View source for Out-of-place artifact

An '''out-of-place artifact''' (OOPA, OOPa, or OOPart) is any object displaying evidence of a technology that, according to [[uniformitarianism|uniformitarian]] or related paradigms, ought not exist in the particular [[geologic column|geologic stratum]] in which it rests. OOParts are one of the most troubling controversies for [[archaeology]] today.

== History of OOParts ==
The report in 1572 of a six-inch nail found in Peru and presented to the [[Viceroy]] of Peru as a gift<ref name=ta>"[http://www.bibleufo.com/embed.htm Embedded Anomalies: Evidence of Civilization Before the Accepted Creation Timeline]." ''[http://www.bibleufo.com/index.htm The Bible-UFO Connection],'' accessed March 31, 2008</ref> might be the oldest OOPart report on record. More than eighty OOParts have been alleged since then.

The significance of a six-inch nail is simply this: the [[Inca]]s, who inhabited Peru before [[Francisco Pizarro]] conquered it, did not nail their monuments together. The Incas did use metal, but did not make nails out of it. That is why the nail would be anachronistic to Inca culture.

== Types of OOParts ==
The OOParts fall into three main categories:
# Evidence of modern or even more-advanced technology from either an ancient culture (e.g. the Saqqara Bird in [[Egypt]]) or a location in a geologic stratum regarded as far too deep to be contemporary with man.
# Fossilized human remains. The alleged lack of such remains is one of the most common reasons cited to discount the Flood account.<ref name=Hodges>Hodges, Bodie. "The Flood: Whom Do You Trust?" Lecture delivered at the [[Creation Museum|Creation Museum and Family Discovery Center]], Petersburg, [[Kentucky]], [[USA]], March 28, 2008.</ref>
# Evidence of [[dinosaur]]-[[human]] cohabitation on [[earth]]. This varies from ancient artwork depicting creatures supposedly not discovered until centuries later, to side-by-side human and dinosaur tracks.

=== Modern technology in ancient times ===
These artifacts are found among other artifacts of an ancient culture. The difference between these and the other artifacts among which they are found is that they represent a technology that the civilization under study was not supposed to have. They include:

# The Baghdad Battery, an apparently spent dry cell in a six-inch yellow clay pot, found in the Baghdad Museum in 1938.<ref name=top10>Jochmans, Joseph R., PhD. "[http://www.rense.com/general3/top10.htm Top 10 Out-Of-Place Artifacts]." ''Atlantis Rising'', Issue 5 (Sep-Oct 1996). Now hosted by Jeff Rense. Accessed March 31, 2008.</ref><ref name=AncientX>"[http://www.ancientx.com/nm/anmviewer.asp?a=75&z=1 The 10 Most Puzzling Ancient Artifacts]." <http://www.ancientx.com/> Accessed May 22, 2008.</ref>
# The Dendera Tubes. More specifically, these are images on an Egyptian bas-relief of tube-like structures in the hands of Egyptian priests or acolytes. At least one electrical engineer has stated that the objects depicted in that bas-relief are Crookes tubes, which were the forerunners of the cathode-ray tubes still in common use in [[television]] receivers.<ref name=top10/>
# The Ashoka Pillar in Delhi, India. This wrought-iron shaft supposedly dates to an Indian king who died in 413 AD. The metal, which ought to have crumbled into rust long ago, remains in excellent condition.<ref name=top10/>
# The Antikythera Computer, a geared structure recovered in 1900 from the wreck of a merchant vessel that, to judge from the other cargo it carried, apparently sank sometime between 85 BC and 50 BC. This object was a highly sophisticated and easy-to-use [[orrery]] that predicted the annual motions of the [[sun]] and [[moon]] in the earth's sky.<ref name=top10/><ref name=AncientX/> (Note: Recent evidence suggests that it could have been a product of the post-Alexandrian civilization that flourished in the second century BC, mentioning as it does certain athletic competitions that were of strictly local interest during that period and since forgotten.<ref name=marchant>Marchant J, "[http://www.newscientist.com/blogs/shortsharpscience/2009/07/jo-marchant-consultant-from-sw.html  World's first computer may be even older than thought]," ''New Scientist'', 29 July 2009.</ref>)
# The Saqqara Bird, a seven-[[inch]] object, first thought to be a [[bird]] figurine, but then recognized as a model [[airplane]]. This was found in 1898 in the tomb of Pa-Di-Imen and dates to 200 BC.<ref name=top10/><ref name=AncientX/><ref name=s8int>"[http://www.s8int.com/ OOParts and Ancient High Technology: Evidence of Noah's Flood]?" Accessed March 31, 2008.</ref>
# An Inca pendant, dated from 500 to 800 AD, that turns out to be a model of a high-speed aircraft, possibly a jet. More remarkably, the object's apparent rudder fin bears an engraved [[Hebrew]] or [[Aramaic]] letter beth.<ref name=top10/><ref name=s8int/>
# The Cabrera Stones. These are 20,000 stones that appear to be illustrations from a medical textbook. The surgical techniques depicted in these illustrations rival or even far surpass any surgical techniques in use today, and even include encephalic transplantation.<ref name=top10/><ref name=AncientX/>
# The Dropa Stones. Chi Pu Tei found these in a cavern in the Baian-Kara-Ula mountains in China. These are nine-inch disks, each with a hole in the center and an intricate spiral groove that is actually densely etched with hieroglyphs. These objects, dated about 10,000 years old, speak of the crash-landing of multiple spacecraft all piloted and crewed by a people calling themselves the Dropa. Human remains were also found in that same cavern.<ref name=AncientX/>

=== Modern technology in deep time ===
These are artifacts buried in geological strata where no artifact of any human civilization, ancient or modern, ought to exist, or at the very least are in strata that are supposed to be older than the oldest written records.

# The Bullet-Punctured Skull of Zambia, a human cranium, supposedly of the paleolithic era, that bears evidence that the person involved was shot to death with a rifle. Local geological evidence indicates (by uniformitarian standards) that the skull is 38,000 years old.<ref name=top10/>
# The Wonderstone Spheroids, now numbering 200 or more, found in a silver mine in South Africa. They are of a nickel-steel alloy that cannot have occurred outside a laboratory or a steel mill. Nor could they be meteoric; the composition does not match that of any meteorite thus far found. A museum curator has observed one of these spheroids rotating within its setting, apparently under its own power. Yet the miners who excavated these spheroids found them in a stratum that, according to [[uniformitarianism]], ought to be 3 billion years old.<ref name=top10/><ref name=AncientX/>
# A brass bell with an iron clapper, found in a lump of coal. Uniformitarians commonly insist that all the coal in the world formed 280 to 300 million years ago.<ref name=disc>"[http://www.discoverynews.us/OOPART.html Ooparts (Out of Place Artifacts)]." ''Discovery News''. Accessed March 31, 2008.</ref>
# The Coso Artifact, a porcelain-and-metal object in a hexagonal casing with a spring at one end. Witnesses have said that this object resembles a modern spark plug. This was found in rock that, according to uniformitarian models, should have taken 500,000 years to form.<ref name=AncientX/>
# An iron pot found within a lump of coal in Thomas, Oklahoma. The same consideration applies to this object as applies to the bell mentioned above.<ref name=AncientX/><ref name=disc/>
# The London Hammer, a hammer found in limestone in the Cretaceous stratum, supposedly 140 million years old.<ref name=disc/>
# An obvious notch, made with an ax, in a lump of petrified wood in the [[Petrified Forest]] of [[Arizona]], [[USA]].<ref name=disc/>

=== Human fossils ===
Fossilized human remains, especially any such remains found buried in [[deep time]], are among the most striking evidences against the uniformitarian model.
# A fossilized human finger found in the Cretaceous Walnut Formation of the Commanche Peak limestone deposit.<ref name=disc/><ref name=cem1>Lines, David. "[http://75.125.60.6/~creatio1/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=28 The Fossilized Human Finger]." [[Creation Evidence Museum]] online, 1995. Accessed March 31, 2008.</ref> The ''in situ'' provenance of the finger is lacking. But if this object proves genuine, then it might represent long-sought remains of a casualty of the [[Great Flood]].
# Skulls and other bones found within coal.<ref name=s8int/><ref name=conrad>Conrad, Ed. "[http://www.edconrad.com/oldascoal/index.html Man as Old as Coal]." Accessed March 31, 2008.</ref>
# Malachite Man, consisting of the remains of ten individuals in a supposed 140-million-year-old stratum. Some of the bones have been partially petrified with malachite, a peculiar greenish mineral. Petrified human bones would be even more likely to represent Flood casualties.<ref name=malachite>Patton, Don. "[http://www.bible.ca/tracks/malachite-man.htm Official World Site Malachite Man]." ''[http://www.bible.ca/bible.htm The Interactive Bible].'' Accessed March 31, 2008.</ref>
# A human handprint in limestone.<ref name=AncientX/>
# A human footprint in shale.<ref name=AncientX/>

=== Dinosaur-human cohabitation ===
{{main|Dinosaur#Dinosaur-like creatures in history and modern sightings}}

These are artifacts, artworks, or physical signs that humans and dinosaurs walked the earth together.
# Stone depictions of [[stegosaurus]] in Khmer temple art.<ref name=disc/><ref name=Patton>Patton, Don, and Swift, Dennis. "[http://www.bible.ca/tracks/tracks-cambodia.htm Dinosaurs in ancient Cambodian temple]." ''[http://www.bible.ca/bible.htm The Interactive Bible].'' Accessed March 31, 2008.</ref>
# Clay figurines of obvious dinosaurs found at Acambaro, Mexico.<ref name=disc/><ref name=disc2>"[http://www.discoverynews.us/dino_figurines.html Discovered: Thousands of Dinosaur Figurines from Mexico]." Accessed March 31, 2008.</ref>

== In popular culture ==
[[Hollywood]] has lately noticed the OOParts debate. Producer [[George Lucas]] and director [[Steven Spielberg]] have now made a new [[motion picture|film]] based on a hypothetical explanation of the crystal skulls of Belize.<ref name=IndianaJones>''[https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0367882/ Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull].'' Produced by [[George Lucas]]. Directed by [[Steven Spielberg]]. With [[Harrison Ford]], [[Cate Blanchett]], [[Karen Allen]], [[John Hurt]], et al. Paramount Pictures Corporation, Lucasfilm Limited, and Amblin Entertainment, 2008. Released May 22, 2008.</ref>

== Discussion ==
For a complete discussion on the possible significance of OOParts, see [[Essay: Out-of-place Artifacts, ET's, and the Great Flood]].

== References ==
{{reflist|2}}

[[Category:Archaeology]]
[[Category:Geology]]
[[Category:Paleontology]]