How the stone balls were found
The balls were first talked about in the 1930s, when the United Fruit Company cleared the jungle for banana plantations and other fruit plants. Company workers found the balls and, remembering a local legend about spheres covering golden cores, tried to crack them with dynamite, hoping to find the gold hidden inside.Ball Research
1948 - Dr. Samuel Lothrop of the Peabody Museum at Harvard University and his wife undertook a comprehensive study of the stone spheres. 1963 - research results were published. In his report, Lothrop described all 186 known specimens and noted that he had heard that there were another 45 balls somewhere in the Yalaka area, where they were located, but they were transported somewhere.Several spheres were also discovered in the Pacific Ocean on Cano Island, 12.5 miles to the southwest. This may confirm the version that several hundred such stones were once created. Beginning in the 1940s, stone spheres began to be transported - often moving around railway from one end of the country to the other. Some of them can be seen in the National Museum, others in the parks and gardens of the country's capital, San Jose. To date, only six Costa Rican stone balls are known to remain where they were found.
Scientific analysis of Costa Rican stone balls has been going on for decades. Work began in 1943 by archaeologist Doris Zemurray-Stone, the daughter of Samuel Zemurray, the founder of the United Fruit Company. She conducted research on stones found by fruit company workers, and later became director of the National Museum of Costa Rica and in 1943 her work was published in American Antiquity magazine. There were 5 maps of the area, on which 44 stone balls were placed.
According to Stone, these balls could be cult statues, tombstones, or were elements of some kind of calendar. Lothrop's 1963 publication also included maps of the sites where the spheres were found, data comparative analysis pottery and metal artifacts related to stone balls discovered nearby, as well as many photographs and drawings of the balls, data on their sizes and notes on the location of the spheres.
Archaeological excavations
Later, in the 50s. XX century, were carried out archaeological excavations, thanks to which stone balls were discovered in the south of Costa Rica along with pottery and other artifacts related to the cultures of pre-Columbian America. Since that time, research has been carried out regularly, but the most thorough excavations were carried out by archaeologist Iphigenia Quintanilla from the National Museum of Costa Rica in the years 90–95 of the 20th century.
Versions of the origin of stone balls
For many years, archaeologists have been trying to figure out the origin of these strange balls. It remains a matter of debate whether they are natural objects or man-made. Some geologists claim that the spheres are of natural origin. They put forward a theory according to which magma rising into the air after a volcanic eruption settles on a hot, ash-covered valley, then the magma balls cool and form spheres.According to another version, the granite blocks were located in specially dug holes at the bottom of a huge waterfall and, under the influence of the flow of falling water, over time they acquired an almost ideal spherical shape.
However, a more likely version is that the stones were created by humans, especially considering that granodiorite, from which the balls are mainly made, is not found in these places. Deposits of this rock are found in the Talamanca mountain range, approximately 50 miles from the discovery site.
Archaeologist Iphigenia Quintanilla, during field research, was able to establish the source of the raw materials: she discovered boulders that can be called unfinished specimens of stone balls. During the excavations of Quintanilla, fragments of balls were also discovered, which made it possible to reconstruct the method of their creation. To give the stones a rounded shape, they most likely did this: first, a boulder of approximately round shape was alternately exposed to heat and cold until cracks began to appear in the rock, then the surface was leveled using heavy stone sledgehammers, possibly made from the same material, and polished with some kind of stone tool.
There is only one objection: the stones have an almost perfect spherical shape. They are hewn to within “0.5 inches ±0.2%.” The version could be flawless if the spheres were not carved with such precision. However, the surface of the boulders is not absolutely ideal: the diameters of some of them differ by 5 cm from the parameters of a regular sphere. It is also unclear how the inhabitants of pre-Columbian America could transport and install them in the right places. This kind of skill indicates a highly developed culture and a well-organized community (although if the stones were carved directly from a quarry in the mountains, rolling the balls down would not be particularly difficult).
So who created these balls?
The question of who could create these mysterious spheres and why is more difficult task. According to archaeological data, spheres were carved over 2 periods. The earlier of these, the Aguas Buenas period (100–500 CE), only has a few balls. Most of the stone balls in the lowlands of the Terraba River were created in the second period - the Chiriqui (800-1500). But this cannot help in any way to clarify the purpose of the spheres.Let's ignore such a convenient explanation as the intervention of aliens and Atlanteans. The original theory is that they were created by a highly developed prehistoric culture and served as antennas for the ancient worldwide electrical network. But without concrete evidence, such a theory is groundless and seems as mythical as the legend that local residents there was a potion that was able to soften rocks.
Why were the Costa Rican stone balls created?
It is not precisely established why these spheres were created. This is especially difficult to find out because most of the balls have been transported to other places. This issue is important because the arrangement of the balls appears to have played an important role in the lives of the people who created them. It should be noted that initially many balls were placed so that each place corresponded to the position of the Sun, Moon and all the planets known at that time. There is even a version that they reflected the entire solar system.
In the 1940s, while studying the balls, Lothrop noticed that some of them had rolled down nearby hills where there had once been homes. Probably, the spheres at one time were located in the center of settlements, on the tops of hills. In this case, they could not be used in astronomy and, of course, in navigation. Most likely, for more than thousand-year history existence, stone balls performed many functions, which changed over time. An interesting theory is that the labor-intensive production of the balls could itself be an important ritual process. At the same time, it played the same role (and perhaps even more significant) as, in fact, its result.
These days
2001 - with the assistance of various government organizations National Museum Costa Rica began transporting the balls over a high mountain range from San Jose to the area where they were found. Nowadays they are protected in storage, but when it is built cultural center, spheres will be placed in it and they can be seen in the very places where they were originally located in the Diquis River delta.Archaeologists still find balls in the muddy sediments of the Diquis River delta. These days, stone balls can be seen in museums in Costa Rica, they decorate the lawns in front of various official buildings, hospitals and schools. Two of them were taken to the USA: one is exhibited in the museum of the National Geographical Society(Washington, DC), and the other is located in the courtyard of the Peabody Museum of Archeology and Ethnography at Harvard University (Cambridge, Massachusetts). Costa Rican stone balls also decorate the gardens of the rich as symbols of their status in society.
30s of the XX century, Costa Rica. A group of workers from the famous United Fruit Company is clearing dense thickets of tropical plants to establish another banana plantation.
And suddenly... Among wild jungle people stumble upon something unimaginable - huge stone balls of absolutely regular shape.
The diameter of these “balls” was about three meters, and their weight was approximately 16 tons. True, it later turned out that there were medium and small specimens nearby – up to the size of a child’s ball.
And then another mystery arose. It turns out that the spheres are not located chaotically, but in a certain order. Some rows formed straight lines, others formed triangles and parallelograms.
In 1967, such balls were found in Mexico in silver mines - only these artifacts were even larger. And in Guatemala, on the high mountain plateau of Acqua Blanca, for the time being, hundreds of huge stone sculptures of ideal shape were also hidden.
Subsequently, something similar began to be discovered almost everywhere: in the USA, New Zealand, Egypt, Romania, Germany, Brazil, Kazakhstan, and Franz Josef Land. And more recently - on the territory of Russia: in Siberia, Krasnodar Territory and Volgograd Region.
Workers had barely discovered the stones in Costa Rica when American archaeologist Doris Stone arrived there. In 1943, her observations and conclusions were published in an academic journal of US archeology.
And Samuel Lothrop, an archaeologist at Harvard University, began studying stone spheres in 1948. In 1963, the results of his research were published: maps of the areas where the balls were located, descriptions of pottery and metal objects found next to them, as well as many photographs and drawings.
Modern scientists have continued this research work, but there is still no clear answer to the most basic questions: what are the balls, where did they come from and what did they serve?
Multi-ton “balls” played by the gods
The famous Swiss writer and ufologist Erich von Däniken called the balls “balls played by the gods,” and, perhaps, this fantastic formula is closest to the truth, because it is almost impossible to explain their origin from the point of view of science and common sense.
Geologists attribute the appearance of the “balls” to volcanic activity, arguing that a ball of such an ideal shape can be formed if the crystallization of volcanic magma during an eruption occurs evenly. But this version does not fit the fact that the balls clearly have traces of grinding, and, in addition, they are not laid chaotically, but according to some kind of system. And one more objection - “round stones” are also found in places where no volcanic activity is observed at all.
Archaeologists, unlike geologists, recognize that stone spheres were not produced by nature, but by people. According to scientists, the “balls” were made from round boulders in several stages. First they were heated, then processed with stone tools and finally polished to a shine, removing all roughness.
Archaeologist Samuel Lothrop said: “Obviously, the balls are the products of the high quality. They are so perfect that measuring the diameters showed no difference.”
Cosmodrome or “cash”?
Researchers are wondering: what did these mysterious formations serve for? Some believe that they were installed in front of the houses of noble people as a symbol of their power, or that the stone balls were related to certain cults and sacrifices.
Interestingly, in Costa Rica, one group of four balls was aligned along a line pointing due north. A number of archaeologists suggest that this is evidence that the creators of the spheres were familiar with such science as astronomy, and that the spheres themselves somehow interacted with space. This version is confirmed by the fact that the Mayans, who once lived in Costa Rica, were outstanding astronomers. They accurately divided the year into seasonal cycles, observed the movements of the planets, and compiled star charts with more or less fixed coordinates of celestial objects.
Some are even sure that the stone spheres represent a map of the starry sky and, accordingly, serve as “beacons” for spaceships. There is also an opinion that the balls had a topographical function - they played the role of landmarks for travelers and marked the boundaries of certain territories.
There is an exotic version that the balls were used as money - after all, some tribes still have stone “cash”. Spheres different sizes- these are just “coins” of different denominations - from the most expensive to small “pennies”.
Looking for gold
These days it is very difficult to refute or confirm one or another version. During research, agricultural work and just for the sake of pampering, almost all the balls were moved from their original places. Numerous connoisseurs of antiquities stole smaller “balls” to decorate their gardens and courtyards.
Much damage to science was done after someone started a rumor that there was gold inside the balls. Of course, no one “dug up” the precious metals inside them, but a huge part of the unique objects was irretrievably lost.
In addition to all the other unsolved mysteries, it remains unclear when the balls “came into being.” Archaeologists often determine the date of origin of artifacts by the cultural layer in which they were discovered. But the balls are found in completely different layers, which date back to 200 BC. before 1500 AD
However, many researchers are confident that the “balls” were made much earlier. American scientist George Erickson claims that ancient craftsmen produced them more than 12 thousand years ago. This is also proven by artifacts recovered from seabed, where they could appear, most likely, only at a time when there was land there.
Another mystery is the method of transporting the balls from the place of manufacture to the place of installation. According to scientists, this distance was sometimes tens of kilometers, and heavy stone products had to be transported through the jungle, swamps and rivers.
It is unknown whether the secrets of the “balls of the gods” will ever be solved. The researchers themselves doubt this. Archaeologist Doris Stone once said: “We must classify the stone balls as incomprehensible megalithic mysteries.”
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Stone balls of Costa Rica
Another megalithic mystery, which, among similar ones, again turned out to be completely insoluble for modern adherents of academic science, was the mystery of the stone balls of Costa Rica. And in front of me - there were so many of them: ancient flying machines, and the pyramids of Egypt, and Stonehenge, and Karnak, and Mitla, and the labyrinths of the North - you can’t list everything, again and again the eternal question arises - will I be able to cope with this task? , will I solve this ancient crossword puzzle? And as it happened with others: at first, it was as if everything was in darkness, and then more and more, first small, and then larger details of clarity appeared... And then, you see, this is the result!
But, everything is in order.
At the end of the 30s of the last century, a report appeared in one of the local newspapers about an unexpected discovery in the jungles of Costa Rica, this small Central American republic. It turns out that while cutting a clearing, the workers of a fruit company came across a scattering of stone balls that had appeared out of nowhere. Among them were huge ones, reaching 3 m in diameter and almost 16 tons in weight, and there were also very small ones, no more than 10 cm in diameter. There was also a curiosity: the workers who discovered these objects remembered a local legend about the spheres covering the golden cores, and tried to split them with dynamite, hoping to find, like Balaganov and Panikovsky, the gold hidden inside. But, for some reason, their expectations were not justified, nothing foreign was found in the core, everything was just solid stone.
Original location of stone balls discovery
The stone balls were originally found in the delta of the Terraba River near the cities of Palmar Sur and Palmar Norte. Subsequently, it turned out that they are scattered throughout Costa Rica from the north (Estrella Valley) to the south (Coto Colorado River).
Several balls were found in the Diquis River delta, others were discovered in the Jalisco region near the city of Aulaluco de Mercazo in Mexico, in the area of the city of Los Alamos and in the state of New Mexico (USA). It should be noted that all these areas are characterized by quite active volcanic activity...
In 1967, an engineer who worked in the silver mines of Western Mexico and was interested in history and archeology, told scientists from the United States that he had discovered the same balls in the mines as in Costa Rica, but significantly more large sizes. In his opinion, they were made by the Aztecs. This sensational statement had the effect of a bomb exploding. Then in Guatemala, on the Acqua Blanca plateau, located at an altitude of 2000 m above sea level, near the village of Guadalajara, an archaeological expedition discovered hundreds of balls that were an exact copy of the Costa Rican ones.
Stone sphere in the courtyard of the National Museum of Costa Rica
Scientists managed to find similar stone balls in completely different places on our planet - in the Kashkadarya region of Kazakhstan, Egypt (Kharga oasis), Romania (Costesti), Germany (Eifel), Brazil (Korupa deposit), Chile, New Zealand and even on Franz Josef Land (Champ Island). And in 2008-2009, they began to be found in Russia - in Siberia, the Krasnodar Territory and the Volgograd Region.
As you can see, there are a lot of stone spheres on Earth. But still, Costa Rica’s balls are considered the most unique of these products. Their quality is admirable: some have such an absolutely correct shape and smooth surface that the question involuntarily arises: how were they made? And what is their purpose?
The National Museum of Costa Rica has a catalog that includes about 130 spherical stones that are still preserved. But there are many more balls that are not included in the lists. In general, more than 300 stone spheres have been found in Costa Rica. Undoubtedly, many are yet to be found: they are hidden underground and in dense jungles.
The counting of these ancient monuments caused a number of difficulties: many of them were removed from their original places and are now located one by one in gardens and temples. Other similar stone artifacts adorn official buildings in Costa Rica, such as the Legislative Assembly, or hospitals and schools. They can be found in museums, as well as in the estates of wealthy residents of the republic. Two balls are also on display in the United States: one of them is in the museum of the National Geographic Society in Washington, the other in the courtyard of the Museum of Archeology and Ethnography at Harvard University.
Location geometry
The very first studies showed that the balls were located, as a rule, in groups of three to forty-five pieces. Many of the balls, some of them in groups, were found on top of mounds. But the most amazing thing happened next. Costa Rican scientists, interested in the stone balls, decided to look at the discovery site from above, from the air. The helicopter rose above the jungle - and suddenly a page from a geometry textbook, stretching for tens of kilometers, seemed to float underneath it. Strings of balls formed into giant triangles, squares, parallelograms, circles... They lined up in straight lines, some precisely oriented along the north-south axis...
These geometric constructions were then used to put forward some hypotheses of functionality.
Hypothesis 1. The balls are arranged in groups, like models of certain constellations. It is possible that these bizarre stone mosaics of balls were intended for astronomical observations related to calendar calculations and determining the timing of agricultural work. In this case, it is quite appropriate to assume that somewhere nearby there existed a highly developed civilization - the predecessor of all the ancient civilizations of Central America.
Hypothesis 2: As already stated, one group of four balls was aligned along a line oriented toward magnetic north. This has led some scientists to speculate that they may have been placed by people familiar with the use of magnetic compasses or celestial orientation.
In general, there have been plenty of versions of the functional purpose of stone balls. I am not going to comment on them, just, in addition to the above 2 hypotheses, I will list others:
the arranged balls are like constellations, they are symbols of celestial bodies, a reflection of the entire solar system;
the balls served to mark the boundaries between the lands of different tribes;
these are navigation instruments of a highly developed ancient civilization - Atlantis;
stone spheres are symbols of social status;
Or maybe these were the balls of the gods when they played their game?
guests from other cosmic worlds chose this place of accumulation of balls as their permanent cosmodrome, and the huge spheres are located in the form of boundary lines because they performed a function similar to the current landing strips of airfields;
some archaeologists believed that under the balls there could be some kind of capsules with messages from our alien brothers in mind, left by them when they finally decided to leave our planet;
most likely, over more than a thousand-year history of existence, the spheres performed many functions that changed over time;
An interesting version is that the labor-intensive production of balls in itself could be an important ritual process. Moreover, it played the same role (and maybe even more significant) as, in fact, its result;
The ancient inhabitants of Costa Rica were surprisingly warlike and possessed powerful technical military means. For example, they could have throwing weapons of exceptional power. Stone balls are just "projectiles" scattered on the battlefield. Maybe it wasn’t even a battle, but military exercises (maneuvers) took place here; a huge field is a kind of training ground for throwing weapons.
Difficulties. By now, almost all groups have already been destroyed, so measurements taken about fifty years ago cannot be verified for accuracy. Virtually all known balls have been moved from their original location by agricultural activities, destroying information about their archaeological contexts and possible groups. Some of the balls were blown up and destroyed by local treasure hunters who believed fables that the balls contained gold. The balls were rolled into ravines and gorges or even under water on sea coast.
Question: where did they come from?
Scientists are still engaged in fierce debate about the balls; there are many versions of their appearance, but none of them has yet been confirmed. But, there are 2 main versions - natural and artificial.
Version – geological natural formations
According to it, it is believed that 25-40 million years ago, several dozen volcanoes suddenly awoke in Central America. Their eruptions caused catastrophic earthquakes. Lava and hot ash covered vast areas. It was then that the glassy particles ejected from the volcanoes began to cool. They, they say, were the embryos of giant spheres. Around these nucleoli, surrounding particles of eruption products gradually began to crystallize. Moreover, crystallization proceeded evenly in all directions, so that a ball with an ideal shape gradually formed.
And then nature acted - through factors such as water, wind and rain, which washed away the ashes and soil day after day. Thanks to this, over time, the “whitened” stone balls ended up on the surface. For example, it has been established that in areas of the Earth with large daily temperature differences (fluctuations), ordinary weathering, called exofolization, works very effectively. In this case, the rocks are destroyed spontaneously in a “falling husk” type, that is, the outer layers of the rock formation are gradually separated, like the peel of an onion, which, in the end, allows only the solid spherical core to remain “alone.”
If the centers of the balls were located close to each other, then the stone spheres could even grow together with one another. And to confirm this guess, several such balls were found fused together.
Thus, not some unfounded assumption appeared to explain the origin of the stone balls, but a completely substantiated hypothesis. It would seem that the mystery of the origin of the stone spheres has ceased to exist, but not everything is as simple as it seems at first glance...
And all because this – geological – version does not fit the fact that the balls clearly have traces of grinding, and, in addition, they are clearly laid according to some kind of system. And one more objection - balls are also found in places where no volcanic activity is observed at all. And the main thing here is that the version is not able to explain through volcanic activity the emergence of balls from a material such as granite.
In addition, many balls are made of granodiorite, a hard, coarse-grained rock of igneous origin that is intermediate in mineral composition between granite and quartz diorite. The granodiorite deposit is located in the foothills of the Talamanca mountain range. But this factor plays precisely against the geological version: in the area where the balls were found, such material is absent, and granodiorite deposits are found no closer than 50 miles from the place where the megaliths were found.
There are several balls made of coquina, a hard material similar to limestone that is formed in coastal sediments from shells and sand. Perhaps these balls were brought inland from the Terraba River delta.
The spherical formations of the Urals are natural geological objects
And these are also natural objects
Version – manual production
Archaeologists, unlike geologists, recognize that the balls were made not by nature, but by people. And they believe that these balls were made and placed by very skillful people. But what tools did the ancient craftsmen use to give the stone the correct spherical shape? Suddenly he stood before the scientists incredible fact: except for stone spheres in this area there was not a single object indicating the presence of a person ever here. No tools for working stone, no shards, no bones were found. Nothing!
And, developing the version, it is believed that the balls were made from huge boulders, which were processed into a spherical shape by breaking off parts and grinding. Granodiorite exfoliates with sudden changes in temperature. To remove a thick layer of material, the workpiece must be heated, for example with hot coals, and then quickly cooled with water. When the boulder is already close to spherical in shape, the material is removed by striking it with the same hard material. Finally, the last stage of processing is polishing to a shine. This process is similar to that used to produce stone axes and stone statues and is believed to have been achieved without the use of metal tools, laser meters or alien helpers. To top it all off, the ball could be polished with sand or leather.
As one serious scientist explained, I will not propagate his name, the balls are larger " created by the most skilled craftsmen, and their shape is so close to perfection that measuring the diameters using a tape measure and a plumb line did not reveal any inaccuracies" He also says that the natives had mathematical abilities, extensive knowledge of stone processing and knew how to use tools. But since those tribes, apparently, did not have a written language, there are no records about the technology for making balls, and information about the manufacturing method, naturally, has not reached us.
The question is when?
Besides all the other unsolved mysteries, it remains unclear when the balls were made. For such items, radiocarbon dating is not applicable, which is used to date only biological remains. Therefore, the determination of the age of the stone spheres was made using accompanying objects that were found along with them in archaeological layers. The stone balls were found in pottery beds from the Aguas Buenas culture, which dates from approximately 200 BC to 800 AD. Stone balls have been found in burials with gold decorations dating back to around 1000 AD. They were also found in beds containing shards of Chiriqui period pottery, dating back to 800 BC. to 800 AD This type of pottery has been found with iron tools from the colonial period, produced up until the 16th century. Thus, the balls could be made at any time and during any foreseeable period.
The age of the stone balls is unknown
However, many of the researchers are sure that they were made much earlier - in the most ancient times. US scientist D. Erikson claims that the balls appeared more than 12 thousand years ago. This is supposedly proven by the finds of balls on the seabed, where they were installed at a time when there was still land here...
Who made it?
The balls are believed to have most likely been made by the ancestors of the peoples who lived here before the Spanish conquest. These people spoke the Chibchan language and lived in an area from modern-day eastern Honduras to northern Colombia. Their current descendants include the Boruca, Teribe and Guaymi peoples. These people lived in isolated settlements that rarely consisted of more than 2,000 people. They fished, hunted and agriculture. Crops grown included corn, cassava (a shrub whose roots produce a nutritious meal), beans, squash (a type of summer squash), papaya, pineapple, avocado, chili peppers, cocoa, and many other fruits, roots, and medicinal plants. They lived in mostly round houses with foundations made of river cobblestones.
And in order to claim that it was they who created these mysterious spheres, you need to have more evidence than you have, and therefore the answer to this question remains an unsolvable task.
Transportation method
Another mystery is the method of transporting the balls from the place of manufacture to the place of installation. According to scientists, sometimes this distance was tens of kilometers, and the balls had to be delivered through the jungle, swamps, rivers...
How were such blocks transported? What devices were used to “roll” the balls from place to place, making precise balls out of them? geometric shapes? Unfortunately, there were no satisfactory answers to these questions.
If blanks for balls were obtained from quarries, stone craftsmen, presumably, had to carefully monitor their descent. How can such a heavy load be moved such a long distance without modern technology? If granite was mined in a quarry and then transported, then almost a three-meter cube, which was required for a ball with a diameter of 2.4 meters, weighed 24 tons! Probably, the natives had to build the wide, smooth road necessary for transporting the blocks through the dense jungle, which again is not an easy task! Other balls are made of shell rock, a material much like the limestone found on the sea coast near the mouth of the Diquis River. Then it turns out that the rock was floated 50 kilometers upstream. Balls were also found on Caño Island, located approximately 20 kilometers from the Pacific coast, etc.
Researchers
The first to study the balls was the archaeologist from the USA D. Stone, who arrived in Costa Rica immediately after the discovery stone artifacts. And in 1943, in an academic journal on archeology, he published his observations and conclusions, which, which would turn out to be characteristic of all future studies and researchers, end with the words: " We must classify the perfect spheres of Costa Rica as incomprehensible megalithic mysteries"Everything is exactly the same as what another archeological authority, now the Frenchman P. Gio, spoke about other stone products a little later: " ...megaliths are a nightmare for archaeologists" And it’s impossible to disagree with them.
Then there were many followers and continuers of the study of stone balls, and an inquisitive reader who is ready to dive deeper into the topic can always find reports of their expeditions and materials of work in print. For this article, suffice it to say that apart from replenishing the statistics of finds, describing the locations of these stone products, and studying the accompanying cultural layers, no solid scientific conclusions were ever made. Just as before, the main questions remained unanswered: who?, when? and why? made these stones.
So, attempts to scientifically analyze the stone balls of Costa Rica have been going on for more than 60 years. But, as they say, things are still there...
Not long ago, the question of assigning the status of a World Heritage Site to these ancient artifacts was raised to UNESCO. D. Hoopes, associate professor of anthropology at the University of Kansas and director of theGlobal Indigenous Nations Studies Program.
Scientist D. Hoopes next to an ancient stone riddle
And he, having carried out the necessary research with his colleagues, upon returning from a trip to Costa Rica, made a report at UNESCO, excerpts from which are given below.
The earliest reports of these stones date back to the late 19th century, but these reports were not scientifically confirmed until the 1930s, so they can be considered a relatively recent discovery, Hoopes said. - Official science dates the stones to 600-1000 AD, but they all appeared before the Spanish Colonization of America. We determine the age of the balls by the style of manufacture and radiocarbon dating of objects that are found with the balls. One of the problems with this technique is that it reports the date the balls were last used, but not the date they were created. These objects may have been used for centuries and are still in the same places for thousands of years. Therefore, it is very difficult to determine the exact date of creation.
According to Hoopes, pseudoscientists have distorted the general understanding of stone balls. For example, some publications claimed that the stones belonged to the “vanished” continent of Atlantis. Others suggested that the balls were navigational devices, or that they were associated with Stonehenge, or with the giant heads from Easter Island.
Myths, based on a variety of incredible theories about imaginary ancient civilizations or alien visits, Hoopes categorically rejected. However, in return, he did not present a single version of himself that would shed any light on the solution to the Costa Rican balls.
We really don't know why they were made,” Hoopes admitted. “The people who made them left no written records. We can only speculate based on historical dates and reconstruction of the environment. The culture of the people who made them disappeared soon after the Spanish Conquest. Therefore, there are no myths or legends left about why these balls were made.
The only mystery that the scientist was allegedly able to explain was the method of their manufacture.
Most likely, the main techniques were hammering, drilling and stone grinding, Hoopes explained. - Some balls were found with traces of hammer blows on them. We believe that this is how they were created: by hitting large stones with a hammer and carving them into spherical shapes.
So, this one, if I may say so, “the head of the balls,” under the pressure of questions from members of the UNESCO commission, but not forgetting to throw a handful of dirt at ufologists, both himself and his science signed for complete professional insolvency and helplessness. So who should be called false and pseudoscientists, if not such hoopes?
So, modern researchers have no answer yet. Therefore, the question of assigning object status to balls world heritage also remained open.
The mystery of the stone balls of Costa Rica
The Stone Balls of Costa Rica are strange, perfectly round stone formations discovered in the 1930s, one of the great mysteries of pre-Columbian America. Hundreds of these stone balls, ranging in size from a few centimeters to 7 feet in diameter, the largest of which weighs 16 tons, were discovered in the Diquis area of Palma Sur, near the Pacific coast of southern Costa Rica. Most are made from granodiorite, an igneous rock similar to granite. But a few examples are carved from shell rock, a type of limestone consisting mainly of shells and their fragments.
How the stone balls were found
The balls were first talked about in the 1930s, when the United Fruit Company cleared the jungle for banana plantations and other fruit plants. Company workers found the balls and, remembering a local legend about spheres covering golden cores, tried to crack them with dynamite, hoping to find the gold hidden inside.
Ball Research
1948 - Dr. Samuel Lothrop of the Peabody Museum at Harvard University and his wife began a comprehensive study of stone spheres. 1963 - research results were published. In his report, Lothrop described all 186 known specimens and noted that he had heard that there were another 45 balls somewhere in the Yalaka area, where they were located, but they were transported somewhere.
Several spheres were also discovered in the Pacific Ocean on Cano Island, 12.5 miles to the southwest. This may confirm the version that several hundred such stones were once created. Beginning in the 1940s, stone spheres began to be transported, often by rail from one end of the country to the other. Some of them can be seen in the National Museum, others in the parks and gardens of the country's capital, San Jose. To date, only six Costa Rican stone balls are known to remain where they were found.
Scientific analysis of Costa Rican stone balls has been going on for decades. Work began in 1943 by archaeologist Doris Zemurray-Stone, the daughter of Samuel Zemurray, the founder of the United Fruit Company. She conducted research on stones found by fruit company workers, and later became director of the National Museum of Costa Rica and in 1943 her work was published in American Antiquity magazine. There were 5 maps of the area, on which 44 stone balls were placed.
According to Stone, these balls could be cult statues, tombstones, or were elements of some kind of calendar. Lothrop's 1963 publication also included maps of the sites where the spheres were found, a comparative analysis of nearby pottery and metal artifacts related to the stone balls, and many photographs and drawings of the balls, their dimensions, and notes on their locations. spheres
Archaeological excavations
Later, in the 50s. XX century, archaeological excavations were carried out, thanks to which stone balls were discovered in the south of Costa Rica along with pottery and other artifacts related to the cultures of pre-Columbian America. Since that time, research has been carried out regularly, but the most thorough excavations were carried out by archaeologist Iphigenia Quintanilla from the National Museum of Costa Rica in the years 90–95 of the 20th century.
Versions of the origin of stone balls
For many years, archaeologists have been trying to figure out the origin of these strange balls. Whether they are natural objects or man-made remains a matter of debate. Some geologists claim that the spheres are of natural origin. They put forward a theory according to which magma rising into the air after a volcanic eruption settles on a hot, ash-covered valley, then the magma balls cool and form spheres.
According to another version, the granite blocks were located in specially dug holes at the bottom of a huge waterfall and, under the influence of the flow of falling water, over time they acquired an almost ideal spherical shape.
However, a more likely version is that the stones were created by humans, especially considering that granodiorite, from which the balls are mainly made, is not found in these places. Deposits of this rock are found in the Talamanca mountain range, approximately 50 miles from the discovery site.
Archaeologist Iphigenia Quintanilla, during field research, was able to establish the source of the raw materials: she discovered boulders that can be called unfinished specimens of stone balls. During the excavations of Quintanilla, fragments of balls were also discovered, which made it possible to reconstruct the method of their creation. To give the stones a rounded shape, they most likely did this: first, a boulder of approximately round shape was alternately exposed to heat and cold until cracks began to appear in the rock, then the surface was leveled using heavy stone sledgehammers, possibly made from the same material, and polished with some kind of stone tool.
There is only one objection: the stones have an almost perfect spherical shape. They are hewn to within “0.5 inches ±0.2%.” The version could be flawless if the spheres were not carved with such precision. However, the surface of the boulders is not absolutely ideal: the diameters of some of them differ by 5 cm from the parameters of a regular sphere. It is also unclear how the inhabitants of pre-Columbian America could transport and install them in the right places. This kind of skill indicates a highly developed culture and a well-organized community (although if the stones were carved directly from a quarry in the mountains, rolling the balls down would not be particularly difficult).
So who created these balls?
The question of who could create these mysterious spheres and why is a more difficult task. According to archaeological data, spheres were carved over 2 periods. The earlier of these, the Aguas Buenas period (100–500 CE), only has a few balls. Most of the stone balls in the lowlands of the Terraba River were created in the second period - the Chiriqui (800-1500). But this cannot help in any way to clarify the purpose of the spheres.
Let's ignore such a convenient explanation as the intervention of aliens and Atlanteans. The original theory is that they were created by a highly developed prehistoric culture and served as antennas for the ancient worldwide electrical network. But without concrete evidence, such a theory is groundless and seems as mythical as the legend that local residents had a potion that was able to soften rocks.
Why were the Costa Rican stone balls created?
It is not precisely established why these spheres were created. This is especially difficult to find out because most of the balls have been transported to other places. This issue is important because the arrangement of the balls appears to have played an important role in the lives of the people who created them. It should be noted that initially many balls were placed so that each place corresponded to the position of the Sun, Moon and all the planets known at that time. There is even a version that they reflected the entire solar system.
In the 1940s, while studying the balls, Lothrop noticed that some of them had rolled down nearby hills where there had once been homes. Probably, the spheres at one time were located in the center of settlements, on the tops of hills. In this case, they could not be used in astronomy and, of course, in navigation. Most likely, over more than a thousand-year history of existence, stone balls performed many functions, which changed over time. An interesting theory is that the labor-intensive production of the balls could itself be an important ritual process. At the same time, it played the same role (and perhaps even more significant) as, in fact, its result.
These days
2001 - With the assistance of various government agencies, the National Museum of Costa Rica began transporting the balls from San Jose through the high mountain range to the places where they were found. Nowadays they are protected in storage, but when the cultural center is built, the spheres will be placed in it and they can be seen in the very places where they were originally located in the Diquis River delta.
Archaeologists still find balls in the muddy sediments of the Diquis River delta. These days, stone balls can be seen in museums in Costa Rica, they decorate the lawns in front of various official buildings, hospitals and schools. Two of them were taken to the United States: one is on display at the National Geographic Society Museum (Washington, DC), and the other is in the courtyard of the Peabody Museum of Archeology and Ethnography at Harvard University (Cambridge, Massachusetts). Costa Rican stone balls also decorate the gardens of the rich as symbols of their status in society.
Stone spheres (balls) are one of the mysteries that no one has yet been able to solve...
What are they and why are they talked about so much?
These are stone balls scattered throughout the world. But the largest number of them is in Costa Rica. And it was in Costa Rica that many stone balls were preserved in excellent condition.
Their uniqueness is thatthey have practically perfect shape and are made according to GOST, or rather GOST - of different diameters.
Many stone balls are made from hard lava rocks, and some are made from sedimentary rocks. Here's another mystery - on the coast where they were found, there is no lava and there couldn't be, but in the center of the country there is - how were they transported? After all, some weigh neither more nor less, but more than ten tons.What forces moved these multi-ton “little ones”?
There are suggestions that the age of these balls is 12 thousand years. Similar balls were also discovered in America, in mines in Mexico, Romania, off the coast of New Zealand, Brazil, Kazakhstan and even in Russia, on Franz Josef Land.
The largest number of them - about 300 - were discovered in the southeast of Costa Rica, in the town of Palmares.
They were found almost by accident - an American fruit company cleared the jungle for banana plantations in the 1940s. I cleared, cleared... and here - THEY. The largest reached three meters in diameter and weighed sixteen tons, and the smallest were no larger than a child's ball, having only ten centimeters in cross section.
The balls were located singly and in groups of three to fifty pieces, at times they were lined up in a straight line or formed geometric shapes. Of course, they stopped the clearing immediately and tried to do archaeological research, but there wasn’t enough budget... Some of the balls were stolen around the country, some were blown up by treasure hunters, some were in museums, and some still rest in the ground - in order to avoid complete destruction, everything they could did was buried back.
Archaeologists and geologists from all over the world put forward various hypotheses regarding the origin of stone balls.
Our article is still a tourist article, not a popular science one, so we will omit the hypotheses :))
But we'll tell you where to find them.
Oddly enough, there are practically no excursions to them, and the vast majority of local travel agencies have a very vague idea of their location.
How to find it yourself:
GPS N 08"54.482" W 083"28.825"
We find the large tourist center JACO on the Pacific coast (not far from the famous beaches of Manuel Antonio).
From here we go along highway 34 to Palmar Sur. Right there in central park there is an old steam locomotive, houses of plantation workers and several balls, which are perfectly preserved.
In order to get your bearings, type in google maps"finca 6 costa rica" and look up the road on satellite.
More Balls can be found on the island Caño. It is also famous for its excellent diving. The island is located 20 km from the coast in the Drake Bay area of the Osa Peninsula.
You can get there by boat from several places: Puerto Jimenez, Drake Bay and the easiest thing from the boat station in the town of Sierpe.
SADNESS!!!
In 2018, while riding with the film crew of the “Heads and Tails” program, we stopped by these balls. Now they have made a museum there, admission is $5 and, most importantly, they have simply destroyed the primitiveness that existed. Some of the balls are moved to a pile. In general, the “reserve” is interesting only if the guide tells you all sorts of legends...
Although the balls are real and still worth a look!