World

The D'Agapeyeff Cipher: The Puzzle Even Its Author Could No Longer Solve

World - Mysteries & the bizarre - The 395-digit string at the end of an introductory cryptography book from 1939 has outlived the author's own solution, and may contain errors that make a clean solution impossible. Alexander D'Agape ..

05/09/2026
4,757

Catatumbo Lightning: The Near-Endless Storm Over Lake Maracaibo

World - Mysteries & the bizarre - Over the southern region of Lake Maracaibo in Venezuela, the sky flashes like a giant lighthouse for many consecutive nights. Thunderstorm clusters re-form near the mouth of the Catatumbo River, mak ..

05/09/2026
5,056

Atlantis: A Real Sunken City or Plato's Philosophical Story?

World - Mysteries & the bizarre - Atlantis is famous as a civilization that vanished beneath the sea, but the most certain starting point of the story is not an ancient map or underwater ruins: it is Plato's two dialogues, Timaeus a ..

04/09/2026
4,896

The Loch Ness Monster: what is left after the blurry photo, sonar and eDNA?

World - Mysteries & the bizarre - Loch Ness holds water so dark, so deep and so long that a ripple in the distance easily turns into the back of an enormous creature. Nessie is famous not because of a bone or a carcass, but because ..

04/09/2026
4,697

Bigfoot: giant footprints, the Patterson-Gimlin film and the FBI's hair sample

World - Mysteries & the bizarre - Bigfoot - or Sasquatch - is described as a tall, hair-covered primate living in the forests of north-western North America. Thousands of reports, plaster casts of footprints and a piece of film shot ..

03/09/2026
5,090

El Dorado: From the Muisca's Golden Ritual to the Dream of a City of Gold

World - Mysteries & the bizarre - El Dorado was originally closer to the image of a man covered in gold dust during a succession ritual than a city built entirely of gold. Through the accounts of the conquistadors, that objective gr ..

03/09/2026
4,737

The City of Z and Percy Fawcett's Final Journey into the Amazon

World - Mysteries & the bizarre - In 1925, Percy Fawcett, along with his son Jack and Raleigh Rimell, entered Mato Grosso to find a place he called ‐Z‑. The three men never returned, leaving behind two often-conflated questions: wha ..

02/09/2026
4,641

The Yeti: footprints on the Himalaya and the answer from bear DNA

World - Mysteries & the bizarre - The Yeti usually appears at the edge of a snow slope: a few large footprints, a dark shape, and then a storm that wipes the trail away. The image of the "abominable snowman" was popularised in the W ..

02/09/2026
4,625

The Chupacabra: blood-sucking monster, or a coyote with mange?

World - Mysteries & the bizarre - The Chupacabra is an unusually young legend. It flared up in Puerto Rico in the mid-1990s, described at first as a two-legged creature with spines along its back; by the time it reached Texas the im ..

01/09/2026
4,673

Thonis–Heracleion: The Egyptian Trading Port Rediscovered Beneath Aboukir Bay

World - Mysteries & the bizarre - For centuries, Thonis in Egyptian texts and Heracleion in Greek sources were considered two different places. Stelae and ruins beneath Aboukir Bay reveal that they were two names for the same tradin ..

01/09/2026
4,995

Helike: The Greek City That Vanished After the 373 BCE Earthquake

World - Mysteries & the bizarre - Helike was once so famous that ancient authors recounted that its ruins could still be seen underwater. When modern searches began, the biggest surprise was that the city was not located in the curr ..

31/08/2026
4,769

Mothman at Point Pleasant: did the red-eyed creature really foretell a disaster?

World - Mysteries & the bizarre - In November 1966, Point Pleasant in West Virginia became the centre of reports about a winged creature with red eyes. A year later the Silver Bridge collapsed, killing 46 people. Popular culture joi ..

31/08/2026
5,076

The Jersey Devil: a thirteenth child, the Pine Barrens and 300 years of legend

World - Mysteries & the bizarre - The Jersey Devil is described as a creature with a horse's head, bat wings and hooves, born as Mother Leeds's thirteenth child and flying straight up the chimney. The story looks like a colonial tal ..

30/08/2026
4,736

Ubar Beneath the Sands of Oman: A Lost City or the Shisr Waystation on the Incense Route?

World - Mysteries & the bizarre - In the early 1990s, radar and satellite imagery helped trace ancient caravan routes converging near Shisr in Oman. The media quickly dubbed this discovery Ubar—the "Atlantis of the Sands"—but the sc ..

30/08/2026
4,626

Dwarka underwater: what does archaeology say about the legendary city?

World - Mysteries & the bizarre - Off the coast of Dwarka and Bet Dwarka lie stone anchors, pottery, and underwater architectural remains. These findings confirm long-standing maritime activity along the Gujarat coast, but the quest ..

29/08/2026
5,015

The Beast of Gevaudan: what animal terrified France in the 18th century?

World - Mysteries & the bizarre - Between 1764 and 1767, the Gevaudan region of south-central France recorded a series of fatal attacks, mostly on women and child herders. "La Bete" - the Beast - was described as larger than a wolf, ..

29/08/2026
4,966

The Mongolian death worm: does Olgoi-khorkhoi really hide beneath the Gobi sand?

World - Mysteries & the bizarre - Olgoi-khorkhoi - usually translated as "intestine worm" - is said to live beneath the sand of the Gobi desert, thick and red, able to kill from a distance with venom or electricity. The story reache ..

28/08/2026
5,026

Yonaguni: Underwater “Pyramid” or Geological Masterpiece?

World - Mysteries & the bizarre - Off the coast of Yonaguni Island at the westernmost tip of Japan lies an underwater rock formation featuring remarkably flat planes, steps, and sharp angles. Such geometry has led many to call it a ..

28/08/2026
4,679

Nan Madol: Who Built Over 100 Islets with Basalt Columns?

World - Mysteries & the bizarre - Nan Madol consists of more than 100 artificial islets off the coast of Pohnpei, separated by canals and encircled by massive basalt walls. The truly fascinating question is not what extraterrestrial ..

27/08/2026
4,778

Mapinguari: guardian of the Amazon, or a memory of the giant ground sloth?

World - Mysteries & the bizarre - In many Amazonian stories, Mapinguari is a creature or an entity that protects the forest, with a terrifying cry, a powerful smell, skin that is hard to pierce and sometimes feet that point backward ..

27/08/2026
4,723