Dozens of Inca Mummies Found on Outskirts of Lima

[Lionel]

Dozens of mummies dating back more than 500 years have been discovered on the path of a proposed highway on the outskirts of the Peruvian capital, near an Inca graveyard, archeologists said on Friday. Archeologists uncovered 26 burial bundles, each containing one or more adult and child mummies dating from 1472 to 1532. In 1533, the Incas were defeated at the hands of the Spanish conquistadors. "This (area) is part of the largest Inca cemetery in Peru and the largest excavated cemetery in the Western Hemisphere, that of Puruchuco-Huaquerones," said archeologist Guillermo c***, who was contracted by Lima's town hall to comb the area for artifacts before construction could begin. c*** said archeologists did not know the exact number of mummies at the site because they had not opened any of the bundles, which are still half-buried. Some were already broken, exposing skulls and showing several hunched mummies with cloth bags tied to their bodies and offerings in their hands.

The mummies were once farmers and craftsmen and lived under the dominion of the Lati and Ishma Inca leaders, who ruled over the Rimac River valley, home to modern-day Lima, c*** said. "These are local inhabitants, what we could now call middle class, belonging to the period of the Inca Empire, between 1472 and 1532," c*** told Reuters.

View: Full Article | Source: Reuters