Where was Noah's ark. Noah's ark - truth or fiction - facts and hypotheses

According to the Old Testament, Noah's ark wandered for 40 days and nights in the rain that flooded the whole world, and when the water subsided, it landed on Mount Ararat. Thus began the rebirth of mankind.

One of the main mysteries of mankind - the biblical legend of Noah's ark - remains unsolved today.

According to the Old Testament, God told Noah to make an ark out of gopher wood. The ship wandered for 40 days and nights in the rain that flooded the whole world. When the water subsided, it stuck to Mount Ararat near the border of modern Armenia and Turkey. So from the 27th day of the second month of 601 from the creation of the world (April 2, 2369 BC), the revival of mankind began.

On the top of the mountain

For over 4,000 years, the biblical story of the first forced migrant has been haunting people's minds. As far back as the beginning of the 19th century, the inhabitants of the Armenian village of Bayazet told about the case of a shepherd who one spring saw a huge wooden ship in the mountains. The Turkish expedition of 1833 to Ararat confirmed the shepherd's story: its report speaks of a wooden prow of the ship protruding from the silt.

In September 1878, the summit of Ararat was conquered alone by the Englishman James Bryce, who made the first ascent without spending the night in 24 hours. At an altitude of 4 thousand meters, between blocks of solidified lava, he discovered a wooden beam, which reminded him of a fragment of a man-made structure. During the First World War, in August 1916, Russian aviator Vladimir Roskovitsky reported that he saw a blue spot from an airplane - a lake, and on its edge - the skeleton of a large ship, a quarter frozen in ice.

According to other sources, the ark was seen at the same time by two more Russian military pilots - Lieutenants Zabolotsky and Lesin. Making a reconnaissance flight over a mountain range, they recorded a strange object in the lake at an altitude of 4.3 thousand meters, resembling a multi-story raft. Their report was delivered to Tsar Nicholas II, who ordered two special military teams to be sent to survey the mountain.

That same summer, both groups climbed Ararat and found a structure resembling Noah's Ark. The structure was carefully examined, measured, and even wood samples were taken. The material for the manufacture of the vessel turned out to be oleander. Native to the Mediterranean, this evergreen tree is durable and rot-resistant, and has been coated with a compound similar to modern lacquer. An excellent "preservative" for the ark is also ice, in which the ship is 11 months a year. Inside, the soldiers found rooms and measured them from largest to smallest.

After reviewing the report, Nicholas II intended to organize another expedition to launch the ship, but then a shot from the Aurora rang out.

There is evidence that the ark was seen by Soviet pilots during the Second World War. One of them fled to America, where he presented the filmed object to the special services. He may have been the first person to photograph Noah's Ark. At the same time, the American pilot Ed Davis discovered the ship on Ararat.

Inspired by these reports, the American historian Aaron Smith, who over the years has collected the history of Noah's Ark from 80,000 works in 72 languages of the world, decided to try his luck on Ararat himself. In 1951, he spent 12 days on top of the mountain with 40 satellites, but the search was unsuccessful. "Although we did not find any traces of Noah's ark, my faith in the biblical description of the flood became even stronger," he later said.

Yerevan researcher Ashot Levonyan discovered the message of the French soldier Fernand Navarre. According to Navarra, on June 6, 1955, he found a processed wooden beam in a crevice on the slope of Ararat. An independent examination at 16 universities around the world showed that this is a kind of oak, and the age of the beam is about 5 thousand years. However, this was not proof that the fragment found was directly related to the ark. By the way, another similar fragment is exhibited in the Museum of the Mother See of Holy Etchmiadzin (the spiritual center of the Armenian Apostolic Church) and is presented as a fragment of Noah's ark.

CIA classified photos

Light on the mystery could be shed by the US CIA classified images of the slope of Mount Ararat, which, perhaps, shot the legendary Noah's Ark. These photographs were taken back in the 1970s from an American U-2 spy plane that carried out reconnaissance flights over Turkish territory and near the borders of the Soviet Union. The repeatedly recorded strange object on the snowy slope of the mountain received the CIA code name "Ararat anomaly".

Law professor at the University of Richmond (USA) Porter Taylor is convinced that the photographs taken by American spy planes confirm the Old Testament legend of the Flood. According to the scientist, since the late 1950s, the US intelligence agency has been hiding information about a strange object on Ararat for a number of reasons. By disclosing these data, Taylor believes, the CIA would seriously endanger the largest operation of the Cold War period - reconnaissance flights of spy planes over the territory of the USSR. Meanwhile, according to the scientist, photographs stored in secret dossiers in the archives of the CIA and DIA (military intelligence) give an almost complete picture of Noah's Ark - 152 meters long, 25 meters high and 15.2 wide. These data coincide with the information given in the Bible.

Back in December 1997, the US agency promised to make public the secret photographs of the "Ararat anomaly", but they never kept their word.

Modern expeditions

Levonyan was among the members of an international expedition that intended to search for the ark on Ararat in August 2000. It was attended by 27 people from six countries: USA, Canada, Italy, Norway, Russia and Armenia. In Turkey, citizens of that country were supposed to join the group.

The conquerors of Ararat were already among the participants of the expedition. Hamlet Nersesyan from Los Angeles climbed to the top of the mountain in 1986. A chemist from Milan, Angelo Palego, has visited Ararat 15 times since 1985, solely to search for the ark. Once he was joined by the famous climber Reinhold Messner, who single-handedly conquered all 14 eight-thousanders of the planet.

Palego told Levonyan about his findings. In July 1989, at an altitude of 4.3 thousand meters, he came across two deep cracks running parallel to one another and forming an even rectangle measuring 100 by 26 meters. It was not immediately possible to get close to the structure from the glacier. “We have to go down there on a rope for 200 meters,” Palego said, “and since the glacier has melted a lot this year, we will definitely find it this time.”

"And here we are standing at the foot of Ararat. The dazzling white glacier on its top is within easy reach ... But the Turkish authorities at the very last moment, when we were already standing on the mountainside, forbade us to climb without explaining the reasons. We are forced to return to Armenia", Levonian said.

Finally, on August 4, 2009, eight citizens of Armenia received official permission to climb to the top of the biblical Ararat. “At the age of 50, after 33 years of dreaming, seeing Ararat almost every day from Yerevan, I was on top of this legendary mountain,” Levonyan recalls.

Two years later, he raised six Muscovites to the top of Ararat. But bad weather and a blizzard prevented them from admiring the view from the top of one of the most famous mountains in the world. Over dinner at a motel near the Bayazet fortress, when an Armenian explorer asked the leader of the American expedition, Professor Richard, who had been searching for the ark for many years, if they had found anything, he smiled and replied: "No, nothing."

Is there an ark?

The mystery of the ark still remains unsolved. Perhaps the French archaeologist André Parrot was right when, in his book The Flood and Noah's Ark, published in 1953, he wrote with irony: attracts people who do not quite clearly understand the border between the legendary and the real."

So does Noah's Ark exist or not? Believers do not need proof, skeptics will not be convinced by a thousand proofs.

Hamlet Matevosyan

Over the mystery of the wooden skeleton of the ship, lying high on the mountainside, humanity has been struggling for more than one millennium. The first evidence of the discovery of Noah's Ark appeared long before the birth of Christ. In the era of Christianity, the historian Josephus Flavius wrote about this in his work Antiquities of the Jews. In 1840, a Turkish expedition discovered a wooden frame protruding from a glacier on Mount Ararat.
. Despite the difficulties, the researchers approached it and saw a giant vessel, the dimensions of which coincided with those indicated in the biblical text - 300 cubits in length, 50 in width and 30 in height, i.e. 150 by 25 by 15 meters.
The ship is brown.
In 1893, the archdeacon of the Nestorian church Nurri, after climbing Ararat, stated that he had seen Noah's Ark. According to him, the ship is made of thick boards of dark brown color. Having measured the ship, Nurri came to the conclusion that its dimensions are fully consistent with those indicated in the Bible. Returning to America, he organized a society to raise funds for the expedition, after which the ark, as a biblical shrine, was to be delivered to Chicago. But the Turkish government did not give permission to take the ship out of the country.
In 1916, a group of Russian aviators were based at a temporary airfield about 25 miles northwest of Mount Ararat. On one of the usual August days, aircraft number seven, specially converted for high-altitude tests, was taken into the air, which were instructed to be carried out by Captain Vladimir Roskovitsky and his partner. During the flight around the summit, they saw the giant outlines of the ship. Even one of the doors was visible. The size of the ship was simply amazing: from a city block! Nakhodka was reported to the base, but in response, the aviators heard a loud and prolonged laugh. Then there was a second flight, after which the information was sent to the government in St. Petersburg. Tsar Nicholas II, being a pious man, equipped two detachments of soldiers with orders to climb the mountain. Fifty men attacked one slope, and a group of a hundred climbed the other. It took two weeks of hard work to cross the gorge at the base of the mountain, and about a month passed before the soldiers reached the ark and saw it. They made detailed measurements, drawings, and took many photographs. The report stated that the whole structure was covered with a mass that looked like wax or resin, and the tree from which it was made belongs to the cypress family. All materials were sent to Russia, but the February revolution had already broken out there, and they disappeared into its maelstrom without a trace. Some of the officers who participated in the expedition left the country after 1917. Several people successfully settled in the United States, and Roskovitsky himself became a preacher in the states.
Kurds living in this area claim that in 1948, during an earthquake, the ship was literally squeezed out of the ground. At that moment, a bright light illuminated the surroundings, and the body of the ark was divided into two parts by a piece of rock. Now the structure allegedly rises above the ground by about 2 meters. In the summer of 1953, American businessman George Green took 6 clear photographs from a helicopter of a large ship, half gone into the ice. After 9 years, he died, and all the original pictures were gone.
On July 6, 1955, mountaineer Fernand Navarra and his fifteen-year-old son Gabriel climbed Mount Ararat, found Noah's ark and informed the world about this discovery. Some time later, photographs appeared in the press, in which the outlines of the ship were clearly distinguishable.
Attempts to climb Mount Ararat were made until 1974, but were unsuccessful. Then Turkey declared the area closed, referring to the presence of observation posts over the border line there.
Two-ark?
Two of the participants of one expedition (more precisely, Vadim Chernobrov, coordinator of the onioo "Kosmopoisk" and an employee of the television company "unknown planet"; approx. M.T.) got to the top and actually photographed what from a height seemed like a petrified skeleton of a huge ship. But today, except for Chernobrova, no one can say for sure what it is.
Many scientists argue that it is necessary to build an absolutely exact route of the Russian expedition of 1916 bit by bit, since only a photograph remains of it, which is a true documentary evidence of the existence of Noah's ark.
But then what about all the other pictures, which depict something that looks like a huge ship?
It was possible to understand what it is only recently with the help of an expert on ancient languages, Willy Melnikov. After looking at many photographs, he said that according to the biblical description, Noah's ark looked like a submarine, and this ship is the spitting image of an ocean yacht. Then Melnikov said that in one of the libraries in Europe he came across a text by an unknown author, dating from about the 3rd century BC. Willy himself called this text "Two-Air". It talked about the fact that Noah, while drifting along the abyss of water, once saw a large ship, the size of which coincided with his ark. He hoped that someone else managed to escape, but when he stepped aboard this ship, he did not find a single soul there. According to Melnikov, this is the same "Second Ark". His - then, in all likelihood, and managed to photograph last year.
In the event that this assumption is correct, then it changes the whole modern idea of the flood! After all, the Bible does not say anything about two arks.
Although it is possible that this discovery only supplements the Old Testament, since its text contains an abridged version of the flood stories borrowed from the ancient Sumerians, whose clay tablets shed much more light on this story. On some of them you can read that before the flood, a fairly advanced civilization lived on earth, which had a fleet. Her ships traveled between Africa and Mesopotamia. They were very large. In the Old Testament, by the way, there is a mention that, along with ordinary people, giants lived on the planet at that time. It was they who "Began to Enter to the Daughters of Men." When this "Civilization of the Giants" began to threaten young humanity, a universal flood was sent to the earth. Noah, as you know, was almost the only righteous man, and he was destined to be saved. By the way, the name Noah, or Noah, translates approximately as "I leave Hope, for she can swim."
Piece of upholstery.
There is a legend that Noah's Ark cannot be seen or touched. He will only appear to people before the end of the world. The legend itself is connected with the climbing of the mountain by the monk Yakob, who tried to climb Ararat for several days in a row. But every time I woke up in the morning, I found myself in the same place where I started my journey. Once in a dream, an angel appeared to him and handed over a piece of the ship's hull. He said that the ark would be opened to people only when God himself wished it. All this could be called fiction, if only. Not a piece of trim! He remained with the monk, and now the relic is kept in the city of Etchmiadzin in Armenia. By the way, in 1766, the Catholicos of All Armenians Simeon of Yerevan gave a piece of it as a gift to Catherine II, thereby expressing gratitude to the Russian Empress for her concern for the Armenian people.
Archeology is not among the exact sciences, and the object lying in the Ararat mountains did not appear to our eyes in its entirety with a sign on which it would be written: "This is Noah's Ark." If the boat-shaped object is not Noah's ship, then it is even more of a mystery. The report of the Turkish authorities about the presence of powerful brown beams on Ararat, which made up something like the skeleton of a giant ship, first appeared in print in 1883. Later, one American newspaper wrote that local residents are well aware of the wreckage, but are afraid to approach them, as they once saw a terrible ghost looking out of a window on board. This message can be treated in different ways; let's just say that one of the emigrating officers who participated in the 1916 ascent, in an interview he gave in New York, said: "It was very cold and scary there. The soldiers earnestly crossed themselves and fervently prayed when they saw the ark and realized that it's like that." In that case, if you believe him, the expedition found out that the interior of the ship was divided into compartments, and on the plank floor there were traces of rust from iron bars - possibly from cages with animals.

According to the Koran, the Ark landed on Al-Jadda Mountain, according to the Book of Genesis - to the Ararat Mountains. Al-Jaddah can be translated as "high place", that is, there is no exact indication of the place of arrival of the Ark in the Koran.
The Bible says: “And the ark rested in the seventh month, on the seventeenth day of the month, on the mountains of Ararat” (Genesis 8:4).
In the Bible Encyclopedia of Brockhaus and Efron, in the article “Ararat”, however, it is written that there is nothing to indicate that Noah’s ark landed on the modern Mount Ararat and it is indicated that “Ararat is the name of the area in the north of Assyria (2 Kings 19:37; Isaiah 37:38), suppose. we are talking about Urartu, mentioned in cuneiform texts - an ancient country near the lake. Wang.
Modern researchers are also inclined to the version that Urartu is meant in the Bible. The Soviet orientalist Ilya Shifmann wrote that the vocalization "Ararat" was first attested in the Septuagint, a translation of the Old Testament into Greek of the 3rd-2nd centuries BC. In the Qumran scrolls, the spelling "wrrt" is found, suggesting the vocalization "Urarat". Shifman is the compiler of the scientific translation of the Pentateuch, in which the above quote from the Book of Genesis sounds like "And the ark stopped in the seventh month, on the seventeenth day of the month, near the mountains of Urartu."

Noah's Ark was built in the USA, photo from Kentucky
Noah's Ark was searched for on Ararat repeatedly. One of the fathers of the Armenian Apostolic Church, Hakob Mtsbnetsi, made attempts to climb Ararat back in the 4th century, but each time he fell asleep along the way and woke up at the foot of the mountain. According to legend, after another attempt, an angel appeared to Hakob and said to stop searching for the ark, in return for which he promised to bring a fragment of the relic. A piece of Noah's Ark is still in the Etchmiadzin Cathedral.
In the following centuries, the search for Noah's Ark continued, every now and then sensational materials appeared in the media that the Ark had been found, but none has yet found scientific confirmation.

Noah's Ark on Mount Ararat coordinates.

The water increased on the earth for a hundred and fifty days, after which it began to subside. “And the ark rested in the seventh month, on the seventeenth day of the month, on the mountains of Ararat. The water continued to decrease until the tenth month; on the first day of the tenth month, the tops of the mountains appeared. (Gen. 8:4,5)

Coordinates: 39°26"26"N 44°14"5"E

Video of Noah's Ark. What kind of object is located on Mount Ararat.

Torah - The Holy Book of the Jews - the Pentateuch of Moses (Greek πεντάτευχος) (Hebrew name - Tora - law). In addition, the Old Testament is also considered the sacred book of the Jews.

The above-mentioned segment - in Surah Al-Baqarah in the 41st verse, the Prophet of Islam urges not to hide those signs that exist in the Bible and in the Holy Quran and which coincide.
After reading the Holy Quran, I came across such signs and wanted to draw your attention to one of them, and I will turn to the rest in the course of time.
Now I will turn to the next sura, which speaks of Noah's Ark, which we have long known from the Old Testament. In the Armenian translation of the Koran I read (translated from Persian by Eduard Hakhverdyan), the ark is presented in the form, but in the Russian and English translations I have not come across a cubic ark. No translated sample of the Holy Quran can properly represent the very essence of the material, for in this book the translation of existing sublime thoughts while maintaining literary eloquent styles is certainly impossible. Therefore, I will make an additional comment about the appearance of the ark, which will complement the series of signs I have found, and those who do not agree with this translation may simply skip the first sign.

The first sign.
What sign contains a cubic ark?

We will consider the following properties related to the faces of a cube. The areas of all the faces of a cube are both equal and similar.

Let's move on to our topic ... We have already calculated the area of \u200b\u200bNoah's Ark
(see dimensions of Noah's ark). The area will be equal to the product of length and latitude - 133.5 meters of length * 22.25 meters of latitude = 2970.37 square meters, and the area of the Republic of Armenia is 29743 sq. km. : If we compare the area of Noah's Ark known to us - 2970.37 m2 and the known area of the Republic of Armenia - 29743 sq. km, we will see that there is a similarity between the first three figures.
That is, in the Holy Quran, the cubic ark is a sign of "similar" areas, in this case, "similar" figures of areas, which are the first three digits of the current area of the Republic of Armenia and the first three digits of the area of Noah's Ark, if you pay attention, they consist of the same the same numbers: 2, 3 and 7.

Second option.
If we assume that the ark in the Koran does not look like a cube, which I encountered in many foreign translations, then we can immediately say that in the Bible we have signs that establish a connection between Noah's ark and the Republic of Armenia, see here: (The Ark of Salvation - this is Armenia), therefore, if the signs of the Holy Quran are consonant with the signs of Our book - the Bible, then the Quran confirms that the ark of salvation is Armenia.

Sign three

Or we can say that the ark is located between the mountains, and to find out which mountains we are talking about, consider the sign that is consonant with the sign in the following lines of the Holy Book:

We draw attention to the fact that we are not talking about Mount Ararat, but about, as indicated in the original samples of the Holy Book. Under the Ararat mountains, the peoples of ancient times understood the entire Armenian Highlands and never Mount Ararat.
Here are two pictures of volcanic waves that became the mountains of the Ararat mountain range or the Armenian Highlands from the territory of the present Republic of Armenia in 29743 sq. km.

Did Noah's Ark Exist? Construction time

If you turn to the original source - the Bible - there will be many questions regarding the date of construction of the magnificent ship. There is no clear mention in the text of the main book of Christians as to when Noah began the building work. But from Genesis 6, we can understand that the Lord commanded Noah to build an ark when the latter was 500 years old.

There are 2 versions of Noah's birth:

according to the Masoretic texts, this is 1056 from the Creation of the world;
in the Translation of the Seventy Interpreters (an alternative name is the Septuagint), 1663 is indicated from the moment the world was created.

Based on the fact that Noah was 600 years old at the time the construction of the floating facility was completed, and also taking into account the difference between the old Russian chronology and the modern one of 5508 years, we can distinguish 2 possible dates for the completion of work:

1156 from the Creation of the world, or 4352 BC;
1763 from the Creation of the world, or 3745 BC.

Accordingly, 5763-6370 years have passed since the creation of Noah's Ark.

In 2017, NAMI researchers found parts of an ancient ship at an altitude of 4,000 meters above sea level on the Ararat mountain range. According to scientists, the probability that this ship is the so-called Noah's Ark is about 99.9%, which coincides with the "biblical tradition". But so far, no one has been able to accurately confirm or refute these loud statements. In any case, the fragments found, covered with a significant layer of volcanic rocks, are of great historical value, as they contain characteristic elements, stairs, pieces of solid petrified wood. Judging by the age of the found fragments, it is about 4800 years old. This is exactly what carbon analysis showed.

The outlines of lava flows resembling a ship, 30 km south of Ararat.

The news of the sensational discovery of scientists spread around the world - the legendary Noah's Ark was found on Mount Ararat.
This time, Chinese archaeologists were lucky - they found a wooden building, divided inside into several rooms. Hydrocarbon analysis of the discovered fragments established their age - 4800 years. This corresponds to the time of the Flood described in the Bible. However, scientists around the world are in no hurry to believe the report of a sensational discovery.

An expedition consisting of Chinese and Turkish explorers climbed Ararat in October last year. But only now scientists have announced their discovery. They are sure that the found wooden buildings are an ark built in the Old Testament times. They suggest that it was in it that Noah and his family, along with living creatures, were saved from the flood.

The exact location of the discovery of Noah's Ark has not yet been disclosed, and it is impossible to visit it without special permission: this part of Ararat is located in a prohibited zone for tourists. The Turkish newspaper Hurriyet, citing the administration of the province of Agra, in whose territory the mountain is located, did not refute the report about the discovery of the remains of Noah's Ark, but did not indicate its coordinates. Photographs taken by Chinese scientists have been published to prove the existence of the legendary ship.

Doubts
However, the director of the Center for Jewish Studies at the Freedom Institute in Lynchburg (USA), Dr. Randal Price, who explored Mount Ararat in 2008, suggests that the wreckage of the ark is fake. He stated that the remains of the tree found by the Chinese were fake. Price said that a group of Kurdish guides, trying to fool scientists, placed large wooden beams on Ararat two years ago, taken from a very old building near the Black Sea. The Chinese group arrived on the mountain later than the forgery, and, finding wooden beams, concluded that they belonged to the biblical ark.

The scandal is gaining momentum - the opinions of scientists are divided. Skeptics believe that the very story of the ark on Ararat is just a beautiful legend. But even they admit - since there is geological confirmation of the reality of the Flood, the ship on which Noah's family escaped existed, but it could moor to another mountain.

Search
The Babylonian historian Berossus was the first to mention the ship on Ararat in 275 BC. At the end of the 15th century, the famous traveler Marco Polo wrote that "the fragments of the ark are still visible on the top of Ararat." The search began. In 1916, Russian military pilot Lieutenant Vladimir Roskovitsky, flying over Mount Ararat, saw the skeleton of a wooden ship and suggested that it was Noah's Ark. He sketched what he saw and wrote a report. A year later, Emperor Nicholas II sent an expedition of 150 people led by Roskovitsky to Ararat. But after the revolution, his report disappeared.
Russian researchers from the Kosmopoisk association followed the route of the first Russian expedition in 2004, even entering the restricted area. And they did not find the ark - what seemed like a ship on aerial photographs turned out to be streaks of volcanic lava.

There is no Noah's Ark on the southern, eastern and northern slopes of Mount Noah's Ark," Vadim Chernobrov, head of the Kosmopoisk public association, told Life. - Please note that the Chinese researchers did not report the location of the find, which is already alarming. It is reported that the expedition was carried out in autumn. Since September, snow storms begin on Ararat, climbing to the top is then physically impossible. Scientists are attracted by the western slope of Ararat, but it is impossible to penetrate there - military bases are located there. However, we still managed to visit the western slope. We followed in the footsteps of the first Russian expedition in 1916, having spoken to the families of the explorers before that. They even found old pre-revolutionary canned food. Imagine what our disappointment was - instead of Noah's Ark, we found volcanic deposits there, surprisingly similar to the outlines of a ship. The myth that the pilot Roskovitsky found the ark there was debunked. I thought for a long time why, after the expedition of 1916, not a single photograph, not a single document remained, testifying to the existence of the ark. After all, if the ark was found, then it would become a symbol of salvation, raised the spirit of the soldiers in the First World War. And the reason for the lack of documents is that the researchers, just like us, instead of Noah's Ark, saw volcanic deposits. Later, in Moscow, an analysis of the samples taken was carried out - all the formations are not a tree, but a stone. However, resin of natural origin was found there. And scientists were surprised how she could be there! So the Turks, with their latest message about the discovery of the ark, simply stir up the interest of foreigners in their state.

For believers, Noah is “a righteous man and blameless in his generations”, one who, according to the testimony of the Bible, “walks with God”, who “found grace in the eyes of the Lord”, and who died nine hundred and fifty years old.

For science, Noah is just an object of study. And if this “object” lived, it was, perhaps, not a bearded old man crowned with gray hair, but a shaven-headed merchant far from holiness.

This disease can affect anyone. Even a doctor. After all, nothing foreshadowed trouble when, in the middle of the last century, the unremarkable and unknown American anesthesiologist Ron Wyatt suddenly “infected” with it. It is he who owns the most popular hypothesis about the existence of Noah's Ark. She was born after the 1957 issue of Life magazine fell into Ron's hands with published photographs of the surroundings of the Tendyurek stratovolcano in the mountains of Ararat (recall, it was in the Ararat mountains, according to the Bible, that Noah moored with his ark). It was in this area that the captain of the Turkish army, Ilham Durupinar, took his famous pictures from an airplane, which depict incomprehensible formations resembling the remains of an ark.

The muse of distant wanderings, as you know, attracts a person. She wrested Father Fyodor from a quiet district monastery, and forced the anesthesiologist Ron Wyatt to look for the ark in the mountains of Ararat. And tireless Ron found him. Rather, only the place photographed by the Turkish pilot. Surrounding the boat-like footprint were what appeared to be clay walls, which Wyatt declared to be the woody remains of the ark. After him, all the hunters for the ark repeated the same thing, immediately joining the ranks of the faithful "Wyattists".

However, geologists have their own opinion on this matter.

“As a geologist, I don’t understand their belief that this is a tree,” says geology professor Larry Collins. - The chaotic pattern of the presented samples of this “wood” has nothing to do with the structure of a petrified tree. In addition, petrified wood is very hard, as the wood cells are replaced over time by silicate molecules commonly known as quartz. Quartz, like diamond, is incredibly hard. The sample given to me does not possess this quality.

One of the creationists, underwater finds expert David Fesseld, who, at Wyatt's insistence, provided the sample to geologist Larry Collins, after the conclusion of the latter even stopped writing his book about the ark, admitting that Wyatt's conclusions were erroneous. What can not be said about Ron Wyatt himself, who was fanatically "self-confident" until the end of his days. As well as the rest of the miracle hunters.

“Looking at this photo, I first of all thought it was a small ledge in the stone, since there is another similar ledge visible there,” admits Boston University geologist Farouk El-Baz. - The stones were sliding down, forming a moat, and this is clearly visible in the picture. I doubt this is the work of man.

The length of the desired object in the area of the Tendyurek volcano is 157 meters. The length of Noah's ark, according to the Bible, is 300 cubits (137 meters). Wyatt's follower, one Jerry Bowen, finds an explanation for this difference. Moses, who wrote the Book of Genesis, studied in Egypt, and he obviously had in mind a measure of length called the royal Egyptian cubit. Thus, the difference in the end is not twenty meters, but only a few centimeters.

However, the size of the "elbows" varies greatly. And if you really want - everything is possible. To see a human face on Mars, to declare the Nazca desert an airfield for flying saucers and to see petroglyphs in the form of space suits in the walls of the Egyptian pyramids.

- Why are we surprised that the expectations to see a ship on Mount Ararat were crowned with success? says Russian researcher Vadim Chernobrov. “Moreover, as many as three of his images were found in different places.

In spite of everything, these too are just general phrases. Let's figure it out in detail.

Another sensation associated with Noah's Ark appeared already in 2000, when satellite photographs of the slopes of Ararat were studied. In the saddle between its two peaks, under the snow, someone again made out the outlines of the ship. Alas, scientists again considered it just an ordinary fold of a sliding glacier. In the end, experts are quite sure: under no circumstances could the ark have remained frozen in the ice for so long. After all, the glacier moves and demolishes everything in its path to the foot of the mountains. According to scientists, if the fragments of the ark had been locked in the glacier, they would have been found not at the top, but at the base of Ararat.

Neither more nor less (an cubit is approximately 50 cm), these are the dimensions of a modern destroyer or megayacht of an Arab sheikh. With a length of 140 meters, it would have been the largest ship in the entire ancient world. Hard work for one family.

“Even in the 19th century, they would not have been able to build such a ship only from wood,” says shipbuilding expert Tom Vosmer. — We would need metal parts. At sea, the skin of such a vessel will crack and leak. It would sink just as fast as an ordinary stone.

Pair of each creature

“Bring also into the ark of all animals and of all flesh a pair, so that they remain alive with you; male and female let them be. From the birds according to their kind, and from the cattle according to their kind, and from every creeping thing on the ground according to their kind, two of them will come in to you, that they may live.”

It is believed that our planet is inhabited by 30 million species of animals. Perhaps, after these words, comments seem redundant. If Noah had a whole fleet of "destroyers", to shove the unimpressible - "a pair" of each type (total 60 million individuals) - would be worse than Landau's problems. The same applies to the loading of "creatures". According to Scripture, Noah and his family were able to accomplish this in a week. According to experts, at a real speed, it would take at least thirty years.

Perhaps the Bible does not mean all animals, but only those that lived in the area where Noah lived? The Book of Genesis describes specific species: seven pairs of ten types of "clean" animals (those that could be sacrificed to God): sheep, antelopes, cattle, goats, deer. “Unclean” animals are also described there: pigs, hares, lizards, snails, etc. There are 30 types in total. In total, 260 individuals were to be on board the ark. This is very small compared to 30 million (consider 60 million), but much more realistic.

Not a trace of the flood

The whole legend of Noah is meaningless without the fact of the flood. The flood described in the Bible would invariably leave a very clear, globally visible geological footprint. His search began a century and a half ago. Geologist Lan Plimer looked for him on all continents, but all in vain. However, not quite. He, like many others, managed rather to prove that nothing like this had ever happened.

But that's not all. The very idea of a flood crosses out everything that is known to science about the history of the Earth. To flood the planet to the peaks of the Himalayas, you need a volume of water three times greater than is available in all the oceans. Where did she come from then? “… all the fountains of the great deep were broken up,” the Scripture prompts.

“It can’t be that water in such a volume came from geysers and underground sources,” says Lan Plimer. - If this happened, then it would no longer be water, but swamp slurry, on which it is impossible to swim. In addition, flooding the entire surface of the planet would lead to changes in the Earth's atmosphere. So much vapor would enter the atmosphere that a person would choke while breathing, and the pressure would increase so much that it would burst the lungs. And the geyser emissions contain sulfur dioxide, so people would have suffocated before the flood even started.

Noah, Gilgamesh and Atrahasis

Philologists also joined the investigation about the ark. After studying the language of the legend of Noah, they came to the conclusion that it was written in the VI century BC. It was inserted into the Torah by Jewish priests who lived in Babylon (modern Iraq - ed.). There is a possibility that it was they who composed a beautiful parable. But scientists are well aware that any of these legends always contains a certain amount of truth. Perhaps the story of Noah's Ark is just an exaggerated retelling of real events.

One hundred and fifty years ago, the Englishman Henry Layerd studied the ruins of the Babylonian library in Nineveh. Finding hundreds of cuneiform tablets, he sent them to the British Museum, where they could be handled by the appropriate experts. However, the museum staff did not attach importance to the next batch of clay books and sent them to the storerooms. They were kept there until 1872, when museum employee George Smith found them and deciphered them. Here is his conclusion was truly sensational. He discovered similarities between the famous "Epic of Gilgamesh" and the biblical legend of our Noah.

Then it went like clockwork. A lot of archaeological and geological expeditions were organized on the territory of Iraq. All of them confirmed that there really was a serious flood in this region. It happened at least five thousand years ago in Mesopotamia. But it was there that the civilizations of Sumer, Assyria and Babylon were born. We owe them the Epic of Gilgamesh, as well as the predecessor of this legend, the epic about the Sumerian hero Atrahasis. All these people, like Noah, listen to the voice of the gods with enviable constancy, build a raft and escape on it. In addition, both epics tell of a real flood in Mesopotamia, which, as we have already said, happened five thousand years ago.

Therefore, scientists suggest that the legend of Noah is only a Christian version of a pagan epic written shortly after the aforementioned flood. The latter washed away many cities in Mesopotamia, but certainly not the whole world.

Meanwhile, scholar Alan Milord is sure that the Bible says nothing about the Flood:

- In Hebrew, the words "land" and "country" were written the same way. It can be assumed that a local flood is described there.

The puzzle has probably worked out.

Was it Noah?

Scientists answer: "Very possible." Only if we take into account the above logical chain, we will have to cross out the familiar image of the biblical Noah, who historically was probably a completely different person.

He was a Sumerian. And that means he was shaved bald, dyed his eyebrows and wore a skirt. So it was accepted in the culture of the Sumerians. How did this person live? The Epic of Gilgamesh says that he had both gold and silver. It turns out that Noah was not at all a simple winemaker, he was a merchant. Instead of an ark, he most likely had a large barge, perfectly suited for transporting livestock, grain, beer and other goods. Shopping centers in those parts lay along the banks, so it was easier and cheaper to transport goods by water.

What size was Noah's barge? Scientists have not yet found accurate descriptions of the Sumerian trading barges, so they simply estimate the maximum possible size of such a vessel at that time.

“The Epic of Gilgamesh says that the boat was divided into sections,” comments Tom Vosmer, an expert on ancient courts. - Large ships could be built like pontoons. Several barges, for example, were tied together with ropes, and at the top was the house of the owner of the ship.

Perhaps Noah lived on this ship with his family, could load animals on it for sale. When this ship was “moored”, and Noah and his family were just on it (according to different versions, it was the moment of some kind of celebration), a hurricane broke the rope and carried the barge along the waters of the Euphrates River.

Scientists know that the melting of snow in the mountains of Armenia in July raises the water level in the Euphrates. At this time, the channels become passable for ships. Noah waited for such a flood to go along the river with his goods. If we assume that at this time there was a strong storm, then the Euphrates could turn into a raging sea, causing floods. However, it rarely rains in July in these places, so such floods do not occur more often than about once every thousand years (it is not surprising that such events were necessarily recorded in the annals). In those days, the climate in these regions was hotter and more humid, and therefore hurricanes and downpours are stronger than now. If such a storm had coincided with the melting of snow in the mountains, it could have flooded the entire Mesopotamian plain. Which probably happened.

But the Bible writes about 40 days and nights when it rained and "the windows of heaven were opened." The Babylonian epic is more modest: it tells only about seven days. But even this week would be enough to "destroy people from the face of the earth." It is possible that Noah's barge, torn off the coast by a hurricane, indeed drifted for quite a long time, but not along the fresh waves of the Euphrates, but along the sea. After all, the Babylonian text states: the water overboard has become salty.

The scientists calculated the course of the barge across the flooded plain and concluded that it must have swept into the Persian Gulf. It is not known how long Noah's family sailed around the bay. According to the Bible - a year, if the Sumerian epic - seven days. The version of the latter, of course, is much more likely. On board Noah's barge, most likely, there was beer that has been brewed here since time immemorial. Noah's relatives and himself drank it instead of water.

But to return after the flood back - to his native Sumerian city of Shurupak - the Sumerian Noah hardly wanted to. According to Sumerian law, anyone who owed money and could not repay the debt was invariably enslaved. As a merchant, Noah probably owed money, and having “burned out” on the flood, he could not make a profit, and he had nothing to repay the debt.

However, according to Babylonian sources, Noah was none other than the head of the city of Shurupak. But that didn't change anything either. Sumerian laws were equal for all. Noah's later life is shrouded in mystery. But in one, in the Babylonian tablets, it still says that Noah remained in the land of Dilmun (now the island of Bahrain - ed.), but Noah's barge could not have ended up in the mountains of Ararat after the flood. There are a lot of unexplored cemeteries on the island of Bahrain. Who knows, maybe one of them still keeps the remains of the legendary Noah?

Alternative opinion

It certainly exists. And it lies in the fact that the Armenians, who from ancient times inhabited the vicinity of Aratat, are none other than the descendants of Noah. The year of foundation of the capital of Armenia Yerevan is considered the year of foundation of the Urartian city of Erebuni - 782 BC. e. However, Armenian legends say that the first settlements in these places appeared in the time of Noah. The main evidence is the folk etymology of the word "Yerevats!" (She appeared!), which Noah allegedly said after the top of Small Ararat appeared from under the water.

The 17th century traveler Jean Chardin writes: “Erivan, according to the Armenians, is the most ancient settlement in the world. For they claim that Noah and all his family settled here before the Flood, and after it he descended from the Mountain where the Ark was left.” At the end of the 19th century, an Azerbaijani version of folk etymology was recorded, producing the name Iravan from the words “aya-ravan” (flowing).

Be that as it may, only Noah seems to know the truth, if he really existed. We have to rely on the facts and probably just believe.

November 2013 Naked Science

It seemed like a simple matter. The last refuge of the ark is known, where there were "each creature in pairs" - Mount Ararat. Go and see if there is a ship there. But at first it was impossible to do this - climbing the sacred peak was strictly prohibited ...
This taboo was broken only in 1829 by the Frenchman Friedrich Parro.

But on the first ascent, the least thing a climber thought about was the Flood. But half a century later, in essence, a competition began for the right to be the first to find the remains of Noah's ship. In 1876, Lord Bryce, at an altitude of 13 thousand feet (4.3 km), discovered and took a sample from a piece of processed log 4 feet (1.3 m) long. In 1892, Archdeacon Nuri, one of the chief priests of the Chaldean Church, finally, for the first time, together with five escorts, discovered a “large wooden vessel” near the top! (The English Mechanic magazine, 11/11/1892).
In 1856, "three godless foreigners" hired two guides in Armenia and set off on a journey with the aim of "denying the existence of the biblical ark." Only decades later, before his death, one of the guides admitted that "to their surprise, they found the ark." At first they tried to destroy it, but they failed because it was too big. Then they swore that they would not tell anyone about their find, and they forced their escorts to do the same ... (Christian Herald magazine, August 1975).
In 1916, the fearless Russian front-line pilot V. Roskovitsky reported in a report that he had observed on the slopes of Ararat (then this area was part of the Russian Empire) from an airplane "a large lying ship"! Immediately equipped by the tsarist government (despite the war!) The expedition began searching. Subsequently, the direct participants claimed that the goal was achieved by them, photographed in detail and examined ... Apparently, this was the first and last official expedition to the ark. But, unfortunately, its results were reliably lost in Petrograd in 1917, and the territory of Greater Ararat was captured by Turkish troops ...
In the summer of 1949, two groups of researchers went to the "ark" at once.

The first, of 4 missionaries led by a retired North Carolina doctor Smith, observed only one strange "vision" at the top ("Mond", 09/24/1949). But the second, consisting of the French, reported that "they saw Noah's Ark ... but not on Mount Ararat", but on the neighboring peak of Jubel Judy southeast of Sevan ("France-Soir", 08/31/1949). True, according to local legends, visions in the form of a ghost ship covered with a layer of mud were often observed near this place. In the same place, two Turkish journalists subsequently allegedly saw a ship (or a ghost?) measuring 500 x 80 x 50 feet (165 x 25 x 15 m) with the bones of marine animals and nearby the grave of Noah. However, after 3 years, Riker's expedition found nothing of the kind.
In the cold summer of 1953, American oilman George Jefferson Green, flying in a helicopter in the same area, from a height of 30 meters took 6 very clear photographs of a large ship, half gone into the rocks and ice sliding from the mountain ledge. Green subsequently failed to equip an expedition to this place, and 9 years after his death, all the original photographs disappeared ... But photographs appeared in print with clearly distinguishable outlines of the vessel, made from space! ("Daily Telegraph", 09/13/1965).
In 1955, Fernand Navarre managed to find an ancient ship among the ice; from under the ice, he removed an L-shaped beam and several planks of sheathing. After 14 years, he repeated his attempt with the help of the American organization "Search" and brought a few more boards. Radiocarbon analysis carried out in the USA determined the age of the tree at 1400 years, in Bordeaux and Madrid the result was different - 5000 years! (F. Navarra. Noah's Ark: I touched it, 1956, 1974).
Following him, John Libi from San Francisco sets off for Ararat, who shortly before that saw the exact location of the ark in a dream, and ... finds nothing. The seventy-year-old "poor Libi", as the journalists dubbed him, made 7 unsuccessful ascents in 3 years, during one of them he barely managed to escape from a bear throwing stones! The owner of the hotel in Dugobayazit at the foot of Ararat, Farkhettin Kolan, participated as a guide in several dozen expeditions. But Eryl Cummings, who has made 31 ascents since 1961, is rightfully the champion among Arkmen!
One of the last to make his 5 ascents was Tom Crotser. Returning with his trophy board, he exclaimed in front of the press: “Yes, there are 70 thousand tons of this tree, I swear on my head!” And again, radiocarbon analysis showed the age of the boards at 4000-5000 years ("San Francisco Examiner", 06/29/1974).
The history of all expeditions (official at least) ends in 1974. It was then that the Turkish government, having placed observation posts over the border line on Ararat, closed this area for any visits. Now there, in connection with the warming of the international situation, voices for lifting this ban are becoming more insistent. So it remains only to hope that the ancient ship preserved in the ice will not crumble in anticipation of new researchers.
However, the description in the Bible of the Flood, which lasted about a year 5 thousand years ago, is far from the only mention of this disaster. An earlier Assyrian myth, written on clay tablets, tells of Gilgamesh, who escaped in an ark with various animals and, after the end of the 7-day flood, strong wind and heavy rain, landed on Mount Nicer (400 m high) in Mesopotamia. By the way, in the presentations of the stories of the floods, many details coincide: in order to find out if the earth appeared from under the water, Noah released a raven and twice a dove; Utnapishtim - dove and swallow. Similar were the ways of building arks. By the way, similar narratives are also found among the natives of South and North America, Africa and Asia.
Wyatt's research
Anesthesiologist Ronal Eldon Wyatt devoted himself entirely to the search and study of the remains of the biblical Noah's Ark.
Since 1977, he has organized several expeditions to Turkey and created the Wyatt Archeological Research organization to popularize this research.
Wyatt proved that this ship is the work of man, and is the very legendary Noah's Ark. The scientist also did a tremendous job: he collected a lot of evidence, photographed and videotaped the work carried out, and analyzed the samples taken in reputable scientific laboratories.
From 1977 to 1987, Ronald made 18 expeditions to the location of the ark. And as a result of this, Wyatt concluded that Noah's Ark had been found!

Remains of the ark
In 1978, an earthquake hit Turkey, which caused the soil covering the ship to fall off. Thus, the petrified remains of the ship were on the surface. Around the entire ark, one could notice recesses that resembled decaying rib beams (frames). Horizontal deck support beams were also visible. The length of the ship is 157 meters (515 feet).
In Knoxville, Tennessee, a mineral analysis was carried out on soil samples taken near the ark. Samples taken from the crack showed 4.95% carbon content, which shows that living matter was once present there - rotten or petrified wood.
The earthquake caused the object to split from bow to stern, which allowed scientists to sample materials from the ark from any depth from the crack in the ark.
In 1986, a new research method was applied - surface radar scanning. Ronald Wyatt and Richard Reives did mini-digs on the ark. They cleared out a section of the ship that was badly damaged. There were rib beams (frames). By removing the ground covering the ark, they saw a difference in color between the darker ground and the lighter beams. This process was videotaped.

lava flow
There are suggestions that during the volcanic eruption, the ark moved in a lava flow, and he did it sideways down the mountainside. This lava sank the ship. They split the ark, pressing it against a huge limestone ledge. As a result, the entire ark was engulfed in lava. The theory was confirmed by scans, which showed a void along the entire length of the hull.
Ron found "strange stones" found in the lowest compartment of the ark, in its torn off part. He suggested that it was the ship's ballast material. As a result of the split of the ship, a large amount of ballast fell out, while the other part remained inside.
The material that was used as ballast did not turn out to be an ordinary stone, it looked so much like waste from metallurgical production. Later analyzes confirmed that the ballast was not of natural origin.

Metal rivets
Soil samples inside the ark showed a high iron content. The Turkish authorities refused to carry out excavations. So in 1985, Ron Wyatt, Dave Fassold, and John Baumgardner performed a deep penetration metal detector survey. The result is simply amazing! The metal detectors reacted very orderly. Stones were placed in these places, then they were connected with a ribbon. This showed the internal structure of the ship.
Also, metal detectors found thousands of metal rivets, with the help of which the wooden structures of the ship were fastened. This suggests that both wooden and metal parts were used in the construction of the ark. Titanium alloys were found in the samples. Titanium is known as a metal that has tremendous strength, light weight and high corrosion resistance. And, what is most interesting, a man mastered the metallurgical production of titanium only in 1936!
stone anchors
In 1977, during the first expedition, very large stones were discovered in the area where the ark was located. They were similar in shape and design to anchor stones found by archaeologists in the Mediterranean. But the rocks that Ron found were much bigger!
This is a type of floating anchor that is constantly found at the bottom of the Mediterranean and other seas. They were often used on ships in ancient times to keep the ship perpendicular to the oncoming waves and to be stable.
Deck wood
The Turkish authorities have recognized the research results of Ronald Wyatt and his team. On June 20, 1987, the official opening of Noah's Ark took place. The event was attended by officials and journalists.
After the ceremony, the governor asked Wyatt to scan the site. Suddenly, Ronald noted a particular reading after several passes by the radar. The site began to be dug and an object about 45 cm long was discovered, which was called “deck wood”.
Journalists filmed the process of excavating wood, and later showed it on television in Turkey. The sample was taken to the USA for research. Laboratory analysis of wood was carried out at the Galbray Laboratory in Knoxville, Tennessee. The entire analysis process was filmed on camera.

The results of the analyzes showed that this sample is a former organic. In addition, this wood lacked annual layers, which usually occur when nutrition changes during the change of seasons. This can be explained by the peculiarity of the climate before the Flood. The Bible says that after the Flood, the Lord said, “As long as the days of the earth sow and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night shall not cease” (Genesis 8:22).
The root of the Aramaic word, which is similar in meaning to the Hebrew word for "gopher tree", means glued wood (layers of wooden boards are glued together one with another, thereby providing additional strength). After examining the section, it became apparent that this part of the decking was definitely laminated timber.
Resin was used as glue, the remains of which in a petrified form have survived to this day. Thus, the method of joining structures that Noah used to build the ark involved gluing three separate layers of wood together for strength.
Not much publicity
Why are they silent about this discovery? After all, there is clear evidence. It can be concluded that the world is unwilling to admit that the ark has indeed been found, thereby having to admit that the Bible, the Word of God, speaks the truth. Therefore, we must live differently.
One Australian film crew visited the site where the ark was found. But she did not shoot the results of the metal detector research, which was carried out in front of their eyes. They chose to film what they thought would serve to discredit the location of the ark.
One can deny the truth, but this will not make it cease to exist...and sooner or later it will still have to be reckoned with...
“Know this first of all, that in the last days there will come scoffers, walking after their own lusts.
and those who say, Where is the promise of his coming? For ever since the fathers began to die, from the beginning of creation, everything remains the same.
Those who think so do not know that in the beginning, by the word of God, the heavens and the earth were composed of water and water:
therefore the world of that time perished, having been drowned by water.
But the present heavens and earth, which are contained by the same Word, are kept up by fire for the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men.
One thing must not be hidden from you, beloved, that with the Lord one day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like one day.
The Lord is not slow in fulfilling his promise, as some consider slowness; but is patient with us, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.