Nazis travel half the globe away in order to hunt for an ancient statue made from a meteorite that fell from space and landed on Earth approximately 10,000 to 20,000 years ago.
Yes, it sounds perhaps like a proposed Indiana Jones movie plot from the 1980's, but sometimes real life is stranger than fiction, because this story, evidently, is real.
Evidently, German researchers, led by Dr. Elmar Buchner of the University of Stuttgart, have confirmed that this statue that the Nazis obtained on an expedition to Tibet just prior to the outbreak of the war did, indeed, come from a meteorite that fell from space. They conducted some tests and found that it was made of axatite, a metal from a scarce kind of meteorite, and contains high concentrations of iron and nickel.
The expedition took place between 1938-1939, and was backed by Nazis, particularly by Heinrich Himmler, at least in part to trace the origins of the Aryans, in an effort to lend historical credibility to the Nazi theory of the roots of alleged racial superiority of what they viewed as the Aryan race. This theory was crucial to Nazi ideology, and the justification of their worldview, and their particular understanding and interpretation of history.
They may have been attracted to this statue in large part, because it has a swastika on it. The swastika, of course, did not originate from the Nazis. in fact, the Nazis got it from it's original eastern origins, and utilized it to their purpose. It was a sign of good luck, until the Nazis used it so relentlessly and militantly in their propaganda, that it was likely forever tainted (at least in the west) and would henceforth be associated with a very specific time and place in history - the Nazi rule over Germany in the 1930's and 1940's.
The research team wrote in the journal Meteoritics & Planetary Sciences:
"One can speculate whether the swastika symbol on the statue was a potential motivation to displace the "iron man" meteorite artifact to Germany."
The expedition was headed by one Ernst Shafer, a zoologist and ethnologist, who brought it back to Germany, where it came to be possessed by a private owner in Munich.
It has come to be known as the "iron man" statue, because of the high concentration of iron.
The statue itself is small, yet quite heavy for it's size - an indication that it was made from a stone that was actually a part of a meteorite. It is 24cm (a bit under 10 inches) tall, and weighs 10.6 kilograms (23.3 pounds). It is a carving of the Buddhist god Vaisravana, also known as Jamhala Vaisravana, who is the god of wealth or war.
The existence of the statue really only became known in 2007, when the owner died, and the statue came up for auction, and the team of German and Austrian scientists, led by Buchner, received permission to conduct chemical tests.
"The statue was chiseled from a fragment of the Chinga meteorite which crashed into the border areas between Mongolia and Siberia about 15,000 years ago, " Dr. Buchner said.
The findings are being published by the researchers in the journal "Metoritics & Planetary Science" this month, which appears to be available from the Wiley Online Library.
Scientists outside of the research team have verified the credibility of the possibility that this statue was carved from the rare meteorite. An Associate Professor from The University of New Mexico, Rhian Jones, suggested that the findings by the team appear conclusive. She specializes in meteorites.
Quing-Zhu Yin, a geology specialist from the University of California, said:
"Looks like a solid piece of geochemical 'forensic' work. No terrestrial artifact would generally contain that much nickel content. Chemical elements don't lie."
Yin, however, did express doubt about the statue's alleged Buddhist roots, explaining, "I am not a historian. But the 'iron man' does not look like a Buddha to me from my cultural background. It looks more like a warrior with a sword...(a) resemblance of Genghis Khan...I have never seen a Buddha with a sword or knife."
Still, whether or not it is, in fact, a Buddhist statue or not, the carving is truly unique. Buchner said in a statement regarding the potential value of the statue:
"The iron man statue is the only known illustration of a human figure to be carved into a meteorite, which means we have nothing to compare it to when assessing value. Its origins alone may value it at $20,000; however, if our estimation of its age is correct and it is nearly a thousand years old it could be invaluable."
The story itself seems priceless. Perhaps it's too bad that this story did not break out in the eighties, during the days of the peak popularity for the fictional archaeologist, Indiana Jones, who constantly had adventures competing for rare artifacts against his rivals and hated enemies, the Nazis. I'm sure Spielberg and Lucas could have made a rich movie out of this. Only, apparently, Indiana Jones would not have won and gotten the prize, for once, as this came to the hands of the Germans. No word on if it possesses some special powers, although it certainly did not help the Nazis win the war.
Below are some links to articles on this fascinating subject, and which I greatly utilized in writing this piece. The article that I borrowed from the most was "Stolen Buddhist Statue Carved From Meteorite" by SkyNews, from which I got some of this history behind the statue, as well as the quote on the history of the piece by Dr. Buchner. It also offers some great close-up pictures of the statue:
http://news.sky.com/story/990085/stolen-buddhist-statue-carved-from-meteorite
I got the history of the Buddhist god that the statue portrays, as well as the quote from Buchner regarding the potentially pricelessness of the piece, from Stephanie Pappas's article from Fox News, "Nazi-Acquired Statue Came From Space":
http://www.foxnews.com/science/2012/09/26/nazi-acquired-buddha-statue-came-from-space/
I got some of the history of the statue, supporting statements from other scientists confirming the plausibilty of this statue having been carved from the meteorite, as well as the specific news of the publication of these findings from the article on Washington Post article, "Researchers, Buddhist statue found by Nazis made from meteorite" Associated Press, September 27th:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/researchers-nazi-expedition-found-ancient-buddhist-statue-made-from-meteorite/2012/09/27/57918fe4-08d9-11e2-9eea-333857f6a7bd_story.html
I got the quote about the potential main motivation for the Nazi acquisition of the statue being the presence of the swastika from the article: "Nazi Iron Man Statue Came From Space, Really" by Dan Evans, September 26, 2012 :
http://www.inquisitr.com/344376/nazi-iron-man-statue-came-from-space-really/
The LiveScience article "Nazi-Acquired Buddha Statue Came From Space" by Stephanie Pappas, LiveScience senior writer, differs than that of the Fox article which credits here, and goes into further details about meteorites, and greater specifics about precisely how the testing was conducted:
http://www.livescience.com/23483-nazi-buddha-carved-meteorite.html
Some of the history of the Buddhist god tha tthis statue could potentially be a representation of came from:
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-205_162-57520778/nazi-acquired-buddha-statue-came-from-space/
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