A likely example of Mr. Osmanagic and his experts being completely
confused by natural geologic features in their ongoing excavations
of the hills, which they believe to be man-made pyramids, are the
"Stone Balls", which are discussed at length at [www.bosnianpyramid.com].

In this page, they claim that these stone balls are of man-made
origin, completely disregarding pictures posted on one of their
own web pages. On this page, "Dr Aly Abd Barakat, Egyptian
geologist (Egyptian Mineral Resources Authority.)...confirmed
that the balls were a manmade rather than natural phenomenon."

++ Megaspherulites ++

In part, their argument against their "stone spheres" being natural
is based largely upon an explanation, which has been mangled by Mr.
Osmanagic to point of being a parody that any conventional geologist
would find somewhat amusing, of how the natural stone balls found
in Mexican volcanic rocks are created. As discussed by Smith et al.
(2001) and Stirling (1969), stone balls of Cerro Piedras Bola
region of Mexico are natural objects, also found in volcanic rocks
near Silver Cliff, Colorado; at Steens Mountain, Oregon; near
Klondyke, Arizona; and in other volcanic regions. These objects are
natural objects called "megaspherulites". Megaspherulites are
spherulites, which are more than a few centimeters in diameter.
Megaspherulites as large as 3.66 meters (11.2 feet) in diameter
have been reported by Smith et al. (2001). The large stone balls of
Ahualulco del Mercado, Jalisco state, Mexico, which Mr. Osmanagic
incorrectly misidentified as being man-made, are documented by
published research as being classic examples of megaspherulites
as discussed by Stirling (1969) and briefly noted by Smith et al.
(2001). Smith et al. (2000, 2001) also demonstrate that Mr.
Osmanagic is completely wrong about there being "nothing in our
current understanding of history that explains the presence of
these stone balls".

Instead of being "thrown out of" volcanoes, as Mr. Osmanagic
misstated, geologists explain the formation of both spherulites and
megaspherulites by the crystallization (devitrification) of vitreous
(glassy) rhyolitic volcanic material, after it has been erupted
as pyroclastic flows and while these deposits cooled to create
either vitrophyre or welded ash flow tuff. This explanation clearly
states that this type of stone ball, megaspherulites, did not
exist at time of the eruption and, thus, could not have been thrown
out of a volcano during an eruption as incorrectly stated by Mr.
Osmanagic.

Cited and Other References About Megaspherulites

Smith, R. K., Tremallo, R. L., and Lofgren, G. E., 2000,
Megaspherulite growth: far from equilibrium crystallization.
paper presented in Session TS-29 How Do Magmas Solidify? II,
"GeoCanada 2000 - The Millennium Geoscience Summit" Meeting
of the Canadian Society of Exploration Geophysicists.

Smith, R. K., Tremallo, R. L., and Lofgren, G. E., 2001, Growth of
megaspherulites in a rhyolitic vitrophyre. American Mineralogist.
vol. 86, no. 5-6, pp. 589-600.

Stirling, M.W., 1969, Solving the mystery of Mexico's great
stone spheres. National Geographic. vol. 136, no. 2, pp. 295-300.

Tremallo, R. L., 1998, Late Eocene to early Oligocene
megaspherulites from a rhyolitic vitrophyre, Silver Cliff, Custer
County, Colorado; their mineralogy, geochemistry and petrogenesis.
Unpublished Master's thesis, University of Texas, San Antonio,
Texas, 156 pp.

Tremallo, R. L., Smith, R. K., and Lofgren, G. E., 1998, Late
Eocene to Early Oligocene megaspherulites From a rhyolitic
vitrophyre, Silver Cliff, Custer County, Colorado: Their Mineralogy,
Geochemistry, and Petrogenesis. Paper given at the Volcanology,
Geochemistry, and Petrology Session of the 1998 American Geophysical
Union Annual Meeting, Dec. 6-10, 1998, San Francisco, California.

Note: a 3 MB PDF version of smith et al. (2001) can be downloaded
from [www.minsocam.org] and the abstract can be found
at [ammin.geoscienceworld.org]

In sharp contrast to the stone balls of Cerro Piedras Bola region,
stone balls of Costa Rica consist of granodiorite and are clearly
man-made origin. There exists not a single shred of geological or
archaeological evidence, which indicates any sort of cultural
connection between the stone balls of Cerro Piedras Bola region
and the stone balls (spheres) of Costa Rica as Mr. Osmanagic
presumes. In claiming that the same techniques were used to create
stone balls in Costa Rica" and the "stoneballs on the Cerra Piedras
Bollas hill", Mr. Osmanagic reveals himself to be hopelessly
ill-informed about the difference between man-made and natural stone
balls and incapable of distinguishing between man-made and naturally
formed stone balls despite having studied them personally in great
detail. In addition, he is completely wrong about the Cerra Piedras
Bollas and Costa Rican stone balls being composed of the "same
material".

A detailed discussion of the stone spheres (balls) of Costa Rica
can be found in "Stone Balls of Costa Rica" at [www.ku.edu].

++ Concretions ++

Mr. Osmanagic and his experts completely ignore a vastly more
common type of stone sphere (ball). These natural stone balls,
which are found within sedimentary strata of Arkansas, New
Zealand, North Dakota, and many other places, have nothing to
do with volcanoes. Instead, these stone balls are concretions,
which formed naturally by the local cementation of sediments
into a spherical mass by the precipitation of either calcite,
silica, siderite, dolomite or other minerals within the sediments
enclosing them.

The presumption that the Bosnian "stone balls" must be man-made
because of their spherical to quasi-spherical shape is soundly
refuted by a number of pictures, which I have archived for my
files, posted one of the Bosnian pyramid web pages at [www.piramidasunca.ba].

These pictures are:











The above pictures clearly show that the so-called "stone balls"
are clearly embedded in the local bedrock as is characteristic of
any natural concretion. Because of this, I find it difficult, if
not impossible, to accept the interpretation that these are man-
made spheres. If these are examples of the stone balls, which Dr.
Aly Abd Barakat pronounced as being man-made, these pictures are
clear evidence that he, like Mr. Osmanagic, is similarly confused
about the difference between man-made and naturally formed stone
balls. Pictures on the "Bosnian Stone Balls" also show well
defined surface fractures, which are typical of the natural
concretions, which form in sedimentary rocks.

These fractures can be seen in:





Compare them to the fractures in the cannonball concretions in the below picture.



and the fractures in a Moeraki boulder at [community.webshots.com].

According to the 1970 1:500,000 scale geologic map of SFR Yugoslavia,
the local bedrock around Mecevici and Ozimica consist of limestone,
dolomite, sandstone, shale, and other sedimentary strata. The presence
of sedimentary strata underlying this area raises the distinct
possibility that the stone balls found in the area of these villages
could very well be nothing more than natural concretions. Also, the
lack of rhyolitic volcanics in the area, as indicated by the 1:500,000
scale geologic map, indicates that the whole discussion about the
Mexican stone balls not being natural in origin is nothing more than
red herring argument, which completely ignores the much more realistic
possibility that the Bosnian stone balls are nothing more than
natural concretions formed in sedimentary rocks.

Examples of comparable natural concretions, which are identical to
the Bosnian stone balls in their physical characteristics, have been
described from all over the world. They include examples of natural
concretions from Arkansas illustrated in:

Hanson, W. D., and J. M. Howard, 2005, Spherical boulders in
north-central Arkansas. Arkansas Geological Commission
Miscellaneous Publication no. 22, 16 pp.

This paper can be downloaded from [www.state.ar.us].

++ Cannonball Concretions, North Dakota ++

The cannonball concretions, from which the Cannonball River gets
its name, of North Dakota are examples of natural concretions,
which are essentially identical to the "stone balls" of Bosnia.
The cannonball concretions of North Dakota are as large as 10 feet
(3 meters) in diameter. A typical picture of a cannonball
concretion can be found in "Cannonball Concretions" at
[nd.water.usgs.gov].

The nature and origin of cannonball concretions is discussed in:

Feldmann, Rodney M., 1997, Theodore Roosevelt National Park. in A.
G. Harris, E. Tuttle, and S. D. Tuttle, eds., pp. 127-135,
Geology of National Parks. Kendall/Hunt Publishing Company,
Dubuque, Iowa.

More pictures of cannonball concretions can found in "A Photographic
Journey up the Missouri River in North Dakota - Lake Oahe to the
Cannonball River at [nd.water.usgs.gov]

Some pictures are:



Cannonball Concretions on display at the Paul Broste Rock Museum, Parshall, North Dakota



Cannonball Concretions on display at Fort Abraham Lincoln State Park

Additional pictures of cannonball concretions can be seen in
"concretions" at [www.rocksforkids.com].

Another article about concretions is "Concretions" at the
Desert USA web site is [www.desertusa.com].

Published peer-reviewed papers, which discuss in detail examples
of natural stone balls, which are spheroidal (cannonball) concretions,
found in Wyoming, Utah, Spitsbergen, and Alexander island, Antarctica
are:

McBride, E. F., Picard, M. D., Milliken, K. M., 2003, Calcite-
cemented concretions in Cretaceous sandstone, Wyoming and Utah,
U.S.A. Journal of Sedimentary Research. vol. 73, no. 3. pp. 462-483.

Horne, R. R.., and Taylor, B. J., 1969, Calcareous concretions in
the lower Cretaceous sediments of south-eastern Alexander island.
British Antarctic Survey Bulletin. vol. 21, pp. 19-32.

Krajewski, K. P., and Luks, B., 2003, Origin of 'cannon-ball'
concretions in the Carolinefjellet Formation (Lower Cretaceous),
Spitsbergen. Polish Polar Research. vol. 24, no. 3-4, pp. 217-242.

++ Kettle Point Concretions ++

Stone balls in the form of natural concretions are found in some
abundance at Kettle Point on the southeast shore of Lake Huron in
Ontario, Canada. The Kettle Point concretions are typically spheres
to oblate spheroids, which ranging in diameter from 0.3 to 1.5
meters (1 to 5 feet). Such natural stone balls are quite common in
many exposures of the Kettle Point Formation and other Devonian
black shales in the region. The origin of these natural stone balls
are discussed in:

Coniglio, M., and Cameron, J. S., 1990, Early diagenesis in a
potential oil shale: evidence from calcite concretions in the
Upper Devonian Kettle Point Formation, Southwestern Ontario.
Bulletin of Canadian Petroleum Geology, vol. 38, no. 1, pp. 64-77.

++ Moeraki Boulders, New Zealand ++

The Bosnian stone balls are also very similar to the "Moeraki
boulders" found in new Zealand. Pictures of Moeraki boulders can
be found in [homepages.ezysurf.co.nz].

Like the cannonball concretions of North Dakota, the Moeraki
boulders have also been confused with man-made artifacts by
alternative archaeologists such as Gavin Menzies.

That web page stated:

"Emerging from the cliff, as if being born
from the earth, the World famous Moeraki
Boulders are septerian concretions formed
some 65 million years ago. Crystallization of
calcium and carbonates around charged particles
in muddy undersea sediments gradually formed
the boulders in a process taking as long as
four million years."

More pictures can be found at [home.xtra.co.nz].

Pictures of individual Moeraki boulders washing out of the strata
enclosing them are:



and



A picture of a number of Moeraki boulders



Being still, in place, makes it difficult, if not impossible, to
argue that they are man-made. Also, a number of scientific papers,
which clearly demonstrate the natural origin of Moeraki boulders,
have been published They include:

Boles, J. R., Landis, C. A., and Dale, P., 1985, The Moeraki
boulders; anatomy of some septarian concretions. Journal of
Sedimentary Petrology. vol. 55, no. 3, pp. 398-406.

Brunsden, Denys, 1969, Mystery of the Moeraki and Katiki boulders.
Geographical Magazine London. vol. 41, no. 11, pp. 839-843

Forsyth, P. J., and Coates, G., 1992, The Moeraki boulders.
Institute of Geological & Nuclear Sciences, Lower Hutt,
New Zealand.

Klug, H., and Zakrzewski, R., 1986, Die Moeraki Boulders;
riesenkonkretionen am strand auf Neuseelands Suedinsel [The Moeraki
boulders; giant concretions of the beach of New Zealand's South
Island.Schriften des Naturwissenschaftlichen Vereins fuer
Schleswig-Holstein. vol. 56, pp. 47-52

Thyne, Geoffrey D., and Boles, James R., 1989, Isotopic evidence
for origin of the Moeraki septarian concretions, New Zealand.
Journal of Sedimentary Petrology. vol. 59, no. 2, pp. 272-279

The abstract to Boles et al. (1985) stated, in part:

"The Moeraki boulders are large (to 2 m)
calcite concretions with septarian veins of
calcite and rare late-stage quartz and ferrous
dolomite. The concretions are enclosed by
Paleocene marine mudstones with vitrinite
reflectance values of 0.29% R suggesting
maximum burial temperatures of 25-30 degrees C."

and

"The growth time of the larger concretions is
estimated at about 4 million years based on
published diffusion growth models. Extrapolation
of compositional trends versus growth time from
these concretion bodies suggests that septarian
veins form on a time scale of several million
years."

After removing them from the outcrop, it is possible that people
at many times during the past, may have rolled concretions around
the landscape and incorporated them into their backyard landscaping.
Still, there is nothing about them being spherical in shape, which
provides any proof of them being man-made.

Of course, a few of the Bosnian stone balls could be made-man.
Still, there exists, not single piece of hard evidence, which has
been published, indicating either when they were carved or who
might have carved them. In place of hard evidence, only arm-waving
speculation unsupported by any substantial research about when
and by whom they were carved has been so far presented by Mr.
Osmanagic.

Best regards,

Paul H.

"The past is never dead. It's not even past."
William Faulkner, Act 1, Scene III, Requiem for a Nun (1951)



Edited 10 time(s). Last edit at 06/18/2006 09:41AM by Paul H..