Desert in Peru with mysterious giant drawings. Nazca geoglyphs

Peru. The mystery of the Nazca desert has been solved?

The world-famous Nazca desert with its mysterious patterns, lines and geometric shapes is located in the south of Peru, 400 km from Lima and 50 km from the Pacific coast. This is one of the driest places on our planet, receiving only about 2.5 cm of precipitation per year - less than the Gobi Desert.

Discovery of Nazca Desert Drawings

Mysterious lines and the Nazca paintings were accidentally discovered during a flight by a Peruvian pilot in 1927. The first to try to uncover the secret of the Nazca Desert was the American archaeologist Paul Kozok, who arrived in Nazca in 1939. They found that the giant drawings were made by removing a 20-centimeter layer of brown, sun-burnt stones and soil, under which a much lighter soil was hidden.

A giant astronomical calendar?

All the drawings could be divided into three groups: in one - geometric shapes, in the other - lines, zigzags and spirals, in the third - giant images of birds, insects and animals. Paul Kozok hypothesized that the Nazca drawings were a giant astronomical calendar. This idea came to him when he saw that on the day of the summer solstice the sun had set just beyond the end of one of the straight lines included in the huge drawing of a bird.

Kozok's research was continued by his assistant, the German mathematician Maria Reiche. We can say that this tireless woman devoted her entire life to the Nazca desert and confirming the hypothesis of her teacher Paul Kozok. For more than 40 years, Reiche cataloged lines and designs, took measurements, and even conducted aerial photography with the help of the Peruvian Air Force. The researcher died in 1992, until the end of her life she believed that the Nazca Lines were a giant astronomical calendar.

1968 - an unexpected blow to the Kozok and Reiche hypothesis was dealt by the American astronomer Gerald Hawkins, who analyzed the Nazca lines using a computer and concluded that 80% of geometric figures have nothing to do with the movement of celestial bodies - since J. Hawkins became widely known After the publication of his book “The Solution of Stonehenge” in 1965, in which he argued that the famous building of the ancients in England was a kind of observatory, his opinion turned out to be decisive for many.

But, as Maria Reiche rightly believed, when making calculations in his research, Hawkins did not take the terrain into account at all, and this led him to an erroneous conclusion. Today, many of the researchers do not rule out that some of the lines are in one way or another connected with astronomical observations of the ancient inhabitants of Nazca, although skeptics say that out of almost 1000 straight lines, some can certainly simply by chance point to celestial bodies on certain days.

A giant map of groundwater distribution?

Relatively not so long ago, a message appeared in the foreign press that the secret of the Nazca drawings had finally been revealed. The author of the new hypothesis was David Johnson, a former high school teacher from New York State. It is interesting that Johnson was absolutely not interested in the mysterious drawings of Nazca, but searched for water in this desert using such an exotic method as dowsing. Johnson was especially drawn to the ancient irrigation canals, some of which still flowed.

Local residents told him that the main sources of water for the canals were two small rivers, but Johnson immediately noticed that the canals ran parallel to the rivers and they could not take water from them. He soon came to the conclusion that the sources of water were geological faults. Water flowing from the Andes accumulated in areas of cracks in the bedrock and flowed down into the valleys along faults underground.

At first, Johnson did not connect this idea with the Nazca lines, but he began to notice that as soon as he discovered aquifers, there were always traces of ancient desert inhabitants and their geometric patterns nearby. One day in July 1996, he climbed one of the hills, looked at two broad lines stretching towards the horizon, abutting the dark crevices of the nearby mountains, which he believed to be formed by geological faults, and then it dawned on him. As Johnson said, he sat on the top of a hill and said to himself: “My God, I know what the Nazca lines mean, they trace underground water sources on the surface!” In other words, the lines and geometric shapes on the surface of the desert are a giant map of the distribution of groundwater.

Although some scientists had long assumed that the Nazca paintings were somehow related to water, the main treasure of these arid places, many of them were skeptical of Johnson's idea. But Helaine Silverman, an archaeologist at the University of Illinois, asked her colleagues at a 1999 conference on Nazca to “keep their eyes open” while Johnson’s hypothesis was being tested.

Johnson's hypothesis has been tested for several years by Steve Mabee, a hydrogeologist at the University of Massachusetts. “We make maps of our water flows, maybe the Nazca people did the same thing, only they “drew” them on the earth’s surface,” says Mabi. He has already found evidence that alternative water sources in the faults Johnson found actually exist. And in all cases, Mabey established the “marking” of these faults with lines on the surface.

Are the Nazca Lines related to sacred rituals?

Johann Reinhard, an anthropologist, was the first to put forward the theory that the Nazca lines are associated with sacred rituals that are dedicated to causing rain. He discovered a ritual that could explain the Nazca Lines. Archaeological finds at some of the wide lines (“Däniken landing strips”) confirm their connection with water. Sea shells (a symbol of water in the Andes) and pottery drinking vessels were found. Reinhard also sees sacred symbols in images of animals, so the spider and monkey in these places were considered associated with fertility, and therefore with water.

Another of the researchers, Entosh Aveni, believes that he has already discovered the hidden logic in the mosaic of the Nazca Lines. He removed all the images of animals, spirals and geometric shapes from the map and left only straight lines on it. It turned out that all the lines converged into sun-like patterns, which he called “ray centers.” Together with a colleague, he was able to identify 62 ray centers and about 800 straight lines. In fact, each of the “ray centers” was located on the top of some hill. According to Aveni and some experts, the lines may have served as paths and led people to the tops of the hills ("ray centers"), where they performed rituals related to water.

Other researchers are also trying to solve the mystery of the Nazca Desert. It has been established that the ancient Nazcans beheaded their enemies by mummifying their heads, and had very interesting religious ideas about nature and the world around them. Images of animals almost identical to the giant paintings in the desert were found on Nazca ceramics.

Markus Reindel decided to take the unbeaten path and chose a different starting point: “If we want to decipher the Nazca geoglyphs, we need to find the people who created them.”

Archaeological expeditions

Reindel conducted a surface survey of the mountain slopes in the vicinity of the town of Palpa, 40 km from Nazca, and at a depth of 30 cm he found the upper part of the wall there. Excavations have confirmed that these are the walls of an ancient city, which was located in close proximity to the legendary drawings.

After the first expedition, the archaeologist drew a detailed plan of the city and reconstructed some of its history. 1900 years ago, on the flat part of the valley, in the interfluve of the Rio Grande, Rio Palpa and Rio Whiscas rivers, there was a strange structure - settlers erected a wall 400 m long and 100 m wide. Meter-high walls made of brick blocks rose to a height of 12 m, symbolizing power and wealth. The basis of the wealth of the “Nazca people” was agriculture, which flourished thanks to an extensive irrigation system.

The surplus of agricultural products created the conditions for such social stratification a society in which some segments of the population did not participate directly in food production. Reindel believes that they had a kind of nobility - the highest social stratum. An indirect confirmation of this assumption can be the complex system of irrigation canals, the construction of which required competent planning and management of the work.

And to create drawings in the desert, orders, plans and guidance were also needed from the rulers in power, whether they were called kings, chiefs, high priests or something else. The surroundings of Palpa on Reindel's plans are covered with lines, triangles and spirals, reaching almost to the settlement itself.

A German archaeologist is searching for the original meaning of the mysterious Nazca paintings in the Rio Grande Valley. The former inhabitants of these places “populated” the surrounding rocks with thousands of images of various animals and humanoid creatures. Small images carved on rocks (petroglyphs) date back to the 4th century BC. e. Later they were repeated in enlarged form on the flat surfaces of mountain slopes. Drawings ranging in size from 10 to 20 m were clearly visible from afar.

“It is from here that the tradition of land paintings must have developed,” Reindel suggested. “As they grew larger, they became more sweeping and abstract and no longer occupied rocky slopes, but vast surfaces of the desert plateau.”

The scientist’s reasoning is very logical, but the question arises: why are these giant schematic drawings located in places where no one can see them? In addition to the previous “cosmic” interpretations of the Nazca drawings, one more hypothesis can be cited. After many years of observations in the basins of the nearest rivers, the American David Johnson made an unexpected conclusion: “The Nazca Lines are a clear text carved into the terrain to indicate to the inhabitants of the region where the accessible sources are located.” water".

Markus Reindel has no reason yet to refute or confirm this and other hypotheses. He pins his hopes on subsequent seasons of excavation and intends to reach individual buildings that lie away from the settlement - directly on the extensions of the Casca lines or directly below them. Archaeologists have not yet discovered such buildings. Excavations inside the walled area will also continue: Reindel wants to find the temple of the “Nasca people.” The next stage will be the search for the creators of the Nazca Lines, and the ultimate goal is to unravel the mysterious signs.

In our opinion, all these hypotheses should be considered as a whole. After all, many of the scientists may probably be right. Some Nazca lines may serve as an astronomical calendar, marking periods of greatest drought or rain, others may serve as ceremonial paths for rituals associated with bringing rain, and others may project underground aquifers to the surface. All the lines together created a real puzzle for scientists...

The explanation of giant images of animals, birds and insects, in our opinion, may be even simpler. Can you see a spider or a hummingbird from a high hill? Unlikely. The ancient inhabitants of Nazca also understood this, but they were only interested in the rain clouds that flew above them at a great height. These giant images were intended for the heavenly deities who control the rains, so that they would see them and take pity on the animals, giving them, and at the same time people, life-giving moisture. Is this the answer to the mysterious Nazca signs?

Nazca Drawings are located on Nazca Plateau- one of the most mysterious places on Earth. It is located 450 km south of the capital Peru, between cities Nazca And Palpa. Here the entire territory is 500 sq. km. covered with lines and drawings of unknown origin. They don't represent anything special if you look at them standing next to them.

Map of Nazca drawings

In 1553 Cieza de Leon was the first to report the Nazca drawings. From his words: “Through all these valleys and through those that have already been traversed, the beautiful, great Inca Road runs along its entire length, and here and there among the sands signs are seen to guess the route laid.”

ABOUTMonkey, Nazca drawing

The drawings were noticed in 1939, when an airplane flew over the plateau American archaeologist Paul Kosok. Huge contribution in the study of mysterious lines belongs to the German doctor of archeology Maria Reiche. Her work began in 1941. However, she was able to photograph the drawings from the air only in 1947, using the services of military aviation.

In 1994, the Nazca Geoglyphs were included in the UNESCO World Heritage List.

Tree and handsNazca drawing

Nazca Plateau occupies 60 kilometers and approximately 500 sq. m of its territory is covered with a pattern of strange lines folding into bizarre shapes. The main mystery of Nazca is geometric figures in the form of triangles and more than thirty huge drawings of animals, birds, fish, insects and people of unusual appearance. All images on the Nazca surface are dug into sandy soil, the depth of the lines varies from 10 to 30 centimeters, and the width of the stripes can reach as much as 100 meters. The lines of the drawings stretch for kilometers, without changing at all under the influence of the relief - the lines rise up hills and descend from them, while remaining almost perfectly smooth and continuous. Who and why created these drawings - unknown tribes or aliens from outer space - there is still no answer to this question. Today there are many hypotheses, but none of them can be a solution.

Dog, Nazca drawing

Whale, Nazca drawing

Hummingbird has a length of 50 meters, spider — 46, condor extends from beak to tail feathers for almost 120 meters, and heron has a length of up to 188 meters. Almost all the drawings are made on this huge scale in the same manner, when the outline is outlined by one continuous line. Perfect straight lines and the stripes go beyond the horizon, crossing dry river beds, climbing hills and without deviating from their direction (although modern geodetic methods do not allow drawing a straight line up to 8 kilometers long on rough terrain so that the deviation does not exceed 0.1 degrees) . The true form of the images can only be observed from a bird's eye view. There is no such natural elevation nearby, but there are half-mountain humps. But the higher you rise above the plateau, the smaller these drawings become and turn into incomprehensible scratches.

Hummingbird,Nazca drawing

Spider, Nazca drawing

Condor, Nazca drawing

Heron, Nazca drawing

What scientists have been able to establish more or less accurately is the age of the images. Based on ceramic fragments found here and data from analyzes of organic remains, they established that in the period between 350 BC. and 600 AD there was a civilization here. However, this theory cannot be accurate, since objects of civilization could have been brought here much later than the appearance of the images. One theory is that these are works of the Nazca Indians, who inhabited areas of Peru before the formation of the Inca Empire. The Nazcas did not leave anything behind except burial places, so it is unknown whether they had writing and whether they “painted” the desert.

"Astronaut", drawing by Nazca

The Nazca Lines pose many questions to historians: who created them, when, why and how. In fact, many geoglyphs cannot be seen from the ground, so we can only assume that with the help of such patterns the ancient inhabitants of the valley communicated with the deity. In addition to the ritual, the astronomical significance of these lines cannot be ruled out.

About four and a half hundred kilometers south of Lima, the modern capital of Peru, and forty kilometers from the Pacific coast is the Nazca Plateau, the mystery of which has excited the imagination of many researchers for decades.

Now there is no problem getting here - a comfortable double-decker bus from Lima will take you along the smooth Pan-American highway to Nazca in just a few hours. A small town on the edge of the desert warmly welcomes tourists with very cozy hotels of various ranks. And in local restaurants you can not only have a snack and relax with a weak Peruvian cocktail “Pisca-sur” or stronger drinks, but also watch a colorful Indian show. And of course, listen to the famous “Condor” in the most unexpected arrangements.

Tourists are loved in Nazca because they provide the local population with the opportunity to live well in a very inhospitable area of ​​the country. After all, if there weren’t such a foreign flow here, it’s completely unclear how people could survive here.

The Nazca Plateau is a surprisingly flat and completely lifeless desert in one of the driest places on Earth. Rains fall here on average once every two years and last no more than half an hour, although even in this case it is sometimes difficult to call them rains. And the proximity to the equator leads to the fact that even during the local “winter” months, the plateau warms up so much during the day that streams of hot air become visible, rising upward from the hot stones, which over many years in these conditions have received the so-called “desert tan” - darkened by the heat and sun.

And yet here, where, it would seem, nothing else could exist, images of animals and people, geometric figures and lines are intertwined on the surface of the plateau. Rectangles, trapezoids, triangles, figures of a whale, monkey, spider, condor, hummingbird, unknown animals and plants. Together, all this forms a strange, intricate pattern that covers a huge area - several hundred square kilometers. It is this pattern that attracts numerous tourists here, the flow of which is even enough to support the life of the local airport with small pleasure planes, from which tourists have the opportunity to examine the most impressive details of the mysterious pattern on the ground.

“Many centuries before the Incas, a historical monument was created on the southern coast of Peru, which has no equal in the world... In terms of scale and precision of execution, it is not inferior to the Egyptian pyramids. But if there we look, raising our heads, at monumental three-dimensional structures of simple geometric shape, then here we have to look from a great height at wide open spaces, covered with mysterious lines and images that are drawn on the plain as if by a giant hand...” (M. Reiche. “ Secrets of the Desert").

Who created the giant “easel” - nature or man?.. Who, when and why painted the lifeless desert like that?.. Where did the strange drawings on the ground come from?..

Not only professional archaeologists and historians, but also amateur enthusiasts around the world have been trying to find the answer to these questions for many years. The versions that are put forward regarding the origin and purpose of the lines and drawings are so diverse and sometimes so fantastic that they form a mixture no less bizarre than the Nazca geoglyphs themselves. And the information about the desert plateau and the images on its surface is so seasoned with the most incredible rumors and conjectures that sometimes even a very experienced reader finds it extremely difficult to understand the real state of affairs on the Nazca plateau and understand which source presents the real facts and which contains nothing but outright fiction and fantasies of the author, who (alas, this is by no means uncommon) has never been to the plateau and has never seen geoglyphs...

In principle, it would seem that there is nothing particularly strange in the very fact of drawings, because people have always loved to draw. And he drew on everything that came to hand - on paper, on walls, on stones. This is his craving for self-expression, which can be traced from the earliest periods of the existence of humanity as such.

The human desire to draw is so great and has such ancient roots that researchers even use special terminology to distinguish one image from another. So frescoes are images on the walls (both natural caves and artificial structures). Petroglyphs are drawings on stones and rocks. Geoglyphs are images on earth...

Near the same Nazca plateau, on some of the surrounding mountains there are, for example, petroglyphs that are applied both directly to the rocks that form the mountain, and to large crumbled boulders.

What, then, is strange about the fact that there are also geoglyphs - drawings on the ground?.. And why such close attention to the Nazca Plateau?..

Geoglyphs are known on many different continents. They are found in Australia, in European England, in North American California. There are also several countries in South America - Chile, Peru, Bolivia. However, if in other regions of the planet these are single images of mainly animals and people, which do not represent anything particularly surprising, then in the central regions of Peru we are faced with lines, stripes and geometric shapes. In addition, on a rather large, but still limited space of the Nazca plateau, there is an incredible concentration of geoglyphs - their number is in the thousands!.. And this is the uniqueness of this region, its fundamental difference from all others places

First of all, Nazca attracts attention with images of animals, sometimes reaching tens and even hundreds of meters in size. So, let's say the drawing of a hummingbird is 50 meters long, a spider is 46 meters long, a condor is almost 120 meters long from beak to tail feathers, and a lizard is 188 meters long. These same images are the most famous.

But there are just over three dozen such informative drawings. Everything else is geometric shapes: Nazca now has 13 thousand lines, about a hundred different spirals, over seven hundred rectangular and trapezoidal areas. Scattered among these strict forms are countless “half-finished figures,” zigzags, strokes, segments, straight rays and curvilinear formations. On top of that, there are more than a dozen so-called “centers” on the plateau - points from which lines and stripes extend in different directions.

Literally a phantasmagoria on a huge “easel”, where a mass of “artists”, adherents of a wide variety of styles and movements, left their memories...

“Nazca is something mysterious, enigmatic. Nazca is shrouded in an impenetrable and incomprehensible shroud of mystery. This is something fascinating, deceptive, logical in its own way and at the same time completely absurd. The message that Nazca brings to us is incomprehensible and mysterious, and any hypotheses about it are contradictory. Nazca appears as something unthinkable and unsolved, almost meaningless and capable of driving you crazy. But if the graphic “messages” that dot the lands in the vicinity modern city Nazca are just cyclopean children’s drawings, completely devoid of any meaning and arising as a result of a strange whim or whim, this means that all laws of logic are violated on the Nazca plateau” (E. Däniken, “Signs facing eternity”).

Theories and hypotheses

During the study of Nazca geoglyphs, many different versions of both the creation of drawings on the ground and their purpose have been put forward. Here we will provide only their (far from complete) list with brief comments. And some of the most meaningful ones will be considered in more detail below.

So, here are some theories (even the most incredible ones) proposed different people– archaeologists, historians, writers, scientists and simply enthusiasts, inspired by the secrets of the Nazca geoglyphs.

Erich von Däniken – Alien Cult

The theory of Erich von Däniken is the most famous. He put forward the idea that long ago aliens from other stars visited Earth. They were also noted on the Nazca Plateau. They landed at this place, and in the process of landing the aircraft, the stones were blown in all directions by rocket exhaust. When approaching the ground, the energy of the gases flying from the engines increased and a wider strip of soil was cleared. Thus the first trapezoids appeared. Later the aliens flew away and left people in the dark. Like modern cults, they tried to call upon the alien gods again by creating lines and shapes.

Paul Kosok – Observatory

Kosok suggested that the Nazca Plateau was something like an ancient observatory, where lines and stripes indicated the positions of celestial bodies (stars and planets) at a certain point in time. This hypothesis was completely refuted during the Hawkins expedition.

Maria Reiche – Astronomical theory

Maria Reiche, the most famous explorer of the Nazca Plateau, favored an astronomical theory in which the lines indicated the rising directions of important stars and planetary events such as the solar solstice, and the spider and monkey designs symbolized the constellations Orion and Ursa Major.

Alan F. Alford – Negroid Slaves

Alford hypothesized that the Nazca lines were created by some “Negroid slaves of the Tiahuanaco culture.” After the revolution, the Negroid population destroyed some of the figures, which, according to Alford, explains the formation of zigzag lines. Later these people went north and founded the Chavin culture in Peru and the Olmec culture in Mexico.

In my opinion, this hypothesis is completely made up. The Tiahuanaco, Chavin and Olmec cultures have absolutely nothing in common with each other. Moreover: in Tiahuanaco and Chavin de Untara there are ruins of structures belonging to an ancient, highly technically advanced civilization (see the author’s book “Peru and Bolivia Long Before the Incas”), while the Olmec culture is completely primitive .

Robert Best – Memory of a Rainstorm

Robert Best from Australia put forward the idea that the Nazca drawings represent certain “ memorable places" O big flood, caused by a prolonged downpour from heaven (such as the Old Testament Flood).

Gilbert de Jong – Zodiac

Gilbert de Jong, based on the results of his own measurements on the Nazca plateau, came to the conclusion that geoglyphs are images of the zodiac constellations.

Robin Edgar – Solar Eclipses

Robin Edgar from Canada believes that the Nazca figures and lines are intended to observe the so-called “Eye of God” during total solar eclipses.

Simone Weisbard – Astronomical and meteorological calendar

Simone Weisbard believes that the Nazca geoglyphs were originally a giant astronomical calendar. The system of lines and drawings was later used by the Nascan culture as a system for meteorological forecasts of the Nascan culture.

What forecast could there be in a desert like Nazca?.. Quite obvious - hot and dry. This is confirmed by the preservation of lines that otherwise would have long been washed away by rain. So creating a lot of lines and drawings for such an unambiguous forecast makes absolutely no sense.

Jim Woodman – Balloon Theory

Jim Woodmann experimented with launching a hot air balloon made by the Aymara Indians from local materials. After this experiment, Woodman proposed the theory that the Nazcans used balloons both to create geoglyphs and to bury their leaders.

Prof. Anthony Eveny – Water Cult

Anthony Eveny believes that there are connections between the lines and some kind of underground system of water channels. In this way, the Nazca Indians allegedly celebrated the cult of water. And figures and lines were used for ceremonial dances.

Prof. Gelan Siverman – Tribal Signs

Michael Ko – Ceremonial Places

The famous Mayan historian and researcher of Mesoamerican cultures Michael Ko believes that the lines are sacred paths for certain religious rites. And the first lines were created in honor of the oldest heavenly and mountain deities who brought water to the fields.

Prof. Frederico Kaufman-Doig – Magic Lines

A famous archaeologist has proposed a theory according to which the Nazca lines are magical lines that have their origins in the cult of the cat deity in Chavin de Huantar.

Georg A. von Brünig – Sports Stadium

Bruenig suggested that the Nazca plateau was used for races for ritual purposes. This theory was supported by Professor Heumar von Ditfurth.

Markus Reindel / David Johnson – Water Cult and Dowsing

David Johnson believes that the Nazca figures are markers for underground water. Trapezes show the flow of streams, zigzags show where they end, lines indicate the direction of the currents. Reindel, complementing Johnson's theory, explains the nature of the figures by using vines to find underground water.

Carl Munch – Ancient “geo-matrix of numbers”

According to Munch, ancient structures around the world are precisely located in a global coordinate system tied to the position of the Great Pyramid on the Giza Plateau in Egypt. The locations of these sites correspond to the geometry of their construction, which was supposedly based on a very ancient number system, called the "Geomatrix" by Munch. The Nazca Lines are also supposedly located in accordance with the “Geomatrix Code System”.

There are many variations of such theories. But alas. Any thorough examination of the “evidence” of such theories quickly reveals that the authors pull out from the general mass of ancient objects only those that are suitable to “substantiate” their theory, ignoring the fact of the existence of objects that do not fit into this “theory.”

Herman E. Bossi – Nazca Code

Bossi's theory is based on the analysis of a geoglyph called the Mandala or Zodiac (more commonly "Estrella"), which was discovered by Erich von Däniken in 1995. Bossi believes that this design contains encoded information about the star HD 42807 and its planetary system. In other drawings, in his opinion, this code is also used.

Thomas Wieck – Plan of the Cathedral

Vic saw the plan of the cathedral in the Estrella geoglyph.

It remains only unclear which cathedral, and what this drawing would do on a desert plateau...

Prof. Henry Stirlin – The Loom

Stirlin believes that the Nazca Indians used the line system as a loom. In the neighboring Paracas culture, textiles were made from a single thread. But the Indians had neither wheels nor looms, so they organized hundreds of people who held this thread. Their position on the ground was determined by the lines.

Dr. Zoltan Zelko – Map

Hungarian mathematician Dr. Zoltán Zelko analyzed the Nazca line system in comparison with other ancient sites in Peru and hypothesized that the Nazca Plateau could be a 100 by 800 kilometer map depicting the area around Lake Titicaca at a scale of 1:16.

Evan Hadingham – Hallucinogens

Evan Hadingham believes that the solution to the Nazca mystery is the use of a powerful hallucinogenic plant such as Psilocybine. With its help, the Indians allegedly organized “shamanic flights” to view the surface of the plateau. And the lines themselves were created for the worship of a certain “mountain deity.”

Prof. Dr. Aldon Mason – Signs for the Gods

Mason's main interest is ancient burials and deformed skulls of the Nazcan culture. He considers geoglyphs as Signs for the Heavenly Gods.

Albrecht Kottmann – Writing system

Albrecht Kottmann tried a different approach to the Nazca mystery. He divided the drawings into separate parts and analyzed their geometry. So he divided the 286-meter-long bird into 22 parts and as a result “found” that the head consists of two parts, the neck of five parts, the body of three, and the remaining twelve parts form the beak. Kottman believes that geometric signs, designs and their parts are a writing system with giant and small letters.

William H. Isbell – Demographic Theory

According to this theory, the Nazca rulers ordered lines to be drawn to control the population. Isbell believes that the Nazcans could not store crops for long, and in fertile years the population increased sharply. When the Indians were working to create lines, they could not produce children at the same time.

Wolf-Galik – Signals from extraterrestrial life

The Canadian Galiki recognizes in the Nazca system undoubted signs of an extraterrestrial race. He believes that only with such a point of view can we explain such a grandiose plan and the work to implement it.

Siegfried Waxman – Cultural Atlas

Siegfried Waxman saw in the Nazcan line system a cultural atlas of human history.

Ivan Koltsov – Graves of leaders

In accordance with Koltsov's hypothesis, the drawings on the Nazca plateau indicate the burial places of local leaders.

Vladimir Babanin – Map of Ancient Civilizations

According to Babanin, the Nazca geoglyph system is a map of the Earth, where the places of ancient cultures are marked with specific geoglyphs. Including the lost continents of Atlantis and Mu.

Alla Belokon – Traces of an alien civilization

According to this version, the Nazca lines were created by streams of energy of an unknown nature from the aircraft of an alien civilization, which combines them with the so-called crop drawings produced by UFOs. According to Belokon, the Nazca geoglyph system reflects the diagram of our Solar system.

Dmitry Nechai – Connection with the Great Pyramid

The geoglyph “Estrella,” according to Nechai, reflects the geometric proportions of the Great Pyramid on the Giza Plateau.

Eduard Vershinin – Navigation signs

Geoglyphs on the Nazca plateau served as navigational signs for training young pilots of aircraft of an ancient highly developed civilization.

Igor Alekseev – Mining

Lines and drawings are a by-product of the activities of an alien civilization in the search and extraction of minerals or chemical elements.

Andrey Sklyarov and Andrey Zhukov – Scanning from aircraft

According to the version voiced in the film “Peru and Bolivia Long Before the Incas” (see video below), the plateau was partially created by people in different periods and, perhaps, some of the drawings were created by a highly developed civilization, which was destroyed as a result of the Great Flood. Sklyarov's group found traces of a mudflow that stopped here, descending from the mountains when returning to Pacific Ocean masses of water of a giant tsunami that hit South America.

As mentioned earlier, the list presented does not exhaust all existing versions.

Consequences of the Flood

When, even before the 2007 expedition of the Foundation for the Development of Science "III Millennium" in Peru (in search of any patterns in the arrangement of lines and figures), I tried to analyze photographs of the Nazca and Palpa plateaus taken from space, I discovered a very interesting detail that had previously for some reason no one paid attention. When viewed from space, this entire area looks like a dry river mouth, or like a stream frozen in place. Moreover, not only the Nazca and Palpa region itself looks like this, but also the region tens and even hundreds of kilometers to the north. The overall picture seemed to record or “photograph” huge water and mudflows that descended from the mountains in a powerful front.

There are no rivers of such width on Earth. Such powerful mudflows, which would have been generated by ordinary climatic factors and at the same time (and there is no doubt about this, looking at the frozen picture) would have descended from the mountains at a front hundreds of kilometers away, have also not been recorded. But there are features of the corresponding relief. Therefore, the idea arises that we are dealing here with traces of such an extraordinary and large-scale cataclysm as the Great Flood.

In the biblical version, the Great Flood is a punishment for people that God sent to them for their sins, flooding the entire Earth with the help of a stream of water from heaven. All living things perished in the waters of the Flood. Only the righteous Noah was saved with his family and those animals that he, at the direction of God, took on board the floating Ark. Similar motifs can be traced in ancient legends and traditions on all continents.

Historical science previously actively denied the reality of the Flood. Nowadays, under quite strong pressure from facts, historians and archaeologists prefer to either attribute everything to local floods, or simply bypass the topic of the Flood “by default.”

According to the views of supporters of the so-called “alternative history”, the Great Flood is a cataclysm on a planetary scale that actually took place, but according to a completely different scenario than that reflected in the Old Testament.

As a number of researchers representing “alternative” trends in history believe, during the events of the Flood, a huge tsunami hit South America from the Pacific Ocean, which, being several kilometers high, reached even remote mountainous areas, leaving behind many “scars” "and consequences that have long been noted by researchers.

In particular, in Lake Titicaca, located on the border of Peru and Bolivia at an altitude of four kilometers, species of animals and plants were found that are characteristic not of fresh water bodies (which is what Titicaca is now), but of the deep sea. They were brought here by the flood tsunami.

The same destructive wave, sweeping away everything in its path, uprooted trees and bushes, killed people and animals, mixing their remains among themselves. This is precisely the picture that archaeologists discovered in many regions of South America - including on the high mountain plateau of the Altiplano, where Lake Titicaca is located...

Usually the description of the Flood is limited to this. But we can produce simple logical reasoning, extending the analysis of the consequences of the cataclysm.

It is quite obvious that after all the dramatic events, the water brought here by the tsunami and covering a significant part of the continent naturally had to go somewhere. She could not evaporate instantly. It also could not be completely absorbed into the soil. So it is quite obvious that the bulk of the water that ended up on land due to the tsunami inevitably had to return back to the Pacific Ocean. Which is what she did.

Only upon returning it was no longer just water, but water that had absorbed dirt, clay, sand, small stones and other “garbage”. It was, in fact, just that powerful mudflow that rushed in a wide front from the mountains to the ocean and is now visible from space in the “scars” it left on the western edge of the South American mountains.

Getting into some hollows and depressions, this flow - actually a mudflow - stopped, forming a kind of “mud lakes”. Subsequently, the water from such “lakes” evaporated, exposing the “dirt”, which, according to all the laws of physics, had by this time settled to the bottom in such a way as to form a smooth surface, which was later used by the ancient “artists” as a “canvas” or an “easel” for your geoglyphs. This is exactly how such flat Nazca-type plateaus were formed, which seemed to be specially leveled by someone. Only this “someone” was, albeit catastrophic, but completely natural events...

This logical assumption was fully confirmed on site by a number of geological features that our 2007 expedition drew attention to.

For example, the Nazca plateau on its outskirts does not at all merge into the surrounding mountains as is usually the case in the foothills - more or less smoothly and gradually increasing its level. Instead, the picture is somewhat similar to the fact that the plateau seems to “flow out” from the gorges between the mountains.

Moreover. Above the plateau level here and there rise the peaks of low mountains, which were flooded by the mudflow, but not completely. And the terrain here fully corresponds to the scenario of events that is associated with the return of the flood tsunami waters to the Pacific Ocean.

And finally, this development of events is fully confirmed by the actual mudflow nature of the sediments that make up the Nazca and Palpa plateaus. Where small rivers cut through the flat surface on the edge of the plateau (and even in places where modern road builders had a hand in going deep into the geological layers), the structure of these deposits is visible, which absolutely coincides with what should have been left after the descent a powerful mudflow - stones, clay, sand and other “garbage” mixed in a chaotic disorder. We saw a similar “section” of sediments just when we were going to inspect the petroglyphs in the surrounding mountains (see earlier) along the “tongue” of this mudflow “flowing” along the valley between the mountains...

However, if the Nazca and Palpa plateaus were formed as a result of the events of the Great Flood, then the geoglyphs, naturally, were created after these events. This is quite obvious - after all, you can’t draw on something that doesn’t exist yet. In addition, geoglyphs created before the Flood would have been simply washed away by the same tsunami that covered South America. It's simple...

But then it turns out (according to existing estimates of the time of the Flood) that the lines and drawings appeared no earlier than the middle of the 11th millennium BC. This is the lower limit of dating geoglyphs. Unfortunately, it is not yet possible to determine how much later they formed based on the same geological features.

For those who are interested in the events of the Flood in more detail, I can recommend that you read them in my book “ Inhabited island Earth" or "Sensational History of the Earth", which were published by the Veche publishing house. Electronic versions of these books can be found on the Internet. We will not delve into the unnecessary details of the Flood and return to the geoglyphs.

Archaeological dating

Archaeologists and historians believe that the geoglyphs of Palpa and Nazca are only about one and a half thousand years old - the same age as, in their opinion, the local culture, whose representatives supposedly created the geoglyphs. But in fact, this assumption is based on radiocarbon dating of the remains of just one single wooden peg, which was found on one of the lines. Meanwhile, it is quite obvious that the peg could have appeared here much later than the drawing - almost at any time, and it is possible that there is no connection at all between the peg and the drawing.

True, recently there have been reports of “confirmation” of this age during thermoluminescent dating of ceramic fragments found both in stone dumps and in some ancient ruins of primitive buildings on the lines. However, these results can also be questioned for the same reasons. Both ceramic fragments and buildings could have appeared here significantly later than the lines themselves. After all, literally fifty years ago or a little more on the Nazca Plateau, no one forbade construction (and outside the territory that is now a protected area, construction is still going on).

It would be a different matter if the find was made not from above the line, but below it. But even in this case, hopes for an accurate determination of the age of the line are not so great.

The radiocarbon dating method is based on measuring the amount of radioactive carbon isotope that accumulates, for example, in a plant during its life and decays after its end. The thermoluminescence method involves measuring the glow of a sample that occurs when it is heated. Both methods are used in archeology and are claimed to be "highly reliable". However, there are also adherents of a skeptical approach who claim that the real measurement error using these methods can even reach several hundred percent. I also adhere to a similar skeptical point of view and believe that these methods can only give the roughest estimates, and not at all accurate dating...

I recently came across the following information on the Internet about the measurements of a certain researcher named Bray Warwick:

“Stones heated to high temperatures leave a coating of manganese oxide, as well as traces of clay and iron. The bottom of the stone is covered with fungi, lichens and cyanobacteria. Such rocks adjacent to the lines can be used for organic analysis using Method C-14. It is assumed that these stones were moved during the process of drawing the lines. In this way the exact date could be determined between 190 BC. and 600 AD But only nine stones were analyzed!”

Let's leave aside the number of stones analyzed - nine pieces are really very few for any categorical conclusions. It is much worse that the author of the above quote clearly does not understand either the conditions on the Nazca Plateau or the methodology for conducting empirical research.

Firstly, there is no clay on the surface of the plateau. There are only stones and very fine, dust-like sand. Secondly, natural clay as such is simply useless for analysis of radiocarbon content. The radiocarbon analysis of ceramics, which, as is known, is created from clay, is based on the assumption that organic matter gets there directly during the process of creating ceramics. For stones near geoglyphs, there is simply no connection between the hypothetical clay (even if it could somehow end up there) and the movement of stones from place to place. Thirdly, the heat and extremely low humidity in the Nazca Desert do not at all contribute to the formation of any fungi and lichens on the stones roasting in the sun (I won’t say anything about cyanobacteria - I don’t know). And fourthly, even if fungi and lichens miraculously ended up there, there is absolutely no guarantee that they would have formed precisely at the moment the stones were moved, and not earlier or later.

In general, we can say that Bray Warwick measured who knows what. And it is absolutely impossible to take his “dating” into account...

Since 1997, the Nazca Palpa project, led by the Peruvian archaeologist Joni Isla and Professor Markus Reindel of the German Archaeological Institute, with the support of the Swiss-Liechtenstein Foundation for Foreign Archaeological Research, has been at the forefront of official archaeological research. The main version based on the results of the work is that the geoglyphs were created by local Indians for ritual purposes associated with the cult of water and fertility. However, as far as can be judged from the available materials, no other version of the authorship of the drawings was seriously considered by archaeologists. So the “result” was actually predetermined...

Moreover. This international team of archaeologists conducts their main research not on the geoglyphs themselves, but nearby - in the places of ancient settlements of local cultures. As for the geoglyphs themselves, only one single attempt was made to conduct excavations on one of the stripes of the Palpa plateau. And during the 2007 expedition, while visiting the archaeological mission, we had the opportunity to familiarize ourselves with the results of these excavations.

Alas. A very weighty report, abundantly supplied with photographs and diagrams, recorded only that under the geoglyph there was ordinary plateau soil. We couldn't find anything.

Therefore, the main basis for dating at one and a half thousand years remains the fact that the mysterious drawings are simply located in the territory inhabited by the Nazca and Paracas cultures known here. Although, following this logic, one could easily attribute the construction of the Egyptian pyramids to modern Arabs - after all, they also live next to the pyramids...

Who came first?

The fact that a number of geoglyphs were created by our contemporaries is beyond any doubt. This is not disputed even by historians who, as a rule, simply do not take them into account by default, considering only obviously ancient drawings.

But if there are ancient and modern geoglyphs, then their history already has a certain dynamics. And if so, then it would be quite logical to assume the presence of similar dynamics in the past. That is, to assume that ancient geoglyphs were created in different time.

It seems to be a rather banal logical consideration, but for some reason it is completely ignored by the overwhelming majority, not only by representatives of academic science, but also by those who adhere to the so-called alternative views of the past. For some reason, both of them are trying to look for a single authorship everywhere and in everything.

Meanwhile, the earlier comparison of styles already clearly reveals the different authors of different drawings. Moreover, the difference between the two groups of drawings on the ground is colossal!..

Then, in order to understand the entire historical picture of the life of geoglyphs precisely in its development, it is not at all enough to divide them only into “modern” and “ancient”. And even if we do not take into account the literally striking difference between drawings and geometric figures (lines, rectangles, trapezoids, etc.), then even in this case, with a slightly more or less careful look, you can notice the difference between different ancient geoglyphs.

For example, an analysis of the most popular and widely known drawings (and at the same time the most extensive in size), in addition to the “contour style,” reveals in them the presence of clear mathematical patterns, which was determined by Maria Reiche. She, alas, was not able to determine what exactly these patterns were (more on that a little later), but she nevertheless unequivocally stated their presence, having carried out careful measurements of many of the drawings.

However, along with these “mathematically verified” geoglyphs, there are also drawings in which there is no point in even looking for any patterns - the naked eye can see that they are not there. The drawings themselves are made very carelessly, and the lines and curves that make them up clearly wander from side to side. These are, as a rule, drawings of a rather small size, which, in addition, gravitate towards the outskirts of the plateau. And if there are doubts about the execution of “mathematically verified” drawings by the Indians, then there is no longer any doubt about their ability to create simple crooked drawings. Here (albeit with more detailed analysis) there is also a feeling of completely different authorship between the two different types or “subgroups” of drawings.

Meanwhile, there are very few drawings on the plateau - a little more than three dozen. There are tens of thousands of geometric shapes, lines, rectangles, trapezoids and other things. But literally a little closer look reveals the same situation with ancient lines and geometric figures. They can also be divided into two very different categories, clearly having completely different “authors”. One group of such geoglyphs is made very well and has smooth boundaries - as a rule, these are images that stretch for many kilometers, sometimes even crossing some small mountains, ravines and other relief features, completely ignoring elevation changes.

The second group of lines is made of much less quality. Stones with more dark color, from the main light surface were removed much less carefully - small pebbles remained in their place. As a result, such lines are even less visible (although they are visible against the general background). These geoglyphs are not very large in size and often have uneven boundaries, which is easily visible to the eye and does not require any precise measurements. And in comparison with large, high-quality lines, representatives of the second group leave the impression of almost hackwork.

Stripe with curved edges

The difference between large and high-quality on the one hand and small and shoddy on the other was so clearly evident to all members of the expedition that the very fact that neither academic historians nor alternativeists had yet mentioned this anywhere was surprising. Meanwhile, the consequences of this observation are literally global.

The difference between the two groups of geoglyphs, upon closer examination, is so obvious and so significant that it naturally gives rise to the version of their creation at different times (at least) by two completely different cultures. Not only Indians or only aliens, but two completely different groups"authors"!..

But the most important thing is that the difference is so great that it cannot be reduced to a simple difference in the size and quality of the geoglyphs. It indicates a strong difference in the technologies and capabilities of different “authors”, that is, a strong difference between the levels of development of those cultures that created geoglyphs at different times.

And here's what's interesting.

Currently, the dominant position in historical science is occupied by a kind of “linear” approach, according to which society develops “from simple to complex.” Deviations, of course, are allowed, but only those that are not of a fundamental nature. Individual cultures may experience ups and downs, but in general the level of development of civilization is increasing. Hence, as a consequence, more ancient societies are considered more primitive, and later cultures are correlated with more advanced technologies.

On the Nazca Plateau, the linear pattern of development “from simple to complex” is clearly violated.

If geoglyphs were the work of the Nazca and Paracas cultures, then (especially taking into account the enormous scale, which requires a long time to paint the entire plateau - see, at least, the calculations of Alla Belokon) most likely one would expect a gradual complication of geoglyphs and an increase in the quality of their execution - along with the Indians' experience in creating lines and drawings. Instead, the most complex large lines, stripes and trapezoids also have the greatest degree of wear due to later damage and natural erosion, which indicates their very respectable age.

Moreover, if you follow banal logic, then the area covered with drawings and lines most likely gradually increased around some very ancient center. Accordingly, from the center to the periphery the perfection of their execution should gradually increase. Meanwhile, the simplest and most carelessly executed geoglyphs clearly gravitate not to the center of the plateau, but to its outskirts.

And if we attribute the authorship of all ancient geoglyphs to the Indians, then from the relative position of various geometric figures and designs and their quality of execution, one would have to conclude that the Nazca and Paracas cultures did not develop over time at all, but on the contrary, they experienced some for unknown reasons, powerful degradation. Meanwhile, actual archaeological finds during excavations at the places of residence of representatives of these cultures reveal absolutely no signs of such degradation. And if the facts contradict the logical consequence of some initial assumption, then this initial assumption itself is erroneous.

Taking all this into account, it must be stated that in reality there was a completely different order of events on the plateau.

The “earliest author” was some very highly developed civilization, as a result of whose activities “mathematically verified” drawings appeared, as well as smooth, large and extended lines, stripes and figures that intersected sometimes complex relief details and required a lot of labor in their creation . It is these geoglyphs that most amaze researchers and ordinary viewers with their scope and precision of execution.

Apparently, they made a strong impression not only on modern tourists, but also on the Indian tribes who lived here, whose representatives tried to imitate perfect ancient models. However, the Indians had incomparably fewer opportunities, and therefore they were only able to create smaller and less well-executed crooked “copies”. So the second group of “hacky” geoglyphs appeared...

By the way, the difference between the level of execution of the two groups of geoglyphs is so great that it makes us remember those whom our ancient ancestors called “gods.”

Historical science considers “gods” to be pure fiction, the fantasy of our ancestors, and categorically denies even the very possibility of the existence of a highly developed civilization in ancient times, although our ancestors themselves had absolutely no doubt about the reality of the “gods.” Meanwhile, over the past few years, during a number of expeditions of the Foundation for the Development of Science “III Millennium” to various countries, we have already identified thousands of artifacts - signs of the real existence of such an ancient civilization, which surpassed even modern humanity in terms of technology development. The number of discovered facts is so great that we consider it necessary to recognize the long-standing debate “whether such a civilization was or was not” is already a thing of yesterday. At the moment, the existence of an ancient, highly technologically advanced civilization has simply been PROVEN. And research has long shifted to the plane of studying the characteristics of this civilization, its origin, technologies and real possibilities.

And by the way, South America (especially the territory of Peru) is characterized by the fact that the brightest, most irrefutable evidence of the use of a certain civilization the highest technologies, in many ways superior to our modern capabilities...

By the way, the version of imitation formulated a little earlier, to a certain extent, not only does not contradict, but is even completely consistent with the position of archaeologists and historians, who have now settled on the version of the “religious-mystical” purpose of geoglyphs.

The ancient inhabitants of Nazca and Palpa saw huge drawings of certain “gods” - that is, representatives of a highly developed civilization - and worshiped “divine creations”, copying them and performing some religious or cult rituals on the lines.

Could this be so?.. And why not?!.

However, there may be different variations of this version. For example, it is possible that even high-quality lines and figures could have been made in several stages by different, if not civilizations, then cultures (even “gods”). It is also possible that even the earliest lines may have been created by humans - but under the supervision and direction of "gods" who simply used local Indians as unskilled labor...

Be that as it may, the facts suggest that the oldest and largest lines were made by representatives of another civilization or with their direct participation. And it’s not even so important whether it was an earthly civilization or aliens from another planet. The main thing is that it was a very highly developed civilization, for which flying by air was absolutely no problem (see below). It was clearly not a problem to create such a huge number of lines on a desert plateau. Or at least organize their creation...

Signs of another civilization

Versions about the creation and use of Nazca geoglyphs by pilots of some fairly advanced aircraft imply a very highly developed civilization that visited these places in the distant past. Whether they are representatives of earthly civilization who survived the flood cataclysm, like Vershinin, or representatives of an alien civilization, like Daniken. And it is quite natural to expect that such a civilization should have left behind more significant evidence of its presence than strange patterns, stripes and geometric shapes on a desert plateau.

As already mentioned in passing earlier, in South America there are not just many, but very many traces of the activity of an ancient, highly technologically advanced civilization. Moreover, it is in South America that these traces are most indicative - the difference between the quality of processing of hard rocks (such as granite, basalt, diorite and others) and the capabilities of local Indian civilizations is so obvious that it leaves no doubt. Almost all of the most famous megaliths - that is, structures made of large and even huge stone blocks - on the South American continent were created by this highly developed civilization, which in a number of parameters exceeded even the capabilities of modern humanity.

I will not dwell here in detail on the features of local megaliths, since this is beyond the scope of the topic of this book. For those who are interested in a detailed description of South American ancient objects, I can recommend reading my book “Peru and Bolivia Long Before the Incas,” published by the Veche publishing house. Here I will only mention direct, immediate evidence of highly developed technologies left in ancient times.

Traces of the use of such technologies are visible, say, in Tiahuanaco (modern Bolivia) in the complex shapes of blocks of hard andesite (local granite) - the creation of such internal corners and represent a major challenge for modern industry. This requires the use of very developed machine (namely machine -!) technologies and durable tools, which the local Indians did not and could not have. The fact that machine technologies were used here is shown, for example, by a block on which ancient craftsmen left a shallow cut with neatly drilled recesses.

Similar cuts, also clearly made with a machine tool, can be seen on the horizontal surface of a small step carved into a cliff at Ollantaytambo in Peru. Moreover, in this case we are faced with double cuts only a millimeter wide, which are physically impossible to obtain using any “impact” methods (simply chopping off the material).

A deeper cut can be seen on the diorite rock at the archaeological site of Sacsayhuaman, located near the ancient Inca capital of Cusco and famous for its “jagged” three-tiered wall of huge sides. Here, for some reason, the ancient craftsmen cut the rock along a length of about ten meters and then broke off a “piece” of several hundred tons from it - just like we work with a glass cutter when cutting glass or ceramics. Only here the cut has a depth of about a centimeter or two, but it is made in the way required by the skill of a glass cutter - in one pass of the tool. This is possible in such a hard material only with the help of powerful stationary equipment using durable steel saws with diamond attachments. And here, it seems, something like our “grinder” was used (only a modern master can go deeper in one pass by only a millimeter and a half, but here the depth is an order of magnitude greater -!). The use of a “grinder” - that is, a circular saw - is clearly indicated by the preserved traces of just such a tool nearby on the same rock, from which in this case, for some reason, a small piece was cut off - see.

However, the main megaliths with signs of the use of highly developed technologies are concentrated in remote mountainous areas. But in the area of ​​geoglyphs there are no such obvious traces. There are no megalithic structures here at all in the usual sense of the word - that is, structures made of large blocks.

It is clear that such a highly developed civilization, which was able to create such megalithic structures in mountainous areas, had no problems covering a distance of several hundred kilometers to the Nazca Plateau. The level of its development is such that it should have mastered air flight long ago and created very advanced devices for this. So she could very well be here. But this is just a logical assumption, but I would still like to see something “more tangible.”

One of the albeit very indirect evidence of the presence of such a civilization here can be found in some features of the Nazca and Paracas cultures.

“The creators of the Paracas culture had a strange predilection for experimenting with their skulls. Infants were subjected to a painful operation to deform the skull, as a result of which the head of the Parakas acquired a wedge-shaped shape. Sometimes children could not withstand such severe tests, as evidenced by the tragic discovery in one of the burial grounds. Here, in 1931, a tiny child was discovered with his head tied with a cotton ribbon. Under the tightly wrapped tape there were two dense pads - one pressed on the frontal and the other on the occipital part of the skull. The result should have been a perfectly wedge-shaped head - but the baby no longer had the chance to rejoice at the result" (G. Ershova, " Ancient America: flight in time and space").

The fashion for such a strange (and very painful, by the way) execution, as a result of which a person’s head takes on an elongated shape, is found in the most different regions planets. But the largest number of such deformed skulls is found precisely in the area of ​​the Nazca and Paracas cultures. Here, such a practice took on a truly manic and all-encompassing scale.

And here's what's interesting. In the practice of head deformation everywhere, in all regions, a certain pattern is clearly visible: with all the variety of methods and methods of influencing the shape of the skull (from tight bandages-caps to special wooden devices), the desire to achieve only one result of deformation is clearly dominant - an elongated head. Nowhere and never has anyone strived for a different form...

A completely logical question arises: what are the origins of such a massive (and uniform in all regions!) desire for an elongated head shape?.. The question is far from idle, given the data of modern medicine that such an effect on the head, in addition to causing inconvenience and unpleasant sensations contributes to the occurrence of regular headaches and seriously increases the risk of negative consequences for mental and physical health person.

Historians do not give any intelligible answer to this question, attributing everything at best to a cult ritual with an unclear motivation. However, even with all the power of influence of religion and cult on the entire way of life of people, it is clearly not enough. For such a “fanatical desire for ugliness” there must be a much more powerful incentive. And the incentive is quite stable, given the ubiquity and duration of this “tradition.”

Recently, more and more researchers are leaning towards the neurophysiological version. The fact is that a change in the shape of the skull also affects various areas of the cerebral cortex, which should, in theory, contribute to certain changes in the human psyche. However, so far all this is only in the realm of hypothetical assumptions, and among the tribes practicing skull deformation, no special positive changes in mental abilities have been noticed. And clergy (shamans and priests), for whom the ability, for example, to fall into a trance or immerse in meditation is very important, do not strive for deformation of the skull at all, preferring less radical means...

And here it makes sense to pay attention to the version put forward by Erich von Däniken, a supporter of the version of the real existence of ancient “gods” who were representatives of an alien civilization.

Daniken suggested that the roots strange tradition The deformations of the skulls lie in the desire of the local Indians to resemble the “gods,” that is, representatives of an alien civilization who had an elongated head shape. And this assumption, no matter how strange it may seem, has a very real basis.

The fact is that among the elongated skulls in South America there were also found those that could well claim to be the skulls of the “gods” themselves!

Robert Connolly first drew serious attention to these skulls during his travels, during which he collected various materials about ancient civilizations. The discovery of these skulls came as a surprise to him.

The first thing that catches your eye is the abnormal shape and size, which have nothing to do with the skull modern man except for the most basic features (“box” for the brain, jaw, holes for the eyes and nose)…

However, the main thing is that during deliberate deformation, only the shape of the skull can be changed, but not its volume. And the skulls that Conolly drew attention to are almost twice the volume of an ordinary human skull!..

Strictly speaking, among people there are cases of increased size of the cranium - in some diseases. However, in cases of such a strong deviation of the head from normal sizes, people are close to the state of a “vegetable” and do not survive to adulthood, but here we are faced with the skulls of clearly adult individuals (which a specialist can easily determine at least by the condition of the teeth)…

Moreover, with artificial deformation, the bones of the skull diverge slightly at the joints. The displacement is not so great as to have any noticeable effect on the volume of the cranium, but it is very clearly noticeable to the eye. And such a displacement can be seen on deformed skulls by almost any tourist who has visited, for example, one of the museums in Peru.

Meanwhile, on those skulls that have a volume significantly larger than a human one and which Conolly drew attention to, in the places of articulation of the skull bones, no signs of their displacement are noticeable. And in general, they do not look deformed at all, but quite natural - even if they have an unusual shape for us.

Do these skulls belong to the same aircraft pilots who created geoglyphs on the Nazca plateau?.. It is unlikely that any definite answer can be given here. But the fact that these could be skulls of at least relatives of the very authors of the drawings on the ground is a completely acceptable hypothesis...

However, there are much more compelling arguments in favor of the version of the creation of geoglyphs by a highly developed civilization. The fact is that in some features of the drawings, lines and geometric figures on the Nazca plateau, oddities are found that are most logically explainable within the framework of this particular version.

Frozen mathematics

To a certain extent, the Nazca geoglyphs were very “lucky” that it was Maria Reiche who became interested in them at one time. The fact is that Reiche was a mathematician by training.

If only archaeologists and historians were engaged in the study of drawings and lines on earth, then they, being strictly humanists, would undoubtedly only reproduce the general appearance of geoglyphs with varying degrees of accuracy of the resulting image and would, at best, only analyze iconography from the standpoint of comparing styles . This is how they are taught, and this is what ultimately shapes not only their approach to describing ancient objects, but also the very principle of their perception of objects, their thinking.

A mathematician thinks completely differently. It is not enough for him to simply reproduce something to scale. He tries to describe the object in his own mathematical language. That is why Reiche not only compiled a general map of the Nazca geoglyphs. Her sketches and diagrams of objects depicted in the desert are accompanied by numerous mathematical parameters of individual elements of these objects, including, for example, the radius of curvature, the location of the center of this curvature, the angles between tangents at different points, and the like.

But the thinking style of a mathematician is such that the researcher does not simply describe the object being studied. A mathematician looks for possible patterns. And Reiche, as a result of her many years of research, discovered that there are not just patterns in the patterns and lines - the Nazca geoglyphs are literally “permeated” with mathematics!..

“The method of making pictorial figures, and the arrangement of lines and “centers” on the surface of the plateau are subject to mathematical logic. Thus, the beauty and harmony of the drawings is explained by the fact that, as Maria Reiche established, all curves are ideally conjugated with each other and with straight lines, that is, they are made according to strict mathematical laws. The envelopes of sinusoidal elements, which are very often used in images, also obey mathematical laws” (A. Belokon, “Figures of the Nazca desert and circles in grain fields as a result of the energy impact of UFOs on the ground,” report at the 10th Anniversary Conference “Ufology and Bioenergy Informatics” , October 2002)

The subordination of geoglyphs to rigid mathematical logic made a strong impression on astronomer Gerald Hawkins, the leader of the 1973 expedition, during which the geodetic parameters of many lines were measured and the hypothesis of the ancient observatory was refuted. Describing this expedition to the hot Nazca desert, Hawkins used a very emotional but capacious expression - “life in the hell of frozen mathematics.”

However, for us, perhaps, what is more important is not Hawkins’ emotional state, but the fact that he discovered during his expedition. According to the measurements taken during this expedition, the large lines of the Nazca plateau were made at the limit of modern (!) techniques of geodesy and aerial photography. Their average deviation in direction does not exceed 9 arc minutes. That is, only two and a half meters for a whole kilometer of length! And this despite the fact that many of the lines cross ravines and small hills. For the primitive Nazca and Paracas cultures this is an impossible result. This requires highly developed measuring technologies!..

A number of researchers paid attention to one strange circumstance. Those images on the Nazca plateau, which, by all logic, should be symmetrical (spider, condor and others), in fact have very pronounced asymmetry. This oddity was so striking that it forced us to look for some kind of logical explanation. And in last years A number of publications have appeared in which the authors independently come to the same conclusion - the violation of symmetry in the Nazca geoglyphs is not at all the result of the negligence of their creators, but an inevitable consequence of the fact that the ancient authors... drew projections of three-dimensional images!

Here is what I. Alekseev writes, for example, about this:

“The condor is drawn in two planes intersecting at a slight angle. The pelican appears to be in two perpendicular. Our spider has a very interesting 3-D appearance (1 – original image, 2 – straightened, taking into account the planes in the picture). And this is noticeable in some other drawings... And look how cleverly the three-dimensional volume is laid out in the tree. It’s like it’s made from a sheet of paper or foil, I just straightened one branch” (I. Alekseev, “Nazca Geoglyphs. Some Observations”).

Kiev geologist, specialist in historical artifacts R.S. Furduy and his colleagues went even further. They conducted a computer experiment with a condor image, which showed that a corresponding distortion in the shape of the picture could occur if the three-dimensional original was projected onto the desert surface at an angle of 14° to the horizon from a height of 355 meters above the ground!..

Just imagine the ancient Indian shamans who managed, one and a half thousand years ago, not only to create a hot air balloon and rise on it to a height of three and a half hundred meters, but also, holding a three-dimensional figurine of a condor in their hands, to direct from this height the actions of the Indian workers on the ground so as to ultimately obtain an accurate projection of the figure. It is unlikely that anyone will object to the fact that the picture turns out to be completely beyond reality...

I. Alekseev decided to try to make an initial three-dimensional figure of a strange creature, which, when projected onto the ground, would give the famous geoglyph, similar to a chicken with nine fingers, and received an interesting result.

“We had to play tricks with the paws; the ancients depicted them in a slightly exaggerated way, and no creature walks on tiptoes. But in general, it turned out right away, I didn’t even have to think about anything - everything is in the drawing (a specific joint, the curvature of the body, the position of the “ears”). What’s interesting is that the figure initially turned out to be balanced (standing on its feet). The question automatically arose, what kind of animal is this? And in general, where did the ancients get the subjects for their wonderful exercises on the plateau?” (I. Alekseev, “Geoglyphs of Nazca. Some observations”).

In 2010, Alekseev managed to solve a problem that Maria Reiche could not completely solve. He found the same mathematical patterns that are embedded in the Nazca geoglyphs. Moreover, he came to this decision literally in a semi-intuitive manner.

Trying to reproduce the Nazca drawings using a computer in a simple graphics editor Paint.net, he discovered that the fewer lines drawn by hand, and the more methods built into the editor to create lines with variable curvature, the greater the resemblance to real geoglyphs. As he himself writes, he even sometimes had the feeling that the authors of the drawings on the Nazca plateau used the same software when creating them!..

But to create lines with variable curvature in modern graphic editors so-called Bezier curves are widely used.

The Bezier curve is a special case of Bernstein polynomials, described by Sergei Natanovich Bernstein in 1912. The Bezier curve method was developed independently in the 60s of the 20th century by Pierre Bezier from the Renault automobile company and Paul de Casteljo from the Citroen company, where this method was used to design car bodies. Due to the ease of defining and managing changes, Bezier curves are widely used in computer graphics for modeling smooth lines.

“And then, at one fine moment, I suddenly discovered that with a certain skill in working with Bezier curves, the program itself sometimes drew the contours quite similarly. At first this was noticeable on the roundings of the spider’s legs, when without my participation these roundings became almost identical to the original ones. Further, with the correct positions of the nodes and when they were combined into a curve, the line sometimes almost exactly followed the contour of the drawing. And the fewer nodes, but the more optimal their position and settings, the greater the similarity with the original.

In general, a spider is practically one Bezier curve (more correctly, a Bezier spline, a sequential connection of Bezier curves), without circles and straight lines. During further work, a feeling arose that grew into confidence that this unique “Nascan” design was a combination of Bezier curves and straight lines. Almost no regular circles or arcs were observed.

Was it not Bezier curves that Maria Reiche, a mathematician by training, tried to describe by making numerous measurements of radii?” (I. Alekseev, “Geoglyphs of Nazca. Some observations”).

“But I truly became inspired by the skill of the ancients when drawing large drawings, where there were almost perfect curves of enormous sizes. Let me remind you once again that the purpose of the drawings was an attempt to look at the sketch, at what the ancients had before drawing it on the plateau. I tried to minimize my own creativity, resorting to completing the drawing of damaged places only where the logic of the ancients was obvious (such as the tail of a condor, the protruding and clearly modern rounding on the body of a spider)” (I. Alekseev, “Nasca Geoglyphs. Some observations").

Alekseev managed to reproduce in this way almost all the main drawings known on the Nazca Plateau. Subsequently, based on the materials of his article, a kind of “dynamic” experiment was conducted on the website of the Laboratory of Alternative History forum. The man tried to draw a freehand image of a spider on top of a photograph in a specialized graphics program. The hand, naturally, trembled and became confused. The program smoothed out “manual” flaws in accordance with the Bezier curve algorithm. In this case, the final curve automatically fit almost perfectly onto the original photograph!..

Reiche only just barely reached this solution to the problem she formulated of identifying the mathematical patterns of the geoglyphs of the Nazca Plateau, although the foundations of these patterns were prescribed by Bernstein at the dawn of her youth. She didn’t make it, most likely, only because she didn’t see the time when the computer use of Bezier curves became widely available.

It is clear that any speculation about the knowledge of the Nazca and Paracas Indians of the Bezier curves is far beyond any reasonable logic. They also did not have modern computers with graphics programs. Only a civilization that had a level of development at least comparable to ours could observe the corresponding mathematical laws.

It turns out that Däniken was right - geoglyphs are not only addressed to celestial viewers, but were also created by them. And the Indians of the local Nazca and Paracas cultures clearly have nothing to do with these heavenly spectators.

Only now this is no longer just an assumption, but a hypothesis that has a strict mathematical justification!

It is quite possible that if not the Indians themselves, then their ancestors knew that the Nazca geoglyphs were created by a highly developed civilization. And they were not created by hand at all, but with the help of special mechanisms.

“...in this regard, the following picture is of interest. A worthy competitor to the famous “astronaut” from the Temple of the Inscriptions in Palenque, Mexico. It is possible that this is an episode from some Nascan myth that has not reached us, but the fact that the “cat god”, devouring objects similar to stones, is used as a kind of vehicle for a warrior with a spear thrower and full ammunition is depicted quite unambiguously” (I. Alekseev, “Geoglyphs of Nazca. Some observations”).

And one more point noted by Alekseev. While experimenting with Bezier curves while drawing the so-called “pelican” - a huge geoglyph covering an area of ​​280 by 400 meters, he discovered a rather strange detail.

“The only drawing that, due to its size and ideal lines, looks absolutely the same in the drawing as in the desert (and in the sketches of the ancients, respectively). Calling this image a pelican is not entirely correct. A long beak and something similar to a crop does not mean a pelican. The ancients did not identify the main detail that makes a bird a bird - its wings. And in general this image is non-functional from all sides. You can't walk on it - it's not closed. And how to catch the eye - jump again? It is inconvenient to view from the air due to the specificity of the parts. It doesn’t really fit in with the lines either. But, nevertheless, there is no doubt that this object was created intentionally - it looks harmonious, the ideal curve balances the trident (apparently transverse), the beak is balanced by diverging straight lines behind. I couldn’t understand why this drawing left a feeling of something very unusual. And everything is very simple. Small and subtle details are separated over a considerable distance, and in order to understand what is in front of us, we must move our gaze from one small detail to another. If you move a considerable distance away in order to take in the entire picture, then all this small detail seems to merge and the meaning of the image is lost. It seems that this drawing was created for perception by a creature with a different size of the “yellow” spot - the zone of greatest visual acuity in the retina. So if any drawing claims to be unearthly graphics, then our pelican is the first candidate” (I. Alekseev, “Nazca Geoglyphs. Some Observations”).

A little conclusion

As we can see, if we do not confine ourselves to a very simplified version of the creation of geometric shapes, lines and patterns on the Nazca plateau by the Indians of local cultures and take into account the existing features of geoglyphs, the mystery of the Nazca plateau turns out to be closely connected with issues that go far beyond the limited desert area on the South American coast. And in order to find a solution to the riddle of geoglyphs, they need to be considered together with a whole mass of other, seemingly completely extraneous facts. Geoglyphs cannot be separated from the rest of history.

Just not the history that is written in textbooks. And history, rejected by modern academic science, but which finds a colossal amount of confirmation both in the form of real artifacts (no matter how archaeologists and historians reject them), and in ancient legends and traditions (no matter how many of them the same historians and archaeologists write off as empty fantasies our ancestors).

Will we ever be able to unravel all the secrets of geoglyphs?.. I don’t know.

So far, only one thing is clear - we cannot isolate ourselves within the framework of any one version. And even more so we must not neglect real facts for the sake of some pre-selected hypothesis.

If the facts indicate that geoglyphs on the Nazca plateau, Palpa and in other regions were created by different “authors”, then we need to look at this matter in dynamics - taking into account the development of the process over time (which does not necessarily have to be a development from simple to complex). It is necessary to separate some “authors” from others. And taking this into account, the main question in trying to understand the chaos of drawings on earth becomes the question of who created what from this. By lumping everything together, you certainly won’t be able to figure out the mystery of geoglyphs...

“So what is this... is Nazca?.. Nazca is like a hundred thunderclaps on the mind. If eyes could scream, they would do it in Nazca. The message of Nazca is veiled and confused, any theory about it is contradictory... This landscape seems unreasonable, insoluble, meaningless and shifts the brain to one side” (Erich von Däniken).

Detailed diagram. Part 6

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Considering huge drawings on the surface of the Earth, photographed from the air, begs the question, could humans have done this? The most mysterious place on the planet is considered the Nazca Plateau, which surprised scientists 100 years ago with its mysterious drawings. Until now, scientists have put forward various theories about the appearance of these drawings, but none of them gave an exact answer about the origin of these masterpieces.

Let's follow the scientists' research a little and try to find some explanation for these drawings.

The Nazca plateau or pampa, as it is called, is located 450 km from the capital of Peru - Lima. Its length is 60 km and 500 sq. meters is covered with various mysterious lines that make up mysterious drawings. The drawings present in this area are images of geometric shapes, animals, insects and people of amazing appearance. The drawings can only be seen from the air, as they are huge images.

When examining the area, it was found that the drawings were dug into sandy soil to a depth of 10-30 cm, and the width of some lines could be up to 100 meters (!). The lines of the drawings can be several kilometers long, while literally not changing from the influence of the shape of the terrain. The lines rise and fall from the hills, but their continuity and perfect evenness are not broken. The question immediately arises: who is the creator of such a picture in the desert - peoples unknown to us or aliens from distant space? But scientists have not yet been able to find an answer to this question.

To date, scientists have been able to accurately determine the age of this “painting.” Scientists carefully examined the remains of plant and organic origin found in the places of the drawings and found that the drawings were created in a period of time starting from 350 BC. to 600 BC

But this fact is not an accurate proof of the date of appearance of the drawings, since these objects could have come here after the creation of the drawings. There is also another scientific theory that says that the drawings are the work of the Nazca Indians, who could have inhabited this region of Peru (even before the arrival of the Incas). After the disappearance of this people, not a single historical mention of them remained on Earth, except for burials. And therefore, scientists cannot say for sure about the involvement of this people in the drawings.

Let's look at historical sources that mention Nazca drawings. They were first mentioned by Spanish researchers in their manuscripts, which date back to the 15th – 17th centuries. In our time, these information sources have attracted the attention of modern scientists, but the most interesting discoveries became available during the creation of the first aircraft, since the lines of the drawings form a single whole and reveal their secret only from a bird's eye view.

The first scientist to discover the Nazca paintings themselves was the Peruvian archaeologist Mejia Xesspe, who saw part of them from an elephant in one of the mountains in 1927. They began to really explore Nazca in the 40s, when the first photographs of drawings taken from an airplane appeared. These studies were led by the American historian Paul Kosok. But in fact, in anticipation of the first photographs of the Nazca drawings, they were discovered by pilots who were searching for water sources in the desert. We were looking for water, but we found the most mysterious mystery of our planet.

Kosok at one time put forward one of the many theories that suggested that the drawings were nothing more than a huge astronomical calendar. For clarity, he cited similar drawings from the starry sky. It turned out that some lines show the direction of the constellations and indicate the point of sunrise and sunset. Kosok's theory was developed in the work of mathematician and astronomer Maria Reiche, who devoted more than 40 years to systematizing and studying the Nazca paintings. She managed to find out that the drawings in the Nazca desert were made by hand.

The first figures drawn were birds and animals, and then various lines were drawn on top of these drawings. The scientist also managed to find sketches, which were later realized in full size. Ancient “artists” used coordinate poles to more accurately navigate the terrain and draw up accurate drawings. These landmarks were located at some points of the figures. If the figures can only be observed from a high altitude, then the conclusion suggests itself that the people who put them on the surface of the earth could fly. Thus a new theory emerged that the creators of the Nazca paintings were an extraterrestrial civilization or created an airfield for aircraft.

It subsequently turned out that Nazca is not the only place that has such images. 10 km from the plateau (near the city of Palpa) there are similar drawings and lines, and at a distance of 1400 km near Mount Solitari there is a huge statue of a man surrounded by lines and drawings similar to the Nazca drawings. On the territory of the Western Cordillera, in the immediate vicinity of Nazca, there are two drawn labyrinths of a spiral shape, with different directions of turns. What’s most amazing is that a cosmic ray hits this area 1-5 times a year and illuminates this area for 20 minutes. There is even a claim by local residents that if you get caught in this beam, you can be cured of various diseases. Similar patterns were found in various countries world - Ohio (USA), England, in Africa, Altai and Southern Urals. They are all different, but one thing they have in common is that they are not intended for earthly viewing.

While conducting excavations in the Nazca territory, scientists found new mysteries for themselves. Drawings were found on the shards, which showed evidence that the inhabitants of this area knew about penguins. Scientists could not find another explanation for the found drawing of a penguin on one of the shards. Archaeologists also managed to find many underground passages and tunnels. Part of these structures is an irrigation system, and the other part belongs to the underground city. There are tombs and ruins of underground temples here.

One of the theories is the hypothesis of the origin of the Nazca paintings associated with the activities of alien civilizations. This hypothesis was first put forward by the Swiss writer Erich von Däniken. He claimed that aliens visited our planet in the Nazca region, but he is not sure that the drawings were their work. According to his theory, the drawings are intended to summon aliens who have left our planet. The triangles informed the alien pilots about the presence of crosswinds, and the rectangles informed the landing site.

Straight lines in the form of recesses could be filled with a flammable substance and serve as an indicator of the direction of the landing strips. This theory is fantastic and is not taken seriously in scientific world, but even the writer managed to sow doubts in the scientific theories of the origin of the Nazca drawings. This is where the theory of energy flows arose, which testifies to the connection between humanity and alien intelligence. One example is a huge image of the “Paracas candelabra,” a design on a mountainside on the Peruvian Paracas Peninsula.

Scientists believe that the candelabra is an information source about our planet. The left side of the picture contains information about the earth's fauna, and the right side about the flora. The general image is made in the form human face. Where the top of the drawing is located, the ancient inhabitants of Nazca installed a pointer, which is a scale of civilization development. According to the same theory, there is an opinion that our civilization was created by aliens from the constellation Leo. Perhaps the composition of straight lines was created by aliens to mark the runway for their ships.

There is other evidence for this theory. Scientists from England were able to study the components of the muscle mass of Inca mummies. And the results were simply amazing. The blood of the Incas had no analogues with the blood groups of the inhabitants of the Earth of that historical period. This blood type is a very rare combination...

But of course, the truth is born in a dispute. And that’s why those who reject all alien theories found it. In the early 80s, a group of students, taking wooden shovels with them, created an “elephant” that resembles the Nazca drawings. But their conviction did not have much influence, and in our time there are many supporters of alien participation in the creation of huge drawings.

Options for theories of the appearance of large drawings on Earth:
Animal drawings were created as a memory of the global flood.
Nazca drawings are one of the ancient zodiac calendars.
The drawn figures are created for ritual ceremonies of the water culture, and the lines represent the direction of the aqueducts.
The trajectory of the drawings was used for sprint races (though this is hard to believe).
Nazca lines and drawings are an encrypted message, a kind of code. It contains the number Pi, radian degrees (360°), decimal system calculus, etc.
The drawings were drawn by shamans under the influence of strong hallucinogens (admittedly, the theory is funny).

No matter how many different theories about the origin and purpose of the Nazca drawings are put forward, the mystery remains unrevealed. In addition, this mysterious plateau presents humanity with new mysteries. New researchers are constantly being sent to this area of ​​Peru. This area is accessible to both scientists and tourists, but will a person be able to open the curtain of mystery that hides the true purpose of the drawings from us?

“Geo” translated from Greek, as we know, means “earth”. And a “glyph” is a “concave line.” The Nazca geoglyphs are huge, beautiful and mysterious. They are surrounded by a seemingly chaotic network of lines and contours. Scientists have no doubt that these images and lines appeared in the pre-Columbian era. Their clear time barrier has also been determined - until the 12th century, when the Incas, who had a completely different culture, entered the territory of present-day Peru. But regarding the framework of the beginning and end of the period in which the main Nazca geoglyphs were created, there are different points of view. Archaeologists, knowing that on fragments of ceramics of the Nazca people the same geometric elements are found as on earth, and the heyday of this civilization dates back to the 100s. BC e. to the 700s n. e., insist on these dates. To this their opponents object that the images were not necessarily created during this entire period. Objections are based on analysis of manganese and iron oxides at the edges of the lines. These oxides in Nazca, in conditions of almost complete anhydrity, form the so-called desert tan of sandy soil, a kind of crust that has formed over thousands of years. Beneath it is sandstone. That is why the Nazca lines are so clearly visible: the dark crust and light sandstone contrast sharply and clearly with each other. And they are nothing more than witnesses of time. According to this concept, the Nazca geoglyphs are attributed by geologists mainly to the 1st century. n. e., and the latest - to the 6th century. n. e. However, neither a purely archaeological nor a purely geological approach can be considered exhaustively reliable; there are still too many unanswered questions in each version.
The history of the discovery of Nazca geoglyphs began only in the 20th century, because they can be seen in their entirety only from a bird's eye view. Until airplanes appeared here, Nazca remained “terra incognita” for the world. Although the shepherds, and then the travelers, of course, saw and understood that the lines on the ground were clearly of man-made origin: the trenches were smooth, lined with pebbles along the edges. In 1553, Ciesade Leon (1518/1520-1554), a Spanish priest, geographer and historian, reported about them this way: “Through all these valleys and along those that have already been passed, along the entire length there is a beautiful, great Inca road , and here and there among the sands you can see signs to guess the path laid out.” Archaeologists Alfred Krebe and Toribio Mejia Xesspe in 1927 suggested that this was a system of irrigation structures; Xesspe, however, later changed his mind, agreeing with Leon. Even then it was noticed that the furrow lines were laid strictly in a straight line; they did not bypass any elevations or dry river beds. But the scale of the drawings itself remained unknown. Until the American archaeologist Paul Kosok (1896-1959) flew over them on an airplane in 1939. And when, in 1941, the German Maria Reiche (1902-1998), a mathematician by profession, began to collaborate with him, a new meaning was revealed, and what a new meaning. She believed, and Kosok agreed with her, that all these contours and lines are nothing more than an astronomical calendar: straight and spiral figures symbolize the constellations, and symbolic animal figures symbolize the positions of the planets. The movement of planets and constellations in the sky could be associated with calculations of the rainy season. And also have a sacred meaning - a message to the heavenly rulers of the forces of nature with a request to send life-giving moisture or, who knows, not only about that. About something purely spiritual, judging by the truly artistic inspiration with which the images were created. If we remember that their creators could not fly into the air on anything, and the contours are drawn in continuous lines, then one cannot help but bow our heads respectfully before the power of their imagination and the accuracy of the execution of their plans.
In 1994, the Nazca Desert geoglyphs were inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List.
The Nazca Plateau is a sandy, arid plain in the southern part of Peru, in the province of the same name in the Ica region, which lies approximately in the center of the country's Pacific coast and 40 km from the ocean, 380-440 km southeast of the country's capital city. In this region they retreat from the coast, and the topography here is mostly flat and level, with minor elevations. The plateau extends between the small cities of Palpa in the north and Nazca in the south, almost 60 km from north to south and has a width of 5 to 7 km from west to east. The Andes spurs approach it from the east. The Pan-American Highway passes through the Pampa de Nazca, as the plateau is called in Peru.
Hypotheses about the origin and purpose of the Nazca geoglyphs, from mathematical to ufological, have long since acquired the character of an avalanche of disputes, in which no one has yet been able to put a weighty and irrefutable point.
But there are still counterpoints in this flow.
Geological and hydrological studies have established that 62 “radial centers” are located on elevations from which river beds (mostly dry today) are visible. Many lines pass directly over faults and, therefore, aquifers, especially in the east of the pampa, closer to the Andes. That is, in the complex it could well be a map of the distribution of groundwater.
Maria Reiche, who spent more than 40 years studying the Nazca geoglyphs, also found small copies of them, sketches. And therefore, she concludes, ancient artists knew how to scale an image, that is, they understood the laws of mathematics and physics (optics), albeit not in theory, but as they manifest themselves in nature. These guesses by Reiche are shared by the Italian archaeologist Giuseppe Orefici (b. 1946), today the world's most authoritative expert on Nazca, as well as the adjacent pyramidal structures of the city of Cahuachi. And he doesn't just separate, he checks them using computer programs. He also has his own impressive hypothesis. Studying Cahuachi since 1982, he came to the conclusion that the Nazca civilization was generally much more highly developed than commonly thought, and put forward a hypothesis about its existence until approximately the middle of the 1st century. n. e. on the plateau of a large city called Suashi. He modeled this city in 3D graphics, based on multispectral analysis of the soil and archaeological finds, in particular in the Nazca necropolises. All the people buried there were without weapons, which means they lived peacefully. And when a person lives in the world, he develops his intellect and talents. The Nazcas did not know writing, but they designed their pyramids perfectly, built them up to 20 m high, they even had a water supply system with multi-level wells, like the kariz in Central Asia, which we write about in the same issue. (An amazing coincidence is evidence that human intelligence develops according to general laws.) On the Orefici monitor, a city built up with temples and pyramids appeared, which went underground as a result of two natural disasters at once - an earthquake and a flood: in that era, Nazca was not as arid as Now. Orefici's calculations showed that only 20% of geoglyphs could be related to observations of the starry sky, and that was hypothetical. And mistakes among the pyramid builders, although rare, did occur; after all, it is human nature to make mistakes. But aliens from other planets, who, according to some versions, are the true authors of geoglyphs, would hardly be mistaken; their level of knowledge, by definition, should have been much higher.
And yet, no scientific conclusions can compare in popularity among the general public with the flight of fancy of supporters of the theory of the participation of extraterrestrial civilizations here. Based on the book of the Swiss ufologist Erich Däniken (b. 1935) “Chariots of the Gods”, in 1970 Harald Reinl made the film “Memories of the Future”, which is documentary in form, but is distinguished by an extremely arbitrary interpretation of the filmed material and conjectures arising from it. This film is widely known in the world. He made millions of people seriously believe that the Nazca geoglyphs are runways for aliens from other planets and were most likely created by them (as well as Egyptian pyramids, and statues of Easter Island, and other famous grandiose and mysterious structures on the planet). Many times these conclusions have been disputed by serious and responsible scientists, but this film and other ufological works are still taken on faith.
One thing is certain: the Nazca Desert will open up many more unexpected and extremely interesting things for all of us.

general information

The US dollar is also the most widely used currency.
The largest river of the Nazca plateau: El Ingenio (drying).

Nearest airport: Jorge Chavez (international) in the capital of Peru, Lima.

Numbers

Population of the Nazca Plateau: about 20,000 people.

Population density: 40 people/km 2 .
Width of trench lines- up to 135 cm, depth - up to 50 cm, on average - 35 cm.

Climate and weather

Average annual temperature: +22°С.

Average annual precipitation: about 180 mm.

Economy

Attractions

Curious facts