Episode "Beneath the Crust"
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The qanats of the Lut Desert near Bam, Iran, are an ingenious method of accessing groundwater. The action of a nearby fault line has created a clay dam, which the deep desert water can't penetrate. Groundwater has pooled against this dam to create an underground reservoir of water, which has been accessed through the digging of a series of gently sloping tunnels, known locally as qanats.
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Santorini is a small, circular archipelago of volcanic islands located in the southern Aegean Sea. Santorini is essentially what remains of an enormous volcanic explosion, destroying the earliest settlements on what was formerly a single island, and leading to the creation of the current geological caldera. The island is the site of one of the largest volcanic eruptions in recorded history: the Minoan eruption (sometimes called the Thera eruption), which occurred some 3,600 years ago at the height of the Minoan civilization. The eruption left a large caldera surrounded by volcanic ash deposits hundreds of feet deep and may have led indirectly to the collapse of the Minoan civilization on the island of Crete.
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Iain Stewart with an axe head near Timna Mine. The mine lies along active fault lines. Civilizations have formed there because faults trap, divert and move deep groundwater – turning arid deserts into lush oases. 11 out of the 13 ancient civilizations of the Near East were based only 75km from a fault line. The Timna Valley witnessed the world’s first great scientific discovery. It was here that man first smelted rocks to release the mineral metals trapped inside.
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The eruption of Santorini's volcano, Thera, 3,500 years ago was the largest volcanic eruption of the last ten thousand years. The eruption virtually destroyed Santorini - the Minoan civilization's main trading hub - and the resulting tsunami caused significant turmoil on their main home, the island of Crete, 70 miles to the south.
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Iain Stewart at the Timna Mine. The mine lies along active fault lines. Civilizations have formed there because faults trap, divert and move deep groundwater, turning arid deserts into lush oases. 11 out of the 13 ancient civilizations of the Near East were based only 75km from a fault line.
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Timna Mine lies along active fault lines. Civilizations have formed there because faults trap, divert and move deep groundwater, turning arid deserts into lush oases. 11 out of the 13 ancient civilizations of the Near East were based only 75km from a fault line. The Timna Valley witnessed the world's first great scientific discovery. It was here that man first smelted rocks to release the mineral metals trapped inside.
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Iain Stewart at the Timna Mine. The mine lies along active fault lines. Civilizations have formed there because faults trap, divert and move deep groundwater, turning arid deserts into lush oases. 11 out of the 13 ancient civilizations of the Near East were based only 75km from a fault line.
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The Negev Desert, Israel is home to the Timna Mine. The mine lies along active fault lines. Civilizations have formed there because faults trap, divert and move deep groundwater, turning arid deserts into lush oases. 11 out of the 13 ancient civilizations of the Near East were based only 75km from a fault line. The Timna Valley witnessed the world's first great scientific discovery. It was here that man first smelted rocks to release the mineral metals trapped inside.
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In the Bronze age, tin was collected all along the coast of Cornwall, on the south west coast of the British Isles, before being sent to the Mediterranean. The centers of Bronze Age civilization were in the Mediterranean (two thousand miles away). Crete, home of the Minoans, was perfectly positioned for the trading of metals such as tin, and along with Santorini became a major trading hub.
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Iain Stewart in the Naica crystal cave, which was formed by mineral rich fluids rising from deep inside the Earth, to create a cavern of gypsum crystals. The giant crystals found in the Cave of the Crystal Giants at Naica are softer than a human fingernail. The largest crystal found at Naica is 500,000 years old.
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Iain Stewart descending 50 meters down a tiny shaft with a cable attached to a tractor, strung over a scaffold tripod. Below, he sees why people live near active fault lines, for water. Faults trap, divert and move deep groundwater, turning arid deserts into lush oases. And it was this ready supply of life quenching water that persuaded 11 of the 13 most powerful civilizations of the ancient world to build their cities along the edges of a plate boundary.
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The Hawaiian islands are the exposed peaks of a great undersea mountain range known as the Hawaiian-Emperor seamount chain, formed by volcanic activity over a hotspot in the Earth's mantle.
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The Dead Sea Fault. 11 out of the 13 ancient civilizations of the Near East were based only 75km from a fault line.
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Iain Stewart at an entrance of the Timna Mine. The mine lies along active fault lines. Civilizations have formed there because faults trap, divert and move deep groundwater, turning arid deserts into lush oases. 11 out of the 13 ancient civilizations of the Near East were based only 75km from a fault line.
