Due to the important natural and historical and archaeological significance, the government of Peru in 1975 declared the territory of the peninsula and its water area National Reserve.

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Geography, relief

The low-lying coast of the Paracas Peninsula is a continuation of the Chilean (Spanish: Desierto de Atacam), the driest desert in the world. The coastal ranges of the Serra Colorado (Spanish: Cerra Colorado) are cut off by sea terraces, the height of the coastal plain varies from 300 to 700 m above sea level.

The relief of the peninsula is formed mainly by a salt desert, which was formed on the site of the ancient ocean, dunes of reddish sand, as well as part of the ocean shelf. The rocks surrounding the peninsula go deep into the Pacific Ocean.

Climate

The climate of the deserted Paracas Peninsula is subtropical - temperate, with an average annual air temperature of +22°C. Here the sun shines all year round, but the winds are constantly blowing, the average strength of which reaches 25 km / h.

origin of name

The word "Paracas" is of Indo-Spanish origin: "para" in Quechua means "rain", "aco" - "sand". Together it turns out "Paraco" - "sandy rain". The Spaniards added the usual ending "as" to the word.

Powerful winds are also called "Paracas" by the locals.

In terms of meaning, everything is quite logical: the winds on the peninsula blow with such force (25 - 60 km / h) that air currents lift tons of sand up, creating sandstorms.

Attractions

La Catedral (Spanish: La Catedral - “Cathedral”) is a huge yellow rock of a bizarre shape, rising from the water 50 m from the coast. Previously, it was connected to the coastal rocks by a granite arch. Unfortunately, over time, the waves washed away the bridge and the arch collapsed.

Ocean waters of aquamarine color constantly rage at the foot of the cliff, and almost the entire water area is always covered with foam scallops.

national reserve

One of the main natural attractions of Peru is Paracas National Reserve(Spanish Paracas National Reserve) is the largest protected area located in the west of the country, 15 km from the city of Pisco, 70 km. west of the city of Ica and 270 km. south of Lima. From the Peruvian capital to the reserve can be reached by.

The reserve was founded on September 25, 1975 in order to preserve the unique marine ecosystem of the Antarctic, the characteristic formations of the coastal tropical desert and to protect the historical and cultural heritage of the peninsula. The cultural heritage of Paracas is associated with the ancient culture of the same name, which is evidenced by more than a hundred archaeological sites.

The national reserve occupies a land area of ​​more than 335 thousand hectares, including the southern Peruvian coast and the peninsula of the same name, and about 200 hectares of coastal waters with nearby rocky islands.

Ideas about national parks for many are associated with lush vegetation, however, Paracas is completely different. There used to be an ocean here, so almost nothing grows on salty soil. From above, the salt is covered with a layer of terracotta-burgundy sand. The gently sloping reddish dunes are very beautiful, creating a feeling of an unearthly landscape here. The reserve has beautiful deserted beaches, however, because of the cold currents, it is cold to swim here, so the beaches are almost always deserted, which creates a feeling of complete solitude with nature.

In addition, the protected area is home to many migratory animal species.

Since the peninsula can be explored from land and from the sea, park staff offer tourists walking tours of the reserve by car, as well as by boat along the coast. Fans of extreme sports can go diving or snowboarding on the sand, ride a buggy. And connoisseurs of nature have the opportunity to observe fur seal rookeries and huge bird colonies in close proximity.

Flora

The terrestrial flora of the reserve forms mainly a kind of belt, which is called desert meadows, or "loma" (Spanish: Loma; pl. Lomas). Lomas is a "foggy" vegetation in the middle of a lifeless desert salt marsh landscape, made possible by frequent fogs. More than 40% of the plant world of the Paracas National Reserve is endemic.

Grows on saline soils Distichlis spiky(lat. Distichlis spicata), reeds predominate in freshwater lowlands, and on the sands - succulent halophyte(lat. Sesuvium portulacastrum). Higher up in the foothills of the Cerro Colorado there are small patches with groups of columnar cacti(lat. Neoraimondia arequipensis).

The underwater flora of the reserve is much more diverse than the terrestrial one. Due to the fact that the Paracas Peninsula is washed by cool Peruvian Current, the local waters are simply overflowing with plankton (only approx. 260 species of seaweed!), which feed on fish, numerous molluscs and crustaceans, which in turn feed on numerous marine animals and birds.

Fauna

The fauna of the Paracas National Reserve is extremely diverse. Washed by ocean waves, the peninsula has become home to many rare animal species.

Among the inhabitants of the national reserve, birds predominate, of which there are more than 200 species. Typical representatives of the feathered fauna of the Paracas Park include: Gray Gull (lat. Larus modestus); Inca tern (lat. Larosterna inca); Black water cutter (lat. Rynchops nigra); Tules (lat. Pluvialis squatarola); red-legged cormorant(Phalacrocorax gaimardi); Cormorant of Bougainville(lat. Phalacrocorax bougainvillea); Penguin Humboldt(lat. Spheniscus humboldti); Chilean flamingo(lat. Phoenicopterus chilensis), Andean condor (lat. Vultur gryphus) is the largest flying bird in the Western Hemisphere; American brown pelican(lat. Pelecanus occidentalis); And peruvian pelican(Pelecanus thagus) is the smallest of the pelicans in the world.

Large mammals live in protected waters: southern sea lion(lat. Otaria flavescens) with a powerful mane; South American fur seal(lat. Arctocephalus australis); common dolphin and common dolphin (Delphinus delphis); Cat otter (lat. Lontra felina). The water area of ​​the reserve is inhabited by leatherback and green turtles, as well as many commercial and ornamental fish.

The Peruvian Current (or Humboldt Current) has greatly influenced the world of marine invertebrates: in addition to the huge variety of zooplankton, the waters of the peninsula are rich in octopuses, squid, molluscs and crustaceans.

Archaeological Museum. Near the entrance to the reserve is the Archaeological Museum, founded Julio Cesar Tello Rojas(Spanish Julio Cesar Tello Rojas, 1880 - 1947), Peruvian archaeologist, researcher of the ancient culture of Paracas. A rich museum exposition acquaints visitors with the ancient Peruvian civilization and the unique nature of this region.

Observatory. In 2014, a group of archaeologists led by Charles Stanisch, near the city of Chincha Alta (Spanish: Chincha Alta; the capital of Chincha Province, Ica Department), discovered an ancient observatory, which is believed to be ca. 2500 years. It occupies an area of ​​40 km², representing straight lines of geoglyphs applied on the surface of the earth (more than 70) and 5 man-made hills surrounding them. The lines are directed to the point corresponding to the summer solstice in the southern hemisphere of the Earth.

Culture Paracas

Culture Paracas- an important archaeological culture that existed on the peninsula in the period from about 750 to 100 years. BC. The carriers of this culture mastered the art of irrigation and melioration.

Basically, our knowledge of the Paracas civilization is based on archaeological excavations of a large seaside necropolis, which was discovered and explored in 1928 by the Peruvian archaeologist Julio Tello. Necropolis at Huari Kayan(Kech. Wari Kayan) consisted of a large number of large underground burial chambers, each of which contained about 40 perfectly preserved mummies. Experts suggest that each of the chambers belonged to a separate family or clan and was used for many generations. The mummies are "swaddled" in several layers. fabrics, decorated with rich ornaments. These fabrics are among the finest examples of pre-Columbian art. Today, most of the Paracas mummies are kept in the museum of the city of Ica (Spanish: Ica).

People of the Paracas culture (so, not knowing the self-name of the ancient people, they are called by toponym) were sure that death is only the transition of the soul from the visible world to the invisible world. They did not grieve, but rejoiced that another tribesman got into the best of worlds. Therefore, archaeologists find ceramic dishes, dried food, sets of cosmetics and jewelry (in female burials), weapons (in male graves) in burials - that is, everything that a person needs during life, and therefore will be needed in the afterlife. Although death has always been considered a blessing by the Peruvians, the ancient inhabitants of the Altiplano did not at all strive for it and tried their best to push back its approach. So, - this is the second name of the ancient tribe, the predecessors of the Incas and modern Peruvians - they owned such an amazing method for those times as trepanation skulls. Moreover, the hole was jewelry "closed up" with gold foil. Entire fragments of such operations are depicted on the ceramic vessels and stones of Ica, even surgical instruments are clearly visible in the drawings.

According to modern pathologists, people with trepanation of the skull lived after the operation for many more years.

The Mochica have left us brilliant examples of pottery adorned with bright, intricate designs and lifelike depictions of humans and animals.

Presumably, the culture is a descendant of the Paracas culture.

Ica stones

The Paracas Peninsula is a place fraught with many mysteries and attracting the attention of researchers from all over the world. Scientists cannot agree on the mysterious "Ica stones", which are found everywhere on the territory of the Peruvian reserve. On the stones, the sizes of which vary from a walnut to a large watermelon, drawings were made by ancient masters depicting quite real and fantastic scenes. Many of the images are about human-dinosaur interactions; on some you can see strange aircraft; many stones are engraved with exceptionally accurate images of animals not native to South America, such as Australian kangaroos. There are stones on which the internal human organs, the human heart and brain are depicted in detail, as well as plots that some experts interpret as organ transplants. Thus, this is nothing more than a clear confirmation of the presence of highly developed medicine in the Paracas culture.

A rich collection of stones was collected by Dr. Javier Cabrera (Spanish Javier Cabrera; 1924-2001), who was a direct descendant of the Spanish conquistador, Don Jeronimo Luis de Cabrera y Toleda (cas. Jeronimo Luis de Cabrera y Toledo; 1528-1574), in 1563 who founded the city of Ica. Javier Cabrera, a professor of medicine, founded a private Stone Museum in Ica, which contains more than 12 thousand exhibits.

Spectral analysis showed that these stones belong to the Mesozoic era, that is, their age is estimated at 230 million years.

According to Dr. Cabrera, the Ica stones were engraved by some unusual "heavenly race" of humanoids that lived in the era of dinosaurs. The stones depict 2 races of people: "alien" and "savages", radically different from each other. If the "Heavenly People" look like modern man, only with a very large head and a sharp nose, then the race of "savages" is depicted in the same way as we imagine the ancient people.

The collection of mysterious stones now has more than 50 thousand copies distributed throughout the world.

Cabrera believed that the "heavenly race" was able to grow their own kind, that is, clone people. She was immortal until a global catastrophe happened, wiping out all life from the face of the earth.

The main mystery of Paracas culture

In the vast territory of the necropolis, located on the peninsula, in 1949, archaeologists discovered bottle-shaped graves dug in the sand, each of which contained sun-dried mummies with elongated skulls wrapped in dense cloth, known as the “Skulls from Paracas”. For example, a dead man with a golden mask on his face, wrapped in expensive patterned fabrics, probably belonged to the elite during his lifetime. People simply divided one "bottle" into four - seven. Tello's find, which amazed the world, consists of more than 300 elongated skulls.

Since then, the world community of scientists has been trying to unravel the mystery of the "eggheads". There was a lot of controversy about this find. A lot of versions and hypotheses were put forward.

The most common version is this: the Paracas people were able not only to operate on the skulls, they deformed the heads, giving them an elongated shape. What was the purpose of such strange manipulations with people? It took years to deform the skull, they began to do it to babies, and it is unlikely that the painful procedure gave the kids pleasure. Since the area of ​​\u200b\u200bthe upper part of the skull, which is “responsible” for logic and abilities for exact sciences, most often increased, the Peruvian anthropologist Dr. Renato Davila Riquelmi(Spanish Renato Davila Riquelme) believes that in this way the people of Paracas and Nazca nurtured "egg-headed" geniuses. It is quite possible that they are the same ones that the mysterious, incomprehensible to this day giant “Nasca drawings” have left us.

Riquelmi reconstructed with his own hands the appearance of the ancient Peruvian "long-headed" princess he had found. The anthropologist suggested that the young princess was sacrificed - this version is confirmed by a mark on the skull from a stone strike. Before the fatal blow, the girl was probably given coca leaves or a San-Pedro cactus to chew on. Under the influence of drugs, she did not feel pain, as evidenced by the serene expression that kept the pretty face of the princess. All adorned with gold, surrounded by luxury items, she went on her last journey with great honors, which indicate that her killers tried to appease the spirit of the volcano, near which the burial is located. Presumably, during the life of the princess, the volcano spewed deadly fire-breathing lava, so people had to sacrifice the best of the tribe to him. The brain volume of the princess turned out to be 3 times (!) More than that of an ordinary person.

Finally, to resolve disputes and establish the truth, geneticists at the University of Texas (USA) decided to conduct a DNA analysis of the mysterious skulls. Mr. Juan Navarro (Spanish: Juan Navarro Hierro), owner and director of the Historical Museum of Paracas, which houses a collection of 35 elongated skulls, allowed samples from 3 skulls to be taken for genetic examination, which included hair, teeth, cranial bone and skin. As a result of an in-depth study, it was revealed that the owners of these remains did not belong to any of the species that live on Earth.

As you know, most cases of elongation of the skull are the result of its artificial deformation, which is achieved by tying the baby's head between 2 wooden splints or pulling it together with a dense cloth. However, as a result of the deformation of the skull, only its shape changes, while the weight, volume and other characteristics remain unchanged.

The same cannot be said about the “Paracas skulls”: the elongated skulls are 25% larger and 60% heavier than ordinary human skulls, i.e. they could not be artificially deformed. They also contain only one parietal plate instead of 2. American biologist Brien Foerster, a specialist in the ancient people of South America with elongated heads and the author of 8 books, commented on the results of genetic analysis of DNA: “We are talking about mutated mitochondrial DNA that is absent in humans and animals known today ... Perhaps we are dealing with a new creature, very far from "homo sapiens" and the Neanderthal."

Thus, the mystery of elongated skulls remains unsolved for mankind. But the conclusion of the scientists who analyzed the DNA of the Paracas Skull is unequivocal: they are NOT HUMANS.

Curious facts

• The family and social behavior of the Southern sea lion is curious. Mature males, having won a section of the coast in intense battles with rivals, begin to form their own harems. The strongest "grab" the most prestigious places in the center of the rookery, and the number of their harem reaches 18-20 females. An “average static” male is usually content with 3 females.
• For many centuries, South American fur seals have served as an object of mass fishing. By the beginning of the 1940s, the number of these animals in Peru had fallen to 40 individuals. Only the strictest ban on trapping of mammals helped restore the endangered species. Now about 20 thousand fur seals live in the country.
• During excavations on the peninsula, the remains of a giant fossil penguin 1.5 m tall, who lived here about 36 million years ago, were discovered, which archaeologists called the “Lord of the Waters”.
• There are several hotels on the territory of the Paracas National Reserve, but in the high season they are quite expensive, since these places are now very popular with tourists.
• Relatively recently, dolphins in Peru were the objects of hunting. Today, their catch is prohibited, but the animals often die, falling into fishing nets or ship propellers. Also, the number of animals is declining due to pollution of the ocean waters.
• There is an opinion that the Paracas Candelabra is the work of European pirates, who thus encrypted the hiding place of the stolen treasures. According to one of the legends, the geoglyph was created by order of the commander José de San Martin (Spanish: Jose Francisco de San Martín; 1778-1850), a national hero who led the first government of Peru. In this case, the image is usually interpreted as a symbol of Freemasonry.
• In a small museum on the island of the Sun of the Alpine mountains, drawings are exhibited that demonstrate the technology of deforming the skull in children. It took years, and it is unlikely that the painful procedure gave the kids pleasure. But then the “eggheads” may have succeeded in what we now attribute to space aliens.
• Among the exhibits are samples of the Mochica culture, exhibited in a private archaeological Museum of Larco Herrera(Spanish: Museo Arqueologico Rafael Larco Herrera) in Lima, there are those where sex scenes are depicted in great detail, the characters in which are ... skeletons. This means that the Mochica believed that in the "better world" there cannot be the best of earthly pleasures.
• Many Ica stones depict plots of transplantation of the heart, brain, and other organs, i.e. surgical operations, which in the 60s. of the last century (the beginning of the collection collection) world physicians have not yet done.
• Why did the "heavenly people" descend on their aircraft exactly here, on the lifeless desert coast of the Pacific Ocean? “Because the land here,” Dr. Cabrera is sure, “has a special magnetism.”
• Egyptian pharaohs had similar elongated skulls - representatives of the first ruling dynasties, which include the maximum flowering of Egyptian civilization, the construction of the largest pyramids and the famous Sphinx.

Aztecs, Mayans, Incas. Great Kingdoms of Ancient America Hagen Victor von

Pre-Inca cultures: Chavin - Mochica - Paracas - Nazca - Tiahuanaco - Chimu (Chimor)

Everything or almost everything in Peru undoubtedly predates the Incas. Archaeologists have been peeling back layers of Peru's ancient history one by one until their shovels landed on a barren cultural layer, and they know that the story that the archeology of Peru tells us is that for thousands of years, cultures succeeded one another, and many of these cultures withered, before the Incas came, they came to seize the whole of this region and form an empire from their possessions received as a result of conquest campaigns.

The fact that we have almost no history of many of these pre-Inca cultures, except for what archeology reveals to us, we owe mainly to the Incas themselves, since during their campaigns of conquest they destroyed other cultures by their "selective juggling of stored history ".

After all, the Incas organized in a certain way not only the lands and people, but also human memory itself, and the theme of the Incas, “carrying civilization”, thus became predominant. The thesis of the Incas was that before their appearance, all of South America was, in the sense of culture, a desert. This official history was imposed on all conquered tribes. The memory of peoples and cultures that existed in the past was systematically purged and "some editing, and selective distortion, which was somewhat like the tendentious distortion that the Spaniards themselves, in turn, subjected to it [the history of the Incas]." An "official" history of the Incas was created, which supplanted the local oral traditions of the tribes they conquered, which were forgotten. The official "keepers of memory", the historians of the Incas, no longer had to bridge the gap between the man of legend and those numerous pre-Inca cultures, in order for this "selective manipulation of history", which was supposed to present the Incas as the only bearers of culture, to become the history of "pre-cultural" Peru. All other stories of the pre-Inca period were consigned to oblivion.

What were the civilizations that now have no names (and barely retain any legends) that preceded the Incas? Who were these peoples who were the first to win in life, forced nature, this demanding mistress, to grow plants where nothing had grown before? Who were those who channeled water into the waterless land and bred from the wild fauna the domestic animals needed for the new flourishing human societies in America? Limited space does not allow us (and this is not the purpose of this book) to describe in detail all these cultures that preceded the Incas; that would make a book in itself. To say everything is to say nothing; to show everything is to show nothing. The main thing is to shed light on what is relevant, and the archaeological excursus, of course limited, will show (without difficulty, I believe) what has already been said: that in the two thousand years before the Incas there was a steady cultural growth in Peru.

As for the exact time, in Peru, in this respect, no one can be absolutely sure of anything. There was no written literature or history here, except for a long list of "remembered" historical events that had been passed down through the ages. There were no dated coins, as was the case, for example, with the Romans, which depicted a portrait of the next emperor and the date was minted; the Incas had no money. There are only dates starting from 1527 that we know absolutely for sure.

And yet, with meticulous perseverance, archaeologists have succeeded in unraveling the spatio-temporal periods of these pre-Inca cultures. Archaeological stratigraphy has removed layers of history one by one. The designs on pottery, which are one of the best aids to temporal analysis, have been carefully studied, and archaeologists have compiled for themselves a table of such "tiered styles"; the excavation and reconstruction of material cultures, the re-examination of Inca oral tradition in this new light, has provided a clear succession of cultural epochs. The conclusions drawn from them are, obviously, only the bare contours of history, which are waiting in the wings to acquire more detailed facts. And yet from all this the late Dr. Wendell Bennett (considered among his colleagues the best authority on the subject) deduced six periods in the archaeological history of South America, supposed, of course.

The curtain rises (about 1200 B.C.) and Period I begins. Man has long been in the north of the coastal desert of Peru. From 1500 B.C. e. he was familiar with pottery and weaving. He builds buildings. He already grows corn (using, no doubt, bird guano as a fertilizer) and the cassava tuber plant. But here this man was not the first; there were others long before him, for what remains of their weaving and agriculture has been radiocarbon dated from as early as 3000 BC. e.

Rice. 116. The leitmotif of the Chavin culture (1200-400 BC) is the god Cat

Rice. 117. Nazca ceramics. Fine workmanship, it is characterized by the use of abstract decor. Her motif: the cat god holding severed heads

The first known culture belonging to the I period is the culture Chavin. Its leitmotif is the ferocious-looking cat god, found on ceramics, fabrics and stone products. This motif was destined to haunt the ancient Peruvians in their ideas about the world for the next thousand years. The center of the Chavín culture (apparently it was a place of pilgrimage even in the late Inca period) is a place called Chavin de Huantar, located in a narrow valley in the Andes beyond the Cordillera Blanca. Here are the remains of impressive buildings, which are characterized by well-built stone walls, decorated with human and animal heads carved from stone.

Rice. 118 (left). The Paracas culture (400 BC - 400 AD) is easily recognizable by its excellent weavings. The figure shows a man in full dress, from a necropolis on the Paracas Peninsula.

Rice. 119 (bottom). Pottery of the Mochica culture that existed on the coast, 400–800: 1 - historical proof of successful leg amputation is presented in the form of realistic depictions of warriors undergoing this operation. From Mochica pottery, 400–800; 2 – ceramics of this period is so realistic that it can be considered a portrait; 3 - a person riding a lama. From Mochica pottery, around 800. A llama is controlled by a foot amputee with a rope passed through the animal's ear.

II period, which, as established, lasted from 400 BC. e. to 400 AD BC, called (if you use the imagination) "Experimenter" - because of the experiments that supposedly took place in weaving and pottery in many widely separated cultures.

paracas, which was located below Central Peru - south of Lima, near Pisco, is a pre-Inca culture of the II period. He is famous for his fabrics, which are considered the most beautiful ever woven. This culture is shrouded in mystery. We do not know the name of the tribe that created it, nor anything more certain about it than evidence found in caves in the hot desert and near the sea on the Paracas Peninsula. More than four hundred mummies were found in deep underground rooms. The bent bodies were wrapped in beautifully woven shawls, turbans and robes, covered with the most exquisite multicolored embroidery. Little is known about these people other than these remains. The people of the Paracas culture (people of the preceding culture, that is, five hundred or a thousand years before the Paracas culture also left their burials in this region) used the natural sands of the desert for mummification. The culture of Paracas does not appear in any annals preserved in memory and is not mentioned by the Incas.

By the beginning of the III period, between 400 and 1000 AD. e., man finally became the master in his own land: in the coastal desert and in the Andes. He got smarter and built cities. This is a period of high craftsmanship in architecture, ceramics and weaving. An empire of the people rises on the coast mochika, divided into clans (we have no idea how they called themselves). They dominate the northern part of the Peruvian desert, and the remains of their temples can still be seen, one of which is called Huaca del Sol in the Moche Valley, built from about 130,000,000 sun-dried bricks. Naturally, this suggests a complex social organization that brought to the end the construction of such a striking structure. The level of development of the Moche society is emphasized by their skill in gold casting and wood carving. It is believed that their weaving was commercialized, as one of the vases of the Mochica culture depicts a man, apparently a chief, who sits under a frilled canopy and leads the rows of women diligently working on their looms. The Moche people had warriors, messengers, weavers and "doctors"; they built roads and created a courier service, and also improved many of the social models that later appeared in the state of the Incas.

In the verdant Nazca valley south of Paracas, which wedged into the barren desert landscape, there is another forgotten culture, forgotten to history because its own history was purposefully destroyed by the Incas, that is the culture Ica-Nasca.. The region is somewhat less of a mystery nowadays as archaeologists work here. Fine examples of weaving and magnificent ceramics have been found here, which do not differ much in their design from the finds in Paracas. However, the architecture here is not the main distinguishing feature, and there is little left to tell us how people lived here. Like others, the creators of this culture are anonymous. The greatest mystery of the cultures of Ica-Nasca is the vast network of lines, a fantastic collection of rectangles and squares that have been "drawn" in the sand and gravel. There are also huge birds, spiders, whales and fantastic figures. These lines - some of them several kilometers long - are well preserved, showing that this land, as it was, and remains a desert, where eternal drought reigns. These lines are approximately one thousand five hundred years old. They could be somehow connected with calendar observations or play the role of symbolic genealogical "trees". At least now, one date is beyond doubt: an American archaeologist at the end of one of these lines discovered a wooden "viewing" stand, and radiocarbon analysis determined that its age is estimated at about 500 years.

Rice. 120. Mysterious lines and figures in the Nazca valleys. They first appear in the Pisco Valley and are concentrated mainly in the five Nazca valleys. This drawing, taken from an aerial photograph, shows us several straight lines, as well as figures both real and fantastic. The bold line represents the ancient Inca road built around 1400; dotted lines represent the modern Pan-American Highway. Drawn by Pablo Carrera (based on notes and photographs by the author of the book)

It is known that at some point around the year 900, the mountain people from Tiahuanaco empire made a military-religious invasion on the coast, rapidly descending from his citadel near Lake Titicaca. These people were interested in astrology, they had a solar calendar and also a sundial. It is highly probable that the Tiahuanaco culture brought the "line" method to the Nazca before their cult of the Weeping God emerged.

Whatever the origin of all this, the Incas did not give any information that could reach us. They treated the Nazca "lines" with contempt; practical Inca engineers built their 7.3 m wide road along the coast right along these lines.

The Tiahuanaco Empire is the main civilization of the fourth period (1000–1300) in Peru and Bolivia. Like all other pre-Inca cultures, it has left us only inexplicable mysteries. The remains of what was probably the greatest ceremonial center in the Andes can still be seen on the Bolivian plateau near Lake Titicaca, lying at an altitude of 3812 meters above sea level. Dr. Wendell Bennett considered "Tiahuanaco to be the most complex and complete expression of culture discovered to date."

The stone structures of the Tiahuanaco culture were created many centuries before the Incas and before their arrival were the best in the Andes. The stones are fitted to each other with the help of inserts and spikes; large stones are fastened with copper staples. All these architectural stone structures suggest a social organization, a strong central authority that could divert human resources to such large-scale non-food production tasks. All this had to be done by a large number of workers with solid technical skills.

Rice. 121. A man getting hit on the head. Redrawn from a Mochica vase dated to around 800. Such blows broke through heads; such injuries were often healed with craniotomy

Rice. 122. Weeping god Tiahuanaco. Large vase found at Nazca dates back to the period of occupation by the Tiahuanaco Empire (1000-1300)

And yet, nothing is known for sure about these people or their empire. This people, like others, has no name.

The fact that this great culture, the Tiahuanaco culture, has no oral history indicates, more than any other data, the success of the Incas (who at some stage of their development were, no doubt, their contemporaries), purposefully trying to erase any memory of the people of this culture. After all, when Pedro de Ciesa de Leon in 1549 began to make inquiries about the people who built Tiahuanaco, which turned into ruins, even the oldest Indians could not remember anything and answered these questions that it was built long before the start of the Incas, but they did not could tell who the builders were.

And yet the cultural impact of Tiahuanaco has penetrated many remote corners of Peru. Many contemporary cultures, and even the ancient Incas, adopted the symbol of the sun god from the Tiahuanaco culture. This Weeping God wept with a wide variety of tears, zoomorphic tears - in the form of the heads of a condor or a snake. These and other motifs, such as puma, trident and stepped designs, are widespread along most of the coast, which is more than one and a half thousand kilometers long. But this conquest, motivated by religious zeal, was not permanent, since the people of Tiahuanaco left no significant mark on society - only these designs on ceramics and fabrics, which cannot be confused with anything, and the cult of the Weeping God.

Chimu Empire(1000-1466), which was also called the kingdom of Chimor, also belongs to this period, despite the fact that it goes beyond it and falls into the Inca period.

The Chimu lived on the coast; they sculpted from clay and worshiped the moon. Their capital city of Chan Chan (located near what is now the Peruvian city of Trujillo, founded by the Spaniards) had an area of ​​​​about 20 (18. - Ed.) km 2. It was full of huge stepped pyramids, row houses, large walled residences, irrigated gardens, and colossal stone-lined reservoirs.

Rice. 123. The Chimu culture, centered on the Viru and Chicama valleys, existed between 1000 and 1466. Chimu were skillfully sculpted from clay, and the walls of their capital, Chan Chan, were covered with designs such as these. Redrawn from photographs taken by the author of the book

From Chan Chan, the Chimu ruled over a stretch of about 1,000 km along the coast from Rimac (now Lima) to the equatorial rainforests of Ecuador. Indirectly, Chimor ruled over a much larger area. Everything was put on a grand scale with them: weaving was put on stream; ceramics, mainly black utensils, were made using matrices; mass production of whistling jugs and pots was launched. Their weavers made excellent tunics from feathers, and the production of gold products was also massive, because the amount of gold that was given to their Inca conquerors was staggering, and even what the Spaniards found much later (which was just a trifle) was worth millions (with our money). The Chimu improved the roads inherited from their Mochica predecessors; they further developed the courier system and pushed the boundaries of their political alliances, which went beyond the coastal desert and deep into the Andes in order to protect the water supply of Chimor.

The Chimu (Chimor) Empire was the last of the major cultures to resist the Incas. We know a lot about the Chimu culture only due to the fact that before the Inca methods of “historical selectivity” had time to work in full force, aimed at erasing the memory of the Chimu people and everything connected with them, the Spaniards appeared.

The list of these pre-Inca cultures will seem - and indeed it is - shortened; there are many others, but only those that have had the greatest influence on the development of the culture of Peru have been named here. This was done to show how stable the development of Peru had been for three thousand years before the invasion of the Incas.

Rice. 124. Indians from the coast carry a child in a palanquin. Redrawn from a Mochica vase, around 800

Many of these civilizations were of the highest level of development, and the Incas took a lot from them to form the material culture of their own empire. In a sense - and this analogy is often drawn - the Incas were here something like the Romans, becoming the heirs of a large "tangle of cultures", which, in the process of "weaving", turned into an intricate tapestry of human achievements.

Thus archeology is in direct opposition to the form of history that the Incas told about themselves: that all the peoples of the Andes and the coast were savages until the Incas appeared on the scene.

The story that archeology does reveal (if you have the patience to first locate and then look through the endless number of articles, monographs and books on this fascinating subject) is this: before the Incas there was a long succession of cultures that succeeded one another, and the Incas arrived late and became organizers rather than creators of Peruvian civilization.

However, as this book will show, they were peerless organizers.