Southern coast, Peru · Classical Era
Nazca Culture
The desert lines visible only from above
100 BCE – 800 CE · 900 years
Famous for enormous geoglyphs etched into the desert, fully legible only from high above the ground.
Where it sits on the calendar
Government
Tribal chiefdom
Writing system
No writing system known
Estimated peak population
25,000
How it ended
Climate shift or drought
Traits
Irrigation agriculture Long-distance trade Astronomical record-keeping Monumental architecture Bronze metallurgy Iron metallurgy Standing army Codified law Urban planning Seafaring
How Nazca Culture ended
Severe El Niño flooding and prolonged drought likely undermined their underground aqueduct agriculture.
See other civilizations that fell the same way →Notable for
- The Nazca Lines geoglyphs
- Puquios underground aqueduct system
- Elaborate polychrome pottery
Who else was alive at the same time
8 other civilizations in this dataset overlap with Nazca Culture's 900-year span.
See every overlap involving Nazca Culture →