NEW LINES IN NAZCA WERE FOUND

NEW LINES IN NAZCA WERE FOUND

19/06/2024

Armed with satellites and drones, archaeologists discover new Nasca lines and dozens of other enigmatic geoglyphs carved into the earth.

Researchers exploring southern Peru with drones have captured images of ancient geoglyphs, and more than 50 of the massive ancient drawings are considered new discoveries by archaeologists.

Recorded in the high desert of southern Peru more than a millennium ago, the enigmatic Nasca lines continue to capture our imagination. More than a thousand of these geoglyphs (literally, 'earth drawings') spread across the sandy soil of Nasca province, remains of little-understood ritual practices that may have been connected to life-giving rain.

Now, Peruvian archaeologists armed with drones have discovered more than 50 new examples of these mysterious desert monuments in the adjacent province of Palpa, traced across the earth's surface in lines almost too fine to see with the human eye. Additionally, archaeologists surveyed locally known geoglyphs with drones for the first time, mapping them in previously unseen detail.

Some of the newly discovered lines belong to the Nasca culture, which dominated the area from 200 to 700 AD. However, archaeologists suspect that the earlier cultures of Paracas and Topará carved many of the newly discovered images between 500 BC and 500 BC. C. and 200 AD.

Unlike the iconic Nasca lines, most of which are only visible from above, the ancient Paracas glyphs were placed on the slopes, making them visible in the towns below. The two cultures also pursued different artistic themes: the Nasca lines often consist of lines or polygons, but many of the new Paracas figures depict humans.

The new geoglyphs add crucial data about the Paracas culture, as well as the mysterious Topará culture, which marked the transition between the Paracas and the Nasca. Centuries before the famous Nasca lines were made, people in the region were experimenting with making massive geoglyphs.

“This means that it is a tradition of more than a thousand years that precedes the famous geoglyphs of the Nasca culture, which opens the door to new hypotheses about its function and meaning,” says the archaeologist of the Ministry of Culture Johny Isla, the lines from Nasca. chief restorer and protector.

Ironically, the discovery of the new geoglyphs was only possible due to threats to previously known Nasca lines.

In December 2014, the environmental group Greenpeace organized a protest a few meters from the famous “hummingbird” of Nasca, damaging the area. In the resulting furor, Peru received a grant from the US to help hire Isla and his restoration team.

Isla's job is extraordinarily difficult, and even more difficult because of the irregular maps. Of the estimated 100,000 archaeological sites in Peru, Isla's colleague Castillo says only about 5,000 have been properly documented on the ground. Even fewer have been mapped from the air.

Castillo, a professor at the Pontifical Catholic University of Peru and the country's former vice minister of cultural heritage, has long advocated the use of drones and other aerial mapping techniques to catalog archaeological sites. Now, Isla and Castillo have much more information to work with, thanks to National Geographic Explorer and “space archaeologist” Sarah Parcak.

After winning the 2016 TED Prize, Parcak founded the GlobalXplorer initiative, which trains citizen scientists to analyze satellite images of archaeological sites and signs of looting. The platform's first project invited volunteers to look at satellite photos of Peru.