Juan Ponce de Leon is probably best known for discovering what is now known as the U.S. state of Florida, but he’s also associated with a search for the so-called “Fountain of Youth” which would supposedly make one young again if they so much as bathed in or drank from the water.

But as with many things that get mythologized over time, it turns out that Ponce de Leon likely never went in search of any such fountain, according to Ancient Origins.

From Page to Explorer

Juan Ponce de Leon was born in 1460 (though some allege the actual year of his birth was 1474) to a poor family in Valladolid, Spain, and served as a page in the court of Aragon.

When he matured, Ponce de Leon became a solider, fighting in the Spanish military campaigns against the Emirate of Granada. But once the war ended, his services were no longer needed, so he decided to become an overseas explorer, hoping that he might gain fame and fortune as a result.

Ponce de Leon trained to be an explorer by joining the second expedition of Christopher Columbus to the New World in 1493. As a result of his service with Columbus, Ponce de Leon was named the military commander and later governor of the island of Hispaniola, which is now known as the Dominican Republic.

While serving as governor of Hispaniola, Ponce de Leon heard that another island, San Juan Bautista, was loaded with gold, so he obtained permission from the Spanish royal family to go and explore the island. A Spanish settlement was established on San Juan Bautista and once again Ponce de Leon became governor of what later became modern-day Puerto Rico.

The Fountain of Youth?

As an explorer, Ponce de Leon was far from the only consquistador looking to make his name in the New World. And some of his rivals actively tried to bring about his downfall:

“In 1511, two years after he was granted the governorship of Puerto Rico, he was forced to surrender his position as the governor to Diego Columbus, the son of Christopher Columbus. As a form of compensation, the king of Spain offered him the mythical land of Bimini, assuming that Ponce de León was able to finance an expedition, and perhaps more importantly, find it.”

As he searched for the tiny island of Bimini, rumors spread that Ponce de Leon was actually seeking the elusive “Fountain of Youth,” but some historical scholars say that was never the the explorer’s intent:

“Instead, it was court politics that resulted in this connection. After Ponce de León’s death, a Spanish court chronicler by the name of Gonzalo Fernández de Oviedo y Valdés sought to discredit the conquistador. Oviedo was aligned with one of Ponce de León’s rivals, Diego Columbus.”

The court chronicler hated Ponce de Leon, so he slurred him as a fool who was motivated by ego and greed:

“In his Historia general y natural de las Indias, Oviedo relates a tale in which Ponce de León, having been deceived by the natives, goes on a wild goose chase for the ‘Fountain of Youth’, thus depicting him as a fool.”

Florida Instead of Bimini

As he continued to search for Bimini, Ponce de Leon instead found Florida, which got its name from the fact that Ponce de Leon landed there during the Easter season, which in Spanish is known as Pascua Florida.

A year later, Ponce de Leon was given permission to colonize the region of Florida, but during the expedition the explorer was wounded in a thigh by an arrow. That wound later killed him at the age of 61.

But despite meeting his end while attempting to secure his place in history, Ponce de Leon gained a bit of immortality, and to this day is one of the most recognizable names of all the famous Spanish explorers, second only to Columbus himself, who was his mentor in the early days of his career.

Oddly enough, however, Ponce de Leon is now associated with the fictional “Fountain of Youth” which it appears was little more than an attempt to discredit him. Instead, it has given him the sheen of immortality all these centuries later.

Here’s more on the famed explorer:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=2&v=lmRbNQBQ5OA

Featured Image: Madame Tussauds Orlando – Juan Ponce de Leon by Jared via Flickr (CC BY 2.0) with Fountain via Pixabay by Mabel Amber 

YouTube Video Here: https://www.youtube.com/embed/U_REwdeweg4?feature=oembed&enablejsapi=1

It’s one of the most well-known stories from the Bible: Noah and his family were instructed by God to build an ark and load it with two of every animal. Noah did as he was instructed and the great flood came, destroying everything except Noah, his family, and the animals on the ark.

But did the great flood actually happen, or is the story of Noah just a myth?

The recent discovery in the Black Sea of a ancient ship graveyard may finally provide an answer to the mystery of Noah’s Ark, according to a fascinating article from Ancient Origins.

Mapping the Sea Floor

Maritime archaeologist, Zdravka Georgieva, along with a team of scientists from Bulgaria’s Center for Underwater Archaeology, in partnership with Professor Jon Adams from the University of Southampton, mapped the floor of the Black Sea using sonar technology and remotely operated vehicles (ROVs). The researchers happened upon a startling site: A Greek trading ship that turned out to be the oldest of its kind ever discovered.

Science vs. Scripture

At depths such as those the team was exploring, we know some facts with absolute certainty:

“There is so little oxygen that the timbers have hardly decayed and that some of these ancient boats are in such good condition that ‘individual chisel marks’ appear on the planks of the hulls. According to both the BBC and The Sun, further studies might help explain the origins of the biblical flood that was sent by God to wipe out corruption and violence in the story of Noah’s Ark.

Related: Before Noah’s Great Flood: Here Are 3 Flood Stories That Predate The Bible

Marine geologists William Ryan and Walter Pitman published a book in 2000 entitled Noah’s Flood in which they suggested that the real flood which may have inspired the story of the Biblical flood occurred about 20,000 years ago and took place in the Black Sea:

“The Black Sea was a small freshwater lake cut off from the Mediterranean by a land bridge. At the end of the last Ice Age, according to the authors, the Mediterranean began to rise and a seawater deluge ‘200 times stronger than Niagara Falls’ causing the Black Sea to ‘explode’ in size, flooding an area ‘the size of Ireland within months.’”

That theory, while intriguing, has more than its share of critics, many of whom say such a scenario is highly unlikely. But some evidence found on land does support the idea of a Black Sea flood that might have been seen as a sign from God:

“The foundations of ancient buildings were found along the Black Sea’s pre-flood shoreline, 12 miles (19.3 kilometers) off the Turkish Black Sea coast, somewhat adding credence to this idea.”

No Such Flood?

A closer look at the facts, however, and the Black Sea flood/Biblical flood theory falls apart. As a matter of fact, there’s even a very good likelihood that no flood of such proportions ever occurred.

“According to the scientists from Black Sea MAP, they ‘don’t believe’ any such flood happened. Dr. Zdravka Georgieva said very clearly ‘there’s no evidence to support this theory and believes that the seas changed over great periods of time.’”

Perhaps the best scientific proof that a worldwide flood never happened can be found in what are known as “raindrop prints,” which record the rain that has fallen over the Earth’s history because they’re preserved in fossils:

“Which could not possibly have been formed and preserved if the muds (now in shales) containing these prints were deposited under water during Noah’s flood, there are rain drops, trillions of them, each one’s geological story shadowed by a legend in the Bible.”

Noah’s Ark is a good myth that doesn’t stand up to scientific scrutiny, but its larger message may be more important now than it was when it was first written: We are expected to be stewards of the planet and the life that exists upon it. That lesson never gets old.

Here’s more on the Black Sea ship graveyard

Featured Image Via Pixabay

YouTube Video Here: https://www.youtube.com/embed/_egEdG9B2uU?feature=oembed&enablejsapi=1

What would happen if the First Lady of the United States disclosed that she believed she traveled with extraterrestrials to Venus? It would no doubt create quite the international media sensation, right? Well, that’s exactly what happened in the case of Japanese First Lady Miyuki Hatoyama. However, did you hear about it at all?

In 2009, then 62-year-old Miyuki Hatoyama, wife of Japan’s Prime Minister-elect, Yukio Hatoyama, came under scrutiny for what she wrote in a book entitled, entitled “Very Strange Things I’ve Encountered.”

Hatoyama wrote about an experience that happened to her two decades before.

“While my body was asleep, I think my soul rode on a triangular-shaped UFO and went to Venus,” she explains in the tome she published last year.

“It was a very beautiful place, and it was very green,” she wrote.

The retired actress and author of cookbooks also claimed to recognize the actor Tom Cruise from another life.

“I believe he’d get it if I said to him, ‘Long time no see,’ when we meet,” she said in an interview.

When she told her now ex-husband at the time, he told her it was probably just a dream. However, she said that her new husband, Yukio Hatoyama, would no doubt have reacted differently. The divorced singer and dancer met the multi-millionaire while working in a Japanese restaurant in San Francisco. They married in 1975.

“My current husband has a different way of thinking,” she wrote. “He would surely say ‘Oh, that’s great.’”

Stanford University-educated Yukio Hatoyama, also 62 at the time, is the grandson of a former prime minister. According to Reuters, he earned the nickname “the alien” for his prominent eyes.

According to the Independent, the nickname comes from the couple’s unconventional approach:

“Though Mr Hatoyama is a multi-millionaire and the fourth generation of his family to rise to the top of the Japanese political world, his appearance is unconventional by rigid Japanese standards: his hair is unruly and he rejects the navy uniform of the political world in favour of suits of brown and moss green.”

“It is this refusal to bow to convention, as well as his tendency to drop conversation-stopping remarks – like his call, during the election campaign, for a ‘politics full of love’ – that long ago led other Japanese politicians to dismiss him as an uchujin, an alien. Though not, presumably, the one who took Miyuki to Venus.”

One would think that this story about travels to Venus might have been more prominent in world news, but it seems to have barely made a blip on the radar. One reason may be that Japan’s approach to the idea of extraterrestrials is so different from western countries.

From the beginning, ancient stories tell of alien-like beings, including the ancient Dogu, alien-like figurines representing gods from the sky.

Ancient Aliens Season 12, Episode 14 explored this, and the primary religion of Japan called Shintoism. The beliefs connect Japan to a mystical past involving celestial beings called Kami. (see below)

UFOs and the Japanese government

In 2007, the Japanese government stated it “has not confirmed the existence of unidentified flying objects believed to have come from anywhere other than Earth.” Then Japan’s defense minister said there were “no grounds” to deny outright the existence of alien-manned UFOs.

BBC News reported that despite a lack of evidence “Chief Cabinet Secretary Nobutaka Machimura later told reporters he believed they [UFOs] were definitely real.”

However, despite that admission that article noted:

“Japan has not yet planned what to do should aliens arrive here.”

“*A member of the opposition asked the government what its policy was to deal with UFOs.

*He said work should begin urgently to try to confirm whether or not they exist because of what he called “incessant” reports of sightings.

*The Japanese civil service swung into action.

In a statement it said that should a flying saucer be spotted in the country’s airspace, a fighter would be scrambled to attempt visual confirmation.”

Related: An 800-ton monolith from Japan and its similarity to tales of strange otherworldly visitors

By 2015, Defense Minister Gen Nakatani answered a question about UFOs during a budget session. He had a very different answer.

“When the Air Self Defense Force detects indications of an unidentified flying object that could violate our country’s airspace, it scrambles fighter jets if necessary and makes visual observation,” Nakatani responded earnestly.
“They sometimes find birds or flying objects other than aircraft but I don’t know of a case of finding an unidentified flying object believed to have come over from anywhere other than Earth,” he said.

You can see more about this story and other UFO-related stories from Japan in Ancient Aliens Season 12, Episode 14, “Masuda-no-Iwafune.”

More about Miyuki Hatoyama from Al Jazeera English:

YouTube Video Here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kk6hugyNXGg

Featured image: Amaterasu, one of the central kami in the Shinto faith via Wikimedia Commons Public Domain with an image of Miyuki Hatoyama and Yukio Hatoyama via AP