Jane Jacobs wrote The Economy of Cities. Her thesis overturned the traditional theory that hunters settled down to be pastoralists who settled down to be farmers who formed the first cities. Jacobs theorized that successful hunters met at traditional campsites that became the first cities. Agriculture was a consequence of the cities. Where cities failed from war or other causes, the marginal peoples were cut loose from the missing center and became pastoralists chasing migratory herds.

Thus, successful hunters, enjoying the benefits of trade in their proto-urban campsites had plenty of time and ability to create those structures and others like them.

Also, note that 8000 years ago was 6000 BCE, a time when the Proto-Indo-European language was so successful that its speakers were ranging wide and diverging. These structures speak to that kind of intellectual ferment. And ferment it was, as beer and wine also date from that time.

What's interesting is the math that needed to exist at that time in order to construct, assuming these were hunter-gatherers.

There are unexplained ancient structures all over the world besides Kazakhstan. By ancient, I'm talking about thousand of years old, well before humans had the tools or ability to create them, but somehow, they did. Or did they? In Central America there's Puma Punku whose 10 ton+ blocks are cut to such perfectly straight lines that modern equipment is hard pressed to emulate them. There are the famous Nasca Lines in Peru where lines and images of spiders and animals can only be viewed from the air to be understood. All over the Earth there are impossible structures made of stone so big and heavy that special machines made today, would need to be built to move them. There is simply no way that ancients could have built such items with what we know of their technology. Even the Pyramids are a mystery, and the Sphinx, which pre-dates the Pyramids is a conundrum. "There are more things on heaven and earth than are dream't of in your philosophy" said good old Willie Shakespeare.

Hunters turned to Agro-economics, then when both overutilization of the land to the point it was totally stripped of nutrients, and climactic conditions rapidly changed for the worse, the crops started to fail... the "monoliths" were raised as appeals to their "deities", when things continued to degrade they turned to living sacrifices (animal, human), and then as even their sacrifices to their deities failed to being the desired results (revitalized land, rainfall, etc.) they turned to the last resort (cannibalism) until the population was no longer sustainable and the people died out. Common recurring theme throughout history.

That, or prehistoric humanity were all Burners (ref. Burning Man, Black Rock City, NV), and built these huge party grounds to make music, dance naked, practice art, and get wasted.

The circle of mounds is in a way fascinating as there are 25 mounds in a circle. Maybe there were external markers/structures (as in stone circles throughout northwest Europe) and it was used for marking planting times, seasonal predictors, etc. When you look at Stonehenge (for example) that structure is far larger and far more complex than the actual stone henge... and people are just now starting to decode it.

My thought was it's part of some sort of religious ritual or belief system that was perhaps as, say, someone traveling today that sees a church (or even a synagogue or mosque) would recognize it for what it is and what it's used for (and in a very basic way, how it is used)....

I can't wait for the Ancient Aliens dude with the haircut of credibility to find out about this.

http://www.bing.com/images/search?q=a...

Since 0 has very little to do let us send him there with a sleeping bag and tent to figure it out, since he claims to know everything.

A-very nice... How much?

they were signaling to E.T. -- "visit here," "coca-cola,"
''have it your way" and the like; yes? -- j
.

Interesting