Zhejiang, China, is home to the Longyou Caves: 24 man-made caverns cut into sandstone at Fenghuang Hill. Their floors average more than 1,000 square metres, and heights reach about 30 metres. Regular, roughly 60-cm bands of parallel, slanted tool marks maintain their orientation around corners. No oil lamps or torches were found, though that does not prove the workers had no light. A Song-dynasty artefact (960–1279 CE) indicates later activity rather than necessarily dating the excavation. The complex is estimated to be at least 2,000 years old. The video argues that the marks look machine-made and compares them with a 20th-century Ukrainian salt mine; that is the presenter's interpretation, not proof of machinery.
Longyou Caves: 2,000-year-old Chinese site with unusually regular tool marks
ChinaSurvey
Key facts
- The Longyou complex contains 24 artificial sandstone caves cut into Fenghuang Hill in Zhejiang, China—not more than 40.
- Average cave floor area exceeds 1,000 square metres, and cave heights reach about 30 metres.
- Regular bands of parallel, slanted tool marks, some about 60 centimetres wide, retain a consistent orientation around corners.
- No oil lamps or torches have been found, but that does not establish that the workers had no lighting.
- The video argues that continuous horizontal lines were excessive for excavation. This is the presenter's interpretation, not an established archaeological conclusion.
- The reported artefact belongs to the Song dynasty (960–1279 CE), not a “Stone Dynasty,” and does not by itself date the excavation.
- The video compares the marks with machine work and 20th-century Ukrainian salt-mine marks; these comparisons do not establish that machinery was used.
- The complex is estimated to be at least 2,000 years old and is described as hand-excavated.
Sources
Longyou Cavesen.wikipedia.org
The caves are notable in several respects: The caves are very large for human-made excavations: The average floor area of each cave is over 1,000 m2 (11,000 sq ...
Archaeological Wonders: The Unsolved Longyou Caves ...discoveryuk.com
The Longyou Caves are a series of twenty-four huge, hand-built sandstone caverns. Remarkably, despite their grandeur and precision, there are no historical ...
China's Mysterious Longyou Grottoes: Nobody Knows Who ...earthlymission.com
Carved from sandstone, each grotto measures up to 30 meters (98 ft) deep and boasts a network of pillars, bridges, and gutters. Estimates suggest that over 1 ...
The Longyou Caves: An Unsolved Enigmatheancientconnection.com
The Longyou Caves, also known as the Xiaonanhai Stone Chambers, are a group of 24 artificial sandstone caverns located at Fenghuang Hill, near the village ...
The Mystery of the Longyou Cavesheritagedaily.com
Longyou Caves is a complex of 24 artificial caves, constructed into the sandstone geology of Fenghuang Hill in the Zhejiang province of China.
Longyou Grottoes in Quzhou of Zhejiang Provincetopchinatravel.com
Longyou Grottoes locate near the village of Shiyanbei village, Longyou County, Quzhou, Zhejiang province, China. It's about 180km from Hangzhou.
Design, construction and mechanical behavior of relics ...sciencedirect.com
by Z Yang · 2011 · Cited by 34 — The relics of Longyou rock caverns are a group of large rock caverns at shallow depths purely carved in argillaceous siltstone of Cretaceous age by ancient ...
The Ninth Wonder of the World - Longyou Caveslongyou-caves.cn
The Longyou Caves are among the largest and most mysterious ancient man-made underground complexes ever found. The Longyou Caves lie beside the Qujiang River in ...
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