CATACLYSM  

The picture below is of a Mayan stone carving photographed by the traveller Teobert Maler (picture and attribution were found on a discussion site, see here; it is also used with the same attribution in Andrew Collins, Gateway to Atlantis). The interpretation of what is depicted is obvious, from left to right: temple destroyed by earthquake, drowning man, erupting vulcano, tidal waves (tsunami's), man escaping in boat, and overall: a giant flood (not entirely clear is the meaning of the fish, possibly it denotes a large scale extinction). According to other sources, the Inca's have a myth about being decendants of a destroyed civilization, of which this may be a portrayal. The appearance of the man as native South American is of course less dependable, since humans tend to depict any human figure to their own liking (something similar applies to the temple).

The image doesn't by itself confirm the stories, since the stories were probably the inspiration for the image. However, there are other things that point in the same direction. There is the fact that most other ancient civilizations from all over the world have similar stories of a massive flood or similar disaster; for an example especially relevant to this website, see the one from Yonaguni island. More tangible, in Sacsayhuaman, Peru, there are remains that point to some disaster, see below:

The usual interpretation of the feature in the picture is that the makers have made some symbolic upside down staircases. The minimal interpretation is that this feature was made as part of a structure like any other, with the usual meaning of up and down, and that some catastrofe has destroyed the structure, this being a remains of it (there is another part visible on the background), see the raw broken rockfaces on top. This disaster was of course a massive earthquake or earthquakes.

More familiar at Sacsayhuaman is the structure that is usually called a fortress, see below. Its walls are constructed of massive, irregularly shaped stone blocks that fit to each other perfectly. If this way of building is not purely esthetical, the only reason one can think of to justify this kind of effort is protection against earthquakes, an idea so obvious that it is raised by lot of people. And the only reason for the builders to think of taking such drastic counter measures is experience with the phenomenon. If one can gauge the kind of experience by the strength of the counter measures, these must have been massive earthquakes indeed, the earth shattering type. The type one associates with the stone carving.

Below are three more pictures of stones that seem to be in their present position due to some upheaval, also taken at Sacsayhuaman. What is remarkble about them is the size of the stones. Many people will recognize the pictures, because they are from Von Däniken's Chariots of the Gods. Of course, the interpretations by Von Däniken do in no way diminish the status of the data he provides, if this can be corroborated, and these pictures are conclusive enough (the third picture is almost the same as the one above that is taken from a tourist website, so the other ones are probably also reliable). The other remarkable thing besides the size of the tumbled blocks is the fact that they are so seldomly seen in pictures (the one exception until now is the one above), while there are plenty examples of most other constructions from Sacsayhuaman.

Judging from the pictures, these blocks are even larger than those in the fortressand those in Ollantaytambo, as can be seen by the size of the man in the left one (is Von Däniken). The picture on the right concentrates on the stone in the foreground, but Von Däniken mentions the block in the background as being of the same huge size, and having also been worked upon like the ones on the left.

The forces that have overturned these blocks are also big enough to overturn, or at least seriously damage, the constructions of made of smaller stones, among which is the fortress of Sacsayhuaman. This would date the fortress as younger than these even more monumental blocks. This would apply even more to the constructions made of still smaller stones, like those of the Inca at Machu Picchu. In fact, in Machu Picchu a clear distinction can be made between the Inca culture and the remains of an obviously revered other, probably older, culture, see here. Of course, it is this possible older culture that is the most interesting for further investigation on this website.

To follow the line of investigation of this site, go to the Climate change page.