Since we're talking about the Nasca lines here I thought I'd go into what is known about how and why the lines were created.

The same designs that you see on the ground at Nasca were first used on their textiles and pottery. Anyone with any experience with weaving or other needle arts knows that your designs are basically being worked on a grid. Therefore it’s quite likely that they "transferred" the pattern to the ground using a grid of stakes tied with yarns. Basically they just used a larger grid to increase the size of the designs. Archaeologists have tested this theory of laying out a pattern with success (and erased what they created to avoid causing confusion to future archaeologists). There is archaeological evidence for this also, stakes have been found still in place beside some of the designs, and carbon dated to the same time frame as the lines. The lines themselves were dated by tests done on the desert varnish that formed on the lines over time.

As I’m sure many of you have read it rarely rains on the Nasca plain, while there are rivers in the area they do run dry at certain times of years. The Nascans learned to find and channel water that run through underground faults from the mountains for dependable sources of water. Since it was the mountains that the life-sustaining water came from the Nascans believed that their gods lived there. The majority of Nasca researchers today believe that the lines were created as "messengers" to the gods in the mountains asking for rain.


Kat

Ma'at Moderator

Founder and Director of The Hall of Ma'at

Contributing author to Archaeological Fantasies:
How pseudoarchaeology misrepresents the past and misleads the public
"If you panic, you're lost" -- W. T. 'Watertight' Southard