Out-of-place artifact (OOPArt) is a term coined by American naturalist and cryptozoologist Ivan T. Sanderson for an object of historical, archaeological, or paleontological interest found in a very unusual or seemingly impossible context that could challenge conventional historical chronology. The term “out-of-place artifact” is rarely used by mainstream historians or scientists. Its use is largely confined to cryptozoologists, proponents of ancient astronaut theories, and paranormal enthusiasts….

In this article we present our selection of Top 10 unexplained ancient sites and OOPArts. There are many more (you can find them by exploring our website).

Top 10 unexplained ancient achievements

Tiwanaku (Spanish: Tiahuanaco and Tiahuanacu) is an important Pre-Columbian archaeological site in western Bolivia, South America. Pumapunku also called “Puma Pumku” or “Puma Puncu”, is part of a large temple complex or monument group that is part of the Tiwanaku. Tiahuanaco is an example of engineering so monumental that it dwarfs even the work of the Aztecs. Stone blocks on the site weigh many tons. They bear no chisel marks, so the means by which they were shaped remains a mystery. The stone itself came from two different quarries. One supplied sandstone and was situated 10 miles away. It shows signs of having produced blocks weighing up to 400 tons. The other supplied andesite and was located 50 miles away, raising the question of how the enormous blocks were transported in an age before the horse was domesticated in South America. Close examination of the structures shows an unusual technique behind their building. The stone blocks were notched, then fitted together so that they interlocked in three dimensions. The result was buildings strong enough to withstand earthquakes.

Gateway of the Sun, Tiahuanaco, Bolivia

Puma Punku site has many finely cut stones – some weighing over 100 tonnes. The processes and technologies involved in the creation of these temples are still not fully understood by modern scholars. Raad More >>

Monolithic stone blocks with precisely cut elements. Puma Punku, Bolivia

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The high desert of Peru holds one of the most mystifying monuments of the known world—the massive-scale geoglyphs known as the Nazca Lines. The “lines” are ranging from geometric patterns to “drawings” of different animals and stylized human-like forms.

The ancient lines can only be truly taken in, their forms discerned, from high in the air, leaving generations mystified as to how these precise works could’ve been completed long before the documented invention of human flight. Who built them and what was their purpose? Are the lines signs left by an alien race? Ancient “crop circles”? Landing strips for alien gods/astronauts? Relics of a ancient people far more advanced—capable of human flight—then previously imagined? Or perhaps a giant astronomical calendar? Read More >>

Sacsayhuamán (also known as Sacsahuaman) is a walled complex near the old city of Cusco, at an altitude of 3,701 m. or 12,000 feet. The site is part of the City of Cuzco, which was added to the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1983.

Giant walls of Sacsayhuaman

They are three parallel walls built in different levels with lime-stones of enormous sizes. Zigzagging walls are made of boulders used for the first or lower levels are the biggest; there is one that is 8.5 m high (28 ft.) and weights about 140 metric tons. Those boulders classify the walls as being of cyclopean or megalithic architecture. There are no other walls like these. They are different from Stonehenge, different from the Pyramids of the Egyptians and the Maya, different from any of the other ancient monolithic stone-works. Scientists are not certain how these huge stones were transported and processed to fit so perfectly that no blade of grass or steel can slide between them. There is no mortar. The stones often join in complex and irregular surfaces that would appear to be a nightmare for the stonemason. Read more >>

[subject related: Evidence of Vitrified Stonework in the Inca Vestiges of Peru ]

Stonehenge is a megalithic monument on the Salisbury Plain in Southern England, composed mainly of thirty upright stones (sarsens, each over ten feet tall and weighing 26 tons), aligned in a circle, with thirty lintels (6 tons each) perched horizontally atop the sarsens in a continuous circle. There is also an inner circle composed of similar stones, also constructed in post-and-lintel fashion.

Stonehenge is angled such that on the equinoxes and the solstices, the sun rising over the horizon appears to be perfectly placed between gaps in the megaliths. This is doubtless not an accident, and probably contributed to the stories of its mysterious origins.

Gerald Hawkins, a Professor of Astronomy, concluded that Stonehenge was a sophisticated astronomical observatory designed to predict eclipses (Stonehenge Decoded). The positioning of the stones provides a wealth of information, as does the choice of the site itself. If you can see the alignment, general relationship, and the use of these stones then you will know the reason for the construction. The author, and other astronomers, discovered the 56-year cycle of eclipses by decoding Stonehenge! The movement of stones once each year from an initial fixed position allows to predict accurately every important lunar event for hundreds of years. This computer would need resetting about once every 300 years by advancing the stones by one space. Mankind generally used the cycle of the moon as a unit of timekeeping.

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One of the strangest mysteries in archaeology was discovered in the Diquis Delta of Costa Rica. Since the 1930s, hundreds of stone balls have been documented, ranging in size from a few centimetres to over two meters in diameter. Some weigh 16 tons. Almost all of them are made of granodiorite, a hard, igneous stone. These objects are monolithic sculptures made by human hands. Read More >>

Balls in the Courtyard of National Museum, San José, Costa Rica. Photo courtesy of John W. Hoopes. Copyright ©2001 John W. Hoopes. All rights reserved.

The mysterious ruins of Baalbek. One of the great Power Places of the ancient world. For thousands of years its secrets have been shrouded in darkness, or bathed in an artificial light by those who would offer us a simplistic solution to its mysteries.

The Temple of Jupiter is one of the most impressive Temples in Baalbeck. It measures 88×48 meters and stands on a podium 13 meters above the surrounding terrain and 7 meters above the courtyard. It is reached by a monumental stairway. One of the most amazing engineering achievements is the Podium which was built with some of the largest stone blocks ever hewn. On the west side of the podium is the “Trilithon”, a celebrated group of three enormous stones weighing about 800 tons each.

Some archaeologists might well wish that Baalbek had been buried forever. For it is here that we find the largest dressed stone block in the world – the infamous Stone of the South, lying in its quarry just ten minutes walk from the temple acropolis. This huge stone weighs approximately 1,000 tons – almost as heavy as three Boeing 747 aircraft.

The large stone at Baalbek, known as the Stone of the Pregnant Woman. Copyright by Ralph Ellis (source: Wikipedia)

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The Great Pyramid of Giza (also called the Khufu’s Pyramid, Pyramid of Khufu, and Pyramid of Cheops) is the oldest and largest of the three pyramids in the Giza Necropolis bordering what is now Cairo, Egypt, and is the only one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World that survives substantially intact. It is believed the pyramid was built as a tomb for Fourth dynasty Egyptian King Khufu (Cheops in Greek) and constructed over a 20 year period concluding around 2560 BC. The Great Pyramid was the tallest man-made structure in the world for over 3,800 years.

Originally the Great Pyramid was covered by casing stones that formed a smooth outer surface, and what is seen today is the underlying core structure. Some of the casing stones that once covered the structure can still be seen around the base. There have been varying scientific and alternative theories regarding the Great Pyramid’s construction techniques. Most accepted construction theories are based on the idea that it was built by moving huge stones from a quarry and dragging and lifting them into place.

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The Shroud of Turin is reputedly Christ’s burial cloth. It has been a religious relic since the Middle Ages. To believers it was divine proof the Christ was resurrected from the grave, to doubters it was evidence of human gullibility and one of the greatest hoaxes in the history of art. No one has been able to prove that it is the burial cloth of Jesus of Nazareth, but its haunting image of a man’s wounded body is proof enough for true believers.

The Shroud of Turin, as seen by the naked eye, is a negative image of a man with his hands folded. The linen is 14 feet, 3 inches long and 3 feet, 7 inches wide. The shroud bears the image of a man with wounds similar to those suffered by Jesus.

One theory is simply that the Shroud is a painting . It has been proposed that it was painted using iron oxide in an animal protein binder. The STURP scientists have concluded from their studies that no paints, pigments, dyes or stains have been found to make up the visible image. Could the image have been produced by a burst of radiation (heat or light) acting over short period of time which would have scorched the cloth? Scientists have not been able to duplicate the characteristics of the Shroud using this method just like the painting hypothesis. Also the color and ultraviolet characteristics of the Shroud body image and a scorch are different. The shroud body image does not fluoresce under UV light but scorches like the burns from 1532 do fluoresce under UV light. Thus many scientists rule out the radiation theory. Read More >>

In the 1930?s, in a small rural village 100 miles southwest of Chihuahua, Mexico, at the back of a mine tunnel, two mysterious remains were found: a complete human skeleton and a smaller, malformed skeleton. In late February of 1999, Lloyd Pye was first shown the Starchild skull by its owners. Nameless then, it was a highly anomalous skull.

Front view of the Starchild skull (on the left) and the human skull (on the right). Compare striking differences between depth of eye sockets and shape of temporal area just behind outer edges of eyes.

The long-standing Star Being legends of Central and South America provide a plausible mechanism for how a highly abnormal skull (relative to humans) might have been biologically created rather than genetically or congenitally malformed, or physically manipulated by deliberate deformation (binding).

Such immense deformation across the entire occipital (rear) and parietal (upper side) areas of the skull could not result from binding without deformation being visible in the frontal area, which is not evident.

Birth defects across the entire occipital and parietal areas, while not impossible, seem highly unlikely because of the remarkable symmetry exhibited in all areas of the skull, including those effected by the deformations.

The terrain of the bone in the eye sockets contains incredibly subtle indentations and ridges that are perfectly symmetrical in both sockets, which simply have to have been formed by genetic directions rather than by deformations.

Related to this subject is Enormous Cone Head Of Paracas Peru:

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The device, made of bronze and encased in wood, was found by divers off the Mediterranean island Antikythera in 1900.

“This device is just extraordinary, the only thing of its kind,” says Mike Edmunds (Cardiff University, Wales) one of the scientists investigating this amazing artefact. “The design is beautiful. The astronomy is exactly right. The way the mechanics are designed just makes your jaw drop.”

Image Copyright © 2001-2012, Anthony Ayiomamitis

Nothing like this instrument is preserved elsewhere. Nothing comparable to it is known. from any ancient scientific text or literary allusion. On the contrary, from all that we know of science and technology in the Hellenistic Age we should have felt that such a device could not exist. Some historians have suggested that the Greeks were not interested in experiment because of a contempt-perhaps induced by the existence of the institution of slavery-for manual labor. On the other hand it has long been recognized that in abstract mathematics and in mathematical astronomy they were no beginners but rather “fellows of another college” who reached great heights of sophistication. Many of the Greek scientific devices known to us from written descriptions show much mathematical ingenuity, but in all cases the purely mechanical part of the design seems relatively crude. Gearing was clearly known to the Greeks, but it was used only in relatively simple applications. They employed pairs of gears to change angular speed or mechanical ad- vantage, or to apply power through a right angle, as in the water-driven mill. Read More >>