{"id":1359,"date":"2026-03-03T15:53:35","date_gmt":"2026-03-03T15:53:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/owspakistan.com\/?p=1359"},"modified":"2026-03-05T01:24:11","modified_gmt":"2026-03-05T01:24:11","slug":"oracle-of-delphi-drugs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/owspakistan.com\/?p=1359","title":{"rendered":"Ancient Greece’s most famous oracle was just high on gas fumes"},"content":{"rendered":"
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For centuries, people traveled to Delphi in southern Greece hoping for a glimpse of their future. There, at the temple of the god Apollo, a priestess was said to enter a trance and issue prophecies in the voice of Apollo himself. Everyday people, kings, even Alexander the Great traveled for miles to hear the priestess\u2019s input on important decisions, from personal finance to matters of state. <\/p>\n

Known as the Pythia<\/em> or the Oracle of Delphi, the priestess wasn\u2019t believed to be a psychic. Ancient writers like Plutarch, who served as a priest at Delphi in the first and second centuries, described her as a vessel for a power that came from the Earth<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

According to Plutarch\u2019s account, the temple of Delphi was constructed around a natural spring, where the water and fissures in the rock produced a sweet-smelling gas called pneuma<\/em>. On designated days a few times per year, the chosen priestess sat amidst the pneuma on a tripod stool and inhaled enough to enter her trance<\/a>. This was an exhausting ordeal for the woman. She might cry out, become hysterical, or collapse.<\/p>\n

Plutarch claimed that there was less pneuma in his time than there had once been, leading to a decline in the temple\u2019s popularity. After the temple closed down in 393 AD, the pneuma remained an enduring scientific puzzle. Was the trance-inducing vapor real? And if so, what exactly was it, and where had it come from?<\/p>\n

Decoding ancient sources for clues<\/h2>\n

The first modern excavations<\/a> at Delphi, conducted between 1892 and 1950, failed to find a large fissure in the rock, which they had pictured as the source of the gas. At the time, experts believed that gases could only rise from the Earth in connection with volcanoes, which Delphi doesn\u2019t have. This led scholars to dismiss the ancient accounts as hearsay. However, subsequent investigations came to a very different conclusion, spurred on by the words of the ancient authors.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I\u2019ve got written sources from the ancient world, my first effort is, \u2018What can I learn from them?\u2019\u201d archaeologist John Hale<\/a> tells Popular Science<\/em>. In the 1990s, Hale and a multidisciplinary team of researchers finally uncovered scientific evidence that corroborated the ancient descriptions of Delphi.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Shifting tectonic plates can cause gases to rise from the Earth<\/h2>\n

Hale explains that his colleague, Dutch-American geologist Jelle Zeilinga de Boer, had noticed a fault line passing under the temple of Delphi during a 1980s surveying project. Fault lines are places where two of the Earth\u2019s tectonic plates bump against one another. The plates\u2019 movement can cause earthquakes and other forms of geological activity, including the emission of gases.\u00a0<\/p>\n

De Boer wondered if the ancient pneuma at Delphi was \u201ca light hydrocarbon gas\u201d that rose from the permeable limestone under the temple, says Hale.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Hydrocarbons are compounds made entirely of carbon and hydrogen. A fundamental component of living things, they also occur in fossil fuels<\/a> like petroleum. Such chemicals \u201care found in a lot of geological formations all over the planet,\u201d says Hale. \u201cThey\u2019re part of the mix of the Earth\u2019s crust.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

When two tectonic plates rub against each other along a fault line, they produce friction, which can generate enough heat to convert those solid hydrocarbons in the Earth\u2019s crust into gas. And if there\u2019s enough holes or channels in the Earth, that gas can rise to the surface, similar to what ancient authors described at Delphi.\u00a0<\/p>\n

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\n\t\t\t\tInsane Natural Gas Discovery in the Wild!\t\t\t<\/p>\n

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When tectonic plates shift, hydrocarbons, such as methane and ethane, can rise to the Earth\u2019s surface.
Video: Insane Natural Gas Discovery in the Wild! \/ @CrafterDUCK<\/a><\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n