A Brief History of Ancient Nazca
With the excitement surrounding the findings in Peru recently, there are some fascinating and mysterious characteristics regarding the location of the discovery. Nazca, Peru is located on an arid plateau in the Peruvian desert, near the Pacific coast. It is situated in a valley between the Ica and Nazca Grande rivers. Following the Paracas culture, the ancient Nazca civilization appeared in the area just over 2,000 years ago, lasting between BC 100 – AD 800.
The Nazca were thought to be heavily influenced and possibly even arose from the Paracas before them. Their civilization originally consisted of a collective of chiefdoms and farming villages surrounding a communal area, known as Cahuachi, where they would make pilgrimages for rituals and ceremonies. They eventually grew into a bigger society with larger urban cities and advanced farming technology.
Known for their pottery and weaving, the Nazca decorated their goods with geometric patterns, plants, and animals which are mirrored in the Nazca lines, the massive, curious geoglyphs that they are known for. Their advanced underground irrigation systems, called puquios, that utilized atmospheric pressure to pump water to their crops is a testament to their level of technology.
The Journey to Cahuachi
At the center of Nazca was Cahuachi, which was originally thought to be a military base. That theory has been overturned, thanks to the research of Italian archeologist, Giuseppe Orefici, who has been studying the site for years. In addition to studying the mysteries of ancient Nazca, he has also spent his career studying the Rapa Nui on the enigmatic Easter Island. Orefici has concluded that Cahuachi was a ritual center and the capital where Nazcans would regularly make a pilgrimage for ceremonies.
The Cahuachi site extends over 370 acres with a nearly 100-foot-tall, stepped pyramid in the middle, making it the biggest ceremonial center of its era. Among it there are 40 other structures made of mud adobe. Within these structures are thousands of tombs that have only been discovered recently, but have since been looted by grave robbers.
In the graves of Cahuachi are an array of bodies with varying textiles, showing differing levels of societal status. Trophy heads were also found with holes drilled through the skulls, seemingly to be worn as necklaces. Some of the bodies of those buried there are well-preserved due to mummification.
The Nazca Lines
Outside of Cahuachi there are cryptic geoglyphs, known as the Nazca Lines, that can only be seen from hundreds of feet in the air. They weren’t discovered in the modern era until the 1920s when airlines flew over and noticed them. The Nazca created these lines by removing a layer of rock and dirt, most likely by tying a rope between two posts and drawing guidelines for themselves. The remnants of these posts have been discovered, confirming this theory however, their method for creating such large drawings with precise measurements is still somewhat of a mystery.
The lines span over 200 square miles and consist of drawings of flora, fauna, and geometric patterns. They have been preserved due to a windless, arid climate and were thought to be larger-scale projections of designs that they would weave into their textiles. Among the 70 different zoomorphic lines, there are depictions ranging from monkeys to birds and jaguars. There is even a human-like figure which has been the subject of debate as to what exactly it depicts. Some see it as an astronaut which works with theories of the lines being a call to extraterrestrial visitors.
The realist perspective on the Nazca Lines sees them in a few different lights. One theory believes that they are ritual walking paths that the ancient Nazcans would follow on their pilgrimages to ceremonies like those held at Cahuachi. Another theory sees them as markers of irrigation paths or actual irrigation canals with their designs being a thank-you to the gods for fertility. A simpler explanation sees them as part of an astrological calendar.
While radical theories, like the one espoused by Erich von Däniken which interprets the Nazca lines as a landing guide for extraterrestrials, might be farfetched to some, the realist theories are not proven either. The idea that the lines represented irrigation systems seems strange in their eccentricity, especially considering their elaborate system of underground aqueducts. Another obscure theory posits that the Nazcans had the technological acumen to create hot air balloons, allowing them to see the designs they created in their lines. Either way, they remain shrouded in mystery with the recent discovery in Peru adding to them.
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Ancient Complex at Karahan Tepe Older than Gobekli Tepe
New discoveries have been made at the ancient site of Karahan Tepe — this sister site of Göbekli Tepe may have just revealed its hidden origins and proved an ancient civilization is even older than once thought.
Archeologists working at the ancient site of Karahan Tepe, about 30 miles east of its sister site Göbekli Tepe, have found stunning carved heads, standing stones, buttresses, and what appear to be snakes prominently carved into the earth. The dig is being led by the University of Instanbul and in their official report point out that, not only are these and other neolithic structures the beginning of architecture but also held a symbolic purpose. Writing, “[T]hey also bear traces of the conceptual transformation of the space. It is during this period when the building was instilled to mean something other than a space to live in, whereby the construction of the first shelters was followed by that of ‘special structures.'”
Science and history writer Andrew Collins, has visited and studied Karahan Tepe since 2004 and has seen these special structures up close.
“The main structures were all what they call ‘subterranean,’ they would cut deep down into the bedrock. One was a huge elliptical stone enclosure,” Collins said. “Clearly, this was an amphitheater for ceremonial ritual activity. Yet this connected via a hole that is 70 cm in diameter into a very strange room containing 11 stone pillars, ten of which are actually carved out of the bedrock itself, and sticking out of the wall of this room that I call the Pillar Shrine, is this elongated neck with a head on the end of it — this carved stone head. This confined room is somewhere initiates or people looking for connection or communication with some kind of otherworldly force or influence or diety would come to do their attunement in altered states of consciousness.”
