首页
登录
职称英语
From the air, the lines etched in the floor of the desert were hard to see,
From the air, the lines etched in the floor of the desert were hard to see,
游客
2023-12-13
11
管理
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. [br] What is the main idea of the passage?
选项
A、Nasca and its history.
B、Nasca and its people.
C、The hidden mysteries of the Nasca lines.
D、The Discovery of Nasca.
答案
C
解析
主旨题。全文的主要内容探讨的都是Nasca曲线隐藏的各种神秘之处,故C项正确。
转载请注明原文地址:https://tihaiku.com/zcyy/3268641.html
相关试题推荐
TheDesertedVillagewaswrittenby______,theoutstandingrepresentativeofth
Fishfarminginthedesertmayatfirstsoundlikeananomaly,butinIsrael
Fishfarminginthedesertmayatfirstsoundlikeananomaly,butinIsrael
Fishfarminginthedesertmayatfirstsoundlikeananomaly,butinIsrael
Fishfarminginthedesertmayatfirstsoundlikeananomaly,butinIsrael
Fishfarminginthedesertmayatfirstsoundlikeananomaly,butinIsrael
Fishfarminginthedesertmayatfirstsoundlikeananomaly,butinIsrael
AlthoughAustraliahasalargearea,______ofthecontinentisdesertorsemi-des
TheGrandCanyonandthePaintedDesertarelocatedin______oftheUnitedStates
Fromtheair,thelinesetchedinthefloorofthedesertwerehardtosee,
随机试题
《兄妹开荒》是延安文艺座谈会召开以后出现的()A.话剧 B.歌剧 C.秧歌
图示为正方形截面等直杆,抗弯截面模量为W,在危险截面上,弯矩为M,扭矩为Mn,A
下列选项中,属于日常生活支出的有()。A.保费支出 B.外出就餐 C.交通罚
计算分辨率为800×600的24位真彩图像的l分钟.25帧/秒的非压缩视频存储容
公司型基金的注册资本限额、缴付安排及出资方式等内容全部由()进行规定。A.招募
已知图示两梁的抗弯截面刚度EI相同,若两者自由端的挠度相等,则P1/P2为:A.
毛泽东在《反对本本主义》一文中所阐明的重要观点和提出的重要思想有A.实行“工农武
以下关于半固定桥的说法中错误的是()A.倾斜基牙为获得共同就位道 B.保护缺隙
根据《中华人民共和国水污染防治法》,下列内容中,属于环境保护主管部门应当对城镇
采用顶管法施工时,应在工作坑内安装的设备有()A.导轨 B.油泵 C.
最新回复
(
0
)