It is well known amongst ancient historians and scientists that Western civilization had its beginning on the Greek island of Crete. I have written about this island many times as being the birthplace of Gnosticism, Judaism, Christianity, the Bible, the Apostles, and the story of Jesus Christ.

Now, we are finding evidence of our ancient human ancestor’s footprints on Crete that date back to 5.6 million years ago, making them by far the oldest footprints ever discovered in Europe.

The footprints were discovered in 2002 by Paleontologist Gerhard Gierlinski, a researcher at the Polish Geological Institute from Warsaw, Poland, who was just on vacation on the island of Crete in Greece enjoying the weather and beautiful beaches with his girlfriend. Since he had a passion for searching for historic artifacts wherever he went, he brought along his hammer, a camera, and a GPS for just such trips.

While traveling along the old Mediterranean shores near Trachilos, he found what looked like human footprints that had somehow been embedded into a flat rock along the shore.

According to the study published in Science Direct, two footprints were found in a natural outcrop above the beach (N 35° 30.857′, E 023° 37.660′), close to the village of Trachilos, west of Kissamos (also known as Kastelli), in the Chania Prefecture of Crete.

You would think that after this discovery, the researcher’s study and finding would have been accepted by the scientific community, but they were instead treated hostile, and the reactions they did receive were negative. 

Many of the editors of scientific journals were flat-out disrespectful even when they had no knowledge on the subject, saying that this couldn’t possibly be true and these can’t be footprints at all,” Ahlberg said in an interview with CBC News.

“In every round [of reviews], there would be at least one, and sometimes several, reviewers who were in the first instance savagely hostile. They would just flatly deny that these would be human or hominin footprints. They would say almost anything — they’re bear or monkey [tracks] or whatever.”

Whether that’s true or not, Ahlberg said his experience has shaken his confidence in the process of science.

“The thing that really troubles me is the sense that we won here only through extreme persistence,” he said. “It really does rather make you wonder what other sort of stories have been buried and have never come out.”

Gierlinski said it was important to him to have the scientific community check over his work to ensure he hadn’t made a mistake. But now that his research has been validated by peer review and official publication, he said, “I will be fighting to prove that I am right… because I am sure 100 per cent.”

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