The Mysterious Crystal Skulls
According to a Mayan legend, there are 13 crystal skulls in the world with strange powers, which represented a mysterious deity. What is their true meaning?
Early 1900s. During the exploration of South America, a famous English archaeologist and explorer, F.A. Mitchell-Hedges, known as "Mike," who was passionate about pre-Columbian civilizations and searching for traces of Atlantis, met a French orphan girl named Ann le Guillon, whom he adopted and took with him. Upon arriving in Honduras in 1923, the explorer encountered the ancient ruins of a Mayan city called Lubaantun. Four years later, in 1927, the now twenty-year-old girl was celebrating her birthday. During a walk in the area where the excavations were taking place, she was attracted by a peculiar glimmer emerging from the ground in front of a stone altar. Driven by immense curiosity, Ann began to dig and unearthed a marvelous skull made of pure transparent rock crystal, carved from a single perfectly polished block, weighing about 5 kilograms, 13 cm wide and high, and 18 cm long.
The dimensions were similar to a human skull, except that the mandible was missing. This was found several months later, after sifting through the entire excavation area. When Dr. Mitchell-Hedges decided to hand over the artifact to the local indigenous people, they stated that it was the image of an ancient deity with a skull face, which had the power to heal diseases but also to kill. After completing the excavations in Honduras, the archaeologist decided to leave with his daughter, and as a sign of friendship, the indigenous people gave them the crystal skull. It seemed strange to the archaeologists that the indigenous people had given the researcher an object of such great importance to them, but unfortunately, neither of the two ever answered this question.
Only years later, in his biography in 1954, the archaeologist mentioned something about the matter:
"…We also brought with us the sinister skull of doom, about which much has been written. I have good reasons for not revealing how this object came into my possession…"
Mike himself claimed that the skull gave a sense of unease, saying that it was described as a representation of evil, and he had no intention of explaining why. On the contrary, his daughter was completely fascinated by it, feeling joy and protection from it, much like what the indigenous people claimed. Even today, Ann, now a centenarian, still possesses the skull, which was left to her by her father upon his death in 1959. According to a Mayan legend recounted in the Popol Vuh,
"…There are 13 crystal skulls in the world. When all of these are discovered and united, they will transmit all their knowledge to humanity. But only when humanity is sufficiently evolved…"
Even today, when and how they were made remains a mystery. Initially, scientists examining them claimed that they probably dated back 3600 years and that the artisans would have taken at least three hundred years to work on them. This is the maximum time they would have required, given the hardness of the material and the tools available at the time; it is believed that to polish it so perfectly, without leaving even a visible scratch under a microscope, the artisan would have shaped it with patient work using sand. However, the true origin of the object and how it was actually created remains a mystery to researchers.
In addition to the Mitchell-Hedges skull, there is another similar one on display at the British Museum in London, but unlike the first, this one has a fixed jaw. The dimensions and weight are the same, with only a few less precise details. It is probably of Aztec origin, perhaps from the 15th century, but its exact age is unknown. It was brought to Europe from Mexico by a Spanish officer, and after much wandering, it arrived in London where it was eventually displayed. It is said that this is probably a fake because the craftsmanship is very precise and the type of quartz is not present in that area of Mexico; however, it is possible that the builders imported the minerals from Brazil, which has vast quartz mines. Five other crystal skulls have been examined, but only two are said to be authentic. One of these is displayed at the Smithsonian Museum in Washington and is known as "Max." It is made of milky white quartz and belongs to an American woman from Houston, Texas, named Joann Parks, who claims it was given to her by a Tibetan.
According to anyone who has had the chance to see the skulls up close, all of them have more or less the same qualities: it is said that the guardians of the British Museum felt a strange sense of unease being near the artifacts, and some even claimed to see strange figures moving inside the prism-cut eyes of the skulls. For this reason, many museum custodians refuse to watch over the areas where the artifacts are kept. Even Ann, who has been keeping the skull for years, covers it to avoid staring at it.
Many experts who have had the opportunity to examine all the skulls nevertheless claim that they are fakes, while some have not wanted the results of their analyses to be known. Whenever we encounter strange objects from the past that involve unknown technologies, scientists tend to discredit them by labeling them as fakes or hiding the analysis results. This is either because they cannot reach conclusions or because the findings might be uncomfortable for the scientific community.
The fact remains that these works of high engineering have come to us directly from the past, brought here by ancient explorers. Therefore, it cannot be assumed that the ancients did not have advanced technologies to produce such objects; consider all the Ooparts found around the world. But what was the reason for using quartz to create these objects? And what were they used for? As the indigenous people told the explorer Mitchell-Hedges, they were used to heal diseases. Today, the physical and healing properties of quartz crystals are well known in science. These stones withstand heat well and conduct pure energy, which is why we use them in crystal therapy for physical and mental ailments. Marie Curie discovered in the nineteenth century that applying strong pressure to them generated electricity. This was also explained by Plato when he spoke of Atlantis, stating that crystals were used to produce large quantities of energy, probably the same used by many ancient peoples such as the Maya or the Egyptians, and thus considered sacred.
Regarding the deity that the indigenous people said it represented, they claimed it was an ancient Death Goddess with a skeleton face, originating from Venus. Near Oaxaca in Mexico, there are temples depicting this deity; in the Monte Alban site, gold objects shaped like deities with skull faces have been found, engraved with strange symbols and hieroglyphs that might indicate a date. Here, there is a megalithic pyramid-shaped temple known as the Temple of the Tigers, with many skulls carved in profile. This temple was supposedly built on the top of a mountain whose peak was cut off. Regarding this, even the American archaeologist Hyatt Verrill could not comprehend how such a feat was accomplished, certainly not, according to him, by simple slaves who, according to official archaeology, did not even know work tools.
As we previously mentioned, there are said to be 13 skulls, and it seems that besides Ann's, the British Museum's, and the white one known as "Max," others have been found. One of these is made of pure amethyst, also carved from a single block, and was discovered in 1915 among some Mayan artifacts in Yucatan. Before this, another was found in 1906 on a property in Costa Rica; in 1912, yet another similar one in transparent quartz. Others include one in clear quartz in 1942 with Mayan symbols engraved on it; one in smoky quartz (with a pointed jaw, called "ET"); and another in rose quartz found in Honduras. As we said, all these have been considered fakes by scientists because microscopic traces of "rotating tools" were noted, which, according to the experts, could not have existed at the time! Nonetheless, it is likely that some of these skulls are not original, given their unverifiable provenance. However, the fact remains that others were unearthed from excavations conducted among ancient Mayan and pre-Columbian ruins, making their authenticity undeniable, as in the case of the Mitchell-Hedges skull.
From our perspective, the legend says that there are 13 skulls, and among those likely to be authentic are the white one, the amethyst one, the ET skull, and the pink one. This, in our view, carries an important message because among the known varieties of crystals, there are thirteen different colors! So, if according to the legend there are 13 skulls, and those found in different colors are already five, then the others, three in clear quartz, should be the fakes. According to our theory, each skull would be a different color from the others, exactly 13 like the number of crystal varieties. We know that 13 is a sacred number in many cultures, especially matriarchal ones.
Thirteen is the number of full moons in a year, which signifies a deep connection with cosmic natural forces, implying a connection with the female body. There are actually 13 zodiac signs; the thirteenth member of a group is the master or initiate destined to succumb and rise again (Jesus and the apostles, but also Sleeping Beauty betrayed by one of the twelve fairies, the Knights of the Round Table and King Arthur, etc.), 12 were the tablets of the law representative of a thirteenth, 12 are the dimensions according to String Theory, and the thirteenth represents the Universe. Additionally, the Babylonians used a base-12 mathematical system, and thirteen cabalistically represented Unity and therefore Divinity.
If so, this explains the significance of the sacredness of the used crystals and the prophecy: "When they are all reunited, they will transmit knowledge to humanity..." What did the Maya mean? Perhaps, with their union, these crystals will transmit (or activate) immense energy.
