Dr. Maria Reiche: Great Lady of Nazca

Nazca has the driest desert in the world; it only gets one hour of rain each year and that is more of a drizzle than a rain. The water the people use flows from the Andes Mountains and an underground water source that is down over 15 meters. The rainy season is only 6 weeks long in February and March. It has been dry for two years now.

The lines are shallow designs made in the ground by removing the reddish pebbles and uncovering the white ground underneath. Many are simple lines or geometric shapes; more than seventy are zoomorphic designs of animals such as birds, fish, llamas, jaguar, monkey, or human figures. Other designs include phytomorphic shapes such as trees and flowers, the largest figures are over 200 meters (660 ft) across. Scholars differ in interpreting the purpose of the designs, but in general they ascribe religious significance to them.

In 1939, Maria was teaching in Lima, the capital of Peru, and doing scientific translations. By then, Germany was already at war in Europe, so she did not want to go back to her home country. Then Maria heard from an American scientist in Lima about the mysterious Lines and Figures of Nazca, which he had recently seen from an airplane. She was intrigued enough to take a flight herself in a small plane over the Nazca desert. When she saw the figures from the airplane of the spider, the hummingbird and the monkey, she was so fascinated by them that she moved to Nazca to study the lines herself.

Maria made many flights, taking photographs of all the etchings on the desert floor. She was especially drawn to the image of the monkey, but when she enlarged the photos she had taken, she was amazed to see that one hand had only four fingers just like her. Due to an infection in Maria’s hand she too lost one of her fingers to gangrene. At that time, she had not even heard about the Lines of Nazca.

 

She asked people who knew the old Nazca stories what this might have meant. Finally, she learned that this was a mark of the God of Thunder, which gave significant power to communicate with the gods. Had Maria, herself, been marked to uncover the secrets meant only for the gods?

Maria Reiche (1903–1998) was a German mathematician, archaeologist, and technical translator who carried out research into the Nazca Lines in Peru, beginning in 1940, and had success in gaining recognition and preservation of the property. She helped educate people about the resource and gain government recognition and preservation. In 1995, the Nazca Lines were declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Maria Reiche - Astronomical Theory

Maria Reiche, the most famous Nazca-Researcher, prefer the astronomical theory. Lines should show in the direction of the rising of influential stars and planetary events like summer and winter solstices. Formations like the spider and the monkey could show star constellations like Orion and Ursa Mayor (Big Dipper).

The big problem of all astronomical theories is that age is unknown. The direction of stars change over the centuries because the phenomena of precession.

Maria Reiche has led a determined effort to discredit the von Daniken theory of extraterrestrials. The strategy of this attack has been to argue that the Nazca Indians constructed the lines relatively recently - sometime between 300 BC and 800 AD. In support of this possibility, some scientists have put forward ingenious ideas on how the geoglyphs could have theoretically been designed from the ground. The important evidence, however, that attempts to link the lines definitively to the Nazcan culture. Here, neither of the two key pieces of evidence survives scrutiny.

As it stands today the truth and origin of these lines is still unknown and may never be known.

Maria Reiche lived her last 25 years rent free at the Nazca Lines Hotel; where they also constructed the Maria Reiche Planetarium. They hold nightly shows in four different languages to explain Maria’s ties between the stars and the Nazca Lines.

Ancient Geoglyphs, Nazca Lines, Nazca, Peru

The Nazca Lines are a series of ancient geoglyphs located in the Nazca Desert, in southern Peru. They were designated as a UNESCO World


Heritage Site in 1994. The high, arid plateau stretches more than 80 kilometres (50 mi) between the towns of Nazca and Palpa on the Pampas de Jumana about 400 km south of Lima. Although some local geoglyphs resemble Paracas motifs, scholars believe the Nazca Lines were created by the Nazca culture between 800 BC and 800 AD. The hundreds of individual figures range in complexity from simple lines to stylized hummingbirds, spiders, monkeys, fish, sharks, orcas, and lizards. 

Whale

Astronaut

 

The lines are shallow designs made in the ground by removing the reddish pebbles and uncovering the whitish/grayish ground beneath. Hundreds are simple lines or geometric shapes; more than seventy are zoomorphic designs of animals such as birds, fish, llamas, jaguar, monkey, or human figures. Other designs include phytomorphic shapes such as trees and flowers. The largest figures are over 200 meters (660 ft) across. 

Monkey

 

Hummingbird

Scholars differ in interpreting the purpose of the designs, but in general they ascribe religious significance to them. Other theories have been summarized as follows: "The geometric ones could indicate the flow of water or be connected to rituals to summon water. The spiders, birds, and plants could be fertility symbols. Other possible explanations include: irrigation schemes or giant astronomical calendars."

Spider

Due to the dry, windless, and stable climate of the plateau and its isolation, for the most part the lines have been preserved. Extremely rare changes in weather may temporarily alter the general designs. As of recent years, the lines have been deteriorating due to an influx of squatters inhabiting the lands. Archeologists, ethnologists, and anthropologists have studied the ancient Nazca culture to try to determine the purpose of the lines and figures. One hypothesis is that the Nazca people created them to be seen by their gods in the sky. Kosok and Reiche advanced a purpose related to astronomy and cosmology: the lines were intended to act as a kind of observatory, to point to the places on the distant horizon where the sun and other celestial bodies rose or set in the solstices. 

Many prehistoric indigenous cultures in the Americas and elsewhere constructed earthworks that combined such astronomical sighting with their religious cosmology, as did the later Mississippian culture at Cahokia in present-day United States. Another example is Stonehenge in England. But Gerald Hawkins and Anthony Aveni, experts in archaeoastronomy, concluded in 1990 that there was insufficient evidence to support such an astronomical explanation. Reiche asserted that some or all of the figures represented constellations. By 1998, Phyllis B. Pitluga, a protégé of Reiche and senior astronomer at the Adler Planetarium in Chicago, had concluded that the animal figures were "representations of heavenly shapes. But she contends that they are not shapes of constellations but of what might be called counter constellations, the irregular-shaped dark patches within the twinkling expanse of the Milky Way." Aveni criticized her work for failing to account for all the details. 

Parrot

In 1985, the archaeologist Johan Reinhard published archaeological, ethnographic, and historical data demonstrating that worship of mountains and other water sources predominated in Nazca religion and economy from ancient to recent times. He theorized that the lines and figures were part of religious practices involving the worship of deities associated with the availability of water, which directly related to the success and productivity of crops. He interpreted the lines as sacred paths leading to places where these deities could be worshiped. The figures were symbols representing animals and objects meant to invoke the gods' aid in supplying water. The precise meanings of many of the individual geoglyphs remain unsolved as of 2013. 

Hands or Frog and Tree

Henri Stierlin, a Swiss art historian specializing in Egypt and the Middle East, published a book in 1983 linking the Nazca Lines to the production of ancient textiles that archeologists have found wrapping mummies of the Paracas culture. He contended that the people may have used the lines and trapezes as giant, primitive looms to fabricate the extremely long strings and wide pieces of textile that are typical of the area. By his theory, the figurative patterns (smaller and less common) were meant only for ritualistic purposes. This theory is not widely accepted, although scholars have noted similarities in patterns between the textiles and the Nazca Lines, which they take as sharing in a common culture. 

Phyllis Pitluga, senior astronomer at the Adler Planetarium & Astronomy Museum and a protégé of Reiche, did computer-aided studies of star alignments. She asserted that the giant spider figure is an anamorphic diagram of the constellation Orion.

This information was gathered from Wikipedia, while I was in Nazca, Peru.

Rio Amazonas (Amazon River)

Woolley Monkeys

On this one day tour, which was organized, by the Golondrinas Tourist Hostel in Iquitos, with two people it cost 90 soles – a boat rented for the day. The first stop was at the Paraiso Del Amazonas where we were greeted by a family of Woolley monkeys and the young family that lives there. We got to see macaws,  sloths, prehistoric turtle, toucans, and several anacondas.

Macaw

 

3 Toed Sloth

Baby 3 Toed Sloth

The buildings built several meters above ground because of the regular high water mark during the rainy season. The last significant rain was in 2012.  

Anaconda

 

Anaconda

 

Prehistoric Turtle

Panoramic view of the Amazon

 

The Climb Up and Down

The 2^nd stop where the El Mirador a tower that overlooks where the three rivers come together to form the Amazon River; that flows from the Andes Mountains into the Atlantic Ocean. 

 

Largest Tree

Girl and baby 2 toed Sloth

 

After climbing the tower and enjoying the view, we walked the see the largest tree of its kind, and it is only 300 years old. We did see the smallest monkeys as they scurried through the trees – no I was not able to get photographs this time. The walk back gave us an opportunity to see a two toed sloth, held by a young girl. Drinks, food, and souvenirs were available for sale. 

Largest Fish in the Amazon

The next and last stop was to the Puerto Fundo Pedrito; where we were to see large lily pads, Paraná’s, largest fish in the Amazon River, alligators, and a macaw.  

 

Parana

 

The largest fish have exceptionally big mouths and will put their young in their mouth for protection from predators. Parana’s will eat each other if they feel other food in not available. I am sure glad that I did not want to go swimming in this water. These alligators have two eyelids, one that is to protect their eyes from the Amazon River water. These large lily pads are more than a meter across and are mightily impressive.