Peru's Enigmatic Nazca Lines

300 Fantastic Figures and Not an Alien or UFO in Sight

The largest and most mysterious collection of colossal figures and geometric shapes on earth, and only clearly visible from the air, the Nazca Lines of Peru continue to intrigue all who seek to explain their origins. Perhaps because of their monumental dimensions and the extraordinary, extra-terrestrial perspective this archeological group appears to have been intended for, there are no shortage of fantastic theories concerning why the lines were created.

These geoglyphs, or writings in the earth, were etched on a large plateau lying between the town of Nazca and Palpa on the southern Peruvian Pampa, an area some 15 miles wide and nearly 40 miles in length. How they were made is straightforward enough; this was done by scraping away the small iron-oxide coated stones which cover the reddish desert here at this high and arid altitude. There is in fact no sand in this desert, which is called the Pampa Colorada or Red Plain. Once the gravel was removed, these lighter colored furrows created the desired contrast with the surrounding red surface area.

Some of these lines are often several kilometers long have cut up the plateau into many sectors. Others were formed to make large geometric figures like spirals, concentric circles, triangles and wavy lines. Yet others were formed to create the shapes of animals and human figures, some up to 1000 feet across. Although similar large geoglyphs like this exist at other locations around the world (including Bolivia, Chile, Egypt, Malta and even in the United States), none of these pre-Hispanic period etchings are even as remotely as large or as impressive.

It is also clear that it took a long time to make the Nazca Lines. They were definitely communal work whose creation took many centuries and a large number of people to complete. And although we do know that the lines were created sometime between 200 BC and 600 AD, no one can say with any certainty exactly who built them or why. And that is of course the reason why so many theories abound today.