All language subtitles for Swallowed by the Sea Ancient Egypts Greatest Lost City BBC 720p HDTV EN Sub

Beneath the Mediterranean,

forgotten for millennia,

an entire city lies buried.

A snapshot frozen in time.

Heracleion,

a major city, a great port,

and one of the most significant in
all of Egypt.

Yet, this real-life Atlantis

seems to have disappeared in an
instant...

..leaving few clues that it ever
existed.

Now it's finally revealing
its secrets.

Incredible artefacts...

perfectly preserved beneath the sea

are at last allowing us to tell the
extraordinary story

of this mighty city.

This is... So beautiful.
..a masterpiece. It is indeed.

Spectacular finds open a unique
window

into the time of the Pharaohs
and reveal this lost city

as one of the most important in
Egyptian history.

2,500 years ago, the Ancient
Egyptian city of Heracleion

stood here on the mouth of the River
Nile.

Now it lies submerged off Egypt's
Mediterranean coastline.

I'm leaving modern Egypt behind
and travelling 6km offshore

to where the ancient shoreline
used to be.

It's remarkable to think that
this sea was once land

and that all around me was once a
legendary port.

This is the place that Helen of Troy
and her lover, Paris,

visited before the Trojan War.

It's where the god Heracles first
set foot in Egypt.

But for centuries the city lay
forgotten,

thought to be nothing more than a
myth.

Until it was rediscovered 13 years
ago

by French underwater archaeologist
Franck Goddio.

THEY CONVERSE IN FRENCH

On the bottom of the sea bed, Franck
discovered a city wall...

..and behind it the remains of a
vast Ancient Egyptian temple...

..with ornate stone columns.

We have here one of the columns of
the temple.

It's made from limestone

and it's absolutely huge!

But the temple was just the
beginning.

Lying beneath the sea are walls,

stone structures, ancient
inscriptions.

Bronzes, ceremonial vessels, gold,
jewels and coins.

And the largest collection of
ancient shipwrecks ever discovered.

The city of Heracleion was no myth.

As an archaeologist, I've worked all
over the world,

but I've never had the opportunity
to have access

to such a fascinating site as
Heracleion.

Only now is the excavation

unravelling the mystery of this
remarkable place.

An entire city, temples, houses,

public buildings untouched for
millennia.

It's a unique window into Ancient
Egypt

at a crucial time in its history.

We rarely get the opportunity to
study a site

that extended for such a long period
of time.

Heracleion existed for over 1,000
years,

it was occupied from the
late-Pharaonic period, the end of
the great pharaohs,

through to the arrival of Alexander,
the Hellenistic period.

And I'm interested to know what the
role of this port city was

and the role it played in the lives
of the people of Egypt.

Franck and his team

are painstakingly mapping and
surveying the whole site.

Heracleion was built on islands

and fractured with waterways and
harbours.

How big you think it was overall?
Overall, we have a city of 1.8km
by 1.2km.

Oh, OK. It's a huge city.

So Heracleion must've been a
significant city,

but what made this city so
important?

A clue may lie in the number of
temples discovered here.

We have evidence of a huge ancient
temple here.

We have also a small temple here,

which is a temple to Khonsou Tut.

We have another temple, a sanctuary
I would say,

a sanctuary to Osiris here.

That's incredible! So where is this
modern boat situated in this space?

We are just anchored here, sitting
on top of the Temple of Amun.

With so many temples, Heracleion
was clearly a place

of religious importance.

And sitting in a narrow waterway,

the team have uncovered something
unique.

Do you want me to hold it while you
do a check? Thank you.

Damien Robinson from Oxford
University

is part of the excavation team.

And the compass being a critical
bit of kit,

visibility not been fantastic.

Sacred artefacts have been found
throughout this narrow stretch.

And alongside, something
even more precious.

OK, so I'm going to
go for a bit of a wander.

RESPIRATOR NOISE

Lying on the sea bed, still
perfectly preserved,

is an exquisite vessel.

Long and sleek, it is carefully
crafted.

It's made of sycamore, a
high-quality wood,

and surrounded by ritual objects.

We could say that the ship sank

somewhere in the late-4th century
BC.

So this is giving us a nice snapshot

of the things that are happening in
Heracleion at this time.

The shape of the boat and the
quality of the wood

suggest that this is something
startling, a sacred barge.

There are images of these ceremonial
vessels throughout Egypt,

but to find the real boat is
incredibly rare.

This is the only ritual barge from
this period ever to be uncovered.

It's a spectacular find.

Ancient writings describe an
important Egyptian ceremony

celebrating the resurrection
of the god Osiris.

Now seen for the first time,

this could be one of the very
barges that led that procession.

And the fact that we've found a
ship in an archaeological context

gives us much more understanding
of what the vessel looked like and
how it was built.

But, importantly, it's also the
artefacts that are associated with
this boat.

And all around the vessel, you find
individual groups of ritual
offerings.

And these are things that have been
given by individuals,

people like you and me, who care
about their religion

and who are offering up goods to
the gods.

And for me that's what's really
incredibly fascinating about this
ship.

They've been excavating in the
area around it

and this is one of the places

where ritual deposits are placed
within...the water.

Here we can see one of my colleagues
excavating.

He's carefully cutting into the clay

to gently remove the different
layers of clay

to reveal the artefacts beneath.

So, as we can see, the excavation of
what looks to me

like one of those small
offering-type plates.

The simple bowl reveals one
individual's act of worship

made on this very spot over 2,000
years ago.

Offerings would perhaps have been
put on the bowl

and then slid gently into the water.

It's craftily made, carved out of
stone.

So this is an example of everyday
ritual,

a thing that the people of
Heracleion would have done,

but it's really a beautiful piece.

Other finds brought up from the deep

show what kinds of offerings these
individuals would have made.

Now in this spot there's a lot of
bones. Oh, you've got...a tooth.

A burnt tooth by the looks of it.

Do you think these are burnt? Or it
could be that it's taken...

because when it's in this deeper
level, in the anaerobic level,
the soil becomes quite dark.

OK. I'm sure that's what you're
experiencing when you're excavating,

so sometimes they get discoloured by
the context. So...

But that looks burnt.

Food may have been burnt,
sacrificed,

then slipped into the waters of the
sacred River Nile

on offering plates like this one.

Look at that. It's absolutely being
grown over. Indeed.

Now, this is on a clay layer

with...these bone-like elements
closely nearby.

Yeah.

And alongside the humble offerings,
preserved for millennia,

are objects of extraordinary wealth.

Rich and poor alike offering their
gifts to the gods.

'The finds in this remarkable city

'are giving us a unique insight into
Egyptian religious practice.'

So it's over here? Yes.

'And here at the excavations
laboratory in Alexandria

'are further clues to the importance
of Heracleion

'in Egypt's sacred life.'

Ladles. Bronzes ladles with...

the end in the form of a duck. Yes.

An extraordinary number of these
ladles, 70 in all,

have been found lying on the sea bed
close to the temple.

In Heracleion, we found more of
those ladles

than all ladles that were found
in Egypt.

In all sites of Egypt.

It's overwhelming. It is.
OK, thank you.

These are important ritual
implements

used by the priest to purify
offerings,

ladling water from the sacred River
Nile.

And the finds include an astonishing
array of rarely seen votive objects

given as a prayer to the gods.

Those are lead models of the barge
of Osiris.

I've never actually seen votive
boats, but I've seen images of them.

Images. And here we have them. Yeah.

And you can see this barge here.
Oh, yes! You see the papyrus.

It represents a barge made of
papyrus. You can see the striations.

And there was a throne here, there
was a steering house here.

So you can steer. And here this
part. So, sorry,

you're saying that they're
deliberately destroying them?

Absolutely, to make offerings to
the gods.

These boats were beautifully
crafted,

but they, just like the animal
bones, were sacrificed.

Who was making the offerings? Who
was depositing these objects?

Obviously, the big objects were
offerings from the priest. Right.

The inhabitants of the city, they
were making small offerings.

Votive objects are the physical
embodiments of prayers...

Miniature ways.

..their form representing the
content of the prayer or the person
who made it.

A small votive anchor. An anchor!
A nice one.

This ancient anchor could be the
prayer of a sailor.

A small elephant, to the god.

And this beautiful elephant
the offering of a soldier.

Yes, Ptolemies had a big reliance
upon elephants for their warfare.

So strange. Yes.

As well as the humble objects left
by workers,

sailors and now soldiers,

there are incredibly fine pieces

fashioned at great cost by expert
craftsmen.

And here, one of the most
extraordinary pieces

of the entire collection.

One of the masterpiece of
Heracleion.

Oh! It's a pharaoh. Stunning!

With the blue crown, which was the
crown of the pharaoh fighting.

Yes. Defending Egypt.

Look at the detail!

This exquisite figure is over 2,500
years old

and the supreme quality suggests

it could only have come from one
person, the pharaoh himself.

A masterpiece... It is indeed.
..of statuary, of Egyptian statuary.

So many of these objects are just of
the top quality.

Such an object of that quality

would only be a gift from pharaoh to
the temple.

Absolutely stunning!

Do you have favourite objects? Are
we allowed favourite objects?

Is this...? I don't think we're
allowed favourite projects,

but I have to say that this is
one of my favourite objects.

An exquisite piece. Hmm.

These spectacular finds reveal
Heracleion

as an important sacred centre.

But that's not all it was.

Could Heracleion have been
significant

for more than just its temples?

So what's this large stone at the
end here?

It looks like it's... This is a
marble stone.

Among the religious finds at the lab

is one that hints at another very
different role.

You can see an inscription on it.
Oh, yes.

It's a beautiful Greek inscription.

And it's a text about a young man of
18 years

who died in...at the war.

And was buried in Heracleion.

The tombstone reads, "Here lies
Lucos, son of Luciscos,

"he lived in the city of Pryim, the
land of his father.

"He trembles not in the face of the
phalanx,

"but under the blows of the enemy,
he found death on the battlefield."

So this was found in an Egyptian
city

right next to a pharaonic temple

and yet it's the tombstone to a
Greek soldier.

Heracleion sat at the mouth of the
River Nile,

making it a vital entry point into
Egypt

and a place of huge strategic
importance.

During the period of Heracleion's
life, Egypt was invaded by Persia,

conquered by Alexander the Great

and suffered various internal
power struggles.

But the most revealing finds are not
weapons or spears,

but something much smaller.

Hey there. Hi, Marie. So what have
you been working on today?

These are finds that have just
come up? Yes, they are almost fresh
from the water.

Marie Mon, the site's chief
conservator,

is working on one of the hundreds
of Greek coins discovered here.

Which is actually a Greek...

Is that a whole coin or is it...?

It's a little damaged. Yes, exactly.
Can you see here? Yes, you can.

Big eyes of the owl. Yeah, big
eyes.

Yeah. And all of the...feathers.

And this is not just any Greek coin,
but one from Athens.

It's harder to see, but you've got
the head of Athena with her hair.

'At this time, Egypt didn't have its
own currency,

'trade and taxes were simply taken
in goods.'

Head. And here you've got some Greek
letters. Yes, exactly.

'So these coins were used to pay
Greeks coming in from Athens.

'Soldiers brought into Heracleion
to defend Egypt.'

So this kind of currency was
probably made in Egypt

to pay for Greek mercenaries.

I love the idea of these things
being minted

specifically for paying the
mercenaries.

It reinforces the idea that there's
a military presence here

and there are people who are being
paid specifically to protect the
site.

'Our Lucos could have been one of
these soldiers.

'And the money that paid him

'may well have been made here in
Heracleion itself.'

There seems to be coins everywhere.

Marie was showing me one
that potentially was made here.

Oh, yes, we have two type of coins.

One we are sure has been minted here
and the other one we suspect.

The one we are sure of is because we
found

a lead weight with a negative
imprint of that coin,

showing that they were minting it...
On the spot. ..on the spot.

This stamp could have been used

to mint the mercenaries pieces of
silver...

..creating hard currency accepted
all over the Ancient World.

Heracleion did not merely sit on
this vital gateway into Egypt,

but helped defend it.

The excavations here are bringing
this forgotten city to life.

Heracleion was an important,
bustling place,

thronged with soldiers, sailors and
religious devotees,

but this spectacular site still
has more to reveal.

The other thing that's really
amazing about Heracleion

is it has not one, two, three...but
64 shipwrecks!

This is an incredible number of
shipwrecks to find in one site,

particularly at such an early
period.

In the Mediterranean, you have a
huge number of sites

from the Roman period, but never so
many from the earlier period and
never so many in one site.

So this gives us the possibility to
explore different types of ships,

boats that were carrying cargoes,

those that were lightering goods
from the larger ships to the shore.

The vessels that were carrying
trade goods upriver, up the Nile
into the delta.

And at the same time, the different
construction of the vessels

gives us an insight into
the technology and technology is
obviously an insight into people,

into maritime communities and into
the life of the city of Heracleion.

Among the boats wrecked over
hundreds of years

is one that is particularly
significant.

This is the very front of our ship.

This boat is much, much larger than
the ceremonial barge we saw earlier,

a massive 28m in length.

The planks themselves

are made out of a very local wood.

This is called acacia, it's a
perfect shipbuilding material.

Herodotus described a type of river
boat called a baris on his visit
to Egypt

and we think this is more or less
what we've got here.

These craft have never been seen
before.

Perfectly designed for this region
of the Nile,

baris were working boats, cargo
boats.

It is a very substantially built
ship. Yes, indeed.

But in terms of what it could be
used for,

it's perfectly adapted
for the environment.

So it's got a flat bottom,
and it's probably a cargo boat.

I mean, that's sort of...
Or people? It's wide and long.

Do you think it could've carried...

Presumably, when you've got this
landscape of islands and channels

you need some way of moving
around...

You do, absolutely.

..between the temple and your
workshop, or whatever it is.

There's a fabulous Rameside papyrus

that talks about a temple fleet,

and the fleet sail around the delta

and they pick up tithes

from various properties that
the temple owns.

Collecting the taxes.
They do.

So I think this could well be
involved

in either trans-shipping goods
from the port to down the river...

This boat reveals another
face of Heracleion -

a working port with fleets of cargo
boats.

And below the surface,

there is evidence that the trade
wasn't simply local.

There are a multitude of anchors
littered across the site.

This is from a seagoing vessel -

at the top is a rope hole

and, at the bottom, holes for wooden
spikes that would grip

into the sea bed.

Then there are the objects
from Persia and Phoenicia,

cargoes from Cyprus.

It seems Heracleion was no small
local port,

but an international one.

And then something spectacular...

A stone covered in hieroglyphs.

This pristine black granite stele

stands over two metres high

and it is full of information.

'A stele is a carved public decree

'and this one was found buried in
the heart of the city.'

And the name of our city.

Heracleion. Heracleion.

This beautiful block is older
than the Rosetta Stone...

..and has survived for over 2,000
years, completely intact.

It was commissioned
by the pharaoh Nectanebo I,

and you see him here

presenting gifts to the goddess
Neith...

and, on the right-hand side,

the date of its commission -

the first year of the reign
of Nectanebo,

which is essentially 380BC.

'It looks like a religious monument,

'but it has another purpose -
taxation.'

Here you see the amount of tax
that was being levied -

10% -

on materials such as gold

and silver

and timber and worked wood.

So Heracleion was a major port,

charged with collecting
customs duties on imports.

All coming in from the sea
of the Greeks -

imports from the Mediterranean.

Towards the end of the stele

we have a specific reference
to the port of Heracleion,

located, as it was, at the mouth

of the sea

of the Greeks - again referencing
the Mediterranean.

These are the symbols
for the foreign boats

arriving into the port.

And here we have the section
of the stele

that references the port
of Heracleion -

Ta Hone of Sais.

Thonis, the Egyptian term
for Heracleion.

'But there is something else
incredible about this stele.'

The stele that was found at
Heracleion was not the only one.

There was a second stele

that was found 100 years earlier

at the site of Naukratis.

Naukratis was the great Egyptian
centre of trade,

where are all goods from Greece

and the Mediterranean passed
through.

It's one of the most important
sites in Egypt.

The identical steles tell us
something remarkable -

the forgotten Heracleion
was the sister port -

the equal -
of this renowned centre of trade.

Essentially, Heracleion and
Naukratis,

this great Greek emporium, worked
in conjunction with each other,

feeding the goods of trade
through to the capital at Sais.

Our city, the gateway
for international trade into Egypt,

was more than a legendary port,

it was a vital one.

Submerged and forgotten
for millennia,

Heracleion is revealed as a wealthy
city of scale,

with religious, strategic
and commercial importance.

And then Franck found something
breathtaking.

Right beside the temple,
lying on the sea bed,

Franck found the head
of a colossal statue.

And not just one -

head,

torso,

legs -

three great statues were assembled.

One, Hapi,
the god of the Nile floods.

The others, huge stone images
of the pharaoh and his queen,

each over five metres tall.

They were commissioned
by the pharaoh himself,

carved inland and then transported

at vast expense to Heracleion's
temple.

But there's something very unusual
and significant

about the way this pharaoh
is depicted.

Very curiously, he was
represented as leaving the temple.

Oh, that's interesting.

Having in his right fist...
er, what we call the "mekes"...

This was an object that contained
the inventory of everything

existing on the land and in the sky,

given to the pharaoh by the gods,

it conferred on them
the divine right to rule.

And that inventory he just received
from the supreme god,

of the Egyptian Amun,

and by receiving this,

he was becoming the master
of the universe.

So it's really this connection
between the religious power base,

reinforcing his power, which
then he's taking back

to his capital
or back to the rest of...

He was the ruler of the universe,
as a matter of fact.

He was the master of it.

And another find suggests that
the pharaohs received

that right to rule
right here at Heracleion.

Less dramatic than the statues,
but more significant,

is this stone box.

This is the "Naus",

the sacred centre of the temple
which housed the god.

Inscribed on this holy stone

is the description of specific
dynastic rights -

rights that each pharaoh had to
perform

to legitimise his power.

The pharaoh had to come into
that temple

to receive from the supreme god
Amun the title of their power.

And when they were coming in
Heracleion,

we have written evidence

that there was a special palace
to receive them.

So Heracleion was not just
an important Egyptian city,

it was the very city where new
pharaohs came to receive

the receive the divine to rule,

and legitimise their kingship.

To understand just how important
that was,

we need to travel to the place

where these rights first came
to prominence.

Over 800km south of Heracleion

is the site of the mighty ancient
temple of Karnak.

This was the centre of power for
the kings of Egypt

before the power base
shifted north to the delta.

The most incredible thing is
just the scale of it.

Yeah, and you feel that the moment
you start walking in.

It's just overwhelming.

Karnak was a precursor to
Heracleion,

playing the same role in empowering
kings,

gifting their right to rule
from the god Amun.

Elizabeth Frood has been working
here for over eight years.

Of course, Amun was the significant
deity in Heracleion,

so can you just tell me a bit
about the role he played here?

Sure, he was a prominent early god,

but he only really becomes
linked to kingship,

and the site of Karnak,

at the beginning of the new kingdom
again.

And he is constantly and
consistently bound up

with ideas of kingship,

and what it is to be king
and how to renew royal power.

All around us on the columns here,

are figures of Amun with the king.

This is Amun on the left.

What's most characteristic,

and what communicates his identity
most clearly, is the crown.

It has the double-plumed crown.

All the scenes showing human figures
show the king before Amun,

offering to him,

performing rituals before him...

So anyone who entered an Egyptian
temple

would have been bombarded
with images of kingship.

He gains his legitimacy

through that intimate, ritualised
relationship with the gods.

Just like in Heracleion,

we see that an Egyptian temple
wasn't simply a sacred space,

it was a place that communicated
and legitimised

the power of the state.

What I want to know is who would be
looking at these inscriptions,

who were the people meant to be
awed by the power of the king?

Liz has an ingenious way
to find out -

graffiti.

I mean, I think of graffiti as,
you know,

when you scratch your name
randomly on something.

Is that the sort of graffiti
we're talking about?

We definitely have some of that.

We've lots of scratches
and scribbles of scribes

and other members of the temple
staff

scrawling their names and title
on the walls of the temple.

And they also draw little pictures,
as well.

Let's have a look at them.
Let's have a quick nosy in here.

This is amazing, isn't it?
Yeah.

And this is another member of
the temple staff.

His name Nebuneb
is inscribed here.

And he is an overseer of...bakers,

or...something to do with baking -

the title is quite difficult
to read.

Over 3,000 years ago,

an Egyptian worker sat here

and scrawled this picture.

Here we have a picture of Amun,
a form of Amun,

Oh, wow, yes...
You can see the plumes.

You tend to think about these sorts
of workers

as being quite invisible.
Yes, exactly.

Yeah, yeah, but through graffiti
they become visible to us.

We will never know
why someone carved this here,

but he knew.

And it gives you that feeling
of a connection

with one individual in the past,

which is really hard to get
sometimes.

Absolutely.

This graffiti is giving me a real
sense of the ordinary people

who spend their days in and around
this temple.

And the range of jobs they did is
encapsulated in this one grand
inscription.

Here we have an inscription of
the high priest of Amun,

whose name is Roma, or Rui.

And in this text he addresses

some of the people that were working
over here.

He's promising them a new building,

and he talks about greeting
the brewers and the bakers

and the confectioners

that were all busy in this area
producing offerings for the temple.

And these were the people and the
priests, the scribes,

the bakers and confectioners

who the pharaoh was speaking to

when he declared his relationship

with Amun and his right to rule
Egypt.

So what we're seeing here
at Karnak

really makes that connection

between ritual, religion
and royalty.

And it makes me reflect on how
much that continuity

can be mapped out in Heracleion.

800km and 1,000 years apart,

and yet so much is still the same.

Amun is still the deity that needs
to bestow royal power,

and Heracleion's colossi declare
that power,

just as the iconography does here
in Karnak.

For Egypt's final pharaohs it was
not this mighty temple

that played the pivotal role,

but Heracleion's.

And that made Heracleion one of the
most important cities in all Egypt.

What we've discovered about this
once forgotten city is astounding.

It was a huge city,

a sacred centre

and the gatepost of Egypt

where soldiers, ships and trade
flowed,

and even pharaohs gained
their power.

The reality of the city is far more
amazing than the myth.

Why then did it disappear
without being missed?

How did this great place come
to be forgotten?

Our discoveries so far have given us
a clear understanding

of the role of Heracleion.

However, what we still don't
understand

is what happened to Heracleion.

Why and how did it disappear?

And these are the bits of the puzzle
that we have still got to

fit together.

There are several theories -

was it destroyed in an earthquake
or a tsunami,

covered by a massive Nile flood...

..or just abandoned
as it sank slowly into the sea.

Heracleion was a city of low-lying
islands and channels,

at the mouth of this great river,

and as such was subject
to flooding.

Before the early 1900s,

when my great-great-grandfather
helped build the Aswan Dam,

the river would regularly inundate
the land,

turning roads into rivers
and villages into islands.

The Nile was the great
bringer of life,

flooding the land with fresh water
and fertile silts.

But it could also be incredibly
destructive.

'I've come here to
Rhoda Island in Cairo

'to understand when the Nile was
at its most dangerous.'

It was really important
that the Egyptians understood

the position of the Nile
over its annual cycle,

and here we can see an example of

what was essentially
a measuring gauge.

It was called a Nilometer.

It gave the Egyptians
an understanding of

the point, the level of the Nile
over the course of the year.

It was so important to understand
the position of the Nile

that over time,
these Nilometers were improved,

they were made more sophisticated.

So, this was most definitely in
at the sophisticated end of

the Nilometer market.

Here you can see one of the three
openings for the Nile rivers

to enter, and for the majority
of the year, this area

would have been submerged,
so I'd be underwater, effectively.

This huge column is
essentially the Nilometer,

and each of the different stages
is marked off in cubits,

giving an indication of the
rising level of the Nile

as it extended over the
course of the year.

'Priests would know exactly what
height would lead to prosperity,

'to fertile fields
and large harvests...

'..and what would lead to
flooding and famine.'

As you work your way up the column,

you go up to various
critical stages.

'Here, 12 cubits would mean hunger.

'14 cubits, happiness.

'But 16 cubits would mean abundance,
rejoicing, festivities.

'Climb even higher, though,
and the rejoicing would stop.'

If the flood levels rose above
the 16 cubit mark,

then we were looking towards
devastation across the country.

'Priests didn't just measure
the changing level of the Nile,

'they recorded it, and many of
these records still exist.'

The data that I'm looking at here is
a detailed record of the Nile floods

from around 600 AD that was recorded
here at the Rhoda Island Nilometer.

And here we can see particularly
high episodes of flooding,

sort of mega-floods, as you were.

'These mega-floods happened in the
7th and 8th centuries AD,

'but we know that these
did not destroy Heracleion,

'because by the time
these monster floods hit,

'Heracleion wasn't even
located on the Nile anymore.'

As the Nile River crosses the Delta
towards the Mediterranean Sea,

it splits into a number of
smaller branches.

In ancient times there were
seven branches,

the westernmost of which
was called the Canopic Branch,

and at the silty mouth of
the Canopic Branch,

the ancient site of
Heracleion was located.

'I've come to meet geologist
Clement Flaux,

'an expert in this region and on
the Canopic Branch in particular,

'to find out how Heracleion's
river disappeared.'

Clement, we're here on the
Rosetta Branch, erm,

which, I guess, would have been
pretty similar to

how the Canopic Branch was
in antiquity?

Yes, it does. This is where we are,
just south of Rosetta. Uh-huh.

And this is where was the
Canopic Branch here.

OK. The Canopic Branch was in the
low lying deltaic

sedimentary context, with this
kind of, er, humid vegetation,

which lie in the waters.

'Over time, silts deposited by
the Nile built up,

'clogging the channel

'and reducing the Canopic Branch
to a muddy stream.'

Do we have a sort of,
a date at which we are fairly sure

that the Canopic Branch was defunct?

We have to distinguish
between the mouth,

which was the first to be silted up,
probably mainly because of

the Alexandria Canal,
which, south of the mouth,

it diverts waters which used to
reach the mouth. Ah-ha, OK.

So the flow decline at the mouth.

Yeah. Oh, so you think this is

as much to do with the
sort of human action

as it was to do with the natural
silting of the Canopic Branch? Yeah.

Do we have any idea exactly

when the Canopic Branch was
completely silted? Not exactly.

Because it was a really very gradual,
er, process, so we know that

around the 5-6th century AD
the mouth does not exist anymore.

So the mouth seems to have
disappeared at this time,

5-6th century AD.

'That was 200 years before
the recorded mega-floods.

'When they happened, Heracleion was
largely cut off from the river.'

It's clear from what Clement says
that the idea of a big Nile flood

is not the primary reason why
Heracleion vanished.

The timing just doesn't add up.

Essentially, by the time of
the mega-floods,

the mouth of the Canopic Branch
had already silted up.

'We've discovered that
the Nile floods

'are not what made Heracleion sink.

'But the movement of the river did,
in a very different way,

'play a part in the demise of
this great city.'

'Its strategic and commercial roles
were intimately bound up

'with its port.

'Once the mouth of the Canopic
Branch silted, its port was defunct.

'But even before this process was
complete, Heracleion's commercial

'power base was being usurped by the
great new port of Alexandria...

'..founded by Alexander The Great
in 331 BC.'

Alexander built his harbour here

because there was a solid limestone
ridge that ran along this coastline.

That created a solid
platform for the harbour.

'As Alexandria's port grew,

'Heracleion's diminished.

'So even before the city
slid beneath the waves,

'much of its importance and power

'was taken over by
Egypt's new capital.

'That might account for why
there's no record of it sinking.

'But it doesn't explain how

'Heracleion vanished
beneath the waves.

'If flood waters
didn't drown Heracleion,

'maybe some other natural
catastrophe was to blame.

'Franck has carried out a
geophysical survey of the site

'and uncovered
something remarkable -

'a ship graveyard.'

So you've got...

..the main harbour of the
city of Heracleion.

In the middle of the harbour,

there are six, seven,
eight shipwrecks,

which makes you think,
"Well, why are they here?

"How did they get here?

"Are they a product of
a simultaneous event

"or did this happen
over a period of time?"

If it was a simultaneous event

then that equates to something
fairly catastrophic.

'At first glance
this looks like a tsunami.

'But Damien has uncovered something
rather unusual about these wrecks.'

'And here is our excavation.

'What we can see here,
this long, quite thick stake,

'it seems to be going directly down
into the planking in this direction.

'One of our hypotheses at the moment
is this is essentially a stake

'that has been used to try
and pin the ship into position.

'This ship wasn't wrecked by
a natural event

'but deliberately scuttled
and carefully positioned.'

'This section is
particularly interesting

'because what we can see here is
the covering of stones which was

'put over the top of the wreck
in order to secure it to the floor

'and make sure that it stayed down.

'Lots of the ships in this
graveyard also had these stakes

'around them as well, and this is
how all of the ships are

'placed exactly where
the Egyptians wanted them.'

'This is truly unusual.

'If boats are abandoned,
they are generally just left,

'not deliberately placed
and fixed into position.

'It would appear that
the residents of Heracleion

'were creating some sort of
structure.'

I've been standing waiting patiently
for you here since you left.

Staking boats on the bottom of a
harbour is not normal practice,

and I guess you have to think
about why they were doing that.

That's one of the mysteries that
we're trying to think about.

You know, obviously,
you don't sink a ship...

No, it's not really, no.
..in the middle of a harbour.

Or you don't sink seven or eight
ships in the middle of the harbour.

I know already that there's elements
of silting that's happening,

particularly in the
northern part of the site.

Do you think it's something
connected with that?

I think it could be. If the northern
entrance has been silted up, er,

then you're looking at something
like artificial creation of land.

We know that the northern part of
the site seems to be, erm,

seems to be sinking slightly, so they
might be creating a little island.

These boats could be an example
of ancient land reclamation.

I really like the evidence
that Damien's just presented to me -

this idea that the ships
were deliberately sunk

on the base of the main harbour
of Heracleion.

And I guess it's not so unusual
in the ancient world,

but it's particularly uncommon
in such an early period.

And Damien suspects the reason
they needed to create more land

was because, at the time
these ships were scuttled,

parts of the site were subsiding.

Heracleion was sinking.

Elsewhere on the site,
another ship adds to the mystery.

So, Franck, I didn't realise
that you had one vessel

that you're saying
was catastrophically wrecked.

This is Shipwreck 61,
south of the temple.

And...she was moored,
most probably close to the temple,

and on that shipwreck, we can see
a limestone block from the temple,

and even columns from the temple,

just...tumbled on it.

Columns from the temple have fallen
and crushed the boat.

Some of the ceramics
that we are finding on the temple,

which is perfectly dateable and in
pristine condition, even intact.

We are finding the same layers

under...at the bottom
of that shipwreck.

Ceramics trapped and crushed in
the wreckage can be precisely dated.

That's just great,
as archaeologists -

when you get something
like that happening,

it's just the ticket with the date,
isn't it? It is.

It's that specific point in time.

It's a kind of... Snapshot.
..image - snapshot - of an event

which has lasted a few seconds.

Meaning we could be looking
at a scene

from Heracleion's very
moment of collapse.

The ceramics
and the other dating evidence

is pointing to what sort of time
for this event?

We are at the very end
of the 2nd century BC,

beginning of 1st century BC. Right.

The fact that the temple wall
fell on top of this ship

that was moored alongside the temple

means that it happened
in a single event

and in amongst the temple debris,
on top of the ship,

we find pottery remains
that give us an exact time

as to when the temple fell.

In the 2nd century BC,

the building central
to Heracleion's remaining power

catastrophically collapsed.

But at this time,

no major earthquakes or tsunamis
are recorded.

So what did destroy Heracleion?

The combination of subsidence
and a sudden collapse

gives a vital clue.

Franck has worked with geologists
to investigate the land

directly beneath the city.

Fire it up. All set.

Taking core samples, they have found
that 2,000 years ago,

the earth here was a mixture
of soft silts, sands and clays,

deposited during the annual floods.

To understand exactly
what these results mean,

I've gone to meet sedimentologist
Professor Jeff Peakall.

Hi. Hi. Beautiful landscape.

Oh, yes, absolutely fantastic.
Definitely.

Being at the mouth of the estuary,

it's quite an interesting
comparison, in many ways,

to the mouth of the Canopic branch
upon which Heracleion was built.

So I'm interested in learning a bit
more about this deltaic environment.

Yes. I mean, deltaic environments
are the most active -

most peculiar, in many ways -
environments that we have.

They literally build to
a tipping point. Yeah.

At which point,
sediment fails and it moves off.

Also, they're very liable

just to erosion
and, obviously, to subsidence.

Deltas are far from static,
stable environments

and it's not just the rivers
and water channels

but the land itself.

This, sort of, dynamic tipping
point, as you describe it -

I mean, is it something
that happens instantly?

What are the triggers for this
and how quickly can this happen?

It certainly would be
an almost instantaneous effect.

Sediment can just fail
under its own weight

but it's much more likely to be
pushed by some large event,

so either a large river flood,
or a tsunami,

or you can have an earthquake
in here.

This can cause you to just move
beyond that tipping point.

When the land fails,
it can subside or erode.

But there is also another,
stranger process -

a process that may well have
occurred at Heracleion.

I know that the team have taken

a series of geological
cores in the region.

I know that you've had
a look at these.

Can you see anything specifically
in that that maybe helps give us

a clue as to what happened,
particularly at the site?

Yes - I mean, they're very strange
to look at,

because normally,
when you look at cores,

particularly modern ones, you expect
to see a series of nice, flat,

horizontal layers through them

and that's because sediments
are always deposited

almost horizontally... Yes.
..in the natural world.

But in the middle of these,
you see some that are completely bent

and deformed within those

and this gives us a big clue,

because this is a sign
of liquefaction,

where you change a solid
into a liquid.

At some point, the land below
Heracleion didn't simply sink -

it liquefied.

This is a simple but nonetheless
very effective demonstration

of liquefaction -

it's just a tank that we've filled
with sand and with water

and, at the moment,
is a nice, stable environment.

But, as we've heard, deltas
are inherently unstable environments.

And in order to demonstrate this,

I've brought a little temple
for you...

Really?
..to place on top.

LAUGHING: That's great.
Thanks so much.

So, here we are,
temple in Heracleion,

based on solid ground,
or what seemingly, at this point,

is solid ground.

Well, we could have a number
of triggers that could transform

this solid into a liquid,
but for our purposes here,

we're going to simulate
a small earthquake,

using this.

All I'm going to do is actually
tap this very gently

on the side of the tank.

Yeah.
And we'll begin to see some changes.

Ah! You can already see that you're
getting a very dramatic change.

You can see the water
coming up to the surface

and you can see that our temple
is beginning to move. Amazing!

And what's happening here
is that our sand is, er...

is compacting and, as a consequence,
it squeezes out water

and it locally turns into a liquid

and, as you can see, our temple base
has sunk straight into this. Yeah.

'These soft muds and sands
need only a minor force

'to trigger them to sink
and spurt out liquid.'

It's quite interesting
how just a small vibration,

a small movement, can actually make
quite a dramatic impact.

Yes, that's it.

I mean, once you've got liquefaction,
then you'll see that temples

and columns will start to tilt
and tip and potentially collapse,

but also you could get
larger-scale movement.

If you've got solid -

you could have solid on top
of a layer that liquefies,

you've have solid on top of a liquid

and that can just literally
slide off and slump,

so whole parts of a city,
potentially, can sort of move

considerable distances during
the time that this is a liquid.

'Buildings erected on unstable,
muddy soils can collapse

'as if their foundations
had been built on quicksand.'

So the demonstration that Geoff
has just shown me

of the process of liquefaction
is a really visual insight

into how this fairly vulnerable
landscape,

at the mouth
of the Canopic branch,

upon which Heracleion was built,
could have changed so dramatically.

The same thing that occurred at
Heracleion in the Second Century BC

occurred in New Zealand in 2011.

Land liquefaction
devastated a modern city.

So imagine the impact in ancient
times on towering temples -

structures with no foundations.

It didn't have to be
a major tsunami,

it didn't have to be
a huge earthquake -

it didn't necessarily have to be
recorded by the ancient historians,

it could have been a minor event

but the impact of that event
was devastating.

Heracleion sank, to be lost
and forgotten for over 2,000 years.

In the end, the silts of the Nile,
the so-called Bringer Of Life,

were too unreliable
to build a city on.

No matter how great
its power became,

Heracleion's reign
could only ever be temporary.

Ironically, the silts of the Nile
that destroyed Heracleion

are also the thing that have
allowed its perfect preservation.

And, as a result, we are able to
rebuild this city, piece by piece.

A city of temples.

A military garrison keeping
the state safe from invasion.

A vast port,
linking Egypt to the world.

And a royal city, vital for
the continuation of pharaonic power.

Heracleion, sleeping and forgotten
for thousands of years,

is now revealed - one of the most
important cities in Egypt.