book exerpt #2: The Mystery of the Carvings

(this material is an excerpt from the book "The Message of the Stones", by Dr. Javier Cabrera)

According to the theory of evolution, higher animal forms are the result of a slow process that began with the first living forms (microorganisms) that arose from the primitive seas of our planet. This process has taken millions of years. Studying the strata that form the surface of the earth, geologists have identified five main geological levels, each of which conforms to one of the stages of this slow process, and in each of which have been found long-extinct animal and vegetable remains. The antiquity of the layers has dated the organisms found in them. Each one of these five geological eras has been subdivided into smaller time frames called periods (see chart). The oldest geological era is the Archeozoic. This era does not begin with the origin of the earth (which is calculated to have occurred about 5,000 million years ago), but with the formation of the earth's crust, when there already existed seas, rocks, and mountains. This era began 3,500 million years ago and lasted 2,000 million years. It is believed that during this period there was a great deal of volcanic activity and shattering cataclysms that culminated in the formation of mountain chains. Since organic material is transformed into carbon under certain conditions of temperature, pressure, and time, the abundance of carbon found in the rocks of the Archeozoic era leads one to the conclusion that there was considerable animal and vegetable life during this period. The next era, the Proterozoic, began 1,500 million years ago lasted 900 million years. This, it is believed, was a period of glaciers. In Proterozoic rock spicules of sponges, aguas vivas (evidence of waters in which organisms can live), and remains of mushrooms, algae, mollusks, arthropods, and worms have been found. All this demonstrates that in this era life not only existed, but the process of evolution had advanced notably.

At the beginning of the next era, the Paleozoic, all vegetable and animal life still lived in the seas. We find primitive crustaceans and organisms similar to arachnids. At that time most of what is now land was covered with shallow sea. Fish with hard, shell-like coverings, without fins or mandibles, next emerged, one of which was the agnata. Later terrestrial plants developed. The mandible-less fish evolved into a grater variety of fish, a fact which has led to this era being called the Age of the Fish. Ancestors of osseous (bony) fish appeared, which evolved into forms with lobular fins and even radiated fins. One type of fish with lobular fins, the celacanth, was believed to be extinct, but in 1939 and 1952 fishermen caught live specimens 2 meters long in the waters around Madagascar. The first amphibians appeared, similar to the fish with lobular fins, but with feet instead of fins. The extensive marshy forests that eventually created the earliest carbon deposits arose. At the end of the Paleozoic era primitive reptiles appeared, among them the seymuria, the oldest reptile known, about which it is difficult to say whether it was an amphibian about to become a reptile or a reptile scarcely differentiate from an amphibian. Also at the end of this era important climactic and tectonic changes occurred. The continents emerged from the seas. In North America the Appalachian mountain range was formed. In Europe other mountain ranges appeared. There was a period of glaciation from the Antarctic that covered most of the southern hemisphere. This era began 600 million years ago and lasted 370 million.

The most distinctive feature of the era that followed, the Mesozoic - which began 230 million years ago and lasted 167 million - was the origin, differentiation, and finally the extinction of an enormous variety of reptiles, for which the period is also known as the Age of the Reptiles. Moreover, many species of reptiles achieved enormous size, among them certain species of dinosaurs. Some giant dinosaurs walked on two feet, like the tyranosaurus, the iguanodon, the lambeosaurus, the coritosaurus, and the parasaurolopus. Others walked on four feet: The brontosaurus, the diplodocus, the brachiosaurus, the stegosaurus, the anchilosaurus, the triceratops, and the tirocosaurus. There were also huge marine dinosaurs with fins, like the ichthyosaur, plesiosaur, elasmosaurus, etc. Related to the dinosaurs were flying reptiles with membranous wings and stumpy legs; some had a long tail that served as a sort of rudder, and others had a short tail; the feet of the flying reptiles were not capable of supporting the weight of the animal and these creatures, like the bats, rested by hanging from their feet. Warm-blooded mammals began to appear, as well as the oldest species of birds known to us, one of which, the archeoterix, was about the size of a crow, covered with feathers. It had undeveloped wings, jaws with teeth and the long tail of a bird. At the end of this era was a cataclysmic event known as the Revolution of the Rocky Mountains, much like that which had ended the previous era. This new cataclysm gave rise to the Rockies, the Alps, the Himalayas, and the Andes.

The next era was the Cenozoic, which began 63 million years ago, and saw among many other things the separation of North and South America. It has been divided into two periods: The Terciary (which lasted 62 million years) and the Quaternary (which lasted 1 million). At the beginning of the Cenozoic era certain winged mammals and mammals with tails became extinct, among them the megacheiroptera. However, this era is noted for the evolution of the birds, insects, plants and especially the mammals, for which it is known as the Age of the Mammals. During this era we find thirty main groups of mammals. Some primitive species have managed to survive in Australia, where there was little competition from more advanced species, since this continent was separated from the others since the end of the Mesozoic era. Two examples are the ornitorrinco and the echidna. Unlike other mammals whose young are born live, both are oviparian, which suggests their link to the reptiles. Also during this era we have the mastodon, the mammoth (both now extinct), and their descendants the elephants. The evolution of the horse begins at the start of this era, with a species of small horse with toes instead of hooves. Llamas and camels date from the Cenozoic - the alticamellus with its several toes is an example - as do huge armadillos, megatheres, etc. The most, advanced of these in terms of brain size were, of course, the primates. Primates appeared approximately 70 million years ago (at the end of the Cretacic period, Mesozoic era), evolved from their mammalian ancestors.

Based on evidence from living primates, the theory of evolution has established the following order of appearance: tupaids, lemurs, loris, tarsiers, monkeys, and anthropoids. Anthropoids are different from their immediate ancestors - the monkeys - in the absence of a tail. Gibbons, orangutans, gorillas, and chimpanzees are living anthropoids (Fig. 17). The theory of evolution holds that there must have been a branch of anthropoids, unknown to us, which divided, producing one branch which was the origin of present day anthropoids and another which was the origin of man. Fossils of anthropoids have been found dating back 25 million years.

In 1967, the anthropologist Luis Leakey found in Kenya the remains of an anthropoid more fully developed than those I have just mentioned; his age has been established at 20 million years (kenyapithecene Africanus). Earlier in 1962, and also in Kenya, the same anthropologist and discovered the retrains of another anthropoid, the Kenyapithecene Wiquerii, next to a rudimentary stone hammer. His age has been estimated to be 12 million years. Leakey considers these two anthropoids to be more akin to man than to anthropoids; in short, he believes they are hominids. Fossilized remains of more advanced hominids have also been found in Africa. The 1.7 million year old zinjanthropus - a much more advanced hominid than the others - is believed to have provided the common trunk from which each of the human races as we know them developed: the australoid, the mongoloid, the caucausian, and the negroid (see chart 4 on human evolution). In each of these branches fossilized remains of humanoid forms between the zinjanthropus and the human have been discovered, usually jawbones, teeth, femurs, humeri, skull fragments, and in a few cases, complete skeletons and/or skulls: the Australopithecene, 1 million years old, found in calcareous rocks in the austral zone of Africa; and the Neanderthal, 250,000 years old, found for the first time in Germany.

Within this evolutionary process, the Neanderthal man is considered to be human, because he used tools and fire and buried his dead in ritualistic fashion, to judge from the bones and utensils that have been found. Cro-Magnon man (40,000 years old), found in many parts of the world, was not unlike modern man, not only because he used tools and fire, lived in society, and practiced funeral rituals, but also because he left artistic testimonials to his high intelligence compared to those who came before him: the drawings that decorate the caves where he lived. Good examples are the caves of Altamira, in Spain, and Lescaux, in France.

What this classical theory of evolution tells us is that the man that illustrated the reproductive cycles of the megacheiroptera, the dinosaur, and the agnata on the stones of Ica could not be any of the humanoids that existed between the zinjanthropus and the Neanderthal, since these humanoids appeared much, much later than the animals depicted, and also because even had they coexisted, and even had they been able to guess at the reproductive processes of the beasts around them, their brains were simply not developed enough to have executed the drawings.

For Cro-Magnon man, whose brain development was complete, one must raise similar objections. Although he may have carved animal figures (bisons, goats, giraffes, pigs, bears, horses, etc.), with an accuracy that suggests high intelligence (Fig. 18), he was even farther removed chronologically from the prehistoric animals depicted in the Ica stones, and moreover, his high intelligence notwithstanding, Cro-Magnon man clearly had not achieved the intimate understanding of biology - as great as that of modern man - that the artists of the Ica stones possessed.

FIGURE 18: Stone with the figure of a bison carved by Cro-Magnon man, found in France.
In the process of evolution Cro-Magnon man (40,000 years old) is such like modern man.

At this point in my investigations I must confess I was surprising myself at every turn. The engraved stones of Ica were revolutionizing paleontology and radically changing the date of the appearance of culture and intelligent man on earth. One question remained: Was it possible that the engraved stones of Ica were somehow being manufactured by modern man? I remembered the assertion made by the Director of the Museo Regional of Ica that the peasants of Ocucaje were making them. The assertion strained credulity, since these are simple people who totally lack the specialized understanding of science that can be seen in the stones. Possibly the stones were not manufactured by peasants but by one or two men who did possess such understanding and who had the stones carved with the intention of selling them. Despite the fact that I knew from Herman Buse's account that these stones had been sold since 1961 for very little (11), amounts that would not even come close to compensating the enormous trouble they cost, I decided that I must have laboratory confirmation of the age of the stones.