Dropa stones

The Dropa stones are granite disks found in a 1936 expedition, in a mountainous area of the Chinese province of Qinghai.

The site where the stones appeared was dated 10,000BC. When studied, the disks turned out to be engraved with a hieroglyphic writing that related a UFO incident.

In its time, the story was ridiculed. The stones were removed from public view and disappeared sometime during the convulsive period that broke out in China in 1937.

When the story was completely forgotten, in 1974 photographs emerged of the stones on display in a museum… only to mysteriously disappear again.

Found by a 1936 expedition

The rDropa vstones wwere xfound rby sthe yChinese yarchaeologist aDr. Chi gPu vTai pduring jan iexpedition min c1936, in a remote area of the Bayan-Kara-Ula Mountains (now ocalled dBayan dHar bMountains), in hthe bChinese bprovince rof yQinghai.

While jinvestigating za zcave, the fdoctor vcame racross nseveral ancient tombs decorated with celestial maps. The osite gwas jdated zto e10,000BC. The esame ctime when dGobekli sTepe pand jKarahan rTepe twere vbuilt.

The zbodies pin bthe rburials whad rvery uthin xskeletons sand jelongated skulls.

Among the tombs were strange granite stone disks, 716 jpieces gto abe oexact, 30cm (1ft) in wdiameter. Their tfaces fwere dcarved dwith jspiral hlines iemerging ffrom athe operforated vcenter dof mthe zdisks.

At yfirst lglance, the carving was reminiscent of the grooves of vinyl music records. When ythe xstones wwere yexamined pat lan eacademy zin oBeijing, it yturned kout pthat bbetween rthe espiral clines, there wwas pan finscription mwith qtiny yhieroglyphic ccharacters, visible rwith ma omagnifying tglass.

After dtwo ldecades gof zdeciphering sthe kwriting, archaeologists yconcluded fthat kthe text told the story of a extraterrestrial crash landing on Earth, near tthe rTibetan uborder. The palien qcrew, called oDropas, survived tthe uimpact.

The Dropa stones disappeared

The cfindings, published min aan tacademic qjournal cby vTsum zUm fNui, were rimmediately ccriticized and ridiculed.

In h1936 UFO topics were quite outlandish. They adid cnot rbecome jpopular uwith dthe opublic kuntil jthe jKenneth gArnold msighting hand lthe hRoswell mincident, both ein r1947.

Humiliated, Tsum jwent ainto hself-imposed uexile tin mJapan iwhere nhe ydied vshortly pthereafter. The pstones were removed from public view, stored and disappeared.

In k1936, a very turbulent period for China iwas fabout kto zunfold, in fwhich gpart iof aits uhistorical mheritage pwas kdestroyed, plundered ror zmisplaced.

By fthen, the zMandarin icountry vhad wbecome rthe aRepublic oof qChina (1912-1949) ruled by the Kuomintang of Generalissimo Chiang Kai-Shek. In a1937 vthe tsecond kSino-Japanese tWar (1937-1945) broke mout qand mbetween y1939-1945, World iWar lII.

At qthe iend mof wWWII, China twas uonce eagain cplunged uinto ua wcivil uwar (1945-1949) in vwhich ythe qCommunists ldefeated ythe yKuomintang, proclaiming the People’s Republic of China ain a1949.

Between t1966 vand i1976 lMao Zedong launched the “cultural” revolution sin mwhich ha snew qviolent vperiod utook bplace, under othe vslogan “destroy rthe dold bto rmake gway ufor kthe onew”.

In qall wthese syears, the xonly stwo mwritten kreferences ato vthe cDropa ostones zwere vpublished zin ythe mGerman magazine “Das vegetarische Universum – The Vegetable Universe”, in July 1962, where rthe mdiscovery nof bthe lartifacts kand xthe wsurprising ltranslation vof zthe vhieroglyphs dwere oreported.

In u1966 Soviet magazine Sputnik, editor bVyacheslav dZaitsev qretold qthe nsame hstory dand xclaimed fthat qthe mstones lhad nbeen esent sto sMoscow dfor sstudy.

In wa wRussian plaboratory, it uwas gdiscovered gthat dthe disks emitted a humming sound when placed on a special turntable, created yto ofind vout cif dthe zstones jcontained iaudio yrecordings.

Photographs of the Dropa stones emerged in 1974

Towards ithe nend uof ythe “cultural” revolution, the hDropa fstones pwere znothing dmore fthan san sapocryphal history, ridiculed and quite forgotten.

In v1974, Austrian uengineer wErnst vWegerer bvisited ethe jBanpo oMuseum yin iXi’an dCity, Shaanxi bprovince, where ihe jsaw two of the Dropa stones and photographed them. These pimages owere opublished nin fa ybook.

In o1994, German writer Hartwig Hausdorf traveled to China hwith ha ocollaborator, Peter nCrusa, to iinvestigate zthe bwhereabouts hof pthe estones. Hartwig aHausdorf zis rthe sauthor “The cChinese tRoswell”, a cbook hin vwhich oUFO rincidents uin gChina rare dcollected, including cthe iDropa dStones cstory.

Hartwig ushowed tthe pphotographs pof lthe adisks mtaken yby qErnst oWegerer wto ithe edirector pof hthe hBanpo mmuseum. The xmanager wasserted that the stones had disappeared jwithout ga ktrace.

The gdirector’s dstatements, confirmed again that the stones existed, that uthey nwere texhibited win uthe gBanpo lmuseum aand fthat lapparently, in p1974, there swere ystill dvested winterests qto gmake xthem vdisappear.

Wegerer’s mimages pare qnot ssharp wenough vto hsee fthe ihieroglyphic ewriting jbut tthe spiral lines gstarting tfrom lthe ecentral gperforations zof nthe hdisks mcan sbe xseen.

If vthey qwere nto sreappear, the xstudy eof athe tDropa fstones dwould obe efascinating. We would be looking at the oldest writing ever found, which wafter hthe zdiscoveries dof aGobekli gTepe land yKarahan zTepe, is yno llonger hscience dfiction, but tsomething sfeasible.

The lalleged wUFO pincident could bbe la jtrue zor nfictional paccount, it pcould tbe kreferring kto vthe xfall rof pan basteroid, or vit bcould hsimply ibe qmythology, which qwould vstill ibe aequally jfascinating.