Marcahuamachuco is an archeological site of Pre-Incan ruins in the La Libertad
Region of Peru.
Although less well-known than other sites, it is considered significant and
has been referred to by archaeologists as "Machu Picchu of the North" and "The
Jewel of La Libertad."
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Prior considerations for visitors
Marcahuamachuco is one of the largest pre-Hispanic archaeological
monuments in the northern mountains of Peru.
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With its 250 hectares (1 mi2), it sits on a wide plateau that
manifests itself in four natural promontories, which define its
archaeological sectors called Cerro el Castillo, Cerro de las Monjas,
Cerro de los Corrales and Cerro Viejo.
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Plan of Marcahuamachuco
Plan Legend:
- Rectangular towers
- Gallery A
- Main plaza
- Hall with niches
- The Castle (El Castillo)
- West portal
- The Nuns (Las Monjas)
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Climbing towards the rectangular towers
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Interpretative panel 1
Marcahuamachuco: archaeological wonder of Peru.
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Just as there is a myth that tells how the first Incas arrived in the
Cusco area from Lake Titicaca in the Altiplano region, there is also a
legend that tells us where those people who probably built
Marcahuamachuco came from.
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It is said that long, long ago, Huamachuco was populated by people
from other lands, known as guachemines. The god Catequil exterminated
them using two huaracas, expelling the survivors. Then, Catequil went
to the Guacat or Huacate hill and, digging in it, brought out people
with whom he repopulated Huamachuco.
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This story explains, in a mythical way, the arrival in Huamachuco of a
group of migrants from the area where the Huacate hill is located,
that is, in the province of Virú, on the border of the departments of
La Libertad and Ancash.
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Marcahuamachuco plateau
Marcahuamachuco was built on a hill, on a plateau of 250 hectares (1
mi2). In all this extension there are 172 main squares like the one in
Huamachuco. This shows us that Marcahuamachuco is a sleeping giant at
the top of the sky, and is the maximum architectural and religious
expression of what the kingdom of Huamachuco was before the arrival of
the Incas.
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Marcahuamachuco, which was abandoned around the year 1100, has been
divided into four sectors: the El Castillo sector, where we are at
this moment, the Las Monjas sector, the Viejo sector and the Los
Corrales sector.
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The El Castillo sector is named so because it contains a structure
known as “El Castillo”, the largest in the site, which we will see
later; it is the sacred sector of Marcahuamachuco. The Las Monjas
sector is named so because it has some structures that, it is said,
the Spanish mistook for convents. The Los Corrales sector is named so
because there are some structures completely surrounded by walls like
corrals for animals. And, finally, the Cerro Viejo sector is named so
because it is where the first constructions of Marcahuamachuco would
have been built. The two sectors enabled for tourist visits are the El
Castillo sector, where we are right now, and the Las Monjas sector,
where we will arrive at the final part of our tour.
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The El Castillo sector, which as we have said is the sacred sector of
Marcahuamachuco, is the largest of the four, and occupies almost half
of the entire archaeological site. The largest amount of architecture
is found in this sector. It is separated from the other three sectors
by a perimeter wall that runs along the contours of the hill and has
its main entrance to the northwest.
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What was Marcahuamachuco?
Some believe it was a city, others that it was a ceremonial center. It
is even thought that the population did not have a fixed number but
rather fluctuated. It probably had a permanent population throughout the
year, but it is also believed that the bulk of the population was
reached during the periods of celebration of its main religious
festivals and people came from various areas of the kingdom of
Huamachuco.
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Huamachuco was a kingdom and its most important authority was the main
curaca, a kind of king. But the kingdom was made up of pachacas and
guarangas, which are the equivalent of the ayllus of southern Peru.
And the pachacas and guarangas had, in turn, their own curacas. The
curaca of Huamachuco must have been very powerful. The monumentality
of Marcahuamachuco is proof of the existence of his power; a power
capable of summoning and compelling the mass participation of people
in its construction.
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When the Incas conquered Huamachuco around 1470, certain towns
acquired Quechua names, and in other cases they were mixed with Culle.
For some linguists, Huamachuco is precisely a word composed of two
words from those two languages: guaman is a Quechua word that
means “falcon” and chugo or chuco is a Culle word that
means “land, country”, from which it is understood that
Huamachuco would mean “land of the falcon”. Marca is a
Quechua word that means “land, country, region” but it is also called
the upper part of a house, from which it is deduced that
Marcahuamachuco would mean “the upper part of the land of the falcon”,
a very appropriate name for a site that is located 3,650 meters
(11,975 ft) above sea level, right?
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Continuing to climb towards the rectangular towers
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Rectangular towers (Plan No. 1)
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Panorama of the rectangular towers fron east
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Interpretative panel 2
The funerary towers of the ancestors.
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Here are four structures whose shape and appearance of small
fortifications have earned them the name of “towers.”
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These four towers, whose remains we see, were built, one after the
other, between approximately 400 and 500 CE. On average, they are
about 15 square meters (161 ft2), measuring 11 meters (36 ft) long, 6
meters (20 ft) wide and about 7 meters (23 ft) high.
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They are mausoleums or open tombs, very elaborate and special tombs,
generally known in the Andes as chullpas.
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The location and orientation
The four towers have an entrance that faces east. Why do you think the
Huamachuco people oriented the entrance to the towers toward the east,
right where the sun rises? The Augustinian friars of the 16th century
tell us that after Ataguju, the sun was one of the main divinities of
Huamachuco. In fact, the sun was a main divinity in many pre-Hispanic
Andean societies. And most of the funerary towers built by these
societies had their entrances facing the sunrise.
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It is also interesting that these funerary towers are located at a
point where three of the most important hills in the area are visible:
Icchal, Shulcahuanca and Yanaguanca.
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On Icchal Hill there is the oracle and sanctuary where the god
Catequil was consulted and worshipped, and who was asked for food,
animals and children.
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The ancient Huamachuquinos worshipped the Shulcahuanca and Yanaguanca
hills before going to war, so that they would give them strength.
These hills had their servants and they held festivals, as was the
custom in pre-Hispanic times, but the Augustinian friars prohibited
them when they arrived in the 16th century.
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It is possible that the visibility of these hills was an important
factor in choosing this site as the point for the construction of
these 4 funerary towers.
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The construction process
The construction process of the four funerary towers can be seen in the
figure on the panel.
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On the levelled ground (in purple, with the number 1 in the figure on
the panel), a rectangular platform was raised (in red, with the number
2 in the figure on the panel), with walls containing a filling of
large stones.
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Then (in blue, with the number 3 in the figure on the panel) the walls
that gave the rectangular shape to each tower were built, of about 30
m2 (323 ft2), with an entrance arranged towards the east side, which
was accessed by an attached staircase (in orange, with the number 4 in
the figure on the panel).
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Later, stepped reinforcement walls were placed (in light and dark
green, with the number 5 in the figure on the panel) that surrounded
the structure, giving it greater stability.
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All the walls were built with a slight inclination towards the
interior, perceiving a trapezoidal shape in all the final
architecture.
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The findings inside the towers
Inside these towers, human remains of up to 13 people, men and women,
were found, but the bones were scattered and charred by the fire.
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Along with the bones, several burned fragments of fabric and some
ropes were found, which would indicate that the dead were dressed and
perhaps wrapped in fabric, that is, funerary bundles.
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One of these people was a teenager of about 12 years old; the rest
were all adults between 25 and 50 years old. None of them showed signs
of having been sacrificed.
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Along with them, there were complete pieces and also fragments of
metal objects, ceramics, beads from necklaces of lapis lazuli,
turquoise and other semi-precious stones, stone tools, mullu shells,
etc.
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This would indicate that they were very important people for the
ancient Huamachuquinos; possibly they were their ancestors, their
first ancestors.
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Panorama of the rectangular towers fron north
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Interpretative panel 3
The destruction of the ancestors.
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The cult of the ancestors buried in the funerary towers continued to
be practiced during the Inca presence in the area, from 1470, when
Marcahuamachuco was already abandoned and the Incas had settled where
the town of Huamachuco is now. The cult even survived until the first
decades of the Colony.
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Archaeologists found the remains of ancestors inside the towers,
burned, even charred, destroyed, with their bones scattered and mixed
together, and they suspect that the cause was the Spanish Augustinian
friars who arrived in Huamachuco in 1551. Possibly, the friars were
witnesses of the cult that the Huamachuco people rendered to the
people buried in these towers or chullpas. The Spanish friars, as
representatives of a religion that they professed as the true one,
burned the bodies because they considered their veneration an act of
idolatry.
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Despite the bodies having been burned, the ancestors continued to be
venerated for some years until, with the passage of time, their cult
ended and was forgotten.
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The grave robbers and the curious, along with the growth of vegetation
and the rains, deteriorated the towers over the course of four
centuries, to such an extent that when the researchers arrived, they
found many of the stones fallen, buried under layers and layers of
earth hardened by the rains. The patient work of the archaeologists
and the conservators has allowed these structures to be rescued and to
be restored to part of their original appearance, always respecting
the international standards of conservation.
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Gallery A (Plan No. 2)
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Interpretative panel 4
The architecture of Marcahuamachuco.
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The structure we see here, which is also highlighted on the panel, is
an example of a monumental house or residence from Marcahuamachuco
that archaeologists call a “gallery” because it has a series of
internal divisions. This is an example of a rectangular-shaped
residence, but there are also curvilinear or circular ones, as we will
see in the The Nuns (Las Monjas) sector.
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This, like all the buildings built in Marcahua Machuco, was built with
stones that were actually obtained from the same hill. Just as cement
is used today to bind bricks, at that time mud was used as mortar to
bind the stones that formed the walls, and small stones or pachillas
were included as wedges in the mortar to give stability to the
construction.
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The stones used for the constructions are of a type of sandstone
which, due to its mechanical properties, can be used and reused to
build the walls of buildings. For the more delicate works, such as the
finishing touches on the entrances and the corners, trachyte rock was
used.
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Some buildings have two or more floors, for which they installed
horizontally projecting stones or corbels, on which they placed alder,
quinual and other local tree timbers, to support the upper floors made
of reeds, thin branches and mud. Supposedly, these upper floors served
as storage rooms that were accessed by stone and mud stairs.
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Detail of the wall of Gallery A
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Continuing to walk to the main plaza
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Main plaza (Plan. No. 3)
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Panorama of the Main plaza from east
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Interpretative panel 5
The cult of the gods in the main square of The Castle (El Castillo).
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The place where we are is the main square of the architectural complex
known as El Castillo. This complex began to be built after the
funerary towers were built, a little before the year 600 CE.
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The square measures 60 m (197 ft) on each side and, as we can see, is
bordered by residences or galleries, as well as other types of
buildings. Its main entrance is located on the north corner, right
where we will exit to continue our tour.
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Under this dirt floor that we see, there is the original floor of the
plaza, which is covered with stone slabs, and which also has an
elaborate drainage system implemented to evacuate rainwater that,
otherwise, would pool and even flood this space.
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In pre-Hispanic societies, floors were generally made of dirt. The
fact that the Huamachuqui builders placed stone slabs on the ground is
a clear indicator of the importance of the plaza.
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Parada del Gallardete
The Augustinian friars of the 16th century were told that in squares
like this one, the curacas of the different guarangas and pachacas of
Huamachuco – equivalent to the ayllus of southern Peru – met with the
elites, ate and drank, pouring a little chicha on the ground to give to
the god Ataguju and the chucomama, the mother earth, to drink.
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Today, there is a ceremony that clearly dates back to pre-Hispanic
times and that could have been similar to the one that was practiced
in this square. This is known as the Parada del Gallardet and,
currently, the central point of the celebration is the main square of
Huamachuco. With this ceremony, which is celebrated on July 29, the
patronal festival in honor of the Most Holy Virgin of Alta Gracia
begins.
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The pennant is a huge, heavy piece of wood that is carried by members
of the different huarangas or ayllus that still exist in Huamachuco,
to which a red and white flag with horizontal stripes is placed. It is
then raised by hundreds of people from Huamachuco and nearby villages
inside a hole in the main square.
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Possibly, the wood is a portal or a magical link between earth and
sky, through which the Huamachuquinos fed and worshipped Ataguju, the
primordial god, the creator of everything and everything, who resides
in the sky and never leaves it. But the wood can also be interpreted
as a phallic element that, when penetrating the mother earth or
chucomama, symbolically fertilizes her.
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The Castle (El Castillo)
This architectural complex is called El Castillo (The Castle) due to the
presence of that tall building, which is the largest in Marcahuamachuco,
with a perimeter wall reaching 14 meters (46 ft) in height.
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Inside the building there are galleries or residences up to 4 stories
high, which are believed to have been used by the highest-status
family lineages or clans in the kingdom of Huamachuco.
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Panorama of the Main plaza from northeast
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Interpretative panel 6
The stone steps.
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Like the funerary towers we just visited, this area was once covered
by plants, mud and stones. The archaeologists and conservators
patiently removed the rubble that covered the structures and found the
remains of these three staircases.
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These allowed people to climb up to a kind of platform where the main
chiefs of Huamachuco probably sat to observe the ceremonies that took
place in the plaza.
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Perhaps they placed their blankets or mats on the ground to sit and
receive attention from the service staff, which included chicha and
food specially prepared for the occasion.
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The stone steps
As part of the structure of one of these staircases, two stone stelae
were found, both very similar, representing a male character sitting
cross-legged under a structure with a gabled roof. At the top of the
roofs, there are two birds with parrot-like but also condor-like
features, which look at each other.
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The character represented could be one of the gods of Huamachuquin
mythology. The candidates: Ataguju, Guamansuri or even Catequil.
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Hall with niches and The Castle (Plan No.4 and No. 5)
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Going up towards The Castle
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West portal (Plan No. 6) and The Nuns (Plan No. 7)
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Walking towards the West portal
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Fork in the path to the West portal
At this fork, if we go left we will reach the West portal and The Nuns,
if we go right we will reach the entrance to the archaeological park.
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Because at the time of this visit the West portal was undergoing
restoration work and was out of reach, we took the path to the right
and returned to the entrance to leave the archaeological park.
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See also
Source
Location
