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A Temple of the Martian Moon Gods? In July 1976, the NASA space probe Viking 1 photographed the Cydonia region of Mars. The photographs revealed a mile-square landform which resembles a human face. It was immediately discounted as 'a trick of light and shadow' by scientists. Other strikingly artifact-like landforms in the region were also dismissed. But the controversy just hasn't gone away.
The famous 'Face on Mars' Why would an intelligent civilization on Mars build a sculpture of a face and several other mysterious monuments on such a scale that they can only be properly viewed from high above? One possibility is religious. Pre-technological civilizations on Earth repeatedly turned to worship of sun, moon and stars, and built monuments to their 'sky gods.' What if the Martians did the same? If such a 'Message in the Stones' were found, it would clearly be strong evidence for artificial origin. With that evidence as our goal, let's now take a look at the prime candidates for Martian 'sky god' worship -- the moons Phobos and Deimos -- the brightest, fastest moving, and closest objects in the Martian night sky. Let's take a look at the Martian Moon System:
Overhead view of Martian Moon System . . .
. . . Viewed from an angle . . .
. . . Viewed from the 'side' (equatorial plane). The last view shows that the Martian moon system can be represented as a straight line with distance markers placed to scale. It would look like this:
We're going to relate this to sculpted monuments at Cydonia, so let's incorporate some artistic symbolism. For example, the center of the planet might be represented by a cross-hairs, the surface radius by an arc segment, the moons by . . . faces. |
The 'Stylized Martian Moon System' Schematic
Individual rocks that look like faces are one
thing. But to have several 'rocks' resemble a schematic diagram of a moon
system would be just too much detail to expect from random chance. If we
found such an illustration at Cydonia, its complexity would lead us to
acknowledge it as artificial.
Let's recapitulate the argument.We're suggesting the Face on Mars is part of a larger complex of monuments at Cydonia. The purpose of such monuments might be religious. That they point skyward suggests they are involved in the worship of 'sky gods' -- a universal religious concept among vastly differing, isolated cultures on Earth. The Martians might have worshiped their own moons, much as ancient cultures on Earth worshiped our Moon. If the Martians had crude naked eye astronomy, they could have calculated the distances to their moons, as well as the size of their own world, using geometric surveying techniques. If so, they might have made a large temple complex of several monuments, incorporating their astronomical knowledge in the form of a stylized diagram of the Martian moon system. With that in mind, let's examine the Cydonia Complex component by component, and relate it to a stylized diagram of the Martian moon system: A. CENTERPOINT. These four 'dots' (each the size of a large Egyptian pyramid) correspond to the cross-hairs on a schematic diagram, symbolizing the center of a circle. In this instance, it represents the center of the circular cross-section of Mars, and is also the center of the orbits of the two moons.
B. WEDGE. On the left-hand side, this landform has the shape of an animal face in profile, and possibly represents the pagan personification of Mars itself. The right-hand side's curving wall schematically corresponds to an arc segment of a circle. In this context, it represents the circular cross-section of the Martian surface.
C. FACE. The most famous of Cydonia landforms represents the inner martian moon, Phobos, in the form of a human face. As in the folk traditions of many cultures here on Earth, the Martians also chose to symbolize a 'man in the moon.'
D. SECOND FACE. The image shown here is vertically compressed to simulate a low-south viewing angle; in overhead perspective, the elongated curving shape of a moon in crescent phase is even more pronounced. The symmetrical eyes, nose ridge, mouth, and chin repeat the 'man in the moon' facial theme. This face personifies the god of the outer martian moon, Deimos. So, all the symbols of a line schematic of the martian moon system are present at Cydonia. But are they grouped together, in the appropriate order and distance scale? Here's the NASA composite photograph of the Cydonia Complex, as viewed by the Viking 1 space probe long ago in the summer of 1976: |
Landforms: geometry and layout
This diagram shows three correspondences between
the Cydonia Complex and the Martian moon system: symbols, arrangement,
and scale.
A strange choice of messages? Not really. In the early 1970s, believing advanced intelligent beings live among the stars, NASA affixed a plaque to two space probes destined to leave the solar system. Named after the space probes, it was called the Pioneer Plaque.
The 'Pioneer Plaque' At the bottom of the plaque is a diagram representing the layout of our solar system: the Sun at left, then Mercury, Venus, Earth, etc., out to Pluto. Distance information is encoded. And then there are illustrations of two 'typical' human beings. An astronomical diagram, containing two faces. Look familiar? The message at Cydonia is clear. It couldn't be more clear if we had written it ourselves. And in a way, we have.
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