The Nazca Lines

[MARAB0D]

Would you count the people who built Gobekli Tepe a religion in this sense? They have a reasonably sophisticated, centralised religious site, kept up over centuries.

--Jaylemurph

Jayle, note that I did not say the simple ancient cults being incapable of undertaking large scale building projects. Egyptians, Minoans, Sumers, Babylonians... But in all these cases we are talking about a developed civilizations with intensive urbanization and agriculture, well-structured power systems and control position of the priesthood as keepers of Knowledge, including Engineering knowledge. As I mentioned they had MONEY and all associated infrastructure - treasuries, budgets, taxes, records, archives, files etc.

But in Nazca we have a primitive culture with highest technological achievement as early post-neolithic ceramics with no glaze, not a civilization.

[Abramelin]

Never read of a reasonable explaination as to what they were for, who did it, why it was done, etc.,etc.,etc.? I love the speculation, regardless of how intellectual it might sound. Just say "I don;t have a clue" and leave it at that.

I have posted here quite a few times about the little booklet Johan Reinhard wrote about those lines (THE NAZCA LINES - A New Perscpective on their Origin and Meaning).

According to him (I bought his book in Peru, 1991) the lines were (and still are, in Chile) created in honor of mountain gods, and for a fertility/water cult.

Here´s a quote on the inside of the book cover, about the photo on the front :

The sun sets to the right of a ridge of the mountain Tunga near Nazca. The outline of Cerro Blanco is visible in front of Tunga. Local mythology described Tunga as being the lord of the coast and a lover of Cerro Blanco, while Cerro Blanco is believed to be the wife of the mountain Illa-kata, lord of the heights and provider of surface water to the Nazca people. Still today people think that a lake inside Cerro Blanco provides water to the subterrabean canals for irrigation of the Nazca valley and offerings are made on Cerro Blanco's summit for water. Prehispanic ceremonial structures were found on the summits of Tunga and Illa-kata. The lines and figures drawn on the desert surface were likely part of religious practices which involved worship of mountains and other sources of fertility for agriculture.

And here's the summary:

SUMMARY (page 5)

The lines and figures (geoglyphs) constructed on the desert surface near Nazca are analyzed in terms of mountain/fertility concepts found widely throughout the Andes. Theories to explain the geoglyphs are briefly examined. Ethnographic and historical data are presented to demonstrate that mountain worship was important at Nazca from ancient to recent times. Comparative data relating to geoglyphs in other areas are also used in development of a theory to explain the lines and figures as part of religious practices designed primarily to insure the fertility of crops, and it is demonstrated that straight lines are still being used for this reason.

Oh brother, here´s the whole booklet (a bit older version than I have as booklet) as pdf :

http://users.ipfw.edu/sutterr/p370/Reinhard.pdf

.

Edited February 15, 2010 by Abramelin

[ShadowSot]

Stonehenge, as I understand it, was built during the stone age in Europe, and Stonehenge itself is just one of many such megaliths.

Such structures are more dependent on organizational skills.

An example has already been given of the Nazca's building of aqueducts, which reveals a pretty good organizational and technical skill.

The patterns themselves don't require a huge degree of skill to make, though the result is impressive.

[lakeview rud]

Sorry Swede, but I cannot buy your argument that these are "naturally" created. First why would some tops be sheared off and others supposedly of the same vintage be unaffected? Secondly, why would they end up being pretty much perfectly horizontal when you would expect that in a mountainous region there would definitely be tilting of the rock strata? Thirdly, the fact that the Nazcans chose to do their lines on top of one of these things (the airport looking one) hints very strongly that they had something to do with its creation.

[Giavanna]

Curry Lines?

Quoted information.

Earth radiation is a theoretical geophysical phenomenon described primarily by the German authors Manfred Curry and Ernst Hartmann.

They both describe a mystic force field (similar to Odic force, Mana, Qi) that covers the earth at regular intervals and can be detected by dowsing using a divining rod. It is not supposed to be detectable by common scientific instruments but some still connect it to telluric currents, which are actual phenomena, detectable by scientific instruments.

Placing people or other living things in certain spots of the earth radiation knots is believed to be beneficial/harmful depending on radiation flow direction. It connects to the Gaia philosophy and vitalist school and is very popular in certain New Age circles in Europe, especially in Germany.

The radiation is described as a grid-like arrangement with lines at regular distances:

* Curry lines are supposed to be circa 3 meters apart (with variations), diagonally to the poles, east to west.

* Hartmann lines run both east-west and north-south forming a grid across the earth's surface with a distance of circa 2 meters in the north-south direction and 2.5 meters in the east-west direction.

* Ley lines are man-made energy lines, created by stone formations such as stone ships or other ancient archaeological structures. The knowledge of creating ley lines is supposed to be lost.

[Giavanna]

Curry Lines?

Quoted information.

Earth radiation is a theoretical geophysical phenomenon described primarily by the German authors Manfred Curry and Ernst Hartmann.

They both describe a mystic force field (similar to Odic force, Mana, Qi) that covers the earth at regular intervals and can be detected by dowsing using a divining rod. It is not supposed to be detectable by common scientific instruments but some still connect it to telluric currents, which are actual phenomena, detectable by scientific instruments.

Placing people or other living things in certain spots of the earth radiation knots is believed to be beneficial/harmful depending on radiation flow direction. It connects to the Gaia philosophy and vitalist school and is very popular in certain New Age circles in Europe, especially in Germany.

The radiation is described as a grid-like arrangement with lines at regular distances:

* Curry lines are supposed to be circa 3 meters apart (with variations), diagonally to the poles, east to west.

* Hartmann lines run both east-west and north-south forming a grid across the earth's surface with a distance of circa 2 meters in the north-south direction and 2.5 meters in the east-west direction.

* Ley lines are man-made energy lines, created by stone formations such as stone ships or other ancient archaeological structures. The knowledge of creating ley lines is supposed to be lost.

Here's a link.

http://earthacupuncture.info/earth_grid.htm

Edited February 15, 2010 by Giavanna

[Columbo]

I cant remember where i saw this, but it was thought that they were to mark our subterranean rivers

Just found this on a google search.

NAZCA LINES LINK

It would seem to make sense for a desert inhabiting people to mark out where the nearest supply of water is.

And the rivers just happened to flow in all these designs and patterns?

[Swede]

Sorry Swede, but I cannot buy your argument that these are "naturally" created. First why would some tops be sheared off and others supposedly of the same vintage be unaffected? Secondly, why would they end up being pretty much perfectly horizontal when you would expect that in a mountainous region there would definitely be tilting of the rock strata? Thirdly, the fact that the Nazcans chose to do their lines on top of one of these things (the airport looking one) hints very strongly that they had something to do with its creation.

lakeview - While I can appreciate your position, I believe it would be of assistance to your understanding of the situation to study geologic/hydrological processes and the area under consideration in more detail. I realize that the following will be redundant, be it may help.

1) The formations pictured are not mountains. A bit of simple scaling on the plateaus themselves will verify this. As can be observed in Riaan photo #6, the true mountains can be observed in the background. At a notably higher altitude. The Nazca Plains (Peruvian Plains) are named so for a reason. In addition, the erosional processes are readily apparent to anyone that has observed spring run-off on the the shoulders of a dirt road. Similar "high plains" are rather common in the western U.S., a region in which I have personally observed similar processes. The photos of the Badlands of South Dakota which I supplied a link to are areas that I have, again, personally walked and researched. The same would apply to areas in the Four Corners. Have you actually studied the formational processes involved in the plateau structures utilized by the Ancestral Puebloans (Anassazi)?

2) The erosional processes, as has been pointed out, are readily apparent. The long term effects of the subduction of the Nazca Plate under the South American Plate results in an upward shifting/tilting of some areas that allows the down-cutting to continue.

3) Rest assured that this is not solely "my argument". I am merely providing well documented geologic information that I would hope would put the fallacious proposals of some "authors" into a scientifically balanced perspective.

My best suggestion would be to pull up all the references which have been previously provided, including all those available via Science Digest (This may require access to a good library). And, as also suggested, utilize Google Earth to get a larger field of view. To isolate features from their broader matrix can result in an inaccurate assessment of their over-all formational ancestry.

Hope the above is of assistance.

.

[lakeview rud]

Thanks, I will check that out. Also may I suggest an easy way to check this out. If the areas in question were "skimmed/flattened" by human activity then the most likely place for the debris would be in adjacent areas much as modern man when building a roadway will use the material removed to fill in the low spots along the roadway. I would think that we have the technology to scan the area and see if any of the plateaus have "fill" in or near them. If no "fill" is found then there's no argument from me as it could not have just disappeared. (unless taken into outer space by the aliens of course!!)

[Swede]

Thanks, I will check that out. Also may I suggest an easy way to check this out. If the areas in question were "skimmed/flattened" by human activity then the most likely place for the debris would be in adjacent areas much as modern man when building a roadway will use the material removed to fill in the low spots along the roadway. I would think that we have the technology to scan the area and see if any of the plateaus have "fill" in or near them. If no "fill" is found then there's no argument from me as it could not have just disappeared. (unless taken into outer space by the aliens of course!!)

Your comments regarding the absence of massive amounts of humanly transported soils are quite on track. Aerial views clearly display the outwash deltas from the current erosional transport/deposition that has created the plateau formations and there is no evidence of the material that would have been removed to create a "flat-topped mountain(s)". To put such speculation into perspective, you may wish to study the volume of the Monk's Mound at Cahokia. This is the largest known man-made earthen structure in North America, yet would pale in comparison to the volume that some would propose for Nazca. (Note - please don't just do "a Wiki" on this one. Dig a bit deeper. I can provide sources if need be).

Another aspect that I find terribly (tragically!) amusing relates to the dark surface stratum that is displaced in order to reveal the substrate and create the lines. This surface stratum is quite thin, generally measuring roughly in the range of a few millimeters to a centimeter or two. Thus, some "authors" would appear to present a scenario in which truly significant volume of soils were transported to an unlocated destination, the subject surface was manicured, another

soils type was transported in and most carefully distributed, and THEN the lines were created. I will allow you to draw your own conclusions.

.

[Guest Gilfaer]

This is one of those subjects that is like asking who built the pyramids - bound to get all manner of answers, from the ruthlessly empirical mundane ("The Egyptians of course."), to the outlandish, stories of aliens and ancient races or Atlantis or comparable ideas.

One thing I cannot believe, is that they are a landing site for ET UFO's, serving as a runway. If a craft is capable of either warping space time or traversing an Einstein-Rosen Bridge wormhole, then it isn't going to need a runway. Such a thing would be massively anachronistic.

[Wyrdlight]

I have a documentory i recorded from the discovery channel last week all about the lines, i have not seen it all yet but the team have taken thousands of pictures and built up the first 3d-map of the whole region and all the lines.

The Nasca people suffered some great disaster and it is mirroed in the lines themselves and the lines are linked to mass sacravices andritual decaptitaion. The impression i get so far was that the environment they lived it, which was already very dry and hostile got even drier. The narrow irigation channels (which look VERY simlair to the multitude of long straight nasca lines, so much so i think they are one and the same, shallow depressions in the rock meant to channel water and be cultivated, differing generations added to them, did not need older ones ect, and thus the criss cross pattern we have today) which had worked so well begun to fail.

Over a long long time, several generations, they carved images into the rock as benadictions to the Gods to bring back the rain, the Whale(Water filled Sea), the Monkey(Lush Jungle), the Spider (Symbol of Rain) could be seen as such bendictions, vast images to thier Gods who lived in the Sky. Alas there, benedictions failed as the rains had, and they died out.

As to the often asked questions (how can they make them when they can only been seen from a great height) is simply, there Gods were in the Sky (I think) and its not so ahrd a thing to make such images with precision if you have a large and willing workforce and some basic maths skills, of which the Nasca clearly had both.

Edited March 15, 2010 by Wyrdlight

[arglebargle]

Saw a documentary before where it was mooted that they were "dance-lines". The natives would form a sort of conga-line and bob their way along the shapes. Round and round we go.

So they would make these gigantic pictograms on hillsides and such, only to have a dance track? Seems to me that whatever they were used for, they might have found better uses for their time in a hunter-gatherer society like that, even though they did focus on spiritualism and all these things. But okay, what supports the conclusion that it was setup for dancing?

[Eldorado]

So they would make these gigantic pictograms on hillsides and such, only to have a dance track? Seems to me that whatever they were used for, they might have found better uses for their time in a hunter-gatherer society like that, even though they did focus on spiritualism and all these things. But okay, what supports the conclusion that it was setup for dancing?

Boredom.

(Religion)

Having a good time.

All of which are much more plausible reasons for scratching shapes on the earth than UFO's. Or do you believe the ancients never got bored and never had any fun?

[arglebargle]

Boredom.

(Religion)

Having a good time.

All of which are much more plausible reasons for scratching shapes on the earth than UFO's. Or do you believe the ancients never got bored and never had any fun?

I have not made up my mind what I believe, it is possible, perhaps even plausible it was for dancing, but why make all these different tracks for it? And there are geoglyphs other places too, on fairly steep slopes. Were they for dancing too? Also why do all the mountains surrounding the Nazca Plateau have their peaks, yet the plateau itself is completely flat, as if someone sawed off the top and polished it flat. Does anyone know anything about this, by the way? Because it seems like such a lot of work strictly for dancing.

I have also seen in some documentary that there is another geoglyph out by the ocean that points straight for Nazca Plateau, any truth to this? And why would this be made in the first place? Also for dancing?

And to ask your question which i underlined in your quote; I know they got bored, I know they had fun, the question is would they take the time to design, execute and then dance around these lines? I don't know, but I would at least like some evidence supporting this, just like I would want evidence for the UFO related theories.

[Eldorado]

I have not made up my mind what I believe, it is possible, perhaps even plausible it was for dancing, but why make all these different tracks for it? And there are geoglyphs other places too, on fairly steep slopes. Were they for dancing too? Also why do all the mountains surrounding the Nazca Plateau have their peaks, yet the plateau itself is completely flat, as if someone sawed off the top and polished it flat. Does anyone know anything about this, by the way? Because it seems like such a lot of work strictly for dancing.

I have also seen in some documentary that there is another geoglyph out by the ocean that points straight for Nazca Plateau, any truth to this? And why would this be made in the first place? Also for dancing?

And to ask your question which i underlined in your quote; I know they got bored, I know they had fun, the question is would they take the time to design, execute and then dance around these lines? I don't know, but I would at least like some evidence supporting this, just like I would want evidence for the UFO related theories.

Hi Ranyhyn

I put forward the idea of dancing, which I did see explained in a documentary years ago, because it makes as much sense as any of the other suggestions mooted here. The truth is we can only guess. Were all of these enigmas created at the same time by like-minded people? It's doubtful.

As for the flat plateau.....these are natural.

[arglebargle]

Hi Ranyhyn

I put forward the idea of dancing, which I did see explained in a documentary years ago, because it makes as much sense as any of the other suggestions mooted here. The truth is we can only guess. Were all of these enigmas created at the same time by like-minded people? It's doubtful.

As for the flat plateau.....these are natural.

Fair enough, but it appears to be the only one in the area, and it is completely flat. I don't know how the chances of this happening to only one out of many, versus a group of these are, but I'd like to find out.

Also I heard somewhere that the lighter colored lines contained crushed glass, I hardly believe this but has anyone else heard this? Or is it merely hogwash? I wouldn't know where to look for this info myself, because most of the info on the plateau tends to be written by people insisting they are like an airport, which I am not convinced of.