Reports in a Facebook group for flat-earth conspiracy theorists claim to show images of colossal human remains. These photos are shared as alleged evidence that giant humans once roamed the planet, and are part of an internet scam that has been going on for over 15 years.
Two Facebook posts that allegedly share authentic videos of giant skeletons can be found here and here in a group called “Ancient Giant Tree Truth.”
As explained here in a previous Reuters Fact Check, the group speaks with a belief among Flat Earthers, conspiracy theorists who claim that our planet is not a globe, but a flat surface (here) that ‘real’ trees no longer does not exist.
Proponents of her case have been working to make the actual transcript of this statement available online. The trees we see now are small replacement versions of giant 20 mile high trees that once existed on earth, as stated in a Quartz article here. , but also that giants who once wandered on earth were what cut them off.
A 2007 National Geographic article says “unbridled reports and photos” of alleged giant skeletons, described as “photo gallery”, have led to a steady stream of emails to National Geographic News’ from ‘Around the World’ (here). In the article, National Geographic reveals many of these photos and surrounding claims.
The first image of the remains of a suspected giant (here) can be found here as ‘Photoshop submission for’ Size Matters 4 ‘contest, designed 8854061.’ The caption below the entry reads: “Whitmath57, an American designer, created this Photoshop on August 14, 2011 for DesignCrowd (Community Contests), a company in Australia. Photoshop was designed for the project ‘Size Matters 4’. It received 3 out of 5 stars. ”
As noted here on the Hoax-Slayer blog, the second image (here), which appeared in a fake news report on a Bosnian website (here) in 2015, is a combination of two images: a photo of a very old but normal size female skeleton (here) and a photo of archaeologists digging up a dinosaur fossil in 2013 (here).
As seen in active Facebook groups like ‘The Flat Earth Nephilim Hybrid Giants Biblical Truth’, which has nearly 7,000 members and can be found here, some flat ears believe that a group of giant humans, known as the Nephilim, once lived on earth inhabited and cut. down the colossal trees, leaving stumps behind that the general public understands as geological formations such as Devils Tower in Wyoming and Giant’s Causeway in Ireland (here, here).
According to believers, the Vatican hides archaeological evidence of the existence of these giant humans (here, here).
As explained by the Encyclopedia Britannica, the Nephilim are described in the Hebrew Bible as ‘a group of mysterious beings or people of extraordinary size and strength who lived before and after the Flood’ (here). Genesis and Numbers refer to the Nephilim.
A scientific explanation of the biblical origins of such internet theories can be found here in a 2015 article entitled ‘The Embarrassing and Alluring Biblical Giant’, written by Brian Doak, Professor of Biblical Studies at George Fox University in northwestern Oregon ( here).
VERDICT
Untrue. These images of alleged giant skeletons have been altered and are part of years of internet fraud.
This article was produced by the Reuters Fact Check team. Read more about our fact-checking work here.