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The Guardian - US
The Guardian - US
World
Dan Collyns in Lima

Archaeologists use AI to discover 303 unknown geoglyphs near Nazca Lines

lines depicting a person in grey stone
A geoglyph discovered in Nazca, Peru, with an annotated version to highlight the image. Photograph: University of Yamagata

Archaeologists using artificial intelligence (AI) have discovered hundreds of new geoglyphs depicting parrots, cats, monkeys, killer whales and even decapitated heads near the Nazca Lines in Peru, in a find that nearly doubles the number of known figures at the enigmatic 2,000-year-old archaeological site.

A team from the Japanese University of Yamagata’s Nazca Institute, in collaboration with IBM Research, discovered 303 previously unknown geoglyphs of humans and animals – all smaller in size than the vast geometric patterns that date from AD200-700 and stretch across more than 400 sq km of the Nazca plateau.

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