Mysterious elk-shaped structure found in Russia

By Owen Jarus /
Livescience.com/ October 12, 2012, 12:19 PM
Mysterious elk-shaped structure found in Russia


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A historical Google Earth image from 2007 showing the animal-shaped geoglyph in Russia, which may predate
Peru's famous Nazca Lines.
/ Google Earth

A huge geoglyph in the shape of an elk or deer discovered in Russia may predate Peru's famous Nazca Lines by thousands of years.

The animal-shaped stone structure, located near Lake Zjuratkul in the Ural Mountains, north of Kazakhstan, has an elongated muzzle, four legs and two antlers. A historical Google Earth satellite image from 2007 shows what may be a tail, but this is less clear in more recent imagery.

Excluding the possible tail, the animal stretches for about 900 feet at its farthest points (northwest to southeast), the researchers estimate, equivalent to two American football fields. The figure faces north and would have been visible from a nearby ridge.

"The figure would initially have looked white and slightly shiny against the green grass background," write Stanislav Grigoriev, of the Russian Academy of Sciences Institute of History & Archaeology, and Nikolai Menshenin, of the State Centre for Monument Protection, in an article first detailing the discovery published last spring in the journal Antiquity. They note that it is now covered by a layer of soil.

More:
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-205_162-57531405/