Over 50 geoglyphs have been discovered across the northern steppe of Kazakhstan, deepening the mystery of why the ancient patterns were created. 
 
 Using Google Earth, archaeologists found the geoglyphs - man-made outlines on the ground made from mounds or ditches that are visible from above - in a variety of shapes, including squares, rings and swastikas. 
 
 Often attributed to the sun, the swastika was used among the ancient Celts, Indians and Greeks, and later in Buddhism, Jainism and Hinduism. In Asia, the symbol first appears in archaeological records around 2,500 BC in the Indus Valley Civilisation. 
 
 "As of today, we can say only one thing – the geoglyphs were built by ancient people," archaeologists Irina Shevnina and Andrew Logvin, who discovered the Kazakh geoglyphs, told Live Science. 
 
 They added that other structures and evidence of fireplaces within the geoglyphs suggest rituals took place there. 
 
 Experts have compared the findings in Kazakhstan to the famous Nazca Lines in Peru, which were designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1994. 
 
 Although some of the Peruvian geoglyphs resemble Paracas motifs, an Andean society that lived between 800 and 100 BCE, scholars believe they were created by the Nazca culture between 400 and 650 AD. 
 
 In the past year, researchers from Kostanay University and Vilnius University in Lithuania have been conducting archaeological excavations, aerial photography and ground-penetrating radar surveys to examine the geoglyphs in Kazakhstan. 
 
 The symbols vary in shapes and size. One swastika was made from timber, although the majority of the geoglyphs were made using mounds of earth. 
 
 One of the largest measures 1,312ft in diameter, suggesting it was created by a larger, well-established culture, the researchers said. 
 
 Ancient tribes may have used the geoglyphs to mark ownership of the land, but the reason behind the creation of the patterns remains unknown. 
 
 Central Asia is pockmarked with other mysterious ancient constructions called kurgans, mounds heaped over a burial chamber. Found across Kazakhstan, Mongolia and Poland, the earliest kurgans appeared in the 4th millennium BC in the Caucasus and are associated with the Indo-Europeans. 
 
 Geoglyphs and similar patterns have been discovered across the world, including in Britain, thanks to the introduction of Google Earth. In 2012, a giant elk-shaped geoglyph was discovered near Lake Zjuratkul in the Ural Mountains in Russia. 
 
 The Kazakh geoglyphs were presented at the European Association of Archaeologists' annual meeting in Istanbul. ||||| More than 50 geoglyphs, including one shaped like a swastika, have been discovered in northern Kazakhstan. 
 
 More than 50 geoglyphs with various shapes and sizes, including a massive swastika, have been discovered across northern Kazakhstan in Central Asia, say archaeologists. 
 
 These sprawling structures, mostly earthen mounds, create the type of landscape art most famously seen in the Nazca region of Peru. 
 
 Discovered using Google Earth, the geoglyphs are designed in a variety of geometric shapes, including squares, rings, crosses and swastikas (the swastika is a design that was used in ancient times). Ranging from 90 to 400 meters (295 to 1,312 feet) in diameter, some of them are longer than a modern-day aircraft carrier. Researchers say that the geoglyphs are difficult to see on the ground, but can easily be seen from the sky. [See Photos of the Amazing Geoglyphs in Kazakhstan] 
 
 Over the past year, an archaeological expedition from Kazakhstan's Kostanay University, working in collaboration with Vilnius University in Lithuania, has been examining the geoglyphs. The team, which is conducting archaeological excavations, ground-penetrating radar surveys, aerial photography and dating, recently presented its initial results at the European Association of Archaeologists' annual meeting in Istanbul. 
 
 The geoglyphs were made of earthen mounds. 
 
 Archaeological excavations uncovered the remains of structures and hearths at the geoglyphs, suggesting that rituals took place there, said archaeologists Irina Shevnina and Andrew Logvin, of Kostanay University, in an email to Live Science. Ancient tribes may also have used the geoglyphs to mark ownership of the land, the researchers noted. 
 
 "As of today, we can say only one thing — the geoglyphs were built by ancient people. By whom and for what purpose, remains a mystery," said Shevnina and Logvin. 
 
 Why they're builders used geometric shapes is also a mystery, although the swastika is an ancient symbol found throughout Europe and Asia. 
 
 Geoglyphs around the world 
 
 While Peru's Nazca Lines are the world's most famous geoglyphs, archaeological research suggests that geoglyphs were constructed in numerous areas around the world by different cultures. 
 
 For instance, in the Middle East, archaeologists have found thousands of wheel-shaped structures that are easily visible from the sky, but hard to see on the ground. Also recently in Russia, archaeologists excavated a geoglyph shaped like an elk, which appears older than the Nazca Lines. 
 
 Ancient geoglyphs have also been reported in many other countries, including the United Kingdom, Brazil and even the Southwestern United States. The introduction of high-resolution Google Earth imagery over the last decade has helped both professional archaeologists and amateurs detect and study these enigmatic structures. 
 
 Editor's Note: This article was updated to reflect the fact that all of the geoglyphs were made of earthen mounds. 
 
 Follow us @livescience, Facebook & Google+. Original article on Live Science. ||||| NASA is best known for solving the mysteries of space, millions of miles from our home planet. It’s now joined the investigation into some very strange and very old earthbound formations in northern Kazakhstan, the New York Times reported (paywall). 
 
 These huge formations—called the Steppe Geoglyphs—were first discovered on Google Earth by Dmitriy Dey, an amateur archaeologist, in 2007. Since then, Dey has found about 260 of the land designs—which resemble crop circles, but are much stranger. 
 
 Archaeologists don’t know what they are or who built them, but they estimate that the oldest is 8,000 years old. 
 
 Bestamskoe Ring 
 
 Dey’s research was apparently convincing enough to persuade NASA to help figure out what these things are. NASA’s satellite images (taken by contracter DigitalGlobe) of the formations are the first time they’ve been photographed from space. 
 
 NASA has also directed the astronauts on the International Space Station to start photographing the region, so perhaps look out for new photos on Scott Kelly’s Instagram in the coming weeks. 
 
 The geoglyphs—formed by man-made mounds, divots, trenches, and banks—come in a variety of shapes. 
 
 One of them, called the Bestamskoe Ring, is a circle made up of dozens of smaller circles. Another, named Ushtogaysky Square, is 810,000 square feet—each 900-foot side is as long as an aircraft carrier—with an X-shape through the middle. The weirdest of all, though, is the Turgai Swastika, which, you guessed it, resembles a swastika. (The swastika was a popular symbol long, long before the Nazis appropriated it.) 
 
 DigitalGlobe/NASA Turgai Swastika 
 
 Thousands of years ago, the northern region of Kazakhstan offered rich hunting grounds for nomadic Stone Age tribes. (Ushtogaysky Square, the largest of the formations, sits close to a known Neolithic settlement.) The problem is, the formations would have taken far longer to build than how long historians currently believe these tribes stayed in one place. 
 
 “The idea that foragers could amass the numbers of people necessary to undertake large-scale projects—like creating the Kazakhstan geoglyphs—has caused archaeologists to deeply rethink the nature and timing of sophisticated large-scale human organization as one that predates settled and civilized societies,” Persis B. Clarkson, an archaeologist at the University of Winnipeg, told the Times. 
 
 Dey dismisses theories that aliens are behind them—he believes the elevated straight lines on the geoglyphs were “horizontal observatories to track the movements of the rising sun.” 
 
 That would make them a close cousin to structures like Stonehenge, and the recently discovered “Superhenge,” which scientists also theorize may have been sun-related. ||||| Nasa has released a series of photos taken from space of the desert in Kazakhstan, in a bid to help unlock the secrets of a prehistoric settlement. 
 
 The site in the Turgai region of northern Kazakhstan is unremarkable from the ground: a vast empty steppe, with little evidence of human habitation. But seen from 430 miles above ground, the 8,000-year-old shapes begin to take the form of man-made constructions. 
 
 The photos show at least 260 different earthworks — mounds, trenches and ramparts — which make up five basic shapes; among them a circle and a swastika. When the images were first spotted in 2007, on Google Earth, wild rumours circulated that the sites were designed by Nazis or even aliens. 
 
 “ I was worried this was a hoax ,” said Ronald LaPorte, an emeritus professor of epidemiology at Pittsburgh who noticed a report about the findings last year, while researching diseases in Kazakhstan. 
 
 But he became increasingly fascinated by the findings, and determined to speak to Dmitriy Dey, the Kazakh geologist who first spotted the site after watching a documentary about ancient sites, and wondering whether his own country had such areas. 
 
 In 2013 scientists found a mysterious pentagram symbol in Kazakhstan - sparking speculation that it was something to do with a cult. But it is now believed to have been created as a Soviet theme park, long since abandoned. 
 
 The Turgai site, however, has been far more complex to fathom. 
 
 The two men worked to publicise the find, and enlist the help of Nasa. 
 
 Photo: Nasa 
 
 “I’ve never seen anything like this; I found it remarkable,” said Compton Tucker, a senior biospheric scientist for Nasa in Washington who provided the archived images, taken by the satellite contractor DigitalGlobe, to Mr Dey and The New York Times. 
 
 It is now hoped that the detailed images will enable greater research into the site. 
 
 Mr Dey said he does not think they were ever intended to be seen from the air. Instead he believes that the figures built along straight lines on elevations were “horizontal observatories to track the movements of the rising sun.” 
 
 His research suggests that the Mahandzhar culture, a Stone Age tribe living in the region from 7,000 BC to 5,000 BC, could have created some of the the older structures. 
 
 Photo: Nasa 
 
 But scientists have been surprised by the idea that a nomadic population would have stayed in one place for the time required to fell and lay timber for ramparts, and to dig out lake bed sediments to construct the huge mounds - originally six to 10 feet high, and now three feet high and nearly 40 feet across. 
 
 “The idea that foragers could amass the numbers of people necessary to undertake large-scale projects — like creating the Kazakhstan geoglyphs — has caused archaeologists to deeply rethink the nature and timing of sophisticated large-scale human organization as one that predates settled and civilized societies,” said Persis Clarkson, an archaeologist at the University of Winnipeg, who viewed some of Mr Dey’s images. 
 
 “Everything is linked through the cult of the sun,” Mr Dey told The New York Times. 
 
 He now hopes to create an operations centre at the site, for further research. 
 
 “We cannot dig up all the mounds. That would be counterproductive,” he said. “We need modern technologies, like they have in the West.” ||||| A historical Google Earth image from 2007 showing the animal-shaped geoglyph in Russia, which may predate Peru's famous Nazca Lines. [ See more Russian Nazca Lines Photos 
 
 A huge geoglyph in the shape of an elk or deer discovered in Russia may predate Peru's famous Nazca Lines by thousands of years. 
 
 The animal-shaped stone structure, located near Lake Zjuratkul in the Ural Mountains, north of Kazakhstan, has an elongated muzzle, four legs and two antlers. A historical Google Earth satellite image from 2007 shows what may be a tail, but this is less clear in more recent imagery. 
 
 Excluding the possible tail, the animal stretches for about 900 feet (275 meters) at its farthest points (northwest to southeast), the researchers estimate, equivalent to two American football fields. The figure faces north and would have been visible from a nearby ridge. 
 
 "The figure would initially have looked white and slightly shiny against the green grass background," write Stanislav Grigoriev, of the Russian Academy of Sciences Institute of History & Archaeology, and Nikolai Menshenin, of the State Centre for Monument Protection, in an article first detailing the discovery published last spring in the journal Antiquity. They note that it is now covered by a layer of soil. 
 
 Fieldwork carried out this past summer has shed more light on the glyph's composition and date, suggesting it may be the product of a "megalithic culture," researchers say. They note that hundreds of megalithic sites have been discovered in the Urals, with the most elaborate structures located on a freshwater island about 35 miles (60 km) northeast of the geoglyph. [See Photos of Russia's Nazca Lines] 
 
 The Russian geoglyph was made out of stone, now covered by soil, and an archaeological team has been at work studying it. Credit: Image courtesy Stanislav Grigoriev. 
 
 Discovery & excavation 
 
 A man named Alexander Shestakov first discovered the glyphs using satellite images. He alerted researchers, who sent out a hydroplane and paraglider to survey the giant structure. 
 
 This has since progressed to an on-the-ground excavation by a team led by Grigoriev. They've found that the stone architecture of the geoglyph is quite elaborate. When they excavated part of a hind leg the largest stones were on the edges, the smaller ones inside. This past summer they also found the remains of passageways and what appear to be small walls on the hoof and muzzle of the animal. 
 
 "The hoof is made of small crushed stones and clay. It seems to me there were very low walls and narrow passages among them. The same situation in the area of a muzzle: crushed stones and clay, four small broad walls and three passages," Grigorievwrote in an email to LiveScience. He cautioned that his team didn't excavate all the way down to the bottom of the walls, not wishing to damage the geoglyph. 
 
 An image of the makeup of the leg of the Russian geoglyph. Credit: Image courtesy Stanislav Grigoriev. 
 
 Dating the geoglyph 
 
 Among the finds from the excavations are about 40 stone tools, made of quartzite, found on the structure's surface. Most of them are pickaxe-like tools called mattocks, useful for digging and chopping. "Perhaps they were used to extract clay," he writes in the email. 
 
 The style of stone-working called lithic chipping used on one artifact dates it to the Neolithic and Eneolithic (sixth to third millennia B.C.), though Grigoriev says the technology is more typical of the Eneolithic, between the fourth and third millennia B.C. 
 
 If that date is correct, it would make the geoglyph far older than Peru's Nazca Lines, the very earliest of which were created around 500 B.C. Grigorievadded that current studies of ancient pollen at the site will help to narrow down the age. [Gallery: Aerial Photos Reveal Mysterious Stone Structures] 
 
 In the Antiquity journal article, Grigoriev and Menshenin point out that palaeozoological studies show that the landscape in the southern Urals supported fewer trees in the Eneolithic, with forest growth not appearing until about 2,500 years ago. "This means that there were open landscapes in the Eneolithic and Bronze Age, which allowed the hill figure to be created," they write. 
 
 A megalithic culture 
 
 Researchers say this geoglyph may have been built by a "megalithic culture" in the region that created stone monuments in prehistoric times. 
 
 "[M]any megalithic sites with features in common with European megaliths have been located: Some 300 are known but have not yet been studied in detail," write Grigoriev and Menshenin in the Antiquity article. Among these megaliths are numerous "menhirs," large upright standing stones. 
 
 The most spectacular megalithic complexes are on the relatively small Vera Island, located on Turgoyak Lake, about 35 miles (60 km) northeast of the geoglyph. 
 
 Grigoriev and Julia Vasina of the South-Ural State University described the Vera Island megaliths in a 2010 article, noting the surviving portion of one monument, megalith two, as being covered by a mound and supporting a gallery and square chamber. Another monument, megalith one, is cut into the bedrock and covered by a mound consisting of stones, brown sand and lots of grass. It is more than 60 feet (19 meters) long and 20 feet (6 meters) wide. It contains three chambers one of which has "bas relief sculptures" in the shape of animals, probably a bull and wolf. 
 
 Stone tools and ceramics found at the megalithic sites date them to between the Eneolithic period and the early Iron Age, around 3,000 years ago. Researchers emphasize more dating work needs to be done to verify; however, if the evidence holds, the giant geoglyph, along with the megaliths, were constructed millennia before Peru's Nazca Lines, a testament to the building prowess of an ancient prehistoric culture in the Ural Mountains. 
 
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– Google Earth can be used for more than peeking into your neighbor's backyard: Archaeologists have discovered more than 50 geoglyphs in Kazakhstan, thanks to images from the virtual geographical and map service, reports the International Business Times. Geoglyphs are large designs on the ground, usually created out of mounds of dirt and other natural elements, that can be seen from above. Scientists from Kostanay University, who made their announcement about the structures at an archaeology meeting in Istanbul, say the geoglyphs range in size from 295 feet to 1,312 feet in diameter and come in the shape of squares, circles, crosses—and even a giant swastika, LiveScience reports. (Click to a photo slideshow.) Geoglyphs like these that resemble Peru's famous Nazca Lines have been found all over the world, including giant "wheels" in the Middle East and an elk-like structure in Russia. It may seem surprising at first that a swastika is one of the Kazakhstani creations—and it was made of timber, not dirt, LiveScience notes—but many ancient cultures and religions used the swastika long before Hitler appropriated it. "Swastika" is derived from the Sanskrit term for "good fortune" or "well-being," and the symbol itself is believed to show the sun's movement in the sky, notes the US Holocaust Memorial Museum. "As of today, we can say only one thing—the geoglyphs were built by ancient people. By whom and for what purpose, remains a mystery," two of the project's scientists said in an email to LiveScience. (See what was revealed when sandstorms blew over the Peruvian desert last month.)