What are They?
The greatest scratch pad on Earth
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| Runway for alien spaceships? That's just
one of the fanciful theories on the purpose of the Nazca lines. (Photo
courtesy Persis B. Clarkson.) |
In the hot hazy desert of southwest Peru, couched between the Andes Mountains
and the Peruvian coast, lies what many have called one of the most baffling
enigmas of archeology. Huge geometric patterns and spirals, animal figures
including a monkey, a spider and an 'owl man', and thousands of perfectly
straight lines are immaculately etched onto the desert's surface. The last of
them were drawn about a thousand years ago. Known as the Nazca lines, the
drawings have mystified scientists since they were first discovered in the
1920s.
From ground level, the earth drawings, or geoglyphs as they're called, seem
like a confused mass of lines. It's only when viewed from the air, that one sees
how the lines and figures convey a sense of purpose, of organization. But for
whom? Why? And how did they get such large drawings one of the lines is 65
kilometers long, and some of the animal drawings are more than two soccer fields
long so precise?
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| The 'owl' man |
Phylliss Pitluga is a senior astronomer at the Chicago Adler Planetarium. She's
studied the lines for more than ten years from an astronomical perspective.
The lines first captivated her when she saw them from above in an airplane.
"When I got over there and flew over the site, I saw a sense of
organization that doesn't show up in small close-up photos," says Pitluga.
"I was fascinated and I was compelled to want to know more."
She's not the only one. Ever since the founder of Peruvian archeology, Julio
Tello, first recorded the lines in 1926, scientists have spent years puzzling
over the riddle of the Nazca lines. Still, not one clear theory exists today
that answers these basic questions, making the drawings one of the world's most
intriguing unsolved mysteries.
Thousands of lines, hundreds of patterns
Scattered over about 500 square kilometers of an arid plateau between two
river valleys around the city of Nazca, perhaps the most famous of the drawings
are the biomorphic figures: a spider, a monkey, a whale, a snake, a lizard, a
flower, a man and 18 bird shapes, including the hummingbird and the condor.
There are about 50 of these figures ranging in size from 25 meters to 275 meters
long. Despite their fame, these are confined to a small corner of the desert
or the pampa, as it is called by the Peruvians.
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| The hummingbird |
Most of the pampa is dominated by 1,300 kilometers of perfectly straight
lines, some as narrow as 6 inches and others as wide as hundreds of meters,
crisscrossing or running parallel to each other. There are also 300 geometric
figures, mostly trapezoids, triangles, zig-zags and spirals.
The Nazcans
The Nazca lines are thought to have been made by the Nazca Indians who lived
in the region between 300 BC and 800 AD. Their pottery has been found at the
Nazca lines. Predecessors of the Incas, the Nazca Indians didn't leave any
evidence of a written language, and none of their descendants survive today.
But we do know that they were farmers, says Persis B. Clarkson, an
archeologist and expert in geoglyphs at the University of Winnipeg. Although the
region is one of the driest in the world, the land is fertile, and the Nazcans
made use of a subterranean irrigation system to water their crops. They made
channels and tunnels to access the water system, which would have required a way
to regulate the water system, says Clarkson. And that implies that Nazcan
society was a hierarchical one.
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| The spider (Image courtesy UFO Folklore) |
They also worshipped deities. Some of the pictures on their pottery are of
figures with both animal and human characteristics and some very scary
features, says Clarkson. Exaggerated eyes and large fangs on their half-feline,
half-human creatures, for example, suggest "that there was a greater power
out there than humans."
Their huge burial sites also show that they paid special attention to their
dead, placing them in their graves in the fetal position, wrapped with beautiful
cloths.
Simple Methods
Peruvian desert a perfect tableau for Nazcan 'artists'
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| 1,300 kilometers of lines, 300 geometric
figures and about 50 biomorphic drawings are etched onto the Peruvian
desert. (All images are clickable for larger versions.) |
The Nazca lines aren't the only geoglyphs in the world. The tradition of drawing
figures on the ground spans the pacific coastal desert areas from central
California to northern Chile. The drawings at Nazca, however, are unique because
they are so large and so densely packed within a 500 square kilometer area in
southwest Peru. Straight lines that go on for hundreds of kilometers, only
swerving out by a few degrees, huge trapezoids and spirals, and animal figures,
some of which can be seen in their entirety from the air have been puzzling
archeologists since the 1920s. How did the Nazcans make them so precise? For
whom? And why?
As it turns out, how they got their drawings so precise is the one question
on which scientists can agree. The Peruvian desert provided a perfect tableau
for the Nazcan 'artists'. Covered by fist-sized volcanic rocks, blackened and
varnished from exposure to the atmosphere, the desert or pampa surface makes a
sharp contrast to the soft yellow soil only inches underneath the stones. By
simply removing the overlying stones and piling them on each side, the Nazcans
were able to sketch their drawings onto what may be the greatest scratch pad in
the world. In another climate, the drawings would have been obliterated in
months, but Nazca is one of the driest and most windless regions on Earth.
Climate and geology conspired to create an ideal medium for the Nazcans
leaving their distinctive images to be admired and pondered over thousands of
years later.
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| The desert surface is covered with dark,
shiny pebbles which contrast with the softer yellow soil underneath. |
But how were the Nazcans able to get the hundreds of kilometers-long lines so
straight, and their figures in such perfect proportions?
No spectacular engineering feat
Since many of the drawings must be viewed from the air to be seen in their
entirety, the task of getting such large figures so perfectly proportioned and
the lines so straight was thought to have required an observer from above to
guide the drawings. This led some to hypothesize that the Nazcans may have been
capable of flight!
But Dr. Persis B. Clarkson, an archeologist and geoglyph expert at the
University of Winnipeg says the technology required was very easy and
straightforward. "It was not a difficult technology ... all you need is the
will." As Clarkson explains, all it took was careful and diligent attention
to sight lines.
For the straight lines, two wooden stakes could be used to guide the
placement of a third stake along the line. One person 'sights along' the first
two stakes and instructs a second person where to place the third stake. Strings
could also have been used to help ensure the lines were straight. This process
could be repeated for hundreds of kilometers with due diligence.
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|
During the summer of 1984, ten volunteers from Earthwatch, an international
nonprofit organization that supports scientific field research, helped Anthony
Aveni, an astronomer and anthropologist at Colgate University in Hamilton, New
York in a study of the Nazca lines. They constructed a straight line that wound
up into a spiral 35 meters long and one meter wide in just an hour and a half
without a printed plan. One group squatted in the interior of the figure,
uncovering the stones to let the pale yellow soil underneath to show, while
another group moved these stones to the edge of the figures and arranged them
into piles about a half a meter high. A third group supervised the edging
process to ensure that things lined up correctly. The result, says Aveni, was a
figure that was as accurate as any Nazca drawing measured with a surveyor's
instrument.
By extrapolating their results, Aveni and his team concluded that the work
crew could have cleared an average-sized trapezoid spanning an area of 16,000
square meters in about a week. With a work force of 10,000 people, Aveni
estimates that every line and trapezoid on the entire pampa could have
been made in less than a decade.
Were the Nazcans capable
of flight?
Many of the Nazca drawings etched
onto the Peruvian desert are so large, they can only be seen
in their entirety from the air. This has led some to speculate
that the Nazca Indians, who are thought to have made them,
were capable of flight. This idea comes from two sources.
First, paintings on pottery found in the area show images of
what may have been balloons or kites. Second, wide, circular
'burn-pits' containing blackened rocks have been found at the
end of many of the lines, which may have been launch
sites for hot-air balloons.
To test out this theory, an American
resident of Peru, Bill Spohrer, assembled a balloon using only
materials and technology that he felt would have been
available to the Nazcans. Their tombs revealed a fabric with a
finer weave than present-day parachute material and tighter
than hot-air balloons. Using a cotton whose weave and weight
was nearly identical to the Nazcan cloth samples, Spohrer and
Jim Woodman, a member of the Miami-based International
Explorers Society, made a hot-air balloon in the shape of an
inverted triangle with a hole at the bottom to let in the heat
energy from the smoke of a burn-pit. A banana-shaped gondola,
woven from reeds harvested along the shores of Lake Titicaca
on the Peru-Bolivia border, was stitched to the balloon.
In November 1975, with copilot Julian Nott, Woodman took to the air in the balloon, dubbed Condor 1 after the condor figures etched onto the desert
using the
heat of a 'burn-pit' for lift-off. Within seconds, they
floated to about 400 feet. But after only three minutes, were
brought back down again when the air in the balloon cooled.
When the two men hopped out of the gondola, the lightened
balloon shot up again. It went up to an altitude of 1,200 feet
and sailed several kilometers before sinking back to the
ground for its second and final time.
The balloon had 'flown' for 14
minutes long enough, say the balloonists, to prove that the
Nazca Indians could have taken to the sky in a hot-air
balloon. However, despite their enthusiasm, there is no
evidence that the Nazcans actually could have flown. The
theory is fascinating speculation at best.
Deities and Pilgrimages
Rituals, deity worship were these the purposes of the Nazca lines?
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| The dog (Most of the Nazca line images are
clickable for larger versions.) |
Spanning 500 square kilometers of the arid Peruvian desert, or pampa as
it is called, the huge trapezoids, animal figures and long straight lines etched
in the earth have led to some fanciful theories about their purpose. Runways for
alien spaceships, the site of gigantic pre-Columbian Olympic Games and even
ancient minimalist art, the Nazca lines have left a tantalizing legacy that have
us wanting to ponder their usage. Yet they haven't offered quite enough
information to help us solve that mystery.
Paul Kosok, an American geographer, was one of the first people to study the
lines. He proposed that the straight lines represented 'the largest astronomy
book in the world', believing they were intended to point to astronomical events
at the horizon. He came to the conclusion after witnessing the sun setting
almost exactly over the end of one of the long single lines on June 22, the
winter solstice in the Southern Hemisphere, the shortest day of the year. The
theory was further explored by Maria Reiche, a German mathematician, who spent
more than half of her life measuring and mapping the lines. She believed that
the lines predict the positions of the Sun, Moon, planets and stars and that
they were used to determine the correct time of year for planting seeds, the
annual appearance of water in the rivers, and the right times to harvest the
crops.
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| The enigmatic drawings span the desert near
the city of Nazca. |
The astronomical hypothesis, however, was pretty much disproved (sort of!) in 1968, when
American astronomer Gerald Hawkins plotted the lines to analyze, by computer,
their relationship with various celestial bodies. Applying the same technique he
used to deduce an astronomical key for Stonehenge several years earlier, Hawkins
found that the Nazca lines at least the ones he studied were random,
astronomically speaking.
But both the astronomy hypothesis and rebuttal were misguided in one critical
aspect, says Dr. Persis B. Clarkson, an archeologist and geoglyph expert at the
University of Winnipeg. They both assumed the Nazca Indians had the same
constellations that the Europeans did.
"Very little attempt has been made to look at Andean conceptions for
constellations," says Clarkson, leaving any previous astronomical
interpretations with a western and northern hemisphere bias. As Clarkson
explains, some formations can't be seen in one hemisphere, but can be in the
other.
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| Hummingbird (Image courtesy UFO Folklore) |
"Without understanding how the Andeans look at the world, you can't even
begin to say the 'monkey' aligns with Orion or whatever."
Like a growing number of archeologists, Clarkson believes the lines were made
in relation to irrigation systems and religious pilgrimages. The idea was first
proposed by Peruvian scholar Mejia Xesspe in 1926, when he suggested they might
be sacred roads.
Precursor to the Inca ceque system?
The theory is based on the tradition of the Incas the people who succeeded
the Nazcans of imbuing power to landscape features. In a study of the lines
done with Anthony Aveni, an astronomer and anthropologist at Colgate University
in Hamilton, New York, the researchers found similarities between the Nazca
lines and the so-called ceque system of the previous Inca capital of
Cuzco, about 250 kilometers east of Nazca. The city has four roadways, or suyus,
leading out to the most remote areas of the Inca kingdom. And according to
Spanish chroniclers, each of the roadways were couched within 41 imaginary
straight lines called ceques, which radiated outward from Coricancha, a temple
in Cuzco and the center of the Inca universe. The ceques were specified by
actual physical sacred places or huacas some 328 of them, eight or nine
of which were arranged on each ceque. The last huacas of many ceques were
located at underground water sources of Cuzco's underground irrigation system.
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| The biomorphic figures of the Nazca lines.
Adapted from Maria Reiche |
The ceque system at Cuzco has a number of functions. It provided a calendar,
with each huaca representing a day in the agricultural year. The ceques also
functioned as astronomical sight lines. For example, points out Aveni, "the
third huaca in the 13th ceque of the southwest quadrant consisted of a large
hill with two markers. When the sun reached them, it was time to sow." The
Inca had transformed their environment into an agricultural clock.
But that wasn't all that the ceques were for. They were also often the routes
of pilgrimage, and used to unite the different social classes of their society.
So, that the ceques were "ranked hierarchically in groups according to
which class of people (nobility, part-nobility or commoner) worshipped at and
cared for their particular huacas," explains Aveni.
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| The Nazca lines also radiated outwards from
landscape features such as hills. |
When Aveni and his team compared the Cuzco ceque system to the Nazca lines, from
maps made by Reiche, they found that the Nazca lines also tended to radiate
outwards, like the spokes of a wheel from 'ray centers.' Could it be that the
Incan ceque system was based on a more archaic form perhaps the Nazca lines?
To answer the question, the group measured 800 straight lines, and with the
use of a photographic survey, mapped all the measurements. Amazingly enough,
each of the 'centres' of the Nazca lines "bore an uncanny likeness to one
another. Each one consisted of a natural hill or low mound topped by a rock
cairn that may have served as an identifying marker," says Aveni.
In fact, there are "two to 40 lines raying out of any given
hilltop," says Clarkson. And the vast majority of the lines connect to
other hills, about 30 to 40 meters high.
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| The straight lines at Nazca 'rayed' out
from a hill in all directions or in one direction. (diagram courtesy
Persis B. Clarkson) |
Many of the lines opened into the large trapezoidal patterns, which on average,
were about 16,000 square meters, or about four football fields large. The team
also discovered that the trapezoids' axes oriented along the water sources, with
the skinny end pointing upstream about two-thirds of the time.
"All these facts seem to point to at least one absolute certainty: the
construction of the lines was connected in some important way with water,"
says Aveni.
The measurements also support the idea that the Nazca lines performed similar
functions as the Inca ceques. "It's not such a horrible leap to apply the
Inca traditions to the Nazcans," says Clarkson. The Nazcans predate the
Incans by 2,000 to 500 years depending on the region.
Johan Reinhard, an archeologist well-known for his research on Incan ice
mummies, came to the same basic conclusion after studying the Nazca lines.
Mountain gods and sacred pilgrimages
"The straight lines are sacred pathways to a place, from which they
worshipped the water source [mountains]," says Reinhard. "Now that can
be symbolic worship towards the ocean, or it can be, as it normally was,
invoking the mountain deities."
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| Fish |
Exactly how they used the lines is more open to speculation. But, as Clarkson
points out, many of the lines are about as wide as footpaths, and almost all the
drawings are made from one single, continuous line, leading her to conclude that
they probably walked along the lines. "The figures invite you to walk along
them."
One of the greatest myths of the lines is that they have to be seen
from above to fully appreciate them, says Clarkson. "But, that's only
because that's how they're used to seeing things." For example, we view a
painting on a wall by looking straight at it.
By walking the lines, Clarkson says that one can visually create an
image of the figure, providing another way of 'looking' at them. She herself
drew an image of a particular drawing by 'walking' it. When she viewed the same
figure from above, what she drew matched the pattern she saw from the air. And
she insists she's not an artist in the least.
So, that would provide an explanation for the 1,300 kilometers of straight
lines. But, what about the much older animal figures and spirals?
"The sky is the limit," on that one, says Clarkson.
 Reinhard,
however, proposes that the animal figures represent the forms taken on by the
mountain gods, which are still worshipped today in Andean culture. "The
mountain gods take the form of different kinds of animals, or are believed to
control different kinds of animals."
He also provides a hypothesis for why the figures were so large that many can
only be seen in their entirety from the air namely so that they would be
clearly visible to the mountain gods, presumed to exist up above.
But many questions still remain. "I don't think [my theory] necessarily
explains every single thing," admits Reinhard. "People are too complex
for that. And it's too long a period."
Perhaps the legacy of the Nazca lines is to captivate our imaginations, as
they might have of the Nazca Indians. As Maria Reiche, who dedicated more than
50 years of her life studying the drawings, once said, "we will never know
all the answers, that's what a good mystery is all about."
NAZCA LINES - DESIGNS
1. Killer Whale
2. Wing
3. Baby Condor
4. Bird
5. Animal
6. Spiral
7. Lizard
8. Tree
9. Hands
10. Spiral
11. Spider
12. Flower
13. Dog
14. Astronaut
15. Triangle
16. Whale
17. Trapazoids
18. Star
19. Pelican
20. Bird
21. Trapazoid
22. Hummingbird
23. Trapezoid
24. Monkey
25. Llama
26. Trapezoids
THEORIES ABOUT THE NAZCA LINES
Maria Reiche - Astronomical Calendar - She was the most famous Nazca
Researcher. Lines should show in direction of the rising of important stars and
planetary events like sun solstices. Formations like the spider and the monkey
could show star constellations like Orion and Ursa Mayor.
The big problem of all astronomical theories is the unknowing of the age. The
direction of stars is changing within centuries because the phenomena of precession
of the equinoxes.
Reiche led a determined effort to discredit theories of extraterrestrial
visitors. The strategy of this attack has been to argue that the Nazca Indians
constructed the Lines relatively recently - some time between 300 BC and AD 800.
In support of this possibility, some scientists have put forward ingenious
ideas on how the geoglyphs could theoretically have been designed from the
ground. The more important evidence, however, is that which attempts to link the
Lines definitively to the Nazcan culture. Here, neither of the two key pieces of
evidence survive close scrutiny.
The first piece of evidence is a series of radiocarbon dates, based on
ceramic and wood remains which were left at the Lines by the Nazcan people. It
is claimed that this proves that the Nazcans constructed the Lines. On the
contrary, the dating of these materials tells us only that the Nazcans lived in
the area of the Nazca Lines. Since the Lines themselves cannot be radiocarbon
dated, the possibility remains that they already existed when the Nazcan culture
emerged.
The second piece of evidence is the alleged resemblance of the Nazca
geoglyphs to certain features found on Nazcan pottery. This is an important
issue because it potentially offers proof that the Nazcans had either designed
the images or at least viewed them from the air.
Maria Reiche, the German mathematician and archaeologist most famous for her
research into the enigmatic figures of Nazca, died in 1998 at the age of 95. She
is buried in the arid valley she loved so well.
Professor Gerald Hawkins and his group went to Nazca to prove the
astronomical Theory of Maria Reiche but was unsuccessful. In 1968, a study by
the National Geographic Society determined that, while some of the Nazca lines
did point to the positions of the Sun, Moon and certain stars two thousand years
ago, it was no more than could be expected by mere chance. In 1973, Dr Gerald
Hawkins studied 186 lines with a computer programme and found that only 20 per
cent had any astronomical orientation - again no more than by pure chance.
In 1982, Anthony Aveni obtained similar results.
Georg Petersen - 1980 - pointed out that Reiche's theory did not explain the
different lengths and widths of the lines. More recently, Johan Reinhard has
noted that the surrounding mountains provided a ready-made and much more
effective mechanism for the Nazcans to use as a solar calendar; the lines would
thus have been quite superfluous to them. In addition to this avalanche of
scientific opinion, we should also note that Reiche, like von Daniken, has
failed to explain the significance of the animal geoglyphs.
Simone Waisbard - Astronomical Calendar - The drawing of Nazca are a
giant astronomical calendar. Further the Nazca-line-system was used to measure
the precipitation value. Figures, especially seabirds, have a connection to the
meteorological prophecy system of the Nazca-Culture. Her ideas for the trapezoid
formations: places for holy animals before sacrifice them, or field claims
connected with filter galleries, observatories or places for ritual ceremonies
of the different clans.
Erich von Dδniken - Long time ago visitors from other stars visited the
Earth. They landed at Nazca. During the landing stones was blown away by the
power of rocket propulsion. By approaching more the power was increasing and the
cleaned band broader. In this way the first trapezes emerged. Later the Aliens
disappeared and left confused people. Like in the modern cargo cults they tried
to call the Gods back by drawing lines, figures and trapezes. He discovered the
GGF/Mandala/Zodiac and the mirror - Formation and compares them with modern
VASIS or PAPI-Signs.
Alan F. Alford - Negroid Slaves - the Nazca-Lines was made by Negroid Slaves
of the Tihuanaco Culture. After a revolution the Negroid population destroyed
some figure, this is the explanation for overdrawn zigzag-formations. Later this
people went in northern direction and founded Chavin and the Olmec culture.
Robert Bast - A memory of the Deluge - The animal, plant and
human-shaped figures are lying together on the ground. So it could be a memorial
place of the big flood. Many cultures of our world know deluge-myths, you can
find a couple of them at his Side.
Gilbert de Jong - A Nazcan Zodiac was himself in Nazca and measured
the GGF by GPS. He obtained a length of the square side of about 54,7 Meter. In
the formation he recognized a Zodiac.
Nazca Figurine depicting Solar Eclipse
It all comes back to the Sun - Eye (Ra) -
Light at a time of transition of consciousness
Robin Edgar - the Nazca-Figures were inspired by, and intended to be seen by,
the (so-called) Eye of God that is manifested during total solar eclipses. An
extraordinary series of solar eclipses coincided with the construction of the
Nasca lines. Some Lines are aligned with the winter solstice, a less spectacular
but more regular, death and rebirth of the Sun God.
Nazca Lines and
the Eye in the Sky Eclipse
 
Michael Coe - Ceremonial Places - believes the Nazca Lines are sacred paths
to walk by specific rites. But primary the lines was a offering for
elders,heaven- and mountain-deities who spent water for fields.
Siegfried Waxmann recognized a culture atlas of the human history in the
Nazca-line-system.
Archaeologist Frederico Kauffmann-Doig - the Nazca Lines are magic lines
which origin from the cat cult in Chavin de Huantar.
Georg A. von Breunig believes the Nazca Lines were used for sprinting to
honor especial gods or ritual competitions. This theory was supported by the
professor Hoimar von Ditfurth.
Markus Reindel - Dowsing - The Nazca-Figures are markers for subterranean
waterflow. Trapezoides show the broadness of the waterstream, zigzaglines show
where they end, lines show into direction of the puquitos. Reindel sympatizes
with Johnsons Theory, additionally he explain the nature of the figures by
rod-dowsing (to find the subterranean water) and shamanstic flights (to overview
the figures).
Hermann E. Bossi - The Nazca-Code - based on a formation called the
GGF, Mandala or Zodiac that was discovered by Erich von Dδniken 1995. This
formation include a plenty of different combination possibilities and include
information about the Star HD 42807 at different times and it's planet. Other
formations like the monkey seems to be of this code too. The same code is to
find in other places like Stonehenge, Avebury and Borobudur, but also by Crop
Circles.
The Code of Carl Munck: The Ancient Geomatria of Numbers - - The Nazca Line
ground markings locate themselves on The Code Matrix system. - Nazca
Lines and Archaeocryptography
The ancient sites around the world are very precisely positioned on a global
coordinate system in relation to the position of the Great Pyramid at Giza. The
positions of the sites are given in the geometry of their construction. A very
ancient system of numbers was used in the system, which we will call Gematria.
Gematrian numbers are found in ancient myths and religions, including the
Bible. Gematrian numbers were used in systems of weights and measures by ancient
peoples, including the Greeks, the Egyptians, the Persians, the Babylonians and
the Romans.
The Code system uses mathematical constants, such as pi and the radian. The
system also uses conventions that are still in use, such as the 360 degree
circle, 60 minute degree, 60 second minute, the base-ten numbering system, the
12-inch foot, and the 5280-foot mile.
The ancient Mayans used Gematrian numbers in their very accurate timekeeping.
The Nazca Line ground markings "locate themselves" on The Code Matrix
System.
Professor Helmut Tributsch - Fata Morgana -important cult places like
Stonehenge, the Pyramids and naturally Nazca were built on places where often
the Fata Morgana - Phenomena occurs. In this way People could see the Fata
Morgana of the Nazca-Lines.
Jiri Mruzek - The Seal of Atlantis Complete complex solution of the
monkey's figure. It involves geometrical code, which speaks of specific aspects
of analytical geometry. This code coincides with the code of prehistorical La
Marche, France.
John D. Miller - 177 Feet - analyzes different buildings worldwide. So he
found in ancient buildings and old cathedrals often the value of 177 feet. His
theories are based on several holy numbers and units, so he believes that there
is a deeper importance within.
Thomas Wick - A plan of a Cathedral - private researcher of ancient
mysteries. When he saw the figure of the GGF, he recognized the ground
principals of a cathedral.
Professor Henri Stierlin - loom - the Nazca-Indians used the line-system as
loom. In the paracas-culture was made textiles witch was made of one string. But
the Indians hadn't wheels and looms, so they organized hundreds of men who held
the string. Their position was defined by the lines.
Dr. Zoltan Zelko - Map - Hungarian mathematician who analyzed the Nazca-line-system
and compared with other ancient places in Peru. Nazca could be a map of a 100 x
800 kilometer including region around the Titicaca-Lake.
Prof. Helaine Siverman - Clan Signs - the figures are clan signs of different
Indian clans in the region of Nazca.
Prof. Dr. Aldon Mason - Signs for Gods - The main interest of Mason
are the tombs and the deformation of skulls of the Nazca-Culture. Nazca Lines
are Signs for Gods in the Sky.
William H. Isbell - Provision of Work - the kings of Nazca ordered the
drawing of the Nazca-lines to control the population. When they did work they
couldn't make children at the same time. Why this? Isbell has the idea the Nazca-Indians
wasn't able to store field fruits, so in good years the population were
increasing to strong.
Albrecht Kottmann divided the figures into different parts and analyzed them
in a geometrical way. So he divided a bird of 286 Meter length into 22 Parts. He
found that the head takes two parts, the neck five parts, the body three parts
and the other twelve parts for the beak.The proportion between the beak and the
rest is 6:5. He believes the geometric signs are a picture writing system with
giant and small letters.
Ley Lines - Paul
Devereux
From Ellie - The Nazca Lines are another stone marker in the geological
blueprint of our reality. As one quests for answers to the hidden mysteries of
our creation - one must look above and below to determine the past, present and
future.
There is something to said be said for each of the theoires above, for in
truth each has a certain degree of validity. Finding answers once again becomes
a game in which all roads lead back to the 'Eye' - the creational source of all
things. In Egypt it was the Eye of Ra - The Eye of God.
I have always believed that all of creation is part of a geometric blueprint
that repeats in cycles of time created by the same consciousness. Stone markers
are placed in power points around the planet - as they are places humans are
drawn to explore. The markers link together - and to the universal game board -
based on creational geometry.
The clues are all universal - the flower of life - gods from the skies -
spirals of consciousness - humans - animals - candles=sacred flame -
birds=ascension back to the heavens. The archetypes - metaphors and symbols are
all the same as those found in the myths and legends of our little experience
called 3D.
The more one studies the more one realizes that one soul played the roles of
all of the gods - left all of the markers - all of which speak of time when the
eye - eclipse - light will appear in the heavens once again. It will appear 'out
of the blue' - midnight blue.
At this time - humanity will remove its consciousness from the 3D grid of and
spiral through the 'stargate' of higher light. That time is almost here. we
sense it, feel it, know it to be true or else we would not be here questing for
answers.
On the pampa, south of the Nazca Lines, archaeologists have now uncovered the
lost city of the line-builders, Cahuachi. It was built nearly two thousand years
ago and was mysteriously abandoned 500 years later. New discoveries at Cahuachi
are at last beginning to give us insight into the Nazca people and to unravel
the mystery of the Nasca Lines.
Cahuachi is emerging as a treasure trove of the Nazcan culture. As Orefici
and his team excavate, discoveries of paintings on preserved pottery, and the
ancient technique of weaving that the Nazca people developed, have given an
insight into how the lines may have been made, and what they might have been
used for, more than 1500 years ago.
Most exciting is the discovery of human remains. Stunningly preserved in the
dry soil of the Peruvian desert are the mummified bodies of the Nazcan people
themselves.
Skulls from Ica, Peru
Originally believed to have been a military stronghold, Cahuachi is now
reckoned to be a place of ritual and ceremony, and Orefici's stunning new
evidence confirms this idea. Cahuachi is now revealed to have been abandoned
after a series of natural disasters destroyed the city. But before they left it,
the Nazcan people covered the city in the arid pampa sand where, until recently,
it has remained a barely visible mound in the desert.
Preserving the Nazca Lines
It is difficult to keep the Nazca Lines free from outside intervention. As
with all ancient ruins, such as Machu Piccu, weather by wind and rain, and human
tampering will take their toll on these ancient Lines.
In recent years the Nazca Lines have suffered gradual destruction, as tomb
raiders seeking pre-Inca artifacts scar the terrain with hundreds of burrows,
garbage, among other waste material. A boom in copper and gold mining -
including a mine built in 1997 a few feet from a 2,000-year-old, two-mile-long
trapezoid -- is defacing parts of the Nazca Lines with tracks from truck
traffic.
Over the past decade, advertisers and political campaigns have carved huge
messages in the rock and sand between the ancient designs in this region 250
miles south of Lima.
In 1998, floods and mudslides from the El Nino weather pattern seriously
eroded several figures.
As electricity reaches the growing local population, utility companies are
running power cables over and around the site.
The damage to the Lines underscores Peru's desperate struggle to preserve its
national patrimony. Archaeologists say they are watching helplessly as the quest
for scholarship and conservation in a country viewed as the cradle of New World
civilization is losing out to commercial interests, bleak poverty and the
growing popularity of heritage sites as tourist attractions.
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