Stone balls. Giant stone balls of Costa Rica: the mystery of the Indian tribes

1930s, Costa Rica. A group of workers from the famous United Fruit Company clear away dense thickets tropical plants to start another banana plantation.

And suddenly... Among wild jungle people stumble upon something unimaginable - huge stone balls perfectly correct form.

The diameter of these "balls" was about three meters, and the weight was approximately 16 tons. True, it later turned out that there are medium and small specimens nearby - up to the size of a children's ball.

And then another mystery arose. It turns out that the spheres are not arranged randomly, but in a certain order. Some rows formed straight lines, others 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 plateau of Aqua Blanca, for the time being, hundreds of huge stone statues perfect shape.

In the future, something similar began to be found almost everywhere: in the USA, New Zealand, Egypt, Romania, Germany, Brazil, Kazakhstan, on Franz Josef Land. And more recently - on the territory of Russia: in Siberia, Krasnodar Territory and Volgograd region.

As soon as the workers opened the stones in Costa Rica, the American archaeologist Doris Stone arrived there. In 1943, her observations and conclusions were published in the US academic journal of 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 elementary 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 Daniken called the balls “balls played by the gods”, and perhaps this fantastic formula is the 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 "balls" to volcanic activity, arguing that a ball of such an ideal shape can form if the crystallization of volcanic magma during an eruption occurs evenly. But this version does not fit the fact that the balls clearly have grinding marks, and, moreover, they are not stacked randomly, but according to some system. And one more objection - "kruglyashi" are also found in places where no volcanic activity is observed at all.

Archaeologists, unlike geologists, recognize that stone spheres were produced not 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 products of the highest quality. They are so perfect that measurements of the diameters showed no difference.”

Cosmodrome or "cash"?

Researchers are wondering: what were these mysterious formations? Some believe that they were installed in front of the houses of noble people as a symbol of their power, or that stone balls were related to certain cults and sacrifices.

Interestingly, in Costa Rica, one group of four balls was aligned on a line pointing due north. A number of archaeologists suggest that this is evidence that the creators of the spheres were familiar with such a science as astronomy, and that the spheres themselves somehow interacted with the cosmos. This version is confirmed by the fact that the Maya Indians, who once lived in Costa Rica, were outstanding astronomers. They precisely divided the year into seasonal cycles, observed the movement of the planets, and compiled maps of the starry sky with more or less fixed coordinates of celestial objects.

Some even believe 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 of different sizes are just "coins" of different denominations - from the most expensive to small "pennies".

In search of gold

Nowadays, it is very difficult to refute or confirm this or that version. In the course of 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 yards.

Great damage was done to science 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 other unsolved mysteries, it remains unclear when the balls "were born". 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 from 200 BC. before 1500 AD

However, many researchers are sure 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 proved by artifacts raised from the seabed, where they could appear, most likely, only at a time when there was land.

Another mystery is the method of transporting the balls from the place of manufacture to the place of installation. According to scientists, this distance sometimes amounted to tens of kilometers, and heavy stone products had to be transported through the jungle, swamps and rivers.

It is not known whether the mysteries of the "balls of the gods" will ever be solved. The researchers themselves doubt this. Archaeologist Doris Stone once said: "We must attribute the stone balls to the incomprehensible megalithic mysteries."

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Stone balls of Costa Rica

Another megalithic riddle, which, among similar ones, again turned out to be completely unsolvable for modern adherents of academic science, was the riddle stone balls Costa Rica. And in front of me - how many of them have already been: the ancient aircraft, 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 - can I cope with this task , will I solve this ancient crossword puzzle? And as it happened with others: at first - as if everything is in darkness, and then more and more appear, and more at first small, and then - larger details of clarity ... And there, you see, - that's 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 find in the jungles of Costa Rica, this small Central American republic. It turns out that while cutting through the clearing, the workers of the fruit company stumbled upon a scattering of stone balls that had come from nowhere. Among them were the huge ones, reaching 3 m in diameter and almost 16 tons in weight, and there were also very small ones, having a diameter of no more than 10 cm. It was not without a curiosity: the workers who discovered these objects remembered the 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 a solid stone.

The original location of the discovery of stone balls

Initially, stone balls were 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 found in the Jalisco region near the city of Aulaluco de Mercazo in Mexico, near the city of Los Alamos and in the state of New Mexico (USA). It should be noted that all these areas are characterized by rather active volcanic activity ...

In 1967, an engineer who worked in the silver mines of Western Mexico and was fond of history and archeology, told scientists from the United States that he had found the same balls in the mines as in Costa Rica, but significantly large sizes. According to him, they were made by the Aztecs. This sensational statement had the effect of an exploding bomb. Then in Guatemala, on the Aqua 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 National Museum 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 (Costeshti), Germany (Eifel), Brazil (Korupa deposit), Chile, New Zealand and even on Franz Josef Land (Fr. Champ). And in 2008-2009, they began to be found on the territory of Russia - in Siberia, the Krasnodar Territory and the Volgograd Region.

As you can see, there are many stone spheres on Earth. But still, the balls of Costa Rica are considered the most unique of such products. Their quality is admirable: some have such an absolutely regular 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 have survived to this day. But there are many more balls 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 the dense jungle.

The calculation of these ancient monuments caused a number of difficulties: many of them were removed from their former place and are now 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 rich residents of the republic. Two balls are also on display in the USA: one of them is in the Museum of the National Geographical 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 at the top of the mounds. But the most amazing thing happened next. Costa Rican scientists, interested in stone balls, decided to look at the find site from above, from the air. The helicopter rose above the jungle - and under it suddenly, as if a page from a geometry textbook floated, stretching for tens of kilometers. Strings of balls folded into giant triangles, squares, parallelograms, circles... Lined up in straight lines, some precisely oriented along the north-south axis...

These geometric constructions were then used to put forward some functional hypotheses.

Hypothesis 1. Balls in groups are arranged like models of some constellations. It is possible that these bizarre stone mosaics from 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 was a highly developed civilization - the forerunner of all the ancient civilizations of Central America.

Hypothesis 2. As already mentioned, one group of four balls was aligned along a line oriented to magnetic north. This has led some scholars to speculate that they may have been placed by people familiar with the use of magnetic compasses or astronomical orientation.

In general, there have been plenty of versions of the functional purpose of stone balls. I am not going to comment on them, simply, in addition to the indicated 2 hypotheses, I will list others:

spaced balls are like constellations, they are symbols heavenly bodies, a reflection of the entire solar system;

balls served to mark the boundaries between the lands of different tribes;

these are navigational instruments of a highly developed ancient civilization - Atlantis;

stone spheres are symbols of social position;

or maybe these are the balls of the gods when they played their game?

guests from other space worlds chose this place of accumulation of balls as their permanent cosmodrome, and the huge spheres are located in the form of restrictive lines because they performed a function similar to the current runways airfields;

some archaeologists believed that under the balls there may be original capsules with messages from our alien brothers in mind, left by them when they finally decided to leave our planet;

most likely for more than thousand years of history the existence of the sphere performed many functions that changed over time;

interesting is the version that the labor-intensive production of balls in itself could be an important ritual process. Moreover, it played the same role (and perhaps even more significant) as, in fact, its result;

the ancient inhabitants of Costa Rica were surprisingly warlike, possessing powerful technical military means. For example, they could have thrown weapons of exceptional power. Stone balls are just "projectiles" scattered on the battlefield. Maybe it was not even a battle, but military exercises (maneuvers) took place here, a huge field is a kind of range 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 in the course of agricultural work, destroying information about their archaeological contexts and possible groups. Some of the balls were blown up and destroyed by local treasure hunters who believed the fables that the balls contained gold. Balls rolled into ravines and gorges or even under water for sea ​​coast.

The question is where did they come from?

Scientists are still fiercely arguing 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 origin.

Version - geological natural formations

In accordance with it, it is believed that several dozen volcanoes suddenly woke up in Central America 25-40 million years ago. Their eruptions caused catastrophic earthquakes. Lava and hot ash covered vast areas. It was then that the vitreous particles ejected from the vents of volcanoes began to cool. They, they say, were the embryos of giant spheres. Surrounding particles of eruption products gradually began to crystallize around these nucleoli. Moreover, crystallization went evenly in all directions, so that a ball with an ideal shape gradually formed.

And then nature already acted - through such factors as water, wind and rain, which washed the ashes and soil from day to day. Thanks to this, over time, the "whitened" stone balls appeared on the surface. For example, it has been established that in areas of the Earth with large daily temperature differences (fluctuations), ordinary weathering, called exopholization, "works" very effectively. In this case rocks collapse spontaneously like a "falling husk", that is, the outer layers stone formation are gradually separated, like the husk 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 in confirmation of this conjecture, several fused such balls were found.

Thus, not some unfounded assumption appeared, explaining the origin of stone balls, but a well-founded 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 this is due to the fact that this - geological - version does not fit the fact that the balls clearly have traces of grinding, and, moreover, they are clearly laid according to some 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 the emergence of balls from a material such as granite through volcanic activity.

In addition, many balls are made of granodiorite, a hard coarse-grained rock of igneous origin, which mineral composition is intermediate between granite and quartz diorite. The granodiorite deposit is located in the foothills mountain range Talamanca. But, this factor plays just against the geological version: in the area where the balls were found, there is no such material, and deposits of granodiorite are found no closer than 50 miles from the place where the megaliths were found.

There are several balls made of shell rock, a hard material similar to limestone, which is formed in coastal sediments from shells and sand. Perhaps these balls were brought inland from the delta of the Terraba River.

The spherical formations of the Urals are natural geological objects

And these are also natural objects

Version - handmade

Archaeologists, unlike geologists, recognize that the balls were not made by nature, but by people. And they believe that these balls were made and laid by very skilled people. But, what tools did the ancient masters work with, who managed to give the stone the correct spherical shape? Suddenly 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 here ever. No tools for working stone, no shards, no bones were found. Nothing!

And, developing the version, they believe that the balls were made from huge boulders, which were processed to a spherical shape by chipping 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 rapidly cooled with water. When the boulder already has a shape close to spherical, the material is removed by hitting it with the same hard material. Finally, the last stage of processing is polishing to a shine. This process is similar to that used in the manufacture of stone axes and stone statues and is believed to have been achieved without the use of metal tools, laser meters, and alien assistants. To top it off, the ball could be polished with sand or leather.

As one serious scientist explained, I will not promote his name, the balls are larger " created by the most skilled craftsmen, and their shape is so close to perfection that measuring the diameters with a tape measure and a plumb line did not reveal any inaccuracies". He also says that the natives had mathematical abilities, extensive knowledge in the field of stone processing and knew how to use tools. But since those tribes, apparently, did not have a written language, there are no records of the technology for making balls, and information about the manufacturing method, of course, did not reach us.

The question is when?

In addition to all the other unsolved mysteries, it remains unclear when the balls were made. For such products, radiocarbon analysis is not applicable, which is used to date only biological remains. Therefore, the determination of the age of stone spheres was carried out on the basis of accompanying objects that were found along with them in the archaeological layers. Stone balls have been found in pottery beds from the Aguas Buenas culture, which dates from approximately 200 BC to 800 AD. Stone balls have been found in tombs with gold ornaments dating back to around 1000 AD. They were also found in layers with shards of pottery from the Chiriqui period, dating from 800 BC. before 800 AD This type of pottery was found along with iron tools from the colonial period until the 16th century. Thus, the balls could be made at any time and for 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. Erickson claims that the balls appeared more than 12 thousand years ago. This, allegedly, is also proved by the finds of balls on seabed, where they were installed at a time when there was still dry land ...

Who made?

The balls are thought 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 eastern Honduras to northern Colombia. Their current descendants include the Boruca, Teribe and Guaymi peoples. These people lived in isolated settlements, which rarely consisted of more than 2,000 people. They fished, hunted and farmed. Among the crops grown were corn, cassava (a shrub whose roots are a nutritious flour), beans, squash (a type of summer gourd), papaya, pineapple, avocado, chili, cocoa, and many other fruits, root vegetables, and medicinal plants. They lived in mostly rounded houses with a foundation made of river cobblestones.

And in order to assert that it was they who created these mysterious spheres, one must have more evidence than there is, and therefore the answer to this question remains an unsolvable task.

Transport method

Another mystery is how the balls are transported 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? With the help of what devices were the balls "rolled" from place to place, making up exact geometric shapes from them? Unfortunately, there were no satisfactory answers to these questions at all.

If blanks for balls were obtained at quarries, stone craftsmen, it is believed, had to carefully monitor their descent. How to move such a heavy load over such a long distance without modern technology? If granite was mined at 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 lay a wide, smooth road necessary for transporting blocks through the dense jungle, which, again, is not an easy task! Other balls are made of shell rock, a material similar to limestone, which is found on the sea coast near the mouth of the Dikvis River. Then it turns out that the rock was rafted 50 kilometers upstream. The balls were also found on Canyo Island, located about 20 kilometers from Pacific coast etc.

Researchers

The first to study the balls was an archaeologist from the USA D. Stone, who arrived in Costa Rica immediately after the discovery stone artifacts. And in 1943, in an academic journal of archeology, he published his observations and conclusions, which, as will be characteristic of all future studies and researchers, end with the words: " We must attribute the perfect spheres of Costa Rica to the incomprehensible megalithic mysteries". Everything is exactly the same as was expressed a little later on other stone products and another of the authorities of archeology, now the Frenchman P. Gio:" ... megaliths are a nightmare for archaeologists". And it is impossible not to agree with them.

Then there were many followers and continuers of the studies of stone balls, and an inquisitive reader, ready to delve deeper into the topic, can always find reports of their expeditions and materials of work in print. For the same article, it is enough to say that apart from updating the statistics of finds, describing the locations of these stone products, and studying the accompanying cultural layers, no solid scientific conclusions have been made. Just as before, the main questions remained unanswered: who?, when? and for what? made these stones.

So, attempts to make a scientific analysis of the stone balls of Costa Rica have been going on for more than 60 years. But, as they say, things are still there ...

Not so long ago, the question of assigning the status of a world heritage site to these ancient artifacts was raised before UNESCO. It was entrusted to D. Hupes, Associate Professor of the Department of Anthropology from the University of Kansas and head ofGlobal Indigenous Nations Studies Program.

scientist D. Khupes next to the ancient stone riddle

And he, having conducted the necessary research with his colleagues, upon returning from a trip to Costa Rica, made a report to UNESCO, excerpts from which are given below.

The earliest reports of these stones date back to the late 19th century, but these reports were scientifically confirmed only in 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 predate the Spanish Colonization of the Americas. We determine the age of the balls by the style of manufacture and radiocarbon analysis 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 could 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 idea of stone balls. For example, some publications have claimed that the stones refer to the "disappeared" continent of Atlantis. Others have suggested that the orbs are navigational instruments, or that they are associated with Stonehenge, or with giant heads from Easter Island.

Myths, based on many incredible theories about imaginary ancient civilizations or alien visits, Hoopes categorically rejected. However, in return - he did not present any of his versions, shedding at least some light on the solution of the balls of Costa Rica.

We don't really know why they were made,” Hoopes admitted. “The people who made them didn't leave any written records. We can only speculate based on historical dates and reconstruction of the environment. The culture of the people who made them disappeared shortly after the Spanish conquest. Therefore, there are no myths or legends left about why these balls were made.

The only mystery that the scientist allegedly could explain was the way they were made.

Most likely, the main techniques were hammering, drilling and grinding stones, - explained Hoopes. - Found some balls on which there were traces of hammer blows. We believe that this is how they were created: with the help of hammer blows on big stones and cutting spherical shape.

So, this one, so to speak - “the head of the balls”, under the pressure of the questions of the members of the UNESCO commission, but not forgetting to throw a handful of dirt at ufologists, both himself and his science signed in complete professional failure and helplessness. So who should be called false and pseudo-scientists, if not such khupes?

So, the answer is modern researchers- Not yet. Therefore, the question of assigning object status to balls world heritage also remained open.

Costa Rica is called fairyland. And not only for the extraordinary beauty and natural resources this tiny corner of the Earth, but also for the secrets that it keeps. One of them is stone spheres, the strings of which fold into giant triangles, squares, parallelograms, circles, line up in straight lines, some of which are precisely oriented along the north-south axis. In the 40s of the 20th century, workers of the American campaign came across them. Cutting down the primeval tropical jungle to accommodate banana plantations, they found stone balls in shape so close to perfection that measuring the diameters with a tape measure and a plumb line did not reveal any inaccuracies. The largest reached three meters in diameter and weighed approximately 16 tons. And the smallest were no larger than a children's ball, having only ten centimeters in diameter. The balls were located singly and in groups of three to fifty pieces. They are made of granodiorite - a hard coarse-grained rock of igneous origin, limestone or sandstone.
If this is the work of man, then, apparently, the natives had mathematical abilities and deep knowledge in the field of stone processing using special tools. If we take into account the accuracy of the form, then the conclusion suggests itself that it could not have done without mechanical processing. According to one theory, the work may have used high temperatures and then cooling, after which the upper layers of the rock were removed. To top it off, the balls could be polished with sand or leather. But, probably, the creators did not have a written language, and therefore there is no information about the method of their manufacture. There are no myths or legends left about why and when these balls were made.
Archaeologists believe that the balls could have been created during a different, unfortunately, not precisely established period: 1000 years BC, in the first millennium AD, or even more than 12 thousand years ago. This, allegedly, is also proved by the finds of balls on the seabed, where they were installed at a time when there was still land here.
To date, almost all groups of balls have already been destroyed, as in the course of agricultural work they were moved from their original location, which destroyed information about the archaeological contexts. Balls rolled into ravines and gorges, or even under water on the coast. Some of them remain intact in their original locations, but many have been damaged by erosion, fires and vandalism. A certain part of the balls was destroyed by local treasure hunters who hoped to find gold in the middle.
For six decades, scientists have been trying to find out the purpose of these balls, but they still cannot determine exactly. Of course, there are many hypotheses that attribute completely different meanings to these balls. Some are based on the assumption of their creation as symbols of heavenly bodies, in which the entire Universe is reflected, or they served as landing strips for airfields for aliens from other worlds, and under them there could be capsules left by aliens for future earthlings. Or maybe the balls served as borders separating the lands of different tribes, or maybe they were something ritual, or they were "shells" left after exercises or battles. And if these are the balls with which the gods played football? Some publications have claimed that the stones belong to the "lost" continent of Atlantis. Others have suggested that the orbs are navigational aids, or that they are related to Stonehenge or giant heads from Easter Island.
Version artificial creation balls, put forward by archaeologists, is rejected by geologists, who consider the origin of the balls to be the result of catastrophic earthquakes, as a result of which the cooled vitreous particles ejected from the vents of volcanoes were the basis or core of their formation. Surrounding particles of eruption products crystallized around these cores. Since the crystallization proceeded evenly in all directions, balls of the correct form gradually formed. But then several questions arise: - why do the balls have traces of alignment and polishing?
- Why are they stacked according to a certain scheme?
- why are they found in places where volcanic activity has not been observed? And besides, it does not explain the appearance of some balls of granite and shell rock.
The method of transporting the balls (or blanks for them) also remains a mystery. From the places of the alleged origin of the material for their manufacture to the places of their further location, tens of kilometers, a significant part of which falls on swamps and dense thickets rainforest. If granite was mined at 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! What powerful equipment had to be used to move such a load! And balls made of shell rock, which is found on the sea coast near the mouth of one of the rivers, indicate that the rock had to be rafted 50 kilometers upstream.
Two balls are currently on display in the US. One is in the National Geographic Society Museum in Washington, DC, and the other is in the courtyard of the Peabody Museum of Archeology and Ethnography at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. In Costa Rica, a significant part of the balls is used as a decoration for lawns, and is located on the territory of the museum.
Archaeologist Doris Z. Stone, who pioneered the study of the enigmatic spheres of Costa Rica, wrote that they belonged to incomprehensible megalithic mysteries.
It is possible that the Costa Rican stone balls will be included in the UNESCO World Heritage List. cultural heritage that will help their preservation and further study.

Stone spheres (balls) are one of the mysteries that no one has yet been able to solve ....

What is it and why are they talked about so much?

These are stone balls scattered all over the world. But the largest number of them - in Costa Rica. And it is in Costa Rica that many stone balls have been preserved in excellent condition.

Their uniqueness is thatthey have an almost perfect shape and are made according to GOST, or rather GOSTs - of different diameters.

Many stone balls are made of hard lava rocks, there are specimens from sedimentary rocks. Here's another mystery - on the coast, where they were found, there is no lava and could not 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 kind of forces moved these multi-ton "babies"?

There are suggestions that the age of these balls is 12 thousand years. Similar balls have also been found in America, in mines in Mexico, in Romania, off the coast of New Zealand, in Brazil, Kazakhstan, and even in Russia, on Franz Josef Land.

The largest number of them - about 300 - was found in the South-East of Costa Rica, in the town of Palmares.

We found them almost by accident - an American fruit company in the 1940s was clearing the jungle for banana plantations. Cleared, cleared ... and here - THEY. The largest reached three meters in diameter and weighed under sixteen tons, while the smallest were no larger than a children's ball, having only ten centimeters in cross section.

The balls were located singly and in groups of three to fifty pieces, sometimes they were lined up in a straight line or formed geometric shapes. Of course, they immediately stopped clearing, tried to do archaeological research but the budget was not enough .... Some of the balls were scattered 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 of everything that they could, they buried it back.

Archaeologists and geologists from all over the world put forward various hypotheses about the origin of stone balls.

Our article is still tourist, not popular science, so we will omit the hypotheses :))

Here's where to find them.

Oddly enough, they practically do not carry excursions, and the vast majority of local travel agencies have a very vague idea of ​​​​their location.

How to find yourself:

GPS N 08"54.482" W 083"28.825"

We find on the Pacific coast a large tourist centre JACO (before reaching famous beaches Manuel Antonio).

From it we drive along highway 34 to Palmar Sur. Right there in central park there is an old steam locomotive, the houses of plantation workers and a few balls that have been perfectly preserved.

In order to orientate - hammer in google maps"finca 6 costa rica" ​​and look "on the satellite" for the road.

More Orbs can be found on the island Cano. It is also known for excellent diving. The island is located 20 km from the coast in the Drake area. bay peninsula Peninsula Osa.

You can get there by boat from several places: Puerto Jimenez, Drake Bay and the easiest with boat station in the town of Sierpe.

SAD!!!

In 2018, while riding with the film crew of the Eagle and Tails program, we stopped at these balls. Now they have made a museum there, the entrance is $ 5 and, most importantly, they simply destroyed the primitiveness that was. Part of the balls moved to a pile. In general, the "reserve" is interesting only if the guide will go over the ears with all sorts of legends ...

Although - the balls are real and still worth a look!

In the late 1930s unusual spherical stone boulders were found on the territory of Costa Rica. Workers of the United Fruit Company stumbled upon them, cutting down dense thickets. tropical jungle for banana plantations. The diameter of the balls ranged from 10 cm to more than 3 m, the mass of the largest balls reaches 20 tons.

In total, more than 300 round boulders were found in Costa Rica, but this number is inaccurate, since many of them were taken to various institutes, museums and schools. Many stone balls were broken by treasure hunters who thought that there were some kind of jewelry inside the spheres.

In total, more than 300 round boulders were found in Costa Rica, but this number is inaccurate, since many of them were taken to various institutes, museums and schools.

In 1967, an engineer and amateur in history and archeology, who worked in Mexico in silver mines, told American scientists that he had stumbled upon similar balls in the mines, but much larger. large sizes. Some time later, on the Aqua Blanca plateau near the village of Guadalajara (Guatemala), at an altitude of 2000 m above sea level, an archaeological expedition found hundreds more stone balls. They have also been found in Los Alamos and the state of New Mexico (USA), on the coast of New Zealand, in Egypt, Romania, Germany, Brazil and Franz Josef Land. But the spheres of Costa Rica, unlike the others, are almost perfectly spherical in shape, and their surface is very smooth and even.

Interestingly, the stone balls were not randomly scattered, but were in groups of 3 to 50 boulders. Moreover, it turned out that the balls are composed of different geometric shapes: squares, triangles…

Perfect polishing and polishing

Putting forward theories about the origin of the stone boulders of Costa Rica, scientists and researchers are divided into two camps.

Supporters natural origin balls believe that the stones acquired this shape thanks to volcanic activity.

Supporters of the natural origin of the balls believe that the stones acquired this shape due to volcanic activity. A ball of ideal shape can form if the crystallization of volcanic magma occurs evenly in all directions. According to the candidate of geological and mineralogical sciences Elena Matveeva, the balls could come to the surface as a result of the so-called exopholization - weathering, which works in areas with large daily differences. In the same place, where the temperature is more stable, similar balls are found, but underground.

However, no matter how convincing these assumptions sound, there is still no final solution to the phenomenon. First of all, this hypothesis is not able to explain the appearance of granite balls. In addition, the ancient volcanoes could not correctly arrange the many balls in the form of figures. Finally, the Costa Rica spheres show clear signs of leveling and polishing.

The theory of artificial origin claims that the spheres of Costa Rica are the result of human activity. However, this version does not reveal the curtain of secrets, but raises even more questions. What tools could be used to carve huge stones with such precision? How were they moved and laid out in geometric shapes? What were they for? According to archaeologists, the balls were made by processing round boulders into a spherical shape in several stages. First, the boulders were subjected to intense heating and cooling alternately, as a result of which the upper part of the processed stones peeled off, like the leaves of an onion. The granodiorite from which they are made has been shown to still show signs of extreme temperature fluctuations. When the stones approached the shape of a sphere, they were processed with stone tools from a material of the same hardness. At the final stage, the balls were placed on the base and polished to a shine.

As already mentioned, a significant part of the stone balls were located in certain groups. Some of these groups formed straight or winding lines, triangles and parallelograms. One group of four balls was determined to be aligned in a line oriented to magnetic north. This led Ivar Zappa to speculate that they may have been placed by people familiar with the use of magnetic compasses or celestial orientation. However, the hypothesis of Ivar Zappa that the groups of stone balls were navigational devices pointing to Easter Island and Stonehenge seems to be unfounded. This group of four balls covers only a few meters, which is clearly not enough to avoid planning errors over such long distances. In addition, with the exception of the balloons located in Isla del Caso, most of the balloons are too far from the sea to be useful for ocean navigators.

There is also a version that the location of the stone balls resembles some celestial constellations. In accordance with this, some researchers often consider the balls of Costa Rica to be a kind of planetarium, observatory or landmarks for spacecraft. However, it should be noted that the authors of such versions relied more on their imagination than on the results of field research.

Just decorations?

Many of the balls, some of them in groups, were found at the top of the mounds. This has led to speculation that they may have been kept inside buildings built on top of the mounds, making them difficult to use for observation. Moreover, by now all but a few groups have already been destroyed, so measurements made almost 50 years ago cannot be verified for accuracy. Virtually all known balls have been moved from their original location in the course of agricultural work, destroying information about their archaeological contexts and possible groups. The balls were rolled into ravines and gorges or even under water on the coast (as in Isla del Caso).

Nowadays, a significant part of the balls is used as an unpretentious decoration of lawns. It is possible that at least some of the spheres were also once used for similar purposes. So, for example, in the center of Izapa, located off the Pacific coast on the border with Guatemala, which existed a little later than the Olmecs, round balls small size were found next to small stone pillars, which could well serve as coasters for them.

The method of transporting balls (or blanks for them) also remains a mystery, because from their locations to the places of the alleged origin of the material for their manufacture - tens of kilometers, a significant part of which falls on swamps and dense thickets of tropical forests ...

So Costa Rica is still waiting in the wings, when archaeologists and geologists will come to grips with its stone mystery.