Josh Gates embarks on a sprawling hunt across two continents for one of archaeology's most elusive prizes: the lost tomb of Alexander the Great. In Alexandria, Egypt, Gates joins archaeologist Calliope Limneos-Papakosta in a flooded excavation beneath the modern city, crawling through cramped tunnels to examine the foundation of a massive ancient structure. The team uncovers the building's northern wall and discovers fragments of painted plaster in red, blue, and yellow—colors Gates recognizes from the tomb of Alexander's father, Philip II, in Greece. The investigation turns dangerous when pumps fail and the tunnel rapidly fills with water, forcing an emergency evacuation. Later, Gates pursues a controversial theory that Alexander's remains may have been smuggled to Venice and now rest in St. Mark's Cathedral, hidden in plain sight for centuries.
Mainstream scholarship confirms that Alexander died in Babylon in 323 BCE and was likely entombed in Alexandria, the Egyptian city he founded, where ancient sources describe his body being displayed in a crystal sarcophagus. The tomb was visited by Julius Caesar and other Roman leaders, but all traces vanished sometime between the 3rd and 4th centuries CE, spawning one of history's greatest archaeological mysteries. What makes this episode compelling is the tangible evidence emerging from Alexandria's waterlogged ruins—architectural remains grand enough to match a royal tomb, decorated with colors associated with Macedonian royalty—combined with the genuine peril of urban archaeology and the audacious Venice hypothesis that challenges conventional assumptions about where Alexander's journey truly ended.
Alexandria
Egypt · archaeological
Josh hunted for the lost tomb of Alexander the Great, diving Egypt's coast to reveal ruins of Alexander's Royal Quarter and tunneling under modern Alexandria despite equipment malfunctions.
British Museum, London
United Kingdom · historical
Gates receives an after-hours private tour of the British Museum with Andrew Chugg, examining a large granite sarcophagus originally inscribed for Pharaoh Nectanebo II that Chugg believes was used to hold Alexander the Great's body, and later uses augmented reality to test whether a block from Venice fits the sarcophagus.
Cleopatra's Needle, Victoria Embankment, London
United Kingdom · historical
Gates meets historian Andrew Chugg at the Egyptian obelisk on the Thames embankment, where Chugg uses the monument's migration from Alexandria to London as a metaphor for his theory that Alexander's remains similarly migrated out of Egypt.
Cloister of St. Apollonia, Venice
Italy · archaeological
Gates meets imaging expert Pietro Meloni at this cloistered repository where the church stores a carved limestone block discovered in the crypt of St. Mark, featuring a Vergina Star shield and sarissa spear — which Gates and Meloni 3D-scan to later test against the sarcophagus in London.
Saqqara Necropolis
Egypt · archaeological
Josh joined an active dig of 4,000-year-old tombs, uncovering mummies and treasure that could solve the mysterious collapse of Egypt's Old Kingdom.
St. Mark's Cathedral
Italy · historical
Josh investigated shocking evidence suggesting Alexander the Great's body may actually be interred in Venice's famous cathedral.
Vergina (ancient Macedonian royal tombs)
Greece · archaeological
Gates references his earlier visit to Vergina, where Philip II's subterranean tomb glitters with ancient treasures and is adorned with the Vergina Star, giving him a benchmark for the likely riches in Alexander's own tomb.