The fascinating stone spheres of Costa Rica: Here’s all you don’t know 

If you are asked to picture Costa Rica, you would probably think of a place with pristine beaches, sprawling rainforests, cascading waterfalls, volcanoes and exotic flora and fauna. After all, that’s what we all know Costa Rica is famous for. While its beautiful coasts, both the Caribbean and the Pacific, certainly live up to their reputation, its jungles are shrouded with many mysteries, including the giant stone balls that dot the landscape on the southern side of the country. Named as the ‘stone spheres of Costa Rica’, you will see them scattered all around in this region, some big, some small but all perfectly round and smooth. The questions that have intrigues archaeologists are whether or not these are manmade and why were they created at all. Let us tell you what is known about these stones so far 

The stone balls at a glance 
Simply put, these are spherical structures made of various kinds of stones. These are actually 300 of these stone spheres in Costa Rica, some on the alluvial plain of Diquís Delta and some on the small island and biological reserve of Isla del Caño. Also called bolas de piedra (literally stone balls) locally, the near-perfect spheres, are made of stones ranging in size from a few centimetres to over 6.6 feet in diameter, and weigh up to 15 tonnes. Most seem to have been sculpted from gabbro, an equivalent of basalt while others appear to have been made from limestone and sandstone., an equivalent of basalt while about a dozen seem to have been made from limestone, and another dozen from sandstone.. 

Are they manmade or natural?  
According to most of archaeologists, the spheres are manmade structures. They believe they were created between 800 and 1500 AD, most likely by the native people of the indigenous tribal groups who used to live there before or at the time of the Spanish conquest. The perfect round shape of these stones is most astonishing for the researchers but they say they may have been created by hammering natural boulders with other rocks and then polishing them with sand.  

There are numerous myths surrounding the existence of these stones. Some say that they came from the lost continent of Atlantis, or were created by nature. The local legend also says that the stone spheres are “Tara’s cannon balls”. According to locals, Tara, the God of Thunder, used his giant blowpipe to shoot these balls at the gods of wind and hurricanes, to drive them out of these lands.  

Why were they made? 
It is still unclear what the stone spheres were actually built for since most stones have been moved from their original locations. Some say they were placed in lines along the entry to the houses of chiefs or eminent people. Maybe, they were used for lawn decorations or to represent the status of people at that time. Another popular speculation is that these spheres represented solar systems. They may also have been used for making astronomical observations, or as compasses. Currently, these spheres are regarded as national symbols and part of the cultural ethos of Costa Rica. Therefore, they can be seen in government buildings. 

Discovery of the stone spheres 
The spheres were discovered in the 1930s as the United Fruit Company, an American MNC trading in tropical fruit, was clearing the jungle for its banana plantations.  The first scientific investigation of the spheres was undertaken shortly after their discovery by Doris Stone, a daughter of a United Fruit executive who later went on to become the director of the National Museum of Costa Rica. In 1948, she met an American archaeologist, Samuel Lothrop while he was on an expedition to Costa Rica. Stone described to him the strange stone balls she had found in Costa Rica and Lothrop then conducted an examination on these spherical structures.