The U.S. Returns Looted Sculptures to Libya

Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg today announced the return of two antiquities collectively valued at more than $500,000 to the people of Libya.

The artefacts, “Veiled Head of a Lady” and “Bust of a Bearded Man,” were both looted from the ancient city of Cyrene, which faced rampant looting in the late 1980s and throughout the 1990s shortly before the appearance of the pieces on the international art market.

The items were returned during a repatriation ceremony attended by the Charge d’Affaires of the Embassy of Libya in DC Khaled Daief, and U.S. Homeland Security Investigations (“HSI”) Acting Deputy Special Agent-in-Charge Mike Alfonso. 

“These are more than just beautiful artefacts – they are windows into thousands of years of culture and deserve to be returned to their country of origin,” said District Attorney Bragg.

“Manhattan is home to some of the most prized art and history pieces in the entire world, but they must be acquired legally. We will not allow New York to be a hub for trafficked antiquities, and will continue to crack down on looting and smuggling across the globe in coordination with our law enforcement partners.”

“Thanks to the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office, we are grateful for the opportunity to repatriate this cultural artefact.

We would like to express our highest appreciation and gratitude for the efforts undertaken by the Manhattan District Attorney and his staff, the Department of Homeland Security, and everyone that worked to ensure that this invaluable Libyan artefact returns to its homeland in Shahat Museum,” said Charge d’Affaires of the Embassy of Libya Khaled Daief.

Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) New York Acting Special Agent in Charge Ricky J. Patel said, “HSI is honoured to return these incredibly significant antiquities to the people of Libya. 

The stunning ‘Veiled Head of a Lady,’ which dates back to the late 4th century B.C., and the extraordinary ‘Bust of a Bearded Man,’ both of which derive from Cyrenaica’s rich archaeological heritage.  For decades, these pieces were stolen and trafficked around the world, ultimately landing in the United States. 

HSI is proud to partner with the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office to actively pursue the theft of these national treasures and work to preserve the cultural history of nations throughout the world.  Today, we return these invaluable pieces to the country of Libya – their rightful home.”

As part of an ongoing criminal investigation concerning antiquities looted from the Middle East and North Africa, the Antiquities Trafficking Unit uncovered evidence that the two antiquities repatriated today had been looted from Cyrene, an archaeological site located near modern-day Shahat, Libya.

Dating to roughly 350 B.C.E, the Veiled Head of a Lady is valued at nearly half a million dollars and was seized from the Metropolitan Museum of Art where it was on view since 1998. Prior to its display at the Met, the piece had been looted from a tomb in Cyrene, smuggled into Egypt by an antiquities trafficker known to the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office, and then shipped to New York.

Dating to 100-300 C.E., the Bust of a Bearded Man is valued at $30,000 and was also looted from Cyrene, where it originated in a tomb rich with small niches. The piece was smuggled from Libya to Geneva, Switzerland, before arriving in Manhattan.  

In January of this year, the Manhattan D.A.’s Office returned another marble antiquity looted from Cyrene valued at $1.2 million the “Veiled Head of a Female,” to the people of Libya.
 
Assistant District Attorney Matthew Bogdanos, Chief of the Antiquities Trafficking Unit and Senior Trial Counsel, handled the investigation with Supervising Investigative Analyst Apsara Iyer and Special Agents Robert Mancene and Robert Fromkin of Homeland Security Investigations.

Additional support for the investigation was provided by Investigative Analysts Alyssa Thiel and Daniel Healey.

District Attorney Bragg thanked HSI New York, the Embassy of Libya in D.C., Morgan Belzic of the Institut National D’Histoire de l’Art, and the French Archaeological Mission in Libya for their assistance with the matter.

Burnt seeds show people used tobacco 12,000 years ago

Four charred tobacco plant seeds found in an ancient Utah fireplace suggest early Americans may have been using the plant 12,300 years ago. The finding makes the first known use of tobacco some 9,000 years earlier than previously thought.

Researchers believe hunter-gatherers in the Great Salt Lake Desert may have sucked or smoked wads of the plant.

Until now, the earliest evidence of tobacco use was a 3,300-year-old smoking pipe discovered in Alabama.

Archaeologists discovered the millimetre-wide seeds at the Wishbone site, an ancient camp in the desert in what is now northern Utah.

There, they found the remnants of an ancient hearth that was surrounded by bone and stone artefacts. These included duck bones, stone tools, and a spear-tip bearing the remains of blood from a mammoth or an early form of an elephant.

Their findings suggest the native American hunter-gatherers may have consumed the tobacco while cooking or toolmaking, the scientists say in a paper published in the journal Nature Human Behaviour.

The tobacco plant is native to the Americas and contains the psychoactive addictive substance nicotine.

Tobacco was widely cultivated and dispersed around the world following the arrival of Europeans in the Americas at the end of the 15th Century.

“The tobacco seeds were a big surprise. They are incredibly small and rare to be preserved,” Daron Duke of the Far Western Anthropological Research Group told the New Scientist.

“This suggests that people learned the intoxicant properties of tobacco relatively early in their time here rather than only with domestication and agriculture thousands of years later.”

Today, the Great Salt Lake Desert is a large dry lake. But 12,300 years ago, the camp would have been on a vast marshland.

“We know very little about their culture,” Mr Duke said of the hunter-gatherers. “The thing that intrigues me the most about this find is the social window it gives to a simple activity in an undocumented past. My imagination runs wild.”

Ancient Mysteries Of Chicago: Is The Puzzling Waubansee Stone A Neglected Pre-Columbian Artifact?

One of the most fascinating and obscure artefacts in North America is tucked away in a Chicago museum. The Waubansee Stone is a huge glacial erratic granite boulder with a larger-than-life head sculpted upon its upper surface. The expertly fashioned relief carving shows the face of a man with a chin beard, depicted with his mouth open and eyes closed. On the top of the stone, just above the head, is a large drop-shaped bowl that once emptied through the head and out of the mout xxx , xxx vea,,00h, over the lower lip, to another drainage spout below the man’s goatee. There are also two connecting holes on either side of the boulder, presumably used as a line anchorage for a sea vessel. 

All holes and drainage spouts are currently plugged with putty or other additions, suggesting there is no interest in a modern restoration. The mysterious face carving and associated cavities have given rise to speculation about its origins, including one theory that the stone was carved by prehistoric Mediterranean seafarers who used the 3,000-pound  boulder as a mooring stone.

Originally standing around 8 feet in height, the Waubansee Stone has mentioned in the first Fort Dearborn accounts as being located just beyond the stockade walls, along the shore of the Chicago River. Chicagoua (or Chicagou) was a local Indian word for the native garlic plant Allium Tricoccum, not an onion plant, that grew profusely along the banks of the Chicago River. 

When the first fort was built in 1803, the Potawatomi Indians of southern Lake Michigan had been trading with white people for well over a century but were becoming increasingly hostile to the number of new settlers coming into the region and staking a claim on their land. President Jefferson, who was very interested in the Indiana Territory (the Indiana Territory included Illinois lands from 1800-1809), was anxious about its security. 

He felt that an American military outpost should be established to protect the new frontier. He selected the mouth of the Chicago River as the site for a new fort. At that time there were several fur traders and their Indian wives living in the region. The fort was named after General Henry Dearborn, Secretary of War. It was built on the south side of the Chicago River where Michigan Avenue now crosses at Wacker Drive. 

Skirmishes with the Potawatomi were on the rise, reaching a crescendo in 1812 when settlers and soldiers were massacred at the first Fort Dearborn (1803-1812) was burned to the ground by the enraged Indians. 

The second Fort Dearborn was rebuilt in 1816-1817 and the Waubansee Stone was presumably reduced in size to be dragged into the fort’s parade grounds where it remained until the fort was dismantled. After that, the stone passed from collector to collector until it found a permanent home at the Fort Dearborn exhibit at the Chicago Historical Society.

Historian Henry H. Hurlbut (1813-1890) developed the generally accepted theory about the stone’s origin in 1881, unsupported by any records or documentation. His belief, admittedly based on no evidence, has the stone being carved in the early 1800s by an unnamed soldier stationed at the original Fort Dearborn. Its face was supposedly fashioned after a friendly Native American Potawatomi Chieftain named Wabansee [1], and this appointed name stuck. 

Hurlbut had only hearsay on which to base his observations, including the presumption that the Indians used the upper recess as a mortar to grind their corn. This accepted explanation has come under fire from several angles. For starters, the recess was intentionally plugged after the Indians supposedly used it, so it would have been an ineffective mortar because the corn would have drained through the mouth. Also, why would a frontier soldier, who was probably suspicious of the Potawatomi in the first place, spend many months to carve the likeness of their tribal leader? Aside from the fact that granite is one of the hardest stones to sculpt, the face is clearly the work of a master stone-cutter who must have devoted a considerable amount of time and labour to the job—hardly in keeping with the strenuous daily tasks of a common frontier soldier. Finally, Native Americans were not known to have grown goatees, nor did they ever carve in granite. But if not Hurlbut’s anonymous soldier or an Indian sculptor, then who crafted the mysterious features on the Waubansee Stone?

With more source material than Hurlbut had at his disposal, yet with an uncertain date and a possible grisly usage, fragments of evidence can be pieced together using various historians to arrive near the truth. 

An article in the Chicago Tribune dated September 22nd, 1903 clearly illustrates the two opposing viewpoints clashing over the stone’s origin:

“The second school of historians and antiquarians is convinced that the so-called Waubansee Stone dates back hundreds and perhaps even thousands of years before even Father Marquette first visited the site of Chicago in 1673. They see in the tall boulder, with its deeply top, a sacrificial altar on which perhaps the mound builders of prehistoric America offered even human sacrifices, and they are ready to believe that the face carved on one side of the stone is a representation of an ancient idol—one of the far off gods to whom that mythical people poured libations and offered the sacrificial blood of animals. However that may be, there is no question of doubt that in the early days of Fort Dearborn, as far back as we have any record, that identical stone, practically the same as it is today, lay near the stockade of old Fort Dearborn.”

The diffusionist theory of the Waubansee Stone describes it as a sacrificial altar for ancient Celtic and Phoenician traders in the millennium before Christ.

All historians agree that the Mississippian Culture performed animal and human sacrifices high atop their platform mounds, but where this practice originated is unknown. The Aztec or Toltec people from Mexico may have influenced them, or perhaps an earlier seafaring people notorious for infant sacrifices were responsible. It is well known that the Phoenicians (and their Celtic allies) travelled across the ocean to “the Farthest Land” known as Antilla. The precise location of Antilla was a closely guarded secret because it contained the most valuable commodity to the Bronze Age people—copper. 

Michigan’s Upper Peninsula is the richest natural deposit of pure copper in the world. It may seem a long way to go for metal, but in the Bronze Age, copper was more prized than gold or silver since it was the primary alloy used in weapon and tool production. With profit as a clear motive for their journey, it makes sense that the Phoenicians would travel very far to export copper. It also makes sense that the Phoenicians would spread their religious practices with their voyages. An integral element of the Phoenician religion was infant sacrifice to appease pagan gods and win favour for whatever activity was at hand. At the height of Phoenician power—lasting a thousand years from 1,200 BCE until the Second Punic War—babies were taken to an outdoor sacred site, called a Tophet, where a young child was placed in a carved depression on an altar and had its’ throat slit. 

Both the Celts and Phoenicians were known to sacrifice infant children of their enemies or barter with their trading partners to acquire a baby for this heinous ritual. In the case of the Waubansee Stone, the sacrificial blood would flow through the sculpture into the Chicago River as an offering to the water gods, thus ensuring a safe passage. The stone’s hideous purpose is evident in the closed eyes, an unusual style elsewhere, but recurring in surviving Phoenician art used for infant sacrifices. Moreover, the face depicts a chin beard, a personal grooming style of male Phoenicians. 

The mouth of the Chicago River was a necessary transition stop before entering the narrow river network leading into the Mississippi and then down to the Gulf of Mexico. Ships would need to be reconfigured from open water safety to narrow river defense. Oars and shields would replace conspicuous sails. After arriving at the mouth of the Chicago River, the ancient explorers may have settled for a brief time, sailed onward, been killed off, or possibly assimilated with the native population. There was likely a small Tophet temple at this strategic crossroad of lake and river, which thousands of years later would grow up to be the third-largest city in the United States.

Compiled by Neil Gale, Ph.D.

[1] Waubonsie, {Wah-bahn-see} a Potawatomi Chief.

Waubonsie (1760-1848) was a leader of the Potawatomi Native American people. His name has been spelled in a variety of ways, including Waubansee, Wah-bahn-se, Waubonsee, Waabaanizii in the contemporary Ojibwe language, and Wabanzi in the contemporary Potawatomi language (meaning “He Causes Paleness” in both languages)

Waubansee was a chief who supported the British in the War of 1812. In 1814 he signed the Treaty of Greenville by which Potawatomi allegiance was transferred to the United States.  In a series of treaties signed by Waubansee, Potawatomi lands around Lake Michigan were sold.  

In 1835 Waubansee visited Washington, D.C., to sign the treaty which sold the last of the tribal lands and to accept land west of the Mississippi River. During this visit, his portrait was painted by Charles Bird King (1785-1862). The Potawatomi Nation moved to Kansas in the 1840s and settled in what is now Waubansee County, just east of Topeka. Waubansee’s portrait illustrates the Native American attraction to military costume. Coats,hats, and swords were often presented as gifts to prominent chiefs. Additionally, Waubansee wears a Presidential Peace Medal and large trade silver earrings.

157-year-old Civil War Shell Discovered Intact in Georgia

A group of archaeologists poking around in the dirt at Kennesaw Mountain National Battlefield in Georgia stumbled upon an intact Civil War bomb, according to the Southeast Archeological Center.

The bomb was deemed still viable, and the Cobb County Police Department Bomb Squad was summoned to the site, just west of Marietta.

“After examination and review, the Civil War-era explosive was moved to the bunker for storage until the bomb squad can counter charge the cannon shell,” the Cobb County Police Department wrote in a Feb. 28 Facebook post.

“This 157-year-old parrot shell was discovered 10 inches below the surface and was used extensively in the Civil War by the Union Army.”

The 2,965-acre Kennesaw Mountain National Battlefield Park preserves the battleground where Union and Confederate forces fought from June 19 through July 2 in 1864.

The fighting was part of the Atlanta Campaign, during which “more than 67,000 soldiers were killed, wounded and captured,” Explore Georgia says. The Southeastern Archaeology Center reports the bomb was found last week as a team did “a metal detecting survey for a new hiking trail.”

“There is an old ‘truism’ in archaeology — the most exciting find is almost always on the last day. And this project was no exception,” the centre wrote on March 3 on Facebook.

“This shell had a percussion fuse that did not ignite when it hit the ground.” Many commenters on social media called for the bomb to be preserved. But the safest approach is a controlled detonation, Cobb County officials wrote.

“The bomb squad stated that they would love nothing more than to preserve this piece of history, however, there is no way to safely render it without counter charging it,” police said.

“They try to use the smallest charge appropriate. This charge is very small and will perforate the case. Unfortunately, even a small amount of live explosives can set the whole shell off.”

Chinese explorers discovered America before Columbus?

History may be rewritten as new evidence suggests ancient Chinese explorers landed on the New World around 2,500 years before Christopher Columbus, contrary to popular belief that the Italian seafarer ‘discovered’ America.

History may be rewritten as new evidence suggests ancient Chinese explorers landed on the New World around 2,500 years before Christopher Columbus, contrary to popular belief that the Italian seafarer ‘discovered’ America.

John Ruskamp, a research doctorate in Education Illinois, claims to have spotted petroglyphs or carvings high above a walking path in Albuquerque’s Petroglyph National Monument in the US state of New Mexico.

The carvings, a series of inscriptions with Asian characters, struck him as unusual.

“After consulting with experts on Native American rock and ancient Chinese writing scripts to corroborate his analysis, I’ve concluded that preserved by the readable message was likely these petroglyphs inscribed by a group of Chinese explorers thousands of years ago,” Ruskamp was quoted as saying by the New York-based Epoch Times.

Spanish daily ABC reported on Friday the carvings could reveal that the Chinese stepped on that region before the sailors who came in known caravels.

Ruskamp’s thesis enabled him to write a book and make good money and now, the author claims to have deciphered inscriptions that corroborate his new theory, it said.

To date, over 82 Ruskamp-identified petroglyphs have matching unique ancient Chinese scripts not only at multiple sites in Albuquerque, but also nearby in Arizona, as well as in Utah, Nevada, California, Oklahoma, and Ontario.

“Collectively, I believe that most of these artefacts were created by an early Chinese exploratory expedition” though it appears that some reproductions were made by native people for their own purposes, he said.

One ancient message, cartouche or carved tablet preserved by three Arizona petroglyphs, translates as: “Set apart (for) 10 years together; declaring (to) return, (the) journey completed, (to the) house of the Sun; (The) journey completed together.”

At the end of this text is an unidentified character that might be the author’s signature, the report said.

Ruskamp said the mixed styles of Chinese scripts found in the petroglyphs indicate that they were made during a transitional period of writing in China, not long after 1046 BC – hundreds of years before Columbus arrived at the New World in 1492.

It is difficult to physically date petroglyphs with absolute certainty, notes Ruskamp.

Yet the syntax and mix of Chinese scripts found at two locations in original correspond to what experts would expect to use explorers from China some 2,500 years ago.

18th-Century Cannons Recovered in Georgia

Archaeologists have hauled up 12 more Revolutionary War-era cannons from the Savannah River, a remarkable find that raises questions about which vessels carried them and precisely how they ended up in the water. The local district of the US Army Corps of Engineers, which is in charge of the deepening of the channel in Savannah’s busy harbour, on Tuesday posted a video and photos about the discoveries.

Last month’s raising of the rusted artefacts brings to 15 the number of cannons, plus fragments of another, found in the past year during preparation for the port expansion project.

“There is no telling what all is down there,” Corps district archaeologist Andrea Farmer told CNN, saying “so much of the river is unknown.”
That’s because the river bottom is strewn with everything from Native American pottery that was pushed downstream, to a small amount of debris from a Civil War ironclad that sank in 1864 and other vessels lost over time in the colonial Georgia city. Archaeologists said they would have expected the cannons to have been found during maintenance dredging.

When the first three cannons were located during dredging last February east of the town’s famous River Street, near Old Fort Jackson, archaeologists and Britain’s Royal Navy offered an intriguing possibility about their source.

They said — based on measurements and appearance — the cannons may be from the HMS Rose, a famed British warship that mixed it up with colonists during the revolution or, as the UK calls it, the War of Independence. Nearly 250 years ago, the British scuttled the ship in the Savannah River to block the channel and prevent French ships from coming to the aid of colonists trying to retake the city.

But they quickly learned that theory does not hold water, so to speak. The HMS Rose, it turns out, was sunk farther up the river and its artillery apparently was removed beforehand. British archives indicate the cannons may have belonged to two or more British troop transports also sunk to block the channel. Farmer says officials believe the cannons are associated with the Revolutionary War. Experts are looking for any distinguishing marks or features that can help verify their provenance, such as a known inventory of what a ship was carrying. The goal is to match the artefacts with a specific vessel or wreck.

So why were British troops in Savannah?

A short refresher course might be in order to answer that question.
The 13 colonies, determined to gain their independence, fought the forces of King George III on land and sea. The British, hoping they would gain support from royalists in the South, took Savannah in 1778, only to find themselves defending it less than a year later. The HMS Rose, with its 20 cannons and 160 sailors, and other vessels were brought in to help fellow Redcoats.

The warship was already famous, having been a “scourge” on the colonists, as the Royal Navy puts it. It quelled smuggling in Rhode Island, prompting the formation of the forerunner of the US Navy. The Rose fought in and patrolled New York waterways and parts of the Eastern Seaboard before it sojourned south. In Savannah, the vessel was sacrificed by the Royal Navy on September 19, 1779, to keep French allies from joining the American siege at that point in the river.

“The French had blockaded the port of Savannah, getting ready to attack,” Stephen James, an archaeologist with Commonwealth Heritage Group, says in the Corps video. “They scuttled these troop transports to keep the French out and basically saved the city early on from being taken over. They plugged the channel to where … the French could not come up and take the city.”

It’s possible that the cannons may have belonged to the HMS Venus or HMS Savannah, which were burned or scuttled as part of the British strategy. The British eventually won the battle and controlled Savannah until almost the war’s end. The cannons appear to date to the mid-1700s — predating the Civil War by about a century — which aligns closely with the HMS Rose’s history. The ones found last February are about 5 feet long. Further study and the removal of sediment on the cannons may provide information on when and where they were manufactured.

“I think it’s fantastic and interesting when artefacts from maritime history come to light,” Cmdr. Jim Morley, serving as the UK’s assistant naval attache in Washington, told CNN last year. “It just gives us an opportunity to look back at our common maritime history and history in general.”

CNN reached out Tuesday to Morley for further comment.

More research and analysis lies ahead

The Army Corps of Engineers utilizes contractors for much of its work, and that is the case with historic artefacts found in the water, such as the cannons found in a deep spot called Five Fathom Hole. Salvage divers assisted Commonwealth Heritage Group in lifting the ordnance from the channel. Divers can work only during high or low tide and when no freighters are passing directly overhead. Conditions are hazardous and the government has discouraged treasure hunters from diving in these waters. A diver enters the water in December 2021. Crews have explored Revolutionary War and Civil War sites.

“The tide turns and it turns like that. You got zero vis (visibility),” diver Richard Steele says in the video. “The current is ripping you, you are holding on for dear life half the time, trying to hike your way through down there. Every time you get in the water, you are racing the clock.”
Crews placed slings beneath the cannons and used inflatable lift bags to free them from the mud. They were moved to a holding area in advance of the January recovery.

It’s possible the cannons come from several ships — whether for combat or ballast.

Farmer said she does not believe they are associated with the CSS Georgia, a Confederate ship that defended the city during the Civil War. It was stationed in the vicinity of Old Fort Jackson and where the 15 cannons were found.

Several cannons were pulled up several years ago when the wreckage of the CSS Georgia was removed by the Corps as part of the harbour deepening. Archaeologists involved in that project are now helping on the current one.

Robert Neyland, head of the underwater archaeology branch at the Naval History and Heritage Command, last year said it’s possible the Civil War ironclad carried older guns and more research was needed. It’s possible some of the cannons were used at Fort Jackson, which was constructed in the early 1800s, or elsewhere and discarded.

“You have to do the detective work to solve the mystery,” Neyland said at the time.

He could not be reached for comment Tuesday, but the NHHC said it received a report on the cannons from the Army Corps of Engineers “and looks forward to reviewing the data.”

Farmer says officials will identify a few of the artillery pieces — which are being kept in protective troughs — for conservation and, ideally, put them on exhibit in Savannah. The Corps, meanwhile, is in the final stages of deepening the harbour from 42 feet to 47 feet to make sure supertankers have ample room to navigate.

Besides the cannons, archaeologists using sonar have found anchors and bar shot, a type of munition designed to destroy ship rigging. They were commonly used during the Revolutionary War. Divers also studied “cribs” — underwater obstructions placed in the river to ward off Union ships during the Civil War. The Army Corps of Engineers’ Savannah office will provide more details to the media next week. An expert will provide an analysis of what has been learned. “They are still actively performing archival research and working with other experts on this, so they will have more information to share,” Farmer said.

The public will have a chance to learn more at 7 p.m. ET on February 17 during a free program at the Savannah History Museum. Face masks are required.

A couple renovating a 115-year-old building discovered two 60-foot-long hidden murals

What started out as a couple’s renovation project to convert a historic building into a bar has turned into an effort to restore decades-old artwork in a small Washington town.

Nick and Lisa Timm purchased the building in Okanogan, located about four hours east of Seattle, at the end of 2021. This past week, they discovered 60-foot murals painted on canvases along its north and south walls.

“We were about 20 minutes from covering up the walls,” Nick told CNN on Wednesday. “I then was like ‘Well, let’s just look at what’s behind all this plaster.’”

As the plaster peeled away, they discovered a giant mural — stretching 60 feet long and 20 feet high — depicting a lake, cabins and trees. One crew member threw out the idea that there could be another canvas on the opposite wall. Lo and behold, there was indeed a matching mural.

They found the murals at around 5 p.m. and had been working since 5 a.m., Nick said. But the team stayed for four more hours to uncover the rest of the artwork.

“It was like a lightning bolt of energy,” Nick said. “We were just hooting and hollering and pulling things down.”

The Timms moved back to Okanogan last year to take care of Nick’s father, who was diagnosed with lung cancer. After he died in September, a family friend told the couple about the chance to purchase the building.

“One of our main goals moving back was to reenergize Okanogan and then this happened,” Nick said.

Dating back to around 1907, the building had served as a movie theatre, a pool hall and even a rooster fighting rink, according to Nick. The couple’s plan was to turn the 3,000-square-foot space into a bar and gathering place for the community, building on Nick’s experience running bars and restaurants in Olympia.

“It’s funny how this worked out,” Nick said. “We were going to make it a historical showcase by bringing in a bunch of historical stuff about the area.”

After the Timms’ big find, the Okanogan County Historical Society was able to dig up a newspaper clipping from 1915 that reveals the original plan for the murals.

A local artist was set to paint the murals for what was the Hub Theatre at that time, according to the clipping, which was provided to CNN by the society.

“The new improvements at the Hub include 120 feet of panoramic landscape scenery in light tans,” the clipping reads.

Now, that panoramic scenery will be cautiously taken down, refurbished and rehung. Nick said some sections of the murals have extensive water damage that they want to get restored as quickly as possible.

It will likely be a pricey process. The couple has started a GoFundMe page to gain support from the community.

The Timms had hoped to open their renovated bar by the end of March, but it may now take until midsummer to finish work on the murals, Nick said.

The mural will be the centrepiece of the establishment, and the plan still is to fill the rest of the space with other historical items. Nick’s family has lived in the area for centuries, so many of the items have been passed down for generations. Other memorabilia have been donated by others in the community.

And Okanogan’s future gathering place already has a name: the Red Light Bar, an ode to the singular red light in town.

The Ant People legend of the Hopi Native Americans and connections to the Anunnaki

The more you look at ancient texts and stories from around the world, you can’t help but see surprising patterns. Some are so glaring that it takes real effort to ignore them, but that’s what many people do. One example is from the Hopi Native American tribe and their beliefs in “Ant People.” The Hopi of the American Southwest is sometimes referred to as “the oldest of people” by other Native American tribes.

Once you learn about the Ant People, you can’t help but compare them to the ancient Sumerian texts of the Anunnaki. Why? Let’s take a simplified look, respecting the truth that only members of the Hope tribe could fully explain.

In ancient cultures, there is a common thread of worshipping extraterrestrial beings from the stars who will one day return. Animals symbolic of these beliefs appear frequently in ancient art.

The Hopi have a reverence for ants, similar to the way the Egyptians Sumerians and other cultures had a special reverence for cows. The cows may have represented our Milky Way galaxy, and in the case of the ants, they described beings from the stars known as the Ant People.

The Hopi words for the Ant People or Ant Friends (Anu Sinom) create a direct link to the stories of the Anunnaki. It could be coincidental, but it is quite striking. The Babylonian sky god was named Anu, which is the Hopi word for ant. The word, Naki translates to “friends.” Thus, Anu-Naki translates to “ant friends” in Hopi. In both languages, they are describing extraterrestrial beings, but the Hopi say these Ant People came from under the ground.

Another strikingly similar word is the Hopi word Sohu, meaning “star,” and the Egyptian word sahu means “stars of Orion.” This constellation is seen repeatedly across the globe. Ancient Astronaut theorists observe Orion and other systems such as the Pleiades appearing over and over in the layout of the pyramids and ancient structures. Another coincidence?

In the Hopi legend, these Ant People were their saviours, taking them underground and teaching them how to survive two extreme cataclysms. Once again, we see stories of a great flood like that described in Sumerian texts and the Bible.

Surviving underground with the Ant People, the Hopi ancestors learned how to grow food with little water and build dwellings in the rocks. They learned about the stars and mathematics and would put those skills to use when they founded a new civilization.

When it was safe to return to the surface, the Ant People instructed the building of incredibly complex habitations such as what is seen today at Chaco Canyon. From above, they might appear like a giant ant mound. The structures included Kivas, a Hopi word for round semi-subterranean ceremonial rooms that were entered by ladders from above.

According to the National Park Service:

“During ceremonies today, the ritual emergence of participants from the kiva into the plaza above represents the original emergence by Puebloan groups from the underworld into the current world.”

Petroglyphs depicting the Ant People appear still appear today, and the Hopi continue to tell the story in dances and rituals.

Below are some intriguing images of Hopi ceremonies taking place inside the kivas.

Ancient Origins elaborates on the legend:

“One of the most intriguing Hopi legends involves the Ant People, who were crucial to the survival of the Hopi—not just once but twice. The so-called “First World” (or world-age) was apparently destroyed by fire—possibly some sort of volcanism, asteroid strike, or coronal mass ejection from the sun. The Second World was destroyed by ice—Ice Age glaciers or a pole shift. During these two global cataclysms, the virtuous members of the Hopi tribe were guided by an odd-shaped cloud during the day and a moving star at night that led them to the sky god named Sotuknang, who finally took them to the Ant People—in Hopi, Anu Sinom . The Ant People then escorted the Hopi into subterranean caves where they found refuge and sustenance.”

Stories that giants and other strange beings have lived deep inside the Earth are seen around the globe. In the Hopi legend, these beings were benevolent and helped the tribe even to their own detriment.

“In this legend, the Ant People are portrayed as generous and industrious, giving the Hopi food when supplies ran short and teaching them the merits of food storage. In fact, another legend says that the reason why the ants have such thin waists today is because they once deprived themselves of provisions in order to feed the Hopi.”

The thin waisted ants with their elongated heads and antennae resemble some of the ancient petroglyphs. Across the globe, an African species of Ant called the Pharaoh Ant to remind some of a tiny version of Pharoah Akhenaten, famous for his strange alien appearance.

The History Channel’s Ancient Aliens series covers this subject in Series 4, episode 9 (See a clip below). In addition to depictions of the Ant, People are wall paintings that show an unmistakable similarity to cuneiform symbols from ancient Sumeria. These symbols are associated with the “WingMakers,” according to the show.

Just as in ancient Egypt, there were matriarchal dynasties, DNA findings from Chaco Canyon show a possible maternal dynasty that ruled for hundreds of years between A.D. 800 and 1250. Scientific American published a story on this in 2017 after researchers examined the remains of 14 people found a burial crypt that ended up at the American Museum of Natural History in New York.

The Chaco Canyon settlement had thousands of Anasazi inhabitants, who believed in protecting Mother Earth. However, the ancient Puebloans mysteriously disappeared, along with any signs of the Ant People. Today researchers believe that climate change drove them away as the growing population couldn’t sustain itself.

The Anasazi integrated with tribes like the Hopi, Zuni, and Rio Grande Pueblo. As the modern world faces extreme challenges from climate change today, the teachings of these tribes are more important than ever. Can we learn to respect the natural world and live in harmony with Mother Earth? Or are we headed for inevitable disasters, like those described in the Hopi legends?

Ancient Astronaut theorists often speculate if extraterrestrial beings could play a part in helping humans overcome impending future disasters. In the case of the Hopi legends, it appears they did just that. Could the Ant People return from deep in the Earth or from their home in the stars in our time of need?