Month: March 2023

Long walls have been found in many parts of the world, and some have been very long. The best-known walls are Hadrian’s Wall in the UK and the Great Wall of China.

Less well-known is Khatt Shebib, a wall that crosses the desert in Jordan. The first reports of it beyond Jordan were made by British diplomat Sir Alec Kirkbride in 1948. Flying over Jordan, he noticed a stone wall that went on for miles, but seemed to serve no purpose.

In the 2010s, Aerial Archaeologists in Jordan made a new map of the wall. They recorded its full extent – it runs NNE to SSW for 106km (66 miles). There are sections with a second, parallel wall and some branches off it.

The wall also has the remains of about 100 “towers”: 2m-4m diameter buildings at various locations along the wall. Many of them are later additions, added to the wall.

No one knows more than the basic facts about the wall: no one knows what it was for, who built it and when, are all mysteries. Pottery finds along the wall have come from somewhere between AD100 and AD600, but these dates are not necessarily when the wall was built.

Momo was first sighted in the US state of Missouri in 1971. He was a 7 feet tall, hairy, humanoid creature with a large head and a very strong smell. There were other sightings in 1971, but the summer of 1972 saw a spate of sightings and publicity.

Two children saw Momo in their backyard on July 11, 1972 in the town of Louisiana in NE Missouri. This started a two-month flap. The children said the creature they saw was covered in blood and carrying a dead animal (possibly a dog or goat).

Sightings continued through July and August, and were often accompanied by a strong smell of rotting garbage, yelps and growls, and even strange fireballs in the sky. Locals organised unofficial posses to hunt down Momo, but they never found him. However, they did find an abandoned building on Marzolf Hill on the edge of the town. Many of the sightings were immediately around the hill, and the building contained a large nest and an overpowering smell. It appeared to be Momo’s den.

By the end of August, Momo sightings stopped and the mystery has never been solved. Some people have suggested it was a bear, although this idea has never really taken hold, as bears are very rare in that area. Others suggested it was a hoax. And of course many mentioned that Momo could be related to Bigfoot. But with no evidence and no body, Momo’s identity will never be solved.