A year of research has got me nowhere. It is ironic that a most tangible object on present-day earth... of a long, long, lost civilization is so overlooked.
If the stones are a hoax (which they could be), I have some overriding questions: Why would anyone go to the trouble of years of labor carving pictures in stone and then burying them..., some many decades ago? Where is the profit angle? How would they do it? How could anyone without very recent knowledge, know how the world looked from the skies some 13,000,000 years ago? I have been looking for answers, without success. I welcome opinions.
Let me first explain that I pretend no extraordinary knowledge of the stones, other than what I have read. Nor do I attempt to deny or confirm their origination, and I do not yet accept or deny that they may be alien-related. On the contrary, if someone were to insist on my own theory, I would hesitate a very long time, but based on the information, would have little choice but admit that I lean toward the ancient civilization possibility. Nothing else makes sense.
One thing is certain... approximately 15,000 stones, ranging from the size of a tomato to twice that of a basketball, do exist. Of that, there is no doubt. They are not a secret. They are not cached away in some mysterious place. Dr. Cabrera's museum is so incredibly open that anyone off the streets can walk in and handle the stones. Theft? Why bother? At one time, they could be purchased off vendor carts.
Why the mystery, then? The stones are clearly carved with remarkable scenes of medical transplants, people riding dinosaurs, telescopes, and views of the planet Earth as it appeared 13,000,000 years ago (that's right, 13 MILLION years ago, pre-stone age). No one can explain them. There has been no logical, rational, or believable explanation of who carved them? When? Why? And, most importantly, how did they do it?
Only recently have scientists agreed on the continental shifts which have taken place over millions of years. Africa, the Americas, Asia, were once all configured radically different than today. Most research confirms that without question. However, these rocks, buried for countless centuries, depict precisely how the world looked millions of years ago. As I said, this is a hobby of mine, nothing more, but I would truly enjoy having someone explain the mystery. For reasons I do not understand, the rocks have received little attention.
First, although I have covered the globe many times (retired airline employee), I have never seen Peru. The information presented here comes from books, scant as they are, articles, and BBC productions. Also, this is purely empirical information, as I have seen no hard evidence or testimony, other than pictures of the very real and undeniable stones themselves. A great many tourists have possession of some actual stones, as the local museum is full, and the vendor sells them from carts. To appreciate the environment where the stones were found, let me briefly describe the area, for those unfamiliar with Peru.
Peru is one of the most geographically diverse countries on earth, with radical environments and weathers. It is large -- 1,285,216 square kilometers -- only slightly smaller than Alaska. The massive Andes mountains split its north/south borders, producing over 30 peaks above 6000 meters and competing with the Himalayas in elevations.
It also has the deepest canyon on earth, yet is bordered with 2000 kilometers of coastline on the Pacific Ocean. Peru has combinations of rain forests and deserts, in surprisingly close proximity.
Peru is bordered by Columbia, Ecuador, Brazil, and Bolivia, thus making it slightly dangerous for the amateur traveler. The high country is filled with drug operations and bandits. Only seasoned travelers or those in groups should venture on foot into the hills.
Ancient history is deeply engulfed in Peru. It is the home of antiquities, and pre-Columbian civilizations like the Chavin, Mochica, Chima, and the Incas. It boasts the excavations of the Lord of Sipan, the fabulous Bruning Museum of Gold in Lambayque, the Valley of the Pyramids of Tucume, and archaeological sites of Chan Chan.
Perhaps the most famous of Peru's sites are the Plains of Nazca, famous for their unexplained plateaus sculpted with landing sites (or whatever) and intricate designs which can only be visually realized from the air.
Ica is a relatively small place, some 300 kilometers from Lima. Some time ago (the exact date is unknown, but approximately 20 years) a villager claimed to have found piles and piles of rocks deep in various gorges and caves. Some were also buried slightly under the ground. The native farmer produced only bags of stones at first, but later, he produced literally thousands of the artifacts. Here, the story gets confusing.
It has never been made clear on how many stories the man told but most were false, and they changed by the day, depending on who asked the questions. The countryside was ablaze with rumors and gossip about the find and no one could get a straight story.
The man was making a sizable income (by his standards) selling the stones to tourists and the curious. The stones really are remarkably beautiful, ignoring all aspects except decoration. That alone makes them quite unusual. He became something of a celebrity. Word traveled in the archaeological world, and experts descended on Ica.
Several BBS documentaries were run and that was my first exposure, many years ago. I was fascinated by the stones, incredibly beautiful even on TV.
Enter the Peruvian government. Now, you have to understand their position, not wanting to become another Egypt, overrun with diggers and robbers. They had enough of them already. No one knows what was said to the farmer but after arrest and confinement, he admitted the hoax and that he had carved the stones himself. He was going to bilk the tourists and never realized it would get out of hand.
End of story. The BBS, not pleased with the idea of being fooled, buried the story until European newspapers learned that the highly regarded BBS had been duped. They sprayed the story all over Britain, and the world. The stones' authenticity died overnight and would have remained a hoax...
...Except for one Dr. Javier Cabrera, a highly-regarded South American who still had questions. He kept badgering the farmer about carving the stones. How did he do it? With what? Could he show the doctor? The farmer was evasive and maintained his story about bilking the tourists. After all, the Peruvian government released the man and allowed him to continue selling them from a cart. He was in heaven and why let this foolish doctor ruin a good thing?
Ironically, Dr. Cabrera became the prime customer for the stones, and the farmer apparently had an endless supply. When Cabrera had bought a few thousand, he really put the pressure to the farmer, "Just how many are there?" The farmer seemed to produce more every week. Cabrera was beginning to believe that he had fallen prey to this farmer, and the man had created a cottage industry.
Except the farmer refused to discuss exactly how he made the stones. The designs were the first overwhelming aspect to the doctor. Here were scenes of natives, adorned with robes and high crowns, similar to the Incas, performing medical procedures on patients. Several depict heart and brain transplants (I have seen several photos of these, and can attest to the descriptions).
Surely, no uneducated farmer could even begin to fathom such things? Then the sheer number of stones became apparent. The farmer finally admitted that he had sold them for some time, perhaps thousands of them, before he became famous. The doctor currently owns 11,000 stones (at latest count) and estimates the total in existence to be about 15,000.
Even if one were to accept the unlikely notions that this man understood surgery, art, carving stone, and the history of the Incas..., and dinosaurs, and flying reptiles..., and a host of other disciplines, all of which is most improbable; there is the issue of simple math for one man to carve 15,000 stones would mean:
1. he began as a teenager;
2. he carved one stone a day;
3. he continued this 7 days a week for 41 years without missing a single day.
To refute this simple logic would mean:
1. he carved more than one a day (impossible to even do one);
2: he had help and lots of it'
3: they came from someone else.
Even if one accepts the idea that he had help in the hills, other farmers or such, the pure knowledge of the scenes would deny that any group of people could possess the wide scientific knowledge to complete the accurate details.
Dr. Cabrera, by then a trusted friend of the farmer, learned that the man was released from prison once he signed the confession that he was cheating the tourists. He agreed not to pretend the stones came from the hills but that he had indeed carved them himself. It was either that or go to prison for selling government possessions (the international antiquity laws).
The story, however, died the death of all shams and no reputable investigator would be stained by falling for the same hoax. BBS had been ridiculed beyond belief, and had thoroughly and painfully apologized to their public for airing the sham.
Meanwhile, the doctor continued his research with geologists to interpret the maps on several stones showing a weird configuration of the world. Some angles and land masses looked vaguely familiar, but the majority were badly skewered into strange shapes. Geologists have confirmed that based on current computer projections, the shapes indicated on the rocks are indeed accurate for the planet earth, as it was, about 13,000,000 (million) years ago, and as seen from above!!!!
I have seen several of these photos, they are not some weird, distorted collection of vague notions, but very clear and distinct carvings showing land masses and oceans.
Now, Dr. Cabrera had a real problem. A farmer insists that he carved the stones himself and therefore, Cabrera has had no success in getting anyone to take the stones seriously. At first, the doctor was only considering the aspect that his stones dated back to the Incas, or pre-Columbian era. But now, his stones appear to be 13 million years old, not a mere few thousand. This would be pre-stone age!!!
How on earth could this man convince anyone of stature to even look at the stones, with their brief history in the press, much less consider them to predate stone-age man ???
The doctor maintains he has two enormous problems in getting anyone to take him seriously. One, there are so many stones. Like diamonds, we expect anything of value to be rare and difficult to obtain. There are thousands of the things just sitting around in Ica. Second, and this is the real issue, one would have to accept the notion that some highly-intelligent form of man occupied this planet millions of years before the first known man could even swing a club. This is simply not acceptable.
I've seen several photos of stones showing men in robes riding flying reptiles and dinosaurs, very similar to the animals and reptiles shown in the movie, "Jurassic Park." To accept this concept would invalidate every book ever written about ancient man, and everything since then.
I've searched the net looking for references. But nowhere, outside of Peru, can I find anyone with any information.
Maybe it is a hoax, but if so, it is the greatest one I've ever read about. And the magnitude? Think about it. You're some kind of a trickster on a grade scale. Okay, do you spend years of your life carving complicated pictures in rock and then scatter them in the hills? Why? Where's the profit? What's the reason? Who benefits? This farmer, selling them off a vendor's cart?
I simply don't get it. Somewhere, somehow, there is an explanation. I want to know: Who carved them? When? How? How did they acquire the knowledge? And, why did they carve them?
