:03:01
by tyrants, pharaohs,
emperors, warlords.
:03:06
And every time it changed hands
it grew larger.
:03:12
And then suddenly...
:03:15
it vanished.
:03:18
It didn't reappear
for more than a thousand years,
:03:22
when knights from the First Crusade
:03:23
discovered secret vaults
beneath the Temple of Solomon.
:03:27
You see, the knights who found the vaults
:03:29
believed that the treasure
was too great for any one man -
:03:34
not even a king.
:03:36
They brought the treasure back to Europe
and took the name "the Knights Templar".
:03:44
Over the next century
they smuggled it out of Europe
:03:47
and they formed a new brotherhood
called the Freemasons,
:03:50
in honour of
the builders of the great temple.
:03:54
War followed.
:03:55
By the time of the American Revolution
the treasure had been hidden again.
:03:59
By then the Masons included
:04:01
George Washington,
Benjamin Franklin, Paul Revere.
:04:06
They knew they had to make sure
:04:08
the treasure would never fall
into the hands of the British.
:04:12
So they devised a series of clues
and maps to its location.
:04:16
Over time the clues were lost or forgotten,
:04:18
until only one remained -
:04:20
and that was the secret that Charles Carroll
entrusted to young Thomas Gates.
:04:32
Charlotte.
:04:34
"The secret lies with Charlotte. "
:04:38
Who's Charlotte?
:04:40
Oh, not even Mr Carroll knew that.
:04:43
Now look here, Ben.
:04:45
The Freemasons
among our Founding Fathers left us clues.
:04:49
Like these.
:04:51
The unfinished pyramid.
The all-seeing eye.
:04:55
Symbols of the Knights Templar,
guardians of the treasure.
:04:59
- They're speaking to us through these.
- You mean laughing at us.