[Rick]
So, what you see before us,
it’s curious.
I don’t know what to make of it.

…Rick and Marty join other members of the team
in the research center to discuss
another curious discovery on Lot 5—
a man-made stone marker
found just three weeks ago.

Gary was metal detecting, uh,
and we came across this,
and we both went,
“Well, that’s strange.”

[narrator]
And to help their investigation,
Laird has created a 3D model of the feature.

[Laird]
I did a drone-based 3D model
of the split stone feature.
I fly the drone around at different angles,
different heights,
and take a lot of photographs.*

And then I bring all of those photographs back into the lab,
and I have a program that will reconstruct everything.
Very similar to the reconstruction of a CT scanner.

And in the end, we have this beautiful 3D model,
so we can show all angles and all heights
and get a really
much better idea
of what this split stone looks like.*

Laird, what can you tell us about it?

Well, it was…
the stone sticking out, like,
that much from the ground.
Looked like a standing stone.

And then we found a much larger rock
beside the standing stone.
If we flip it up,
you can see how the rock was sitting.

[Steve]
Mm-hmm.

[Marty]
Yeah, I don’t see a natural way
for that to happen.

No.
No.

[Laird]
So, a hole was dug.
It was placed in the hole,
propped up,
and then surrounded by rocks.

[Marty]
I don’t have the expertise to say
that it was 100% placed,
but the people who do have that expertise tell me that.

So the scientific finding is
that that boulder was placed.

Okay, to me,
there’s only two alternatives.
It was placed to cover something up,
or it was placed to be a marker of some sort.

We need to figure out which of those it is.

We did get this dark organic soil
underneath the rock.
And as I was removing that,
we got this lone piece of wood
that is being sent for C-14.

[Steve]
The dating on that will be important.
Could be quite significant
to figuring out who was on Lot 5.

Because I went back through
some of my old survey stuff last night,
and this structure is very different.

And so I had to go way, way back in time
to find structures like this.
This formation was typically used
by the Romans—
or later by the Vikings.

[Marty]
Really?

[Steve]
This marker could go back
hundreds,
if not thousands of years.

And so it’s used for two things.

It’s used as a marker stone
to say you’re on a,
you know, like, a Roman road.
You’re at a 100-mile point.

Or it’s used to claim land.
So they put it on an area of significance
to say,
“This is ours.”

[Scott]
Which one used it to claim their land?

The Romans.
The Vikings were more so,
“We were here.”

[Marty]
Right.
So it was purposeful?

Yeah.
Oh.
100%.

What else has been found so far in that area?

We’ve got six Roman coins
within a 250-foot radius of this.

Yeah.

[Doug]
You know, one thing we learned
on our research trips,
tracking Templar movement all over Europe,
oftentimes Viking settlement sites
had Roman coins associated
in those settlement sites.

Yeah.

[narrator]
In 2023…

[Roberto]
There is a cave that I would like to show you.

[Alex]
Great.

[Rick]
Absolutely.

…members of the team traveled to Reykjavik, Iceland,
to investigate the theory
that descendants of Vikings and members of the Knights Templar
hid sacred treasures on Oak Island
as early as the 12th century.

As you can see,
there is a cross with a circular top.

[Doug]
Oh.

[Rick]
Wow.

We’ve seen that before.

[Alex]
Oh, yeah.

[narrator]
And while visiting sites
where some believe the two groups traveled together,
they saw not only a carving of a cross
that matches the 14th-century cross found at Smith’s Cove…

[Doug]
Do you know the years the coins were issued?

Yeah.
This is fourth century.

Fourth century?

Yeah.

Well, that’s great.

…but were also shown a number of Roman coins
found at the same site matching the six coins
that were found on Lot 5.

Is it possible that the stone marker,
which Steve believes has a connection to both the Romans
and the Vikings,
may be another clue
that could support this theory?

[Marty]
Is this oriented
to north right now?

[Steve]
Yes.
It’s just common knowledge, too.
You would never put your next marker
out of sight.

You have to see between the two.

There should be another one?

Yeah.
Exactly.
Yeah.

[Steve]
I went out and surveyed the orientation of…
…the six-foot diameter
with the rocks sitting in the center, um,
and that’s the orientation
of the face on top.

[Marty]
If you project that line,
does it hit anything?

Okay.
Nothing as of yet.

When we were out there on the site,
you said,
“Let’s walk it.”

I think we should.

Yeah.

[Steve]
Yeah, yeah.

[Laird]
Yeah.

There might be another one of these—
or something even more important.

I know.
And then that would really clinch it,
wouldn’t it?

Yeah.

[Rick]
It could be highly relevant to…
some of the early work
that was done on this island.

It might have some association
to Nolan’s Cross
and to the five stone cairns.

But a more valuable aspect of this find
is this—
how many other structures like this
have we walked past?

How many other structures
are there yet to be found?
How many other things
have we missed
in our ongoing daily efforts
to try to solve this mystery?

Think we’ve got a little bit of work
we can do.

Let’s walk that line
and then follow where it leads.

Yeah.

And of course we’ll bring Gary
and we’ll detect it.

Okay. Let’s go.

[Laird]
All right.

See you later.

[Doug]
See you, guys.

[Tom]
See you.

[narrator]
The next day…

[Steve]
All right.

Back at the marker stone.
So, what I’d like to do
is walk southeast.

[Peter/Gary]
Okay.

…Steve and other members of the team
prepare to find out if the possible stone marker on Lot 5
might point them to an even greater discovery.

[Steve]
Because we’re in pretty thick woods,
what I’m gonna do
is I’m gonna set my control point
behind this stone
and we’re gonna run a line of sight
until Ethan can’t see us anymore.

Then what we’ll do
is we’ll move him to that location
and we’ll keep going on that line.

[Gary]
And what is this station?
What does it do?

Total station.
It does the exact same thing my GPS does.
It just doesn’t use satellites.

Okay.

It uses ground control,
and it’s great for situations like this,
where you can’t get a signal
because of the trees.

Okay, mate.

[Steve]
We’ll get set up.

Yep.

[Peter]
Okay.

You need this, I assume?

Yep.
I do.
I need you to hold that, Ethan.

What I plan to do is use my total station,
create a—a control line,
we’ll call it.

I plan to move it every couple hundred yards
so we can survey a perfectly straight line,
looking for
another control point
or marker stone.

This is essentially a land version
of my GPS.

So this is the satellite, essentially.
And this is my…
what you’d see me run around with the GPS.

And I got to tell you, mate—
I’m a little bit jealous.
I’ve got my magic wand,
but that looks better.

[laughter]

All right.
I’m ready to go
when you guys are.

Let’s do it.

You tell me where, Ethan.

Yeah, more right.
More right.
There you go.
Perfect.

[Steve]
All right, Gary.
Here’s our first location.

Okay, mate.

[Steve]
So, you know, we go a couple hundred yards.

We’ve got Peter and I cutting line.
We got Gary metal detecting.

And that’s important
because if this truly is a line of significance,
anything he finds
could really be a big clue
of what this marker stone could’ve been
—or who could’ve walked this line.

[beeping]

[Gary]
Pete, got a target over here, mate.
We’re not too far off the line.

[beeping]

[Gary mutters]

Iron, right?

Yeah.

[high-pitched beeping]

A little…
little piece of strap.

Mm-hmm.

You see that?
Square hole in it.

Whoa.

It could be
a barrel loop.

It looks pretty thin.

[Gary]
Yeah.
I like this little piece of strap.

We’ve had some amazing results
from pieces of strap
that we found around the island.

And, of course,
if you’re looking for treasure
and it’s in a large barrel,
they would’ve had iron straps around ’em.

Just put it in my pouch.

Sounds good.
It’s going back to the lab.

Okay, mate.
We’ll keep following the line.

[Steve]
All right, Gary. I’ll keep moving.

[Gary]
Okay, mate.