Ancient Peru Pyramid Spotted by Satellite
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Rossella Lorenzi, Discovery Channel, October 6, 2008
A new remote sensing technology has peeled away layers of mud and rock near Peru’s Cahuachi desert to reveal an ancient adobe pyramid, Italian researchers announced on Friday at a satellite imagery conference in Rome.
Nicola Masini and Rosa Lasaponara of Italy’s National Research Council (CNR) discovered the pyramid by analyzing images from the satellite Quickbird, which they used to penetrate the Peruvian soil.
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“We know that many buildings are still buried under Cahuachi’s sands, but until now, it was almost impossible to exactly locate them and detect their shape from an aerial view,” Masini told Discovery News. “The biggest problem was the very low contrast between adobe, which is sun-dried earth, and the background subsoil.”
Cahuachi is the best-known site of the Nazca civilization, which flourished in Peru between the first century B.C. and the fifth century A.D. and slid into oblivion by the time the Inca Empire rose to dominate the Andes.
Famous for carving in the Peruvian desert hundreds of geometric lines and images of animals and birds that are best viewed from the air, the Nazca people built Cahuachi as a ceremonial center, molding pyramids, temples and plazas from the desert itself.
There, priests led ceremonies including human sacrifices, drawing people from across the region.
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Featuring a 300-by-328-foot base, the newly discovered pyramid consists of at least “four degrading terraces which suggest a truncated pyramid similar to the Grand Pyramid.” With seven levels, this imposing monument was sculpted from the landscape and enhanced by large adobe walls.
“This is an interesting finding. As with the Grand Pyramid, it is likely that also this pyramid contains the remains of human sacrifices,” Andrea Drusini, an anthropologist at Padova University, told Discovery News.
In previous excavations at Cahuachi, Drusini found some 20 severed “offering heads” at various locations inside the Grand Pyramid.
“They have circular holes cut into the forehead and were perfectly prepared from an anatomical point of view,” Drusini said.
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(Posted on October 6, 2008)
Comments
What else does Peru have to entice tourists except their ancient buildings? After all, they have accomplished nothing since then…
Posted by at 5:29 PM on October 6
I am middle aged and been away from the college scene for a long time. Do they celebrate human sacrifice at colleges these days?
Or is homage paid to that element of diversity chalked up to professional scale college football programs?
Posted by Flamethrower at 6:37 PM on October 6
Based on the similarities between Egyptian and South American civilization and the fact that modern South Americans natives are very low IQ, I wonder if the people who built that civilization were a different race than what the natives are now, and they were overwhelmed by immigration, much like we will be soon.
Posted by at 7:07 PM on October 6
Hmm, interesting how many cultures built pyramids or mounds as religious edifices. Also human sacrifices seems to be another common theme, even for northern Europeans:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ancient/british_prehistory/human_sacrifice_01.shtml
Also mentioned in the OT Bible by Semitic peoples, here’s a particular barbaric form:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moloch
Posted by Frank at 8:16 PM on October 6
Luckily that culture was replaced by Europeans bringing a more humane culture.
Posted by at 7:25 AM on October 7
Peru is a place full of natural beauty and relics of an interesting past. The people there are very friendly, and it is well worth a trip there. That being said, Peru is where Peruvian culture belongs. Stay in Peru and build your country and make it prosper. Don’t come to the US just for an easy buck.
Posted by SG at 9:33 AM on October 7
The peaceful indians living in harmony with nature myth we get taught in public schools by the modern liberals who think Meztisos with admixtures of 64% European and 14% black mixed with some ameri-indian from somewhere (they can’t pinpoint where exactly) are native americans from tribes in the USA apparently.. lol. Would be laughable if it weren’t so tragic. They were cold blooded killers who practiced slavery and were locked in tribal war for centuries. They liked to kill and sometimes eat their enemies.
Posted by Unemployed WASP at 10:48 AM on October 7
Actually, the early Europeans only sacrificed liberals,
which kept the tribes stable and healthy. It was a public
health measure. Much to recommend it, I’d say.
Posted by at 11:59 AM on October 7
I wonder how many human sacrifices were committed by these genius pagan primatives? However lest we be too judgemental of them let us step back and take a look at America, where over 50,000,000 unborn innocents have been sacrificed at the alter of abortion.
Posted by THE OLD SAGE at 12:43 PM on October 7
Frank at 8:16 PM on October 6 wrote:
“Hmm, interesting how many cultures built pyramids or mounds as religious edifices. Also human sacrifices seems to be another common theme, even for northern Europeans”
Contrary to what is widely reported on tv by talking heads, pyramids are not that hard to build, even for a pre-industrial society (a fact most civil engineers will be more than happy to confirm).
Ancient peoples (from the Egyptians to the Maya) built pyramids for several reasons: from simple ego (look what we can do!) to bringing themselves closer to the gods (or so they believed). Keeping the peasantry busy with massive public works projects was another reason.
All the psychobabble aside, human sacrifice was simply the violent manifestations of primitive and superstitious minds. By the time of the so-called Axial Age (800-200 B.C.) it had begun to fall out of favor in civilized societies throughout Eurasia. It is mainly seen today among peoples who, due to cognitive limitations, never could quite catch up with the rest of us.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/4098172.stm
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,501020729-322673,00.html
Posted by at 8:56 PM on October 7
Peru has recently come under fire for its annual “Gastronomical Festival of the Cat,” in which purpose-bred cats are slaughtered and eaten. They’re believed to cure breathing ailments and act as (what else?) an aphrodisiac.
Posted by Flossie at 2:41 PM on October 9