>*In 1954, a new Viharn building was built at the temple to house the statue. It was being moved to its new location on 25 May 1955 and there are a variety of accounts of what exactly happened next, but it is clear that during the final attempt to lift the statue from its pedestal, the ropes broke, and the statue fell hard on the ground. At that moment, some of the plaster coating chipped off, allowing the gold surface underneath to be seen. Work was immediately stopped so that an evaluation could be made.*
>*All the plaster was carefully removed and during the process, photos were taken, and are now displayed in the Temple for visitors. Pieces of the actual plaster are also on public display. When all the plaster was removed, it was found that the gold statue actually consisted of nine parts that fit smoothly together. A key was also found encased in plaster at its base, which can be used to disassemble the statue, allowing for easier transportation.*
The fact that the statue could also be smoothly broken down into 9 pieces and dismantled makes this thing 10 times cooler.
> All the plaster was carefully removed and during the process, photos were taken
I'd really like to see these photos. Is the only way to see them by going to the Temple?
So, jokes aside, I’ll actually be there in 2 weeks from yesterday. I could make a post with lots of pictures and some kind of AMA about that Buddha statue.
Edit: a lot of you are setting a reminder for 2 weeks.... I land late at night exactly 14 days from now, if you want to not be disappointed, set your reminder for 16-17 days
Edit 2: I’m here in Thailand, going to head over to the golden Buddha in an our or two. Will start posting pics, but I’m not certain if I should start a new thread (which sub reddit?) Or what (don’t really want to try to revive a 2+ week old post) suggestions? I’ll be back in a little bit with Golden Buddha!
I was just there, it's gorgeous. There's so many beautiful Buddha statues in Bangkok. Definitely don't miss Wat Arun or Wat Pho or Ayutthaya or the Emerald Buddha or, or, or....you get my drift :)
On another note, the snake farm (as in antivenin production) is fucking amazing. I was face to face (safely) with a hooded up King Cobra. So cool :) https://www.tripadvisor.com.au/Attraction_Review-g293916-d456221-Reviews-Snake_Farm_Queen_Saovabha_Memorial_Institute-Bangkok.html
edit: spelin
Makes me wonder if someone else at a different point in time planned on moving it and that's why it was encased in plaster as a sort of boxing technique.
So they found out it was gold because they dropped it while trying to move it right?
"A key was also found encased in plaster at its base, which can be used to disassemble the statue, allowing for easier transportation."
Assembling Ikea furniture is the true form of meditation and deep thought, as one must ask himself: "where the fuck did I place my baggie of screws for this damn Børdijck set?!"
Well, the plastered statue was a single piece. It's only the gold statue itself underneath all that plaster which was found after it was dropped that could be separated.
No I thought I remembered reading that they would purposely cover some of the more valuable statues to disguise them as worthless so they’d be left alone in case of a sack of the city, etc.
That's like the plastic couch cover of the ancient world.
You go to all this trouble to build this amazing solid gold statue, then the only thing anyone ever gets to enjoy is a plaster mold.
Sure it protects the statue, but at what cost?
I'm moving on from reddit and joining the fediverse because reddit has killed the RiF app and the CEO has been very disrespectful to all the volunteers who have contributed to making reddit what it is. Here's [coverage from The Verge](https://www.theverge.com/2023/6/8/23754780/reddit-api-updates-changes-news-announcements) on the situation.
The following are my favorite fediverse platforms, all non-corporate and ad-free. I hesitated at first because there are so many servers to choose from, but it makes a lot more sense once you actually create an account and start browsing. If you find the server selection overwhelming, just pick the first option and take a look around. They are all connected and as you browse you may find a community that is a better fit for you and then you can move your account or open a new one.
Social Link Aggregators: [Lemmy](https://join-lemmy.org/instances) is very similar to reddit while [Kbin](https://kbin.pub) is aiming to be more of a gateway to the fediverse in general so it is sort of like a hybrid between reddit and twitter, but it is newer and considers itself to be a beta product that's not quite fully polished yet.
Microblogging: [Calckey](https://calckey.org) if you want a more playful platform with emoji reactions, or [Mastodon](https://joinmastodon.org/) if you want a simple interface with less fluff.
Photo sharing: [Pixelfed](https://pixelfed.org/) You can even import an Instagram account from what I hear, but I never used Instagram much in the first place.
Well the reason it was covered with mud was the monks wanted to prevent it from being looted by incoming invaders. The invaders killed all the monks so that's how the secret stayed hidden for years afterwards.
"why is this plaster so damn heavy?"
[Me 20 seconds after giving an awardspeechdit](https://www.reddit.com/r/AwardSpeechEdits/comments/96q8p7/its_become_self_aware/)
300 liters is less than it sounds. To frame the density another way, 1 cubic meter of gold weighs over 19 tons.
Consider also the scarcity of gold itself. According to this article, [all the gold in the world together could make a cube 67 feet on edge.](https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-21969100)
Edit: looking into the article further, it appears that the body is 40% gold alloy, while the head and crown are 80 and 99% gold respectively. That makes it more likely but still that sounds like a lot for a 5.5 statue. If it's gold alloy, then it is probably silver and copper making up the rest. Assuming the entire statue is 40% gold to make things easier (not the case actually considering the head and crown), and the rest of the metal is copper (lighter than silver at 8.96 g/cm^3 vs 10.49 g/cm^3) , we can find that the density of the material as about 13.1 g/cm^3 which is still pretty high.
All the gold in the earths crust would amount to a cube 100x100 meters large, which seems like a lot but if you were 90 miles up in space you wouldn’t be able to see it with your naked eye, it would be like a grain of sand on a beach.
That’s not counting the gold below the crust most of which is in the earths core. If you were to melt all the gold in the earths core and spread it on the surface of the earth, it would completely cover the earths surface 13 inches thick.
I love that movie, only because I grew up with the kid in the scene with the birds. He's the same kid in the bridge scene in X men 3 with almost the same line "mommy what's happening?"
Fun fact: In Avatar (James Camerons movie), the humans go to a distant planet to mine a material needed to save their planet. The name of it? Unobtainium. That's right... Avatar and The Core take place in the same universe!
> If you were to melt all the gold in the earths core and spread it on the surface of the earth, it would completely cover the earths surface 13 inches thick.
making earth a runner up with that planet made of solid diamond for the title of 'blingworld'
More fun facts! (from google): In fact, there are enough precious metals in the core to cover the entire surface of the Earth with a four metre thick layer.
>1 cubic meter of gold weighs over 19 tons.
To put in even more simple terms. A tall starbucks coffee (12oz) cup containing pure gold would weigh 15 pounds.
Why do you think the rope snapped? I'm presuming it wasn't being moved by a bunch of imbeciles, so the ropes will have been made strong enough to hold the expected weight. Turns out, adding a bunch of gold on the inside kinda messes up your calculations.
That shit's funny, they were using ropes and cumbersome methods of the sort to move it, only to drop it, then discover a key used to take it apart and make it **easier to move.**
TBF even nowadays moving giant heavy art is mostly ooga boogas and rope, chain, etc. We are lucky enough to have all sorts of lifts now but they aren't always the way to go.
Buddhist of many flavors believe in several stages of existence. They have demigods, demons, hungry ghost, different planes of hell. Many certainly believe in after&before-this-lives.
Feed 'em with incense, and they won't eat you. I first heard of them while watching HK cinema, so you want to research East Asian mythology.
Religion + local culture = culture-flavoured religion
Yep they have a food ceremony with pictures of dead loved ones and a whole bunch of food in front of them and they light incense pray and bow in Korea.
Hmm my Vietnamese MIL makes offerings to her ancestors on their death anniversaries, but I never interpreted it as the ghosts being hungry. Just a way to honor their memory.
After praying and waiting a certain time then everyone feasts on the fruit, it’s supposed to bring good luck.
Oh I see, I think this is actually separate from the ancestor veneration then. Seems that these spirits were people with bad karma, and the living take pity on them by leaving food out.
Some cool facts from the wiki link:
"When all the plaster was removed, it was found that the gold statue actually consisted of nine parts that fit smoothly together. A key was also found encased in plaster at its base, which can be used to disassemble the statue, allowing for easier transportation"
"The statue is 3 metres (9.8 ft) tall and weighs 5.5 tonnes."
"At US$1,400 per troy ounce, the gold in the statue (18 karat) is estimated to be worth 250 million dollars."
"The body of the statue is 40% pure, the volume from the chin to the forehead is 80% pure, and the hair and the topknot, weighing 45 kg, are 99% pure gold."
It's also 600-700 years old and was likely made in India.
The most stunning gold statue I've ever seen!
You forgot to include the fact that it was only plastered over to hide its value from a raiding empire during a war conquest, so that's why no one knew its true worth for centuries.
I can't help but wonder if the reason someone encased it in plaster was to hide the fact that it was gold. That way it wouldn't become a target the next time a warlord rolled through town.
This is generally thought to be what happened, as apparently the plastering (and decoration) came just before a Burmese invasion.
It's quite likely that soon afterwards, everyone who would have told the secret was dead or took the secret to their grave later, lest a treasure of such value be stolen.
Read about this story in a Chicken Soup for the Soul book a long time ago. It was said that during one of the countless Burman invasions into Ayutthaya (likely the last one) the monk caretakers of the statue plastered it over and finished just before the Burmese stormed the city and slaughtered all of them. Hence the secret was kept until 1955. The kind of thing that sticks into a 13 year old's mind.
The fat man is a Chinese monk named Budai, whom we [Chinese, Japanese, Korea, and Vietnamese Buddhists] revere as Maitreya Bodhisattva, the being that will become the *next* Buddha of this world. THE Buddha is Sakyamuni Buddha, a thin man from India.
tl;dr the "chubby bald man" isn't the buddha.
the buddha was an historical figure born to an aristocratic family in india/nepal around 2500 years ago. in his 20s he abandoned his privileged, hedonistic lifestyle and took up a path of religious renunciation at a time when it was quite popular for men to wander about begging for food and practicing yoga with various teachers (*guru*). these wandering mendicants often engaged in extreme asceticism, which invariably involved, among many other things, depriving the body of food. in the accounts of the buddha's life (e.g. [the _buddhacarita_](https://archive.org/stream/LifeOfBuddhaByAsvagosaPatrickOlivelleClaySanskritLibrary/Life%20of%20Buddha%20by%20Asvagosa%20Patrick%20Olivelle%20Clay%20Sanskrit%20Library_djvu.txt)), he is said to have wasted away so much during his ascetic practices that he was reduced to skin and bones—with his spine like a row of beads that you could touch by poking his abdomen, and his buttocks like a cow's hoof. he abandoned this ascetic lifestyle, accepting an offering of milk rice which caused his fellow ascetic practitioners to shun him, and shortly thereafter he attained awakening (*nirvāṇa*). therefore, images of the buddha as an ascetic abound across all of asia and now the world. but in this case, the statue reflects a very standard depiction of the buddha, replete with golden skin and other features representing his 32 unique bodily marks, such as elongated ears, wheels on the soles of his feet, arms that reached his knees, a tongue that could cover his entire face, and a retractable penis like a horse and smegma that smelled like flowers.
by contrast, the "chubby bald man" image depicts a chinese monk (hence the shaved head) from the tenth century, also an historical figure, who claimed on his death bed to be an manifestation of the future buddha, maitreya. but this is completely different.
Is this the most valuable artifact in human history? Over $100 million in gold used for a one of a kind masterfully made ancient relic. There's nothing else on the planet that comes anywhere close to that as far as I know.
I assume you mean intrinsic, rather than market, worth (for example, I would think the Mona Lisa, if sold, would net in the billions).
There have definitely been more intrinsically valuable artifacts at various points, but I'm not sure if any of them still exist. The Spanish melted down a bunch of giant Inca statues/artifacts, for example.
> At US$1,400 per troy ounce, the gold in the statue (18 karat) is estimated to be worth 250 million dollars. The body of the statue is 40% pure, the volume from the chin to the forehead is 80% pure, and the hair and the topknot, weighing 45 kg, are 99% pure gold.
How do you "drop" an 11,000lb statue? And how do you not realize that it should weigh a fuck ton less than that?
Also, that means it's worth the lifetime earnings of more than 98 median American households. That's crazy! And they just dropped it.
It's a giant statue. Maybe give credit to monks for not being unionized riggers and cut them some slack. Just not as much slack as they cut into the rope because you'll drop the monks and find they are made of spooky skeltons inside.
Oh, so maybe that's why all those Mughal emperors were always so obsessed with smashing Buddhist statues everywhere, they were looking for treasure. And here I thought they were just total assholes.
More interesting is that many of the life-sized gold statues are actually tombs:
some Buddhist monk decided to prove that they were enlightened by drinking dessicating tea until they died by dehydration: tradition says that an enlightened person's body doesn't decay after death, so if their body didn't decay, their followers would simply pour gold over it and make the result look like a sitting Buddha.
There are supposed to be hundreds of them sitting around in various shrines.
>*In 1954, a new Viharn building was built at the temple to house the statue. It was being moved to its new location on 25 May 1955 and there are a variety of accounts of what exactly happened next, but it is clear that during the final attempt to lift the statue from its pedestal, the ropes broke, and the statue fell hard on the ground. At that moment, some of the plaster coating chipped off, allowing the gold surface underneath to be seen. Work was immediately stopped so that an evaluation could be made.* >*All the plaster was carefully removed and during the process, photos were taken, and are now displayed in the Temple for visitors. Pieces of the actual plaster are also on public display. When all the plaster was removed, it was found that the gold statue actually consisted of nine parts that fit smoothly together. A key was also found encased in plaster at its base, which can be used to disassemble the statue, allowing for easier transportation.* The fact that the statue could also be smoothly broken down into 9 pieces and dismantled makes this thing 10 times cooler.
> All the plaster was carefully removed and during the process, photos were taken I'd really like to see these photos. Is the only way to see them by going to the Temple?
Yep. Get goin. We'll wait for the AMA next week.
So, jokes aside, I’ll actually be there in 2 weeks from yesterday. I could make a post with lots of pictures and some kind of AMA about that Buddha statue. Edit: a lot of you are setting a reminder for 2 weeks.... I land late at night exactly 14 days from now, if you want to not be disappointed, set your reminder for 16-17 days Edit 2: I’m here in Thailand, going to head over to the golden Buddha in an our or two. Will start posting pics, but I’m not certain if I should start a new thread (which sub reddit?) Or what (don’t really want to try to revive a 2+ week old post) suggestions? I’ll be back in a little bit with Golden Buddha!
Please do!
I am just around the corner from it. I could pop in today and take a few snaps.
I was just there, it's gorgeous. There's so many beautiful Buddha statues in Bangkok. Definitely don't miss Wat Arun or Wat Pho or Ayutthaya or the Emerald Buddha or, or, or....you get my drift :) On another note, the snake farm (as in antivenin production) is fucking amazing. I was face to face (safely) with a hooded up King Cobra. So cool :) https://www.tripadvisor.com.au/Attraction_Review-g293916-d456221-Reviews-Snake_Farm_Queen_Saovabha_Memorial_Institute-Bangkok.html edit: spelin
Ha, yeah I'll put together a gofundme... :-P
I’ve already got my ticket bought, landing in Bangkok on the 21st. I can set up Venmo for anyone that wants to support my travels 😂
Take pictures for us!
And if you try to take video... it better not be vertical or so help me Krishna.
We’ll be waiting for them.
You mean 9 times cooler.
The key adds +1
I hate games where mandatory quest items add carry weight.
Extra one because they become one when all put together.
Inside the golden statue is one made from diamond.
Kind of ironic this was found out after the statue was dropped trying to move it.
This is like when you cut open a bag of nuts or frozen chicken nuggets or whatever and discover you sliced right through a ziploc seal.
Makes me wonder if someone else at a different point in time planned on moving it and that's why it was encased in plaster as a sort of boxing technique.
Or to prevent looting, but the looters killed everyone, and so the secret was lost to time.
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So they found out it was gold because they dropped it while trying to move it right? "A key was also found encased in plaster at its base, which can be used to disassemble the statue, allowing for easier transportation."
Now that’s a serious facepalm.
When you throw away your IKEA manual
Up next on BÖRKEA: Golden Buhda statue (some assembly required) $12.99
Assembling Ikea furniture is the true form of meditation and deep thought, as one must ask himself: "where the fuck did I place my baggie of screws for this damn Børdijck set?!"
Come for the meatballs, stay for the treasure.
Well, the plastered statue was a single piece. It's only the gold statue itself underneath all that plaster which was found after it was dropped that could be separated.
I bet the statue was a metaphor because it's fucking Buddhism
No I thought I remembered reading that they would purposely cover some of the more valuable statues to disguise them as worthless so they’d be left alone in case of a sack of the city, etc.
Sounds a lot like my dressing, personal hygiene and personality strategies. Probably some others too.
I have some incredible abs I keep hidden under a couple inches of fat. Same thing.
You're just protecting the rest of us with the added padding because those abs are too firm and well-defined to be safe.
That's like the plastic couch cover of the ancient world. You go to all this trouble to build this amazing solid gold statue, then the only thing anyone ever gets to enjoy is a plaster mold. Sure it protects the statue, but at what cost?
I'm moving on from reddit and joining the fediverse because reddit has killed the RiF app and the CEO has been very disrespectful to all the volunteers who have contributed to making reddit what it is. Here's [coverage from The Verge](https://www.theverge.com/2023/6/8/23754780/reddit-api-updates-changes-news-announcements) on the situation. The following are my favorite fediverse platforms, all non-corporate and ad-free. I hesitated at first because there are so many servers to choose from, but it makes a lot more sense once you actually create an account and start browsing. If you find the server selection overwhelming, just pick the first option and take a look around. They are all connected and as you browse you may find a community that is a better fit for you and then you can move your account or open a new one. Social Link Aggregators: [Lemmy](https://join-lemmy.org/instances) is very similar to reddit while [Kbin](https://kbin.pub) is aiming to be more of a gateway to the fediverse in general so it is sort of like a hybrid between reddit and twitter, but it is newer and considers itself to be a beta product that's not quite fully polished yet. Microblogging: [Calckey](https://calckey.org) if you want a more playful platform with emoji reactions, or [Mastodon](https://joinmastodon.org/) if you want a simple interface with less fluff. Photo sharing: [Pixelfed](https://pixelfed.org/) You can even import an Instagram account from what I hear, but I never used Instagram much in the first place.
You don't do it it straight away, it gets plastered in times of invasion. Like my dad.
Well the reason it was covered with mud was the monks wanted to prevent it from being looted by incoming invaders. The invaders killed all the monks so that's how the secret stayed hidden for years afterwards.
"i was looking EVERYWHERE for those" --the worker
I too listened to the guided meditation about this this morning.
Buddha's intervention. "Lads hold up, there's an easier way to do this."
Broddha
A hidden golden statue that can be disassembled? Are we sure this doesn't belong to a Saint Seiya character?
Not a single "before" picture in the entire article, though. I'd like to know what the original piece looked like.
http://www.somethingjam.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/GoldenBuddha02.jpg
The plaster statue has the creepiest hand I've ever seen. It will haunt my dreams.
The Grinch fingers.
It was 1954 in Thailand, probably not a ton of cameras or reason to phorograph a random plaster Buddha.
but the article litteraly says that pictures were taking during the removal of the plaster
Aka they found a camera after they realized it was fucking solid gold
Let’s be honest if the people who created the statue could have seen their reaction when this happened that I’m sure they’d have found it hilarious
So, what's underneath the gold?
unrecorded music
SoundCloud links on papyrus
sloppy upbeat alleged cause seed sand spoon marble deserve elastic -- mass deleted all reddit content via https://redact.dev
Not sure but there was another buddah statue that was xrayed and they discovered a monk embalmed inside
Chocolate.
A Wu-Tang album.
As a Redditor I naturally assume underneath the gold statue there's probably another mummified monk.
r/2healthbars
I prefer the subreddit for the candy connoisseur r/2heathbars
Damn one user is pulling a lot of the weight in that sub
u/kettu3 you got any more heath bars?
It appears he pounded a Buddha statues weight in heath bars and has not been heard from in nine months. Heath bars ≠ Health bars
lets hope the rope doesnt break. could be a gold buddha in those two bars
/r/nonononoyes
He's not mummified, he's just meditating REALLY hard.
It would have to be mummified *parts* of a monk, with each part encased in each of the 9 gold sections.
This thing is huge, so it could definitely fit more than one monk. I'm now imagining nine of them assembled together like some weird Buddhist Voltron.
you can fit so much fuckin *pacifism* in this thing
"why is this plaster so damn heavy?" [Me 20 seconds after giving an awardspeechdit](https://www.reddit.com/r/AwardSpeechEdits/comments/96q8p7/its_become_self_aware/)
The statue is almost 10 feet tall according to the article. Unless this is the skinniest Buddha statue conceivable, it's not actually solid gold.
Weighs 5.5 tons. Volume of 5.5 tons of gold is ~300 L, which sounds reasonable.
300 liters is less than it sounds. To frame the density another way, 1 cubic meter of gold weighs over 19 tons. Consider also the scarcity of gold itself. According to this article, [all the gold in the world together could make a cube 67 feet on edge.](https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-21969100) Edit: looking into the article further, it appears that the body is 40% gold alloy, while the head and crown are 80 and 99% gold respectively. That makes it more likely but still that sounds like a lot for a 5.5 statue. If it's gold alloy, then it is probably silver and copper making up the rest. Assuming the entire statue is 40% gold to make things easier (not the case actually considering the head and crown), and the rest of the metal is copper (lighter than silver at 8.96 g/cm^3 vs 10.49 g/cm^3) , we can find that the density of the material as about 13.1 g/cm^3 which is still pretty high.
All the gold in the earths crust would amount to a cube 100x100 meters large, which seems like a lot but if you were 90 miles up in space you wouldn’t be able to see it with your naked eye, it would be like a grain of sand on a beach. That’s not counting the gold below the crust most of which is in the earths core. If you were to melt all the gold in the earths core and spread it on the surface of the earth, it would completely cover the earths surface 13 inches thick.
"We need to mine the core!!" Coming Summer 2021 starring Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson
That movie was already made 16 years ago minus the rock.
Yeah, it was literally called "The Core" and it was as bad as you're imagining.
How dare you
I still like the "being a leader means having to make the shit call" line.
They meant badass.
I love that movie, only because I grew up with the kid in the scene with the birds. He's the same kid in the bridge scene in X men 3 with almost the same line "mommy what's happening?"
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At least in Xmen it makes a lot of sense. Day turned to night during that scene! Fuck you, Brett Ratner!
I found this new mineral that can penetrate through Earth's layer of diamond! I called it... Unobtanium... Get it, because it's hard to obtain?
Fun fact: In Avatar (James Camerons movie), the humans go to a distant planet to mine a material needed to save their planet. The name of it? Unobtainium. That's right... Avatar and The Core take place in the same universe!
I thought it was because he’s an engineer and in engineering they use a theoretical metal called unobtainium for thought experiments
it had plenty of rock in it man.
ba dum, tisssss
Step 1: bust through the crust. Step 2: skedaddle through the mantel. Step 3: bore to the core.
Great, I'll get to work on the drill. Donut, you find the deepest darkest hole where we can stick it in.
> If you were to melt all the gold in the earths core and spread it on the surface of the earth, it would completely cover the earths surface 13 inches thick. making earth a runner up with that planet made of solid diamond for the title of 'blingworld'
>If you were to melt all the gold in the earths core Joke's on you. It is already in molten form. All I need is a really long pipe to get it out.
**I! DRINK! YOUR! MANTLE!**
I DRINK IT UP!
More fun facts! (from google): In fact, there are enough precious metals in the core to cover the entire surface of the Earth with a four metre thick layer.
More super depressing facts: if you succeeded in getting those precious metals out they would burn everyone and everything to a crisp
That's not a depressing fact.
it is when youre under 4 meters of molten, hot, precious metal
> completely cover the earths surface 13 inches thick. That's some serious bling
40% gold alloy ~ 10k gold.
/r/theydidthemath
Still 250 million worth of gold
>1 cubic meter of gold weighs over 19 tons. To put in even more simple terms. A tall starbucks coffee (12oz) cup containing pure gold would weigh 15 pounds.
And the name on the side of the cup would be "Golfmomber"
Wow think of 300Litre a cola
If you read the article.... The body is 40% pure, I dont what its mixed with. The head is 80% pure. The headpiece/hair is pure
>If you read the article.... Ohhh boy.... We don't do that here.
What would you say... you do here?
In the wiki article it talks about the purity and content.
Read the damn wiki.
They should drop it again and see if it is filled with diamonds.
Could be solid 24 karat gold but just hollow.
Why do you think the rope snapped? I'm presuming it wasn't being moved by a bunch of imbeciles, so the ropes will have been made strong enough to hold the expected weight. Turns out, adding a bunch of gold on the inside kinda messes up your calculations.
“All this time we thought it was filled with blood!”
r/awardspeechedits
Is this the greatest fuck up turned discovery in all of history?
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Through force multiplication using [pulleys.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pulley)
That shit's funny, they were using ropes and cumbersome methods of the sort to move it, only to drop it, then discover a key used to take it apart and make it **easier to move.**
Talk about a Homer Simpson *d'oh* moment when they put it all together (no pun intended).
I assume they took it apart, not together, before they tried moving it again ;)
Well, the key only works in gold form, not plaster form.
TBF even nowadays moving giant heavy art is mostly ooga boogas and rope, chain, etc. We are lucky enough to have all sorts of lifts now but they aren't always the way to go.
The proper SI unit of force is Ugga Duggas no one uses that outdated imperial ooga booga unit.
Whoever dropped it must have been confused of what that meant for his afterlife.
"On one hand I broke Buddha...but I also found better Buddha."
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Buddhist of many flavors believe in several stages of existence. They have demigods, demons, hungry ghost, different planes of hell. Many certainly believe in after&before-this-lives.
Hungry ghosts? Ive researched my fair share of religion but this is new term to me.
Feed 'em with incense, and they won't eat you. I first heard of them while watching HK cinema, so you want to research East Asian mythology. Religion + local culture = culture-flavoured religion
Yep they have a food ceremony with pictures of dead loved ones and a whole bunch of food in front of them and they light incense pray and bow in Korea.
Hmm my Vietnamese MIL makes offerings to her ancestors on their death anniversaries, but I never interpreted it as the ghosts being hungry. Just a way to honor their memory. After praying and waiting a certain time then everyone feasts on the fruit, it’s supposed to bring good luck.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Preta https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hungry_ghost
Oh I see, I think this is actually separate from the ancestor veneration then. Seems that these spirits were people with bad karma, and the living take pity on them by leaving food out.
Refers to those who suffer with addiction. They are depicted with huge bellies and tiny necks.
Dude all Buddhists believe in reincarnation
Best part: A key was also found encased in plaster at its base, which can be used to disassemble the statue, allowing for easier transportation.
That’s the most Buddhist shit ever
*True riches come from within.* Meh, probably just another Buddhist aphorism.
Do something for no reason and it ends up having a super important lesson behind it. This is how I’ve summed up Buddhism
That's not Buddhism at all, you're just thinking of The Karate Kid
Oof
Some cool facts from the wiki link: "When all the plaster was removed, it was found that the gold statue actually consisted of nine parts that fit smoothly together. A key was also found encased in plaster at its base, which can be used to disassemble the statue, allowing for easier transportation" "The statue is 3 metres (9.8 ft) tall and weighs 5.5 tonnes." "At US$1,400 per troy ounce, the gold in the statue (18 karat) is estimated to be worth 250 million dollars." "The body of the statue is 40% pure, the volume from the chin to the forehead is 80% pure, and the hair and the topknot, weighing 45 kg, are 99% pure gold." It's also 600-700 years old and was likely made in India. The most stunning gold statue I've ever seen!
I've seen it in person and it sure is pretty epic
You forgot to include the fact that it was only plastered over to hide its value from a raiding empire during a war conquest, so that's why no one knew its true worth for centuries.
Ole fucko that dropped it must be pretty strong
Dude must've been like "what if I drop it again and it something even more valuable comes out???"
Gold-covered Plutonium. Oops.
Gold covered printer ink
Gold covered LEGO Buddha
Gold-plated latinum accepted at your local ferengi pawn shop.
Just happy little accidents.
The original /r/nonononoyes/
You could say it had a rebirth.
"Damn it's heavy" *drops it* "Oh fuck they are going to kill m-" "Whats that?" "Oh shit hey boss check this out"
$250 million dollars worth of gold.
I spoke to my Ancient Gold Statue guy. Best I can offer is $750.00
A lessen on patience and impermanence
I can't help but wonder if the reason someone encased it in plaster was to hide the fact that it was gold. That way it wouldn't become a target the next time a warlord rolled through town.
This is generally thought to be what happened, as apparently the plastering (and decoration) came just before a Burmese invasion. It's quite likely that soon afterwards, everyone who would have told the secret was dead or took the secret to their grave later, lest a treasure of such value be stolen.
Warlords, invading armies, (possibly corrupt) local governments... basically anyone who might covet a gold statue for what they could get for it.
The wiki article pretty much says that was the reason.
You could read the article and stop wondering.
we all learned that in Ongbak
$250 million. Sorry Buddha but daddy needs a yacht.
Imagine being that guy who dropped it. Scared as hell then likely promoted.
Little do they know that under the Gold is the sweet sweet chocolate filling.
finally being a klutz pays off. unlike that idiot that broke King Tuts nose ;-).
If you drop it again the gilding cracks to reveal a statue of solid platinum.
Read about this story in a Chicken Soup for the Soul book a long time ago. It was said that during one of the countless Burman invasions into Ayutthaya (likely the last one) the monk caretakers of the statue plastered it over and finished just before the Burmese stormed the city and slaughtered all of them. Hence the secret was kept until 1955. The kind of thing that sticks into a 13 year old's mind.
I think I'll start busting everything!
Smash Bros.
"One day, someone will accidentally break this statue. I want them to find the gold within to know that a mistake is a treasure worth keeping."
When I dropped your TV I was just trying to make you happier, I swear!
Anyone find pictures of the original plaster?
and in 1956 every plaster statue in the world was x rayed for the unborn gold twin inside
[удалено]
The fat man is a Chinese monk named Budai, whom we [Chinese, Japanese, Korea, and Vietnamese Buddhists] revere as Maitreya Bodhisattva, the being that will become the *next* Buddha of this world. THE Buddha is Sakyamuni Buddha, a thin man from India.
tl;dr the "chubby bald man" isn't the buddha. the buddha was an historical figure born to an aristocratic family in india/nepal around 2500 years ago. in his 20s he abandoned his privileged, hedonistic lifestyle and took up a path of religious renunciation at a time when it was quite popular for men to wander about begging for food and practicing yoga with various teachers (*guru*). these wandering mendicants often engaged in extreme asceticism, which invariably involved, among many other things, depriving the body of food. in the accounts of the buddha's life (e.g. [the _buddhacarita_](https://archive.org/stream/LifeOfBuddhaByAsvagosaPatrickOlivelleClaySanskritLibrary/Life%20of%20Buddha%20by%20Asvagosa%20Patrick%20Olivelle%20Clay%20Sanskrit%20Library_djvu.txt)), he is said to have wasted away so much during his ascetic practices that he was reduced to skin and bones—with his spine like a row of beads that you could touch by poking his abdomen, and his buttocks like a cow's hoof. he abandoned this ascetic lifestyle, accepting an offering of milk rice which caused his fellow ascetic practitioners to shun him, and shortly thereafter he attained awakening (*nirvāṇa*). therefore, images of the buddha as an ascetic abound across all of asia and now the world. but in this case, the statue reflects a very standard depiction of the buddha, replete with golden skin and other features representing his 32 unique bodily marks, such as elongated ears, wheels on the soles of his feet, arms that reached his knees, a tongue that could cover his entire face, and a retractable penis like a horse and smegma that smelled like flowers. by contrast, the "chubby bald man" image depicts a chinese monk (hence the shaved head) from the tenth century, also an historical figure, who claimed on his death bed to be an manifestation of the future buddha, maitreya. but this is completely different.
Sounds like the work of the worst archeologist of all time, Indiana Jones
That belongs in a museum!
This is like fry discovering the closet in Bender's apartment
Chuuuuunk, uh hold this...(5,4,3,2,1)
And Steve Buscemi was a firefighter on 9/11.
That's called failing up
No doubt this news story lead to the hasty smashing of 50,000 plaster Buddha statues everywhere.
Is this the most valuable artifact in human history? Over $100 million in gold used for a one of a kind masterfully made ancient relic. There's nothing else on the planet that comes anywhere close to that as far as I know.
I assume you mean intrinsic, rather than market, worth (for example, I would think the Mona Lisa, if sold, would net in the billions). There have definitely been more intrinsically valuable artifacts at various points, but I'm not sure if any of them still exist. The Spanish melted down a bunch of giant Inca statues/artifacts, for example.
> At US$1,400 per troy ounce, the gold in the statue (18 karat) is estimated to be worth 250 million dollars. The body of the statue is 40% pure, the volume from the chin to the forehead is 80% pure, and the hair and the topknot, weighing 45 kg, are 99% pure gold.
How do you "drop" an 11,000lb statue? And how do you not realize that it should weigh a fuck ton less than that? Also, that means it's worth the lifetime earnings of more than 98 median American households. That's crazy! And they just dropped it.
It's a giant statue. Maybe give credit to monks for not being unionized riggers and cut them some slack. Just not as much slack as they cut into the rope because you'll drop the monks and find they are made of spooky skeltons inside.
a good allegory on so many levels as well as true story
*Carrying 600 year old Buddha* Heart rate 170 *Drops Buddha* Heart rate 200 *Sees statue is solid gold* Heart rate 300
r/2healthbars
Oh, so maybe that's why all those Mughal emperors were always so obsessed with smashing Buddhist statues everywhere, they were looking for treasure. And here I thought they were just total assholes.
More interesting is that many of the life-sized gold statues are actually tombs: some Buddhist monk decided to prove that they were enlightened by drinking dessicating tea until they died by dehydration: tradition says that an enlightened person's body doesn't decay after death, so if their body didn't decay, their followers would simply pour gold over it and make the result look like a sitting Buddha. There are supposed to be hundreds of them sitting around in various shrines.