Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
CHIMÚ & CHACHAPOYAS
Following the demise of the Wari, a number of small nation-states emerged in different
corners of the country. They are too numerous to detail here (for more, Click here ) , but
there are two that merit discussion because of the art and architecture they left behind.
The first of these is the Chimú culture, once
based around present-day Trujillo. Between
about AD 1000 and AD 1400, this sophisticated
society built the largest known pre-Columbian
city in the Americas. Chan Chan ( Click here )
is a sprawling, 36-sq-km complex, which once
housed an estimated 60,000 people. Though
over the centuries this adobe city has been worn
down by the elements, parts of the complex's geometric friezes have been restored, giving
a small inkling of what this metropolis must have been like in its heyday. The Chimú were
accomplished artisans and metallurgists - producing, among other things, some absolutely
outrageous-looking textiles covered top-to-bottom in tassels.
In the interior of the northern highlands is the cloud-forest citadel of Kuélap ( Click here
), built by the Chachapoyas culture in the remote Utcubamba Valley beginning around AD
800. It is an incredible structure - or, more accurately, series of structures. The site is com-
posed of more than 400 circular dwellings in addition to unusual, gravity-defying pieces of
architecture, such as an inverted cone known as El Tintero (The Inkpot). The compound
caps a narrow ridge and is surrounded, on all sides, by a 6m- to 12m-high wall, making the
city practically impenetrable. This has led at least one historian to theorize that if the Incas
had made their last stand against the Spanish here, rather than outside Cuzco, history might
have been quite different.
The website www.arqueologia.com.ar/peru/ gathers
useful links (in Spanish) related to archaeology
news in Peru. The site contains timelines as well as
some basic photo galleries devoted to different cul-
tural groups.
 
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