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Peru Ministry of Culture
Excavators stand near a newly discovered temple at the archeological site El Paraíso in Peru.
By Live Science
Archaeologists in Peru have uncovered what they believe is a temple, estimated to be up to 5,000 years old, at the site of El Paraíso, north of Lima.
Inside the ruins of the ancient room, which measures about 23 feet by 26 feet (7 meters by 8 meters), there's evidence of a ceremonial hearth, where offerings may have been burned, archaeologists say. The temple also had a narrow entrance and stone walls covered with yellow clay, on which traces of red paint were found, according to a statement from Peru's Ministry of Culture.
El Paraíso, located on the central coast of Peru, just north of Lima, is a site made up of 10 buildings stretching over 123 acres (50 hectares). It's one of the earliest known examples of monumental stone architecture in the Americas, dating back to the Late Preceramic period (3500-1800 B.C.). The newly found building is thought to date back to 3000 B.C., which should be confirmed with a radiocarbon analysis.
Rafael Varón, Peru's deputy minister for culture, said in a statement that the discovery of the temple "has particular importance because it is the first structure of this type found on the central coast." It suggests that the Lima region had more religious, economic and political importance during this early period than previously thought, Varón added.
Peru Ministry of Culture
The ruins of El Paraíso in Peru, estimated to be 5,000 years old.
Previously, man-made mounds shaped like orcas, condors and even a duck were discovered in Peru's coastal valleys, including at El Paraíso, by anthropologist Robert Benfer, professor emeritus of the University of Missouri, who spotted the mounds in satellite photos. One curious mound found in El Paraíso in the Chillón Valley was of a condor head whose burned-charcoal eye was likely the place where offerings were once burned. The condor was also positioned to line up with the most extreme orientation of the Milky Way as seen from the Chillón Valley. [See Photos of the Animal Mounds]
A second mound, right next to the condor, looked like a combination of a puma and alligatorlike cayman, Benfer said. That one was oriented toward the spot where the sun rises on the day of the June solstice, the start of summer.
Dating to more than 4,000 years ago, the structures may be the oldest evidence of animal mounds outside of North America, Benfer said last year. The previous oldest animal structures date to about 2,000 years ago, part of the Nazca Lines. These lines are simple stone outlines of animals decorating the Nazca Desert in Peru.
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Leave a Comment:
Pushing back the edges of civilizations, eh ? -joe
mi familia....hehehe
The earth is way older than we think. So are ancient civs, like this one, and Indus River valley. We may not be alone, the proof is right in front of us, but its so unbelievable we discard the theory.
I don't think the earth is "way older than we think" or that there's aliens or anything like that. But I have wondered, were there civilizations before the start of the last ice age? The glaciers probably started coming down around 100,000 years ago, and hung around till 20,000 years ago. The earliest known civilizations started popping up alongside the barley right after the ice left (probably to make beer). But what about before 100,000 years ago? Modern humans were certainly around back then, and had long since left Africa. The ice would have obliterated anything they built.
100,000 year old remains are often found, but regarding people, the remains are usually just fosilized bones. Imagine if you were thrown back naked into a subsistence existence in a forest or jungle - if you were lucky, you'd figure out how to fashion crude tools and get enough food to live on. You'd likely not, with all your great brain power and knowledge, be able to build anything like a stone temple, and you wouldn't waste the effort since stone temples don't give you food.
The real stunning thing is that we built civilizations at all, so stunning that some have to credit space aliens and others an inter-active God. I think people of that time were pretty amazing. They built things (slowly, of course) that no one told them to build. People invented civilization for themselves on their own with no foreknowledge or models to follow. They created moral codes for themselves. They created gods, of course, hundreds of them, but the creation of gods was merely a tool to help them create so much more important stuff than gods.
I'm no expert, but I would think the June Solstice in the Southern hemisphere would mark the beginning of winter, not summer.
This stuff is facinating!!! Just how far back do we go?
There were so called Aliens wayyyyy back when, and they're still with us today! My guess is, we came back to help what we started, so many years ago? We watched our experiment grow. We are still watching us today! WE, are the aliens, i do believe that!!!
But what happened where we live, out there? Why did we come to this planet, and start a new line of human beings? So many questions, so few answers!!!
Just a small piece of the BIG PICTURE, which is a smaller piece of the BIG PUZZLE.