June 24, 2019

Today, June 24, people in Peru celebrate the Fiesta del Sol (Festival of the Sun, or Inti Raymi in Quechua, the ancient language of the Inca). The festival marks the winter solstice in the Southern Hemisphere, and it is considered the most important day on the Inca calendar. The festival celebrates Inti, the Inca sun god, and begins the new Inca year. Inti Raymi celebrations include elaborate dances, the wearing of colorful costumes, and the sharing of traditional food and drink.

An Inca man displays a colorful quipu, a knotted record-keeping device, during an Inti Raymi procession in Cusco, Peru. Credit: © James Brunker, Alamy Images

The Inca are a native South American people who once ruled one of the largest and richest empires in the Americas. The Inca empire emerged in the early A.D. 1400’s and occupied a vast region centered around the capital of Cusco, in southern Peru. Today, Cusco remains a center of Inca culture, and it hosts the main celebrations for the Festival of the Sun. Nearly half of all Peruvians are descended from the Inca or other indigenous peoples, while another third are mestizos—people of mixed Spanish and Native American heritage.

The traditional Inca religious ceremony—the Festival of the Sun, or Inti Raymi—is reenacted at an ancient fortress in Cusco, Peru. Credit: © M. Timothy O’Keefe, Alamy Images

Originally, the Sapa Inca (emperor), nobles, priests, and thousands of devoted worshippers celebrated Inti Raymi at Huacaypata, Cusco’s main square (now called the Plaza de Armas). Ancestral mummies were paraded through the plaza, great numbers of llamas (and sometimes people) were sacrificed, dances and songs were performed, and sacred food and drink were taken. The ceremony was banned after the Spanish arrived in Peru in the 1530′s, but the festival was revived—minus the mass animal sacrifices—in the 1940′s. Today, Inti Raymi draws many thousands of people to Cusco and other Inca sites.

This illustration shows an Inca emperor entering the Temple of the Sun in Cusco, the capital. The chosen women, who prepared food and offerings used in the ceremony, stand near the mummy of a former emperor, left rear. Credit: WORLD BOOK illustration by Richard Hook

June 24 is a busy feriado (holiday) in other parts of Peru, as well. The day marks the birth of San Juan Bautista (Saint John the Baptist), one of the 12 apostles of Jesus Christ. People enjoy the Día de San Juan throughout the Selva (the Amazon region), where San Juan is the patron saint. June 24 is also the Día del Campesino (Day of the Peasant), a holiday once known as Día del Indio (Day of the Indian) that celebrates farm workers as well as Peru’s large indigenous population. For hundreds of years, in the Rímac district of Lima, June 24 was also the Fiesta de Amancaes. Amancaes, or flores de Amancay, are large yellow lilies native to the district, which was once a haven for people looking to escape the city for an afternoon.

September 12, 2018

High in the Atacama Desert of Chile, a system of stone pillars and rock piles called saywas was recently found to be an ancient Inca calendar. Once thought only to mark a local Inca trail, a team of archaeologists, astronomers, historians, and researchers recently showed how the saywas work as a complicated and connected calendar to identify and predict equinoxes, solstices, and other astronomical events. The Inca trail in the Atacama Desert is part of the Qhapaq Ñan, an extensive Inca road network that stretches from southern Colombia to central Chile.

The sun peeks over the Andes Mountains at dawn, illuminating a line of ancient Inca saywas in the Atacama Desert of northern Chile. Credit: A. Silber, ALMA/ESO/NAOJ/NRAO

Working at 13,800 feet (4,200 meters) above sea level in the desert mountains near Taltal, a small city in northern Chile, the scientific team began visiting the saywas and taking measurements in 2017. The team included local indigenous people as well as experts from the Chilean Museum of Pre-Colombian Art, the nearby Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) observatory, and the European Southern Observatory. The research was funded by BHP/Minera Escondida, a mining company with more material interests in the desert.

The scientific team began the study by documenting alignments between certain saywas and the sunrises on the March equinox and June solstice. They then began connecting saywa points with other important dates on the ancient Inca calendar. Operating much in the same way as Stonehenge in England, the saywas align with sunrises on certain dates, while also projecting shadows on the ground that lead to other stone points. The researchers also found that certain saywas align with constellations at night, further strengthening the researchers’ conclusion, published in 2018, that the network of stones served as a large calendar for Inca astronomers.

The first written accounts of the saywas were recorded during the Spanish conquest of Andean  South America in the 1500′s and 1600′s. The saywas’ remote locations in the empty desert, far from Inca cities, led the Spanish to believe that the stone piles were little more than pathway markers to help guide people through the vast, barren desert. The saywas did in fact aid in navigation, but the larger purpose of the stone markers remained unknown for centuries. In recent years, however, knowledge of the Inca has greatly expanded, and the study of ancient Quechua and Aymara (Inca languages) dictionaries led to the examination of the relationship between the saywas and the Inca astronomical system.

The ancient Inca capital of Cusco (in modern-day Peru) was surrounded by columns used to measure time, create calendars, and predict equinoxes and solstices as well as the planting and harvesting seasons. The remote saywas, however, were tucked away in the Atacama Desert. Perhaps that was merely the best view of the heavens, allowing Inca astronomers to get the most accurate measurements while Cusco was obscured by clouds and mist. Modern astronomers use the high desert for the same purpose. The sprawling ALMA observatory is only a (figurative) stone’s throw away.

May 11, 2018

At the end of April, Archaeologists in Peru published shocking details about an ancient site where more than 140 children were ritually killed in a human sacrifice ceremony about 550 years ago. Archaeologists consider the site, built by the Chimú culture on Peru’s northern coast, as evidence of the largest single mass child sacrifice in pre-Columbian history (the period before the arrival of Columbus in America). The site, which also includes the remains of more than 200 sacrificed llamas, is in Huanchaquito, a town near the city of Trujillo.

The remains of sacrificed children and animals were found near the ruins of the ancient city of Chan Chan, seen here before the modern buildings of Trujillo in the background. Credit: © Jess Kraft, Shutterstock

The Chimú were one of several civilizations that developed in what is now Peru beginning around 2800 B.C. The Chimú built a large capital city called Chan Chan. It was begun about A.D. 1000. Chan Chan’s ruins cover about 8 square miles (20 square kilometers) outside the present-day city of Trujillo. Experts in pre-Columbian history know that sacrifices and offerings were important in the religious ceremonies of many peoples, including the Chimú. People often sacrificed crops and animals to ensure adequate rainfall and fertile soil. Human sacrifices were made under certain circumstances, and numerous individual graves of sacrificed children have been found. The remains of the Chimú children of Huanchaquito, however, represent the first evidence of sacrifice on such a large scale. Archaeologist believe the mass child sacrifice must have been performed during a time of terrible crisis, perhaps caused by a natural disaster.

Richly decorated walls line the ruins of the Chimú capital of Chan Chan. The Chimú people were among Peru’s early inhabitants. Credit: © Christopher Howey, Dreamstime

The ceremonial site at Huanchaquito was discovered by archaeologists in 2011 as they were investigating the remains of an early Chimú temple. Archaeologists called the site Huanchaquito las Llamas because they found the skeletal remains of several llamas that had been killed as a religious sacrifice. Radiocarbon dating of remains indicated that the sacrifice occurred around A.D. 1400 to 1450. However, many ancient human remains were then also found at the site. As excavations continued, the number of human skeletal remains totaled 140 individuals. The researchers were shocked to discover that the skeletal remains were all from children aged 5 to 14. Most were between 8 and 12 years old. The llamas were young too, all less than 18 months old.

Other evidence showed that the children all died together as part of a mass human sacrifice. Forensic anthropologists observed cut marks on many of the bones. Such marks show the children were intentionally killed by other people and that they were not victims of a flood, earthquake, or other calamity. Especially telling were cut marks found on the sternum (breastbone) of many victims, along with damage to their ribs. This is evidence that the victims had their chests cut open and their hearts were violently removed. Traces of powdered cinnabar, a red mineral pigment often used in religious ceremonies, were also discovered among the bones of the child victims. The Chimú children were buried facing west toward the nearby Pacific Ocean. The llamas killed at the site were buried facing east toward the Andes Mountains. Archaeologists believe the children and animals were killed as part of the same ritual.

Archaeologists observed that the sacrifice victims were buried beneath a layer of fine mud. This evidence suggests a severe flood at the time in the otherwise arid (dry) region, perhaps caused by an unusually powerful weather event known as El Niño. In the late 1400’s, within a few decades of this mass child sacrifice, the Chimú were conquered by the expanding Inca civilization.

Before Huanchaquito, the largest known mass child sacrifice event was at the Templo Mayor in the ancient Aztec capital of Tenochtitlán (modern-day Mexico City), where the remains of 42 children were found.

March 7, 2018

Last week, on February 28, an exhibition of artwork of the ancient Americas opened at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. Called “Golden Kingdoms: Luxury & Legacy in the Ancient Americas,” the exhibition features the arts of the Aztec, the Inca, and other pre-Columbian cultures of Mexico and Central and South America. American Indian art created before A.D. 1500 is called pre-Columbian because it was produced before Christopher Columbus arrived in the New World in 1492.

The Golden Kingdoms exhibition includes this burial mask recovered from an ancient site known as Dos Cabezas on the northern Pacific coast of Peru. The gilded copper mask features eyes inlaid with shell and violet stone. The mask covered the face of a young man–no doubt someone of significance–wearing gold nose ornaments (see image below). Credit: Burial mask (A.D. 525–550), gilded copper, shell, and stone; Museo de Sitio de Chan Chan, Perú; Christopher B. Donnan/Metropolitan Museum of Art

Gold working in the ancient Americas began in the Andean cultures of South America and later developed farther north in Mesoamerica (what is now Central America and Mexico). Gold—considered an earthly remnant of the divine sun—and other precious metals were used more for decoration and ritual than for currency, tools, or weapons. Fine arts in the ancient Americas often connected people to ancestors, to the natural world around them, and to the gods and legends of their individual mythologies. Decorative objects were also used used in games and music and to celebrate fine harvests or rites of passage.

The Golden Kingdoms exhibition pays particular tribute to gold working. However, it also shows numerous works of bronze, copper, and silver, as well as precious objects made of cinnabar, jade, malachite, sea shell, turquoise, and feathers—materials often considered more valuable than gold. Noble textiles and fine pottery are also featured in the exhibit, which explores how materials were selected and transformed into art, what gave the objects meaning, and how they were used in sacred rituals.

These nose ornaments on display at the Met were found beneath the burial mask seen above. The deceased young man wore a rectangular gold ornament with a silver border. The hammered gold owl was compressed and placed in his mouth. The other ornaments depict a bat and a monkey. Credit: Clockwise from top left: Nose ornament (A.D. 525–550), gold and silver; Nose ornament (A.D. 525–550), Gold; Nose ornament (A.D. 525–550), Gold and stone; Nose ornament (A.D. 525–550), Gold; (Museo de Sitio de Chan Chan, Perú/Christopher B. Donnan/Metropolitan Museum of Art)

The Met exhibition features more than 300 works of newly discovered archaeological finds as well as established masterpieces from museums in Europe, Latin America, and the United States. Objects on display include bells, belts, collars, masks, and various forms of jewelry. “Golden Kingdoms: Luxury & Legacy in the Ancient Americas” runs through May 28.

June 26, 2014

An ancient Inca road in South America, a French cave with prehistoric art, and mysterious stone spheres in Costa Rica are among the 30 new important sites just added to the World Heritage List. The list is an international registry of sites with cultural and natural significance. Some sites are listed because of their unusual scenery and wildlife. Others are included because of their importance as part of our cultural heritage. Some areas possess both natural and cultural importance. The list, established in 1972, is maintained by the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization’s (UNESCO) World Heritage Committee. The committee also works to preserve the sites. With the new additions, the list now includes 1,007 sites around the world.

The United States gained its 22nd site, the monumental earthenworks of Poverty Point, Louisiana. The complex comprises five mounds, six concentric semi-elliptical ridges separated by shallow depressions, and a central plaza. The complex was created and used for residential and ceremonial purposes by a society of hunter-gatherers from 3,700 to 3,100 B.C. Other Heritage List sites in the United States include Independence Hall in Philadephia; Grand Canyon National Park in Arizona; Cahokia Mounds State Historical Site in Illinois; and the Statue of Liberty in New York City.

In addition to having “outstanding universal value,” sites must meet at least 1 of 10 criteria. These include representing “a masterpiece of human creative genius”; containing “superlative natural phenomena or areas of exceptional natural beauty and aesthetic importance”; and containing “the most important and significant natural habitats for in-situ conservation of biological diversity.”

Chauvet Cave in southern France was added to the World Heritage List because of its spectacular examples of art by prehistoric people. (Center for Information & Documentation (DRAC Rhone-Alpes))

The latest additions to the World Heritage List include:

• Qhapac Nan, a 1,865-mile (3,000-kilometer) network of roads that connected all parts of the Incas‘ Andes Mountain empire;
• Grotte Chauvet in France, which holds the earliest known and best preserved figurative drawings in the world, dating back as early as  32,000 B.C.;
• The Stone Spheres of the Diquis Delta in Costa Rica, known for their perfection, size, and density, “whose meaning, use and production remain largely a mystery.” The spheres are located on four archaeological sites dating from A.D. 500 to 1500 that also contain artificial mounds, paved areas, and burial sites.
• The Okavango Delta, a vast wetland in Botswana, that is home to some of the world’s most endangered species of large mammals, including cheetahs, white rhinoceroses, black rhinoceroses, African wild dogs, and lions.
• Stevns Klint, a site in Denmark that contains geologic and fossil evidence of the impact of the Chicxulub meteorite that crashed into the ocean off the coast of Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula about 65 million years ago. The catastrophic impact is believed to have caused the extinction of some 50 percent of all species on Earth, including the last of the dinosaurs;
• The Mount Hamiguitan Range Wildlife Sanctuary in the Philippines, a mountain ridge that provides habitat for a range of plant and animal species, some of which are critically endangered.

To see all sites chosen for the World Heritage List in 2014, go to

http://whc.unesco.org/en/newproperties/date=2014&mode=list