Tuesday, July 15, 2008
Sunday, May 18, 2008
Bermuda Triangle
Bermuda Triangle
Introduction:==
The Bermuda Triangle (also known as Devil's Triangle and Devil's Sea) is a nearly half-million square-mile (1.2 million km2) area of ocean roughly defined by Bermuda, Puerto Rico, and the southernmost tip of Florida. This area is noted for
a high incidence of unexplained losses of ships, small boats, and aircraft..
The Bermuda Triangle has become popular through representation by the mass media, in which it is a paranormal site in which the known laws of physics are either violated, altered, or both.
While there is a common belief that a number of ships and airplanes have disappeared under highly unusual circumstances in this region, the United States Coast Guard and others disagree with that assessment, citing statistics demonstrating that the number of incidents involving lost ships and aircraft is no larger than that of any other heavily traveled region of the world
There is a common belief that a number of ships and airplanes have disappeared under highly unusual circumstances in the region called
Bermuda Triangle. Over 100 airplane disappearances and over
1000 lives lost since 1945
Many of the alleged mysteries have proven not so mysterious or unusual upon close examination, with inaccuracies and misinformation about the cases often circulating and recirculating over the decades.
The triangle is an arbitrary shape, crudely marking out a corridor of the Atlantic, stretching northward from the West Indies, along the North American seaboard, as far as the Carolinas. In the Age of Sail, ships returning to Europe from parts south would sail north to the Carolinas, then turn east for Europe, taking advantage of the prevailing wind direction across the North Atlantic. Even with the development of steam and internal-combustion engines, a great deal more shipping traffic was (and still is) found nearer the US coastline than towards the empty centre of the Atlantic. The Triangle also loosely conforms with the course of the Gulf Stream as it leaves the West Indies, and has always been an area of volatile weather. The combination of distinctly heavy maritime traffic and tempestuous weather meant that a certain, also distinctly large, number of vessels would flounder in storms.
Given the historical limitations of communications technology, most of those ships that sank without survivors would disappear without a trace. The advent of wireless communications, radar, and satellite navigation meant that the unexplained disappearances largely ceased at some point in the 20th Century. The occasional vessel still sinks, but rarely without a trace. It should be noted that both the concept and the name of the Bermuda Triangle date only to the 1960s, and were the products of an American journalist.
Other areas often purported to possess unusual characteristics are the Devil's Sea, located near Japan, and the Marysburgh Vortex or the Great Lakes Triangle, located in eastern Lake Ontario.
Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bermuda_Triangle
Bermuda (or "Devil's") Triangle
The Bermuda Triangle (a.k.a. the Devil's Triangle) is a triangular area in the Atlantic Ocean bounded roughly at its points by Miami, Bermuda, and Puerto Rico. Legend has it that many people, ships and planes have mysteriously vanished in this area. How many have mysteriously disappeared depends on who is doing the locating and the counting. The size of the triangle varies from 500,000 square miles to three times that size, depending on the imagination of the author. (Some include the Azores, the Gulf of Mexico, and the West Indies in the "triangle.") Some trace the mystery back to the time of Columbus. Even so, estimates range from about 200 to no more than 1,000 incidents in the past 500 years. Howard Rosenberg claims that in 1973 the U.S. Coast Guard answered more than 8,000 distress calls in the area and that more than 50 ships and 20 planes have gone down in the Bermuda Triangle within the last century.
Many theories have been given to explain the extraordinary mystery of these missing ships and planes. Evil extraterrestrials, residue crystals from Atlantis, evil humans with anti-gravity devices or other weird technologies, and vile vortices from the fourth dimension are favorites among fantasy writers. Strange magnetic fields and oceanic flatulence (methane gas from the bottom of the ocean) are favorites among the technically-minded. Weather (thunderstorms, hurricanes, tsunamis, earthquakes, high waves, currents, etc.) bad luck, pirates, explosive cargoes, incompetent navigators, and other natural and human causes are favorites among skeptical investigators.
There are some skeptics who argue that the facts do not support the legend, that there is no mystery to be solved, and nothing that needs explaining.The number of wrecks in this area is not extraordinary, given its size, location and the amount of traffic it receives. Many of the ships and planes that have been identified as having disappeared mysteriously in the Bermuda Triangle were not in the Bermuda Triangle at all. Investigations to date have not produced scientific evidence of any unusual phenomena involved in the disappearances. Thus, any explanation, including so-called scientific ones in terms of methane gas being released from the ocean floor, magnetic disturbances, etc., are not needed. The real mystery is how the Bermuda Triangle became a mystery at all.
The modern legend of the Bermuda Triangle began soon after five Navy planes [Flight 19] vanished on a training mission during a severe storm in 1945. The most logical theory as to why they vanished is that lead pilot Lt. Charles Taylor’s compass failed. The trainees' planes were not equipped with working navigational instruments. The group was disoriented and simply, though tragically, ran out of fuel. No mysterious forces were likely to have been involved other than the mysterious force of gravity on planes with no fuel. It is true that one of the rescue planes blew up shortly after take-off, but this was likely due to a faulty gas tank rather than to any mysterious forces.
Over the years there have been dozens of articles, books, and television programs promoting the mystery of the Bermuda Triangle. In his study of this material, Larry Kushe found that few did any investigation into the mystery. Rather, they passed on the speculations of their predecessors as if they were passing on the mantle of truth. Of the many uncritical accounts of the mystery of the Bermuda Triangle, perhaps no one has done more to create this myth than Charles Berlitz, who had a bestseller on the subject in 1974. After examining the 400+ page official report of the Navy Board of Investigation of the disappearance of the Navy planes in 1945, Kushe found that the Board wasn't baffled at all by the incident and did not mention alleged radio transmissions cited by Berlitz in his book. According to Kushe, what isn't misinterpreted by Berlitz is fabricated. Kushe writes: "If Berlitz were to report that a boat were red, the chance of it being some other color is almost a certainty." (Berlitz, by the way, did not invent the name; that was done by Vincent Gaddis in "The Deadly Bermuda Triangle," which appeared in the February, 1964, issue of Argosy, a magazine devoted to fiction.)
In short, the mystery of the Bermuda Triangle became a mystery by a kind of communal reinforcement among uncritical authors and a willing mass media to uncritically pass on the speculation that something mysterious is going on in the Atlantic.
Band of Holes near
Introduction
Band of Holes, Pisco Valley, Peru
Thousands of man-sized holes are carved into the barren rock near Pisco Valley, Peru on a plain called Cajamarquilla.
Location 13°42'57.67" S, 75°52' 31.50"WGoogle Earth Bookmark >> 13 42'57.67"S, 75 52'31.50"W Length: approximately 1,450mWidth: approximately 20mNumber of holes estimate: 6,900
These strange holes, stretching for a mile over uneven mountain terrain, were here for so long that the local people have no idea who made them, or why. Funny thing is no one really saw the big picture until the area was seen from the air.
Thousands of man-sized holes are carved into the barren rock near Pisco Valley, Peru on a plain called Cajamarquilla.
Click on the image to enlarge.
Satellite photo of the Pisco Valley with marked location of
the "Band of Holes" . Click on the image to enlarge.
Archeologists have speculated they were dug to store grain in. Two problems with this, say the folks thinking out of the box: there were a lot easier ways to create storage containers than the hard work and decades it must have taken to chip out all of these, and it would have made more sense, if these were to store grain, to build several huge chambers.
Ok, said the archeologists. Perhaps they were used as one-person tombs? Vertical graves of some sort? But no bones, artifacts, scraps, inscriptions, jewelry...not even a tooth or strand of hair has been found in them. They have no covers to seal them as you might a tomb and no sacred history or even myth was passed down to label them as such.
Some sections have holes in rigid and perfect precision; some run in rows that curve up in arches, some staggered lines. They vary in depth to about 6-7 feet deep yet some are merely shallow indents as if not completed - though surrounded by those that are.
To date, no one has a clue why they're here, who made them or what they were.
Satellite photo of the "Band of Holes" near Pisco Valley.
Note: The location of the band of holes is highlighted brown.
Click on the image to enlarge
Even von Daniken's work begins to take on a realness when one finds an old National Geographic from 1933 corroborating the "Band of Holes," that he personally inspected a few years ago. Each hole is a meter wide and just as deep. There are eight holes spanning 24 meters in width, marching in repetitive uniform fashion, from the Pisco Valley rolling over a mile through mountain terrain -- finally disappearing in the misty mass of Peru. These holes remind this old West Texas boy of the traces left by a massive drilling rig moving along methodically, testing the geology of the Andes for precious metals. Lasers have also left such tracings in the ground. Archaeologists say they represented defensive positions or graves for the ancient ones, except why would you bury anyone on a slope in rocky soil at more than a 45-degree angle?
If you look at the most northern part of the band, you will notice that it ends within unnaturally darkened area (it almost looks like a remnants of an explosion)... see the photo below
Strangely dark area where the "band of holes" ends.
Click to enlarge
Few miles east from the band, satellite photo shows structures that look like a remnants of an ancient settlement (these formations do not look natural and there is nothing similar in the entire area): 13 42'36.80" S, 75 51'4.07" W
Remnants of an ancient city?
Click on the image to enlarge
For the reference here is satellite photo of Machu Picchu
Ruins of Machu Picchu, Peru (click to enlarge).
---------------------------------------- by sree--------------------
Wednesday, April 16, 2008
Wednesday, January 9, 2008
Tuesday, January 8, 2008
Friday, January 4, 2008
Mystic Placesn part 13
Easter Island:
Photo © by Martin Gray
The Moai statues of Rapa Nui.
In the early 1950s, the Norwegian explorer Thor Heyerdahl (famous for his Kon-Tiki and Ra raft voyages across the oceans) popularized the idea that the island had been originally settled by advanced societies of Indians from the coast of South America. Extensive archaeological, ethnographic, and linguistic research has conclusively shown this hypothesis to be inaccurate. It is now recognized that the original inhabitants of Easter Island are of Polynesian stock (DNA extracts from skeletons have recently confirmed this), that they most probably came from the Marquesas or Society islands, and that they had arrived as early as 318 AD (carbon dating of reeds from a grave confirms this). At the time of their arrival, the island was entirely covered with thick forests, was teeming with land birds, and was the richest breeding site for seabirds in the Polynesia region. Within a matter of centuries this profusion of wildlife was destroyed by the islanders' way of life. The reasons are today eminently clear.
It is estimated that the original colonists, who may have been lost at sea, arrived in only a few canoes and numbered fewer than 100. Because of the plentiful bird, fish and plant food sources, the population grew rapidly and gave rise to a rich religious and artistic culture. However, the resource needs of the growing population inevitably outpaced the island's capacity to renew itself ecologically and the ensuing environmental degradation triggered a social and cultural collapse. Pollen records show that the destruction of the forests was well under way by the year 800, just a few centuries after the start of the first settlement. These forest trees were extremely important to the islanders, being used for fuel, for the construction of houses and ocean-fishing canoes, and as rollers for transporting the great stone statues. By the 1400s the forests had been entirely cut, the rich ground cover had eroded away, the springs had dried up, and the vast flocks of birds coming to roost on the island had long since disappeared. With no logs to build canoes for offshore fishing, with depleted bird and wildlife food sources, and with declining crop yields because of the erosion of good soil, the nutritional intake of the people plummeted. First famine, then cannibalism, set in. Because the island could no longer feed the chiefs, bureaucrats and priests who kept the complex society running, chaos resulted, and by 1700 the population dropped to between one-quarter and one-tenth of its former number. During the mid 1700s rival clans began to topple each other's stone statues. By 1864 the last of the statues was thrown down and desecrated
Photo © by Martin Gray
The Moai statues, Easter Island
The barren lands and social strife that Admiral Roggeveen reported during his visit in 1722 make it difficult to imagine the extraordinary culture that had flowered on the island during the previous 1400 years. That culture's most famous features are its enormous stone statues called moai, at least 288 of which once stood upon massive stone platforms called ahu. There are some 250 of these ahu platforms spaced approximately one half mile apart and creating an almost unbroken line around the perimeter of the island. Another 600 moai statues, in various stages of completion, are scattered around the island, either in quarries or along ancient roads between the quarries and the coastal areas where the statues were most often erected. Nearly all the moai are carved from the tough stone of the Rano Raraku volcano. The average statue is 14 feet, 6 inches tall and weighs 14 tons. Some moai were as large as 33 feet and weighed more than 80 tons (one statue only partially quarried from the bedrock was 65 feet long and would have weighed an estimated 270 tons).
Photos © by Martin Gray
The Moai statues, Easter Island
The moai and ahu were in use as early as AD 700, but the great majority were carved and erected between AD 1000 and 1650. Depending upon the size of the statue, between 50 and 150 people were needed to drag it across the countryside on sleds and rollers made from the island's trees. While many of the statues were toppled during the clan wars of the 1600 and 1700s, other statues fell over and cracked while being transported across the island. Recent research has shown that certain statue sites, particularly the most important ones with great ahu platforms, were periodically ritually dismantled and reassembled with ever-larger statues. A small number of the moai were once capped with ‘crowns’ or ‘hats’ of red volcanic stone. The meaning and purpose of these capstones is not known, but archaeologists have suggested that the moai thus marked were of pan-island ritual significance or perhaps sacred to a particular clan.
Scholars are unable to definitively explain the function and use of the moai statues. It is assumed that their carving and erection derived from an idea rooted in similar practices found elsewhere in Polynesia but which evolved in a unique way on Easter Island. Archaeological and iconographic analysis indicates that the statue cult was based on an ideology of male, lineage-based authority incorporating anthropomorphic symbolism. The statues were thus symbols of authority and power, both religious and political. But they were not only symbols. To the people who erected and used them, they were actual repositories of sacred spirit. Carved stone and wooden objects in ancient Polynesian religions, when properly fashioned and ritually prepared, were believed to be charged by a magical spiritual essence called mana. The ahu platforms of Easter Island were the sanctuaries of the people of Rapa Nui, and the moai statues were the ritually charged sacred objects of those sanctuaries. While the statues have been toppled and re-erected over the centuries, the mana or spiritual presence of Rapa Nui is still strongly present at the ahu sites and atop the sacred volcanoes.
Mystery surrounds the purpose of the ahu platforms and moai statues but even more perplexing mysteries have begun to surface from the research of scholars outside the boundaries of conventional archaeology. As previously mentioned, orthodox archaeologists believe that Easter Island was initially settled sometime around 318 AD by a small group of Polynesians lost on the open sea. Other scholars, however, have suggested that the tiny island may have once been part of far larger island and that the original discovery and use of the site may be many thousands of years earlier in time (it is known, for example, that Melanesians were journeying around the Pacific in boats as early as 5500 BC). Three researchers in particular, Graham Hancock, Colin Wilson and Rand Flem-Ath, believe that Easter Island was an important node in a global grid of sacred geography that predates the great floods of archaic times. Easter Island, writes Graham Hancock, is “part of a massive subterranean escarpment called the East Pacific Rise, which reaches almost to the surface at several points. Twelve thousand years ago, when the great ice caps of the last glaciation were still largely unmelted, and sea-level was 100 meters lower than it is today, the Rise would have formed a chain of steep and narrow antediluvian islands, as long as the Andes mountain range.” At that time, the land we now call Easter Island would simply have been the highest peak of a much larger island. The fascinating question posed by Hancock, Wilson and Flem-Ath is whether this much larger island had been discovered and settled before the melting of the ice caps.
Besides its more well known name of Rapa Nui, Easter Island is also known as Te-Pito-O-Te-Henua, meaning ‘The Navel of the World’, and as Mata-Ki-Te-Rani, meaning ‘Eyes Looking at Heaven’. These ancient names and a host of mythological details ignored by mainstream archaeologists point to the possibility that the remote island may once have been both a geodetic marker and the site of an astronomical observatory of a long forgotten civilization. Speculations about this shadowy antediluvian culture include the notion that its mariners had charted the world’s oceans, that its astronomers had sophisticated knowledge of long-term astronomical cycles such as precession and cometary orbits, and that its historians had records of previous global cataclysms and the destruction they caused of even more ancient civilizations. In his book, Heaven’s Mirror, Hancock suggests that Easter Island may once have been a significant scientific outpost of this antediluvian civilization and that its location had extreme importance in a planet-spanning, mathematically precise grid of sacred sites. He writes, “The very existence of such an ancient world grid has been staunchly resisted by mainstream archaeologists and historians – as, of course, have all attempts to relate known sites to it. Nevertheless, the definite traces of lost astronomical knowledge that are to be seen on Easter Island, and the recurrent echoes of ancient Egyptian spiritual and cosmological themes, cast doubt on the scholarly explanation that the odd name ‘Navel of the World’ was adopted for purely ‘poetic and descriptive’ reasons. We suspect that Te-Pito-O-Te-Henua may originally have been selected for settlement, and given its name, entirely because of its geodetic location.” “What we are suggesting therefore is that Easter Island might have originally have been settled in order to serve as a sort of geodetic beacon, or marker – fulfilling some as yet unguessed at function in an ancient global system of sky-ground co-ordinates that linked many so-called ‘world navels’”.
Two other alternative scholars, Christopher Knight and Robert Lomas, have extensively studied the location and possible function of these geodetic markers. In their fascinating book, Uriel’s Machine, they suggest that one purpose of the geodetic markers was as part of global network of sophisticated astronomical observatories dedicated to predicting and preparing for future meteoric impacts and crustal displacement cataclysms. The great floods of archaic myths did not result only from the melting of the ice caps between 13,000 and 8000 BC but also from two great cataclysms that occurred during and after the melting of the ice caps. These cataclysms, a planet wide crustal displacement in 9600 BC and the seven cometary impacts of 7640 BC resulted in the massive waves (3-5 miles high, traveling at over 400 miles per hour for distances of more than 2000 miles), volcanic activity and other earth changes recorded in myths all across the planet. Prior to the melting of the ice caps and these cataclysmic events, however, a great maritime civilization may have existed, with its cities along coastlines now submerged beneath the seas.
©1983-2005 Martin Gray, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Reprinted with permission.
The Article Source: http://www.sacredsites.com/americas/chile/easter_island.html
PLACES OF PEACE AND POWER - The Sacred Site Pilgrimage of Martin Gray
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Other Articles by Martin Gray
Anthropologist and photographer Martin Gray specializes in the study of sacred sites and power places around the world, having visited more than 1000 of these magical sites in 80 countries. Each year he also guides group pilgrimages to different countries and this year is offering magical journeys to Peru/Bolivia in June and Greece in October.
Connection between Easter Island and Peru?
"The detail shot shows the incredible precision in the stone fittings. It was this precision, so similar to the stonework done by the Incas, that gave Thor Heyerdahl the idea that the Easter Islanders had come from South America in reed boats on the prevailing currents. Stonework of this complexity had not been seen in Polynesia, but it was common in Peru. It's impossible to look at that site and not think of the exact type of stone fitting which is so common in sites like Machu Picchu."
Source: http://www.mysteriousplaces.com/Easter_Island/html/tour3.html
Vinapu: "The sea wall of Ahu Vinapu I at Vinapu,
which has been likened to Inca masonry". Taken in 1995.
Copyright © Clive Ruggles, University of Leicester
Image Source: http://www.asahi-net.or.jp/~yf5f-wtnb/ Click to enlarge
Stone wall at Ahu Vinapu, Easter Island
Left: Stone wall (detail) at Ahu Vinapu, Easter Island; Right: Inca Wall, Peru
Source: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/easter/civilization/first.html
There are curious connections between the Andes and Easter Island. For as long as we know, Easter Island has had the potato and the totora reed, both of Andean origin. In the oldest legends, Easter Island was called "The Navel of the World." Cuzco was called the same.
Read more >>
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Map of Easter Island
Image Source: Map of Easter Island
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Moai Statues Statistics
The following statistics on Easter Island's moai are the results of Van Tilburg's survey in 1989.
She reported, "A total of 887 monolithic statues has been located by the survey to date on Easter Island...397 are still in situ in quarries at the Rano Raraku central production center.....Fully 288 statues (32% of 887) were successfully transported to a variety of image ahu locations....Another 92 are recorded as "in transport," 47 of these lying in various positions on prepared roads or tracks outside the Rano Raraku zone."
Number of Moai
Total number of moai on Easter Island: 887
Total number of maoi that were successfully transported to their final ahu locations: 288 (32% of 887)
Total number of moai still in the Rano Raraku quarry: 397 (45%)
Total number of moai lying 'in transit' outside of the Rano Raraku quarry: 92 (10%)
Less than one third of all carved moai actually made it to a final ceremonial ahu site. Was this due to the inherent difficulties in transporting them? Were the ones that remain in the quarry (45%) deemed culturally unworthy of transport? Were they originally intended to remain in place on the quarry slopes? Or had the islanders run out of the resources necessary to complete the Herculean task of carving and moving the moai?
Size and weight of Moai
Measuring the size, weight, and shape of the 887 moai on Easter Island has been a 15-year process for Van Tilburg. The most notable statues are listed below:
Largest moai:
Location: Rano Raraku Quarry, named "El Gigante"
Height: 71.93 feet, (21.60 meters)
Weight: approximately 145-165 tons (160-182 metric tons)
Largest moai once erect:
Location: Ahu Te Pito Kura, Named "Paro"
Height: 32.63 feet (9.80 meters)
Weight: approximately 82 tons (74.39 metric tons)
Largest moai fallen while being erected:
Location: Ahu Hanga Te Tenga
Height: 33.10 feet (9.94 meters)
Smallest standing moai:
Location: Poike
Height: 3.76 feet (1.13 meters)
Van Tilburg's painstaking effort to inventory and carefully measure the nearly 900 moai statues on Easter Island has enabled her to construct a digital version of an average moai. This digital statue has informed her hypothesis for a potential transport method for moving the moai; the statue which Van Tilburg's team will attempt to move and erect for the NOVA program has been made to the exact dimensions of this digital moai. The dimensions are as follows:
Statistically average moai:
Height: 13.29 feet (4.05 meters)
Width at Base: 5.25 feet (1.6 meters)
Width at Head: 4.86 feet (1.48 meters)
Depth through body at midpoint: 3.02 feet (92 cm.)
Total volume: 210.48 cubic feet (5.96 cubic meters)
Center of gravity: 4.46 feet (1.36 meters)
Total weight: 13.78 tons (12.5 metric tons)
Source: http://www.pacificislandtravel.com/easter_island/introduction.asp
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Moai Transport Theories
ROCK IT, standing up, side-to-side. Or, maybe try to ROLL IT, lying down, on round palm poles, or perhaps DRAG IT on its back. Among the many secrets buried in Easter Island prehistory is the question of how the Rapanui people transported the multi-ton statues, or moai, from their quarries to their final ceremonial ahu sites around the island. In many cases, the optimum route of transport would have meant that the teams of statue-movers, and the statues themselves, had to traverse several miles over very rough and hilly terrain. What would have been the best way to move Easter Island's stone giants, which weighed, on average, some 14 tons? The transport question has long been debated, and has been the subject of some experimentation by a growing arena of theorists. All have tried to approach the question as the early Rapa Nui people did, with the use of only stone, wood, rope, and human power. The following is a brief summary of those attempts.
Like most oral traditions, Rapa Nui folklore has been passed down through the generations, and it is unknown whether the stories are based on historical fact. Most center on the mystical idea that the massive megaliths were moved using "mana," or divine power. Those who possessed mana were able to command the moai to walk to their designated places. Accounts of who actually possessed mana differ greatly. In 1919, Katherine Routledge, a British archaeologist who lived on Easter Island for a year, recorded in her journal: "There was a certain old woman who lived at the southern corner of the mountain and filled the position of cook to the image-makers. She was the most important person of the establishment, and moved the images by supernatural powers (mana), ordering them about at her will." Earlier accounts recorded by visitors to the island indicate that statues were ordered to walk by the mythical King Tuu Ku Ihu and the god Make Make. Even specialized priests were known to move moai at the request of those who wanted them on their family land or ahu.
READ MORE >>
Source: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/easter/move/past.html
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Easter Island Photos
Image Source: http://www.asahi-net.or.jp/~yf5f-wtnb/
The Moai statues, Easter Island
Image Source: http://www.asahi-net.or.jp/~yf5f-wtnb/
Unfinished Statue sree
Mystic Places part 12
Machu Picchu © 2003-2004 by Richard Nisbet
Machu Picchu © 2003-2004 by Richard Nisbet
It is now generally thought that at the time of the conquest, knowledge of Machu Picchu had been lost by the Incas themselves. This hasn't stopped modern historians from somehow attributing its construction to Pachacutec, the 9th Inca who reigned in the mid 15th century, and gets credit for much of the achievements of that civilization.
Machu Picchu © 2003-2004 by Richard Nisbet
Hiram Bingham was told of a plant whose juices softened rock so that the surfaces would join perfectly. There are reports of such a plant, including this one by one of the early Spanish Chroniclers: While encamped by a rocky river, he watched a bird with a leaf in its beak light on a rock, lay down the leaf and peck at it. The next day the bird returned. By then there was a concavity where the leaf had been. By this method the bird created a drinking cup to catch the splashing waters of the river. Considering the fact that lichen softens stone to attach its roots, and considering the ongoing extinction of plant species, perhaps this isn't really such a far-fetched notion.
Eric Von Daniken, in his series of books beginning with Chariots of the Gods theorized that the Andean stoneworks were built by Alien/Gods who visited the earth long ago, bringing civilization to primative man. The scientific community simply snickered.
Whatever one thinks of his theories, he brought to the public an awareness of the many ancient monuments on earth that seem to defy rational explanation.
Machu Picchu © 2003-2004 by Richard Nisbet
In his novel "Slapstick" Kurt Vonnegut quips:
"...there must have been days of light gravity in old times, when people could play tiddley winks with huge chunks of stone."
Pedro de Cieza de Leon wrote of an old Inca legend about the creator-god, Viracocha. Once to show his power he caused a huge fire, then extinguished it. As a result of having been burnt so, the stones were so light that even a large one could be picked up as though it were made of cork.
Machu Picchu © 2003-2004 by Richard Nisbet
The structures at Machu Picchu are not as gigantic as those at Sacsahuaman, but some are surely finer. In a few cases, as in the "Temple of Three Windows" these walls stand among the most inspired structures created by man
Temple of Three Windows. Machu Picchu © 2003-2004 by Richard Nisbet
Atlantis 
How do we know about Atlantis?
Timaeus and Critias, two of Plato's dialogues,
are the only existing written records which
specifically refer to Atlantis.
The dialogues are conversations between Socrates, Hermocrates, Timaeus, and Critias. Apparently in response to a prior talk by Socrates about ideal societies, Timaeus and Critias agree to entertain Socrates with a tale that is "not a fiction but a true story."
The story is about the conflict between the ancient Athenians and the Atlantians 9000 years before Plato's time.
Knowledge of the distant past apparently forgotten to the Athenians of Plato's day, the story of Atlantis was conveyed to Solon by Egyptian priests. Solon passed the tale to Dropides, the great-grandfather of Critias. Critias learned of it from his grandfather also named Critias, son of Dropides.
Cast of Characters:
All of the men, except for Timaeus, who take part in or are mentioned in Timaeus and Critias are known to have actually existed in ancient Greece. Records of their lives and deeds have been recorded in other writings from the time period. Note: There are 2 people named Critias related to the story of Atlantis and this can lead to some confusion. There is the Critias who actually takes part in the dialogues. He is the one who tells the story of Atlantis to Socrates. Then there is Critias who was the grandfather of the Critias of the dialogues. This elder Critias told the story of Atlantis to his grandson, Critias, who then conveyed the story to Socrates in the dialogues. Those who actually take part in the dialogues: Timaeus - there is no historical record of him.Critias - Plato's great grandfather.Socrates - Plato's mentor and teacher. He was condemned to death by authorities in Athens for "corrupting the moral of Athenian youth"; He lived from 469 to 399 BC.Hermocrates - statesman and soldier from Syracuse. Those mentioned in the dialogues: Solon - Athenian traveler, poet, and lawgiver who lived from approximately 638-559 BC. According to Plato it was he who learned of the story of Atlantis from an Egyptian priest.Dropides - Critias' great grandfather who was told the story of Atlantis by Solon, a distant relative and close friend.Critias - Son of Dropides and grandfather of the Critias who takes part in the dialogues. It was he who related the story of Atlantis to the Critias of the dialogues
The Atlantis Syndrome:
by Paul JordanAtlantis started with Plato and in his hands it was never a supercivilization of the sort conjectured by later authors; perhaps in strictly Greek terms it was no civilization at all but rather a fatally luxurious elaboration of an essentially barbarian way of life, for all its inception by a god. At all events, it was no seminal civilization: it wasn't the fons et origo of all later civilizations in the world, indeed Athens was its independent contemporary. Both Atlantis and old Athens were, for Plato, but episodes in the ever ongoing cycle of catastrophes and renewals that he saw as the most rational and scientific interpretation to which the world of human experience could be subjected. For him, science and religion were quite bound up together, so that the natural catastrophes were at the same time eras in which the divine light was withdrawn from the world and the equally natural renewals were times when it returned. So rational and obviously true was this scheme of things to Plato that the "problem" of the real historical location and fate of Atlantis that has exercised so many writers after him would have left him cold, or perhaps amused to think of what he had started. We quoted early in this book several passages of Plato to show how he handled stories in his works. Read the whole article: http://mailbox.univie.ac.at/~muehleb9/atlantissyndrome.html Evidence for Existence of Atlantis Note: The following 4 segments contain excerpts from the full length articles listed below. "This is probably the greatest discovery in World history", was stated by Maxine Asher, the co-director of a scientific expedition that found Atlantis at the bottom of the ocean, reported United Press International and major newspapers in the United States during the summer of 1973. UPI continued that "Maxine Asher said that scuba divers found data to prove the existence of the super-civilization which legend says sank beneath the sea thousands of years ago". "The divers had found evidence of roads and large columns, some with concentric spiral motifs, in the exact place described by the Greek philosopher Plato"."The group of some 70 scientists, teachers and adventurers was endorsed by Pepperdine University in Los Angeles, California."The document "History of the Golden Ages" reveals over 30 ruins including pyramids, domes, paved roads, rectangular buildings, columns, canals and artifacts that have been found on the ocean bottoms from the Bahamas to the nearby coasts of Europe and Africa, referencing the vast size of the lost continent.Dozens of historians and famous writers wrote about the Atlantis they believed existed, how the Myans and Aztecs had told their conquerors that they came from Atlantis and Mu, about ancient tablets photographed in Peru showing those two lost continents, Atlantis and Lemuria, and ancient maps clearly showing Atlantis.Just some of the ruins so far found include: A pyramid explored by Dr Ray Brown on the sea floor off the Bahamas in 1970. Brown was accompanied by 4 divers who also found roads, domes, rectangular buildings, unidentified metallic instruments, and a statue holding a "mysterious" crystal containing miniature pyramids. The metal devices and crystals were taken to Florida for analysis at a university there. What was discovered was that the crystal amplified energy that passed through it. Ruins of roads and buildings found off Binini Island in the 1960's by the photographed and published expeditions of Dr Mansan Valentine. Similar ruins were also photographed off Cay Sal in the Bahamas. Similar underwater ruins were found off Morocco and photographed 50 to 60 feet underwater. A huge 11 room pyramid found 10,000 feet under water in the mid Atlantic Ocean with a huge crystal top, as reported by Tony Benlk. A 1977 report of a huge pyramid found off Cay Sal in the Bahamas, photographed by Ari Marshall's expedition, about 150 feet underwater. The pyramid was about 650 feet high. Mysteriously the surrounding water was lit by sparkling white water flowing out of the openings in the pyramid and surrounded by green water, instead of the black water everywhere else at that depth. A sunken city about 400 miles off Portugal found by Soviet expeditions led by Boris Asturua, with buildings made of extremely strong concrete and plastics. He said "the remains of streets suggests the use of monorails for transportation". He also brought up a statue. A marble acropolis underwater across five acres of fluted columns raised on pillars. Heinrich Schilemann, the man who found and excavated the famous ruins of Troy (which historians thought was only a legend), reportedly left a written account of his discovery of a bronze vase with a metal unknown to scientists who examined it, in the famous Priam Treasure. Inside it are glyphs in Phoenician stating that it was from King Chronos of Atlantis. Identical pottery was found in Tiajuanaco, Bolivia. Many other examples of roads, buildings and columns are available, many of them made with materials not available in their areas.Many ancient maps are also known to have Atlantis on them, including the ancient Greek ones studied by Christopher Columbus before he set sail for America.Ancient writings from the Aztecs, Myans, Greeks, Egyptians, Spain, India, Tibet, and islands in the Atlantic and Pacific oceans all speak of ancient sunken continents and their connection to them.Human footprints and shoe prints, a perfectly engineered cube, jewelry, a prehistoric animal with a hole in its skull that scientists admit only a bullet could make, a remnant of a screw, and other modern artifacts have been found in layered rock strata geologists admit formed on these objects MILLIONS of years ago. All of these discoveries were printed in public daily newspapers when they occurred, and left out of history books simply because historians could not explain them with THEIR theories. Who Were the Atlanteans? Firstly, it's important to point out that Atlantis was not the only continent from ancient times that sank beneath the waves. There was the huge continent of Lemuria which also incorporated other countries like Mu and Mar in the Pacific Ocean, and Lumania in the Indian Ocean. Remnants of the lost continents may still be seen as the peaks of their mountains make small islands in the middle of vast oceans - Easter Island is thought to be a remnant of Lemuria and still bears the great stone statues, though only their heads are showing above the ground.There were also the lands of Thule and Hyperborea in the north, which are believed to be sunk below what is now the north pole. There is also information about this land at the north pole continuing to exist today on a fourth dimensional level - but that's another story. Also the land which is now at the south pole was also thought to be once inhabited when it was a tropical land.The story of how these various continents became inhabited with highly advanced civilizations is a fascinating one, but after many thousands of years it all came to an end for the last time around 11,500 years ago with dramatic planetary events which sank and shifted continents and covered much of the earth with water. Clues to the history on earth before our own recently recorded history can be found in the Sumerian texts.So who were the Atlanteans and how did they live? The following information has been gathered from various sources for a very brief introduction. I recommend that you read the original documents for more in-depth information [linked at the bottom of the page].The original Atlanteans were of extra-terrestrial origin and came to earth over 50 thousand years ago. They were of human shape, but not modern earth humans as we are. They were very tall and fair skinned and probably originated from the Lyrian star system. They are also known as the Elohim or Annunaki and their story is hidden in the texts of Genesis. They had life spans of around 800 years and are known in some texts as 'the tall ones'.Most all ancient civilizations believed in the Titans, the race of giant humans that inhabited Earth long ago. Different races knew them by different names. These 7 to 12 foot humanoids were thought to be legendary until the excavation of over a dozen skeletons 8 to 12 feet tall, around the world, shocked archaeologists. The Spanish Conquistadors left diaries of wild blond-haired, blue eyed 8 to 12 foot high men running around in the Andes during the conquest of the Incas.They, along with other groups working on the planet, eventually developed the smaller human being by genetic manipulation, originally for use as workers.The 'Adamu' (or man) were originally created to work in various projects around the world. Some of these were mining, food production, construction, etc. By giving man the ability to reproduce on his own (the original sin), the population began to multiply quite rapidly. The Annunaki began to clamor for more of the workers. Human females were further altered so that conception was possible not once per year, but every 28 days. This can be found in Genesis, Chapter 3, Verse 16.The Annunaki soldiers eventually started to reproduce with the earth human females: "When the sons of the Elohim came unto the daughters of man, and they bore them children". Technology on Atlantis The Atlantean consciousness eventually evolved from a less material, fourth-dimensional form toward the sensual, or physical. Far from being like the other 'ancient' civilizations that we know about, the level of technology reached when Atlantis was at its' peak was far superior to our own.Among the accomplishments of the Atlanteans, for example, was 'perfect' wather control. Now the average immediate notion is of abundant fields of waving grain in endless summer alongside the most beautiful of beaches. They had that, and it bored them; too utilitarian to them, like we might look at a vineyard. They left such backlands to the serving creatures. The Atlanteans had come into the physical world essentially for the stimulation. They loved storms. Whole areas of their land were given over, like national parks, to violent displays of atmospheric turbulence. Their servants, of course, were less fond of these events, which could kn the equivalent of "artisitc licence" spill over and kill them, destroy their homes, etc. If the Atlanteans noticed and/or cared, they could restore all this damage at will. Some did, some didn't.They also had the ability to effect geological events for their experiential pleasure. Volcanic fountains were a favourite, but much was done with steam and mineral venting for artistic result. They had plenty of time. The earlier ones were still immortal. More than one volcanic seamount poking its head above the waters of the Atlantic Ocean started out this way. Later, of course, they lost control.The real core of Atlantean technology that can still be dug up around the earth was far beyond something as simple as weather control. What has attracted the military like carrion is the 'threshold' technology. Some hint of this floated up in the movie 'Stargate', except that the Atlantean version could be called 'Probability Gate'. It's a solid state device (with no selectable 'dial' like the stargate in the movie, for instance) that uses what we think of as time/space as an energy source. The threshold is a lens into probable existence streams, or continua. This area was delved into more deeply with research like the Philadelphia Experiment. Atlantean Crystals The Atlanteans used crystals quite extensively, and mis-used them to such a degree that they eventually led to the catastrophe which caused Atlantis to disappear into the ocean.The Atlanteans used the knowledge of the crystal refraction, amplification and storage. It is known that a beam of light directed intensley and focused specifically on certain series of facets in a gem will, when it exits from the reflective plane of the gem, be amplified rather than diminished. And further, these amplified energies were broken down into a wide and sophisticated spectrum. The Atlanteans used the spectrum of this energy so as to be more useable, and for a specific purpose, much as one would use petoleum in terms of its various spectrum limitations for specific purposes.Extracting this and that and other things from the same basic substance, they used certain divisions of the energy for growing things. Others for healing, others for knowledge or increasement of substance. Other phases of spectrum for dissassembling molecule structures, and yet other combinations of these strata for building, assembling structures, as in chains; or producing matter, transmutation of matter and that sort. Their basic technology is still available in the earth plane in various locations.Crystals have the ability to transfer energy, to retain it, to maintain its intensity, to focus and transmit it over great distance to similar receivers as are equal or comparable to the transmitter. Thus, from one pyramid to another the Atlanteans, in a sense, transmitted energy. That when the face of the earth was directed toward a certain point, one pyramid would function to intensify and transmit energies to other pyramids which would then act as receiving devices and would disperse energy as it was needed. The opposite would be true, when that pyramid was at unfocusable point to their celestial alignment the others would transmit to those. Very simple method, very effective method. Though it brought them many difficulties later.Atlantean crystals were natural forms, but their growths were speeded up. Some specimens of clear quartz were produced to almost 25 feet high and 10 feet in diameter, had 12 sides and were used for storing and transmitting power.Small crystals, four to five feet high were infused with different colours, and had a varied number of facets, to be used for different purposes, such as healing, meditation, psychic development, increasing mental capacity, communications, powering generators, dematerialisation, and transport of objects, magnetic force fields, and travel at speeds undreamed of by our culture today.A number of crystals were shaped into invered pyramids, with four to six sides, were infused with various shades of pink or rose, which created a light beam for surgery, by changing molecular structure, and for soothing pain, particularly in the delicate areas of the brain, the eyes, the heart and reproductive organs. Gold or yellow crystals changed colours to deeper hues in the presence of disease or bodily vibrational disorders. Ruby and purple stones helped cure emotional and spiritual problems; and black crystals, no longer in existence, were powerful protectors.For general rejuvenation and a return of vitality the ancient Atlanteans periodically meditated 15 to 20 minutes inside a circle of 6, 11, 22 or 24 stones of different types, holding a clear quartz in their hands, which acted as a control and focaliser.All these various crystals received their power from a variety of sources, including the Sun, the Earth's energy grid system, or from each other. The larger stones, called Fire Crystals, were the central receiving and broadcasting stations, while others acted as receivers for individual cities, buildings, vehicles and homes. On a higher spiritual level, rooms made of crystals were places where the Initiates left their bodies in the Final Transcendence, often never to return.In the modern Bermuda Triangle, on the ocean bottom where the ruins of Atlantis now exist, the energy build-up in the sunken and damaged Fire Crystals can periodically trigger dematerialisations of anything in the area.One of the most detailed descriptions of the Atlantean use of a mysterious instrument called the Great Crystal was given by Edgar Cayce, who mentioned it many times. The crystal, he said was housed in a special building oval in shape, with a dome that could be rolled back, exposing the Crystal to the light of the sun, moon and stars at the most favourable time.The interior of the building was lined with non-conducting metal or stone, similar to asbestos or bakelite, a thermosetting plastic. The Crystal itself, which Cayce also called the Tuaoi Stone, or Firestone, was huge in size, cylindrical in length, and prismatic in shape, cut with six sides. Atop the crystal was a moveable capstone, used to both concentrate incoming rays of energy, and to direct currents to various parts of the Atlantean countryside.It appears that the Crystal gathered solar, lunar, stellar, atmospheric and Earth energies as well as unknown elemental forces and concentrated these at a specific point, located between the top of the Crystal and the bottom of the capstone.The energy was used for various purposes. In the beginning it was used as purely a spiritual tool by initiates who could handle the great energy. The early Atlanteans were peaceful people. As they developed more physical material bodies, they used the crystal to rejuvenate their bodies and were able to live hundreds of years while maintaining a youthful appearance.Later the Crystal was put to other uses. Currents of energy were transmitted throughout the land, like radio waves, and powered by these, crafts and vehicles traversed the land, through the sky and under the sea at the speed of sound. By utilisation of other currents originating from the Crystal, the Atlanteans were also able to transmit over great distances the human voice, and pictures, like modern television. In the same manner, even heat and light could be directed to specific buildings or open arenas, giving illumination and warmth by seemingly invisible means.Toward the end of their existence, however, the Atlanteans became greedier for more power, the operation of the Crystal was taken over by those of less spiritual fortitude, and the energies of the Great Crystal were tuned to higher and more destructive frequencies.Finally the Crystal was tuned too high, activating volcanoes and melting mountains, ultimately causing the submergence of Atlantis, and perhaps even the axis shift of the Earth itself. Credits The 4 segments above contain excerpts from the following full length articles: History of the Golden Ages - by Steve Omar Accessible Remains of Atlantis - by Mark Hammons Crystal Power and Energies in Atlantis - by Geoffrey Keyte The Way - by T. Donovan Atlantis in Mexico? Gene D. Matlock deeply searches and analyses different cultures also comparing with vedic (vaydik, Sanskrit: वेद)) ancient culture of Asia, quite common over India to Japan passing through Tibet and China, finding outstanding curious similarities among all cultures among the globe when all where in the mythical "golden age". He compares linguistically the different languages he analyses; western, eastern, ancient Native American and other languages. He says that with this method , used long before him by others linguist, and exploring deep in ethymology, he finds impressive similarity between the myths from ethnies around the world circa the copper age, bronze age or other ancient times he refers to in his papers. He finds links between Maya, Native American and Asian ethnicities, oral tradition and ancient cultures. Gene D. Matlock seems to have discovered many language and culture similarities between many precolumbian civilizations and people from Afghanistan to far east Asia. Also giving arguments that support the idea of extensive commercial relations between precolumbian America with the rest of the world, long before Christ, has Matlock tries to find rather possible or not. He might be quite convinced that ancient cities from Mexican gulf to Tenochtitlan are related to some Atlántepec, Tolan, A-tolan and other TLAN like cities: Quote:_"Should we continue our fun guessing games about Atlantis for another few millenniums? Or should we confidently begin our search for the submerged half of Atlantis from Atlántepec's (Mexico's) southeast coast? Will the ruins that we'll surely find be those of the real Atlantis?" He believes we should be conducting the search for Atlantis in the Yucatan region of Mexico. Matlock cites place names as one of the compelling proofs: Atlán, Autlán, Mazatlán, Cihuatlán, Cacatlán, Tecaltitlán, Tihuatlán, Atitlán, Zapotlán, Minititlán, Ocotlán, Miahuatlán, Tecaltitlán, Tepatitlán, Tihuatlán, Texiutlán, and the like. Notice that the Nahuatl Tlán root of these place names is exactly like the Tlan in "Atlantis." He also cites an ancient, spiral-shaped harbor with high banks or dikes lining the channels that once existed near San Lorenzo Tenochtitlán, Mexico. This layout is very much like that described by Plato for Atlantis's great port city. When Gene D. Matlock was seven years old, he became deathly sick from pneumonia. His mother prayed that if he survived, she would dedicate him to the study of theology. She never suspected Gene's studies would lead him to "no-no" conclusions not welcome in Sunday School, the mosque, and the synagogue. Matlock says that the linguistic revelations comparing different cultures are astonishing. That we are and always have been a global community from the very beginning of civilization. He says: "When I was a young college student in Mexico, I took a course in linguistics. This course and my experiences in studying Spanish, Portuguese, Malay, and Nahuatl, taught me that a word is much more than a combination of strange sounds. Each one tells the history of the people who use it." According to Matlock, the secret surrounding the location of Atlantis -- and thus, proof that it really existed -- can be traced back to the forbidden letter. He then tries to link everything with the ancient roots of "Panch" , Panis, Phoenicias and Hebrews, linking many things according to his research, but many scholars don't agree with this. Modern game fictional characters like Gill (Street Fighter), and Urien (Street Fighter) are examples of the fantasy Atlantis may arise in subconcient, has it has being for many years a source of mystery and inventions. Sources Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gene_Matlock" THE LAST ATLANTIS BOOK YOU'LL EVER HAVE TO READ! : THE ATLANTIS-MEXICO-INDIA, by Gene D. Matlock India Once Ruled the Americas, by Gene Matlock From Khyber (Kheeber) Pass to Gran Quivira (Kheevira), Nm and Baboquivari, Az by Gene D. Matlock
Book Description More than 25,000 books, plus countless other articles have been written about a fabled confederation of city-states known as Atlantis. If it really did exist, where was it located? Does anyone have valid evidence of its existence artifacts and other remnants? According to historian, archaeologist, educator and linguist Gene D. Matlock, both questions can easily be answered: Only Mexico is named Atlan; Itlan; Otlan; Tlan; Tollan, etc. No other nation on earth can make that claim. Since this is the case and every nation on earth is what it is, Atlantis is Atlantis! From the Publisher The Last Atlantis Book You’ll Ever Read! reveals the secret of “the forbidden letter ‘A’” and many more hidden nuggets of information that “settle the matter once and for all,” declares Matlock. His proof is convincing; his linguistic revelations are astonishing. That we are and always have been a global community from the very beginning of civilization is rapidly becoming evident. According to Matlock, the secret surrounding the location of Atlantis -- and thus, proof that it really existed -- can be traced back to the “forbidden letter ‘A.’” Atlantis Debunked by D. Trull, Enigma Editor The island of Bimini in the Bahamas has long been a favorite hotspot in the search for Atlantis. Speculation has centered around a supposed "Bimini Road" (or "Bimini Wall"), a structure often said to have been paved on the ocean floor by Atlanteans, which is actually a natural formation of limestone. There have also been unfounded reports of stone columns and giant pyramids in the island's waters. Now another claim has surfaced of a great discovery at Bimini, and it appears that it will prove just as insubstantial as the Atlantis theories that have come and gone before. Aaron Du Val, president of the Miami-based Egyptology Society, recently announced that a team of underwater explorers has found the ruins of 12,000-year-old temples off the coast of Bimini. Du Val claimed the structures bear markings and architectural specifications that match well-known megaliths in Egypt, South America and other parts of the world. The noted similarities to Egyptian ruins included distinctive quarry marks on the rocks and the same geometric angles present in the Great Pyramid of Giza. Other markings were said to match the Altamira cave paintings of Spain. To make his claims even more fantastic, Du Val said the Bimini ruins contained "exact orbital plots of the planets and what seem to have been intricate star shafts, metal-coated walls, and intermingled stones of various colors." In the initial press release, dated July 6, 1997, Du Val made no specific reference to Atlantis. Later, in an interview conducted by a new age organization called New Heaven New Earth, he stopped short of claiming that these ruins were evidence of the legendary sunken city, although he seemed to relish the possibility. "Atlantis is a pretty touchy subject," Du Val said. "Maybe this will be the trigger to bring more people forth to explore ideas that have been taboo in the past. Megalithic structures are not supposed to be in the Bahamas. These are closer to what you would find at Giza than what you would find in Mexico or Peru, which is very strange. People are saying unbelievable things like it could force the re-interpretation of the course of human history." Du Val was quick to agree when the interviewer noted how his announcement seemed to fulfill the predictions of alleged prophet Edgar Cayce, one of the top Atlantis advocates of all time. "This discovery fits right with his predictions," Du Val said. "Now we are not saying it is Atlantis, but it sure is strange how these findings not only match Cayce's predictions but Plato's writings as well, even to the metal-coated walls." In fact, Cayce actually prophesied -- among other things -- that Atlantis would rise again to the surface in 1968 or 1969. Plato's description of Atlantis was most likely a reference to the Minoan island of Santorini, near Crete, which was devastated by a volcano. Du Val remained tight-lipped on crucial details of the Bimini ruins, including the exact location of the findings and the names of the explorers who found them. He explained that he needed to work out arrangements with museums and the Bahamian government to protect the site before its location was made public. Du Val planned a press conference for July 25, promising full disclosure and presentation of video tapes and photographs of the ruins. He also stated that he had never claimed the ruins were Atlantis, apparently to combat the "Atlantis fever" word of his announcement had triggered on the Internet. Du Val's claims garnered a stern rebuke from Dr. Paul Pettennude, an underwater archaeologist with the Maya Underwater Research Center, who is intimately familiar with the waters around Bimini. In a statement issued to New Heaven New Earth, he listed several reasons why nothing like the ruins Du Val describes could possibly exist. Among the points of Pettennude's argument: -- "Bimini is not the lost world. It is a very, very popular resort destination and thousands of divers visit it every year. Every available reef is dived frequently and nothing else has turned up." -- Equipment used by the Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institute of Melbourne, Florida, and the Rosenteil School of Oceanography at the University of Miami "is very sophisticated and there is nothing but known wrecks being found." -- "In 1986, NASA had the Navy scour everything north of Cuba to north of North Carolina looking for pieces of the exploded Challenger shuttle. Every square foot of bottom down to 6,000 feet was examined and every piece of the wreck larger than a dinner plate was recovered." -- "The U.S. Navy maintains a system called SOSUS which cost $16 billion to secure the ocean floor from foreign subs. It paints a picture of everything from the bottom up." -- "The reefs off Bimini from 300 feet up to the surface are less than 14,000 years old. This is the level to which the water rose at the end of the last ice age. There could not be a sunken city because the Bahama Islands are not shrinking but actually growing inches per year. This would have made any ancient city unstable." -- "Divers could not have found a city below 250 feet without special diving gases. ... There are only a handful of people in the world trained and certified to dive these research blends. I am one of them and the group is a close knit family. No one has any knowledge nor has been asked to find an ancient city." Pettennude also mentioned the spurious "Bimini Road" and noted that the man who discovered it in 1968, J. Manson Valentine, was one of his professors at the University of Miami. Another red herring that has thrown off Atlantis seekers at Bimini are stone pillars on the ocean floor that resemble shattered marble columns. These artifacts were actually formed by barrels of cement and similar materials that sunk from ships and hardened underwater, leaving stone casts after the wood staves of the barrels rotted away. The weight of the evidence certainly seems to be stacked against Du Val. As it turned out, he canceled the July 25th, 1997 press conference at the last minute. He indicated that more time was necessary to ensure the safety of the ruins, lest they fall victim to looters and vandals. Du Val rescheduled the press conference for August 8, '97 but it was postponed a second time. After extensive research, ParaScope has found no further information on this supposed discovery or any subsequent public remarks from Du Val. Obviously, the mass media has made no announcement on the discovery of Atlantis. The only news outlet that seems to be following the story is the web site of New Heaven New Earth, whose news bulletins are available to members only -- at a cost of $100 a year. News concerning the Bimini discovery is to be posted by NHNE "four weeks after our subscribers have received it." At ParaScope, where we believe the news should always be free for everyone, we may have more to report on this story after all the details have surfaced. Source: http://www.greatdreams.com/bermuda.htm
CLASSICS YIELD NEW CLUES TO AN ANCIENT MYSTERY As a former police chief, Jacques Hebert enjoys a good mystery. That’s why he chose to take up archaeology as an avocation. These pursuits led him to look for a solution to the age-old mystery of Atlantis.
In Atlantis Rediscovered, Hébert reveals the results of his rigorous research and training as a detective. The author’s work relied heavily on analyzing Plato’s dialogues, which are among the earliest record of the famous “lost continent.” He shows how he discovered a misinterpretation of Plato’s work that confused the identification of the continent’s location. He goes on to show why a different reading places Atlantis in an unexpected setting. Compared to previous theories, his is the first that is in complete harmony with the writings of Plato, up to and including descriptions of the vegetation. As a result of Hebert’s painstaking analysis, the myth is demystified. The author’s victory is palpable as the reader follows his discoveries step by step in a book which reads like a novel. With the results validated scientifically, his work is likely to call into question some fundamental historical concepts. Atlantis Rediscoveredby Jacques Hebert ISBN 1-59309-039-7 Book DescriptionThis book offers a step-by-step disputation of the myth of Atlantis. It takes the reader through a detailed analysis of the Platonic dialogues, uncovering a probable misunderstanding of a transcript of an Egyptian priest that Plato relied on. This leads the author to conclude that the Atlantic people probably did not die out entirely but more likely were the ancestors of the Phoenicians' highly successful maritime civilization. Atlantis Rediscovered has just been released by Carnot USA Books. Carnot USA Books is a dynamic new publisher of original trade paperbacks targeted at the American experience as well as nonfiction and fiction titles focused on such global topics as current events, crime and mystery, the arts and classics. Based in New York City, Carnot USA Books is a wholly owned subsidiary of Editions Carnot, one of France’s fastest growing publishers. Carnot’s books are translated into 30 languages and distributed in over 50 countries. Edgar Cayce - Atlantean Hall of Records Edgar Cayce predicted the discovery of an Atlantean "Hall of Records" between the Sphinx and the Nile with a connecting entrance under the right, front paw of the Sphinx.The following segment was taken from Cayce, Edgar "On Atlantis" New York: Warner Books, 1968. ...It would be well if this entity were to seek either of the three phases of the ways and means in which those records of the activities of individuals were preserved -- the one in the Atlantean land, that sank, which will rise and is rising again; another in the place of the records that leadeth from the Sphinx to the hall of records, in the Egyptian land; and another in the Aryan or Yucatan land, where the temple there is overshadowing same. (2012-1; Sep 25, 1939) - from page 146 ...the entity joined with those who were active in putting the records in forms that were partially of the old characters of the ancient or early Egyptian, and part in the newer form of the Atlanteans. These may be found, especially when the house or tomb of records is opened, in a few years from now. (2537-1; Jul 17, 1941) - p.146 ...[the entity] was among the first to set the records that are yet to be discovered or yet to be had of those activities in the Atlantean land, and for the preservation of data that is yet to be found from the chambers of the way between the Sphinx and the pyramid of records. (3575-2; Jan 20, 1944) - p.147 Q.2: Give in detail what the sealed room contains.A.2: A record of Atlantis from the beginning of those periods when the Spirit took form, or began the encasements in that land; and the developments of the peoples throughout their sojourn; together with the record of the first destruction, and the changes that took place in the land; with the record of the sojournings of the peoples and their varied activities in other lands, and a record of the meetings of all the nations or lands, for the activities in the destruction of Atlantis; and the building of the pyramid of initiation, together with whom, what, and where the opening of the records would come, that are as copies from the sunken Atlantis. For with the change, it [Atlantis] must rise again. In position, this lies -- as the sun rises from the waters -- as the line of the shadows (or light) falls between the paws of the Sphinx; that was set later as the sentinel or guard and which may not be entered from the connecting chambers from the Sphinx's right paw until the time has been fulfilled when the changes must be active in this sphere of man's experience. Then [it lies] between the Sphinx and the river. (378-16; Oct 29, 1933) - p.147-8 This excerpt was taken from Cayce, Edgar. "On Atlantis." New York: Warner Books, 1968.
Wednesday, January 2, 2008
Three walls of Sacsayhuaman - the teeth of the Puma's Head Originally there were three "walls" or "bulwarks" which foundations are still seen today; they are the most spectacular remains of that fabulous building that according to chroniclers did not have any comparison in the old world. They are three parallel walls built in different levels with lime-stones of enormous sizes; zigzagging walls that because of their appearance it is suggested that they represent the "teeth" of the puma's head that the complex represented. The boulders used for the first or lower levels are the biggest; there is one that is 8.5 m high (28 ft.) and weights about 140 metric tons. Those boulders classify the walls as being of cyclopean or megalithic architecture. Some authors believe that the three walls represent the three levels of the Andean Religious World: beginning from the bottom would be the Ukju Pacha (underground stage), the Kay Pacha (earth's surface stage) in the middle, and the Hanan Pacha (sky stage) on the top. Besides; those levels are identified with their three sacred animals: the Amaru or Mach'aqway (snake), the Puma (Cougar or Mountain Lion), and the Kuntur (Andean condor). Because of the zigzagging shape of the walls, some authors suggest that they represented the Illapa god (thunder, lightning and thunderbolt). It is possible that all the previous elements related to their religion would not be excluding, because there are divine interactions, and as it is known "three" was a key number among Quechuas. There are no other walls like these. They are different from Stonehenge, different from the Pyramids of the Egyptians and the Maya, different from any of the other ancient monolithic stone-works.
The stones fit so perfectly that no blade of grass or steel can slide between them. There is no mortar. They often join in complex and irregular surfaces that would appear to be a nightmare for the stonemason.
Scientists speculate that the masonry process might have worked like this: after carving the desired shape out of the first boulder and fitting it in place, the masons would somehow suspend the second boulder on scaffolding next to the first one. They would then have to trace out a pattern on the second boulder in order to plan the appropriate jigsaw shape that would fit the two together. In order to make a precise copy of the first boulder's edges, the masons might have used a straight stick with a hanging plum- bob to trace its edges and mark off exact points for carving on the second boulder. After tracing out the pattern, they would sculpt the stone into shape, pounding it with hand-sized stones to get the general shape before using finger-size stones for precision sanding. Admittedly, this entire technique is merely scientific speculation. The method might have worked in practice but that doesn't mean this is how the ancient Quechua stonemasons did it.
There is usually neither adornment nor inscription. There is Elfin whimsy here, as well as raw, primitive and mighty expression. Most of these walls are found around Cusco and the Urubamba River Valley in the Peruvian Andes. There a few scattered examples elsewhere in the Andes, but almost nowhere else on Earth.
Mostly, the structures are beyond our ken. The how, why and what simply baffle. Modern man can neither explain nor duplicate. Mysteries like this bring out explanations scholarly, whimsical, inventive and ridiculous.
What is left from the three walls is made with lime-stones that in this case were used just in order to built the bases or foundations. The main walls were made with andesites that are blackish igneous stones which quarries are in Waqoto on the mountains north of San Jeronimo, or in Rumiqolqa about 35 Kms. (22 miles) from the city. Limestones are found in the surroundings of Sacsayhuaman but they are softer and can not be finely carved as the andesites of the main walls that were of the "Sedimentary or Imperial Incan" type. Destruction of Sacsayhuaman lasted about 400 years; since 1536 when Manko Inka began the war against Spaniards and sheltered himself in this complex. Later the first conquerors started using its stones to built their houses in the city; subsequently the city's Church Council ordered in 1559 to take the andesites for the construction of the Cathedral. Even until 1930, Qosqo's neighbours just paying a small fee could take the amount of stones they wanted in order to build their houses in the city: four centuries of destruction using this complex as a quarry by the colonial city's stone masons.
Sacsayhuaman was supposedly completed around 1508. Depending on who you listen to, it took a crew of 20,000 to 30,000 men working for 60 years.
Here is a mystery:
The chronicler Garcilaso de la Vega was born around 1530, and raised in the shadow of these walls. And yet he seems not to have had a clue as to how Sacsayhuaman was built. He wrote:
"....this fortress surpasses the constructions known as the seven wonders of the world. For in the case of a long broad wall like that of Babylon, or the colossus of Rhodes, or the pyramids of Egypt, or the other monuments, one can see clearly how they were executed...how, by summoning an immense body of workers and accumulating more and more material day by day and year by year, they overcame all difficulties by employing human effort over a long period. But it is indeed beyond the power of imagination to understand now these Indians, unacquainted with devices, engines, and implements, could have cut, dressed, raised, and lowered great rocks, more like lumps of hills than building stones, and set them so exactly in their places. For this reason, and because the Indians were so familiar with demons, the work is attributed to enchantment."
Surely a few of those 20,000 labourers were still around when Garcilaso was young. Was everyone struck with amnesia? Or is Sacsayhuaman much older than we've been led to believe?
Archaeologists tell us that the walls of Sacsayhuaman rose ten feet higher than their remnants. That additional ten feet of stones supplied the building materials for the cathedrals and "casas" of the conquistadors.
It is generally conceded that these stones were much smaller than those megalithic monsters that remain.
Perhaps the upper part of the walls, constructed of small, regularly-shaped stones was the only part of Sacsayhuaman that was built by the Incas and "finished in 1508." This could explain why no one at the time of the conquest seemed to know how those mighty walls were built.
Muyuqmarka
Garcilaso wrote that on the top of the three "walls" or "bulwarks" there were three strong towers disposed in a triangle. The main tower was in the middle and had a circular shape, it was named as Moyoc Marca (Muyuq Marka), the second one was named as Paucar Marca, and the third Sacllar Marca (Sallaq Marka); the last two ones were rectangular.
This is the remaining base of a tower discovered in 1934 at the top of the Temple of Sacsayhuaman. The Muyuqmarka consists of three concentric, circular stone walls connected by a series of radial walls. There are three channels constructed to bring water into what many scientists consider to be a reservoir. A web-like pattern of 34 lines intersects at the center and also there is a pattern of concentric circles that corresponded to the location of the circular walls.
Cusco
According to Indian legend, Cusco was so barren that no crops could be grown there. In what is now the center of the city, there was a lake and a bog. The second Inca, Sinchi Roca, had the swamp drained and filled with stones and logs until it was firm enough to support their stone buildings. He also had thousands of loads of good earth brought in and spread over the land, making the valley fertile. What could possibly have been the attraction of this barren, boggy place? Suppose the magnificent lower walls of Sacsayhuaman were there before Manco Capac came to Cusco. That in itself would be enough to make the place holy.
The imperial city Cusco, meaning ‘navel of the earth,’ was laid out in the form of a puma, the animal that symbolized the Inca dynasty. The belly of the puma was the main plaza, the river Tullumayo formed its spine, and the hill of Sacsayhuaman its head. According to one early Spanish chronicler, the Inca emperor Pachakuti, who had made a pilgrimage to the ancient holy city of Tiahuanaco, sought to emulate the building perfection he had seen there in the construction of Cusco’s temples. Cusco, however, was not really a city in the European sense of the word. Rather it was an enormous sacred artifact, the dwelling place of the families of the Inca nobility (common people were not allowed entrance to the ceremonial nexus), and the center of the Inca cosmos.
Coricancha
In Cusco too, was the most important temple in the Inca empire, the Coricancha (meaning literally, "the corral of gold"). Dedicated primarily to Viracocha, the creator god, and Inti, the Sun god, the Coricancha also had subsidiary shrines to the Moon, Venus, the Pleiades, and various weather deities. Additionally there were a large number of religious icons of conquered peoples which had been brought to Cusco, partly in homage and partly as hostage. Reports by the first Spanish who entered Cusco tell that ceremonies were conducted around the clock at the Coricancha and that its opulence was fabulous beyond belief.
Golden Enclosure in Coricancha sheltered
INTI Sun God & Gold Disk (1430-1532). The wonderfully carved granite walls of the temple were covered with more than 700 sheets of pure gold, weighing around two kilograms each; the spacious courtyard was filled with life-size sculptures of animals and a field of corn, all fashioned from pure gold; the floors of the temple were themselves covered in solid gold; and facing the rising sun was a massive golden image of the sun encrusted with emeralds and other precious stones. (All of this golden artwork was quickly stolen and melted down by the Spaniards, who then built a church of Santo Domingo on foundations of the temple.) The Coricancha (sometimes spelled Qoricancha) was also the centerpiece of a vast astronomical observatory and calendrical device for precisely calculating precessional movement. Emanating from the temple were forty lines called seques, running arrow-straight for hundreds of miles to significant celestial points on the horizon. Four of these seques represented the four intercardinal roads to the four quarters of Tawantinsuyu, others pointed to the equinox and solstice points, and still others to the heliacal rise positions of different stars and constellations highly important to the Inca. Rodadero Hill and the Throne of the Incas In the outskirts of Cusco, exactly opposite to Sacsayhuaman is Rodadero, a giant rock hill with numerous stairwells and benches carved into the rock
Throne of the Inca
The rock is smooth and rounded, like it was polished by a glacier.
Rodadero hill is made up of diorite rock of igneous origin, where you can find waterways, carved rocks and what has been revealed to be the so-called throne of the Incas that is accessed by a series of precisely carved stairs. Behind this section there are small labyrinths, tunnels and vaulted niches in the walls.
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Construction Theories
Source: Inca Architecture
[ http://www.class.uidaho.edu/arch499/nonwest/inca/index.html
In the Sacred Valley at the site of Ollantaytambo lie many unfinished blocks of ryholite. They were quarried or collected from a large rockfall 2.17 miles away across the Urubamba River. How are the massive stones quarried, transported, dressed and placed? The lack of written history leaves it up to us to figure out by observation, comparison, and experimentation.
Quarrying did not occur in the classic sense of hewing raw blocks from solid cliffs. The Inca stonemasons searched the rockslides for blocks that would suit their purposes. Often the raw blocks were partially shaped at the quarry or during transportation. Final fitting and dressing of the stones occurred at the work site.
Rough shaping of stones was accomplished by two main techniques. At the base of the ramp leading up to the Sun Temple at Ollantaytambo lie several blocks abandoned in transit. One shows small holes pecked into a natural groove into which wedges were driven to split the stone.
The other method for roughing stones was to simply carve a collar around the stone until the unwanted portion broke off. This worked on any area of the stone and didn't rely on a naturally occurring fissure.
At Ollantaytambo transporting the large blocks required them to be lowered from the quarry area, hauled across the valley floor, over the Urubamba River, and up to the Temple site.
As mentioned above there are several large stones lying at the base of a large ramp which leads up to the Temple. They are called the "Tired Stones". As evidenced by digging under other stones left in the fields, getting them to this point was accomplished by dragging them over a prepared bed of cobblestones. Vincent Lee has suggested a method for getting them up the steep ramp, turning them and bringing them to the site.
Vincent Lee developed his method while working on similar problems on Easter Island. He devised a method that employs a track of ladder-like sections for the roadbed, a sled to place the stone on, and levers to move it forward
Dressing and setting the stones in the precise way that made Inca construction so famous is also not known from written history. None of the stonemasons' methods survived to present day. Many theories have been proposed.
The most well accepted theory about how the Inca dressed the stones is that they used hammer stones to shape the blocks. Larger hammer stones were used to rough the blocks and smaller stones were used to finish and smooth the blocks. Trial experiments has proven that this is a viable method for reproducing the work of the Inca stonemasons
Setting the blocks presents an obvious problem. The stones are massive with many weighing several tons. Moving and fitting must be an efficient and simple process to be worthwhile. Many theories exist about how it was accomplished. Again Vincent Lee has proposed a reasonable solution that does not rely on space alien interventions.
Vincent Lee has proposed a process that is not far from the method used by log workers to build log cabins. Essentially a stone must be maneuvered into place above its intended placement. Then the stone may be scribed with the exact form of the placement below and lowered into place. Mr. Lee has developed a method for holding the stones in place above their eventual location. His ideas seem to work well with the small protuberances and concavities seen at the base of so many stones. His suggested scribe tool has never been seen though and any minor refitting would be difficult to perform.
Source: Inca Architecture
More about Inca Stone Technology>>
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by sree
