"A team of archaeologists in Bolivia said they have discovered tombs containing over a hundred bundles of artifacts and human remains dating more than 500 years old that belonged to an indigenous civilization that once inhabited the region." Source: Archaeology News Network.
Human remains were found in the tombs along with objects from the Inca and Aymara cultures.
"The indigenous Aymara kingdom of Pacajes flourished in the Bolivian highlands until it was conquered by the Incan empire in the mid-15th century, according to archaeologists, who believe the Pacajes people may have not been wiped out by the Incan conquest, but could have fallen victim to some type of epidemic."
"...According to some Bolivian researchers, the Tiwanaku civilization started out as a village around 1580 BC, becoming an imperial state by 724 AD and finally falling around 1187."
Note: The Tiwanaku empire apparently collapsed very suddenly, perhaps as the result of drought. According to Wikipedia, however, it seems more likely that their "explosive collapse" was caused by some kind of violent social upheaval:
"Some areas of the capital show signs of intentional destruction, though this could have taken place at any time. Monolithic gates, like Gateway of the Sun, were tipped over and broken. By the end of Tiwanaku V period the Putuni complex [1] was burned and food storage jars smashed. This indicates an event of destruction, followed by abandonment of the site. Colonies in Moquegua and on Isla del Sol were also abandoned around this time."
Just to put things into perspective, I should point out that the relatively obscure Tiwanaku empire lasted for at least 463 years. In other words, by the time it collapsed it was over a hundred years older than the United States is right now.
Gateway of the Sun, Tiwanaku.
[1] "The public - religious space of this city is shaped by a series of architectural structures that correspond to different periods of cultural accessions: Temple Semi-underground, Kalasasaya's Temple, Akapana's Pyramid, Pumapumku's Pyramid. In addition, the area politician - administrative officer is represented by structures as the Palace of Putuni and Kantatallita. This architectural complex reflects the complex political structure of the period and its strong religious nature." Source: UNESCO.
"Machu Picchu is a city comprised of more than 200 buildings, temples, houses, pathways, fountains and altars all cut from grey granite from the mountain top. There is no evidence of any fortified walls, which means that it was not a fortress. Many of the stone blocks weigh more than 50 tons, and all are cut and fitted together in such a precise manner that it raises incredulity as to how [its builders could have] created such a monumental place." Source: Ancient Origins (2013).
Notes: A few years ago "[a] Polish-Peruvian archaeological team ... confirmed what has been suspected for many centuries – the Incas used the ancient city of Machu Picchu as a mountaintop observatory." (Ancient Origins (2014)) How the Incas constructed the city is apparently still a mystery:
According to Rediscover Machu Picchu, "[t]he Incas used dry stone technique to build the city. No mortar was used, the stone bricks were simply put together without any material to stick them together." The rocks were then "put together like a huge puzzle." This would've required an amazing amount of precision since "[s]ome of the bricks are so tightly put together that one cannot even put a knife between them."
The rocks were apparently split "with the so-called wooden wedge technique: holes were drilled into the rocks and wet wooden wedges were inserted into them. After that the constructors waited until the wet wooden wedges froze." The expanding wedges would then split the rock, "[b]ut the wooden wedge technique cannot explain the smoothness and perfect straightness of the bricks."
The construction of Machu Picchu required thousands of workers and a huge amount of detailed planning, but from what I've read the Incas didn't have iron tools, wheels, or a written language. The logistics involved are mind-boggling, but the city was built somehow so unless you believe in ancient aliens, Machu Picchu provides yet more evidence that early humans were more technologically sophisticated than commonly believed.
"A team has used genome-wide ancient DNA data to revise Central and South American history. Their analysis of DNA from 49 individuals spanning about 10,000 years in Belize, Brazil, the Central Andes, and southern South America has concluded that the majority of Central and South American ancestry arrived from at least three different streams of people entering from North America, all arising from one ancestral lineage of migrants who crossed the Bering Strait. " Source: Science Daily.
Note: I'm not sure if this was the same DNA study, the results of which were announced at around the same time, which showed that the remains found at Spirit Cave in Nevada were related to modern Native Americans. In any case, the Spirit Cave study found evidence of an Australasian genetic component which suggests that yet another migration into South America may have occurred, this time from across the Pacific Ocean.
"Archaeologists have discovered 19 humanlike wooden idols, some of them wearing beige clay masks on their faces, in the ancient city of Chan Chan, Peru, according to the country's Ministry of Culture." Source: Live Science.
"... These idols are the oldest yet to be discovered at the Chan Chan archaeological complex in northern Peru, which was once the capital of the Chimú Kingdom, a culture that lasted from about A.D. 900 to 1430, when it fell to the Inca Empire. [In Photos: Moche Treasures Hidden in Peru Temple]"
Video from 2014.
Note: The Inca conquered the wealthy city of Chan Chan long before it was looted by the Spaniards:
"After the Inca conquered the Chimú around 1470 AD, Chan Chan fell into decline. In 1535 AD, Francisco Pizarro founded the Spanish city of Trujillo which pushed Chan Chan further into the shadows. While no longer a teeming capital city, Chan Chan was still well known for its great riches and was consequently looted by the Spaniards. An indication of the great Chimú wealth is seen in a sixteenth century list of items looted from a burial tomb in Chan Chan; a treasure equivalent to 80,000 pesos of gold was recovered (nearly $5,000,000 US dollars in gold)." (Wikipedia)
"In 1925, Colonel Percy Harrison Fawcett journeyed into the Brazilian jungle in search of ‘Z,’ an ancient lost city that he believed existed somewhere in the uncharted depths of the Amazon. The British-born explorer expected to make archaeological history, but following a final dispatch on May 29, he and his two companions vanished without a trace. Their disappearance inspired rampant speculation, and many would-be rescuers later died while trying to hunt down evidence of their fate." Source: History Channel.
Fawcett's story is straight out of an H. Ryder Haggard novel, but this time the hero didn't manage to get out alive. That's not surprising considering the primordial nature of the Brazilian jungle, a vast wilderness teeming with hostile tribes, vampire bats, poisonous spiders, dangerous animals and exotic diseases. But the biggest hazard was the jungle itself:
"Colonel Fawcett probably came closest to death during his trips not from human or animal agents but from the geography of the land itself," according to the Museum of Unnatural History. "While traveling down the uncharted Madidi River by raft, his expedition encountered a series of dangerous rapids. With each the speed of the rafts increased until they were rushing down the river uncontrolled. Finally, the river widened and the velocity slowed.
"The crews had just given a sigh of relief when they rounded a steep bluff and the roar of a waterfall filled their ears. One of the rafts was able to make it to shore, but Fawcett's was caught in the current. With the water too deep to use a pole to snag the bottom and turn away, the raft shot over the drop." They managed to survive, but lost most of their equipment.
As far as I know, the disappearance of Fawcett and his expedition remains an enigma to this day. No one knows what happened to them and a lot of people have died or gotten themselves into serious trouble trying to find out:
"In the years since the ... expedition, the mystery surrounding Fawcett’s disappearance has lured scores of other would-be rescuers and investigators into the Amazon. It’s estimated that as many as 100 of them have died in the jungle, and a few have followed in the explorers’ footsteps by vanishing without a trace. As recently as 1996, a team of Fawcett-hunters led by a wealthy businessman named James Lynch was captured by Amazonian Indians and held for ransom. They only escaped with their lives after giving up $30,000 worth of equipment." (History Channel)
Note: Fawcett's story was turned into a film in 2016. I haven't seen it, but it looks pretty bad and this review makes it clear that the story has been heavily pozzed with the usual politically-correct BS which is now the standard for the Hollywood propaganda machine. The movie was based on a book with the same title by David Grann. I haven't read the book, either, but it's probably a lot better. The books usually are.
Notes: "The archaeological site of Chavin gave its name to the culture that developed between 1500 and 300 B.C. in this high valley of the Peruvian Andes. This former place of worship is one of the earliest and best-known pre-Columbian sites. Its appearance is striking, with the complex of terraces and squares, surrounded by structures of dressed stone, and the mainly zoomorphic ornamentation." Source: UNESCO World Heritage List.
Chavin de Huantar was a ritual center and pilgrim's destination as well as a major trade hub. "More so than its stunning architecture, Chavín de Huántar was a place of great mystical significance. A shaman elite wielded immense power through the use of drugs, architectural conceits, and the aegis (or threat) of divine sanction. Indeed, though religious rites are hardly attestable, this is in part due to their malleability at the hands of the shamans." Source: Global Heritage Fund.Note: I think that last sentence means that the religious practices at Chavin de Huantar are hard to reconstruct because the shamans adapted their rituals to suit the circumstances.
The site was occupied by pre-Chavin peoples as long ago as 3000 BC. The Chavin Culture built the temple sometime during the mid 2nd - mid 1st millenium BC and it became a major ceremonial center with its own oracle, shamans and a small elite with a direct pipeline to the gods. The Chavin civilization began to decline around 500-300 BC, perhaps as a result of a general loss of political unity in the Andean world.
In 2012, Popular Archaeology reported that "... a recent archaeoacoustic study suggests that the ancients of the 3,000-year-old Andean ceremonial center at Chavín de Huántar, in the central highlands of Peru, practiced a fine art and science of manipulating sound with architecture to produce desired sensory effects. With the assistance of architectural form and placement, and sounds emitted from conch-shell trumpets, the oracle of Chavín de Huántar 'spoke' to the ancient center's listeners."
In other words, the "voice of the oracle" was an acoustical trick. In fact, if there was a voice, it had to be a trick (unless you think that oracles are real). The shamans and temple priests were probably running a con on the gullible pilgrims who visited the temple and the pronouncements of the oracle could have been one of the ways they exerted control over their neighbors.
"A huge fire ravaged Brazil's 200-year-old National Museum Sunday night, destroying most of its collection of 20 million historical items and invaluable artefacts." Source: Daily Mail (9/3/2018)
"Firefighters worked to put out the blaze at the esteemed National Museum in Rio de Janeiro overnight, which houses artifacts from Egypt, Greco-Roman art and some of the first fossils found in Brazil."
Note: "The collection of archaeology of the National Museum comprised more than 100,000 objects, covering distinct several civilizations that lived in the Americas, Europe, Africa, and Middle East, since the Paleolithic Age until the 19th century. The collection is subdivided into four main segments: Ancient Egypt, Mediterranean cultures, Pre-Columbian archaeology, and Brazilian archaeology — this last nucleus, systematically gathered since 1867, is the largest segment of the archaeological collection, as well as the most important collection of its tipology in the world, covering the history of Pre-Cabraline Brazil in a very comprehensive manner and sheltering some of the most important material records related to Brazilian archaeology. It is, therefore, a collection of considerable scientific value, and object of several works of basic research, theses, dissertations, and monographs." Source: Wikipedia.
"The nearly 1,500-year-old remains of at least 60 people and six trophy heads have been discovered in deep pits in Vitor Valley [1] in southern Peru. Due to the arid climate, some of the remains became naturally mummified, their flesh surviving without the need for artificial mummification." Source: Live Science.
"There were 27 pits in total, each dug 10 to 13 feet (3 to 4 meters) into the ground, according to the excavation team. Dating back to around A.D. 550, a time when there was no writing system in Peru, the individuals likely belonged to what modern-day archaeologists call the La Ramada culture, according to Maria Cecilia Lozada, a research associate and lecturer of anthropology at the University of Chicago, who led the excavation team."
[1] "The Vitor Valley is an alluvial oasis linking the Arequipa highlands to the Pacific coast of southern Peru. The northern limit of the valley hosts a dense archaeological landscape of interspersed fieldstone structures and cemeteries known as the Millo Complex. This cluster comprises three principal segments referred to as Millo 2, Millo 3, and Millo 4; each of which preserves extensive architecture." Source: Taylor Francis Online.
Note: "Trophy heads have been found at other sites in Peru and may be the heads of enemies killed in battle, archaeologists say. However, Lozada believes that the heads found in these pits are from people who lived in the same community and were killed in an outside battle."
"Genetic analysis of plant species has long pointed to the lowlands of southwest Amazonia as a key region in the early history of plant domestication in the Americas, but systematic archaeological evidence to support this has been rare. The new evidence comes from recently-exposed layers of the Teotonio archaeological site, which has been described by researchers as a 'microcosm of human occupation of the Upper Madeira [River]' because it preserves a nearly continuous record of human cultures going back approximately 9,000 years." Source: Science Daily.