Message #233508

[Paradox]

After: Neatly Excavated Ruins

Photograph from Kuttig Travel/Alamy

Machu Picchu's ruins are seen neatly excavated in 1997. The unique beauty and historical importance of the site led UNESCO to declare it a World Heritage site in 1983.

During his 1912 trip to Machu Picchu, Bingham and his team excavated some of the buildings and temples in search of artifacts—metalwork in particular.

However, they were mostly unsuccessful. The scientists began finding objects of interest only after members of the farming families living at the site guided them to burial chambers hidden on Machu Picchu's mountain slope, Heaney noted.

The skeletons found in those chambers led Bingham to speculate that Machu Picchu might have been a temple devoted to the Virgins of the Sun, a holy order of chosen women dedicated to the Inca sun god, Inti.

Bingham's theory was based on the incorrect interpretation that the skeletons were mostly female. It's now known that the remains were about half male and half female.

(Related: "Rare Mass Tombs Discovered Near Machu Picchu.")

Published July 22, 2011