Marine animals, in size and variety significant for us appeared some 600 million years ago. At -450 million
years, the corals invade the oceans, where conditions are favourable. see also "
hibis,lagoon"
There are vestiges and fossils everywhere; the flints testify sometimes :
very widespread, they would be agglomerates of sponge skeletons,
dating from the cretaceous moreover, more than 70 million years ago.
One finds out on them prints of shells, gorgons and corals, but it is necessary to be patient (a low sun is more favourable); with a bit of luck, one finds
beautiful prints and even cut flint (see "hibis,
decoration".
REFERENCE MARK.
The classification of our planet history is complex and unpleasing for us, profane;
I thus chose to fix a simple reference mark, for periods particularly interesting and known for :
the secondary era, which covers approximately two periods: the Jurassic one, with the formation of the mountains of
-180 million years to -135 million years, then the cretaceous which reveals incredible layers of limestone coming from marine micro-organisms, from
-135 to -70 million years
.
Considerable mountains are marine deposits (limestones) raised, and even coral reefs,
like the Dolomites (Italy), canyons in Madagascar and so on..
As for our beloved dinosaurs, they would have lived approximately between -165 to -65 million years
; they have thus disappeared at the end of the cretaceous, excepted birds, their descendants, they say.
After the Dinosaurs, at the tertiary era, a part of the France was covered by a TROPICAL SEA ( Loire valley, Tours, Angers). In some areas of Touraine, the ground is made of
conchiferous calcareous containing uncountable tiny teeth of sharks ; impassioned always hope
to find there a tooth of the giant shark, Mégalodon. see "hibis, sharks").
Paris, May 2002; while digging for the enlarging of the aquarium of Trocadéro (Paris), one discovered these tropical fossil traces (small corals, teeth
of sharks, shells). Traces of palm trees had already been identified in the same zone.
Evolution of the climates.
Since the creation of our planet, its climate does not evolve unrelentingly in a sole and unique
direction. In addition to the cyclic variations climatic,
the distribution of the ices has changed during the time - for example, the weather
has been hot in Europe but cold in Australia - and the magnetic poles themselves
would have been reversed, which would be dramatic if renewed because
the magnetic flux protects us from mortals jets from the sun and certain more remote radiations.
Catastrophic scenario ; By
the thinning of the only icecap of the North
Pole, some think of a brutal swing (reversal) of our Earth, seemingly as
that occurs to the icebergs.
>A recent theory proposes to
connect the
repetition of great ice ages to the crossing, by our planet, of the "arms"
of our galaxy (called Milky Way, kind of gigantic lens made up of billion
solar systems like our). That would give periods of some 140 million years.
If true, how to understand that the last
great glaciation was completed there 11.000/ 8.000 years ago and that
the chart below expresses many fluctuations of the volume of the ices during
the 900 000 past years ? reality is changes are numerous,
though repetitive. Averages, small and microscopic variations are
superimposed on the more significant movements. We are thus not at the end
of our sorrows.
In White, simulation of volumes of the ices; white points = maximum of ice. nowdays, ice is at the lowest ever for the last 900,000 years.
The chart is completed for the current time, with one of the lower
levels of ice observed over the last 900.000 years period ; it match with a
significant reheating. But as one can note it on the chart, nothing clear
can be foresee for the future.
The sea level.
by supposing that over one "so short" period there is neither
loss nor creation of water, the sea level is only depending on the amount of
ice ; 600.000 years ago, time of great creation not to say expansion of
the marine life, it was rather comparable with that which we know today;but 20.000 years ago, the level was 110 meters lower than today,
which explains why the cave of Cosquer (Mediterranean) is now under water.- Calanques of Cassis (rocky inlets), France;
At a time when the level of water had been lowering, mouths
of rivers turned into falls which dug the rock before falling in the sea
below. The sea got again its current high level, invading the fjords drugged.
Variations quickness
It was thought that being thousands, million years or more, climates got
through extremely slowly from a period to another; science not having ever
any embarrassment to disavow itself (*), it is now told that the
passage of a glaciation period to a non glaciation period would be carried
out in less than one century (one even says 50 years) and
could
a few years of milder weather take place among a
long very cold period. By by forecast..
These last ten millennia, relatively tiny climatic modifications caused significant
cultural upheavals, which could account for the disparition of ancient civilisations.
Climatic forecasts are
like our weather forecast. We catch immediately that probably never can we
understand anything, because explanations arrive most naturally, afterwards
!
Without going any further, the idea of a nearest
come back to an Ice Age was in the air, if I can say, when this article was
written ; it finds its origin in the extrapolation of the temperature chart
relating to the 1 000 last years (East of Europe), then the hundred last
years; one always finds this abrupt cooling after a long period of
heat. It's somehow a Self-evident truth and one smiles at
this holy reading, because the number of times curves were wrongly prolonged
is infinitely big. It is like to say, "after
the rain, the fine weather". Or the contrary.
Indisputable facts : they were lived by some old men like me :
the fall of the temperatures started more precisely about 1950 (on the
Riviera, I indeed have the souvenir of much more beautiful summers - but
without water, excepted violent occasional storms - they had been years
later.
In 1970, something surprising occurred: the
winter lasted only 35 days (instead of 90) and spring made its appearance
exceptionally early. And yet brutal change, the autumn started later and
spring was very late. It is precisely in 1971 that time started to be
degraded, causing the series of agricultural disasters which one knows in
the northern hemisphere.
The following year, the average temperature,
especially in winter, was definitely lower than that of the previous years
in North America and in the Mediterranean area (the quantity of snows and
ices years 71/72 increased by 13 % (what is enormous) for only one winter;
on the other hand, the European Arctic Ocean knew abnormally high
temperatures, while the centre and the west of Europe were affected by long
periods of dryness. During this time, the Mediterranean and the Near East,
underwent rains unusually abundant just as the Pacific coast of North
America and most of Eastern Europe.
Mechanisms and consequence : if
there is too much cold air, no monsoon on the tropics. In summer the
contraction of the circumpolar cold air normally attracts the belt of
subtropical anticyclones towards the moderate zones (where the weather is
nice). While being withdrawn, these anticyclones create an equatorial wet
air drainage on the tropics; it is monsoon. If the masses of cold air
contract less than usually, monsoon remains more close to the equator : it
is the dryness on the tropics.
This document reproduces a digest
of an " Science & Vie" item (unknown date).
Evolution of the climates (comments)
The general outline is coherent with what I could read in addition, but it
is not therefore a certainty
because the ignorance, notorious falsifications can be allowed for a time
and even relayed by the most serious world scientific presses (*).
the author points out himself that certain alarmist forecasts produced by American on the climate
of India or the countries of Asia, could well be sullied with a strong
desire to selling their foodstuffs !!(see here-after Mistakes, falsehoods, deceptions"
and " "the Cosquer cave".
Datation
and carbon 14. carbon-14 is a whose mass (quantity) is
constant in the alive beings, but which decreases regularly by radioactivity
after their death. By measuring the remaining quantity, one can estimate the
time of death. Alas, this carbon exists only at the alive beings or
materials coming from (wood, leather, horn, hair). Therefore, no information
can be drawn from the stone, metal, fabrics. except if they contain traces
of them (leather, hairs, horn ..).
Some other radioactive elements
can allow to evaluate the time, and appropriate means like circles in the
fossil trees or other observations (see " the nautilus and the moon")
It was thus hitherto thought that the climate changed over very long periods, it is now
admitted the
passage from a glaciation period to a non glaciation period can be carried out
in less than one century (one says 50 years)
1 / - Enormous glaciers level lowered considerably; that can be watched on the wear of
the rocks and I remember to have made this strange observation in the
west Canadian, where one can see vertical cliffs of rock in an immense
narrow part scraped by the glacier when its surface was a hundred meters
above our heads
2 / -
Area which were flooded in the past and sea-beds which were raised :
they can be identified because of the presence of laden (there are limestone,
shells, fossils..). Most of mountains have that in.
These marine laden, despite their
importance, represent only 5 et 10 % of the amount of sediments
produced by the wearing of rocks (that gives sands, clays ..) whose have been
sometimes agglomerate into new rocks (sandstone, marbles,
powdery rocks - bauxite), under the chemistry or high pressure work.
Mistakes, falsehoods, and hoaxesof the science.
There were sites and
archaeological objects, but also animals, "manufactured" to make believe
in significant discovery, and distorted experiments that nobody never
succeeded in reproducing them. Scientific hoaxes are not rare either ; remember these strange circles in the French
fields, that gathered scientists of the whole world, coming to verify on
the spot, of which some declared "that could not be done by men" !
For a time, it was admitted that the ground was flat and an English club always supports this theory, but undoubtedly in good mood and with
force pints of beer. One will not blame them, for what we believe today can revals being wrong tomorrow.
Galileo had been jailed to have said that the ground was cycling around the sun (and not the reverse as it
was affirmed at the time) and our exceptionally gifted Champollion had
preferred to keep silent on the fact that the discoveries in Egypt proved
incontestably that the arrival of the man on earth largely exceeded less
the 5000 years fixed by the Church. For this behaviour, nothing will ever
change on the earth.
Similar scientific declarations : "it was believed hitherto that,
.. but elements show now that ... are current facts.
Recent example : It was discovered recently that the ways and practices of certain species of fish, followed under the
ice-barrier with tracers, were not at all what one believed hitherto !
(but we do not understand
any more, it was said as being sure !).
Scientists, no more than financial analysts and other politologists has never any embarrassment to
disavowed itself, without excuses nor regrets.
We thought until then that the climate were evolving over very long periods;
it is now admitted that the passage of a glaciation to a period of not glaciation could occur within century
(say, 50 years)
After the famous "ozone hole" and the stream "El
Nino", scientists worries now about the Gulf Stream, this stream "blessed by
Gods", who gives France and of all the western shore of Northern Europe a moderate
temperature while they are freezing in New-York, therefore at the
Bordeaux latitude.
(part
from a Voutch's drawing) Relaxing a bit : Well before the invention of our hair sprays,
the caveman had it already become aware that
by cutting flint, it modified the climate (..)
stirred at time the the world of the press, archaeology, or art, the whole
in the background of legends and of supernatural powers. These human
skulls, cut in rock crystal, are indeed fascinating. They
are several in the world and even in museums.
They first appeared in the second half of the XIXth
century, being supposedly
of origin Maya or Aztec. Their discovery remains
both a little romantic and uncertain;
British Museum places his own by 1300-1500 AD, but
does not display it any more.
They aroused such a craze
that glass false were even produced. A precise analysis allowed to
prove that they had been cut with modern tools, such as jeweler's
grindstones, probably with a Brazilian quartz
sent to Germany. They are now a curiosity shown at temporary
exhibitions. There is one piece in France at the Quai Branly Museum. The last movie of Spielberg uses this theme.
Prehistoric man could mean - 70,000 years for our likeness, and much more less for an approach.
The man known as "of the caves"; around -40.000, better -20.000 years A.D, is said tbe alike ourselves.
At that time, Europe knew a severe ice age, with temperatures dropping to - 40° - 50°, even - 70° C
. On the north of the current France and until half way, extended a deserted
zone covered with ice almost all the year. The south of France looked like
steppes of Central Asia;
The prehistoric men (*)
lived in full ice age, one of the hardest moments of the cyclic history of
the terrestrial climate. The chart of France, and more generally of Europe,
was divided into three great zones.
The first consisted of a cap of ice, called "ice cap", which covered the ground until a limit fluctuating around
the axis Berlin-south of England. The sea level was 110 meters lower than today. The French Channel thus did not exist and the edges of the French
coast." were several tens of kilometres towards the west, on what today is the continental step.
Below, an area called "periglacial desert" extended from the medium of the today France. This zone that the
historians describe as "vacuum" sheltered few animals and even less men.
It was completely covered with ice during the long winter. Some parts could thaw out in summer: during a few weeks. It grew a transitory vegetation
there, alike this of Northern Canadian or Northern Russia.
The temperatures could vary a few degrees above zero to - 40 - 50, even -70° C. ( -40° F to -94° F )
The third zone, much greeting started at the southern half of France. As the rest of Europe, it was subjected to glacial conditions, but the regular thaw lasted
several months allowing the development of a vegetation favourable to the herds.
Translation : white area : "glaces permanentes" = permanent ice - brown area : "zones avec fontes d'été" = areas with melting summer ice.
dec. 1975 picture from "Science&Vie - Paris Match).
the Southern Mediterranean part was much less cold than elsewhere due to the influence of the sea
; at the contrary, the Rhone, including the area of
Solutré (*) was opened to the harsh
winds and the Arctic cold. Here, nothing came to mild the icy influence of
the Siberian anticyclone which remained permanently above Europe. On the few
thousands years of the solutréenne period, a few moments of higher
temperatures could be intercalated with durable periods of great cold.
(*)
the discovery of a tool made called "Solutréen" the period of
the Palaeolithic superior ranging between - 22 000 and -18 000.
(*) Cave man and wall art :
the prehistoric man said "of the caves" would be a myth of our textbooks,
myth maintained to better trap the tourists, if we believe the beautiful
"reconstructions" (?) that now adorn some famous sites.
Because there ares no clues of a "day to day" life in those; i.e. not
traces of fires having been used to cook food, not remainders of bone of animals consumed on the spot, traces of manufacture of tools, not of dead ..
; their
only "cultural" demonstrations left works which we admire now : drawings of animals and hunting which were undoubtedly their first concern, outline of hands
or plugs and clay modelling and sculptures (including very realistic sexes of men or women); all that sometimes at the bottom of the cave, up to several
hundred meters (Ariège), but also in incredible settings: at the far end and under a rock projection of a few tens of centimetres in height, a true hole
under rock that obliged the artist to be put in position of the mechanic slipped
under a four drive wheels to paint its lower part ! Did
they permanently do it or only at favourable periods? and what could be their
motivations ? perhaps quite simply ourselves,
representation of their environment and their life; pagan belief, exorcism
of the bad fate, call upon a good and generous nature (productive hunt, climatic
accidents, conditions), or quite simply testimony; perhaps all of that.
This prehistoric man protected himself
especially under what one calls rock shelters, perhaps supplemented with
branches and peals. He possibly could have sheltered at the entry of a cave, but
that's all. It is not assumed that human groups have ever lived
nearby one of them.
"Lion
man" Picture of a remote past dominated by
animals, Löwenmensch, or lion man, reappeared after having spent
almost fifty years in the basement of a museum, where it was broken into 200
pieces. Carved in a defence of mammoth, this 30 cm height statuette was
found in the cave of Hohlenstein-Stadel, nearby the valley of Danube, line
of possible migration towards Europe of men came from the Middle-East. Among
the masterpieces of the cave of Vogelherd appear a horse and a mammoth out
of ivory. The discovery of a flute of bone, in Geissenklösterle, confirms
the existence of an artistic conscience. .
approximately
less than 32.000 years A.D.
Sculpture of horn. Germany.
Analyses with carbon-14 reveals that frescos come back
to approximately 32 000 years, the animals in question kept suddenly more
importance.
In fact, the cave of Chauvet also
contains representations of man animal. Numerous are those
nowadays which think that the men of Neandertal, whose beginning is fixed
around - 70.000 years, also evolved to modernity. New testimonies coming
from French sites indicate that our supposed cousins "stupid" manufactured
actually objects of style aurignacian 38 000 years ago. "In the south-west
of France, declares the archaeologist Jean-Philippe Rigaud, it seems that
the men of Neanderthal carried out the passage to modern technology before
the arrival of the aurignacians. The debate among the specialists in the
last ice age concerning the mentality of the man of Neanderthal emerged again when in late 1998, a discovery was
made close to the town of Fatima in the Portuguese countryside : a
prehistoric site of human camping containing pieces of bone, stone tools and
charcoal, vestige of hearths as well as the aces of a child buried 25
000 years ago.
There were lions in France,
36.000 years A.D
picture "Science&Vie - Paris Match",
dec. 1975)
heads of lionesses: admire the complete fresco (click)
the cave
Chauvet (La Combe-d'Arc, Ariège - France) ;
This scenery of bisons hunting by lionesses is, for both the quality of
the drawing and the movement, an incredible realism; The artist did not
possibly arrive at this stage directly, and a good number of previous
sketches from him are certainly ignored ; me be certain awkward drawings are
they from students.
grotte Chauvet (In French, but pictures.. )
On the website, click onto "bisons".
36.000 years ago A.C, prehistoric men known as"of the caves", of which those of the cave of Chauvet-Combe-d'Arc, were living in full ice age,
one of the hardest moments of the cyclic history of the terrestrial climate (see above "evolution of the climates).
The Cosquer cave ;
Discovered by a diver, the Cosquer cave, is accessible only by a passage,
difficult and long, located deeply under water, because the sea level was
low at that glacial time ; it is now closed for protection - there were also
deaths. The intervention of the State in this business was nasty and
disastrous; just announced by "the inventor", scientific services
immediately let know that they knew already the existence in order to
deprive our man from his discovery and keep for to them honors and later
incomes. It is only after a difficult battle, the business spreading over
the media, that our decouvror was half restored in his rights. He gave at
least his name. That sad story occurred under Jack Lang, a charismatic
culture minister.
The Lascaux cave (In French)
One visits only his partial copy; it is a very small cave, extremely well done and it worths the visit.
The true cave is always visited on particular reservation.
Aztec; as for all
ancient pre-Columbian, knives for sacrifice are a
lot ; one extracted the heart of alive people, these unhappy ones being
placed on a sacrifice
stone.
The heart was posed on the belly of a chac-mool, small
statue of stone representing a man on the back, half raised (leaning
on on the elbows and folded knees), is the most current
representations. Condemned, captive, voluntary or not were to
finish their existence there to feed the insatiable need for the gods. At
the Mayas were believed less sanguinary; it seems not ; they also
pushed
girls in the holes of the "cénotes" (kind of swallow-hole of our French
south-west). It is said that they "were prepared" (drugged) before the great
jump.
Note about the Maya ; Brutal disappearance of the Mayas is the object of many
calculations : missing water according an French, final horror for all
these sacrifices according to others, leading finally people giving up all
and being dispersed; or even big climatic change. May be it is
what watches for us, facing a too complex society, which does not
bring any more this why it was created (as become right now big cities). But
before, it is generally the war which solves temporarily all the problems
when States are enable to deal with. But in Maya land, no traces of war were
found either.
if you fancy to admire in detail the
incredible complexity of incrustations practised in the jade of the handle,
click !
Despite of the horror, let us admire this sacrifice knife
with an obsidian blade
(I brought back a beautiful glare of this rock and I cut myself several
times !). .
From feet to fingers; and as the whole is thirty centimetres I believe,
incrustations are millimetre-length ! One can dispute the artistic quality
of the subject, but on the technical field, nothing else in the world can be
compared there.
Mayas and astronomy.
The pyramid of Chichen Iza base is a square.
Four staircases, one
for each side, sum up 365 steps, the number of
the days of the year. Méso-American, just like the Egyptians, were much interested
in the sky, an unreachable
world,
strange
and moving, where the sun, the moon and
the stars were rotating, although with variable périods. It was also
from a practical point of
view, a way of reinforcing the religious power; the forecast of an eclipse,
worrying fact, could be used to impress the people.
In the Mayas, the year was split in 18 months of 20 days each, plus 5 floating days (one finds
these 18 months on a very large round stone of the museum of Mexico City, sold in small size to the tourists, and which represents also the four worlds which have existed, the Mayas living the last. For the Mayas, the ground
is a square posed on the back of a giant caiman; the sky (there are
13 of them),
is supported by four giants and below, it is the hell (there are 9 of them). A
giant tree is at the centre and one at
each corner.
mechanic slipped
under a four drive wheels to paint its lower part ! 
Fondoc 3 (religions,
cathedrals)
(part
from a Voutch's drawing)
Translation : white area : "glaces permanentes" = permanent ice - brown area : "zones avec fontes d'été" = areas with melting summer ice.
