at the FMS stone cutting yard in
northern Italy blocks of exotic marble
colorful Brandon are imported from
across the world here they are cut into
slabs destined for a high-end kitchen
and bathroom countertops not too long
ago the mason sliced a massive block of
Egyptian limestone that’s like a loaf of
bread but the slabs couldn’t be used for
countertops
they were riddled with what appeared to
be fossilized bones so a common agenda a
produce a party on being Masons we were
ignore the importance of the discovery
we had made says supervisor Ricardo
Franchione e viado but they knew enough
to call in some italian experts who
determined they had inadvertently
created an almost perfect cross-section
of an ancient whale it lived in egypt 40
million years ago finding the ancient
whales from Egypt a country that’s 95
percent desert might seem unusual but it
isn’t for decades
National Geographic grantee Philip
Gingrich has been digging up whale bones
near the oasis of for you during the
time of the dinosaurs the area was
covered by the ocean and is now filled
with marine fossils still gingrich the
premier expert in egyptian whales was
intrigued when he was notified about the
discovery so Gingrich and Egyptian
authorities drove out to visit in person
they determined that any potential whale
bones would be embedded deep in the
layers of limestone almost impossible to
discover except by chance however they
found something else of interest the
quarries also contain columns of
redstone from a later period after the
water and whales had disappeared sudden
they have done on me that should have
bones in it
there should be animals preserved in
that sediment too so I went over to the
base of the first outcrop got down on my
hands and knees and there were bones all
over the place some samples were removed
for further investigation National
Geographic researchers Greg Janelle and
Ellen Miller were able to tease out a
pile of small mammal bones from the rock
they realize these little jaws and legs
have an amazing significance they may be
the remains of some of the first mammals
to migrate from Asia to the African
continent see way back when land masses
were shifting Africa was an isolated
island drifting toward Eurasia then
about 20 million years ago as sea levels
dropped the two continents were joined
for the first time you get a land bridge
between Eurasia and Africa and at that
time you get a whole array of different
kinds of animals which comes flooding
into Africa and the deposits here
preserve the remains of those animals
the first immigrants from Eurasia into
Africa Egypt was likely one of the
points of entry for that flood of Asian
animals and they evolved over millions
of years to become some of the iconic
animals of Africa zebras
rhinoceros wildebeest quit the quarry
provide clues from that period
to find out National Geographic
partially funded an expedition to the
quarry’s to collect more evidence the
team included Miller and Janelle along
with Bill Sanders and Ahmed Albuquerque
of Cairo University I didn’t find
anything over there but do you have here
anything in here yet they chip away at
samples it’s hard and dusty work inside
the little rocks we look for any sign
that there’s any kind of bone or teeth
or anything like that and if we find
some idea that this is going to contain
bone we take it back to the lab and we
process it there the bones are a smaller
mammals like rats and bats
they’ll help the scientists establish
what life was like here all those
millions of years ago
the small animals are really important
because they’re very sensitive to
temperature and climate they don’t move
very far during their lifetime so
they’re a very good indicator of
relative humidity rainfall things like
that
the findings may confirm that this
barren desert was a different place when
the mammal started to cross from Asian
was a lush tropical Delta with a series
of large river systems it was a tempting
new home for animals on the move
when they first arrived these animals
looked very different from what they
look like today but on the wide open
plains removed and isolated from their
now distant Asian ancestors they began
to evolve the giraffe’s neck grew longer
the zebra developed its stripes they
became what many think of today as
uniquely African animals not realizing
that they have Asian roots the
researchers haven’t found any major
fossils at the quarry yet but they are
gathering more pieces of a fascinating
puzzle actually every every fossil got
its its own importance it’s not only
that we find one fossil but to integrate
the information together to get the
bigger picture every day you come out
and you you work as hard as you can and
you have to be optimistic if you’re a
paleontologist you have to also be lucky
and every day you come out and you think
this is the day this is the day this is
the day and some days it it’s right this
is exactly where you often find a little
bones and for these paleontologists this
was just one of those proverbial days
when an accidental discovery in a
limestone countertop in Italy led to new
information about the ancestors of
iconic African animals
sponsored by National Geographic mission
programs taking science and exploration
into the new millennium
northern Italy blocks of exotic marble
colorful Brandon are imported from
across the world here they are cut into
slabs destined for a high-end kitchen
and bathroom countertops not too long
ago the mason sliced a massive block of
Egyptian limestone that’s like a loaf of
bread but the slabs couldn’t be used for
countertops
they were riddled with what appeared to
be fossilized bones so a common agenda a
produce a party on being Masons we were
ignore the importance of the discovery
we had made says supervisor Ricardo
Franchione e viado but they knew enough
to call in some italian experts who
determined they had inadvertently
created an almost perfect cross-section
of an ancient whale it lived in egypt 40
million years ago finding the ancient
whales from Egypt a country that’s 95
percent desert might seem unusual but it
isn’t for decades
National Geographic grantee Philip
Gingrich has been digging up whale bones
near the oasis of for you during the
time of the dinosaurs the area was
covered by the ocean and is now filled
with marine fossils still gingrich the
premier expert in egyptian whales was
intrigued when he was notified about the
discovery so Gingrich and Egyptian
authorities drove out to visit in person
they determined that any potential whale
bones would be embedded deep in the
layers of limestone almost impossible to
discover except by chance however they
found something else of interest the
quarries also contain columns of
redstone from a later period after the
water and whales had disappeared sudden
they have done on me that should have
bones in it
there should be animals preserved in
that sediment too so I went over to the
base of the first outcrop got down on my
hands and knees and there were bones all
over the place some samples were removed
for further investigation National
Geographic researchers Greg Janelle and
Ellen Miller were able to tease out a
pile of small mammal bones from the rock
they realize these little jaws and legs
have an amazing significance they may be
the remains of some of the first mammals
to migrate from Asia to the African
continent see way back when land masses
were shifting Africa was an isolated
island drifting toward Eurasia then
about 20 million years ago as sea levels
dropped the two continents were joined
for the first time you get a land bridge
between Eurasia and Africa and at that
time you get a whole array of different
kinds of animals which comes flooding
into Africa and the deposits here
preserve the remains of those animals
the first immigrants from Eurasia into
Africa Egypt was likely one of the
points of entry for that flood of Asian
animals and they evolved over millions
of years to become some of the iconic
animals of Africa zebras
rhinoceros wildebeest quit the quarry
provide clues from that period
to find out National Geographic
partially funded an expedition to the
quarry’s to collect more evidence the
team included Miller and Janelle along
with Bill Sanders and Ahmed Albuquerque
of Cairo University I didn’t find
anything over there but do you have here
anything in here yet they chip away at
samples it’s hard and dusty work inside
the little rocks we look for any sign
that there’s any kind of bone or teeth
or anything like that and if we find
some idea that this is going to contain
bone we take it back to the lab and we
process it there the bones are a smaller
mammals like rats and bats
they’ll help the scientists establish
what life was like here all those
millions of years ago
the small animals are really important
because they’re very sensitive to
temperature and climate they don’t move
very far during their lifetime so
they’re a very good indicator of
relative humidity rainfall things like
that
the findings may confirm that this
barren desert was a different place when
the mammal started to cross from Asian
was a lush tropical Delta with a series
of large river systems it was a tempting
new home for animals on the move
when they first arrived these animals
looked very different from what they
look like today but on the wide open
plains removed and isolated from their
now distant Asian ancestors they began
to evolve the giraffe’s neck grew longer
the zebra developed its stripes they
became what many think of today as
uniquely African animals not realizing
that they have Asian roots the
researchers haven’t found any major
fossils at the quarry yet but they are
gathering more pieces of a fascinating
puzzle actually every every fossil got
its its own importance it’s not only
that we find one fossil but to integrate
the information together to get the
bigger picture every day you come out
and you you work as hard as you can and
you have to be optimistic if you’re a
paleontologist you have to also be lucky
and every day you come out and you think
this is the day this is the day this is
the day and some days it it’s right this
is exactly where you often find a little
bones and for these paleontologists this
was just one of those proverbial days
when an accidental discovery in a
limestone countertop in Italy led to new
information about the ancestors of
iconic African animals
sponsored by National Geographic mission
programs taking science and exploration
into the new millennium
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