Stone balls. Stone balls of Costa Rica. Objects of an ancient settlement

A call from the Kotovsky district of the Volgograd region from the Honored Worker of Culture of Russia, artist Vasily Krutskevich, made him hurriedly pack on the road. It was about stone balls found in a ravine near the village of Wet Olkhovka. Due to the unprecedented snowy winter, stormy melt waters brought down part of the slopes of the ravine, and amazing constructions appeared to the world - stone balls more than a meter in diameter, identical in shape, as if calibrated.

“Material? .. Well, something similar to solid quartz sandstone of a layered structure,” said Vasily Dmitrievich. - But the most amazing thing is that the balls inside are hollow! Rather, filled with something like grayish-yellow sand. Sensation as if they were petrified eggs of a huge animal. - Maybe a dinosaur? They find ... - I suggested.
  “No, too big.” The petrified dinosaur eggs found in different parts of the world have sizes from 18 to 24 centimeters and weigh up to five kilograms. And here almost a ton weighing ...
  An endless tape of asphalt brought us from Volgograd to the Kotovsky district. In a shallow ravine with a dry sandy trail on the site of a spring stream we descend a chain led by Krutskevich. The researchers include Volzhsky Valery Moskalev, Sergey Lobanov with two young assistants, the Volgograd writer Oleg Bazhanov and the author of these lines.
  We see in a steep wall of red sandstone a ball in the depths of a person with a cracked stone surface. At a distance, several similar balls lie in a row at once. Two spheres are broken, inside there is really a void filled with sand.
  Most attracted balls are not broken. They are whimsically covered with a solid mesh resembling petrified blood vessels. This resembles a chicken egg at the stage when the embryo of the future chicken is formed (photo No. 1).

True, the balls are not like laying eggs: the distance of the extreme balls from each other is at least two hundred meters. They stretch a chain along the bottom of the beam. Several spheres in the earth lie right under their feet, as if they remained in a muddy bottom, untouched for many millions of years. Such a time period - tens of millions of years - we, without saying a word, define for a mysterious find. The abyss of time that you can inspect, touch, capture in the photo! ..
- Come here! - Sergey Lobanov, a young researcher, called us. - There is something incomprehensible here! ..
  He clears with a sapper spatula the roundness that lurks in the ground. Nearby is a strange five-meter-long structure, consisting of, as it were, three fused "eggs". The surface structure resembles the shell of a giant tortoise. (Photo No. 2.) In total, we counted twelve balls in the ravine, except for three spheres connected together.

Guests from the Mesozoic

  When everyone was already full of contemplation of the mysterious spheres, made measurements, took samples - the time of hypotheses began.
  The first thing I thought: is this not something like traces of volcanic activity? From the crevice at the bottom of the Tethys paleo-ocean, which once splashed here, bubbles from molten lava rock bubbled up, and such balls formed ... But our objections themselves rejected a convenient version: the material does not look like lava, and it is too structured in uniformity. There is always a petrified shell with a thickness of 20-30 centimeters and an internal cavity with a diameter of 50-60 cm. It is unlikely that the volcano will create such identical "bulks", and traces of ancient fire-breathing mountains were not found earlier in these places.

Or is it really the eggs of some gigantosaurs that lived millions of years ago on Earth? These strange balls painfully look like giant eggs or, say, eggs.

We were leaving home full of doubt and incomprehensible intrigue. Stone balls excited the mind, and soon we again wanted to go to an inconspicuous beam near Wet Olkhovka. A “folk” path has already been run over and over - there are curious compatriots stretching from all around to stare at the miracle of nature.
  Upon arrival, we immediately notice the loss: two balls have disappeared. It is not clear to whom and for what purposes they were needed. Worse, the balls continue to break with sledgehammers.
  By the way, a professor of Saratov State University, doctor of geological and mineralogical sciences Evgeny Petrushov recently visited here. The scientist determined the age of unique formations at 180 million years. And with this alone, you must admit, Kotov balls get special value.

New studies have yielded results. There were about thirty balls, if we count the broken formations and those that lie almost completely buried in the ground. They are approximately on the same plane, one meter higher or one meter lower. It was as if buried in silt. The sand path along the bottom of the beam is entirely internal substance from broken balls. There are several “egg balls” joined together.

“Note that this looks like a plant organism, and I do not exclude the possibility that here we observe a pronounced mineral life form,” concluded the researcher of anomalous phenomena Vladimir Efimchuk. - There is a remarkable work by Albert Bokovikov, in which the silicon form of life is practically proved using the example of the agate mineral. His research is confirmed by other mineral scientists.

Indeed, there was a feeling that unknown giant organisms developed and were at different stages of maturation. Many already burst, were washed away by water, and only strong stone cores and fragments of a stone shell, trailing along the channel of spring streams, showed that these strange organisms were also here. Laboratory analysis of gray sand from balls showed that it is 80 percent organic. So it was a living organism! ..

Wonder around the world

The stone riddle in the Kotovsky district was very fascinated by its secret Volzhanin Yuri Peskishev, a researcher, a chemical engineer by training. He did a great job identifying through the Internet numerous similar finds of strange balls in different parts of the world.
  Yuri now knows a lot about dinosaur eggs: he found detailed descriptions and photographs in China, India, Peru, Mongolia, and others. Layings of eggs are laid in a circle and all petrified. But all are small (photo No. 3).

But large spheres are found in various parts of the planet.
  The small fishing village of Moeraki on the coast of New Zealand has become known worldwide thanks to a geological miracle - the so-called “Moeraki boulders”, huge spherical stones scattered on a sandy beach. Boulders of almost perfect spherical shape, with a diameter of 1.5 to 2.2 meters. Their age is estimated at 60 million years.

“I saw the pictures,” Peskishev called me, “some balls resemble those of Kotov!” They have the same network of veins on the surface ... (photo No. 4).
  In the southeast of Costa Rica, several dozen strange stone balls with a diameter of up to three meters, which weigh under 20 tons, rest. The material is different - from volcanic rock to granite. All of them are almost perfectly round, and have traces of processing. The most surprising: the age of the mysterious spheres is supposedly about five hundred years. But to whom and for what purposes it was necessary to grind them - it is not clear. After all, this is a very long titanic work!
Stone spheres were found in Mexican silver mines; in Guatemala, balls were discovered that somehow “crawled” into the mountains to a height of more than 2 thousand meters. The Arctic island of Champa as part of Franz Josef Land is also dotted with perfectly round stones. They lie like cannonballs laid in a pyramid. The local balls are clearly of natural origin.

In Russia, there are also places where you can admire the strange spherical formations. For example, on the Vyatka River in the Kirov Region. They were discovered by workers in a quarry for the extraction of building materials. The age of the balls is approximately 253 million years, the sizes are different - from half a meter to two in diameter. Weight - one and a half or two tons, and the largest stone - 4 tons (photo No. 5). In 2007, more than 15 balls from 0.7 to one and a half meters in diameter were found on the bottom of the Black Sea near Gelendzhik. Most of the balls had cruciform notches. Geologists and historians have concluded that the ball delivered from the depths is machined artificially, and on its surface there is a “side” and an X-shaped cut.

In general, stone balls are often found. In Kazakhstan, when developing a sand pit at great depths, several large stone spheres were discovered. They come across in coal mines. In the area of \u200b\u200bSouthern Mangyshlak, in the towns of Turysh, Ustyurt, Karagie, whole placers of mysterious spheres of various sizes and configurations were found (photo No. 6). There are giant giants in Mexico, the USA, Brazil, Tanzania, Romania, Egypt and other places. And now also in the Volgograd region ... And increasingly, when explaining the nature of the balls, we came across the word “nodule”.

Is it really lightning?

  It turns out that nodules are from the Latin word concretio - accretion, thickening. These are constrictions, rounded mineral formations in sedimentary rocks. The centers of such contraction can be grains of minerals, shells, teeth and bones of fish, the remains of plants - this is where organic matter comes from! Most of them are formed in porous sedimentary rocks - sand and clay. Some scientists emphasize that nodule turns into a ball and grows evenly when substances are deposited in a rock that is equally permeable in all directions. As the ancestral home of the balls, the muddy ocean floor is most often called. Typical nodules are pearls in mollusk shells, kidney stones, and pancreas.
  Apparently, this is actually a nodule, although there is still a lot of incomprehensible ... And suddenly one day, Yuri Peskishev announced a new hypothesis.
- It is possible that these are traces of ball lightning in the ground! - he said. - Studies of such nodules are carried out by geologist-geophysicist from Kazakhstan G.V. Tarasenko, and he has pretty convincing evidence.

““ Yes, these are spherical nodules, ”said Gennady Tarasenko, Ph.D., to a correspondent's question about the nature of the Kotov balls. - Their origin is associated with electric discharges in the earth's crust and mantle, in zones of active tectonic faults. Real underground thunderstorms with lightning tens of kilometers long occur along them. At the end of linear lightning, their closest relatives, ball lightning, also appear. Many balls are 90 percent iron oxide. Iron is attracted by electromagnetic fields, so nodule is formed. That was just millions of years ago, and the balls became stone. But what's interesting is that underground lightnings appear where there are oil deposits. After all, oil is a dielectric.

So, the new version ... Nobody has come to a single hypothesis about the nature of balls yet. One thing is obvious: a find near the village of Wet Olkhovka is a rare geological phenomenon, and it certainly must be preserved as an interesting natural phenomenon. Whether stone balls are nodules, a plant product, or the creation of underground ball lightning - in any case, we should not lose this phenomenon because of our indifference and neglect. They would dig some balls from the earth, equip here something like an open-air museum, and here, in the Volga steppes, curious tourists would travel, it would be possible to organize fascinating sightseeing tours. People go to the ends of the world in New Zealand or in Costa Rica to admire strange formations!

COST RICA STONE BALLS

Photograph by Connor Lee (GNU Free Documentation License). Stone ball in the courtyard of the capital's National Museum

One of the greatest mysteries of pre-Columbian America are the amazing stone spheres of Costa Rica. Hundreds of these stone balls ranging in size from a few centimeters to 7 feet in diameter, the largest of which weighs 16 tons, have been found in the Dikvis area, in Palma Sur, off the Pacific coast in southern Costa Rica. They are mainly made of granodiorite - an igneous rock similar to granite. However, several specimens are carved from shell rock - a variety of limestone, consisting mainly of shells and their fragments.

Spheres were first discussed in the 30s of the XX century, when the United Fruit Company cleared the jungle under banana plantations and other fruit plants. Workers' companies discovered the objects and, recalling the local legend about the spheres covering the gold cores, tried to split them with dynamite, hoping to find the gold hidden inside. In 1948, Dr. Samuel Lothrot of the Peabody Museum of Harvard University and his wife set about comprehensively studying stone balls. In 1963, the results of the study were published. In his report, Lotrop described all the known 186 specimens and noted that he had heard of the existence of another 45 balls somewhere in the Yalaki region, where they were located, but they were transported somewhere. Several spheres were also found in the Pacific Ocean on the island of Kano, which is 12.5 miles to the south-west. This confirms the version that several hundred such stones were once created. Since the 40s of the XX century. balls began to be transported - often they were transported by rail from one end of the country to the other. Some of them can be seen in the National Museum, others in the parks and gardens of the capital of the country - San Jose. It is known that today only six stones remained where they were discovered.

The scientific analysis of Costa Rica's stone balls lasts more than 60 years. Work began in 1943 by the archaeologist Doris Zemurrey-Stone, the daughter of Samuel Zemurrey, the founder of the United Fruit Company. She examined the stones found by the workers of the fruit company, and later became the director of the National Museum of Costa Rica and in 1943 published her work in the American Antiquity magazine, placing five maps of the area on which 44 stone balls were placed. According to Stone's assumption, these spheres could be cult sculptures, tombstones, or were elements of a certain calendar. In the publication of Lotrop in 1963, there were also maps of places where spheres were discovered, data from a comparative analysis of nearby pottery and metal artifacts related to stone balls, as well as many photographs and drawings depicting spheres, data on their sizes and notes on arrangement of balls.

Later, in the 50s of the 20th century, archaeological excavations were carried out, thanks to which stone spheres were discovered in the south of Costa Rica along with pottery and other artifacts belonging to the cultures of pre-Columbian America. Since then, studies have been regularly conducted, however, the most thorough were the excavations, which in 1990–1995. conducted by archaeologist Iphigenia Quintanilla from the National Museum of Costa Rica. For many years, archaeologists have been trying to figure out the origin of these strange spheres. The subject of wide discussion is whether they are natural objects or man-made. Some geologists claim that the stones are of natural origin. They put forward the theory that magma, rising into the air after a volcanic eruption, settles on a hot, ash-covered valley, then magma balls cool and form spheres. According to another version, granite blocks were placed in specially dug pits, at the bottom of a huge waterfall and under the influence of a stream of falling water gradually acquired an almost perfect spherical shape. But the version that the stones were created by man seems more likely, especially when you consider that granodiorite, from which the spheres are mainly made, does not occur in this area. The deposits of this rock are located in the Talamanca mountain range, about 50 miles from the find. Archaeologist Iphigenia Quintanilla during a field study established a source of raw materials: she found boulders that can be called unfinished specimens of stone spheres. During the excavations of Quintanilla, fragments of balls were also found, which allowed to restore the method of their creation. Thus, in order to give the stones a rounded shape, they most likely did this: first, the boulder of approximately rounded shape was alternately exposed to either heat or cold until cracks appeared in the rock, then the surface was leveled using heavy stone sledgehammers, probably made of of the same material, and polished with some kind of stone tool.

There is only one objection: the stones have an almost perfect spherical shape. They are carved with an accuracy of “0.5 inch ± 0.2%”. The theory would be flawless if the boulders had not been carved with such precision. However, the surface of the balls is not perfect: the diameters of some differ by 5 cm from the parameters of the regular sphere. It is also unclear how the inhabitants of pre-Columbian America transported and installed them in the right places. Such skills indicate a highly developed culture and a well-organized community (although if stones were carved directly in a quarry, in the mountains, rolling down balls was not difficult).

The question of who created these mysterious spheres and why is a more difficult task. According to archeology, balls were carved for two periods. To the earlier of them, the Aguas Buenas period (100-500 CE), there are only a few balls. Most of the stone spheres in the lowlands of the Terraba River were created in the second period - Chirikui (800-1500). However, this does not help to figure out the purpose of the spheres. Let us leave aside such a convenient explanation as the intervention of aliens and Atlanteans. The original is the theory that they were created by a highly developed prehistoric culture and served as antennas of the ancient world electric network. However, without concrete evidence, this theory is groundless and seems as mythical as the legend that the locals had a potion that could soften rock. The authors of Atlantis in America: The Navigators of the Ancient World (1998), Iver Zapp and George Erickson, claimed that the spheres were created as navigation tools for the highly developed ancient race of mariners, the race that inspired the Greek philosopher Plato to write about the disappeared land - Atlantis. According to this theory, the spheres should have been close enough to the coast so that sailors could see them, and this does not correspond to their original location. In addition, this version assumes the accuracy of the arrangement of balls, which can not be said about instances that are not moved.

Surely it is not established why these objects were created. It is especially difficult to find out because most of the spheres are transported to other places. This problem is important because the location of the balls probably played an important role in the lives of the people who created them. Given the currently known data, the most plausible assumption is that the spheres were a kind of labels, possibly the boundaries of land or symbols of public status. It is also worth paying attention to the fact that initially many balls were arranged in such a way that each place corresponded to the position of the Sun, the Moon and all the planets known at that time. There was even a theory that they reflected the entire solar system. In the forties of the XX century, studying balls, Lotrop noticed that some of them rolled down from the nearby hills, on which there were once dwellings. Perhaps the balls were once located in the center of the settlements, on the tops of the hills. In this case, they could not be used in astronomy and, of course, in navigation. Most likely, over more than a thousand-year history of the existence of the sphere, many functions have performed that have changed over time. An interesting version is that the laborious production of balls in itself could be an important ritual process. Moreover, it played the same role (or perhaps even more significant), as, in fact, its result.

Since balls were discovered in Costa Rica, they have been constantly exposed to the effects of temperature changes, suffer from rain, and are periodically ignited. In 1997, land management services began to be created to protect holy sites and landscapes around the world. In 2001, with the assistance of various government organizations, the National Museum of Costa Rica began transporting balls from San Jose to the places where they were discovered through a high mountain range. Currently, they are guarded in the reserve, but when the cultural center is built, they will place balls and they can be seen in the very places where they were originally located in the Dikvis River Delta.

Archaeologists still find balls in the muddy sediments of the Dikvis River Delta. Today, stones can be seen in museums in Costa Rica, they adorn the lawns in front of various official buildings, hospitals and schools. Two of them were exported to the United States: one is on display at the Museum of the National Geographic Society (Washington, DC), and the other is in the courtyard of the Peabody Museum of Archeology and Ethnography at Harvard University (Cambridge, Massachusetts). Balls also adorn the gardens of the rich, as symbols of their position in society. Many stones long ago changed their usual location, but some of them again perform the functions for which they were created.

One of which was the discovery of mystical stones. Costa Rica's giant stone balls became world famous after the release of the Indiana Jones movie. For science, however, the origin of these strange structures has remained a mystery.

Discovery history

The archaeological site was discovered relatively recently - about 50 years ago. For a long time, mysterious spheres were hidden in the wild impenetrable jungle. During the felling of trees under plantations in 1948, workers stumbled upon round stone sculptures. Scientists immediately became interested in the finds. Several hundred balloons had different sizes: the largest in diameter reached 3 m and weighed almost 16 tons, the smallest did not exceed 10 cm. Researchers decided to look at the find from a helicopter height: the balls were arranged in groups of 3 to 45 pieces in the form geometric shapes. These were circles, squares, triangles, stretching for several kilometers. It immediately became clear that the balls were packed by people, but it is not clear for what purpose, and how the stone statues got into this area.

Stone balls Costa Rica. Theories of origin

All balls have an exact round shape, which can only be created using measuring equipment, and, therefore, spheres are the work of a person. According to analyzes, the age of the balls is 1,500 years. During this period, the Mayan tribes inhabited Costa Rica. Scientists believe that the Indians used stone processing technology, which is not known to modern mankind. Excavations in the area of \u200b\u200bfinds showed that the balls were brought here through impassable swamps and jungles from quarries, since no tools were found nearby. Scientists have put forward a number of hypotheses that try to explain how stone balls of Costa Rica appeared among wild forests.

Theories of the origin of the spheres are different:

1. Stone balls arranged in the form of one constellations . Such a combination was necessary for astronomical observations to help calculate the start and end times of agricultural work.
2. Ancient civilizations possessed powerful military equipment .   Balls could serve as nuclei for throwing guns. The geometric arrangement of spheres may have been necessary for training activities at the training ground.
3. Some scholars believe that stone spheres represent connection with alien creatures . The demarcations in the form of which the stones are laid out are original landing strips intended for space objects.

Manufacturing process

Scientists believe that Costa Rica's stone balls, theories of origin of which have not yet been proven, were made of stone blocks by processing and grinding. The stone easily breaks off with a sharp change in temperature. For this, the preforms were heated with coals, and then abruptly cooled with water. Excess pieces were broken off by hitting the stone with harder materials. When the boulders were near completion, they were sanded with sand or leather. The result is a perfect round shape. Inaccuracies were not detected even when measured with a tape measure and plumb line. This once again proves that the Indians had good mathematical and physical knowledge in the field of stone processing.

Transportation

And the way of moving the stone spheres to the place in which they were found. According to researchers, this distance was tens of kilometers through impassable swamps, rivers and forests. Without special transport, it is almost impossible to move the giant stone balls of Costa Rica weighing 16 tons. An analysis of some areas showed that they are made of shell rock and limestone, which are found on the banks of the Dikvis River. And this meant that heavy boulders were transported deep into the jungle upstream to a distance of 50 km. Unfortunately, no answer to these questions has yet been found.

Scientists who made presentations to UNESCO after a thorough study did not come to a common opinion and could not give an exact answer, where did the giant stone balls of Costa Rica come from. Therefore, the finds are not yet included in the World Heritage Register.

Stone balls of different countries (petrospheres)

Chudinov V.A.

In the work, I examined small stone balls of different countries, which turned out to be artifacts for household needs, transmitting globes, although not very accurately. After that, it would be logical to look for large stone balls that could play the role of a real globe. One of them is shown in fig. 1.

Fig. 1. Stone sphere (No. 1) in the courtyard of the National Museum of Costa Rica

About stone balls. Wikipedia writes: “ Costa Rica Stone Balls   - prehistoric stone balls (petrospheres), at least three hundred of which have been preserved at the mouth of the Dikvis River, on the Nikoya Peninsula and on the island of Caño, off the Pacific coast of Costa Rica. Made of gabbro, limestone or sandstone. Their sizes vary from an inch across to two meters; the largest weigh 16 tons.

The first balls were discovered in the 1930s. United Fruit Company workers clearing areas for banana plantations. Mindful of local beliefs that gold was lurking inside the stone, workers drilled them and split them into pieces. Vandalism was stopped thanks to the intervention of company management; The director’s daughter subsequently wrote a monograph on the petrospheres of Costa Rica.

In the 1940s for the study of stone balls began Harvard archaeologist S. K. Lotrop; articles began to appear about them in archaeological journals. To attract tourists, the petrospheres were transported from the jungle to museums and installed on city squares. Currently, only six balls are in places of their initial detection; the rest can be seen in museums - both in Costa Rica itself and beyond (in particular, in Washington and Cambridge).

Traditional stratigraphic methods for dating artifacts are of little use for stone balls that repeatedly moved from place to place. According to the finds of ancient ceramics near the newly discovered petrospheres, they are trying to date them with certain archaeological cultures of Central America. The scatter of dating in this case is from 200 BC. e. until 1500 g. e., that is, it covers almost the entire period of the existence of pre-Columbian civilizations.

The purpose and circumstances of the creation of the petrospheres are also a mystery to scientists. It can be assumed that these were symbols of celestial bodies or designations of boundaries between the lands of different tribes. More precisely, this could be judged if scientists had complete information about the places of their initial placement. Parascientific authors often argue that these "ideal" spheres could not be made by the hands of ancient people and connect them with the activities of space aliens».

Strange and ridiculous claims of scientists. There is no suggestion, it’s either a mystery or a strange statement.

The purpose of the petrospheres is a mystery to scientists.  If they are globes, then there is no mystery. Therefore, it is my task to prove that in addition to spherical shape, stone balls bear the contours of continents, and most likely, the names of geographical objects. Parascientific authors associate them with the activities of space aliens. - If there are readable and understandable inscriptions on the petrospheres, then in what language the inscriptions are made, they belong to such a people of earthlings. According to the finds of ancient ceramics near the newly discovered petrospheres, they are trying to date them with certain archaeological cultures of Central America. The scatter of dating in this case is from 200 BC. e. until 1500 g. e., that is, it covers almost the entire period of the existence of pre-Columbian civilizations.  “Why should it be considered that stone balls are somehow connected with ceramics or with Native American civilizations?” - Small globes were connected with Rus Rurik.

It can be assumed that these were symbols of celestial bodies or designations of boundaries between the lands of different tribes.- But small globes in only one case had, and even then, presumably, the superposition of the celestial sphere on the contours of the earth's continents (the spindle from Slatino). Concerning borders between lands of different tribes, then why put them on a huge globe, where on the scale of the whole Earth they still will not be visible?

Finally, more precisely, this could be judged if scientists had complete information about the places of their initial placement.  - What information about the purpose of the small stone balls we received after learning, for example, that one ball was found in Ecuador and the other in Egypt? - Absolutely no. So this is a false promise.

But then we have an exact statement and even a name: prehistoric stone balls (petrospheres). I have nothing against the name “petrosphere”, but I am surprised at the categorical expression of the opinion about the “prehistoricity” of stone balls. If they are made by people, then those who had excellent knowledge not only about the sphericity of the Earth, but also about the location of the continents on it. Therefore, this is the era of highly informed people, not only not savages, but not even barbarians.

Arguing in this way, archaeologists could come to the idea that only a little remained - to look for appropriate inscriptions. But for some reason, none of them came to this simple thought, although such a thought lies on the surface. And the most obvious of these thoughts is to look for inscriptions in the Greek language on the petrospheres, since it was supposedly the ancient Greeks who assumed the sphericity of the Earth. After all, even ordinary readers know the answer to the question: “What was the very first evidence of the sphericity of the earth and to whom it belonged?” - A certain Vladimir Flakov answered it like this: “ It is believed that the first person who proved the sphericity of the Earth is the ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle (the years of his life from 384 BC to 322 BC). Indeed, in the fourteenth chapter of the second book of the treatise "On Heaven" Aristotle gives some evidence of the sphericity of the Earth"(Http://otvet.mail.ru/question/81735509).

But for some reason, scientists did not look for Greek inscriptions on the petrospheres, although no one forbade to increase the glory of the ancient Greeks. So what stopped them? - I believe that they, like the Germans in World War II, were blown up by their own ideology. The modern historical and archaeological paradigm claims that each ethnos went the evolutionary path of development from wildness to civilization itself, however, at a different speed. The Indians of America allegedly helped in the course of the segment European conquerors - the Spaniards, Portuguese, British and French. But the ancient Greeks were not among the conquerors. Consequently, there can be no ancient Greek inscriptions on petrospheres. But there can be no European inscriptions, since not one of these peoples made any petrospheres in their homeland.

One thing remains: if there are inscriptions on stone balls, then in one of the Indian languages. - But historians do not need this at all! Then it turns out that the Indian civilization overtook the European? “This cannot be allowed for political reasons. It’s better to consider the balls as a game of nature or primitive maps of boundary lines between tribes. Which, in fact, was voiced.

And based on my paradigm, I put forward a different assumption: the petrospheres were made by people, Europeans, around the X-XII centuries A.D., moreover, Russians, and, most likely, in the temples of Rurik. At the same time, I, just like archaeologists, reason by analogy: these were the results of my previous studies of small spheres.

Fig. 2. My readings of inscriptions and revealing of contours of continents on a petrosphere

My readings of inscriptions. As usual, I enhance the contrast. Unfortunately, the natural illumination of this sphere is poorly suited for scientific purposes: the top turned out to be light, low. As contrast increases, the top will become even lighter, the bottom will be even darker, so it will be practically impossible to distinguish the contours in both places. However, for the primary evidence that the globe is in front of us, even such an image is enough.

I start not by identifying the contours of the continents, but by reading the largest inscriptions, since these inscriptions are barely noticeable, and drawing bold lines makes it impossible to read the hardly noticeable letters of the inscription. So the order of the epigraphic analysis is dictated by the features of the image.

So, first I read the largest inscriptions on top of the ball. They say : MASK OF MAKAZHEV RURIK YAR. From the analysis of inscriptions on small globes we know that the words MASK MAKAZHEVA or MASK MASKAZHI mean the current lexemes borrowed in Russian MAP   or THE GLOBE . And the mention of Yar Rurik means that these geographical artifacts were made in the temples of Rurik exactly.

Then I move on to reading the labels on the upper third of the globe. Here the color saturation of the letters is much greater, the letters look much denser, although their size is somewhat smaller. I read this text: MASK MAKAGE YARA RURIK. Although it almost literally coincides with the previous one, its presence is very important in order to understand that the first text is read correctly. The second text confirms the meaning of the first.

One of the eastern bends of the Mediterranean Sea resembles the number 3. It is here that there is a fragment on which you can read the dating of the manufacture of the globe: 303 YEAR YARA. However, this dating is duplicated: in the bottom left, in a rectangular white frame, I read the numbers: 303-324 (as usual, a larger date is written first, then a smaller one). I believe that this is not the date of manufacture of this globe, since such a product can be made in less than a year, but the date of manufacture of a certain series, and the last year is just the year of manufacture of this particular artifact. In terms of the usual calendar for us, we get the dating: 1159-1180 YEARS FROM THE CHRISTMAS , that is, the second half of the XII century.

Inside the three framed white fragments, I read the words: 33 YARA ARKONA. They are no different from the same address read on some small globes. This city is well known to me: later it was called Khersones, and today - Sevastopol. This inscription is very important to me: it says not only that this city of Russian military glory was the center of cartography of the 12th century, but also that the sailors of this port traveled around the world, for which they needed maps and globes. Including demonstration, like this one, from Costa Rica.

And on the last fragment I read the clarification: TEMPLE YARA. - Who would doubt that? For cartography, of course, the temple of Yar was responsible. - It is possible that on this globe there are some more inscriptions with initial data duplicating or clarifying what I read, but this is enough for the first acquaintance with this type of artifacts.

The next problem is the allocation of the contours of the continents. First you need to understand in general which hemisphere we see on the globe in this perspective. Judging by the outlines of the lower left continent - this is Africa. In this case, above we see Eurasia, which goes upstairs beyond the visible part of the globe. And from this it follows that the circumpolar parts of the Earth on it are greatly reduced, which is why Africa goes below the globe and Eurasia above. So the globe in front of us is represented by the Eastern Hemisphere.

Then you should read the labels of geographic features. Of course, these names could be outlined; however, then some frames will fall on others, and it will be very difficult for the reader to understand them. So I went a different way: under each inscription by the runes of the Sort on the globe, I signed the inscriptions in modern letters. And he began with Africa: just above the white frame, I found the word MAINTENANCE, which I signed on the globe, and also spelled the Rod runes on the decryption field. A little higher, I found the word that is still often read on geoglyphs of North Africa. This word CLAVIA. Thus, in the XII century the name of the whole continent and the name of its northern part differed from the modern ones. Although, it is possible that they are already out of use. - At the same time I checked myself: I recognized the contours of Africa correctly.

Subsequently, the contouring of the coastline did not go so smoothly. It was easy to recognize the boot of the Arabian Peninsula, but it was difficult for me to understand where exactly the line of his toe went. On the one hand, it turned out to be very short in the area of \u200b\u200bthe foot, but on the other hand, the coastline of Persia was clearly pushing it. In order to make sure, I read the names: on the boot I found the name ARABIA, and in the more eastern region - PERSIA.

Perfectly round stone spheres of various sizes were discovered on the territory of the small Latin American state of Costa Rica almost a hundred years ago, and all this time the mystery of their origin and destination excites the minds of researchers.

Scientists have not come to a unified version, discussing both the natural processes that could result in the formation of balls, and some kind of highly developed civilization capable of technologically processing stone. True, why in this case they used these round stones is also not clear.

How stone balls were found

Workers stumbled upon a mysterious find while clearing the jungle under the planting of banana plantations in 1930. More than three hundred stones were united by an obvious similarity - a perfect round shape and a smooth surface. The size of the spheres varies - from a few centimeters to a couple of meters in diameter, respectively, and the weight of the largest is quite impressive - about 20 tons. When flying around the territory on an airplane, it turned out that most of the stones are located in strict order, forming clear geometric shapes.

Workers, suggesting that a gold treasure might be hidden inside, immediately began to cut the finds, until the company's management stopped vandalism. However, after several years, less than a dozen balloons remained in place - the rest were transported to museums, public buildings and souvenirs. Today, stone balls adorn patios, archaeological collections, parks and squares.

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

Traces of processing or where they came from

The discussion of the origin of round boulders was immediately divided into two areas: natural or human hand. The second version is confirmed by obvious traces of grinding and polishing on the spheres, as well as their organized location.

In the 60s it was found that the stone spheres of Costa Rica are not unique: similar finds were made not only on the American continent (in Mexico, the USA), but also in New Zealand, Egypt, Germany and even in the Arctic. But, for example, in Mexico, similar spheres were found not on the earth, but under it - in silver mines. Others were not processed and rounded by nature.

The natural theory, supported by many scientists, is repelled by volcanic processes. As a result of uniform crystallization of magma, in principle, the formation of round shapes is possible, and their subsequent rise to the surface is not excluded in areas subjected to strong weathering. Where such processes are not observed, the spheres remain underground.

A prerequisite is significant temperature differences, and their traces are just found on the surfaces of the balls. But the catch is that the temperature effect could just be artificial - for machining. This again leads to the idea of \u200b\u200bhuman intervention, especially since the natural version does not explain why the balls were laid out in strict geometry and how they moved.

The remains of an ancient civilization?

According to archaeologists, the boulders were brought to a perfect round shape by mechanical decoration. To facilitate the work with the stone, it was repeatedly heated, cooled, excess was exiled, then it was trimmed with a solid tool. The finished sphere was mounted on the base and sanded / polished with an abrasive and probably leather.

However, many questions remain unanswered. What tools did the alleged masters work with? How did huge stones move around the area, sometimes tens of kilometers through the jungle and swamps? Why and by what principle did they fit into groups?

Perhaps it would be easier to solve the riddle, if the balls remained in their original places. But by the beginning of the research, they were all moved, information about the exact points of their location is unreliable, the time of their appearance was not established.

Assumptions that groups of stones were prototypes of astronomical observatories or places of worship are discussed, but suffer from a lack of fact. From the same field, there are ideas that these are the nuclei of ancient military weapons, landmarks for starships, or even just architectural decor.

So, the American researcher I. Zapp associated the location of one of the groups of balls with Stonehenge and Easter Island, claiming that it was a kind of geographical index. And adherents of alien theories, of course, also see traces of high-tech guests who equipped cosmodromes here. But none of the official and semi-official versions is recognized as final and confirmed, therefore the stone balls of Costa Rica continue to excite the minds and imagination of millions of people.