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LATIN AMERICA |
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500-Year-Old
Wooden Statues Found in Peru
LIMA – Peruvian archaeologists found 12
anthropmorphic wooden statues more than 500
years old in the archaeological complex of
Chan Chan, the biggest adobe city in the
Americas.
The director of one of the teams working at
Chan Chan, Cristobal Campana, confirmed the
find to Efe on Tuesday, saying that the
statues were discovered at the entrance to
the Ñan An palace, the most modern building
on the site.
Campana said that the statues, in a fine
state of conservation, belonged to the
penultimate stage of the Chimu culture,
which was defeated and its lands occupied by
the Incas.
While the anthropomorphic figures, which
measure between 60 and 70 centimeters (24
and 28 inches) are indicated by their dress
to be males, they display symbols of the two
sexes, Campana said.
The statues found with cream-colored faces,
a low headdress and with the Peruvian
Spondylus seashell in their hands represent
femininity, while those with the faces
painted white, a tall headdress and with
Conus fergusoni seashells in their hands
represent masculinity.
Campana said that other statues found in
1997 and 2006 in the archaeological complex
have spears in their hands, a difference
that gives “vital importance” to the new
discoveries.
The new wooden statues “are welcoming life,”
Campana said, in contrast to the
anthropomorphic figures found previously
which fulfill the symbolic function of being
on guard.
The expert also said that all the statues
had their noses and seashells broken with a
chisel, a fact that could be associated with
a “change of government or situation,”
probably the Inca conquest of the Chimu
empire.
“This was an intentional, arranged act, it
didn’t happen by chance, it wasn’t done by
some spiteful individual. Someone gave an
order (to break these elements),” Campana
said, adding that an in-depth study of this
coincidence in the statues is still needed.
Chan Chan, located near the southern city of
Trujillo, was the capital of the Chimu
kingdom, and had in its period of maximum
splendor as many as 60,000 inhabitants in an
area of 1,400 hectares (3,500 acres).
The citadel is made up of palaces,
administrative centers and temples in the
form of pyramids with decorated walls.
In 1986, Chan Chan was declared a World
Heritage Site by the U.N. Educational,
Scientific and Cultural Organization, though
it is also on the list of endangered
heritage sites due to the fragility of its
adobe structures caused by the area’s rains
and intense heat. EFE
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