Ancient structures have long been a source of mystery for generations of people who inherit the cultural legacy of their ancestors. Now, satellite images of a remote northern steppe in Kazakhstan, released by NASA, show mammoth earthworks – geometric figures of rings, lines, crosses and squares - stretched over an area as large as several football fields. These figures are discoverable only from high up in the air and it is estimated that the oldest among it is 8,000 years old.

The earthworks were described as “unique” and “previously unstudied” at an archaeology conference in Istanbul, reports NY Times. The figures in the Turgai region of Kazakhstan are at least 260 in number, composed of ramparts, trenches and mounds arranged in five basic shapes. The largest among it is a colossal square composed of 101 raised mounds, with a diagonal cross connecting its opposite corners, covering an area larger than the Great Pyramid of Cheops.

Another has been described as a type of “three-limbed swastika,” with arms bent counterclockwise.

Dmitriy Dey, Kazakh economist and archaeology enthusiast, spotted the Steppe geoglyphs, as it is famously known, on Google Earth in 2007. The geoglyphs have puzzled observers and have been largely hidden from the outside world. NASA made an announcement about its photographs of the Steppe geoglyphs taken from nearly 692 km up, showing intricate details as small as a few centimetres.

Compton J. Tucker, senior biospheric scientist for NASA in Washington, said, “I’ve never seen anything like this; I found it remarkable,” reports NY Times. He revealed that NASA was “proceeding to map the entire region.”

The structures are estimated to have been built much before the Nazca lines in Peru, which are estimated to be 1,500 years old. The only humans that inhabited this part of Kazakhstan were nomadic tribes of the Stone Age, who were not advanced enough to create such structures, according to Science Alert.

Earlier theories about the Steppe geoglyphs linked to ancient aliens were dismissed by NASA’s announcement, which signified a new interest in the nature of large-scale organisation of humans that predates civilised societies.

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