Machu Pichu was at one time a vital Incan habitation site where nobility, priests and residents lived and thrived.
In ancient South America, the Incas ruled until smallpox destroyed them. Perhaps the most famous Inca city is Machu Pichu, way up in the Andes Mountains of Peru. Built somewhere between AD 1460 and 1470 by one of the rulers of the time, the city is now believed to have been more of a residence or palace for royalty, where ceremonies and astrological observations were done.
The altitude of the city is approximately 8,000 feet above sea level, above the Urubamba River and about 44 miles from the city of Cuzco. The mountain top is covered with gray granite and the ancient Incas utilized these stones to construct their buildings. Within the 5 square miles of Machu Pichu, close to 200 buildings were built as homes, temples, storage buildings and possibly a palace.
Some estimates place the population in and around Machu Pichu of up to 1,000 people. It's believed that men, women, children and priests resided in the city. It may have only been used by nobility on special occasions, but the other residents probably made the city their home.
Some of the houses were situated together around a central courtyard or laid out on terraces and connected by roads or alleys. The designers or architects were certainly very skillful, because the blocks of stone used for construction were likely cut using only bronze or stone tools and smoothed by hand. But this isn't the most amazing aspect of the buildings. The fact that the stones were placed together so perfectly that the blade of a very thin knife cannot fit between them is incredible. There was no mortar used, yet the majority of the stones still stand.
The Incas planted and grew maize and potatoes and would have collected rain water in cisterns within the city. There are numerous terraces cut into the mountain sides around Machu Pichu that were probably used for the crops. Due to the narrow nature of the terraces, it's not too likely that the crops would have produced enough for transport and sale in Cuzco. Machu Pichu was probably a self-sustaining city.
Although the use or meaning of many of the structures may never be known, one structure in particular does have special significance. The intihuatana is a column made of stone, positioned on a large block of granite. This column was used by the priests in a ceremony to symbolically tie the sun in place so that it couldn't disappear forever as the winter solstice grew closer. The sun would disappear sooner and sooner during the winter season and since the sun was very important to Inca society, the priests were tasked with preventing it was vanishing forever.
At midday on March 21st and September 21st, when the sun is at its peak and directly over the column, it doesn't cast a shadow. This is the time when the sun is 'tied' to the post of the column.
At its prime, Machu Pichu was an active and vital place, but in the early 1500's, the white man's disease, smallpox, found its way to the Incas. Even before the conquistador, Pizarro, arrived in 1532, Machu Pichu's residents were gone and the city was abandoned and forgotten.
In 1911,Hiram Bingham, a Yale archaeologist found Machu Pichu again. Since then, the city as been studied, and has become a tourist attraction for thousands of people who are willing to travel up the steep mountainside to witness the awesome wonder that was once a great Incan city.
