Seven Wonders Read Online Free PDF Page B
Author: Ben Mezrich
led to the groundbreaking theory of Mitochondrial Eve—the evolutionary concept that all humanity could trace its origins to a single woman who lived around two hundred thousand years ago, somewhere in present-day Africa. Mitochondrial Eve was the Holy Grail of evolutionary science, one ancient woman whose DNA was the perfect, pure source of every generation that came after her.
Sloane wasn’t tunneling through the Colosseum, her boots kicking up dust older than Christianity, expecting to find the equivalent to Mitochondrial Eve in the plant world; but to her, the mystery she was trying to unravel felt just as important. Christine might never understand, but eventhe greatest accomplishments of mankind—let alone some field hockey championship or ballet performance—seemed no more impressive to Sloane than the glory of a single, perfect Leucobalanus leaf that represented tens of thousands of years of evolutionary struggle, surviving fires, storms, pestilence, the rise and fall of civilization after civilization. And all Christine would ever see was the leaf of a common oak.
Sloane felt her way down the cobblestones, running the flashlight over the stone walls to her right and left, moving much more cautiously since she’d narrowly avoided the ditch and the poisonous vines. It wasn’t oak leaves she’d ditched the two Polizia for, though she wouldn’t have been surprised to find an oak sapling or two poking out from one of the numerous creases and gashes that she’d seen all over the hypogeum. From the very moment she’d set foot in the Modern Wonder, she’d been awed by vastness of the place, the scale of something built so goddamn long ago. But unlike other tourists who found their way into the Colosseum, it wasn’t the architecture or the history that truly enthralled her. It was something that most tourists would hardly notice at all.
To Sloane, the subterranean tunnels were as fascinating as any imagined gladiator battle. Even without the help of a tour guide, she could make out the various notches and holes in the stone that were the remaining evidence of the machinery that had once functioned literally beneath the scenes: vertical shafts that had once held cages that could be lifted into the arena, depositing men, wild beasts, even scenery. Elevators, complex pulleys, hydraulics, most of it controlled by capstans—giant wheels pushed by slaves like enormous gears in the biggest watch ever constructed.
And even more incredible, as Sloane picked her way through the tunnels, pulling farther and farther from the Polizia, was the evidence of runoff canals she could see, often at waist level, dug right into the sides of the tunnels. She’d read in guide books that the entire arena could be flooded for the naumachiae , mock ocean battles that had involved small warships sailingthrough water as deep as nine feet.
But Sloane’s fascination with the mechanics of the hypogeum was mainly academic; what truly thrilled her were the incredible wonders she was seeing within the cracks, seams, and cubbyholes dug into the ancient stone. She’d read about what she was seeing, but until she’d climbed under the rope and the bright red PERICOLO! sign—a warning she didn’t need her grandmother to understand—and had started to observe the true diversity sprouting from every nook and gash in the elaborate tunnels of travertine stone, she didn’t truly believe it could be real.
Sloane wasn’t the first scientist to come to the Colosseum to study plants. According to the guidebooks, the Colosseum had one of the strangest botanical collections of any place on Earth. Vines, shrubs, and even trees had been found growing through the ancient ruins, a diversity that had yet to be adequately explained by modern science.
The first recorded study of the Colosseum’s plants had been done way back in 1643 by a scientist named Domenico Panaroli who had listed over six hundred and eighty different species. Barely two turns in
Sloane wasn’t tunneling through the Colosseum, her boots kicking up dust older than Christianity, expecting to find the equivalent to Mitochondrial Eve in the plant world; but to her, the mystery she was trying to unravel felt just as important. Christine might never understand, but eventhe greatest accomplishments of mankind—let alone some field hockey championship or ballet performance—seemed no more impressive to Sloane than the glory of a single, perfect Leucobalanus leaf that represented tens of thousands of years of evolutionary struggle, surviving fires, storms, pestilence, the rise and fall of civilization after civilization. And all Christine would ever see was the leaf of a common oak.
Sloane felt her way down the cobblestones, running the flashlight over the stone walls to her right and left, moving much more cautiously since she’d narrowly avoided the ditch and the poisonous vines. It wasn’t oak leaves she’d ditched the two Polizia for, though she wouldn’t have been surprised to find an oak sapling or two poking out from one of the numerous creases and gashes that she’d seen all over the hypogeum. From the very moment she’d set foot in the Modern Wonder, she’d been awed by vastness of the place, the scale of something built so goddamn long ago. But unlike other tourists who found their way into the Colosseum, it wasn’t the architecture or the history that truly enthralled her. It was something that most tourists would hardly notice at all.
To Sloane, the subterranean tunnels were as fascinating as any imagined gladiator battle. Even without the help of a tour guide, she could make out the various notches and holes in the stone that were the remaining evidence of the machinery that had once functioned literally beneath the scenes: vertical shafts that had once held cages that could be lifted into the arena, depositing men, wild beasts, even scenery. Elevators, complex pulleys, hydraulics, most of it controlled by capstans—giant wheels pushed by slaves like enormous gears in the biggest watch ever constructed.
And even more incredible, as Sloane picked her way through the tunnels, pulling farther and farther from the Polizia, was the evidence of runoff canals she could see, often at waist level, dug right into the sides of the tunnels. She’d read in guide books that the entire arena could be flooded for the naumachiae , mock ocean battles that had involved small warships sailingthrough water as deep as nine feet.
But Sloane’s fascination with the mechanics of the hypogeum was mainly academic; what truly thrilled her were the incredible wonders she was seeing within the cracks, seams, and cubbyholes dug into the ancient stone. She’d read about what she was seeing, but until she’d climbed under the rope and the bright red PERICOLO! sign—a warning she didn’t need her grandmother to understand—and had started to observe the true diversity sprouting from every nook and gash in the elaborate tunnels of travertine stone, she didn’t truly believe it could be real.
Sloane wasn’t the first scientist to come to the Colosseum to study plants. According to the guidebooks, the Colosseum had one of the strangest botanical collections of any place on Earth. Vines, shrubs, and even trees had been found growing through the ancient ruins, a diversity that had yet to be adequately explained by modern science.
The first recorded study of the Colosseum’s plants had been done way back in 1643 by a scientist named Domenico Panaroli who had listed over six hundred and eighty different species. Barely two turns in