Mysterious drawings of the Nazca desert

Have you ever seen 120-meter monkeys and condors? What about a 180-meter lizard? And what about the “small” hummingbird bird measuring 50 meters in size? What about a 46-meter spider? Who painted them and why on a huge canvas called the Nazca Desert?Between northern part Chile and the south of Peru are located on a plateau - a completely deserted plain, where the wind rarely blows, and rain occurs once every few years. This is the Nazca Desert. Its length is 25 and its width is 8 kilometers. More than 100 geoglyphs were discovered here - giant images of famous plants and animals, simply geometric figures, a scattering of incomprehensible, unrelated straight lines, which turned the Nazca desert into a giant art gallery - another mystery of our planet. Who is the artist? Why was such titanic work needed? After all, the drawings are difficult to grasp even from a bird’s eye view! Then the question arises: what is the feasibility of the work carried out? What value - economic, religious, military - did these drawings represent for the people of antiquity? Or maybe not for people? This is where many theories and versions have appeared trying to explain this. However, everything remains only at the level of assumptions, and the true purpose of the images remains a mystery of the Nazca desert.

All patterns are formed by light lines resulting from the removal of fine gravel from the surface of the soil, darker than the ground below it. They mainly depict animals - flying birds, a spider, a fish, a monkey. But there are also geometric patterns: rectilinear stripes and symbolic figures, triangles, trapezoids, the meaning of which is difficult to decipher. In 1927, over the plateau in search of water sources the plane was flying. Water will be found there later, and then a Peruvian pilot discovered giant images. Interestingly, mention of the Nazca Lines dates back to the 16th century. In 1548, the book “Chronicle of Peru” appeared, written by the Spaniard Pedro Cieza de Leon. Here the Nazca Lines received the name: “guideposts for wanderers.” But only in the 20s of the twentieth century, the “father of Peruvian archaeology” Julio Tello was the first to copy the drawings. True, they did not become the object of serious research. Archaeologists then suggested that these were the remains of an ancient irrigation system. Everything changed only when, interested in what he saw, Paul Kosok, an archaeologist from the University of Long Island (USA), who had previously studied ancient irrigation systems in Mesopotamia, came to Peru. Seeing Nazca from the plane, he was shocked. But there was no sensation then. The Second has begun World War, and there was no time for drawings. It was only in 1946, when Kosok passed on his notes to Maria Reiche, who was interested in ancient observatories, that a “canonical” history of drawings of the Nazca desert was established, and Reiche became the main expert on this problem, devoting 40 years to it. What did she install? The whole difficulty is not in creating the drawings themselves, but in the calculations. There are no approximate measurements here, since this could lead to distortion of the proportions of the drawings, and, apparently, the ancient Peruvians had some kind of equipment that does not exist today. Reflecting on the size and perfection of proportions, Reiche argued that “ancient artists” could have created this if they could fly. During her research, she discovered 60 figures and lines, and in 1986, the Peruvian pilot de la Torre, in a little-explored area in the San Jose Pampa, saw previously unknown drawings: 87 photographs he took depicted images of animals, plants and people.

Nazca paintings date back to 500 BC. e. - 500 AD e. - before the formation of the Inca Empire. The people living here then did not leave any written sources about themselves. All known facts about them were obtained by studying the burial sites and the objects found there. Official science believes that this “gallery” belongs to the pre-Inca Indian culture Nazca, which flourished between 300-900 AD. e. Historians and archaeologists believe that the drawings were made by hand, removing stones and laying them out in rollers along the edges of the figures. When marking, poles and elliptical mirrors were used, and giant images were made from small sketches. Indeed, such sketches have been discovered. Various hypotheses were expressed regarding the purpose of the figures: either totemic or ritual signs, and the lines, P. Kosok believed, were used as an astronomical calendar for household needs. Researcher D. Hawkins drew attention to the huge number of vessels with a convex bottom found in the area of ​​the drawings, which are difficult to use in everyday life. But, in his opinion, during religious holiday These vessels were inserted into the grooves of the design, and then something flammable contained in them was set on fire. After all, many ancient peoples, as is known, attached great importance to fire. Continuing this idea, the Russian ufologist M. Gershtein suggested that this happened at night and contributed to the appearance of mirages in the sky. According to I. Koltsov, this desert was ideal place for burials with “ensuring incorruptibility”, and the vessels were the “container of the soul” of the deceased. The drawings were chosen according to the importance of the person and his totemic name (Spider, Monkey, Swan...).

However, there is a very strange circumstance. Locals take clean drinking water not from Lake Nazca, but from wells located exactly along the lines of the drawings, and the irrigation system here, based on a system of artificial underground canals, two of which pass directly under the bed of the Nazca River, is very perfect and productive. American scientists S. Mabee and D. Proulx believe that some of the lines are indicators underground sources water. It was noted that the designs in the desert and on clay vessels are almost identical. From here it was concluded that these symbolic drawings pleased the deities of natural forces - sky, earth and water, in order to receive a lot of water and a good harvest. On this, perhaps scientific evidence and end. The agricultural calendar hypothesis was criticized by astronomer D. Hawkins. It was not confirmed by computer calculations. Moreover, estimates based on data from the Hawkins Expedition indicate that such a large-scale effort would require 100,000 man-years, even if the entire estimated population worked 12 hours a day. Who would get their daily bread? A more reasonable version was proposed by the Englishman T. Morrison. He believed that the drawings and lines were symbols of various religious groups or nationalities living in the Andes. They had a tradition of burying relatives and fellow tribesmen at the very edge of the roads, so that the graves were easier to access. Here they prayed and meditated. In this regard, Morrison believes that Nazca paintings could serve as caste, religious and social symbols for local residents. However, ritual objects must first of all affect people's feelings! This is where another mystery arises: drawings from the ground are not perceived, they can only be seen by rising into the air. In this regard, the American D. Woodman in 1977 put forward a hypothesis that the Indians knew how to do Balloons, rising into the air during ritual ceremonies. This allowed them to fully appreciate the mystical meaning of the drawings. There is confirmation of this. An image of a hot air balloon was found in one of the Nazca tombs. While exploring this circumstance, the American B. Sporer came across an old Incas legend about a little boy who helped them in battle, flying over enemy fortifications and reporting the location of enemy troops. There are images of flying people on many Incan fabrics. In addition, by examining four pieces of fabric found in a looted grave near the drawings, Sporer established that the ancient Nazca inhabitants used a better weave in their fabrics than that used in the manufacture of parachutes, and stronger than in modern fabrics for parachutes. balloons.

Before moving on to the next hypothesis, it should be noted that the Nazca desert complex is just part of the phenomenon. Ground figures similar in technique are found in the middle zone of the Andes along the entire Pacific coast South America, and in this regard, they cannot in any way relate to one local Indian culture, such as the Nazca culture. One can, of course, assume that the drawings were created manually, but if we take the overall picture, considering that the sizes of the figures range from 30 to 300 meters with a contour line width from 15 centimeters to 3 meters... And besides, it is difficult to assume that when creating Such giant objects by hand, the rest of the surface would be completely undamaged. But no such damage was found. In this regard, radio physicist Alla Belokon claims that the drawings could only be made from the air by a stream of directed energy of an unknown nature, and some of their asymmetry resembles the distortions that are obtained when projecting at an angle to the surface. In addition, she believes that the distortions are three-dimensional in nature, and therefore the drawings could not be simple enlargements from sketches on a plane. The most fascinating hypothesis was put forward by the Swiss Erich von Däniken, who connected the images of Nazca with extraterrestrial civilizations. He proposed to consider them as landmarks of a cosmodrome built by aliens. This idea is prompted by what was discovered on a 350-meter mountain slope near the city of Paracas on the coast. Pacific Ocean image of a trident, named because of its resemblance to the candlestick “Paracas candelabra”. From it, through the mountains and valleys to Nazca, there stretches a straight white line, visible only from a height, along which there are images of jumping creatures. This and a number of other lines are very reminiscent of runways. Däniken believes that Nazca could serve as a refueling site for spaceships, since the release of unknown energies was recorded here: several points were discovered where the compass needle “goes crazy,” and the pilots saw straight lines of many kilometers from above, giving ultra-precise landmarks on the sides of the horizon. Be that as it may, the art gallery in Nazca is one of the most amazing attractions on our planet. But the mystery of the desert is not alone. 1,400 km away, at the foot of Mount Satari, a giant, 120-meter tall statue of a man was discovered, surrounded by lines and signs similar to the Nazca drawings. Mysterious drawings are also found in the USA (Ohio), England, Kazakhstan, Southern Urals, in Africa ( south of the lake Victoria), in Ethiopia and a number of other places. So, in 2003 in natural park Sajama in western Bolivia with an area 16 times greater desert Nazca scientists discovered more than 400 geoglyphs, drawn with lines 1-2 meters wide, and in some cases up to 20 kilometers long. In their opinion, giant drawings bring humanity some kind of important information, but, apparently, our consciousness has not yet “grown” to the level of its perception. So questions about the most famous art gallery in the Nazca desert and others like it are still open to the curious.


How to get there

The main settlement of the Nazca area is logically named Nazca. The most convenient way to get here is by bus, this indispensable Peruvian transport. Buses depart from all major cities countries, the fastest way to Nazca is from the city of Ica, the center south coast Peru - the journey will take 2-3 hours and cost approximately 30-40 PEN. Buses from Cusco and Arequipa also arrive in Nazca; in the first case, you will have to spend about 14 hours on the road, in the second - “only” nine, both buses depart from their starting points at night, arriving at the place in the morning. A ticket from Cusco will cost about 90-100 PEN, from Arequipa - about 75-85 PEN. The trip from Lima will take approximately 6-8 hours depending on the route. If you want to see the Nazca Lines, but are based in Lima, it is most convenient to purchase a sightseeing tour from one of the agencies in the Peruvian capital. Tourists set off at 4 am, visit the cities of Ballestas and Nazca itself (including its attractions), and also fly around the Nazca lines in a light aircraft. Return to Lima around 10 pm the same day. The cost of the excursion is about 800-900 PEN. Prices on the page are as of June 2016.

How to get around

You can get around the city of Nazca on foot - it is quite small. A taxi ride to any distance within the city will cost no more than 3 PEN, and a trip to the airport (from where the light-duty cars with tourists take off) will cost no more than 4 PEN.

,
and also obtained using Google Earth

We used the versions and classifications expressed in the book by A. Belokon “Nazca Desert. Traces of another mind” and in the LAI film “Nazca - Beyond Logic” from the series “Forbidden Topics of History”.

I. Lines

So, if you try to delve into the issue, the first thing you come across is a huge number of theories based on fairly modest factual material. And when you see a diagram of lines and drawings of the most famous part of the Nazca desert, for example, this one:

at best, this does not add clarity.

I decided to take an interest in the topic and somehow quietly got involved in a small study, the results of which I post here. There will be no revolutionary classifications or theories, the emphasis is simply slightly shifted based on factual material from Google Earth and, in my opinion, logical interpretations are offered.

The first thing I did was, according to established tradition, to leave the found, or rather raided, tourist routes and decided to take an interest in the surrounding area (using Google, of course). The results were simply stunning! If the literature mentions a section of the Earth's surface 70 by 15 km, then in fact the lines are visible along almost the entire coastal strip, right up to the city of Trujillo, which is 900 km to the north. I used markers on the map to mark places where the lines were obvious.

For example, well-preserved lines near the town of Casma 650 km north of Nazca.

It is quite possible that there were a lot of lines along the entire coast, and the preservation of the Nazca lines is only unique natural conditions plus the heroism of the tireless researcher Maria Reiche, largely thanks to whom this entire place (the Nazca Plateau is now a nature reserve) remained in good condition.

On the periphery, the density of lines is much less, there is less chaos in them, and while I adapted to finding them, some patterns became clear.

The first (well-known) - ancient lines are almost always perfectly straight for hundreds of meters, and sometimes kilometers (very easy to check with a ruler), have a characteristic edging on the sides, often ignore the relief and you always get the feeling that they were made from exactly that place, where you look at them on Google.



Human traces are either obviously modern (mostly automobile) or “walking” depending on the terrain. And besides, people often use lines for their own purposes:

The second and most important pattern is ATTACHMENT TO RELIEF, and not just to relief, but to changes in relief - river valleys, desert junctions with mountains, edges of plateaus, flat hilltops, etc.

The marks are well-preserved lines. The connection to river valleys and foothills is very clearly visible. The little blue squares in the center are just that popular place with a lot of lines and drawings.

Detailed plan diagram of the Palpa region.

A plot of the same in 3D.

Below I give examples of the most typical places where lines meet (let’s forget for a moment about the plateau with its chaos of lines and patterns and try to find elementary algorithms using simple examples).

Foothills-mountains:

near Lima (360 km from Nazca)

Hill with “astronaut”:

Hill ridges:

Near Lima:

River valleys:

The following classification of lines was formed by itself.

SCAN LINES – thin long lines, straight, zigzags, etc. They also made drawings.

PASSING LINES – long thin strips of the same thickness or expanding.

MAIN STRIPS - wide, up to one hundred meters, rectangular or widening stripes, whose length is commensurate with the width.

The classification is not rigid, i.e. a short and thick passing line can be called a long and thin main strip, etc.

Very often, passing lines are joined to the main ones and a line with “variable geometry” is obtained. The joints are clearly visible almost everywhere and are sometimes marked by characteristic clusters of dots.

There is another clear class of stripes, but more on that a little later.

Another interesting pattern emerged. I call it the height rule. Almost all stripes of unequal width widen as the height decreases. The rule is not absolute if, say, the height difference is small. Sometimes there are groups of bands with an inverse relationship, for example, like here:

And in general, it seems that the change in bandwidth depends not on height, but on another factor.

So, I am announcing the working version.

Something that interested the ancients was washed away from the mountains either by a cataclysm or by rains and rivers and settled in river valleys and plateaus. It could be anything - rare earths, precious metals, building materials for megaliths, orichalcum, quantum fluids, etc. Let’s call it “ore” for now. And the Nazca plateau, and, it seems, the entire western Peruvian coast was a large development of this ore deposit. I specifically do not touch on the question “how did they do it”, this is a question of technology, and in my opinion it is very reckless to comment on, say, the operation of a nuclear reactor from the position of a medieval city dweller. Now we are interested in the question “what did they do.”

Let's consider the main algorithms for mining on the Nazca plateau.

Classics of the genre. Let's not pay attention to the spirals and drawings for now, let's leave that for later. So, three passes. We select an area, scan, in this case with a zigzag, select the ore with a passing line and get the most delicious ones in small main strips. All.

I cannot help but note the following.

A very famous drawing of this figure. The ends of the passing line were slightly adjusted (in fact, the scanning line goes far beyond the boundaries of the drawing), they called it a whip and voila, the meaning has changed. You can launch Indians with a tambourine and rejoice in the greatness of science...

Sorry, I got distracted.

More examples.

At the bottom left is a modern road. The same algorithm - they just scanned in different ways - longitudinal, radial, and even a little zigzag. And then we went through the main ones. They even left piles of dots.

And also, in the diagrams.

It is very possible that the spirals are some kind of calibration, or a special way of scanning.

In large areas, straight scanning lines several kilometers long were used.

Five scanning methods are very clearly visible:

Let's summarize the preliminary results.

There is one pattern everywhere - scanning first, passing ones on top of them, and covering all the main ones. It can be assumed that the passers-by scanned deeply, took samples and mined. The main strips were intensively developed.

The next example is very important.

The algorithm is the same, but it works in two stages, between which there seems to be a large period of time. Either the resource is renewable, or, more likely, the evolution of technology (they began to work with poorer ore). Here the 4th class of stripes appears. There are not many of them. They are wide (up to one hundred meters), rectangular, with characteristic points and always go across and on top of the main ones. I called them technological.

The rule of heights (the expansion of lines as the height decreases) is associated not with height, but with the enrichment of the ore (flowing down, the flow expands), but somewhere this does not work.

The question arises. Why don’t they just remove the entire top part of the earth and put it into processing, as they would do now?

They probably had a different view of ecology. Another level. Covering streams, rocks and stones with polygonal masonry could only be done by people who were very careful about environment. And, despite the fact that they cut rocks as they wanted and moved megaliths like wooden cubes, they, it seems, did not tear down mountains, did not turn rivers, but simply carefully modified the places where they lived and did something.

Nevertheless, there are examples of intensive processing.

The next place is 800 km to the north. And if it weren’t for the line of clustered dots, stretching for almost 4 km regardless of the terrain, one would think that this is a modern activity.

There are still many details (relative to the lines themselves) that I would like to pay attention to.

But this all relates to technology and requires a more detailed and qualified approach. We move on to the second part.

II. Drawings

So, the drawings.

In a completely natural way, all images that do not belong to lines are arranged into three groups.

The actual drawings are drawings of animals, plants and various kinds of spirals.

Enlarged petroglyphs are anthropomorphic and similar images.

Blueprints. All sorts of strange drawings, circles, groups of dots, etc.

Let's look at the first group. Let us remember that drawings are creativity, and subjective assessment is inevitable. The author is always present here, the meaning he imparts, the instrument and the medium. Everything is clear with the carrier, but we will try to explain the first three positions. And for the purity of perception, I propose to forget for a while about the size of the drawings, the time of creation, theories, etc., and perceive them as they look right here on the monitor screen.

The drawings have three main features. Actually, all this has been known for a long time, but I consider it necessary to repeat it and place the necessary emphasis.

First. General style, one style of drawing, everything is done with one line. According to M. Reiche, there is an extraordinary, mathematically precise alignment of the lines. Nowadays this is called computer graphics elements.

Let us note one more subtlety. If, say, the ancient Egyptian drawings reek of arrogance and grandeur, the Mayan images smack of otherworldly nightmares, then in the Nazca drawings there is, on the one hand, lightness and simplicity, as in graffiti on concrete fences, and on the other, design grace.

Second feature. Correlation of all patterns and spirals with lines or line directions

Third. The attitude of strip creators to drawings. Very often, patterns overlap the stripes and vice versa, and sometimes the main stripes completely cover them

It can be added, and now almost no one doubts this, that they were intended for the viewer from the air, and from a considerable height.

The second group is enlarged petroglyphs.


Geoglyphs on the Nazca plateau, like the famous lost city Incas Machu Picchu is one of the most mysterious attractions of Peru. Giant geometric figures depicting triangles, spirals, lines, constellations, as well as a monkey, a spider, flowers, an astronaut and a hummingbird with a wingspan of more than two hundred meters were created between the 1st and 5th centuries AD. There is still no consensus on the origin of patterns made with deep furrows and the purpose of their creation, despite many years of research.

The Nazca Lines were first noticed in 1939 by American archaeologist Paul Kosok, who was flying over the plateau. He saw that the lines recorded the phases of the moon and indicated certain constellations. It was impossible to detect such parallels from the ground; The figures can only be distinguished to this day only from the air. Subsequently, Maria Reiche was engaged in their research, and many drawings were discovered with her help. According to Reiche, geoglyphs in the desert are the largest calendar of the starry sky under open air in the world. In total, on the Nazca plateau you can find about thirty designs, 788 different geometric shapes, including trapezoids, triangles and spirals, and thousands of lines and stripes. In 1994, geoglyphs were included in the List World Heritage UNESCO.









To travel to the Nazca plateau, choose light, light-colored clothing and closed shoes with hard soles. Best time to view geoglyphs in the desert - from December to March, when you can count on clear sunny weather. The temperature during this period does not fall below +27°C. Even when setting off early in the morning or at dusk, do not forget about sunscreen and a headdress.

In addition to the geoglyphs, there are several other interesting sights on the Nazca Plateau. In particular, you can visit the ruins of Cahuachi - the most important and powerful city ancient civilization, where excavations are still ongoing. 5 kilometers east of Nazca are the Cantayoc aqueducts, and 30 kilometers south is the necropolis of Chauchilla (El cementerio de Chauchilla), most of the burials date back to the 5th-6th centuries. The mummies were found in the first half of the last century, however archaeological site The necropolis was recognized only in 1997.

How to get there

The Nazca Plateau is located 380 kilometers southeast of Lima. The path runs along the picturesque Pacific coast, along Highway 1S. The most convenient way to get from the capital to the city of Nazca is with a transfer to Ica; The average bus journey takes seven and a half hours. Tickets must be purchased in advance, at least one day in advance. Be careful: there are different buses from Lima transport companies(Oltursa, Cruz del Sur, TEPSA) depart from different terminals; for example, TEPSA flights depart from the terminal of the same name, located on Avenida Javier Prado. However, it is not always starting points located in the city center. One-way fares range from 65 PEN (~$20.8) to 140 PEN (~$44.8) per person. Buses depart several times a day, including late in the evening and at night.

The best way to see the geoglyphs on the Nazca Plateau is to go to one of excursion tours on small Cessna planes arranged by local agencies. IN good weather Most of the designs and lines can be seen from the air; guides navigate the desert's most famous sites, including those featuring monkeys, spiders, hummingbirds and other animals.

The routes start from the cities of Nazca and Lima. Excursions should be booked in advance: the number of seats on planes is limited (usually no more than five passengers), and it is unlikely to be possible to organize such a trip on the spot. Their cost from the city of Nazca, for example, starts at $150 per person; The price includes transfer from the hotel to the airfield, flights and the services of a local guide. Such tours operate daily, mainly in the morning, but departure times and travel duration depend on the number of flights scheduled for the day and weather conditions. On average, the excursion takes a little over half an hour.

Organized excursions from Lima will cost more; their prices start at $350 per person. This price includes transfer to the Nazca airfield, watching a short film about the desert lines, flight, as well as lunch in a traditional restaurant and a visit to the observation deck on the way back.

Helicopter excursions over the Nazca plateau are organized by several specialized travel companies. The cost of such a trip starts from $350 per person; flights operate daily. The duration of the excursion is 40 minutes, including the flight time - 25 minutes. The minimum number of passengers is two people.

Another option for visiting the Nazca Lines is Observation deck on the Panamericana Highway (El Mirador). The cost of visiting is 2 PEN (~$0.6) per person. In this case, due to the great distance of the drawings, it will be possible to see only two of them.

Location

The Nazca Plateau is located in the province of the same name in the Ica region, which lies almost in the center of the Pacific coast.

What kind of miracles does it keep within itself? ancient history! How many mysteries have not yet been solved, and how many of them will never be solved! However, stepping into the future, people understand the past more and more deeply and replace guesses and myths real story. Thus, it is believed that archaeologists have already finally solved the mystery that the Nazca Desert concealed. The outskirts of Peru became famous back in 1947, when the first scientific publications about strange lines and mysterious drawings appeared. Later the idea arose that these were alien runways. Many inhabitants of the planet perceived this idea with interest. This is how the myth was born.

The Mystery of the Geoglyphs

For decades, scientists and amateurs have tried to explain the origin of geometric patterns in the desert, which occupy an area of ​​almost 500 square kilometers. Although at first glance the history of their origin in Southern Peru is quite clear. For several centuries, the Nazca Desert served as a canvas for the ancient Indians, on which for some reason they painted mysterious signs. There are dark stones on the surface, and if they are removed, light sedimentary rocks will be exposed. This sharp contrast of colors was used by the Peruvians to create geoglyph drawings: the background for the images was the dark color of the soil. They decorated desert areas with straight lines, trapezoids, spirals and huge animal figures.

Nazca Desert. Coordinates of the drawings

These signs are so huge that they can only be seen from an airplane. However, anyone today can admire the mysterious symbols without leaving home; just run any program on your computer that displays satellite images of the Earth. The coordinates of the desert are 14°41"18.31"S 75°07"23.01"W.

In 1994 unusual drawings were included in the list of monuments that make up the World Heritage Site cultural heritage. And then the whole world knew where the Nazca Desert was. People wondered who the mysterious gallery was intended for. To the gods in heaven who read human souls? Or maybe in this ancient country Aliens once built a cosmodrome, so the markings remain? Or is this the first astronomy textbook where the course of the planet Venus represents the wing of some bird? Or maybe these are family signs that clans used to mark the territories they inhabited? It was even suggested that in this way the Indians designated the flow of underground streams, supposedly this secret card water sources. In general, there were a great many hypotheses, the best minds competed to interpret the meaning of what was written, but no one was in a hurry to select the facts. Almost all assumptions were made speculatively - rarely anyone dared to go to the utter distance. So the Nazca Desert (photo below) remained one of the most mysterious places planet, and its ancient inhabitants - one of the most interesting cultures pre-Columbian America.

The path to the solution

From 1997 to 2006, scientists from a variety of disciplines conducted extensive research in the Peruvian desert. The facts that they collected completely debunked all the explanations of the esotericists. There are no cosmic secrets left! The Nazca desert turned out to be quite earthly. Her drawings also speak of the earthly, even too earthly. But first things first.

Expedition to Peru

In 1997, an expedition organized by the German Archaeological Institute began to study geoglyphs and the culture of the Nazca inhabitants in the vicinity. settlement Palpa. The place was chosen based on the fact that it is located in close proximity to the villages where the ancient Indians lived. “To understand the meaning of the drawings, you need to look closely at the people who created them,” the scientists said.

Landscape exploration

As part of the project, we studied climatic features of this area. This clarified the origin of the symbols. Previously, in the place where the Nazca Desert now lies, there was a flat steppe area. It was formed from a basin separating the Andes and the Coastal Cordillera (another mountain range). During the Pleistocene it was filled sedimentary rocks and pebble. Here comes the ideal “canvas” for applying all kinds of drawings.

A couple of thousand years ago, palm trees grew here, llamas grazed, and people lived as if in the Garden of Eden. Where the Nazca Desert stretches today, there used to be even heavy rains and floods. But around 1800 BC. e. The climate became much drier. The drought burned the grassy steppe, so people had to settle in river valleys - natural oases. But the desert continued its advance and came close to the mountain ranges. Its eastern edge moved 20 kilometers towards the Andes, and the Indians were forced to leave for mountain valleys located at an altitude of 400-800 meters above sea level. And when the climate became even drier (around 600 AD), the Nazca culture disappeared completely. All that remained of her were the mysterious signs inscribed on the ground. Thanks to the extremely dry climate, they survived for thousands of years.

Nazca Desert. Drawings

Having studied the living environment of the creators of the mysterious geoglyphs, the researchers were able to interpret them. The earliest lineages appeared about 3800 years ago, when the first settlements arose in the area of ​​the city of Palpa. Southern Peruvians created their “art gallery” in the open air, among the rocks. They carved and scratched various patterns on the brown-red stones, chimeras of both people and animals. The “Revolution in Art” took place in the Peruvian desert around 200 BC. e. Artists, who previously covered only rocks with paintings, began to paint the largest canvas given to them by nature itself - the plateau stretching before their eyes. Here the masters had room to expand. But instead of figurative compositions, artists now gave preference to lines and geometric shapes.

Geoglyphs - part of the ritual

So why were these signs created? Certainly not for us to admire them today. Scientists believe that the drawings were part of the “sanctuary”; these are so-called ceremonial figures that have a purely mystical meaning. Geophysicists examined the soil along the lines (their depth is almost 30 centimeters) and found that it was highly compacted. 70 geoglyphs depicting some creatures and animals are significantly trampled, as if crowds of people had been walking here for centuries. In fact, various festivals related to the cult of water and fertility were held here. The drier the plateau became, the more often the priests performed magical ceremonies in order to call for rain. Of the ten trapezoids and lines, nine are facing the mountains, where the saving precipitation came from. Magic helped for a long time, and the clouds carrying moisture returned. However, in 600 AD the gods became completely angry with the people who settled in this region.

Debunking the myth

The largest paintings in the Nazca Desert appeared at a time when the rains almost stopped. Most likely, people thus asked the stern Indian god to heed their suffering; they hoped that at least he would notice such signals. But God remained deaf and blind to the prayers. It didn't rain. Eventually the Indians left motherland and set off to look for a flourishing country. And after a couple of centuries, when the climate became milder, the Nazca desert regained its inhabitants. People settled here who knew nothing about the previous owners of these lands. Only the lines on the ground stretching into the distance reminded us that once here a man tried to speak to the gods. However, the meaning of the drawings had already been forgotten. Now only scientists are beginning to understand the reason for the appearance of these writings - huge signs that seem ready to survive eternity.

The Nazca Desert is located in the Ica department in the south of Peru, between the Ingenio and Nazca rivers. This is an area of ​​500 square kilometers, covered with huge images of people and animals, lines, spirals and geometric shapes, the size of which reaches up to 300m in length. These signs are so huge that they can only be seen from an airplane. However, anyone today can admire the mysterious symbols without leaving home; just run any program on your computer that displays satellite images of the Earth. The coordinates of the desert are 14°41"18.31"S 75°07"23.01"W.

The mystery of the Nazca Desert was discovered in 1927, when a Peruvian pilot flying over a desert valley in southern Peru saw that the ground was lined with long lines and painted with images of animals. Such geometric designs appeared on the Nazca plateau during the Nazca civilization. It belongs to pre-Columbian civilizations, II-IV centuries BC.

Geoglyphs represent big mystery, because no one knows why representatives of the ancient Indian civilization that disappeared without a trace painted huge pictures that were visible only from the air. The images seem to have been scratched into the poor, rocky desert soil. At first glance, they are barely distinguishable and represent a chaotic interweaving of lines drawn by someone on the reddish surface of the desert, but from a bird's eye view this chaos takes on meaning.

Despite the fact that geoglyphs were discovered in the last century, the purpose of these amazing drawings is still unknown. Researchers A. Krebe and T. Mejia consider them to be part of an ancient irrigation system. T. Mejía also later suggested that the images were associated with the Incan holy path. Some features, such as mounds of stones at the intersections of lines, indicate that the figures were used for cult purposes.

P. Kozok, who visited the Nazca Valley in 1941, drew attention to the special role of lines in the rays of the setting sun during the summer solstice and called these lines the largest astronomy textbook on earth. This theory was later developed in her research by the German researcher M. Reiche. In her opinion, some of the geometric shapes symbolize constellations, and the images of animals symbolize the location of the planets.

The study of astronomy made a lot of sense to ancient civilizations. Among other things, it also had a practical function - it helped to predict rainy periods important for agriculture, but archaeologist H. Lancho suggested that the drawings were maps indicating the way to vital places, for example, to underground water sources.

The most incredible and at the same time the most popular theory belongs to the famous Swiss researcher Erich von Däniken. He suggested that the images are nothing more than markings on the earth's surface for aliens from other planets.

No less surprising is another hypothesis, according to which representatives of the ancient Nazca civilization mastered aeronautics, which is why the drawings are visible only from above. In support of this theory, several dark spots that appear on the surface of the plateau are interpreted as traces of fire pits on hot air balloon sites. In addition, the pottery of the Nazca Indians has patterns that resemble balloons or kites.

The exact age of the geoglyphs is unknown. According to the results of archaeological research, the images were created in different periods. The earliest, straightest lines probably appeared in the sixth century BC, the latest - drawings of animals - in the first century AD.

Scientists have proven that the figures were created by hand. The drawings were applied to the surface of the desert in the form of furrows 130 cm wide and 50 cm deep. On dark soil, the lines form white stripes. Since the light lines heat up less than the surrounding surface, a difference in pressure and temperature occurs, which leads to the fact that the lines do not suffer during sandstorms.

Who and why painted these pictures on the surface in ancient times, distinguishable only with high altitude, still remains a mystery. A huge number of theories have been put forward, but none of them have yet received scientific confirmation.