The Secrets of Ahnenerbe: German Expeditions in the Mountains of Adygea
A strange briefcase with the logo of the Ahnenerbe, the secret association founded by Heinrich Himmler, was found in the western part of the Caucasus, together with two enigmatic skulls that do not seem to belong to the human species. What did the specialists of the Third Reich do in the mountains of Adygea?
In 1935 Adolf Hitler founded the Forschungsgemeinschaft Deutsches Ahnenerbe e. V., better known simply as Ahnenerbe, and translatable as “Ancestral Heritage Research Society”. Among the founders was Heinrich Himmler, one of the most influential men in the Nazi's Third Reich after the Führer.
Until 1920, Adolf Hitler and his other comrades in arms of the future National Socialist Party had an active interest in the mystical aspects of the origins of the Germans. They joined various societies (such as the Thule Society), where paganism and ancient Germanic cults were studied. A neo-pagan, Alfred Rosenberg, was appointed by Hitler in 1934 to the position of head of ideological education of the party (despite the indignation of the church). However, after the early 1920s, Hitler's attention to occultists and mysticism had waned, so much so that he openly attacked them in “Mein Kampf” (the first edition of the book dates back to 1925).
But the Ahnenerbe, founded on July 1st 1935, survived until 1945. During this period there were many persons among the German elite who enthusiastically supported these mystical ideas. Shortly after its creation, the Ahnenerbe officially became part of the SS. With over 300 scientists as members, the organization continued to search for the heritage and traditions of the so-called “Germanic race”. Indeed, they have searched for very strange things, such as King Arthur's sword or the Holy Grail, things that occultists considered "Aryan treasures".
Some germans believed that many artifacts remained on the territory of the Soviet Union, in the Caucasus.
The entrance to the caves of the Atlanteans
According to some Nazi theories, the cradle of the "Aryan race" could have been Tibet. In 1938, Ahnenerbe members, led by the zoologist Ernst Schäfer, a man from Hitler's inner circle, organized an expedition to the Tibetan mountains, where, in addition to carrying out scientific tasks, has as main goal find traces of the “Aryan” pre-religion and “Aryan” ancestors”.
In their opinion, the Atlanteans must still exist and hide deep in the caves of Tibet. It is clear that they did not receive any information about the entrance to these caves from the local lamas, but the search did not stop. At that time, the bizarre theory that there was a "back door" to the Tibetan caves, and that it was in the Caucasus, had many supporters among the German elite.
In August 1942, an elite Alpine division of the Wehrmacht, with some Ahnenerbe members, conquered the summit of Mount Elbrus (the highest peak in Europe, at 5,642 meters), in Kabardino-Balkaria, raising the Nazi's flag there. The operation was code-named “Edelweiss” and was not justified by any military purpose: for the Nazis the only strategic objective in the Caucasus was the control of the Black Sea ports, certainly not climbing a mountain peak.
For this reason, as Albert Speer, the architect Minister of Armaments and War Production of the Reich from 1942 to 1945 recalled, Hitler was furious: "Still several days later, he took it out, talking to all his collaborators, with 'those mountaineers with broken brains' who, according to him, 'should have been brought to the military tribunal!' In the middle of the war, according to the Führer, they had followed "idiotic ambitions", occupying "idiotic peaks", just when he had ordered to concentrate all german forces for the breakthrough towards Sukhumi.
However, Mount Elbrus had been taken and a base was even established in that area. In 2015, the remains of soldiers from the Edelweiss division were found there, buried by an avalanche. Not far from those places, in the Kharakhora massif, in a 78 meter cave, a brown suitcase with the "Ahnenerbe" logo was found. Close to the briefcase there were two skulls, very difficult to identify.
The mysterious skulls
The german team was exclusively engaged in the search and theft of archaeological artefacts. Herbert Jankuhn, at that time a very famous archaeologist and professor in Germany, was very active in this area. First he went to Crimea and then he moved to the Caucasus. There is documentary evidence of this because there were SS combat units escorting him.
The discovery of the briefcase suggests that the germans were present in the region because they were interested in the mysteries of the ancient dolmens, or in discovering the causes of the high natural radioactivity found in the canyon of the Kishinski region.
However, the presence of the briefcase near the site where the skulls were found has given rise to the hypothesis that the Nazis were in contact with non-terrestrial beings. Of course, it is also possible that these are two completely distinct cases.
Conspiracy blogs speculate that the two skulls are the remains of alien creatures. The skulls are different from anything else known to man. One of the most curious features is the absence of the cranial vault and the jaws, while the eye sockets are unusually large, from which two long separate horn-like growths emerge. However, the facial bones are flat, as in hominids. Furthermore the round hole at the bottom of the skulls is the base of the spinal column, which suggests that these creatures moved on two legs.
Do the mysterious adygea skulls belong to aliens?
There are those who believe that the discoveries are part of a great hoax, hypothesizing that the features of the two skulls were obtained by modeling the pelvic bones of large animals while some others hypothesize that it may be the skull of a wild sheep exposed to water erosion which may have altered its shape.
