One thing is certain. The culture was primitive in every way, as one would expect. Did they have help moving the stones? I don't know. But there is no evidence of them having any special knowledge beyond the primitive. Although we cannot discount extraordinary explanations...I see no reason to involve such explanations in view of the lack of any evidence. Large stones being moved is only evidence of large stones being moved. If we had evidence of "aliens" in history, then aliens could be a reasonable point of study. But aliens are only an idea thus far--and stones are far more substantial.
If we add to the mystery of the stones by invoking "aliens" then we complicate the mystery which Occam does not like doing! We then have an infinite set of mysteries. Why is everything so perfectly primitive? Why are there no myths/legends that are substantially indicative of these aliens--rather than the (as expected) pot-pourri of gods to be appeased? Why is there ONLY some decent geometry (not unique in known history) and large stones being moved?
I believe they built out of stone because that is all they knew. I believe they built in blocks (as children do) because that is all they knew. I believe they worshipped in a primitive manner and beheaded their men and killed their children and their most unblemished and most perfect young girls, because that is all they knew. I believe they died out because that is all they knew. And it would be horrible to think that such terrible and uncivilized and irrational societies knew more than 21st century man.
But do I know how they moved those stones? No, I don't. But I suspect it was one Hell of a hard job!! And yes...it might have been aliens (it really might have)--and there is no reason why Jesus could not have done it all by himself, is there?!
wc-review.washcoll.edu
"Beginning around roughly the same time as the Moche culture, about 2,000 years ago, Tiwanaku started its slow rise, expansion and eventual fall. The two main structures at Tiwanaku are the Akapana and the Puma Punku. The Akapana is a stepped pyramid, composed of seven terraces, that symbolizes a sacred mountain. Channels drain water from the top of the Akapana down through the structure, just as channels of water flow through the more recent Inca structure at Machu Picchu. A moat surrounding the Akapana recalls the Island of the Sun and suggests that the pyramid also symbolizes the center of the world. The Akapana was both a ritual center and a residence, and both burials and offerings have been found there. A whole row of adult mummies was buried in seated positions facing a single male who held a puma shaped incense burner. An offering associated with the sealing of a room included llama figures, pins, a bone lip plug, obsidian and pieces of ceramics. Near the foundation and first terrace, offerings included headless skeletons of adult males, a 2 year-old child, and ceramics including keros. As shown by the headless skeletons, the taking of heads may have been an important part of Tiwanaku ritual sacrifice.11
The second of the two most important structures at Tiwanaku is the Puma Punku, or Gateway of the Lion. Like the Akapana, the Puma Punku was built to channel water down from the top of the structure. Unlike the Akapana, the Puma Punku is aligned directly between Lake Titicaca and the sacred Mount Illimani. The Puma Punku had steps leading onto the temple from the lake in the west and its eastern ritual platform faced the snowcapped mountains. Hills rise on the sides to the north and south of the Puma Punku and seem to channel people from the lake to the temple to the mountains. At the temple, walking up the steps is suddenly like ascending a small mountain above the flat altiplano.
Although archaeologists started working on the Puma Punku more than one hundred years ago, the structure is only barely beginning to be uncovered. Tiwanaku died around 1,000 BC after prolonged droughts and the temples were abandoned for hundreds of years. It is likely that some people still went to the Akapana, Puma Punku, and other structures at Tiwanaku and made offerings there, because it is very difficult to ignore large stone buildings which rise off a very flat land, but Tiwanaku was largely neglected until the Inca empire expanded east and became interested in ancient Tiwanaku. The Inca empire never had to conquer Tiwanaku as it did the Chimu who followed the Moche, because the Tiwanaku culture died about 400 years before the Incas reached Tiwanaku. The Inca empire found the temples in ruins after hundreds of years of neglect and adopted Tiwanaku into its own cultural identity. Tiwanaku helped the Inca to make connections through both time and space by expanding the Inca influence east to Tiwanaku and by linking the Incas to Tiwanaku's origin myths. It helped the Inca empire legitimize its expansion and power. Stone walls and ceramic sherds indicate that while at Tiwanaku, the Inca may have built rooms on the edges of the Puma Punku and made offerings. But the Inca empire was short-lived and the Spanish soon took Tiwanaku. Colonists looted Tiwanaku. Having visited Tiwanaku in 1610, Cobo noted that colonists had already torn the buildings apart looking for treasure and built churches out of Tiwanaku's strong stones. Now the Puma Punku is a mound of tumbled rock. Massive blocks are fallen and dislocated like a giant puzzle and archaeologists are trying to put it back together." |
