The revolt of Túpac Amaru II

Born José Gabriel Condorcanqui in 1742, he was the great-grandson of the last Inca emperor Túpac Amaru. Like his great-grandfather before him, he was destined to resist the Spanish occupation, and, like his great-grandfather before him, was destined to meet the same fate.

July 29, 2009 | Culture & History, Opinion

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Inti Raymi

The Spanish had yet to arrive in Peru but there was such frantic activity throughout the empire in the week leading up to the 24th of June that it was obvious that something just as big was happening. In fact it happened every year and was very important – but thankfully well-rehearsed Inca rituals meant there was no real cause for alarm.

June 24, 2008 | Culture & History, Cusco Guide

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Earliest Gun Shot Victim in the New World

Puruchuco, the site in Ate I visited not so long ago, has turned up yet more spectacular finds. In the Inca cemetery not far from the ruins in which 2500 mummies have been excavated, archaeologists uncovered what appeared to be a skeleton with a Spanish musket ball hole in the back of its skull. The traces of iron in the skull, from which Spanish muskets balls were made, seems to confirm this.

Dating of artefacts buried alongside the bodies allowed them to date the burials to an extraordinary time – about one year after the Spanish had founded the city of Lima.

June 22, 2007 | Archaeology, Culture & History, News

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History of Ayacucho

Ayacucho is famous for its celebrations during the Easter season, a season I’ll be here to witness. The town has a population of over 90,000, swelling during Semana Santa as people arrive to witness the religious festivities.

The city has a long and important history, dating back as much as 15,000 years where the first evidence of human habitation was found in the caves of Pikimachay. Thousands of years later, but still before the rise of the Incas, the area was home to the Huari civilisation which spanned about half of the Peruvian Andes…

April 2, 2007 | Ayacucho Guide, Culture & History

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Ollantaytambo – Inca Ruins

The Spanish had caused the Inca empire to collapse. The pacific coast was theirs, they had founded the city of Lima. Marching on Cuzco they entered without a fight. The Inca emperor had been put to death, and the city of Cuzco was pillaged. The Spanish had installed a puppet emperor who was to do their bidding while they looted the empire for gold and forced the people into Christianity.

November 13, 2006 | Archaeology, Culture & History

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Sacsayhuamán

Pachacútec, expander of the empire, ordered the site’s construction in the mid-1400’s. The complex took almost 100 years to complete with thousands of men. Many of the blocks were taken from as far as 32km away. Some blocks are the size of large buses and weigh hundreds of tons. No-one knows how they managed to move them, not even how they managed to cut the bricks with laser-precision. All that survives of the place is what the Spanish weren’t able to destroy – what they didn’t have the technology to destroy. What you see in my photos is a mere 20% of what once stood here.

November 5, 2006 | Archaeology, Culture & History, Cusco Guide

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