5 Ancient Symbols with Mysterious Meanings

Ever since we learnt how to draw, to carve, to daub and to write, mankind has used symbols
and logos for various purposes both good and evil.
We use symbols to intimidate people, to indicate our love, to deign something sacred and to
demonstrate our faith.
But there are some symbols out there that we're not quite sure about.
Symbols that have been used all over the world and by many disparate cultures, but whose
origins and meanings have been lost to time.
So let's take a look at a few of them right now, in our list of five ancient symbols with
mysterious meanings.
Number 5: The Jolly Roger The Jolly Roger is of course heavily associated
with Pirates, with the combination of a white skull and crossbones on a black background
used to indicate that the ship approaching you was full of men who wanted to steal your
doubloons, drink your rum, and caress you ever so gently with their shiny hooked hands.
But where did this symbol come from?
Well, the Jolly Roger would be flown when a ship was getting ready to attack, and was
most commonly seen during the early 1700's.
But this wasn't the first time the skull and crossbones emblem had been used to strike
fear into the hearts of one's enemy, because many historians believe that the Jolly Roger
symbol dates back to the mysterious Knights Templar.
The Knights Templar was a Catholic military order which became one of the most powerful
and wealthiest organisations in the world after their inception in 1119.
The group, which was responsible for laying the foundations of our modern banking system,
was supposedly disbanded by Pope Clement the Fifth in 1312.
But legend has it that the Knights Templar merely disappeared from public view, with
their influence rumoured to be still in effect today through organisations such as the Freemasons
and the Illuminati.
During the height of their powers the Knights Templar even had their own fleet of ships,
which in the 13th Century may have constituted the largest navy in the world.
This fleet was often used for acts of piracy, and the skull and crossbones symbol used by
the Templar was flown during these raids.
So where did they get it from?
Well one theory links it to a gruesome legend involving a Templar who desecrated the grave
of his ex-lover.
Described as "a great lady of Maraclea", the woman apparently died when she was young,
but her Templar bae wasn't having this, so he dug up her body and violated it, as you
do.
At this point a strange voice told the Knight to return in nine months to find his son,
so he obliged, and when he dug up his ex-lover's grave for a second time he found a head placed
upon two crossed leg bones - hence the skull and crossbones.
This head supposedly possessed magical powers, allowing the Knight to defeat his enemies
merely by showing it to them, and when he died, the head became property of the Knights
Templar, who took it as a symbol to intimidate their enemies.
Number 4: The Three Hares The symbol of the three hares depicts three
hares chasing each other in a circle, with each one having two ears, but with the three
hares arranged so that only three individual ears need to be shown.
Nobody knows quite what this symbol means, but whatever it stands for must be universally
understood, because it's been found in locations all around the world.
The three hares symbol has been spotted on a 15th Century church roof in southern England,
on a 13th Century copper coin used by the Mongol people, and displayed in Ukrainian
synagogues from the 16th Century.
The three hares symbol has also been found on a 13th Century German church bell, a 14th
Century Jewish manuscript, and even painted on the walls of 5th Century Chinese Buddhist
caves.
In fact several sightings of the three hares have come from these caves near the Chinese
town of Dunhuang, which was once an important part of the ancient Silk Road.
This proximity to such an important trade route means the symbol probably originated
in China, before making its way through Persia and spreading across ancient Europe - but
to be honest that assessment is a complete and utter guess.
Because in truth, the Three Hares symbol's origin is as unknown as its meaning,.
However, since it seems to transcend cultures, language and religion, we can deduce that
it must once have been a mark of great importance.
Number 3: The @ (at) Symbol Now hold on a minute, surely we're stretching
the limits of the word "ancient" here aren't we?
I mean sure, the "at" symbol must go back a few decades at least, but that hardly qualifies
it as ancient does it?
No, it does not.
But what you may not know is that the first recorded use of the "at" symbol came from
a Bulgarian translation of an old Greek chronicle, circa 1345.
In this context, "at" was used to replace the capital letter A in the word Amen, but
nobody knows why, and over the following centuries the "at" symbol has been used in a variety
of different contexts outside of religion too.
At one point it signified a unit of measurement known as an amphora, which was used by the
French, Spanish and Portuguese.
But the symbol has also been employed as a contraction of the Latin word "ad", which
seems pretty unnecessary, as a Greek preposition which meant "at the rate of", and as a Norman
French symbol derived from one of their fancy letter á's - you know, the one with a little
hat on.
The "at" symbol then began to appear on typewriters towards the end of the 19th Century for use
as an amphora in business correspondence, and today of course we use it for emails,
twitter handles, and for getting swearwords past a profanity filter.
But before all this, nobody knows exactly where the "at" symbol came from, who invented
it, and what it was originally used for.
What we do know is that different countries call the "at" symbol different things, based
on what they think it looks like.
In Armenian it's called a shnik, meaning puppy.
In Hungarian it's called a kukac, which means maggot.
And in many languages including Bulgarian, Croatian, Dutch and Macedonian they refer
to this symbol as monkey, little monkey, or monkey tail.
Number 2: The Pine Cone Symbol The Pinecone symbol is associated with many
of Earth's oldest and supposedly most enlightened civilizations, as pinecones themselves are
meant to represent the Third Eye and the human Pineal Gland.
The Pineal Gland, which can be found in the brain and which looks a lot like a pinecone,
has long been thought of as the potential source of either the human soul, consciousness
or some other state of spiritual awakening.
But even with modern technology, we don't know much about what the Pineal Gland actually
does.
However, due to the use of this symbol repeatedly throughout the cultures of the Roman Empire,
the Babylonians, The Sumerians and the Egyptians, some people believe that these early civilizations
found and subsequently lost the ability to operate the Pineal gland, or at least had
some understanding of how it once worked, leading them to then worship the Pinecone
as a symbol of human enlightenment.
This is only a guess, though, as we're really not quite sure why the Pinecone and Pineal
Gland came to be seen as so meaningful.
But the reason why this symbol permeates so many cultures is simple, since the Conifer
Pine Trees from which they come are one of the oldest and most widely spread species
of plant on the planet.
So at least we know something.
Number 1: The Swastika Since its appropriation by a certain group
of zero-chill Germans in the 20th Century, the Swastika has come to represent evil, death,
intolerance and bigotry.
But that's not always been the case.
Some of you may already know that this symbol was originally used to decorate items that
were lucky or auspicious, and for most of recorded history it was considered a positive
mark, with Hindus, Buddhists and Jainists still believing it to be a sacred symbol even
today.
But what you might not know is that the use of this symbol, also known as the gammadion
cross or the Hakenkreuz, actually dates back before the Neolithic period over 14,000 years
ago.
On the site of a Palaeolithic Ukrainian settlement called Mezine, archaeologists found a small
bird carved from mammoth ivory that was covered in this symbol, and this was later confirmed
as having been made between 12,000 and 10,000 BC.
Similar symbols have also been seen in Aztec and Mayan works, Native North American carvings
and in objects found in ancient settlements of Western Europe.
There's no doubt that this symbol has become heavily stigmatised today due to its more
recent usage, but when the first groups of civilised humans began to carve it, what did
they mean to use it for?
What did it represent?
How did it make its way to India, South America and Europe?
And also, how did one group of tyrants manage to change its meaning so drastically?
Will the peace symbol be a mark of hatred in 100 years' time?
I wouldn't bet against it.
Those hippies are a pretty violent bunch once you start messing with their tofu.
So that's our list.
And if you're looking for even more mysterious tales of ancient codes and words, take a look
at our recent video on seven hieroglyphs surrounded in mystery.
They are literally surrounded, like, totally enveloped, enshrouded and smothered from head
to toe in delicious creamy intrigue.
I wouldn't lie to you folks.

5 Ancient Symbols with Mysterious Meanings

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