Machu Picchu:

the Wonder of the World

ntroduction
Machu Picchuis the site of an ancient Inca city,
high in the Andes ofPeru. Itis often referred to as
"The Lost City of the Incas.
The Incas built the city on a mountain ridge, 2430m
abovesea level. They lived there between 1200 and
1450 AD. Other people lived there before about 650
AD.
The Incas built houses, fields and temples by cutting
the rock on the mountain so it was flat. They built
anobservatoryto look at the stars.

When the Peru was occupied by Spanish, the

Incas left Machu Picchu. Nobody knows for sure
why they did that, but some think it was because
they were scared of the Spanish. The city was
left unfinished. The Spanish never found Machu
Picchu or the lost city during their occupation.

These remarkable ruins

were rediscovered by the
scientific world in 1911 by
the American archaeologist
Hiram Bingham.
Hiram Binghamwas an lecturer atYale University
.
In 1909, returning from the Pan-American
Scientific Congress in Santiago, he traveled
through Peru and was invited to explore the Inca
ruins at Choqquequirau.
He organized the 1911 Yale Peruvian Expedition to
search for the lost city ofVitcos, the last capital of

Bingham asked a Peruvian farmer, Melchor Arteaga, if he

knew of any ruins in the area.The next day, 24 July 1911,
Arteaga led Bingham and across the river on a primitive log
bridge and up the Huayna Picchu mountain. At the top of the
mountain they came across a small hut occupied by a couple
ofQuechua, Richarte and Alvarez, who were farming some of
the original Machu Picchu agricultural terraces that they had
cleared four years earlier. Alvarez's the 11-year-old son,
Pablito, led Bingham along the ridge to the main ruins.

Thus, Bingham reached original

Incas hidden city which they lived
in 15th century. DuringBingham's
archaeologicalstudies, he collected
various artifacts which he took
back to Yale. One prominent artifact
was a set of 15th-century,
ceremonial Incan knives made
frombismuth bronze; they are the
earliest known artifact containing
this alloy.

After that, Bingham removed many artifacts, but openly and

legally; they were deposited in the Yale University Museum.

By the time Bingham and his team left Machu

Picchu, locals began forming coalitions to defend
their ownership of Machu Picchu and its cultural
remains, while Bingham claimed the artifacts need
to be studied by experts in American institutions, an
argument that still exists today.

 Machu Picchu was declared a Peruvian Historical

Sanctuary in 1981 and aUNESCO
World Heritage Sitein 1983.

In 2007, Machu Picchu was voted one of the

New Seven Wonders of the Worldin a worldwide
Internet poll.