Rituals of the Nasca Lines

New excavations reveal the purpose and origin of the famed geoglyphs

This excavation of a site near the lines at Pernil Alto in the Palpa Valley turned up evidence of a pre-Nasca settlement. (Photo: Andrew Curry)

It was a little after eight in the morning and the sun was still low on the horizon. Jammed in the back of a six-seat Cessna Stationair flying low over Peru's Atacama Desert, I felt a rush of air. Glancing up, I saw the pilot holding the plane's window open with his left hand while steering us into a tight, banking turn with his right. Soon I spotted a wide, straight line that extended for hundreds of yards then turned 90 degrees to the left. Next to it lay the faint outlines of a whale traced in stone. It was one of the Nasca lines...