Peru's Nasca Lines Point To Water Sources, Suggest UMass Researchers

Source: University Of Massachusetts, Amherst
Date: December 1, 2000
Published by Science Daily

AMHERST, Mass. - The ancient "Nasca lines" created on the desert floor by native peoples in Peru thousands of years ago may not just be works of art, according to a team of scientists from the University of Massachusetts. The team, which includes hydrogeologist Stephen B. Mabee and archeologist Donald Proulx, suggests that some of the mysterious lines may in fact mark underground sources of water. The research project is detailed in the December issue of Discover magazine. The team also includes independent scholar David Johnson, an adjunct research associate in the department of anthropology at UMass, and geosciences graduate students Jenna Levin and Gregory Smith.

The lines were constructed in the desert in southwestern Peru about 1,500-2,000 years ago by the Nasca culture, prior to the invasion of the Incas. The lines, which are etched into the surface of the desert by removing surface pebbles to reveal the lighter sand beneath, depict birds and mammals, including a hummingbird, a monkey, and a man, as well as zigzags, spirals, triangles, and other geometric figures. Called "geoglyphs," the elaborate figures are located about 250 miles south of Lima, and measure up to 1.2 miles in length. Their meaning has been the object of centuries of speculation. Some experts have hypothesized that the figures had ceremonial or religious functions, or served as astronomical calendars. But a slate of scientific tests has led the UMass team to theorize that at least some of the geometric shapes mark underground water.

"Ancient inhabitants may have marked the location of their groundwater supply distribution system with geoglyphs because the springs and seeps associated with the faults provided a more reliable and, in some instances, a better-quality water source than the rivers. We're testing this scientifically," said Mabee. "The spatial coincidence between the geoglyphs and groundwater associated with underground faults in the bedrock offers an intriguing alternative to explain the function of some of the geoglyphs."

Proulx, who has studied the region for decades, notes that the symbols on the biomorphs (figures of animals, plants, and humans) and on Nasca pottery are almost identical. "There are representations of natural forces," he says, "Not deities in the Western sense, but powerful forces of sky and earth and water, whom they needed to propitiate for water and a good harvest."

The team has studied the drawings and taken water samples during three separate journeys to Peru, over the past five years. The research has been funded by a University of Massachusetts Healy grant, the National Geographic Society, and the H. John Heinz Charitable Trust.

"So far, the tests indicate that the underground faults provide a source of reliable water to local inhabitants. The water, in comparison with available river water, is better-quality in terms of pH levels, magnesium, calcium, chloride and sulfate concentrations," Mabee said.

Proulx carried out an archaeological survey of more than 128 sites in the drainage area, in conjunction with the geological research. His discoveries provided data for another piece of the puzzle many archaeological sites were constructed near water-bearing faults and used this important secondary source of water.

The team was able to map the water's sources, and found that in at least five cases, the wells and aquifers corresponded with geoglyphs and archaeological sites. "They always seem to go together," said Mabee.

Note: This story has been adapted from a news release issued by University Of Massachusetts, Amherst.

New Archaeological Evidence Illuminates Inca Sun-Worship Ritual

Source: University Of Illinois At Chicago
Date: September 30, 1998
Published by Science Daily

Science Daily — University of Illinois at Chicago archaeologist Brian Bauer and colleagues have unearthed artifacts from sites in South America that shed light on how the Inca organized their sun-worship rituals and how they physically kept track of the sun's movements.

According to Bauer, "many scholars of Latin American antiquity believe that the Inca built large stone pillars to record the sun's horizon location at the June and December solstices, but archaeologists had not found physical evidence of the pillars and there had been no detailed investigation into the organization of the solstice rituals" -- until now.

During a survey of pre-Hispanic sites on the Island of the Sun, in Lake Titicaca, Bauer and colleagues David Dearborn of Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and graduate student Matthew Seddon of the University of Chicago discovered the remains of two stone pillars. They also found a large platform area just outside the walls of a sanctuary on the island.

Archaeological and astronomical research, which the team presents in the Sept. 24 issue of Latin American Antiquity, suggests the Inca used the site to support the elites' claim to power through elaborate solar rituals, perhaps using two-tiered worship.

In the early 15th century the Inca empire -- the largest state to develop in the Americas -- expanded into the Lake Titicaca region in modern-day Peru and Bolivia and usurped the Island of the Sun from local control. The island and a sacred rock, which locals believed was the birthplace of the sun, had been the focus of worship for centuries, said Bauer. Under the Inca it became one of the most important pilgrimage centers in South America.

"The Inca nobility, as well as members of the general populace, journeyed to the island to worship and make offerings in a sanctuary plaza next to the sacred rock," said Bauer.

The team's research indicates that, on the June solstice, the Inca king and high priests of the empire assembled in a small plaza beside the sacred rock to witness the dramatic setting of the sun between the stone pillars. Their findings also indicate that, as the elites paid homage to the sun from within the sanctuary, lower-class pilgrims observed the event from a second platform outside the sanctuary wall. From the perspective of the lower-class pilgrims, the sun set between the stone pillars and directly over the ruling elite, who called themselves the children of the sun.

"We're proposing that the platform outside the sanctuary walls represents a segregation of the elite and non-elite classes of sun worship," said Bauer. "This adds a new dimension to the practice of the solar cult that was not distinctly recorded in accounts of similar state rituals in the imperial capital, Cusco.

"While both groups participated in solar worship, the non-elites simultaneously offered respect to the sun and the children of that deity. This physical segregation emphasized that the Inca alone had direct access to the powers of the sun," he said.

The researchers illustrate the layout of the Inca structures in a map. The two stone pillars were erected on a natural ridge 600 meters to the northwest of the sacred rock. The plaza adjacent to the sacred rock was rectangular in shape, roughly 80 meters long and 35 meters wide, with the long axis pointing in the direction of the June solstice sunset. A sanctuary wall to the south and east blocked access to the site, which could only be reached through a gate. The secondary plaza, accessible to all pilgrims, was just outside the sanctuary wall and about 250 meters southeast of the sacred rock plaza.

Bauer said the remnants of stone pillars are similar to pillars around Cusco, which were described by several Spanish chroniclers of the 16th century. Those pillars were large enough to be seen against the setting sun at a distance of 15 kilometers. One such set of pillars marked where the sun sets at the June solstice, which is the northernmost point at which the sun crosses the! horizon. Unfortunately, said Bauer, a combination of post-conquest looting and recent urban growth in the Cusco valley has destroyed the area where the Cusco pillars once stood.

Bauer and Dearborn's research on the Island of the Sun is a continuation of their long-standing joint research on Inca astronomy. They are the authors of Astronomy and Empire in the Ancient Andes (University of Texas Press), which examines the origins and organization of Inca astronomy in Cusco.

"The findings from the Island of the Sun is the first discovery and documentation of similar pillars outside the imperial capital of the Inca," said Bauer.

Note: This story has been adapted from a news release issued by University Of Illinois At Chicago

Ancient Peruvian metallurgy studied

Published by Science Daily

EDMONTON, Alberta, April 19 (UPI) -- A Canadian-led study has reported the first scientific evidence that ancient Peruvian civilizations in the central Andes Mountains smelted metals.

The study by the University of Alberta's Colin Cooke and colleagues also determined that a tax imposed on local people by ancient Inca rulers might have forced a switch from production of copper to silver.

The researchers said prior evidence of metal smelting was limited mainly to the existence of metal artifacts dating to about 1,000 A.D. and the Wari Empire that preceded the Incas. The new evidence emerged from a study of metallurgical air pollutants released from ancient furnaces during the smelting process and deposited in lake sediments.

By analyzing metals in the sediments, the researchers recreated a 1,000-year history of metal smelting in the area, predating Francisco Pizarro and his Spanish conquistadors by 600 years.

The findings suggest smelters in the Morococha region of Peru switched from producing copper to silver about the time Inca rulers imposed a tax, payable in silver, on local populations.

The study is scheduled for the May 15 issue of the American Chemical Society's semi-monthly journal Environmental Science & Technology.

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