Going to try to just keep this short and won't attempt to ansawer every part of it. Yes most of what you said is what I'm getting at. The had to start somewhere is in refernce to who started the dig and why. There has to be a reason. You don't just wonder onto an island and say hey lets dig for treasure here. If it was the original 3 then the story as we hear it is "probably" true on how it started. If they were not the first to dig then how did it start.. I don't understand how people don't want to say how they think it started is making 100's of posts on here and watching the show for years yet have no opinion
Also keep in mind this is late 1700's to early 1800's. No one is spending millions back then..
Treasure or no treasure leave that out of it..
Ok. I'm glad we are now on the same page. And I believe we can now stop concentrating on who dug the first "hole" because that really is irrelevant to how it got started. And I think the whole issue was that you had decided that "who dug the first hole" was an overriding factor and the rest of us don't see that as being relevant which is why we weren't answering. And given your clear penchant for twisting our words and trying to catch someone "flip flopping" no one here really trusts you enough to even give you our opinion. And the fact that your reputation has come to that should give you pause.
So instead, let's concentrate on "how it all started". But keep in mind that "how it all started" will not tell us whether or not it is true because treasure hunters will believe anything. And just because a treasure hunter believes it does not lend the story any credence.
To me it keeps going back to "with a compelling story". Someone told a story. True or false, a story was told. And that story only had to be compelling enough that it brought the first treasure hunters to the island. If you tell a story to 1000 people and only 1 person believes it, that is enough to give the story wings. But remember, the other 999 may not believe the story. So getting the first treasure hunters to believe it isn't saying much because treasure hunters will believe anything simply because they WANT it to be true, not because it really makes any sense. And I don't think the original story was terribly compelling because not much had been discovered yet. But the story morphed over the years into something compelling enough that it brought the Lagina brothers to the island hundreds of years later despite the fact that nothing concrete has ever really been found.
But you want more, so I'll give it to you. Here is my OPINION. It is not based on facts. But it IS based on common sense, human nature, and how so many treasure hunters on this very forum seem to behave.
The story had to start somewhere..... So....
I think most of the story is made up. But I think there were three men. And I think they had heard rumors of pirates or some other activity on the island. And I can imagine that they found an area on OI where there was a depression in the ground under some tree(s) that looked like someone had put a rope around it at one time or another. And being predisposed to believing something could be on the island, they started digging because it looked like a promising spot. I think they got 10 to 15 down, found some wood scraps or old iron relics along the way and then stopped. And that was the end of it. They filled the hole back in. No treasure and no reason to really believe there ever was a treasure there.
Being human, they wanted attention and they wanted to be able to tell a good story to their friends. And so, like so many treasure hunters we could point to (cough, cough... Franklin), they told people that they believe they had found a great treasure. So they told their story to a few people and embellished a few of the details to make it seem like they were great treasure hunters. And like so many treasure hunting stories where no treasure can be produced to back up the story, they had to make up a reason for why they truly did find a treasure but couldn't show it to anyone. Now if you've spent ANY amount of time out here on this forum listening to treasure hunters telling you about the treasures they've "located but can't dig up" you will see common excuses. And the most common one is, "I know it's there, it's just too deep for me to get to". And this is exactly the excuse they used. And other treasure hunters bought it. Not "smart" treasure hunters, just treasure hunters.
How it went from there I don't know. But I think once they started that story, others found it compelling enough to give it a try. But when they failed too, they made up new aspects to the story about platforms and stones at 90 feet. Why? Because they had to give an excuse for why there MUST be a treasure there but they couldn't get to it. It's always just out of reach or whatever the excuse of the day is.
And as more and more people dug deeper, instead of giving up and admitting that they were wrong and had wasted their time, the excuses just got wilder and wilder. And before long, the excuses and explanations are fueling on each other because there has been so much destruction and backfilling that no one could possibly say what is original and what is from other treasure hunters' failed attempts. By the time it reaches critical mass, lunatic cat ladies are appearing on TV shows in front of millions of people to tell wild theories about alien succubus vampires from the dark realm of the Templars. And because she ended her theory with the word "Templars", people are willing to ignore the fact that she is obviously just a crazed attention seeking whor*...... Ok, you get the point.
That is my opinion. It is not based on facts because we have no facts. But it is based on human nature and what I have seen countless treasure hunters on this very forum do. There is always a treasure story. And it only takes one idiot to believe it and go searching. And when he can't produce a treasure, he makes up an excuse about how it was deeper than he could dig. And some other hopeful idiot believes him, and it just keeps going and going and going.
