Photo by Martti Pärssinen & Fabio de Novaes
Beneath the canopy of the Amazon rainforest, far from major rivers, hundreds of geoglyphs—huge patterns carved into the ground—have been discovered in Brazil. They are thousands of years old. These are traces of an ancient civilization whose population numbered perhaps three million people.
(This is a shortened and adapted translation of the BBC correspondent's material. The original in English can be read here).
“These people were creating monumental geometry in the Amazon at the same time that Pythagoras was formulating his theorem in Greece,” says paleontologist Alceu Ranzi, president of the Amazon Geoglyph Institute and one of the research team members.
Scanning the past
The study, recently published in the journal Nature, was carried out by a team of scientists from universities and institutes in Spain, Finland, Brazil and Denmark.
They scanned the dense forest cover using LiDAR (Light Detection and Ranging) technology, which uses laser pulses to measure distances and create complex 3D maps. This allows large areas to be analyzed without clearing vegetation or physically visiting each site.
image copyrightMartti Pärssinen
“This was the first truly large-scale study using LiDAR technology in the Amazon,” says archaeologist, anthropologist and co-author Martti Pärssinen from the University of Helsinki.
The team studied an area of 4,400 square meters. km. and discovered 432 geoglyphs - the vast majority of them had not been previously recorded. They were created in the period from 600 BC. e. to 850 AD e.
The Akiri civilization, to which these geoglyphs belong, occupied, according to scientists, an area of about 183,000 square kilometers - approximately the area of modern Cambodia or Syria. At its height (100–300 AD), the population could reach three million people.
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According to Ranzi, researchers found ditches up to 15 m wide and up to 5 m deep. Such grandiose structures indicate that they were created by large communities acting together.
“There is no stone in this region. They probably used wooden tools and baskets to move the soil,” he suggests.
However, due to the humid climate of the Amazon, organic materials decompose quickly, making it difficult to draw firm conclusions.
Researchers believe that the construction of such objects required not only enormous labor costs and division of labor, but also deep knowledge in the fields of mathematics and geometry.
Why could they be created?
It was once believed that geoglyphs served as fortresses or defensive structures that protected the population from invasion.
image copyrightRhuan Lopes
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However, today experts believe that these structures most likely served ceremonial and political functions - and served as a gathering place, rather than a permanent residence, for people.
“If this is confirmed... it means these people lived in peace. The fact that they put so much effort and effort into creating [the geoglyphs] suggests that they did not have any serious enemies to worry about,” Ranzi suggests.
According to Pärssinen, the Akiri culture was characterized by a deep respect for nature.
“They never turned the rainforest into a savannah,” he says. “Forest clearing and tree felling were carried out only to the extent necessary to support their way of life - growing corn, pumpkins and cassava - and nothing more.”
The results of excavations indicate that the structures were carefully monitored.
“It was not just about construction, but about preserving these objects over the centuries, which, of course, required extensive accumulated knowledge,” notes another co-author of the study, archaeologist and anthropologist from the Federal University of Pará (Brazil), Ruan Carlos Lopez.
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Photo by Martti Pärssinen, Risto Kalliola & Fabio de Novaes
According to Ranzi, the geoglyphs were not isolated and hidden in the forest, they were interconnected.
“We mapped 350 km of roads connecting geoglyphs,” he explains. “These paths led to them, and as they approached the structures, the roads became wider.”
End of Akiri civilization
The creation of geoglyphs apparently ceased around 850 AD. e. The reason for this remains unclear.
Ranzi draws a parallel with the Mayan civilization: the large centers of this culture in Mexico and Central America were abandoned around the same time.
“The Mayans stopped building and using palaces. The pyramids of Yucatan were swallowed up by the forest, he notes. “Something similar happened in the Amazon. Perhaps the 9th century became a period of large-scale natural crisis.”
New research, including this one, challenges the long-held idea that the Amazon rainforest was a "wild wilderness" that never knew human presence.
In recent decades, interdisciplinary research has shown that long before the arrival of Europeans, millions of people lived here, leaving their mark and changing the landscape of the world's largest rainforest.
“What we see in the Amazon is not a vast natural forest, but rather a vast historical garden shaped by human activity,” says Lopez.
Estimates of the region's pre-colonial population are continually revised upward. While early studies suggested that there were 1–2.5 million people living in the entire Amazon, more recent estimates raise this figure to 5–10 million.
Now, given that up to three million people could live in a relatively small area, these figures may have to be revised again.
In addition, it was previously assumed that the inhabitants of the region settled mainly along large rivers, where it was easier to get food.
However, geoglyphs are found mainly on hills located between rivers. New research indicates that large numbers of people lived in these areas too, growing crops and altering the forest landscape.
“These people did not limit themselves to the banks of large rivers, rich in fish and easy to travel by canoe,” says Ranzi. “They understood the landscape perfectly, settled far from rivers and moved overland using a network of roads. And it completely changes our understanding of how the Amazon was settled."
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