首页
外语
计算机
考研
公务员
职业资格
财经
工程
司法
医学
专升本
自考
实用职业技能
登录
外语
From the air, the lines etched in the floor of the desert were hard to see, like drawings left in the sun too long. As our pilot
From the air, the lines etched in the floor of the desert were hard to see, like drawings left in the sun too long. As our pilot
admin
2012-12-01
39
问题
From the air, the lines etched in the floor of the desert were hard to see, like drawings left in the sun too long. As our pilot cut tight turns over a desert plateau in Southern Peru, north of the town of Nasca, I could just make out a succession of beautifully crafted figures.
"Orca!" shouted Johny Isla, a Peruvian archaeologist, over the roar of the engine. He pointed down at the form of a killer whale. "jMono!" he said moments later, when the famous Nasca monkey came into view. "Colibri!" The hummingbird.
Since they became widely known in the late 1920s, when commercial air travel was introduced between Lima and the southern Peruvian city of Arequipa, the mysterious desert drawings known as the Nasca lines have puzzled archaeologists, anthropologists, and anyone fascinated by ancient cultures in the Americas. For just as long, waves of scientists—and amateurs—have inflicted various interpretations on the lines, as if they were the world’s largest set of Rorschach inkblots. At one time or another, they have been explained as Inca roads, irrigation plans, images to be appreciated from primitive hot-air balloons, and, most laughably, landing strips for alien spacecraft.
After World War II a German-born teacher named Maria Reiche made the first formal surveys of the lines and figures—called geoglyphs—outside Nasca and the nearby town of Palpa. For half a century, until her death in 1998, Reiche played a critically important role in conserving the geoglyphs. But her own preferred theory—that the lines represented settings on an astronomical calendar—has also been largely discredited. The ferocity with which she protected the lines from outsiders has been adopted by their caretakers today, so that even scientists have a hard time gaining access to the most famous animal figures on the plain, or pampa, immediately northwest of Nasca.
Since 1997, however, a large Peruvian-German research collaboration has been under way near the town of Palpa, farther to the north. Directed by Isla and Markus Reindel of the German Archaeological Institute, the Nasca-Palpa Project has mounted a systematic, multidisciplinary study of the ancient people of the region, starting with where and how the Nasca lived, why they disappeared, and what was the meaning of the strange designs they left behind in the desert sand.
As our plane banked into another turn, Isla, a native of the highlands who works at the Andean Institute of Archaeological Studies, kept his broad, high-cheeked face pressed to the window. "Trapezoid!" he shouted, pointing out a huge geometrical clearing looming into sight. "Platform!" he added, gesturing with his finger. "Platform!"
Platform? He was pointing at a small heap of stones at one end of the trapezoid. If Isla and his colleagues are right, such unprepossessing structures may hold a key to understanding the true purpose of the Nasca lines. The story begins, and ends, with water.
The coastal region of Southern Peru and Northern Chile is one of the driest places on Earth. In the small, protected basin where the Nasca culture arose, ten rivers descend from the Andes, to the east, most of them dry at least part of the year. These ten fragile ribbons of green, surrounded by a thousand shades of brown, offered a fertile hot spot for the emergence of an early civilization, much as the Nile Delta or the rivers of Mesopotamia did. "It was the perfect place for human settlement, because it had water," says geographer Bernhard Eitel, a member of the Nasca-Palpa Project. "But it was a high-risk environment—a very high-risk environment."
According to Eitel and his University of Heidelberg colleague Bertil Machtle, the microclimate in the Nasca region has oscillated dramatically over the past 5,000 years. When a high-pressure system over central South America called the Bolivian High moves to the north, more rain falls on the western slopes of the Andes. When the high shifts southward, precipitation decreases, and the rivers in the Nasca valleys run dry.
Despite the risky conditions, the Nasca flourished for eight centuries. Around 200 BC, the Nasca people emerged out of a previous culture known as the Paracas, settling along the river valleys and cultivating crops such as cotton, beans, tubers, lucuma (a fruit), and a short-eared form of corn. Renowned for their distinctive pottery, they invented a new technique of mixing about a dozen different mineral pigments in a thin wash of clay so that colors could be baked into the pottery. A famous ceramic tableau known as the Tello plaque—showing several Nasca strolling while blowing their panpipes, surrounded by dancing dogs—has been viewed as an iconic snapshot of a peaceful people whose rituals embraced music, dance, and sacred walks.
The mysterious Nasca lines discussed in the text is interpreted in various ways EXCEPT______.
选项
A、landing strips for spacecraft from outer space
B、irrigation plans
C、paths
D、religious signs
答案
D
解析
推断题。文中谈到Nasca曲线时,交代了它的多个用途,但没有提到宗教性的用途。所以D项不正确。
转载请注明原文地址:https://kaotiyun.com/show/PUaO777K
0
专业英语八级
相关试题推荐
Asmoreandmorecollegestudentsprefertorentaroomoutsidethecampusandenjoytheirprivatelifethere,problemscomealo
WhichofthefollowingstatementsisNOTtrueofinterlanguage?
Peopleusuallycommunicatebyspokenandwrittenlanguage,yettheycanalsocommunicatewithoutwordsandthiskindofcommunic
Theworld’spopulationcontinuestogrow.Therenowareabout4billionofusonearth.Thatcouldreach6billionbytheendof
Accordingtoreportsinmajornewsoutlets,astudypublishedlastweekincludedastartlingdiscovery:thenation’sJewishpopu
A、substitutescantaketheresponsibilitiesofparents.B、it’sacceptabletoletsubstituteslookafterchildren.C、perhapssubs
HowtoReadEffectivelyManystudentstendtoreadbookswithoutanypurpose.Theyoftenreadabookslowlyandingreatdetail
WhichofthefollowingisNOTacaseinEnglish?
MoviesarethemostpopularformofentertainmentformillionsofAmericans.Theygotothemovietoescapetheirnormaleveryd
Thedistinctionbetween______inlinguisticsliesinhowthingsoughttobeanddescribinghowthingsactuallyare.
随机试题
A.Thelinguistsdonotthinkthatparentsteachtheirchildreninsomewaythatpeoplearetaughtasecondlanguage.B.Sai
买卖合同当事人可以在合同中约定标的物所有权转移的时间。()
印象形成是对别人或事物进行归类,明确其对我们的意义,使自己的行为获得明确定向的过程,主要受到三方面因素的影响,分别是________、社会特征和________。
α-醋酸萘酚酯酶染色阴性的细胞是
辨别表证和里证,首先应审察的是()。
简支梁受分布荷载作用如图4-66所示。支座A、B的约束力为()。
确定一个货物买卖合同是否具有国际性,关键是要确定当事人的营业地,代表处机构所在地的处所往往也被视为通常意义上的“营业地”。
我国历史地名作为一种文化遗存,与当地的民俗、传说、宗教信仰、历史人物等密切相关。以传统村落为例,其命名方式虽有不同,但都包含了深厚的文化。不少村落以最早迁居于此的始祖来命名,如岳阳的张谷英村、新乡的郭亮村。有的则与当地的人文环境相关,如长治的八义村,汉代因
下列选项中不是“抗大”的教学方法的是
列宁说:“没有‘人的感情’,就从来没有也不可能有人对于真理的追求”。这句话肯定了
最新回复
(
0
)