Looking at the following diagrams, what do you think this would be?
At the end of the 19th century, in the Nebraska region of the United States, some strange and huge fossiloids were discovered, which is a spiral-shaped huge stone screw that can reach 2 meters long.
The near-perfect spiral shape, the striking huge size, and the fact that the discovery sites are deserted areas undoubtedly add to the mystery and weirdness of these things. Unknown people call it the "devil's corkscrew"—indeed, much like the corkscrew.
While exploring Nebraska, geologist and paleontologist Owen Barber collected dozens of examples of giant spiral structures, each of which is a left- or right-handed spiral that can extend up to seven feet above the ground and, at the deepest end, to the side.
In 1892, Barber collated some material and reported on these strange and huge things in the journal Science, naming them "Daimonelix" (Devil's Screws). However, although everyone knows the existence of this kind of thing, they still have no idea what it really is.
For nearly a century, many speculations were made based on existing research. There are some strange conjectures, such as that they are the product of grape petrification, good fellow, whose grapes grow into such a spiral to the sky!
Some people think that they are huge fossil worms, after all, there have been many large reptiles in this area before, and perhaps millions of years ago, there was such a long and large worm? It seems that even worms have a perfect mathematical spiral.
▲ National Monument to the Fossil Bed of Agate near the town of Harrison, Nebraska
Barber felt they might be remnants of giant freshwater sponges or plant roots, as he found plant tissue in the helix. He guessed that twenty million years ago, they were in huge freshwater lakes.
A year later, vertebrate paleontologist Edward Deklin Kopp raised his hand against Barber's explanation, believing it was caused by the way rodents with underground habits dug their holes, because there were rodent tooth marks and animal fossils at the bottom of the structure.
From Barber until the early 1900s, scientists working in the area still disagreed with the "devil's screws," which were basically divided into two broad categories, either based on barber's vine plant rhizome remains or mainly based on animal caves.
▲ The "Devil's Screw" in the Fossil Hall of the National Museum of Natural History, with the fossils of extinct beavers on it
However, with more in-depth research and analysis, most people still support the rodent cave hypothesis. Following mathematical "instincts", these rodents dug their holes in a perfect spiral, which later became the shape of today's "bottle openers" because the caves were left vacant for a long time.
Barber rejects the animal cave claim that these "devil's screws" are fossils of plant roots. Later, some people merged the two theories and concluded that they were used as caves by animals after the decay of primitive plant remains.
In 1977, Larry Martin and Bennett published a study in which the remains of extinct beaver archaeology were found, and they found that the beaver's incisors matched the grooves in the devil's corkscrew, so they believed that these structures were caves dug out by ancient beavers and dug with teeth.
▲ Cross-section of extinct beavers and "devil's screws"
They believe that this high and tightly coiled spiral inlet is an ingenious design that can help retain moisture and control the temperature of animal caves.
As for the plant tissues mentioned earlier by Barber, Martin et al. also give explanations. Because the paleoenvironment of the region is arid land, plants struggle to find enough moisture to survive, and spiral-shaped caves have higher humidity, so the roots of the plants invade the caves, and during the fossilization process, the soil and roots are embedded in the silica, and this silicification allows them to be preserved.
In this way, after nearly a century, people finally reached a consensus and found the secret of this strange object, its near-perfect mathematical spiral, like a small world lost in the wasteland, after countless times, finally presented to mankind.