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Long before the Inca came to power in Peru, an “unknown civilization” built the oldest known astronomical observatory in the Americas, according to Sciencealert.
Although this observatory is known as “Shinkilo”, it is “not as old as the site of Stonehenge”. It is a masterpiece of human creative genius, and contains unique features not seen anywhere else in the world.
Shinkilo is located in the coastal desert of Peru and contains a row of 13 stone structures.
The stone structures on the top of the hill extend for regarding 300 metres, and stand out especially at sunrise and sunset.
The site also contains a “three-walled” complex on the top of the hill that constitutes the “fortified temple”, in addition to two complexes of buildings that form the “observatory and the administrative center”.
According to Sciencealert, the site’s history goes back more than 2,300 years.
The site says that the ancient civilization that designed the solar observatory is unknown, but it is one of the oldest civilizations in the Americas and in fact it predates the Inca civilization, who also excelled in astronomy, by more than 1,000 years.
Similar to the Inca civilization, the Sun may have been considered a deity, and the stairs leading to each stone structure indicate that the site may have once been used for rituals.
In 2021, the Shinkilo complex was officially added to the UNESCO World Heritage List.
An unknown civilization .. a scientific puzzlement about the “oldest solar observatory” in the Americas
