Dropa

From SkepticWiki

The Dropa (also known as Dropas, Drok-pa or Dzopa) are, according to certain controversial writers, a race of dwarf-like extraterrestrials who landed near the Chinese-Tibetan border about twelve thousand years ago.

In 1938, according to one source, Chi Pu Tei, a professor of archaeology at Beijing University, and his students were on an expedition to explore a series of caves in the pathless Himalayan mountains of the remote Bayan-Kara-Ula range in Qinghai on the border of China and Tibet. The caves appeared to have been artificially carved into a system of tunnels and underground storerooms. The walls, it is said, were squared and glazed, as if cut into the mountain with great heat.

The explorers are said to have found many neat rows of tombs with short 138 cm skeletons buried within. The skeletons had abnormally big heads, and small, thin, fragile bodies. A member of the team suggested that these might be the remains of an unknown species of mountain gorilla. Prof. Chi Pu Tei was said to respond, "Who ever heard of apes burying one another?"

There were no epitaphs at the graves, but instead hundreds of 30 cm wide stone discs ("Dropa Stones") were found having 20 mm wide holes in their centers. On the walls were carved pictures of the rising sun, moon, stars, the land, mountains, and lines of pea-sized dots connecting the earth with the sky. Along with the discs, the cave drawings were determined to be about 12 000 years old.

Skeptics have cast doubt on a number of the more sensational Dropa claims. Many critics argue that the entire affair is a hoax or pseudoscience.