Case file · Folklore / legend
Ratanabá, the fake lost capital
In June 2022 claims went viral in Brazil that a 450-million-year-old city, Ratanabá, 'capital of the world', lay under the Amazon. The story came from Urandir Fernandes de Oliveira's group Dakila Pesquisas.
2022 CE · -12.00, -58.00 · status: hoax
The account
A federal culture official met Urandir about it, and President Bolsonaro said he had ordered an investigation. Position approximate (claims centred on Mato Grosso).
The sceptical view
Archaeologists dismissed it: 450 million years ago there were no land vertebrates, let alone cities. Critics warned such stories threaten Indigenous lands.