July 8, 2020

Hundreds of Newly Discovered Geoglyphs Older Than Nazca Being Discovered

Johny Isla, chief archaeologist for the Nazca and Palpa Lines for Peru’s ministry of culture, saw an image of a Nazca geoglyph in a German exhibit in 2014. He had never seen this glyph. It was of a killer whale deity, Using drones, he found the image 30 miles from Nazca. It depicts a mythological beast, part orca but with a human arm holding a trophy head and several more heads inside its body.

New drone research has now uncovered hundreds of such figures near Nazca which pre-date the Nazca lines by 1,500 years. They were created by the Paracas and Topará cultures between 500BC and AD200.

On one hillside, a warrior wearing a headdress and carrying a staff or spear stands close to a female figure. Between them is a mythological creature with a mass of tentacles or snakes. The figures are believed to symbolise fertility.

From the ground, the designs are now hard to see. But the drone’s eagle-eye reveals the full design on a monitor viewed by Castillo.

Photogrammetry is being utilized in the search. This is a highly detailed three-dimensional mapping of large areas. While the team have discovered hundreds of geoglyphs in Palpa, Castillo expects to find many more. “We’ve registered maybe just 5% of what there is,” he says.

The Guardian has the story here, with photos;
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2020/may/24/nazca-lines-drones-new-discoveries-peru

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