Dispatches
Mysteries, science, and the ancient sites that blur the line between them.
Ancient Mystery Sites You Can Visit in Peru
Peru holds more ancient mystery sites per square kilometer than almost anywhere on Earth. From the desert floor to the Andean peaks to the shores of Lake Titicaca, here are six places that...
The Mystery of Machu Picchu
The walls of Machu Picchu are built without mortar. The stones are cut and fitted so precisely that not even a knife blade can slip between them — yet they've survived centuries of earthquakes. The...
What \"The Mystery of Puma Punku\" Got Right and Wrong
Season 4, Episode 6 is one of Ancient Aliens' most-watched episodes — and one of its most debated. It makes some claims that hold up, some that don't, and one that archaeologists find genuinely...
Tiwanaku: Gateway of the Sun
A single block of andesite, weighing 10 tons, was carved into an ornate gate and raised at the edge of the world. The figure at its center holds staffs that no one has satisfactorily explained —...
Puma Punku's Impossible Precision
At 12,800 feet in the Bolivian Andes, scattered across a windswept plateau, lie H-shaped stone blocks with drill holes accurate to within a fraction of a millimeter. The civilization that made...
5 South American Sites That Defy Explanation
The Andes gave rise to civilizations that built without wheels, without iron, and without mortar — and yet left behind structures that still puzzle engineers today. These five sites are the...
Teotihuacan: City of the Gods
At its peak around 400 AD, Teotihuacan was one of the six largest cities in the world. Its builders remain anonymous. The name the Aztecs gave it — \"the place where men become gods\" —...
What \"Unexplained Structures\" Got Right and Wrong
Season 2, Episode 8 tackles four of the most famous megalithic mysteries in the world: Stonehenge, Göbekli Tepe, Baalbek, and the Carnac Stones. Here's what holds up — and what...
Easter Island's Moai: The Statues That Walked
Roughly 900 stone statues stand watch across Easter Island. The largest ever carved is 33 feet tall and weighs 270 tons. It never left the quarry. What the Rapa Nui people were...
The Mystery of Stonehenge
Every stone in the outer ring of Stonehenge weighs about 25 tons. The 80 smaller bluestones each weigh up to 4 tons and were dragged from Wales — 150 miles away. The question isn't just...
Baalbek's Impossible Stones
Three limestone blocks sit in the foundation of a Roman temple in Lebanon. Each one weighs roughly 800 tons. The question isn't just how they got there — it's...
What 'The Evidence' Got Right and Wrong
Season 1, Episode 1 of Ancient Aliens aired on April 20, 2010 — and it came out swinging. Four sites, one hour, and an argument that would...
The Mystery of the Nazca Lines
The Hummingbird is 93 meters long. The Condor stretches 130 meters wingspan. You can't see either of them from the ground — which is exactly where the questions begin...
The Mystery of the Great Pyramids of Giza
They built it with copper tools, wooden sledges, and human determination — and somehow produced the most precisely aligned structure in the ancient world...
The Mystery of Göbekli Tepe: The Temple That Rewrote History
In 1994, a Kurdish shepherd noticed something odd in a hillside in southeastern Turkey. What archaeologists found beneath that hill shattered everything we thought we knew about...