The Mystery of Bosnia's Ancient Pyramids

An amateur archaeologist says he's discovered the world's oldest pyramids in the Balkans. But many experts remain dubious

Smithsonian magazine, December 2009, Subscribe

Sam Osmanagich claims that 12,000 years ago, early Europeans built "the greatest pyramidal complex" on earth, in Bosnia. (Morten Hvaal)

Sam Osmanagich kneels down next to a low wall, part of a 6-by-10-foot rectangle of fieldstone with an earthen floor. If I'd come upon it in a farmer's backyard here on the edge of Visoko—in Bosnia and Herzegovina, 15 miles northwest of Sarajevo—I would have assumed it to be the foundation of a shed or cottage abandoned by some 19th-century peasant.

Osmanagich, a blond, 49-year-old Bosnian who has lived for 16 years in Houston, Texas, has a more colorful explanation. "Maybe it's a burial site, and maybe it's an entrance, but I think it's some type of ornament, because this is where the western and northern sides meet," he says, gesturing toward the summit of Pljesevica Hill, 350 feet above us. "You find evidence of the stone structure everywhere. Consequently, you can conclude that the whole thing is a pyramid."

Not just any pyramid, but what Osmanagich calls the Pyramid of the Moon, the world's largest—and oldest—step pyramid. Looming above the opposite side of town is the so-called Pyramid of the Sun—also known as Visocica Hill—which, at 720 feet, also dwarfs the Great Pyramids of Egypt. A third pyramid, he says, is in the nearby hills. All of them, he says, are some 12,000 years old. During that time much of Europe was under a mile-thick sheet of ice and most of humanity had yet to invent agriculture. As a group, Osmanagich says, these structures are part of "the greatest pyramidal complex ever built on the face of the earth."

In a country still recovering from the 1992-95 genocidal war, in which some 100,000 people were killed and 2.2 million were driven from their homes (the majority of them Bosnian Muslims), Osmanagich's claims have found a surprisingly receptive audience. Even Bosnian officials—including a prime minister and two presidents—have embraced them, along with the Sarajevo-based news media and hundreds of thousands of ordinary Bosnians, drawn to the promise of a glorious past and a more prosperous future for their battered country. Skeptics, who say the pyramid claims are examples of pseudo-archaeology pressed into the service of nationalism, have been shouted down and called anti-Bosnian.

Pyramid mania has descended upon Bosnia. Over 400,000 people have visited the sites since October 2005, when Osmanagich announced his discovery. Souvenir stands peddle pyramid-themed T-shirts, wood carvings, piggy banks, clocks and flip-flops. Nearby eateries serve meals on pyramid-shaped plates and coffee comes with pyramid-emblazoned sugar packets. Foreigners by the thousands have come to see what all the fuss is about, drawn by reports by the BBC, Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and ABC's Nightline (which reported that thermal imaging had "apparently" revealed the presence of man-made, concrete blocks beneath the valley).

Osmanagich has also received official backing. His Pyramid of the Sun Foundation in Sarajevo has garnered hundreds of thousands of dollars in public donations and thousands more from state-owned companies. After Malaysia's former prime minister, Mahathir Mohamad, toured Visoko in July 2006, more contributions poured in. Christian Schwarz-Schilling, the former high representative for the international community in Bosnia and Herzegovina, visited the site in July 2007, then declared that "I was surprised with what I saw before my eyes, and the fact that such structures exist in Bosnia and Herzegovina."

Osmanagich's many appearances on television have made him a national celebrity. In Sarajevo, people gape at him on the streets and seek his autograph in cafés. When I was with him one day at the entrance to city hall, guards jumped out of their booths to embrace him.

Five years ago, almost no one had ever heard of him. Born in Zenica, about 20 miles north of Visoko, he earned a master's degree in international economics and politics at the University of Sarajevo. (Years later, he obtained a doctorate in the sociology of history. ) He left Bosnia before its civil war, emigrating to Houston in 1993 (because, in part, of its warm climate), where he started a successful metalworking business that he still owns today. While in Texas he got interested in the Aztec, Incan and Maya civilizations and made frequent trips to visit pyramid sites in Central and South America. He says that he's visited hundreds of pyramids worldwide.

His views of world history—described in his books published in Bosnia—are unconventional. In The World of the Maya, which was reprinted in English in the United States, he writes that "Mayan hieroglyphics tell us that their ancestors came from the Pleiades....first arriving at Atlantis where they created an advanced civilization." He speculates that when a 26,000-year cycle of the Maya calendar is completed in 2012, humankind might be raised to a higher level by vibrations that will "overcome the age of darkness which has been oppressing us." In another work, Alternative History, he argues that Adolf Hitler and other Nazi leaders escaped to a secret underground base in Antarctica from which they did battle with Adm. Richard Byrd's 1946 Antarctic expedition.

"His books are filled with these kinds of stories," says journalist Vuk Bacanovic, one of Osmanagich's few identifiable critics in the Sarajevo press corps. "It's like a religion based on corrupted New Age ideology."

In April 2005, while in Bosnia to promote his books, Osmanagich accepted an invitation to visit a local museum and the summit of Visocica, which is topped by the ruins of Visoki, a seat of Bosnia's medieval kings. "What really caught my eye was that the hill had the shape of a pyramid," he recalls. "Then I looked across the valley and I saw what we today call the Bosnian Pyramid of the Moon, with three triangular sides and a flat top." Upon consulting a compass, he concluded the sides of the pyramid were perfectly oriented toward the cardinal points (north, south, east and west). He was convinced this was not "the work of Mother Nature."

After his mountaintop epiphany, Osmanagich secured digging permits from the appropriate authorities, drilled some core samples and wrote a new book, The Bosnian Pyramid of the Sun, which announced "to the world that in the heart of Bosnia" is a hidden "stepped pyramid whose creators were ancient Europeans." He then set up a nonprofit foundation called the Archaeological Park: Bosnian Pyramid of the Sun Foundation, which allowed him to seek funding for his planned excavation and preservation work.

"When I first read about the pyramids I thought it was a very funny joke," says Amar Karapus, a curator at the National Museum of Bosnia and Herzegovina in Sarajevo. "I just couldn't believe that anyone in the world could believe this."

Visoko lies near the southern end of a valley that runs from Sarajevo to Zenica. The valley has been quarried for centuries and its geological history is well understood. It was formed some ten million years ago as the mountains of Central Bosnia were pushing skyward and was soon flooded, forming a lake 40 miles long. As the mountains continued to rise over the next few million years, sediments washed into the lake and settled on the bottom in layers. If you dig in the valley today, you can expect to find alternating layers of various thickness, from gossamer-thin clay sediments (deposited in quiet times) to plates of sandstones or thick layers of conglomerates (sedimentary rocks deposited when raging rivers dumped heavy debris into the lake). Subsequent tectonic activity buckled sections of lakebed, creating angular hills, and shattered rock layers, leaving fractured plates of sandstone and chunky blocks of conglomerate.

In early 2006 Osmanagich asked a team of geologists from the nearby University of Tuzla to analyze core samples at Visocica. They found that his pyramid was composed of the same matter as other mountains in the area: alternating layers of conglomerate, clay and sandstone.

Nonetheless, Osmanagich put scores of laborers to work digging on the hills. It was just as the geologists had predicted: the excavations revealed layers of fractured conglomerate at Visocica, while those at Pljesevica uncovered cracked sandstone plates separated by layers of silt and clay. "What he's found isn't even unusual or spectacular from the geological point of view," says geologist Robert Schoch of Boston University, who spent ten days at Visoko that summer. "It's completely straightforward and mundane."

"The landform [Osmanagich] is calling a pyramid is actually quite common," agrees Paul Heinrich, an archaeological geologist at Louisiana State University. "They're called ‘flatirons' in the United States and you see a lot of them out West." He adds that there are "hundreds around the world," including the "Russian Twin Pyramids" in Vladivostok.

Apparently unperturbed by the University of Tuzla report, Osmanagich said Visocica's conglomerate blocks were made of concrete that ancient builders had poured on-site. This theory was endorsed by Joseph Davidovits, a French materials scientist who, in 1982, advanced another controversial hypothesis—that the blocks making up the Egyptian pyramids were not carved, as nearly all experts believe, but cast in limestone concrete. Osmanagich dubbed Pljesevica's sandstone plates "paved terraces," and according to Schoch, workers carved the hillside between the layers—to create the impression of stepped sides on the Pyramid of the Moon. Particularly uniform blocks and tile sections were exposed for viewing by dignitaries, journalists and the many tourists who descended on the town.

Osmanagich's announcements sparked a media sensation, stoked with a steady supply of fresh observations: a 12,000-year-old "burial mound" (without any skeletons) in a nearby village; a stone on Visocica with alleged curative powers; a third pyramid dubbed the Pyramid of the Dragon; and two "shaped hills" that he has named the Pyramid of Love and the Temple of Earth. And Osmanagich has recruited an assortment of experts whom he says vindicate his claims. For instance, in 2007, Enver Buza, a surveyor from Sarajevo's Geodetic Institute, published a paper stating that the Pyramid of the Sun is "oriented to the north with a perfect precision."

Many Bosnians have embraced Osmanagich's theories, particularly those from among the country's ethnic Bosniaks (or Bosnian Muslims), who constitute about 48 percent of Bosnia's population. Visoko was held by Bosniak-led forces during the 1990s war, when it was choked with refugees driven out of surrounding villages by Bosnian Serb (and later, Croat) forces, who repeatedly shelled the town. Today it is a bastion of support for the Bosniaks' nationalist party, which controls the mayor's office. A central tenet of Bosniak national mythology is that Bosniaks are descended from Bosnia's medieval nobility. Ruins of the 14th-century Visoki Castle can be found on the summit of Visocica Hill—on top of the Pyramid of the Sun—and, in combination, the two icons create considerable symbolic resonance for Bosniaks. The belief that Visoko was a cradle of European civilization and that the Bosniaks' ancestors were master builders who surpassed even the ancient Egyptians has become a matter of ethnic pride. "The pyramids have been turned into a place of Bosniak identification," says historian Dubravko Lovrenovic of the Bosnia and Herzegovina Commission to Preserve National Monuments. "If you are not for the pyramids, you are accused of being an enemy of the Bosniaks."

For his part, Osmanagich insists he disapproves of those who exploit his archaeological work for political gain. "Those pyramids don't belong to any particular nationality," he says. "These are not Bosniak or Muslim or Serb or Croat pyramids, because they were built at a time when those nations and religions were not in existence." He says his project should "unite people, not divide them."

Yet Bosnia and Herzegovina still bears the deep scars of a war in which the country's Serbs and, later, Croats sought to create ethnically pure small states by killing or expelling people of other ethnicities. The most brutal incident occurred in 1995, when Serb forces seized control of the town of Srebrenica—a United Nations-protected "safe haven"—and executed some 8,000 Bosniak men of military age. It was the worst civilian massacre in Europe since World War II.

Wellesley College anthropologist Philip Kohl, who has studied the political uses of archaeology, says that Osmanagich's pyramids exemplify a narrative common to the former Eastern bloc. "When the Iron Curtain collapsed, all these land and territorial claims came up, and people had just lost their ideological moorings," he notes. "There's a great attraction in being able to say, ‘We have great ancestors, we go back millennia and we can claim these special places for ourselves.' In some places it's relatively benign; in others it can be malignant."

"I think the pyramids are symptomatic of a traumatized society that is still trying to recover from a truly horrendous experience," says Andras Riedlmayer, a Balkan specialist at Harvard University. "You have many people desperate for self-affirmation and in need of money."

Archaeological claims have long been used to serve political purposes. In 1912, British archaeologists combined a modern skull with an orangutan jaw to fabricate a "missing link" in support of the claim that human beings arose in Britain, not Africa. (The paleontologist Richard Leakey later noted that English elites took so much pride in "being the first, that they swallowed [the hoax] hook, line and sinker." )

More recently, in 2000, Shinichi Fujimura—a prominent archaeologist whose finds suggested that Japanese civilization was 700,000 years old—was revealed to have buried the forged artifacts he had supposedly discovered. "Fujimura's straightforward con was undoubtedly accepted by the establishment, as well as the popular press, because it gave them evidence of what they already wanted to believe—the great antiquity of the Japanese people," Michele Miller wrote in the archaeological journal Athena Review.

Some Bosnian scholars have publicly opposed Osmanagich's project. In April 2006, twenty-one historians, geologists and archaeologists signed a letter published in several Bosnian newspapers describing the excavations as amateurish and lacking proper scientific supervision. Some went on local television to debate Osmanagich. Bosniak nationalists retaliated, denouncing pyramid opponents as "corrupt" and harassing them with e-mails. Zilka Kujundzic-Vejzagic of the National Museum, one of the Balkans' pre-eminent archaeologists, says she received threatening phone calls. "One time I was getting onto the tram and a man pushed me off and said, ‘You're an enemy of Bosnia, you don't ride on this tram,'" she recalls. "I felt a bit endangered."

"I have colleagues who have gone into silence because the attacks are constant and very terrible," says University of Sarajevo historian Salmedin Mesihovic. "Every day you feel the pressure."

"Anyone who puts their head above the parapet suffers the same fate," says Anthony Harding, a pyramid skeptic who was, until recently, president of the European Association of Archaeologists. Sitting in his office at the University of Exeter in England, he reads from a thick folder of letters denouncing him as a fool and a friend of the Serbs. He labeled the file "Bosnia—Abuse."

In June 2006, Sulejman Tihic, then chairman of Bosnia's three-member presidency, endorsed the foundation's work. "One does not need to be a big expert to see that those are the remains of three pyramids," he told journalists at a summit of Balkan presidents. Tihic invited Koichiro Matsuura, then director-general of Unesco, to send experts to determine if the pyramids qualified as a World Heritage site. Foreign scholars, including Harding, rallied to block the move: 25 of them, representing six countries, signed an open letter to Matsuura warning that "Osmanagich is conducting a pseudo-archaeological project that, disgracefully, threatens to destroy parts of Bosnia's real heritage."

But the Pyramid Foundation's political clout appears considerable. When the minister of culture of the Bosniak-Croat Federation, Gavrilo Grahovac, blocked the renewal of foundation permits in 2007—on the grounds that the credibility of those working on the project was "unreliable"—the action was overruled by Nedzad Brankovic, then the federation prime minister. "Why should we disown something that the entire world is interested in?" Brankovic told reporters at a press conference following a visit to the site. "The government will not act negatively toward this project." Haris Silajdzic, another member of the national presidency, has also expressed support for Osmanagich's project, on grounds that it helps the economy.

Critics contend that the project not only sullies Bosnian science but also soaks up scarce resources. Osmanagich says his foundation has received over $1 million, including $220,000 from Malaysian tycoon Vincent Tan; $240,000 from the town of Visoko; $40,000 from the federal government; and $350,000 out of Osmanagich's pocket. Meanwhile, the National Museum in Sarajevo has struggled to find sufficient funds to repair wartime damage and safeguard its collection, which includes more than two million archaeological artifacts and hundreds of thousands of books.

Critics also cite the potential damage to Bosnia's archae- ological heritage. "In Bosnia, you can't dig in your back garden without finding artifacts," says Adnan Kaljanac, a graduate student of ancient history at the University of Sarajevo. Although Osmanagich's excavation has kept its distance from the medieval ruins on Visocica Hill, Kaljanac worries that the project may destroy undocumented Neolithic, Roman or medieval sites in the valley. Similarly, in a 2006 letter to Science magazine, Schoch said the hills in Visoko "could well yield scientifically valuable terrestrial vertebrate specimens. Presently, the fossils are being ignored and destroyed during the ‘excavations,' as crews work to shape the natural hills into crude semblances of the Mayan-style step pyramids with which Osmanagich is so enamored."

That same year, the Commission to Preserve National Monuments, an independent body created in 1995 by the Dayton peace treaty to safeguard historical artifacts from nationalist infighting, asked to inspect artifacts reportedly found at Osmanagich's site. According to commission head Lovrenovic, commission members were refused access. The commission then expanded the protected zone around Visoki, effectively pushing Osmanagich off the mountain. Bosnia's president, ministers and parliament currently have no authority to override the commission's decisions.

But if Osmanagich has begun to encounter obstacles in his homeland, he's had continuing success abroad. This past June, he was made a foreign member of the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences, one of whose academicians served as "scientific chairman" of the First International Scientific Conference of the Valley of the Pyramids, which Osmanagich convened in Sarajevo in August 2008. Conference organizers included the Russian Academy of Technical Sciences, Ain Shams University in Cairo and the Archaeological Society of Alexandria. This past July, officials in the village of Boljevac, Serbia, claimed that a team sent by Osmanagich had confirmed a pyramid under Rtanj, a local mountain. Osmanagich e-mailed me he had not visited Rtanj himself nor had he initiated any research at the site. However, he told the Serbian newspaper Danas that he endorsed future study. "This is not the only location in Serbia, nor the region, where there is a possibility of pyramidal structures," he was quoted as saying.

For now Osmanagich has gone underground, literally, to excavate a series of what he says are ancient tunnels in Visoko—which he believes are part of a network that connects the three pyramids. He leads me through one of them, a cramped, three-foot-high passage through disconcertedly unconsolidated sand and pebbles he says he is widening into a seven-foot-tall thoroughfare—the tunnel's original height, he maintains—for tourists. (The tunnel was partially filled, he says, when sea levels rose by 1,500 feet at the end of the ice age.) He points out various boulders he says were transported to the site 15,000 years ago, some of which bear carvings he says date back to that time. In an interview with the Bosnian weekly magazine BH Dani, Nadija Nukic, a geologist whom Osmanagich once employed, claimed there was no writing on the boulders when she first saw them. Later, she saw what appeared to her as freshly cut marks. She added that one of the foundation's workers told her he had carved the first letters of his and his children's names. (After the interview was published, Osmanagich posted a denial from the worker on his Web site. Efforts to reach Nukic have been unavailing.)

Some 200 yards in, we reach the end of the excavated portion of the tunnel. Ahead lies a tenuous-looking crawl space through the gravelly, unconsolidated earth. Osmanagich says he plans to dig all the way to Visocica Hill, 1.4 miles away, adding that, with additional donations, he could reach it in as few as three years. "Ten years from now nobody will remember my critics," he says as we start back toward the light, "and a million people will come to see what we have."

Colin Woodard is a freelance writer living in Maine. His most recent book is The Republic of Pirates (Harcourt, 2007).

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Additional Sources

"Mad About Pyramids," Science, by John Bohannon, September 22, 2006.

"Some See a 'Pyramid' to Hone Bosnia's Image. Others See a Big Hill," by Craig S. Smith, New York Times, May 15, 2006.

Comments (54)

Intresting comment on the Egytian pyrimids being cast from a sandstone mixture. Ive read about this before and it seems this guy noticed street vendors selling Spynx sp. replicas and other souveniers that look real so he asked a vendor about it and was told they mix up this stuff out of pulverized sandstone and cement type and cast it like any mold and out comes the sandstone looking ptoduct. So he starts thinking and goes out to the great pyrimid and gets some chunks od debris and breakes it up and behold..Contamination with camel hair etc. Or so the story goes.. Supposedly the Egyptian Government doesnt want this to get around as it makes the construction of the pyramids very much more easily doable. Ancient American magazine has a story on the Bosnian pyramid and someone states a carbon dating from wood in alleged tunnel at 30,000 years old.

Posted by Dale on February 4,2013 | 03:45 PM

Whack-a-doodle is not a valid scientific methodology. Nice looking hills though.

Posted by Northland on February 2,2013 | 11:25 AM

It's a natural form. Bosnian Pyramid is fake.

Posted by Jess on January 24,2013 | 05:21 PM

I have not seen the others, but from basic photos one can tell that Visocica Hill looks closer to a pyramid than to a regular 'hill'. Anybody that refutes this is in a constant state of denial.

Posted by jef on January 8,2013 | 01:36 PM

if this is a real pyramid why not clear the foliage off the very top to uncover the top and that would soon prove this to be genuine pyramid or geological????

Posted by alex on December 23,2012 | 03:34 PM

Quite fascinating, his economics degree did him well. #YOLO

Posted by Semeni Somnus on November 27,2012 | 08:18 AM

Well, is certainly strange that this shape should be so naturally pyramidic. I thought that when no entrance could be found that they must be some form of natural. But you do have to take the water site into consideration. As in Ireland. It remains to be determined what conditions existed on Earth when these massive forms were solidified. I am thinking magnetism? What if the water was levitated? In a 10 Tesla that happens, and the effort to draw down this sky river would require? This theory fits with the Maori myth of eels from the sky. For all our science discoveries we are focused on astronomical occurrences when the history of E has yet to be defined.

Posted by katesisco on November 24,2012 | 07:47 PM

There are Pyramids in Bosnia, in spite of the fact, that according to mainstream science, they should not be there. There are lots of excavations sites, any of them is showing lined up megalithic structures. Any megalith is 3D-rectangular. Lets say, lets presume they are natural. If that is the truth, then Empire State Building is also natural, not man made. Why? If you check the soil, it is made of the same material (iron, conglomerate). There are lots of other, similar objects that go high in the sky, made of the same material, in the near-by. I could even find some geologist (not real professionals, of course) that could confirm that. It's easy to play games of science, but it is hard to catch a deep breath and look into the hard evidence, and to be frank with oneself. In defiance to all side counter-theories, Bosnian Pyramids are there, for anyone that is really interested into the truth to go there and to look for himself, and to form his own independent opinion. I am convinced, because I was there, looked at the evidence, touched the megaliths, and saw how jackhammer broke down trying to drill into one of them. Concrete in megaliths is harder then any known natural rock, or man made concrete, so, it must be something done with basic materials, like with concrete material of Empire State Building, yet, the method is unknown to modern science, as in other cases of ancient structures. Mainstream science started to be dogmatic, as church was in middle ages. The which-hunt in media is like which-hunts in those times. It is said, said moment for the world today, that one of the biggest archeological discoveries was being so maliciously scrutinized.

Posted by Nick on October 21,2012 | 09:16 PM

I looked at the pictures and saw no real evidence of a pyramid there. Since when are tunnels (even if they were man made) a solid indication of the existence of a pyramid. Carbon dating, please, what did they carbon dated? the soil or what? Shouldn't we expect the soil of a mountain to be as old as the mountain? Who discovered this pyramids? someone with a degree in international economics and politics and a doctorate in the sociology of history who made a lot of trips to other pyramid sites before he "found" this "pyramids". How many years since the discovery? Can anyone provide me with a link to any undeniable evidence? He and the Bosnian government are really smart. He gains fame and gets paid very well and the government gets tourism. Isn't a book about Hitler and some others going to Antarctica his story to make money and not the history of the world? Were is the evidence in any of this?

Posted by livinginstone on October 19,2012 | 02:34 AM

I am sedimentologist in Comenius University, Bratislava. What I have seen on videos, there are not human made pavement or terraces, but natural beds of sandstones and conglomerates. Individual beds were deposited on sea bottom between marl beds. Sandstone beds were naturally breaked up to regular or irregular blocks. It si common in nature. Very peculiar is shape of the hill. If it is ancient pyramid, it was carved from natural hill but not built.

Posted by Daniel on October 18,2012 | 05:13 AM

i cant halp but enjoy you quack smarmy historians who deny the validation of this pyramid to keep your pathetic tenure. LMFAO! time to rewrite history you paid off shills. your not worth the paper your printed on. what a waste of time and money you were. I guess the smithsonain cant dump THESE artifacts at sea. on behalf of humanity, thanks for nothing.

Posted by jaydi on September 22,2012 | 11:07 AM

I have said it before and I'll say it again. If you are an armchair critic, degreed or not, and have not done research your self on a project, then your comments are hollow.

Posted by Arthur Faram on August 6,2012 | 01:48 PM

pyramid?where is it?inside the mountain,inside the soil.how did it get in there?where are the perfectly cut stones?where are the lovely rooms?where are the lovely steps?where are the corridors?where are the wall drawings and paintings?they either lie for easy money or they work for cia or mossad or

Posted by anticapitalist on July 6,2012 | 12:21 PM

Are we sure we are reading a scientific article on the pyramids in the Smithsonian Magazine? The magazine article reads like a state department rebuttal bringing up the recent Bosnian war. It reads like a white-wash. Sorry Smithsonian, but I have read enough articles in the Smithsonian to realize that this is very un-Smithsonian like article. The article sounds defensive and that I want to ask, is there something that the US government writers are trying to hide, and using the Smithsonian Magazine to get that information out couched in a slanted article.

Posted by Carol on May 23,2012 | 11:46 PM

I was ask to join his team and dowse for the chambers and enterways which is simple. If there are tunnels and rooms I can find them by a very simple move, wait till I get there and I 'll know, I dowse coal mine's here in the MidUS and can tell what is in the mine, Men, mules, track, coal cars and wire for lights, Its easy if you know how!!

Posted by larry bird vp dowsers of Illinois on May 20,2012 | 06:32 PM

Dear Sirs,

I was wondering for how long you will try to censor the latest scientific evidence about stecak monuments?

Don you have ever heard about free speech and objectivity?

Kind regards

Nenad M. Djurdjevic

Posted by Nenad M. Djurdjevic on April 19,2012 | 01:22 PM

Hiya all. I was on the site last year in september, and there is no doubt, human hand created it.

Also guide showed me few "tunnel oppenings" and that was it. I asked him, why dont you remove sediments around the object, you would have better picture of what it is instead of digging tunnels. He started babbling (same as other two guys I asked)... so I gave up.

In my observation, as a average viewer (since Im not "GEO" educated - Im engineer of electronics), its rather some kind fortress than pyramid.

Posted by Rizzbah on March 7,2012 | 05:32 AM

Something that is almost the same is happening here in Indonesia, involving two pyramid-like mountain called Lalakon & Sadahurip. Please go here : http://lakubecik.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=15:discovery-process-of-piramida-lalakon&catid=1:artikel&Itemid=2

Posted by Tom on February 25,2012 | 01:00 PM

Guys this article was written years ago.

In the time since then there have been many developments which prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that there is indeed a complex there. From Strong, un-explainable electromagnetic readings, to how perfectly the pyramids of the complex line up with each other to how perfectly they line up with all other ancient sacred pyramid sites... these stones were cut and there is literally tons of evidence of that. each pyramid even lines up exactly with the cardinal points NSEW. this is a much much older style of pyramid building where a more natural stonework was incorporated. nevertheless, there are countless examples of cut stone and even an ancient type of mortar that holds the stones together.

Posted by STRANGE on January 22,2012 | 08:38 AM

I'm not 100% sure either way, but the evidence given by Dr. Osmanagic does not provide very good evidence. I'm sorry, but "if it looks like a pyramid, it must be built by ancient alien people," doesn't hold any water for me.

I'm sure that there are plenty of ruins near the site, as it is, in fact, a very old place. The problem begins when this guy starts claiming that these pyramids were built on a certain date without any scientific test or process. If I told you that my mother was 300 years old, but provided no photos, no documents, but just said that she looked old, would you believe me? Why wouldn't I try to do some scientific testing to support such a claim?

Where he claims that there are ancient burial grounds, where are the bones? Where are the pots, beakers, jewelry, weapons, artifacts, et cetera? Why believe that they are burial grounds without any evidence?

Strong belief + No evidence = Speculation and loss of credibility.

Maybe he's right, but he's doing a great job leading me to believe that he's wrong.

Posted by Bostjan on January 21,2012 | 12:12 PM

these tunnels that are being dug by osmanagich and friends are just underground streams which he is just enlarging and have always been there. as has been proved in Ireland,the entrances to the tunnels is where the water would have flowed out ,most of the streams now exhausted, now taking a different course inside the mound.as for the rock, it was formed this way during the iceage and is easy to adjust into a step form.

Posted by gary a kelly on January 20,2012 | 01:16 PM

First, I really wanted to believe this. I was reluctant to accept the opposing evidence against this being a legitimate find. I do, however, concede we have to ask the hard questions. We can't suppress any challenges to its authenticity because it is far more damaging to let a hoax continue to appear as fact then it is to allow the sensational, energizing effect these hoaxes have in increasing interest in the general subject of archaeology. I do blame the scientific community as well for some of this. Frankly, I do believe that many things are being concealed from the public to protect the reputations of those who are most influential in setting the current historical dogma. On the other hand, I also believe that that which is being concealed probably isn't nearly as sensational as all this. Honestly I don't know what the real gap in what the public knows vs what a small fraction of the experts on top know, but I do completely believe there IS a gap, possibly a large one. If there wasn't a general consensus or feeling about a cover up, these hoaxes wouldn't convince so many people. Is this Bosnia pyramid thing fake? Yeah, probably. There's motive and there's seemingly some evidence, some first hand accounts, etc. I haven't been there and investigated it personally, so of course I can't say for sure one way or the other, but I'd have to say hoax if asked to choose sides. Scientists should be both more honest and open minded, though. Maybe they wouldn't be hounded by this kind of stuff if they did that more often, instead of being dismissive about anything different.

Posted by Marc on January 19,2012 | 09:19 PM

Osmanagic sees what he believes, not the other way around. His sources of knowledge are Daniken, Hancock, etc. It seems that he believes in some supernatural power of pyramids, i.e. being able to transport souls into other dimensions. He believes that Maya came to Earth that way from some other planet and then went back there the same way. He is hoping to discover how they did it, so he can follow them there. I am not joking, this is in his book about Maya. Ironically, in that book he claims that Maya are not nation or civilization, but in his PhD work he claims that Maya are civilization (he even earned his PhD by contradicting himself). Sam appears to be a dreamer lost in his imaginary world, but still with good business and people manipulation skills. If he wasn't a rich guy, none of this circus would ever happen. Bosnian geologists and archaeologists refuted him long before media picked up this storey.

Posted by hamza on January 19,2012 | 01:07 PM

I believe these are man-made structures. I also believe the structures are very very old. The bigger problem is these structures will force the re-writing of history as we know it today and that creates a problem for those who have manufactured a false history and hid the truth. We have all been cheated of the truth of our evolution as human beings on this sphere. Humanity is much older than we all have been told and or taught. When it is all said and done these pyramid structures will lead back to Africa if the truth is not hidden.

Posted by Looking on December 6,2011 | 12:37 PM

Well, having been to Visoko twice, and experiencing the pyramids for myself, I can, without a doubt, say that the debunkers really don't have much to say in their defense.

See for yourself first, before you comment negatively.

Posted by Sahar Islamovic on November 8,2011 | 01:08 PM

David, reread the article in it's entirety. Smithsonian is NOT actually endorsing the pyramids. They have written about the politics and amateur science as well as Osmanagic's other kooky books and kooky beliefs. No, Smithsonian is not taking it very seriously at all, in fact.

Posted by Matthew R. B. on October 27,2011 | 02:42 PM

Surprised that the Smithsonian's name would be associated with any article that treats this man's claims seriously.

Its a complete hoax/wishful thinking.

No evidence for this whatsoever, and every serious archaeologist knows it. The man is a charlatan.

David Ian Lightbody

Posted by David Ian Lightbody on October 25,2011 | 05:41 PM

I don't understand why it seems many scientists get to a certain point and lose common sense. The structures off of Japan for example, anyone who believes/believed they are natural formations are out of touch with reality. I can only go off of pictures I've seen off of the internet but the same thing goes for this Pyramid. Scientists like to act as though these things are naturally forming yet I've never seen a picture of natural formations that look anything like them.

Posted by matt on August 28,2011 | 01:40 AM

It is amazing to think that many centuries ago civilizations were walking our planet before us. It looks to me that there were bigger civilizations that we thought. If that's the case then they must be more advanced than we actually know about it. More discoveries will let us know them better.

I want to share with you this music about Chichen-Itza. The message of that music is about a change we all humans must to in order to live in peace and harmony. Maybe that's the message ancient civilizations wanted us to know.

Arriving at Chichen-Itza 2012

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zlZh2nwdRBY

In Lak'Ech. Peace.

Posted by Martin on August 25,2011 | 06:24 PM

Well, there is nothing in Visoko ...
"Foundation" received some money from the govt.of B-H at first but thats it. Also, one particular govt. (same that gave that money), presided by now late Prime Minister Ahmet Hadžipašić, was in deep trouble at time with economical crisis shaking the government itself, with at least one strike and road blockade every day by angry and hungry workers, miners, teachers and unemployed, even policemen. Obviously, they (govt.) struck a gold, and poke-out they way out using this fairytale. Nationalism in this context, for the brief moment, really emerged and could be felt among those who endorsed the scheme as well as among those who were "targeted", with this clique (Foundation) often used to smearing opponents calling them unpatriotic. But not for long. You would probably find yourself pretty surprised to learn how small number of believers (yeah, its more about faith then facts) are among Bosnians, never the less, Bosnians liked whole charade and said it will improve country's tourism, touristic offer. And really did - improved tourism, tourist offer and revenue for local economy. So, there are more of those who believe in pyramids in Visoko from Belgrade (Serbia) and especially from Zagreb (Croatia), as fringe science scene or even industry is much more developed and prevalent then in Bosnia (hm [cough!], though Bosnians too cultivated few aces and champions of the "Unseen" before Osmanagić themselves, even lead the way with couple weekly magazines and few book edition).

Posted by Santa on August 9,2011 | 06:52 AM

Everybody who is interested in a somewhat more distinguished view of the topic should read this:

http://irna.lautre.net/An-outstanding-team-of-experts.html

http://irna.lautre.net/Hijacking-an-archaeological.html

Sad to see that even suppoesed archeologists (Mr. "I have a degree in Near Eastern Archaeology") fall for this hoax - wouldn´t harm to take some classes in geology...

Greetings

Posted by Naranjito on July 25,2011 | 02:35 AM

I have been looking into this story for quite a while now and am not sure what to think of it. At this moment there is even a trailer out of a dvd to come about the digg, and am not sure if I am allowed to put a link to it here on the site but do it anyway ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hBzxzXJVLuo )in which the audience are asked wether this is real or just the biggest hoax ever..

Time will tell I guess. I remember the underwater structures of the coast of Japan to have been first dismissed as natural formations while now most people, incl. the scientific community are pretty sure they are manmade.

Posted by Quasi Mundo on April 21,2011 | 05:13 AM

...well, my jury's been out on this one for some time, and i'm afraid the judge has now ruled against Osmanagich. There are several key points in the ruling which i'll list, just so you don't think i'm trying to be rude or shout the idea down merely because it's different. I have considered the premise thoroughly, and from many angles. My points of contention are that:

The pyramidal shaped mounds are exactly similar in terms of internal materials and structure to the surrounding mountains, indicating they were formed at the same time, approx 11 million years ago when the whole area was under water.

There is an up swelling of post war nationalism, and an intense interest in Bosnian histories that will prove the Bosnian's cultural dominance in the area, which has lead to: the government endorsing the pyramids on the grounds that they're 'just obviously' pyramids; any pyramid sceptics being harassed, bullied and victimised by those who think they're being 'un-Bosnian' and/or are Serbian sympathisers; and mega bucks being made from the booming pyramid tourist trade.

Osmanagich and his fans have been busy re-sculpting the sides of the pyramid to make it appear more stepped than it had previously appeared. In addition, it's claimed they've exposed specific rocks chosen for their flat sides and/ or cubic nature (all natural geological features) in prominent areas, the aim being to further enhance the impression of artificial construction.

Most interestingly, Osmanagich and his cohorts are currently digging the tunnels themselves! The tunnels were the one provable, real element of this story that most had me going, so i was a bit gutted to hear this bit. Osmanagich has claimed that he's enlarging existing tunnels, but the walls he's 'uncovered' consist almost exclusively of unconsolidated aggregates, and are no different to the materials being removed. cont...

Posted by ZenPyramid on March 21,2011 | 01:50 PM

Sam Hill said, "I won't insult your intelligence by suggesting that you really believe what you just said." The man insulted ours and the many EDUCATED people with degrees higher than his who are ON THE SPOT working on the Bosnia project and know more than this mans arm chair speculations. By all means return him the favor: insult his supposed intelligence. It is people just like him that drag good hard research/science in the mud!

Posted by robert on March 14,2011 | 11:08 PM

One person just said, "There is absolutely no chance that there are pyramids in Visoko."

How can anyone make such a stupid remark? I suggest that whatever university/college gave this person a college/university degree, they take it back. It's no wonder the world is in such sad shape!

Posted by jeffery on March 14,2011 | 10:03 PM

Well, I have a degree in Near East Archaeology and MUST IMPORTANT I have been there and worked for 2 months on the sites.

There are only two things I want to say:
1- you can't make your own idea if you have not been there.

2- read this...and may all the sceptics finally surrend:
http://www.bosnian-pyramid.com/journal/

oh, yeah...and I am firm about the fact that those are Pyramids!

Posted by Riccardo on January 25,2011 | 03:02 PM

The whole article makes him look looney, yes his ideas might be far fetched but it was ideas that made the world we live in and have found some great discoveries. How much of his ideas are true are another story but what we have in Bosnia is an amazing dsicovery. No man or women who is a firm believer in evolution can fight this one, no matter how many ships from smithsonian dump archeology that doesnt fit the tiny coffin sized science we call proof. The stone balls are massive. Don't tell me some nitwitted ape looking man built this. The only apes I know of that resemble man is the gangsters that grafitti everything, and use violence to solve all the hair line fractures they call problems.
This could be the nail in the coffin of evolution. If I had the money and time I would personaly go out and help dig to my last breath to silence modern mans pride.

Posted by Andrew Bishop on January 18,2011 | 02:44 PM

I've seen some compelling photographs, and there is no way someone can convince me this was a naturally occurring rock formation. One of the "hills" in question is in a perfect pyramid shape, and those stones they're are digging-up seem to have some form of mortared joints. It's just too much of a coincidence to be a natural phenomena.

Posted by J Swiss on December 18,2010 | 05:18 PM

Why is it so hard to beleive that those are real pyramids in Bosnia? France and Italy are swarming with pyramids, which are real, confirmed pyramids. Why not in Bosnia? The whole freaking world is scattered with loads of pyramids, on every continent there are multiple, so why not in Bosnia? Maybe because it will prove the opinion of people like myself that think that there was a supreme civilization before even the sumerians and babylonians who built these structures. It may finally disclos the fact that the sphinx and gizah are much older then thought. Maybe people dont dare to beleive it because it means rewriting history, discarding the three mayor religions (chr-Jew-Musl) who beleive in that idiotic 6000 year old earth myth? There are so many reasons why nobody wants this to be real. For the mayority the world as they know it is good enough, pyramids are egyptian and the hamburger comes from the US, no need to make drastic changes, is there? I have woken up a while ago, so mayor changes in my believe system are welcome because I know it will set me free instead of leaving me with a lifetime imprisonment in a bubble called "normal life". mediocrity is the biggest burden of the mind.

Posted by Mton on October 31,2010 | 06:44 AM

am doing architecture my self, educated people ask to many questions, why is it like this, or that, or who is right or wrong.. supporting something which is discovered, being part of it is a life expericance, by doing that people lern more, no matter what it is, time will tell. the only reason pyramids are such of importance i because of its size, how did people with no technology move something. we all forget before there were lots os slaves,, the more pover u had the more slaves u had, if i put 100 elephants pulling something, how big could that object be,,, is all about learning and helping each other out, that way we will know what is real and what is not

Posted by Bato on October 26,2010 | 09:31 AM

In 2006 Dr. Schoch from Boston University investigated the potential stone temple in Bandol and declared that it is a mere natural formation lacking evidence of artificiality.

Of course, as in case of the Bosnian pyramids, he was wrong: http://www.bosnian-pyramid.com/journal/2010/9/9/under-the-lens-stone-temple-in-bandol.html

Italian archaeologists who actually work for the project of the Bosnian pyramids have all delcared that those are PYRAMIDS.

Dot.

Posted by Nenad Djurdjevic on September 21,2010 | 08:25 AM

At first, i thought it was a hoax too. How can there be a pyramid in Bosnia? Are you kidding me. Leaving Bosnia at the age of 7, i did not know much of my own countries history. In 2006, a cousin called me and said "some guy states that there are pyramids in Bosnia." Of course i did not believe him. Then in June of 2010, on my way to my homeland, i met a professor at the Chicago airport. I was talking to my family in my native tounge and he happened to ask me where we are from and i told him, and he says "oh yes i know Bosnia, i gave a lecture on the pyramids in Visoko, are you going to visit them?" I said, if we get a chance. Than i started to think more about them on our way there. Is it real? Or did he just make it up. On our way to Sarajevo one day, we were riding with my cousin and he said that is the believed Pyramid of the Sun. And let me tell you. It looks like a pyramid. So on our way back we decided to go check it out and see what the people have to say. No one thinks they are pyramids, i think they are. For all who believe it is just a hill, why are there layers of brick underneath piles of dirt and vegitation? Did they put them there over night? Did they appear there overnight? I think not. One day, they will prove that they are indeed pyramids. Visoko means "high" and there has to be some meaning behind the name of the city! Dig it up and do your own research. Research can be disproved but you be your own researcher and find out for yourself if it is real or a hoax.

Posted by E from the A on August 7,2010 | 02:25 AM

There is absolutely no chance that there are pyramids in Visoko. The worst thing about this charlatan is that he is soaking up limited public resources in order to prove what he believes in. While Bosniak nationalists, who are in power in much of Bosnia, are wasting public money on this amateurish research, the real science and scientists are left with nothing. The National Museum, which houses a great deal of Bosnia's real heritage, is not able to pay for heating bill for e.g.
Osmanagic is destroying real heritage in the process...I would not have problem with it, if this was his private land and if he financed it solely out of his own pocket, but utilizing public funds for such adventure is a disgrace.

Posted by shmish on May 20,2010 | 07:51 AM

It raises some very serious questions: stone balls in the area, pyramid shape, and large tunnels underground are impressive, but I am cautious because everything in archeology must withstand the hoax test. other stone structures could have been built later, or might be part of 'the pyramid' I would like to see more proof before I completely am sold on it, but remain very cautiously open to the possibility

Posted by questions on March 7,2010 | 08:34 PM

I am both an anthropology major and a believer in New Age theories. The shape of the mountain is compelling, but it seems discouraging that the geological makeup is the same as the surrounding area. There should be no doubt if it really is a pyramid.

It is also very disconcerting that he may be "digging" a tunnel that did not previously exist and in the process, destroying artifacts.

Posted by Kelly on January 26,2010 | 08:51 PM

Sam Hill,

I won't insult your intelligence by suggesting that you really believe what you just said.

Allegations and insults have been since E-V-E-R the only "science" the project opponents of the Bosnian pyramids have known. Curiously, no project opponent ever visited or researched the archaeological location, but what they were able to do was to cause serious damage the old fort situated in the top of world's highest pyramid.

However, thanks to one of the fiercest opponents a votive pyramid has been unearthed in the Visoko valley, so I would like use the occasion to express my gratitude for this exceptional discovery :)

Sam Hill, maybe you don’t know, but in Old Europe everything is older than what you have in your home country!

Please tell me, how the public or reader should define those who caused irrevocable damage to the medieval town Visoki in order to protect an archaeological and historical dogma?

The Bosnian pyramids are real, the tunnel system below the valley is an astonishing opus. The stone spheres have been used in megalithic sites around Bosnia since unknown times and, as Egyptologist Dr. Swelim stated: "In Visoko we have world's biggest pyramid, ... an architectural accomplishment of highest importance for the whole world."

So, please put your anger and insults aside and come to visit the Bosnian Valley of the Pyramids ;)

Posted by Nenad Djurdjevic on January 18,2010 | 05:20 PM

Okay, let me spell this out for some of the more gullible readers...this is a H-O-A-X, and no matter how much this moron says it's true...it never will be.

Posted by Sam Hill on January 9,2010 | 12:51 AM

It kind of seems like this article rather biased towards the bosnian "amateur archaeologist", but from the information given it seems clear that this "hill" is nothing but a heap of mud due to the fact they have not published any finds on artifacts or other structural findings. Rocks with freshly carved writings is hardly evidence that there was a civilization living here, and the fact that they haven't published pictures of these "Writings" further announces that this is a kind of hoax.

Although we can't say anything definite until the site is either excavated or scientifically/historically proven that a civilization might have lived here at any given time of antiquity.

Posted by Sunwoo Yang on December 31,2009 | 05:17 PM

Seems "the hills are alive, with the sound of sausage being made". Geology is amazing. It is a science, folks. And it occurs in regular and irregular formations. The Bosnian hills are a combination of regular and irregular, natural formations. It is the human mind of Ogmanagich that sees a pattern and attaches unashamed importance to simple hills.

Also, here is the simple answer, yet absolutely amazing geological one, to the "magical stone spheres". These are found in many places where hydrological forces have taken place. Many are found in ravines, waterways, etc. Some have been moved and re-shaped by humans, too. If one has ever heard of a "billabong", one will gain insight to the making of these spheres that come in many sizes. They are the stones that make regular, "drilled" holes along river beds, where the constant erosion of sand and said stones, shape the billabongs, forming nice holes and pretty perfect round stones. In places beyond imagine, where huge floods have spilled water and volumes at high velocity, these can get rather large. As to their "perfect" roundness, ALL of nature tends to spherical space- throw a handful of water in the air sometime; you will see it jiggle into varying sized spheres. Depending on the plasticity of the material, this is what happens, in short or long periods of time, to everything under the sun and stars, unless acted upon by other forces thwarting the design.

Posted by David on December 30,2009 | 11:46 AM

Ancient Slavic tribes were building these burial hills. It's no wondering. For this reason, I agree to opinion that the citiziens of Bosnia want to get better their selffillign.

Posted by neoconstantine on December 22,2009 | 06:29 AM

This isn't anything new. I studied these pyramid hills in Art History and later in Architecture 101 at the Univ. of Washington over 20 years ago although both courses stated that up to that point not enough research was done to confirm whether the hills were completely built by hand starting from a relatively flat field upwards or the local humans had built structures in and around an existing hill. Doesn't appear that anyone has any new information yet.

Posted by Jeff on December 19,2009 | 02:43 PM

This is ridiculous. In the face of legitimate scientific opposition to his digging, Samir continues to destroy and dig up real discoveries and tosses them aside. I could care less if some crazy, wants to front the money and carve a pyramid out of a mountain; but when he is disturbing real finds for his popular hypothetical tripe we have a problem. Samir should be stopped immediately before it's too late.

Posted by David B. on December 15,2009 | 05:27 PM

ANCIENT PYRAMIDES...VISOKO
WHO BUILD THEM 3...?
It would be very interesting to have a follow-up from scientists about that discovery. In the world there are lots of places with great pyramids like China among those...But those near VISOKO are very interesting as we don't know much about them or WHAT IS IT???? Merci-Thank You.

Posted by Lucien Alexandre Marion on December 15,2009 | 03:05 PM

I have visited Visoko Valley and the Bosnian Pyramids two years in a row. I encourage all Americans to visit Bosnia to see these incredible pyramidal structures, with a tunnel system, currently being excavated,that runs underneath the the pyramid complex, and to visit the many sites in Bosnia-Herzogovina that have these huge, mysterious stone spheres (stone balls). The highest concentration of stone balls is in Zavidovici, where about 40 of them were discovered in a ravine.

Bosnia, Croatia and Serbia are all beautiful countries, the people are nice and it is safe to travel there. My favorite places are the Adriatic Coast, Medugorje, and Sarajevo. Belgrade (Beograd) in Serbia and Zagreb in Croatia are also beautiful cities, with fascinating architecture and history.

Posted by Sharon Prince on December 2,2009 | 10:11 AM

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The Mystery of Bosnia's Ancient Pyramids