The Nazca Plain
This morning National Geographic Endeavour docked in the small port of Puerto San Juan. At first light we traveled inland from the coast to the Nazca Plain, site of the enigmatic Nazca Lines. We first visited ruins of centers built by inhabitants of this part of the Atacama Desert, one of the driest places on Earth. These early people, the Nazca, beginning perhaps in the second century B.C., built religious and administrative centers here using the local volcanic rocks. Later the Wari people, between the seventh and ninth centuries, built on top of these ruins, and finally the Inca, beginning in about 1450 A.D, built once again using the tightly fitting stonework characteristic of Inca sites in the high Andes such as Cuzco and Machu Picchu. Here before us was the center of three high cultures built over nearly two thousand years. What could have been so important as to bring these people here over such a long time? For what were they praying? One look at the surroundings suggested the answer: Water! For those trying to survive in this desert environment, water must have been the most important thing in their lives – more valuable than the immense quantity of gold which the Inca accumulated and which the Spanish conquistadors found so desirable that they quickly destroyed the Inca culture to obtain it.
Of course our main goal today was to fly over the Nazca Plain to see the Nacza Lines, huge depictions of animals, human-like figures and geometrical designs. What drove the Nazca to mark out these particular figures? Fortunately for us, our shipmate, Johan Reinhard, National Geographic Explorer in Residence and expert in Andean archeology, had explained to us yesterday his ideas about the figures. Johan believes that the lines were used by worshipers who walked along the pathways of the lines to places from which the gods were invoked to provide this most valuable commodity, water. Indeed particular figures such as those of a whale, a hummingbird, two pelicans and a monkey represent animals associated with wet environments. Still today the descendants of those earlier people make pilgrimages to the lines and walk them in ceremonies, which combine ancient beliefs with Catholic rites. Seeing the lines firsthand, most of us were convinced that Johan was indeed correct, and that fanciful explanations involving extra-terrestrials were hardly necessary. It was a lesson to all of us who live even in well-watered parts of our little water planet, that this commodity may indeed be the most important resource of all. Certainly for the Nazca, the Wari and the Inca, water was a sacred gift of the Earth and they showed it great reverence. Not a bad idea for the rest of us.
This morning National Geographic Endeavour docked in the small port of Puerto San Juan. At first light we traveled inland from the coast to the Nazca Plain, site of the enigmatic Nazca Lines. We first visited ruins of centers built by inhabitants of this part of the Atacama Desert, one of the driest places on Earth. These early people, the Nazca, beginning perhaps in the second century B.C., built religious and administrative centers here using the local volcanic rocks. Later the Wari people, between the seventh and ninth centuries, built on top of these ruins, and finally the Inca, beginning in about 1450 A.D, built once again using the tightly fitting stonework characteristic of Inca sites in the high Andes such as Cuzco and Machu Picchu. Here before us was the center of three high cultures built over nearly two thousand years. What could have been so important as to bring these people here over such a long time? For what were they praying? One look at the surroundings suggested the answer: Water! For those trying to survive in this desert environment, water must have been the most important thing in their lives – more valuable than the immense quantity of gold which the Inca accumulated and which the Spanish conquistadors found so desirable that they quickly destroyed the Inca culture to obtain it.
Of course our main goal today was to fly over the Nazca Plain to see the Nacza Lines, huge depictions of animals, human-like figures and geometrical designs. What drove the Nazca to mark out these particular figures? Fortunately for us, our shipmate, Johan Reinhard, National Geographic Explorer in Residence and expert in Andean archeology, had explained to us yesterday his ideas about the figures. Johan believes that the lines were used by worshipers who walked along the pathways of the lines to places from which the gods were invoked to provide this most valuable commodity, water. Indeed particular figures such as those of a whale, a hummingbird, two pelicans and a monkey represent animals associated with wet environments. Still today the descendants of those earlier people make pilgrimages to the lines and walk them in ceremonies, which combine ancient beliefs with Catholic rites. Seeing the lines firsthand, most of us were convinced that Johan was indeed correct, and that fanciful explanations involving extra-terrestrials were hardly necessary. It was a lesson to all of us who live even in well-watered parts of our little water planet, that this commodity may indeed be the most important resource of all. Certainly for the Nazca, the Wari and the Inca, water was a sacred gift of the Earth and they showed it great reverence. Not a bad idea for the rest of us.
