by Gary Vey for Viewzone

Of all the ancient cultures in South America, perhaps the most mysterious are those found in and around the rugged mountains of Peru. The area is such a harsh environment, with steep inclines, temperature extremes and a scarcity of water to sustain crops or man, that it is a puzzle why ancient cultures settled here. But settle they did, often building large living centers from stone at very high altitudes where low atmospheric pressure makes even walking a breathless task.

While the world is generally familiar with Machu Picchu and the Nazca Lines, another mystery has come to light through the modern science of satellite photography. This phenomenon is one that was previously known but the extent of its size and effort required to make it is just being fully realized.

A series of holes, usually about 24 inches across and in neat rows of from nine to twelve, stretch for almost a mile in Peru. It starts at the base of a mountain and then climbs up the side and meanders up and down, over some of the roughest terrain.

The remains of an ancient settlement can be seen near the Southern part of the path, distinguished by two large craters, measuring about 24 feet across. Elsewhere in the mountains, other ancient structures and foundations can be seen from satellite imagry [right], but have not yet been excvated.

In his book, Zecharia Sitchin describes how the annunaki set up a colony in Peru to look for gold, following their disappointment with sea mining. It has been suggested that these holes appear similar to excavations conducted by mining operations, perhaps searching for a vein of precious metal. Similar holes have been encountered from attempts to locate water, although the liklihood of finding water in these stone mountains seems very remote.

What made the ancient people of this era toil in such inhospitable conditions to create these holes? How long did it take them? What sustained them while they labored so hard? These mysteries remain to be answered.

Original Source: The Mysterious Holes Of Peru

June 19, 2007—A nearly 500-year-old skull sports the telltale signs of a gunshot wound from an antique firearm.

The find, discovered recently in an Inca cemetery near Lima, Peru, was the victim of a Spanish musket, according to a detailed analysis. That makes the skeleton the oldest documented gunshot victim in the New World and possibly the first person in the Americas ever to have been killed with a firearm, experts say.

National Geographic grantee Guillermo Cock led the team that uncovered the remains. It is one of 72 skeletons hastily buried at the site without the usual Inca reverence for death. (National Geographic News is part of the National Geographic Society.)

“We thought it was a person killed recently—5, 10, or 20 years ago,” Cock told National Geographic News. “We didn’t expect the individual would have been killed by a bullet 500 years ago.”

—Photo by Elena Goycochea © 2007National Geographic/Puruchuco-Huaquerones Archaeological Project

Original Source: Photo Gallery: New World’s Oldest Gunshot Victim Found?

CHURIN, Peru –Peru’s celebration of the guinea pig included contests for the biggest, the best-dressed — and the tastiest. The second annual festival of the cuy, as guinea pigs are known in the Andes, brought brass bands into the streets of highland Churin on Sunday to celebrate all things related to the furry rodents.

“Zero cholesterol! Protein for anemia!” Teresa Figeroa shouted from under her woven, flower-lined hat.

For 20 soles ($7), she sold plates of guinea pig fried, grilled, baked — even cuy au vin — with generous helpings of Andean potatoes and large Peruvian corn called choclo.

Foreigners may cringe at seeing the critters served for lunch, looking much like they did in life, face down on a bed of greens. But people came from across Peru to savor the meat and to compete in a cuy cookoff.

There was also a competition for the biggest guinea pig; the winner weighed in at almost 8 pounds of flesh, fat and fur. And some competed in a fashion show of traditional Andean dress, with guinea pigs decked out in fedoras and frilly skirts looking like Disney cartoons come to life.

But the food was the main event.

“This isn’t common,” said Nicolas Campos Sanchez, his lips shiny with grease as he ate a mouthful of barbecued guinea pig. “We’re very proud of it.”

Original Source: Peru celebrates tasty guinea pigs

Cameron Diaz apologized Sunday to the people of Peru for committing a fashion and political faux pas over the weekend.

Diaz, 34, had visited Peru’s Incan city of Machu Picchu on Friday carrying a green bag with a red star and the words “Serve the People” in Chinese, an infamous political slogan of Chinese Communist leader Mao Zedong.

The bags are marketed as fashion accessories in some world capitals, but in Peru the phrase evokes memories of the Maoist Shining Path insurgency of the 1980s and early 1990s in a bloody conflict that left nearly 70,000 people dead.
On Friday, one prominent Peruvian human rights activist, Pablo Rojas, said Diaz should have been a little more aware of local sensitivities when picking her accessories.
“It alludes to a concept that did so much damage to Peru, that brought about so many victims,” Rojas told the Associated Press. “I don’t think she should have used that bag where the followers of that ideology did so much damage.”

The star immediately went into damage control, talking to the AP about the “warmth and beauty” she experienced in Peruvians and her wish “for their continued healing.”
In Sunday’s statement, the voice of Princess Fiona in the movie Shrek, said the purpose of her visit was to participate in a television show that celebrates Peru’s culture. The actress has been in Peru as part of 4 REAL, a Canadian TV production that focuses on young community leaders around the world.

“I sincerely apologize to anyone I may have inadvertently offended,” Diaz said Sunday in a statement to the AP. “The bag was a purchase I made as a tourist in China and I did not realize the potentially hurtful nature of the slogan printed on it.”
In her statement, the star of “There’s Something About Mary” said the purpose of her visit was to participate in a television show that celebrated Peru’s culture.

Original Source: Cameron Diaz Apologizes for Handbag Faux Pas

By Julie Steenhuysen

CHICAGO (Reuters) - Anthropologists in northern Peru have found evidence of peanut, cotton and squash farming dating back 5,000 to 9,000 years, researchers said on Thursday, in a finding that helps pin down the start of organized agriculture in the Americas.

Farming marks an important turning point in human history because it signals a change from a nomadic hunter-gatherer way of life to more settled, sedentary society.

“This seems to be a major shift for the development of social structures,” said Tom Dillehay, professor of anthropology at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee, whose findings appear in the journal Science.

“The crops are dependent on people, which ties the latter down,” Dillehay said in comments e-mailed to Reuters.

Anthropologists assumed early farming was taking place in the Andes Mountains, but Dillehay and colleagues managed to find proof.

They discovered peanuts, squash and cotton, as well as a primitive grain and various tubers and fruits on the western slopes of the Andes.

“Agriculture played a more important and earlier role in the development of Andean civilization than previously understood,” Dillehay and colleagues wrote.

“Our data also show that horticulture and cultural complexity developed in the Americas nearly as early as it did in many parts of the Old World.”

They dated the squash from about 9,200 years ago, the peanut from 7,600 years ago and the cotton from 5,500 years ago.

These plants did not grow wild where they were found, and Dillehay believes they must have been domesticated somewhere else. They also found garden plots, irrigation canals and storage structures nearby.

Dillehay believes the development of agriculture served as a catalyst for cultural and social changes that led to the development of towns and political structures in the Andes highlands and along the coast some 4,000 to 5,000 years ago.

The discovery in Peru parallels the 1997 discovery by the Smithsonian’s Bruce Smith that ancient squash seeds found in Oaxaca, Mexico, were nearly 10,000 years old.

“It reveals another specific environment where early agriculture advanced,” Dillehay said of his finding.

Original Source: Evidence of ancient farming found in Andes

The Huaca Centinela was one of the principle centres of the Chincha people, a group of farmers, fishers and merchants that lived in the fertile valley that is now named for them. The Chincha nation existed in the area between the years 900 and 1495 when they were folded into the Inca Empire.

The Chincha nation was a developed one, with dozens of cities and roads between them. They built grand temples and palaces of adobe on vast platforms with towering walls. They were great traders in coca, copper and mulla shells using boats going up and down the coast as far as Chile and Ecuador, returning with other precious items such as emeralds.

Their city of Centinela is formed by two giant pyramids, Centinela and Tambo de Mora, an area of 75 hectares. The largest, Centinela, is formed by various palaces. These were once decorated with complex patterns on their walls. One small part of a wall survives where a pattern of fish and waves can be seen.

In the late 1400s the Inca, who now controlled a massive empire became highly interested in the Chincha’s extensive trade network and particularly in their trade of the sacred Mullu shell. They sent two armies to conquer the Chincha over the course of a few decades, the first by Pachacutec and the second by Manco Inca Yupanqui. Both attempts failed to over-run the Chincha defences, but they knew conquest was unavoidable. They decided to join the Inca empire in exchange for control over most of their trade routes, while providing the Inca with copper and Mulla shell. The Incas constructed a vast palace within the Centinela complex. While the Chincha built using dried abode resembling concrete, the Inca extensions and buildings were built with adobe bricks and are distinguishable.

The Incas respected the Chincha, making sure their buildings were not too pompous with regard to the native ones. The leader of the Chincha would often accompany Inca emperor Atahualpa, successor of Yupanqui, in his travels across the empire - the only non-Inca to do so. It was in this way he met his end in Cajamarca when the Incas first ran into Francisco Pizarro and his Spanish soldiers. He was mistaken, due to his riches and the respect he commanded, for Atahualpa and was mistakenly killed. The Spanish in their interrogations of Atahualpa, who they now realised was the Inca Emperor and before killing him and conquering his empire, were interested in the privileges given to the Chincha leader. Atahualpa explained that in earlier times, the Chincha had influence across all the coast, that they were a great people who put hundreds of thousands of rafts to sea to trade. To honour them, they decided to name one quarter of the empire, Tahuantinsuyu, in their honour: Chinchaysuyu.

Original Source: The Huaca Centinela and the Chincha culture

By Axel Bugge in Lisbon

PERU’S Machu Picchu, Jordan’s Petra and the Acropolis were among the top contenders to be picked as the new seven Wonders of the World with just a few hours to go in a massive poll to pick the winners.

Voting in what may be the biggest ever global online poll closes at 9am tomorrow ahead of the announcement of the winners at a ceremony in Lisbon.

More than 90 million people have voted so far.

Organisers say the contest is a unique exercise in levelling the global cultural playing field by putting hallmarks of European civilization on an equal footing with other cultures such as Mexico’s Mayas.

“We live in a Eurocentric world,” said Tia Vering, spokeswoman for the New 7 Wonders of the World (www.new7wonders.com) organisation.

“When have we ever compared symbols of European civilisation with, for instance, Mayan civilisation?”

Europe’s leading contenders are the Acropolis in Athens, Rome’s Colisseum and the Eiffel Tower. They are competing with Machu Picchu, Mexico’s Chichen Itza ruins, India’s Taj Mahal, Petra in Jordan, Christ Redeemer in Brazil and the statues of Easter Island.

In all, 21 sites are contending.

They also include the Statue of Liberty and Britain’s Stonehenge, which is the oldest candidate, as well as the Sydney Opera House - the newest.

Organisers will announce the list of the new seven wonders but will not divulge the votes each received to avoid having “first and second class wonders,” Ms Vering said.

The ancient world’s seven wonders were all located in the Mediterranean region and only one remains standing today - the Pyramids of Giza.

The originals were selected by one man, believed by many to be ancient Greek writer Antipater of Sidon.

Osama Abbas, Jordan’s tourism minister, said the contest would change all that.

“The old wonders were chosen by one person, this was 2500 years ago and most of them vanished, so it’s about time that there are new wonders that the whole world can work for,” he told Reuters.

“I think it is fair and democratic, the whole world is voting and all continents are represented.”

Some countries have gone to lengths to promote their candidates, such as bus tickets in Brazil reminding travellers to vote and an Indian singer dedicating a song to the Taj Mahal.

But not everybody is enthused, arguing leading world sites cannot be chosen in a popular vote.

The UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) has refused to support the New 7 Wonders campaign, saying the media campaign should not be compared with its World Heritage List based on scientific work.

“This initiative cannot, in any significant and sustainable manner, contribute to the preservation of sites elected by this public,” it said, pointing out that the vote only includes people with access to the Internet.

As host of the only remaining ancient wonder, Egypt has removed the Pyramids of Giza from the competition and has asked UNESCO to assign 300 antiquities experts and intellectuals to choose new wonders.

The New 7 Wonders organisation, established by Swiss-Canadian adventurer Bernard Weber, will use half its revenues to fund restoration efforts worldwide, including recreating the Bamiyan Buddha statue in Afghanistan.

Original Source: Countdown to new Seven Wonders starts

(LIP-jl) — Standing before an audience made up of Peruvian and Brazilian business representatives, Peruvian President Alan Garcia made a call to members from both groups to strengthen their commercial activities and economic ties so that both countries can aim at entering various Asisan markets.

President Garcia kicked off the Peru-Brazil Business Forum yesterday by stressing the importance that the Asian continent represents for both countries.

“The future belongs to those who can dominate trade with Asia. Because of this, we have begun conversations with the leaders of Chile, Colombia, Panama, and Mexico to build a unified trade front in the Asian-Pacific region,” said Garcia.

Garcia emphasized Brazil’s important role in such a possible organization by highlighting its enormous investment capabilities.

“The timing could not be better for Brazil, a supplier of large scale investments, to ally itself with Peru -a land of great possibilities and opportunities,” Garcia added.

“We now have the opportunity to tap into those vast investment supplies by land, and Brazil has the chance to partner up with a country that can provide stability in future endeavors,” stated the president who referred to the mega-Inter-Oceanic Highway project that will connect South America’s Atlantic coast (Brazil) and Pacific Coast (Peru).

Original Source: Peru’s Garcia calls for strengthened ties with Brazil

Football’s governing body, Fifa, has banned international matches from being played at more than 2,500m (8,200ft) above sea level.

Fifa said the decision was made because of concerns over players’ health and possible distortion of competition.

The ruling was greeted with dismay in Latin America, notably in Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia, where games in La Paz are played at 3,600m (11,811ft).

Bolivia’s President, Evo Morales, vowed to lead a campaign against the ban.

Speaking after an emergency cabinet meeting, Mr Morales said the ruling amounted to discrimination.

“This is not only a ban on Bolivia, it’s a ban on the universality of sports,” he told reporters.

To play at above that altitude is not healthy or fair
Sepp Blatter
Fifa president

Mr Morales also said he would send a high-level delegation to Fifa’s headquarters in Zurich and called on other countries to join his campaign.

“We cannot allow discrimination in soccer, we cannot allow… exclusion in the world of sports,” he added.

Many of Bolivia’s major cities, including Sucre and Potosi, are at high altitude.

‘Discrimination’

Local commentators in Peru, which was hoping to stage upcoming World Cup qualifiers in Cuzco at 3,400m (11,154ft), suggested Fifa made the decision after pressure from South America’s two major football powers, Brazil and Argentina.

Both nations have struggled in recent years while playing at altitude, where the thin air hands an advantage to those acclimatised to the conditions.

Playing sport in conditions of high altitude places heavy demands on the body, forcing the heart to work harder.

CITIES AT ALTITUDE
Bolivia: La Paz - 3,600m (11,811ft)
Ecuador: Quito - 2,800m (9,186ft)
Colombia: Bogota: 2640m (8,661ft)

Earlier in 2007, Brazilian club Flamengo said they would not play again at altitude after several of their players needed oxygen during a game against Bolivian team Real Potosi, held at nearly 4,000m (13,120ft).

The ban will also affect Ecuador whose national side has qualified for the last two World Cups, winning through on the basis of strong performances in Quito, at 2,800m.

Mexico City, where the 1970 and 1986 World Cup Final was played, just beats the Fifa limit, having an altitude of 2,240m (7349ft).

Fifa’s president, Sepp Blatter, said the organisation had expected protests from Latin America.

“The executive committee have listened to a proposal from the medical committee and have decided to act because to play at above that altitude is not healthy or fair,” he said.

Original Source: Fifa bans high-altitude football

NewScientist.com news service
Kelly Young

The first solar observatory in the Americas may have been uncovered in coastal Peru. The ceremonial site provides evidence of sophisticated ‘cults of the Sun’ operating in South America as early as 2300 years ago.

Other ancient structures around the world – such as Stonehenge, which is estimated to be 5000 years old – are aligned with the rising and setting of the Sun on certain days called the solstices. These occur twice a year, around 21 June and 22 December, when the Sun appears to reach its highest point above or below the equator.

Previously, archaeologists had uncovered 4000-year-old gourd fragments in Peru showing images of a “staff god” with rays emanating from its head, perhaps like the Sun (see America’s oldest religious icon revealed).

Historical records also describe “Sun pillars” suggesting that South America’s Incan civilisation was observing the Sun – possibly to help mark when to plant crops – around 1500 AD, though those pillars have since been destroyed. The Incas also held public rituals to observe the Sun rise or set at marked positions on the horizon, and Incan leaders claimed authority to rule through kinship to the Sun.

Now, Ivan Ghezzi of the Instituto Nacional de Cultura in Lima, Peru, and Clive Ruggles of the University of Leicester, UK, say earlier civilisations in Peru may also have been observing the Sun as early as the fourth century BC.
Tower ridge

They base their conclusion on ruins at a walled coastal Peruvian site known as Chankillo. Once thought to be part of a fort, ceremonial centre or fortified temple, the researchers now argue the ruin’s central complex may have actually been used as a solar observatory.

Within Chankillo, 13 regularly spaced rectangular towers run the length of a 300-metre ridge like a spine, creating an artificial horizon from some vantage points.

On either side of the ridge are the remains of a western observatory and, lesser so, an eastern observatory, which scientists say were used to watch the Sun rise or set between those towers. On the summer solstice, the Sun rose between Tower 1 and a nearby mountain, Cerro Mucho Malo, and on the winter solstice, the Sun rose around Tower 13.

The Sun appeared for only one or two days in each gap between towers, taking six months to go from one end of the structure to the other. So it is possible the different towers were meant to divide the year into regular intervals lasting about 10 days – the time it takes for sunrises to occur between adjacent towers in the central part of the structure.
Seasonal feasts

The site may have been a place for public rituals and feasts associated with the seasons and the Sun. Excavations have revealed offerings of pottery, shells and other artifacts near an opening at the western observing point.

Researchers say the inhabitants of this site may have been involved in ritualistic practices of passing through a 40-metre-long exterior corridor and standing at the opening to observe the towers.

The specialists who actually tracked the Sun’s motions likely did their work in private while watching the Sun’s light fall onto a wall or through a window, however. “Entry to the observing points themselves appears to have been highly restricted,” the authors write.
Elite class

“Individuals with the status to access them and conduct ceremonies would have had the power to regulate time, ideology, and the rituals that bound this society together,” they continue. “Thus, Sun worship and related cosmological beliefs at Chankillo could have helped to legitimise the authority of an elite class, just as they did within the Inca empire two millennia later.”

David Dearborn, a physicist at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California, US, says the study is very interesting.

“With this abundant evidence for Inca interest in astronomy, and for its use in social organisation, archaeologists have long suspected that earlier cultures also may have engaged in such activities,” he told New Scientist. “Finally, in this work, material evidence is presented that strongly supports such suspicions.”

Journal reference: Science (vol 315, p 1239)

Original Source: Ancient solar observatory discovered in Peru