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Saving Machu PicchuExplore more photos from the story |
When Hiram Bingham, a young Yale professor, discovered Machu Picchu in 1911, he found a site overrun with vegetation. At an altitude of nearly 8,000 feet, the ruins, which sat above the cloud line in Peru's Andes Mountains, had remained relatively undisturbed for more than 300 years. Media in the United States declared it one of South America's most important and well-preserved sites.
Now nearly 2,500 tourists visit Machu Picchu everyday. This influx of visitors has caused a dilemma: How can Peru promote the ruins as a tourist destination, while also preserving the fragile ancient city? In March, a controversial bridge opened within the Machu Picchu buffer zone, some four kilometers outside of the sanctuary, making available yet another pathway to visitors. This development has caused heightened alarm among those who find it increasingly difficult to protect the World Heritage Site.
Bingham probably never envisioned the sheer number of people visiting Machu Picchu today. After all, he came upon the site by chance. While exploring Peru on a scientific expedition, Bingham met a local tavern-keeper Melchior Arteaga who described ruins at the top of a high mountain. In July 1911, a farmer in the area led Bingham up a treacherous incline through thickly matted jungle to an ancient city.
Buried under hundreds of years of brush and grass, the settlement was a collection of beautiful stone buildings and terraced land—evidence of advanced agricultural knowledge. This site, Bingham believed, was the birthplace of the Inca society, one of the world's largest Native American civilizations.
At its height, the empire that natives called Tahuantinsuyu spanned some 2,500 miles across what is now Ecuador, Peru, Chile, Bolivia and parts of Argentina. It was a society of great warriors with both architectural and agricultural know-how, whose 300-year reign came to an end in the 1500s when Spanish conquistador Francisco Pizarro and his army invaded the area.
Machu Picchu, Bingham came to believe, was not only the birthplace of the Inca, but the last surviving city of the empire as well. He also thought that the area held a great religious significance. With evidence of a high number of female remains, Bingham postulated that the city was home to a cult of women, deemed the Virgins of the Sun, who found safe haven here, away from the Spanish conquistadors.
Bingham took several hundred pictures of Machu Picchu and published his findings in National Geographic. The explorer also shipped several thousand artifacts back to Yale for further investigation. That the university still has many of these on display has become a point of contention in recent years between Yale and the Peruvian government.
After years of analysis, scholars have put forth an explanation of Machu Picchu that differs from Bingham's interpretation. Archaeological evidence points to a more balanced ratio of female and male remains at the site, dismissing the Virgins of the Sun story. Instead, they believe the early Incan ruler Pachacútec set up Machu Picchu as one of his royal retreats. In the mid 1400s, the Inca constructed the city with intensive planning that complemented its natural settings. A couple thousand people lived there in its heyday, but they quickly evacuated the city during the Spanish invasion. Save for a couple of farmers, the city was left abandoned for hundreds of years.
Peru recognized the cultural tourist attraction it had in Machu Picchu right away after Bingham re-discovered it, but many years passed before backpackers arrived on holiday. In the 1950s and 60s, tourists could visit the site and, after being admitted by a lone guard, take a nearly private tour of the area. In 1983, UNESCO named Machu Picchu a World Heritage Site for its cultural significance in the area. In the 1990s, as Peru's guerrilla war ended, more and more visitors flocked to the area. Now some 300,000 people visit every year, arriving by foot, train, even helicopter.
Comments
eACH YEAR ABOUT 300,000 PEOPLE VISIT MACHU PICCHU WHAT PROMBLEMS DOES THIS CREATE FOR THUS ARCAEOLOGICAL SIT?
Posted by arrianna on April 18,2009 | 08:51PM