One of the mysteries of Mexico is the Olmec civilization, which is considered the first "mother" civilization of this territory.
Like many ancient civilizations, it arises immediately: already with a developed hieroglyphic writing, an accurate calendar, art and architecture. According to the views of modern researchers, the Olmec civilization arose approximately in the middle of the II millennium don. e. and existed for about a thousand years, then dissolving without a trace in time and space.
However, on this occasion, different versions have also been expressed: some researchers date the collapse of this civilization much earlier.
The name "Olmecs" ("rubber people") was given by modern scientists. We do not know anything about this people: where did they come from, what language they had, why they disappeared. According to one of the Indian legends, these people sailed from afar, led by sages. Moreover, the wise men went somewhere further, leaving here the "simple" population. Well, how can we not recall the legend of Atlantis and the settlement of its inhabitants throughout the Earth?
The main centers of the Olmecs were located in the coastal zone of the Gulf of Mexico, but the influence of their culture can be traced throughout the territory of Central Mexico. This mysterious civilization left us with large ceremonial complexes with earthen pyramids, an extensive system of irrigation canals and city blocks. Their jade products are considered masterpieces of ancient American art, and the monumental sculpture of the Olmecs includes both multi-tone granite and basalt altars and sculptures of human height. But the main mystery of this culture is the huge stone heads.
The first such head was found back in 1862 in La Venta, and today seventeen of them have already been found. All of them are carved from solid blocks of basalt and have a height of 1.5 to 3.4 m. The average height of most Olmec heads is about 2 m, and the weight of these sculptures ranges from 10 to 35 tons.
The heads are made in a single stylistic manner, but each is an image of one particular person. All heads are crowned with some kind of caps, also completely different. Many have earrings in their ears. The largest head has closed eyes, while everyone else has them open.
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Another mystery is that these heads clearly belong to people with pronounced black features: wide, flattened noses with large nostrils, plump lips and large eyes. As you know, this does not fit the anthropological appearance of the inhabitants of ancient America.
There is a version about immigrants from Africa, but the official science, despite all its logic, does not want to recognize it: after all, in those days there could be no connection between the two continents.
Interestingly, no bones, not to mention the whole skeletons of the Olmecs, have survived. At all. Although all the signs of the largest civilization, as they say, are there. Let's not bore you with too fantastic versions, we will give only the main version: science believes that the fault is too humid climate.
There are other mysteries as well. An Olmec vessel in the form of a seated elephant is kept in the Anthropological Museum of Xalapa (Veracruz State).
Meanwhile, similar animals in America disappeared with the end of the last glaciation, that is, about 12 thousand years ago. It turns out that either the elephants lived under the Olmecs, which is contrary to science, or they saw them in Africa, which again contradicts scientific research, or the Olmec culture has deeper roots than is commonly believed.
There is another mystery: in the Olmec culture, toys have been found - dogs on wheels. But it is known that pre-Columbian America did not know the wheel!
But back to the head puzzle.
It was found that the basalt for their manufacture was taken from quarries in the Tuxtla Mountains, the distance to which from the place where the heads were found is 90 kilometers (if measured in a straight line). How it was possible to transport blocks of such weight over such a distance is unclear.
Some researchers put forward the version that the stone for cutting heads was delivered on rafts along the rivers to the Gulf of Mexico, and then overland to their current location. But the fact is that the bay and the heads are separated by 40 kilometers of swamps, so it is unlikely that such a strategy could greatly facilitate the task.
Some researchers put forward a version that the heads were only used by the Olmecs, but in fact they got them from the previous civilization of giants, which, according to some Indian legends, the aliens exterminated. The Aztecs called the ancient giants "kiname" or "kinametine". The Spanish chronicler Bernardo de Sahagun believed that it was the giants who erected the pyramids at Teotehuacan and Cholula.
Bernal Diaz, a member of the Cortez expedition, in his book "The Conquest of New Spain" mentions that, after the conquistadors were entrenched in the city of Tlaxcale, the Indians told them that in very ancient times people of great height and strength lived here. In support of their words, they showed the bone of an ancient giant. Diaz claims that it was a femur and its length was equal to his height. It turns out that the giants were three times taller than an ordinary person.
Giants from the codices (manuscripts with pictures) of the Aztecs
There is also a version that giants ruled in the Olmec cities, and stone heads are portraits of their rulers. And it was the giants, not the Olmecs, who could have been representatives of the Negroid race.
This is even confirmed in the ancient Ossetian epic "The Legend of the Narts", which tells about the struggle of the Narts with the giants called the waigi. It is clear that these events took place too far from America, but if we assume that the civilization of the giants existed, then it could well be anthropologically unified throughout the world. And the Ossetian epos repeatedly emphasizes that the giants are the owners of black leather.
