closer look,
Wyatt brings in a surprising piece of equipment.
- He uses a colonoscope, the same thing that doctors use
to do colonoscopies, to look inside.
Wyatt claims to see that there's a box
with a flat golden side, and on top, he sees a cherub.
This is it. He believes he's found the Ark of the Covenant.
- [Dennis] But Wyatt keeps the details
of his discovery a secret
- Wyatt says that God instructs him
to leave the Ark just as he found it.
God tells him that there will be a time
leading up to the apocalypse,
when all will finally be revealed.
- So Wyatt seals up the cave
and doesn't reveal its exact location.
Now he passes away in 1999.
Who knows? Maybe someday
they'll get an excavation permit
and be able to prove Wyatt's claims.
But until that happens,
most Ark hunters think it's best to keep looking elsewhere.
- Like the Ark, there's another powerful relic
that's captivated the imagination of millions.
The Holy Grail.
- The Holy Grail might be the most famous vessel in history,
used by the most famous person to ever live,
at the most famous meal ever served.
Today, we call it the Last Supper.
It's thought to have taken place
during the Jewish holiday of Passover.
- [Dennis] The meal starts with a blessing.
- Jesus distributes the bread
and tells his followers, "Take, eat.
This is my body."
He then holds up a cup of wine and says,
"Drink all of it, for this is my blood.
Do this in remembrance of me."
- This is one of the most well-known events
in all of Christianity.
The night that a cup was held and blessed by Jesus.
This simple act has created a legend surrounding this cup
that's lasted for 2,000 years.
- [Dennis] But the cup is also revered for another reason.
- According to legend,
the Holy Grail is an object that has magical powers.
It is an object that is held to be sacred.
It is an object that's connected with healing
and potentially even with immortality itself.
- It's a holy relic.
It's been touched by Jesus and it can provide immortality.
This would be the most valuable object
in the history of the world.
- [Dennis] After The Last Supper, the Grail disappears.
From here, legends of its whereabouts
and guardians run the gamut.
- Some churches actively claim to have the Grail.
Others just happily allow people
to make their own assumptions,
but by some counts, there are as many as 200 Holy Grails
across Europe.
- There's at least one sticking point in all these claims.
The large majority of these Grail candidates
aren't associated with any miracles.
The Grail is supposed to possess great powers, right?
So there are a lot of cups with not a lot of powers.
- [Dennis] One cup, however, does claim to have powers,
and it's currently on display at a church
in the Spanish town of O Cebreiro.
- This cup's origins are unknown,
but according to this church, in the 13th century,
it was used to offer communion
to a peasant named Juan Santin.
As the priest is delivering the communion,
the bread and wine turn into actual flesh
and blood in the cup.
So alarmed are these two men that they run away.
They just abandon the ceremony.
For a hundred years,
the cup, filled with the blood and flesh,
remain on display, unspoiled.
- This miracle is certified by Pope Innocent VIII,
and Queen Isabella herself eventually visits the church
and verifies the cup's authenticity.
Today, the flesh and blood are gone,
but the cup can still be viewed inside a glass case.
- So what can we make of all these cups
circulating in Europe
with each town claiming to hold the real one.
Until somebody actually fills one up and drinks from it
and magically becomes immortal,
identifying the Grail is gonna be pretty tough.
- Every culture has stories of weapons
believed to wield great powers,
and one in particular has been held
by some of the world's most infamous leaders.
- In Vienna's Hofburg Palace,
there's an imperial treasury vault
which contains 21 rooms of rare treasures
collected by Austria's Habsburg's rulers
and the Holy Roman Empire.
Among the jewel-encrusted crowns
and golden scepters sits a dull metal spear,
which might be the most valuable object
in the entire collection.
- [Dennis] It's called the Holy Lance,
also known as
the Spear of Destiny.
- The spearhead is
about 20 inches long,
weighs about two pounds.
It's mostly made of iron.
It has a leather wrap to tie it,
and silver and gold cuffs around the middle,
which were added later.
- [Dennis] But the spear's true power
is thought to come from another source.
- In the New Testament,
but only in the Gospel of John,
we're told that the Romans aren't sure
if Jesus has died yet.
And so one of the Roman guards,
he actually pierces Jesus with a spear.
- Jesus has already died by then,
and it's said that there's a gush of blood
and water from the wound.
- According to non-biblical sources,
the guard who wields the spear is blind,
but when he pierces Jesus,
the holy blood drips into his eyes and heals him.
- [Dennis] From that moment on,
the spear is believed to have superpowers.
- It's said that the Spear of Destiny
can make the bearer invincible in combat.
- It's also said that whoever possesses the spear
is taken as a sign that they rule by divine right,
meaning their authority comes directly from God.
Whomever wields the spear
has in their hands the destiny of the world.
- When you study the history of this incredible object
and learn more about its journey,
you realize it's been at the center
of some of the most important events in human history.
- In the eighth and the early ninth centuries,
the first Holy Roman Emperor, Charlemagne,
supposedly carries the Holy Spear
on 47 victorious military campaigns.
Then one day he accidentally drops the spear
and he dies, almost immediately, of a fever.
The relic moves around until 1424,
when it winds up in the city of Nuremberg.
In 1796, Napoleon Bonaparte makes a move to seize it,
so it's sent to the Hofburg Palace
in Vienna for safekeeping.
Napoleon never does get his hands on it.
- [Dennis] Once it's in Vienna,
another power hungry leader sets his sights on the spear.
- Even before his rise to power,
Adolf Hitler is aware of the spear
from his days as a starving artist in Vienna.
He spends his free time wandering the halls
of the Hofburg Palace, which had become a museum.
- [Dennis] When Hitler invades Austria in 1938,
he seizes the weapon.
- Hitler's empire grows, as does his ego.
He seems to believe he's invincible,
but if he paid attention to the legend
surrounding the Spear of Destiny,
he should have realized that things don't always end well
for those who wield it.
- As we all know, eventually the tide turns against Hitler
and on April 30th, 1945, he ends his own life
inside a Berlin bunker.
[explosion booming]
- By January 1946,
the spear is back at the Hofburg Museum in Vienna,
having survived another war,
so maybe it really does hold the power of invincibility.
[dramatic music]
- Like the spear, there's another weapon
that supposedly grants the divine right to rule.
Legend says it was first seized
by a young British warrior named Arthur.
- Excalibur.
The very name of the mighty sword
evokes a sense of sacred, mythical powers,
and is forever linked to the man who wields it,
King Arthur.
- The legend of King Arthur originates from Welsh poetry
written around the late sixth century AD.
Arthur was said to have ruled
after the fall of the Roman Empire,
and he was the leader of what was a knightly fellowship
of the round table.
His stories, of course, involve his famous sword,
which protects the king and his knights in battle.
- In 1136, an English cleric, Jeffrey of Monmouth,
compiles the Arthurian tales
in a book called, "The History of the Kings of Britain."
In Latin, he calls the sword Caliburnus,
it just means "cuts steel."
- Eventually this sort of gets transmuted
into what we now have as a name for it, Excalibur.
So here it is obviously clearly presented
as a miraculous, magical sword.
- [Dennis] The blade is believed to be forged
on the mystical isle of Avalon.
[hammering]
- One of the most famous stories
of how Arthur gets Excalibur is from the sword in the stone,
and in this story, Merlin the wizard,
proclaims that whoever can extract the sword
from the stone will be the rightful King of England.
- So naturally, everybody wants to take a crack at it
and become King of England, and many people try,
but the sword just won't budge
until a boy named Arthur pulls it free,
[metal clanging]
claiming his right to the throne.
- [Dennis] Once it's in Arthur's hands,
Excalibur displays astonishing powers.
- The sword can only be used by those it deems worthy.
Anybody else who takes it will be destroyed
by the sword's magic, and for those who are worthy,
it seemingly enhances their physical abilities
to superhuman levels.
With Excalibur,
King Arthur once single handedly defeats 960 Saxons
in battle.
- The sword is said to be so bright
that it can blind enemies.
Even the scabbard of the sword is said to be magical.
It prevents its owner from losing blood in combat
so that no wound can be fatal.
- The sword's greatest power
is the fact that it grants you the right to rule.
So if you have Excalibur, you are the true king.
- With Excalibur at his side, Arthur marries Queen Guinevere
and then he and his knights embark on a series of quests.
- [Dennis] As the legend endures,
many start to wonder, could the sword be real?
- The thing about Excalibur
is that whether or not its origins are mythological,
it has had a definite impact on history.
So many rulers have wanted to get their hands on it.
- [Dennis] Including the famed English king
Richard the Lionheart,
who in 1191 decides to look for it.
- He hears from an old Welsh bard
that the mighty Arthur is buried at Glastonbury Abbey.
- [Dennis] Convinced this must be King Arthur's
final resting place, Richard has the area excavated.
- What they unearth is pretty thrilling,
an inscribed cross that bears Arthur and Guinevere's names
and large bones believed to be Arthur's,
and even a long lock of blonde hair that crumbles to dust
when a greedy monk grabs it.
- [Dennis] Remarkably, that's not all they find.
- Later that same year,
King Richard heads off to join The Third Crusade,
and when he does, he claims to have Excalibur at his side.
He believes the legendary sword has been found
and that he can wield its power.
- [Dennis] Unfortunately,
King Richard dies in battle in 1199.
- The throne passes on to his brother John,
and in the middle of this,
Excalibur disappears from the historical record.
- [Dennis] But some are hopeful
the sword will turn up again.
- People are still out there, all over the UK,
using a combination of old literature
and new technology to try to find the fabled sword.
If nothing else, this certainly proves
that the legend lives on.
- Stories of holy weapons capture our imaginations,
but sometimes, actual places can inspire us.
Consider one famous fortress,
built by King Herod in the first century BC,
that will become a symbol of incredible bravery, Masada.
- Even though King Herod
is basically a puppet of the Romans, he is no fool.
He knows that his Jewish people have many enemies
that could strike at any time,
and so he decides to build something like a safe house.
Masada, which means "strong foundation" in Hebrew,
is to be a fortress and a royal retreat.
And construction on this starts around the year 30 BC.
- Herod chooses a 18-acre plateau
that's about 1,400 feet above the Dead Sea.
This is a perfect location as a secure refuge,
because it's almost impossible to attack.
- The fortress is surrounded by a casemate wall.
These things run 4,600 feet altogether,
they're 13 feet thick.
The space between the walls could be used in peace time
for storage.
However, in war time, you could fill in that space
with rubble, debris, rocks and dirt,
to make an even stronger defensive wall.
- [Dennis] Luckily, Herod never has to use it,
but seven decades after his death,
it comes in handy for a group of Jewish rebels.
- The first Jewish-Roman war breaks out in AD 66.
This follows years of rising tensions
between the Jewish population and their Roman overlords,
until you have open conflict and warfare between the two.
- [Dennis] As the war continues,
one group in particular look for a more secure post.
They're called the Sicarii.
- The Sicarii are elite Jewish assassins
who are known for taking out their enemies.
The Romans obviously,
but also Jewish collaborators with the Romans.
- The Sicarii, they decide that it's time to get out of town
and they move into the abandoned Masada
by late in the year of 67 AD.
They're sure that the Romans are after them,
but that this is the safest place
that they could possibly hide.
- [Dennis] It turns out to be a smart move.
- By 70 AD, the Romans lay siege to Jerusalem
and pretty much totally destroy it.
The Romans take down every Jewish stronghold in the region,
but they save Masada for last.
- Sometime between 72 and 73 AD,
the Romans decide it's time to attack the Sicarii at Masada.
By this point, the Sicarii have been here,
holding out for about five years.
There are about 960 men, women and children,
and they're very well prepared to defend themselves,
under the command of their leader, Ben Ya'ir.
The Sicarii leader knows that the Romans
can only be delayed, they cannot be stopped.
- The Sicarii decide to burn down Masada
and end each other's lives,
rather than submit to the Romans.
- [Dennis] When the Romans finally enter Masada
ready for battle,
they're instead met with an eerie silence.
- When the Romans entered Masada
and they found all the Jewish inhabitants dead,
they also found that they still had plenty of food there,
so they didn't kill themselves because they were starving.
They did it simply because they wanted to be free.
- [Dennis] For over a thousand years,
the walls of Masada remain silent,
but today, it's a different story.
- Masada is now the second most popular tourist destination
in Israel after Jerusalem.
Nearly a million people make this trek each year
to visit this ultimate symbol of strength and resistance,
a place where a small group of rebels managed to stand up
to the world's most powerful army.
[dramatic music]
- While Masada is a testament to courage and endurance,
there's another rock equally as formidable.
- On the southern tip of the Iberian Peninsula,
there's a narrow passage that separates the Atlantic Ocean
and the Mediterranean Sea, a huge-cliff like mountain,
some 1,400 feet high, that's also full of caves.
- If you are a seafaring culture that wants to expand,
import, or export goods,
there's only one way to exit the Mediterranean,
and that's the eight-mile- wide Strait of Gibraltar.
And so right away, people start giving this place
a sacred significance,
because of how crucial it is to their daily lives.
- The Greeks integrate Gibraltar
into their story of Heracles, who the Romans call Hercules.
Both of these cultures, Greek and Roman,
refer to Gibraltar as the Pillars of Hercules.
- [Dennis] According to the legend,
Hercules travels west to the edge of the Mediterranean Sea
in search of an infamous monster.
- Hercules is tasked with bringing back the cattle
of a three-headed monster named Geryon,
who lives beyond the pillars.
He succeeds, and in some versions of the story,
Hercules then narrows the strait
to prevent sea monsters from entering the Mediterranean.
- [Dennis] Gibraltar also protects against human invaders.
- Given its tactical location,
you can spot enemies from miles away
from the top of that mountain.
We know that the Romans, the Vandals, the Visigoths,
the Muslims and the Christians,
all use it as a strategic lookout.
- [Dennis] Control of the rock continues to shift hands
for generations.
Then the British arrive in 1713,
and begin carving a hidden world deep inside the stone.
- The British began advancing tunnels through the rock,
beginning in the late 18th century.
There are now 35 miles of tunnels in Gibraltar,
including the longest one of them all, the Great North Road,
which is three and a half miles long.
In addition to that, there are training facilities
for the British military inside the rock as well.
- During World War II,
the British host General Dwight D. Eisenhower
for 21 days within the Rock of Gibraltar,
where he commands Operation Torch,
which is a combined US and British invasion,
where they drive the Nazis out of North Africa.
[dramatic music]
- Today, Gibraltar remains as a place of protection,
albeit with a modern twist.
It currently houses
one of the most secure computer data centers in the world.
[mysterious music]
- While many holy marvels are created for the living,
some are meant for the dead.
There's one ancient Egyptian text
that supposedly grants great power,
but only after the person wielding it dies.
- The Book of the Dead isn't
an actual traditional book
with pages.
Instead, it's a collection of hieroglyphics
written in different places,
on tombs, on coffins, on papyrus scrolls.
- It's a hands-on practical guide to the world of the dead,
and the various incantations
that will protect the deceased
against all sorts of perils in the afterlife.
For ancient Egyptians,
the afterlife was a treacherous place.
In the afterlife, you can be eaten by a crocodile,
you can be poisoned by a snake,
you can be bitten by horrible insects.
So there are spells in the Book of the Dead
that you can cast to protect yourself
from all of these things.
- There are other spells
that literally keep you in one piece.
The Egyptians believe that the human being is made up
of a whole collection of substances,
and that upon death, those substances can go flying apart.
- One spell keeps your head attached to your torso.
Another ensures that your heart doesn't go wandering off.
Another keeps your flesh from rotting.
- There are spells that describe
how to make your body regain movement and speech,
or how to craft protective amulets,
or how to turn your saliva into a magical healing elixir.
- [Dennis] Physical survival was only part of the journey.
There's also a test.
- While you're making your way through the underworld,
you get asked a series of questions,
but it's an open book exam.
If you've got your Book of the Dead near you,
you'll be fine.
- For example, part of your journey is made on a boat
or a barge, and so there's a spell in the book
that you need to summon this boat.
And when the boat arrives, it gives you a quiz.
The rudder asks you, "Tell me my name,"
and you have to know
that the rudder's spiritual name
is Aker.
- If you don't have the right spell
or know the answer to a question,
you can die permanently this time,
never to have your chance at immortality.
In other instances, you might lose your head
and be doomed to wander the afterlife
without a head, forever.
- One of the worst possible consequences
is that you get turned upside down,
causing your digestive tract to work in reverse.
That means you're going to spend eternity drinking urine
and eating feces.
So you better have that book.
- If you do everything according to the Book of the Dead,
you get to dwell happily ever after in the afterlife.
- For the Ancient Greeks,
the journey to eternal life
requires crossing a much more treacherous barrier.
- In the epic Greek tales such as Homer's "Iliad,"
there's a natural barricade called the River Styx.
It's a mythical body of water
that protects both our world
as well as the underworld of Hades.
- The living aren't meant to enter Hades,
and the dead aren't meant to come back from it.
So this river is crucially important
to the sacred order of things.
- The River Styx is said to be impossible
to cross by natural means,
because it flows with
a corrosive black water that poisons
and dissolves everything that comes in contact with it.
Now, this water can cause paralysis.
It can even harm the gods.
In one story, it causes the gods
to lose their ability to speak.
- Legends like these cement the Styx
as perhaps the most powerful,
sacred body of water in Greek mythology.
- [Dennis] But a recent discovery suggests
that the River Styx may actually be real.
- Around 130 miles south of Mount Olympus
lies a river called Mavroneri,
which literally means "black water."
- It originates in the high mountains of Achaia
where its cold waters cascade
over this kind of limestone crag
to form the second highest waterfall in Greece.
- They find that a toxin called calicheamicin
flows through the Mavroneri.
It's a naturally occurring soil bacteria
that was discovered in the 1980s
in deposits of calcium carbonate
that form on the limestone in the river.
Cytotoxins like calicheamicin cause cell death,
which can induce fever, chills,
and severe muscular and neurological pain.
- A geochemical analysis of this river
really needs to be conducted
to see whether the concentration of calicheamicin
in the water here could have been deadly.
But it's pretty incredible
that modern researchers are still looking
into the legendary River Styx,
after nearly 3,000 years of speculation.
[intense music]
- When it comes to the embodiment of dark power,
perhaps no figure is better known
or more feared around the world than Satan.
The question is, why?
- The term Satan comes from the Hebrew word Ha-Satan,
which actually means "the accuser" or "the adversary."
The word appears more than 20 times in the Old Testament,
referring to a being dispatched by God
as an instrument of judgment.
- The first instance of the term Ha-Satan occurs
in the Book of Numbers,
when God sends a Satan
to confront the greedy prophet, Balaam,
who's planning to curse the Israelites.
And this Satan actually acts as a kind of employee of God.
He's under his command.
- Ha-Satan's role as an instrument of God's judgment
is further established in the Book of Job.
Satan and God are having this conversation about Job.
Job is a man who's favored by God for his righteousness.
Satan starts questioning Job's integrity,
saying that Job is only good
because God has given him such good fortune.
It's not because of Job's great faith in God.
- And this all leads up to the Book of Isaiah,
when we finally hear the familiar tale
of a former angel called Lucifer,
who is cast out of heaven for aspiring
to be even more powerful than God.
He's said to be banished by God to the quote,
"Lowest depths of the pit."
- But even in this story,
he's still not the kind of powerful, evil force
that we think of him today.
He's actually powerless,
because God has complete authority over him.
- [Dennis] That changes in the New Testament.
- In the Gospels of Matthew, Mark,
and Luke, we start seeing a darker, stronger,
and more independent side to Satan.
In Matthew, Satan tries to tempt Jesus in the wilderness,
offering worldly power in exchange for worshiping him.
And it seems like Satan is doing this
without God's authorization.
- Now we see Satan in this role as a tempter
and as a corrupter, trying to lure people away from God,
even God's own son.
- From there, it gets worse.
The gospels describe Satan causing illnesses,
including fever and leprosy and even arthritis,
and his main goal is to turn humankind toward evil.
[eerie music]
- By the time you get to the Book of Revelation,
Satan's transformation is complete,
into a full-fledged, evil enemy of God,
and he has a whole new look.
He takes the form of a great red dragon with seven heads,
10 horns, and a massive tail.
He eventually wages war against the righteous
and loses, getting cast into a lake of fire to die.
- [Dennis] The Book of Revelation
paints a vivid picture of final judgment.
For millions in medieval Europe,
that vision feels all too real,
when the Black Death sweeps through in the 14th century.
- The Black Death was said to have killed
almost a third of the population of Europe.
[tense music]
- In the wake of the plague,
people are praying to the church,
"Protect us from the evil that Satan has unleashed upon us."
In places like England,
that were hit especially hard by the plague,
Christian sects begin to form
with the goal of living as pious a life as possible
to escape the wrath of Satan.
- [Dennis] The Puritans bring this view to the New World.
- They come from England
when the panic around Satan is in full swing,
and they settle in New England
and they start seeing Satan everywhere around them.
These are extremely religious people
who move to an unfamiliar wilderness.
There are strange beasts all around them.
Wolves had gone extinct in England by the 1500s,
and their wild, nighttime howling
is freaking out the Puritans, [wolves howling]
who believe that these wolves are in league with the devil.
- [Dennis] The fear of Satan is so overwhelming,
that in 1692, the Massachusetts Colony executes 19 people
believed to comport with the devil.
Known as the Salem Witch Trials,
these tribunals eventually launch endless books,
plays and movies.
- Ever since the tragic events of the witch trials,
the idea of an evil Satan,
a beast unleashed on mankind,
has remained firmly rooted in literature and pop culture.
- All you have to do is turn on your television
or your radio or log into your favorite social media site,
and you're going to find depictions of hell.
You're gonna find the devil
and his minions running around with their pitchforks.
You're gonna find fire, flames, darkness, brimstone,
all of these catastrophic,
eternal punishments raining down.
- We've explored the power to live forever,
to protect what's sacred and to destroy entire cities.
But what about a stone
believed to hold the fate of the world?
- The Aztec rule central Mexico from the 14th
to the 16th centuries.
The Aztec are an advanced people.
They develop sophisticated irrigation methods
to use in agriculture.
They design and implement an aqueduct system
to supply fresh water.
They even drain the swampy land
around what is now Mexico City
to construct their capital city of Tenochtitlan.
- [Dennis] As they continue to develop
their thriving culture,
they also expand their spiritual practices.
- A big part of Aztec religious and cultural beliefs
is ritual human sacrifice.
- Why are they killing people so often?
It's because they believe that if they don't, the world,
actually the entire universe will come to an end.
As the legend goes, each night,
the stars and the moon, in a fit of jealousy,
launch an attack against the sun,
and each morning, the sun manages to beat them back
to rise again.
The sun is really their sun god, Huitzilopochtli.
And he can only win this nightly battle
and rise again to power life on Earth
with the help of the Aztec people.
- And the only way to sustain
and support a sun god is through human sacrifice.
[tense music]
- [Dennis] Central to this ritual, the Aztec sunstone.
- It's a massive sculpture, 12 feet across,
over three feet thick, weighing some 54,000 pounds.
It's intricately carved with glyphs.
- It's thought the sacrifices would happen on
or near the sunstone, which was probably originally located
in the main square of Tenochtitlan.
- The victim's blood would spill onto the stone altar,
which features an image of the sun god at its center.
So the power of human life
is being fed directly into the sun.
- [Dennis] Some historians estimate
the Aztec perform around 20,000 human sacrifices per year.
- This continues for centuries until 1519.
That's when Spanish conquistador, Hernan Cortes,
and his men arrive in the Aztec capital.
They're the first European settlers on this land.
- [Dennis] While taking in the sights
of this awe-inspiring city,
they witness a human sacrifice for the first time.
- Now, this definitely doesn't fit
with the Spaniard's Christian beliefs,
which they came to Mesoamerica to spread.
And so the conquistadors very quickly
start to subjugate the Aztec.
In fact, they're so fearful,
they begin a campaign to destroy
or hide any Aztec artifacts they find that aren't gold.
- And of course, the scariest artifact of all,
the massive sunstone that's seen thousands of deaths.
It's said to have been buried near the center of the city
by the first Spanish archbishop there.
- But as is often the case,
what's buried refuses to stay that way.
In 1790, workers making repairs
to Mexico City's cathedral accidentally
unearth the stone.
[dark tense music]
- [Dennis] The sunstone is eventually relocated
to the National Museum of Anthropology in Mexico City,
where it stands today.
- What's interesting is that in one key way,
the Aztec might actually be right
about the way the world could end.
Astronomers today are confident that our planet,
along with the rest of our solar system,
will one day be destroyed by the death of the sun.
- But here's an important distinction
from the Aztec beliefs.
While this is scientifically guaranteed to happen,
it isn't happening anytime soon.
We have about 5 billion years to go, no sacrifices required.
[explosion booming]
- Power in objects like the Holy Grail
or the unstoppable force of Satan
don't always exist in what we can see or hold.
Sometimes it endures in the belief
and purpose we give to it.
I'm Dennis Quaid. Thanks for watching, "Holy Marvels."