Animals & Landscape

Beside the proliferation of straight lines and trapezoid shapes with which ancient Nazcans marked the desert surface of the Pampa, there are to be found the most magnificent drawings of animals – some recognisable, and others apparently mythological. Maria Reiche’s work continued that of Dr. Paul Kosok with regards to looking for any astronomical considerations the builders of these figures might have incorporated into the designs. She tells the story of the discovery of these animal figures in the introduction to her 1977 book, “Mystery on the Desert”, and of how the existence of the scheme left by the ancient Nazcans began to unfold in the 1930s.

As can be seen, both Dr. Paul Kosok in the 1930s and 1940s, and Maria Reiche from the mid-1940s onwards until her death on 1998, found unmistakable evidence that the seemigly haphazard arrangment of lines and figures that greet the first-time observer was nothing of the sort. The setting and rising positions of the sun at its extreme points during the cycle of the solar year was carefully marked by straight lines in the directions towards those points on the horizon.

And, most importantly for our understanding of the possible reasons for the building of these enigmatic geoglyphs, recognition of the astronomical considerations that were incorporated into the siting and design of the Nazca drawings is something that should not be lightly dismissed by an academia founded on what is increasingly being seen as an ‘erroneous’ view of prehisory.

While these drawings were obviously achievable in human terms, exactly how their construction was directed has puzzled everyone. The photograph above was taken from a tall step-ladder and shows the foot of one of several bird geoglyphs. It’s immense size become crystal clear when compared with the human figure in the background. Probably the geoglyph which most adequately shows the sheer size and complexity of the drawings on the Nazca Plain is that of the monkey, which is shown in full in the aerial photograph below.

This drawing of a monkey is so large it covers an area of many square miles. Many believe that these figures represent the constellations of the southern hemisphere as they were depicted by the ancient inhabitants of the pampa – the desert plain of eastern Peru. Certainly the ‘special study’ that Maria Reiche suggested in her 1977 book “Mystery on the Desert” is one that should be taken seriously by archæologists, especially now that she is no longer around to champion the cause for the preservation of this incredible scientific achievement by ancient Nazcans.

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