The mystery of the 'Amazon Stonehenge'

[seeder]

Quote

 

The mystery of the 'Amazon Stonehenge': 1,000-year-old Megalithic stone circle in Brazil hints that ancient civilizations were more sophisticated than first thought

    Rego Grande is located in Amapá state, near the city of Calçoene
    It takes its alternative name from the famous prehistoric monument in Wiltshire
    First discovered in the late 19th century, but excavations didn't start until 2005
    Experts say the unusual stone arrangement may have been used as a place of worship as well as for astronomical observations related to crop cycles

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-4037576/The-mystery-Amazon-Stonehenge-1-000-year-old-Megalithic-stone-circle-Brazil-hints-ancient-civilizations-sophisticated-thought.html#ixzz4SxWan2Cg

 

 

[Likely Guy]

Cool, didn't know about this. The rock with a hole in it must have a purpose.

[Eldorado]

6 hours ago, Likely Guy said:

Cool, didn't know about this. The rock with a hole in it must have a purpose.

Maybe it was "Just for looking through" as the great Chief Dan George might say.

[Nnicolette]

Maybe the light shines through to point to certain places at different times of year like a calendar.

[paperdyer]

1 hour ago, Nnicolette said:

Maybe the light shines through to point to certain places at different times of year like a calendar.

When the Moon shone through - Time to make the sacrifice!

Edited December 16, 2016 by paperdyer

[Thorvir]

1 hour ago, seanjo said:

Ancient Man is always being underestimated.

Yeah, I agree.  All those telephones, aircraft, space craft, work on genetics they had....we just can't compare to ancient man.

 

[Parsec]

We are lucky mr. da Silva stopped razing and didn't carry on. 

 

That's a very interesting find! 

[Jungleboogie]

From the article:

" Instead, some scholars now assert that the world’s largest tropical rain forest was far less “Edenic” than previously imagined, and that the Amazon supported a population of as many as 10 million people before the epidemics and large-scale slaughter put into motion by European colonizers. "

What a stupid assumption.  A holocaust of 10 million people with not a shred of documentation or historical record cited.

The conquistadors of the age were fond of bragging about their travesties to the crowns back in Europe.  It was a good way to ensure continued funding.  A slaughter of unbelievers on this magnitude would have made waves across Europe, and surely have been recorded by many sources.

[Herr Falukorv]

40 minutes ago, Jungleboogie said:

From the article:

" Instead, some scholars now assert that the world’s largest tropical rain forest was far less “Edenic” than previously imagined, and that the Amazon supported a population of as many as 10 million people before the epidemics and large-scale slaughter put into motion by European colonizers. "

What a stupid assumption.  A holocaust of 10 million people with not a shred of documentation or historical record cited.

The conquistadors of the age were fond of bragging about their travesties to the crowns back in Europe.  It was a good way to ensure continued funding.  A slaughter of unbelievers on this magnitude would have made waves across Europe, and surely have been recorded by many sources.

most died of diseases... I think you might have missed som history classes in school.  
ex from wiki

While technological and cultural factors played an important role in the victories of the conquistadors in the Americas, this was facilitated by old world diseases, smallpox, chicken pox, diphtheria, typhus, influenza, measles, malaria and yellow fever. The diseases were carried to distant tribes and villages. This typical path of disease transmission moved much faster than the conquistadors so that as they advanced, resistance weakened.^{[citation needed]}

Epidemic disease is commonly cited as the primary reason for the population collapse. The American natives lacked immunity and resistance to these infections.^[93] Most American native peoples lived in isolated communities, with only limited trade contact and no regular communication, further reducing their ability to build up immunity. Trading was the only ongoing contact between most New World cultures.

When Francisco Coronado and the Spaniards first explored the Rio Grande Valley in 1540, in modern New Mexico, some of the chieftains complained of new diseases that affected their tribes. Cabeza de Vaca reported that in 1528, when the Spanish landed in Texas, "half the natives died from a disease of the bowels and blamed us."^[94] When the Spanish conquistadors arrived in the Incan empire, a large portion of the population, had already died in a smallpox epidemic. The first epidemic was recorded in 1529 and killed the emperor Huayna Capac, the father of Atahualpa. Further epidemics of smallpox broke out in 1533, 1535, 1558 and 1565, as well as typhus in 1546, influenza in 1558, diphtheria in 1614 and measles in 1618.^[10]:133

Recently developed tree-ring evidence shows that the illness which reduced the population in Aztec Mexico was aided by a great drought in the 16th century, and which continued through the arrival of the Spanish conquest.^[95][96] This has added to the body of epidemiological evidence indicating that cocoliztli epidemics (Nahuatl name for viral haemorrhagic fever) were indigenous fevers transmitted by rodents and aggravated by the drought. The cocoliztli epidemic from 1545 to 1548 killed an estimated 5 to 15 million people, or up to 80% of the native population. The cocoliztli epidemic from 1576 to 1578 killed an estimated, additional 2 to 2.5 million people, or about 50% of the remainder.^[97][98]

The American researcher H.F. Dobyns said that 95% of the total population of the Americas died in the first 130 years,^[99] and that 90% of the population of the Inca Empire died in epidemics.^[100] Cook and Borah of the University of California at Berkeley believe that the indigenous population in Mexico declined from 25.2 million in 1518 to 700,000 people in 1623, less than 3% of the original population.^[101]

Edited December 17, 2016 by Rofflaren

[Tatetopa]

You might enjoy 1491 by Charles Mann.  It is full of citations you can follow.  Yes there are references to large populations, elevated village sites, elevated roads between them  in the Amazon.  There is some positional observations that fruit and nut trees were not scattered randomly through the jungle but clustered around village sites.

This is not ancient man, these people were contemporary to most of our European ancestors.  Different environment, different skill set.  And Thorvir, not to make you jealous,  but all of our ancestors made  up for the lack of cell phones and surfing the net with excellent singing, wonderful dancing, and great sex. (I have no citation for that, just my opinion.)

[Thorvir]

22 hours ago, Tatetopa said:

And Thorvir, not to make you jealous,  but all of our ancestors made  up for the lack of cell phones and surfing the net with excellent singing, wonderful dancing, and great sex. (I have no citation for that, just my opinion.)

Which are amazing things we can do now.

[Anomalous_Zombie]

Looks almost like ruins of some sort of larger monument or structure. Very cool discovery!

[Jungleboogie]

On 12/17/2016 at 0:30 PM, Herr Falukorv said:

most died of diseases... I think you might have missed som history classes in school.  
ex from wiki

While technological and cultural factors played an important role in the victories of the conquistadors in the Americas, this was facilitated by old world diseases, smallpox, chicken pox, diphtheria, typhus, influenza, measles, malaria and yellow fever. The diseases were carried to distant tribes and villages. This typical path of disease transmission moved much faster than the conquistadors so that as they advanced, resistance weakened.^{[citation needed]}

Epidemic disease is commonly cited as the primary reason for the population collapse. The American natives lacked immunity and resistance to these infections.^[93] Most American native peoples lived in isolated communities, with only limited trade contact and no regular communication, further reducing their ability to build up immunity. Trading was the only ongoing contact between most New World cultures.

When Francisco Coronado and the Spaniards first explored the Rio Grande Valley in 1540, in modern New Mexico, some of the chieftains complained of new diseases that affected their tribes. Cabeza de Vaca reported that in 1528, when the Spanish landed in Texas, "half the natives died from a disease of the bowels and blamed us."^[94] When the Spanish conquistadors arrived in the Incan empire, a large portion of the population, had already died in a smallpox epidemic. The first epidemic was recorded in 1529 and killed the emperor Huayna Capac, the father of Atahualpa. Further epidemics of smallpox broke out in 1533, 1535, 1558 and 1565, as well as typhus in 1546, influenza in 1558, diphtheria in 1614 and measles in 1618.^[10]:133

Recently developed tree-ring evidence shows that the illness which reduced the population in Aztec Mexico was aided by a great drought in the 16th century, and which continued through the arrival of the Spanish conquest.^[95][96] This has added to the body of epidemiological evidence indicating that cocoliztli epidemics (Nahuatl name for viral haemorrhagic fever) were indigenous fevers transmitted by rodents and aggravated by the drought. The cocoliztli epidemic from 1545 to 1548 killed an estimated 5 to 15 million people, or up to 80% of the native population. The cocoliztli epidemic from 1576 to 1578 killed an estimated, additional 2 to 2.5 million people, or about 50% of the remainder.^[97][98]

The American researcher H.F. Dobyns said that 95% of the total population of the Americas died in the first 130 years,^[99] and that 90% of the population of the Inca Empire died in epidemics.^[100] Cook and Borah of the University of California at Berkeley believe that the indigenous population in Mexico declined from 25.2 million in 1518 to 700,000 people in 1623, less than 3% of the original population.^[101]

I agree with your assertion.  The idea of 'large scale slaughter' from the article is what I was referring to as ludicrous.

Edited January 10, 2017 by Jungleboogie

[oldrover]

I don't have sources for this to hand, but, there is apparently evidence to suggest that much of the Amazon basin was settled around the time of European arrival. My memories are sketchy but I believe soil analyses plus some sort of satellite topography(?) indicates that much of what we think of as primeval forest is in fact secondary growth on old agricultural land. I don't know. 

A for the rock with the hole in it, they should analyse the surfaces of that for traces of pigment. 

https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/e7/33/d2/e733d29654f4f495b23e7abec1d55f13.jpg

Edited January 10, 2017 by oldrover