Draft:Javier Cabrera

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The good doctor himself.

Doctor Javier Cabrera Darquea (1924–) was a respected medical practitioner descended from Spanish aristocracy. His father, Bolivar Cabrera had a small collection of pre-Incan artifacts, including some similar engraved andesite stones collected on the family plantation. Received a carved stone in 1966 as a birthday present. Determining that the engraving was that of an extinct fish species he began to collect similar stones with a singular obsession. Dr. Cabrera expanded his collection with the help of the Soldi brothers who sold him over 300 stones from the nearby Ocucaje region. In the 60's and 70's he bought several thousand additional stones from Basilio Uschuya, a farmer from the Ocucaje district.

The stone collection of Dr. Cabrera

Dr. Cabrera was of the opinion that he had found some truly revolutionary artifacts and was vexed that archeologists in museums in Ica and in Lima did not share his enthusiasm. While Incan and pre-Incan stones of this sort were occasionally found in the Atacama desert a large number were known to be forgeries and folk are of recent vintage.

Undeterred Dr. Cabrera studied his collection, considering it a "library in stone" and proceeded to go into strange and fantastic territory. Interpreting the art on the stones led him to believe that dinosaurs lived with humans. Diverging from young earth creationism and its timelines he determined that the stones told us of human precursors who founded a dinosaur riding, industrial level civilization tens of millions of years ago, possibly as early as the Paleozoic era (535 to 251 million years ago).

In 1996 Dr. Cabrera opened the Museum of Engraved Stones in Ica to house his collection of some 11,000 stones and "Spreading the Message of the Glyptolites." The museum continues as a nonprofit organization after his death in 2001.

The questionable source

Basilio Uschuya has changed his story several times. He has claimed to have manufactured the stones himself, and he has retracted that claim, saying that he lied about making fake Ica stones to avoid running afoul of Peru's laws against grave robbing and theft or exportation of cultural heritage items. It offers a slim lifeline of hope for the eager believer. Despite his powerful enthusiasm Dr. Cabrera has not documented in-situ uncovering of any stones, much less put forth any sort of proper archeological expedition. With over 10,000 stones he was acquiring them at a rate of roughly a stone per day between 1966 and the day he died.

The sheer volume of stones has cited by some as adding to their credibility. Uschuya couldn't have sculpted that many stones. Not all of Cabrera's stones were sourced from Uschuya, and subcontracting this sort of thing wouldn't be too difficult. Once Dr. Cabrera made it known what he was looking for, what sort of subject matter got him most excited, he would become the hub of an entire cottage industry of folk artists armed with dremels, dental tools and hacksaw blades.

The claims, the timelines and the problems

Gliptolithic man

The wildest, and therefore weakest, of Cabrera's claims is that an advanced yet incredibly ancient precursor to humankind lived as far back as the Mesozoic era .

Uncarvable andesite

Andesite is tough stuff, an igneous rock with a Mohs hardness rating of 7. Cabrera and many who believe in his work claim that Andesite is too hard to carve using the primitive tools of Pre-Columbian Peru. The Gate of The Sun in Tiahuanaco Bolivia is a 9 foot high entryway with a lintel carved to a much greater depth of relief than the shallow engraving on the Ica stones. It is made from a single, massive andesite slab. . In truth, you can grind or chip away and stone with a stone tool of identical material split into a point or wedge. Both the tool and the worked medium will wear away at roughly the same rate, but in an area where andesite is just lying around this is a small hurdle to overcome.

World maps

For example, there are some errors in the anatomy of the Tyrannosaurus rex on the stones: it is shown standing upright, which at the time the stones were found was believed to be how the T. rex walked, but more recent research shows they walked by keeping their spine horizontal.