The Paracas Peninsula, located 200 km south of Lima, divides the coast of Peru into two approximately equal parts. Paracas culture was opened unexpectedly. This discovery was made precisely on this desert peninsula.

In 1925, an expedition led by Julio Cesar Tello began working here. Tello’s attention was drawn to the “cavernas” - mysterious ones that were visited from time to time local residents. Having begun to study the “cavernas,” Tello was shocked: it was not a chain of natural grottoes, as originally thought, but a whole system of underground chambers carved into the coastal rock at a depth of about eight meters. Each of the chambers was connected to the surface by a narrow exit. And in each such cell, dozens of people of both sexes and all ages lay in neat rows, wrapped in bright fabrics. The preservation of the fabrics was simply incredible - not only did they not decay, but they retained both the texture and the brightness of the colors.

What kind of people buried their dead on this desert peninsula? After Tello's death, this culture received the name Paracas culture. Today, the monuments of the Paracas culture are known in several versions. Some of them are found not on the coast, but in the mountain valleys of Central and Southern Peru. Numerous evidence proves that the Paracas culture developed directly from the Chavín de Huantara civilization, and this is especially clear from finds dating back to the most ancient period Paracas culture. The only difference was that here, on the southern coast of Peru, they lived more simply and did not build monumental temples.

A burial ground of another type of Paracas culture, discovered by Tello on the Paracas Peninsula, was called "Necropolis". It approximately dates back to the 3rd–4th centuries. BC. The mummies (their number exceeds 400) were in underground tombs made of stone and unbaked bricks. Above each tomb there was a courtyard with a fireplace, where bodies may have been mummified before burial.

In each of the tombs, archaeologists found a lot of various objects - in some cases their number reaches one and a half hundred. These are clothes, jewelry, weapons, stone axes, vessels, tools, jewelry, hats, capes made of llama wool and much more. Many mummies retained gold jewelry - they were inserted into the ears, nostrils, mouth, wrapped around the neck or lay on the chest.

The fabrics of the Paracas culture are striking not only in their size and exquisite combinations of colors, but also in the fact that after one and a half thousand years they have not lost either their elasticity or the brightness of their colors. It seems that these fabrics have only recently left the hands of the weavers. They are woven from wool of five or six colors and painted with magnificent multi-colored patterns - stylized images of birds, animals, fish, anthropomorphic figures and outlandish monsters, as well as geometric patterns. The dyers of the Paracas culture were able to produce remarkable colors - especially blue, green, yellow and brown.

However, the mummies of the Paracas culture found by Tello deserve no less attention than the fabrics. When examining them, it was discovered that the vast majority of them had artificially deformed skulls, and many skulls bore traces of trepanation performed during their lifetime. Research has led to the conclusion that trepanned skulls are the result of a surgical intervention, apparently performed for some ritual and magical purposes. The holes in the skulls made during these religious rites were closed by Indian surgeons with gold plates.

The mummies of the Paracas culture gave scientists another riddle: where did they even come from? The fact is that in the vicinity of the Paracas Peninsula there are no traces of human settlements, and experts still do not know exactly where the dead were brought here from. Perhaps the Paracas necropolises were something like a “pantheon” - people who occupied the upper steps of the hierarchical ladder - priests and representatives of the clan nobility - were buried here?

It is believed that the Paracas culture became the main transmission link of civilizational impulses from to later cultures of the lake basin - for example. Here, however, a problem arises: it turns out that the coastal Paracas culture lacks some features that are characteristic of both the Chavin and Tiwanaku. But how could this happen if we assume that it was the Paracas culture that served as a transmission link for them?

Paracas National Reserve is located 261 km south of Lima, 75 km from Ica and 22 km from the city of Pisco. This coastal ecological system, spread over an area of ​​335 thousand hectares, consists of deserts, beaches, islands, coastal cliffs and is washed by waters Pacific Ocean.

Paracas was the center of pre-Inca culture, famous for its textiles, products of local artisans, and the experience of healers in the field of medicine.

Some of the oldest human remains were found in the Paracas Nature Reserve (6500 BC). Deserves special attention ancient flute, which is considered the first musical instrument from Peru.

A trip on a large boat to the Ballestas Islands, where fur seals and lions, penguins, pelicans and other representatives of the Pacific Ocean live, will take about three hours and will not leave even the most experienced tourist indifferent. Please note that excursions usually start before 11:00, then the water surface becomes hazy and excursions are not conducted.

The trip itself is very pleasant and educational, especially for animal and bird lovers. Huge colonies of gannets and cormorants nest on the islands. Their droppings - "guano" - have been used to fertilize the soil since ancient times.

During this trip, from the sea side you will be able to see the famous mystical drawing a giant trident or, as it is also called, a “candelabra” on a sand dune, and during sunset - admire the pink flamingos in Paracas Bay. Don't forget that it is very easy to get sunburned during this excursion, so be sure to wear sunscreen and a hat.

Curious tourists are attracted by the ruins of the ancient Cantayoc aqueduct, 5 km east of Nazca. Curious excavations ancient cemetery Cahuachi, 17 km north of Nazca and, of course, the ruins of the Inca settlement of Tambo Colorado in the valley around the city of Pisco.

In addition, in the city of Ica it is good to catch a noisy celebration where wine flows like a river, traditional for local wineries. You should definitely try the national drink Pisco, a strong alcoholic drink made from Peruvian grapes. Among the local dishes, you must try Sopa seca, a soup with vermicelli, beef and poultry, Carapulcra, sun-dried potatoes mixed with pork, pepper, achiote (a spice that gives the red color) and ground mani nuts, Guiso de pallares verdes, green beans stewed in a spicy sauce, and Tejas, locally produced sweets filled with nuts, boiled condensed milk, prunes, bananas, strawberries, chirimoya.

You can take a break from the bustle of the city in Huacachina, an oasis 5 kilometers from the city of Ica.

How to get there

The easiest way to fly to the city of Ica is from Lima, which takes 1 hour. Accessible via the Pan American Highway from Lima in 3 hours; from Ica - 4 hours; from Nazca - 6 hours.

Aztecs, Mayans, Incas. Great kingdoms 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 removed layers one by one ancient history Peru, until their shovels stopped on a barren cultural layer, and they know that the story that the archeology of Peru tells us is this: for thousands of years, cultures succeeded one another, and many of these cultures withered away before the Incas came - came to capture this entire region and form an empire from their possessions obtained as a result of aggressive 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 with their “selective manipulation of stored history "

After all, the Incas organized in a certain way not only the lands and people, but also the human memory, and the theme of the Incas “bringing civilization” thus became predominant. The Inca thesis was that before their appearance, all of South America was a cultural desert. This official history imposed on all conquered tribes. The memory of past peoples and cultures was systematically purged and subjected to "some editing and selective distortion, somewhat resembling the tendentious distortion to which the Spaniards themselves in turn subjected it [Inca history]." 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 Inca historians, no longer needed to bridge the gap between the man of legend and those numerous pre-Inca cultures, so that this "selective manipulation of history", which was supposed to present the Incas as the only bearers of culture, became the history of "pre-cultural" Peru. All other stories of the pre-Incan period were forgotten.

What were the civilizations that now have no names (and barely preserved any traditions) that preceded the Incas? Who were these peoples who were the first to achieve victory in life and force nature, this demanding mistress, to grow plants where nothing had grown before? Who were those who channeled water into the waterless region and from the wild fauna bred domestic animals necessary for the new flourishing human societies in America? Limited space does not allow us (and it is not the purpose of this book) to describe in detail all these cultures that preceded the Incas; this would make a book in itself. To say everything is to say nothing; to show everything means not to let anything be seen. The main thing is to highlight what is relevant, and an archaeological excursion, limited of course, will show (I think without difficulty) what has already been said: that during the two thousand years before the Incas there was a steady cultural growth in Peru.

As for the exact time, in Peru no one can be absolutely sure of anything in this regard. There was no written literature or history, except for a long list of "stored in memory" historical events, which has been passed down from mouth to mouth for centuries. There were no coins with dates, as was the case, for example, with the Romans, on which the portrait of the next emperor was depicted and the date was minted; The Incas had no money. There are only dates starting from 1527 that we know with absolute certainty.

And yet, with meticulous persistence, archaeologists have succeeded in uncovering the space-time periods of these pre-Inca cultures. Archaeological stratigraphy has removed layers of history one after another. Drawings on ceramics, which are one of the best assistants in conducting temporal analysis, were carefully studied, and archaeologists compiled a table of such “tiered styles”; excavations and reconstruction of material cultures, re-study oral traditions the Incas in this new light provided a clear sequence cultural eras. The conclusions drawn on their basis 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 specialist in this field) deduced six periods, of course, hypothetical, in the archaeological history of South America.

The curtain rises (around 1200 BC) and the First Period begins. The man is already for a long time was located in the northern coastal desert of Peru. From 1500 BC. e. he knew pottery and weaving. He builds buildings. He already grows corn (using, no doubt, bird guano as fertilizer) and the tuber plant cassava. But here this man was not the first; there were others long before him, since what remains of their weaving and farming, as shown radiocarbon dating, dates back to 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 decoration. Her motif: the cat god holding severed heads

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

Rice. 118 (left). The Paracas culture (400 BC – 400 AD) is easily recognized by its excellent weaving products. The drawing shows a man in full robes, from the necropolis on the Paracas Peninsula

Rice. 119 (bottom). Ceramics from the Mochica culture on the coast, 400–800: 1 - historical evidence of successful leg amputation is presented in the form of realistic images of warriors who underwent this operation. From Mochica pottery, 400–800; 2 – the ceramics of this period are so realistic that they can be considered portraits; 3 - a man riding a llama. From Mochica ceramics, around 800. The llama is controlled by a foot amputee using a rope threaded through the animal's ear.

II period, which is established to last from 400 BC. e. to 400 AD e., is called (if you use your imagination) “Experimenter” - because of the experiments that supposedly took place in weaving and pottery in many cultures located far from each other.

Paracas, which was located below Central Peru - south of Lima, near Pisco, is a pre-Inca culture of the II period. It is famous for its 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 definite about it than the 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 superbly woven shawls, turbans and robes covered with the most exquisite multi-colored embroidery. Little is known about these people beyond these remains. The people of the Paracas culture (people of the previous culture, that is, five hundred or a thousand years before the Paracas culture also left their burials in this region) used natural desert sands for mummification. The Paracas culture does not appear in any surviving annals and is not mentioned by the Incas.

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

In the verdant Nazca Valley south of Paracas, which wedges itself into the barren desert landscape, there is another forgotten culture, lost to history because its own story was purposefully destroyed by the Incas - this is a culture Ica Nazca.. This region is somewhat less of a mystery now that archaeologists are working here. Fine examples of weaving and magnificent pottery were found here, which are not so different in design from the finds in Paracas. However, architecture is not the main thing here. distinctive feature, and little remains to tell us how people lived here. Like others, the creators of this culture are anonymous. The greatest mystery of the Ica-Nazca cultures is the vast network of lines, a fantastic accumulation of rectangles and squares that were “drawn” in the sand and gravel. Huge birds, spiders, whales and fantastic figures are also presented here. These lines - some of them several kilometers long - are well preserved, showing that this land 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 one date is now certain: an American archaeologist discovered a wooden “lookout” post at the end of one of these lines, and radiocarbon dating determined its age to be approximately 500 years old.

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 thick line represents the ancient Inca road, built around 1400; the 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 900 the mountain people from Tiahuanaco Empire made a military-religious invasion on the coast, quickly descending from his citadel near Lake Titicaca. These people were interested in astrology, they had a solar calendar, and also sundial. It is very likely that the Tiahuanaco culture brought the "line" method with them to Nazca - before the advent of their cult of the Weeping God.

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 laid out their 7.3 m wide road along the coast right along these lines.

The Tiwanaku Empire is the major civilization of the fourth period (1000–1300) in Peru and Bolivia. Like all other pre-Inca cultures, it 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 m above sea level. Dr. Wendell Bennett considered "Tiahuanaco to be the most complex and complete expression of culture hitherto discovered."

The stone structures of the Tiahuanaco culture were created many centuries before the Incas and before their arrival they were the best in the Andes. The stones are adjusted to each other using inserts and tenons; stones large sizes fastened with copper staples. All these architectural stone structures suggest the presence of a social organization, a strong central authority, which could divert human resources to such large-scale tasks unrelated to food production. All this had to be done big amount workers with strong technical skills.

Rice. 121. A man getting hit in the head. Redrawn from a Mochica vase dating from around 800. Similar blows broke heads; such injuries were often treated with craniotomy

Rice. 122. The Weeping God of Tiahuanaco. Large vase found at Nazca dates back to the period of occupation by the Tiwanaku Empire (1000–1300)

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

What is 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), deliberately trying to erase all memory of the people of this culture . After all, when Pedro de Cieza de Leon in 1549 began to make inquiries about the people who built Tiahuanaco, which had turned into ruins, even the oldest Indians could not remember anything and answered these questions that it was built long before the reign of the Incas, but they did not could tell who its builders were.

Yet the cultural influence of Tiahuanaco reached 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 cried 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 step patterns, are widespread along much of the coastline, which extends over one and a half thousand kilometers. But this conquest, motivated by religious zeal, was not permanent, since the people of Tiahuanaco did not leave behind a significant mark on society - only these drawings on ceramics and fabrics, which cannot be confused with anything else, 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 with clay and worshiped the moon. Their capital, the 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 step pyramids, row houses, large walled residences, irrigated gardens and gigantic stone-lined reservoirs.

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

From Chan Chan, the Chimu ruled over an area of ​​approximately 1,000 km along the coast from Rimac (present-day Lima) to the equatorial rainforests of Ecuador. Indirectly, Chimor controlled much larger territory. Everything was put on a grand scale for them: weaving was put on stream; pottery, mainly black ware, was made using dies; mass production of whistling jugs and pots was established. 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 they inherited from their Mochica predecessors; They further developed the courier system and expanded the boundaries of their political alliances, which went beyond the coastal desert and went deep into the Andes in order to protect the water supply of Chimora.

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 methods of “historical selectivity” of the Incas, aimed at erasing from the memory of the Chimu people and everything connected with them, the Spaniards appeared in full force.

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 Peruvian culture have been named here. This was done to show how steadily Peru developed over the three thousand years before the Inca invasion.

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

Many of these civilizations had the highest level of development, and the Incas took a lot from them to form material culture his own empire. In a sense - and this analogy is often made - the Incas were something like the Romans here, 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 coasts were savages until the Incas appeared on the scene.

The story that archeology does reveal (if one has the patience to first locate and then sift through the endless number of articles, monographs and books on this fascinating subject) is this: before the Incas there was a long line of successive cultures, and the Incas came late and became organizers rather than creators of Peruvian civilization.

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