machu picchu

Notes From Sherry – The last part of Lee’s tour is to the city of Machu Picchu.

Machu Picchu-sometimes called the “Lost City”- is a pre-Columbian city created by the Inca located at 7,970 feet (2,430 m) on a mountain ridge above the Urubamba Valley about 44 miles (70 km) from Cuzco, Peru.

Machu Picchu was constructed around 1450, at the height of the Inca empire, and was abandoned less than 100 years later, as the empire collapsed under Spanish conquest. Although the citadel is located only about 50 miles from Cusco, the Inca capital, it was never found and destroyed by the Spanish, as were many other Inca sites. Over the centuries, the surrounding jungle grew to enshroud the site, and few knew of its existence.

It wasn’t until 1911 that Yale historian and explorer Hiram Bingham brought the “lost” city to the world’s attention and wrote a best-selling work about it. Peru is pursuing legal efforts to retrieve thousands of artifacts that Bingham removed from the site. Bingham and others hypothesized that the citadel was the traditional birthplace of The Inca people or the spiritual center of the “virgins of the sun,” while curators of a recent exhibit have speculated that Machu Picchu was a royal retreat. Regardless, the presence of numerous temples and ritual structures proves that Machu Picchu held spiritual significance for the Inca.

The photo on the right shows the Intihuatana (“tie the sun”) and is believed to have been designed as an astronomic clock by the Incas.

It is thought that the site was chosen for its unique location and geological features. It is said that the silhouette of the mountain range behind Machu Picchu represents the face of the Inca looking upward towards the sky, with the largest peak,Huayna Picchu (meaning Young Peak), representing his pierced nose. In 1913, the site received significant publicity after the National Geographic Society devoted their entire April issue to Machu Picchu.

According to the archaeologists, the urban sector of Machu Picchu was divided into three great districts: the Sacred District, the Popular District, and the District of the Priests and the Nobility.Located in the first zone are the primary archaeological treasures: the Intihuatana, The Temple of The Sum and The Room of the Three Windows. These were dedicated to Inti, their sun god and greatest deity. The Popular District, or Residential District, is the place where the lower class people lived. It includes storage buildings and simple houses to live in.

In the Royalty Area, a sector existed for the Nobility: a group of houses located in rows over a slope; the residence of the Amatas (wise persons) was characterized by its reddish walls, and the zone of the Ñustas (princesses) had trapezoid-shaped rooms. The Monumental Mausoleum is a carved statue with a vaulted interior and carved drawings. It was used for rites or sacrifices.

All of the construction in Machu Picchu uses the classic Inca architectural style of polished dry-stone walls of regular shape. The Incas were masters of this technique, called ashlar, in which blocks of stone are cut to fit together tightly without mortar. Many junctions are so perfect that not even a knife fits between the stones.

The Incas never used the wheel in any practical manner. How they moved and placed enormous blocks of stones is a mystery, although the general belief is that they used hundreds of men to push the stones up inclined planes. It is unknown if the Incas left behind any documentation about that process because the writing they employed, called khipus, has not been translated.

The space of Machu Picchu is composed of 140 constructions including temples, sanctuaries, parks and residences – houses with thatched roofs.

There are more than one hundred flights of stone steps – often completely carved in a single block of granite – and a great number of water fountains, interconnected by channels and water-drainages perforated in the rock, designed for the original irrigation system. Evidence has been found to suggest that the irrigation system was used to carry water from a holy spring, to each of the houses in turn, the order being dictated by the perceived holiness of the inhabitants.

The view looking down the terraced steps to the Urubamba River.

View of Machu Picchu from Huayna Picchu showing the Hiram Bingham Highway used by buses carrying tourists to and from the town of Aguas Calientes.

Machu Picchu is a UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) World Heritage site. As Peru’s most visited tourist attraction and major revenue generator, it is continually threatened by economic and commercial forces. In the late 1990s, the Peruvian government granted concessions to allow the construction of a cable car to the ruins and development of a luxury hotel, including a tourist complex with boutiques and restaurants. These plans were met with protests from scientists, academics and the Peruvian public, nearly half of which is indigenous. Critics worried that the proposed facilities would not only destroy the beauty of the site but would enable far greater numbers of visitors, which would pose tremendous physical burdens on the ruins.

There are a growing number of people that visit Machu Picchu (400,000 in 2003, Therefore some are concerned that the site is being damaged. For this reason, there were protests against a plan to build a further bridge to the site and a no-fly zone exists in the area. UNESCO is considering putting Machu Picchu on its list of endangered world heritage sites.

A llama overlooking the city of Machu Picchu.