
A geoglyph is a large design or
motif – generally longer than – produced on the ground by
durable elements of the landscape, such as stones, stone fragments, gravel, or earth. A positive geoglyph is formed by the arrangement and alignment of materials on the ground in a manner akin to
petroforms, while a negative geoglyph is formed by removing part of the natural ground surface to create differently coloured or textured ground in a manner akin to
petroglyph
A petroglyph is an image created by removing part of a rock surface by incising, picking, carving, or abrading, as a form of rock art. Outside North America, scholars often use terms such as "carving", "engraving", or other descriptions ...
s.
Geoglyphs are generally a type of
land art
Land art, variously known as Earth art, environmental art, and Earthworks, is an art movement that emerged in the 1960s and 1970s, largely associated with Great Britain and the United StatesArt in the modern era: A guide to styles, schools, & mo ...
, and sometimes
rock art
In archaeology, rock arts are human-made markings placed on natural surfaces, typically vertical stone surfaces. A high proportion of surviving historic and prehistoric rock art is found in caves or partly enclosed rock shelters; this type al ...
. A
hill figure
A hill figure is a large visual representation created by cutting into a steep hillside and revealing the underlying geology. It is a type of geoglyph usually designed to be seen from afar rather than above. In some cases trenches are dug and ...
is created on a slope, so that it can be seen from a distance.
Ancient

Arguably the most famous geoglyphs are the
Nazca lines in
Peru
Peru, officially the Republic of Peru, is a country in western South America. It is bordered in the north by Ecuador and Colombia, in the east by Brazil, in the southeast by Bolivia, in the south by Chile, and in the south and west by the Pac ...
. The cultural significance of these geoglyphs for their creators remains unclear, despite many hypotheses.
Since the 1970s, numerous geoglyphs have been discovered on deforested land in the
Amazon rainforest
The Amazon rainforest, also called the Amazon jungle or Amazonia, is a Tropical and subtropical moist broadleaf forests, moist broadleaf tropical rainforest in the Amazon biome that covers most of the Amazon basin of South America. This basin ...
, Brazil, leading to claims about
Pre-Columbian
In the history of the Americas, the pre-Columbian era, also known as the pre-contact era, or as the pre-Cabraline era specifically in Brazil, spans from the initial peopling of the Americas in the Upper Paleolithic to the onset of European col ...
civilizations. Ondemar Dias is accredited with first discovering the geoglyphs in 1977 and Alceu Ranzi with furthering their discovery after flying over
Acre
The acre ( ) is a Unit of measurement, unit of land area used in the Imperial units, British imperial and the United States customary units#Area, United States customary systems. It is traditionally defined as the area of one Chain (unit), ch ...
.
Other areas with geoglyphs include
Megaliths in the Urals,
South Australia
South Australia (commonly abbreviated as SA) is a States and territories of Australia, state in the southern central part of Australia. With a total land area of , it is the fourth-largest of Australia's states and territories by area, which in ...
(
Marree Man, which is not ancient, but rather a modern work of art, with mysterious origins),
Western Australia
Western Australia (WA) is the westernmost state of Australia. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean to the north and west, the Southern Ocean to the south, the Northern Territory to the north-east, and South Australia to the south-east. Western Aust ...
and parts of the
Great Basin Desert
The Great Basin Desert is part of the Great Basin between the Sierra Nevada and the Wasatch Range in the western United States. The desert is a geographical region that largely overlaps the Great Basin shrub steppe defined by the World Wildlife ...
in the southwestern United States.
Hill figure
A hill figure is a large visual representation created by cutting into a steep hillside and revealing the underlying geology. It is a type of geoglyph usually designed to be seen from afar rather than above. In some cases trenches are dug and ...
s,
turf maze
Historically, a turf maze is a labyrinth made by cutting a convoluted path into a level area of short grass, sod, turf or lawn. Some had names such as Mizmaze, Troy Town, The Walls of Troy, Julian's Bower, or Shepherd's Race. This is the type of m ...
s and the stone-lined
labyrinth
In Greek mythology, the Labyrinth () is an elaborate, confusing structure designed and built by the legendary artificer Daedalus for King Minos of Crete at Knossos. Its function was to hold the Minotaur, the monster eventually killed by the h ...
s of
Scandinavia
Scandinavia is a subregion#Europe, subregion of northern Europe, with strong historical, cultural, and linguistic ties between its constituent peoples. ''Scandinavia'' most commonly refers to Denmark, Norway, and Sweden. It can sometimes also ...
,
Iceland
Iceland is a Nordic countries, Nordic island country between the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic and Arctic Oceans, on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge between North America and Europe. It is culturally and politically linked with Europe and is the regi ...
,
Lappland and the former Soviet Union are types of geoglyphs.
The south of England has a number of equine and human figures cut into
chalk
Chalk is a soft, white, porous, sedimentary carbonate rock. It is a form of limestone composed of the mineral calcite and originally formed deep under the sea by the compression of microscopic plankton that had settled to the sea floor. Ch ...
hillsides. Examples include the
Uffington White Horse
The Uffington White Horse is a Prehistoric Britain, prehistoric hill figure, long, formed from deep trenches filled with crushed white chalk. The figure is situated on the upper slopes of Whitehorse Hill in the English civil parishes in En ...
,
Cerne Abbas Giant,
Westbury White Horse, and the
Long Man of Wilmington
The Long Man of Wilmington or Wilmington Giant is a hill figure on the steep slopes of Windover Hill near Wilmington, East Sussex, Wilmington, East Sussex, England. It is northwest of Eastbourne and south of Wilmington. Locally, the figure w ...
. Some are ancient, others from the last few centuries.
Possible geoglyphs
The "
Works of the Old Men" in
Arabia
The Arabian Peninsula (, , or , , ) or Arabia, is a peninsula in West Asia, situated north-east of Africa on the Arabian plate. At , comparable in size to India, the Arabian Peninsula is the largest peninsula in the world.
Geographically, the ...
, "stone-built structures that are far more numerous than (the) Nazca Lines, far more extensive in the area that they cover, and far older," have been described as geoglyphs by Amelia Sparavigna, a physics professor at Politecnico di Torino in Italy. The use of this term to describe these features is probably inaccurate, as recent research has shown that most were not constructed primarily as art, but were rather built to serve a range of purposes including burial sites and funerary customs, aiding in the trapping of migratory animals, and as cleared areas for camps, houses and animal enclosures.
Contemporary

Not all geoglyphs are ancient. The
Land Art
Land art, variously known as Earth art, environmental art, and Earthworks, is an art movement that emerged in the 1960s and 1970s, largely associated with Great Britain and the United StatesArt in the modern era: A guide to styles, schools, & mo ...
movement created many new geoglyphs as well as other structures; perhaps the most famous example is ''
Spiral Jetty'' by
Robert Smithson
Robert Smithson (January 2, 1938 – July 20, 1973) was an American artist known for sculpture and land art who often used drawing and photography in relation to the spatial arts. His work has been internationally exhibited in galleries and mu ...
. Many towns and cities in the
Western United States
The Western United States (also called the American West, the Western States, the Far West, the Western territories, and the West) is List of regions of the United States, census regions United States Census Bureau.
As American settlement i ...
use
hillside letters (also known as "mountain monograms") on the hills above their locations. Contemporary Australian
sculptor
Sculpture is the branch of the visual arts that operates in three dimensions. Sculpture is the three-dimensional art work which is physically presented in the dimensions of height, width and depth. It is one of the plastic arts. Durable sc ...
Andrew Rogers has created geoglyphs around the world called "The Rhythms of Life".
You Yangs Regional Park is the home of a geoglyph constructed by Rogers in recognition of the indigenous people of the area. It depicts
Bunjil, a mythical creature in the culture of the local
Wautharong Aboriginal people.

Geoglyphic texts and images are common in Central and
Inner Asia
Inner Asia refers to the northern and landlocked regions spanning North Asia, North, Central Asia, Central, and East Asia. It includes parts of Western China, western and northeast China, as well as southern Siberia. The area overlaps with some d ...
but there has been little systematic study of their origins and spread.
More recent figures in the south of England created since the early 1800s have kept up the region's ancient tradition of
chalk
Chalk is a soft, white, porous, sedimentary carbonate rock. It is a form of limestone composed of the mineral calcite and originally formed deep under the sea by the compression of microscopic plankton that had settled to the sea floor. Ch ...
hillside figures. Examples of these are the
Litlington White Horse,
Devizes White Horse,
Fovant Badges,
Cherhill White Horse, and the
Marlborough White Horse.

In 2008–2009
Alfie Dennen created
Britglyph, a
locative art-focused geoglyph created by having participants across the United Kingdom leave rocks at highly specific locations and uploading media created at each location. When taken together and viewed on the main project website an image of a watch and chain inspired by
John Harrison
John Harrison ( – 24 March 1776) was an English carpenter and clockmaker who invented the marine chronometer, a long-sought-after device for solving the History of longitude, problem of how to calculate longitude while at sea.
Harrison's sol ...
's
marine chronometer
A marine chronometer is a precision timepiece that is carried on a ship and employed in the determination of the ship's position by celestial navigation. It is used to determine longitude by comparing Greenwich Mean Time (GMT), and the time at t ...
H5 was created.
People have used the
Strava
Strava is an American internet service for tracking physical exercise which incorporates social network features. It started out tracking mostly outdoor cycling and running activities using Global Positioning System (GPS) data, but now incorpor ...
mobile app and other
GPS systems to create
GPS drawings, virtual geoglyphs.
Geoglyphs in the world
See also
*
Petroglyph
A petroglyph is an image created by removing part of a rock surface by incising, picking, carving, or abrading, as a form of rock art. Outside North America, scholars often use terms such as "carving", "engraving", or other descriptions ...
*
Petrosomatoglyph
A petrosomatoglyph is a supposed image of parts of a human or animal body in rock. They occur all over the world, often functioning as an important form of symbolism, used in religious and secular ceremonies, such as the crowning of kings. Some ...
*
Intaglio (burial mound)
*
Battalion Park
*
Crop circle
A crop circle, crop formation, or corn circle is a pattern created by flattening a crop, usually a cereal. The term was first coined in the early 1980s. Crop circles have been described as all falling "within the range of the sort of thing ...
References
Further reading
*
*
External links
The Blythe Intaglios, A Photo Gallery
{{Authority control
Archaeological features
-01
Methods in archaeology
Prehistoric inscriptions
Rock art