Sunday, October 12, 2003

By Adrian McCoy, Post-Gazette Staff Writer

Sitting high atop the Andes mountains in Peru, the ruins of Machu Picchu have been shrouded for centuries in mist and mystery.

A major exhibition of Incan artifacts from the Yale Peabody Museum of Natural History is designed to clarify some of that mystery. The traveling exhibit "Machu Picchu: Unveiling the Mystery of the Incas" was organized by that museum and curated by Yale anthropologists Richard Burger and Lucy Salazar. It opens Saturday at the Carnegie Museum of Natural History.

"Machu Picchu" is the largest exhibit devoted to Incan history and artifacts ever mounted in the United States. Most of the artifacts are in the Peabody collection, with about 70 pieces on loan from other institutions. Much of the Peabody museum collection hasn't been displayed before. Pittsburgh is one of five cities the exhibit will travel to, before returning to the Peabody as a permanent exhibit.

	If you go ... "Machu Picchu: Unveiling the Mystery of the Incas" will be on exhibit from Saturday through Jan. 4 at the Carnegie Museum of Natural History. A $2 charge will be added to the regular museum admission for entry to this exhibit. Details: 412-622-3131. The museum also will present a series of special programs, including lectures co-sponsored by the University of Pittsburgh, Center for Latin American Studies. Lectures start at 1 p.m. and feature the following speakers: Richard Burger, Yale Peabody Museum, co-curator of "Machu Picchu: Unveiling the Mystery of the Incas," Saturday. Billie Jean Isbell, emeritus professor of anthropology, Cornell University, speaking about Incan astronomy, Oct. 25. Marc P. Berman, associate professor of anthropology, University of Pittsburgh, and research associate, Section of Anthropology, Carnegie Museum of Natural History, speaking on "The Staff God Rules: The Wari and Tiwanaku Empires of Peru and Bolivia," Nov. 15. James B. Richardson III, curator of anthropology, Carnegie Museum of Natural History, and professor of anthropology, University of Pittsburgh, speaking about "Royal Tombs and Great Artisans: The Moche State of Peru," also Nov. 15. Michael Malpass, professor of anthropology, Ithaca College, speaking about "The Inca, the Greatest Empire in the New World," Dec. 6. Silvia Kembel, University of Pittsburgh, speaking about "Temples and Jaguars: Chavin and the Origin of Peruvian Civilization," also Dec. 6. Also on tap are activities for children and family, including the Teen Docent Machu Picchu Cart, which allows participants to make their own "Incan artifact," noon to 4 p.m. Saturdays. At 11:30 a.m. Saturday, Musuhallapa will perform the music of the Andean mountain regions of Peru, Bolivia, Ecuador, Chile and Argentina. Two "Food for Thought" lectures are scheduled at 10:30 a.m. Nov. 8 and 10:30 a.m. Dec. 4 in the CMA Theater. After an address by Richardson, a Peruvian food buffet will be held in the Museum Cafe. Special rates apply. Finally, Oct. 25 is Citizens Bank Free Day, with admission, parking and special programs free to the public.

James Richardson III is curator of anthropology at Carnegie Museum of Natural History and professor of anthropology at the University of Pittsburgh. When he first heard about the plans for the traveling exhibit from colleague Burger, he began lobbying to bring it to Pittsburgh.

The Incas' empire stretched for 3,500 miles in South America. It flourished between 1438 and 1527, ending with the Spanish conquest in the 1530s.

The ruins of Machu Picchu, which means "old Mountain Peak" in the Incan Quechua language, were rediscovered in 1911 by Yale archaeologist and professor Hiram Bingham III.

The exhibit shows how archaeological research at Machu Picchu has changed the image of what Machu Picchu was, not a "lost" city or village, but a retreat home for the empire's elite rulers. Machu Picchu was warm and lush during the harsh winter season in the ancient capital city of Cuzco. During peak season, the population was probably 800 or so, including the Inca (or king), family and guests. Most of the people living there were servants, craftsmen and religious leaders involved in ceremonial activities, says Burger, who is a professor of anthropology at Yale and a curator at the Peabody.

Several factors changed archaeologists' thinking and pointed to the retreat home theory, Burger says. "Our understanding of the Incas on an archaeological level has improved vastly in the last 30 years. When Bingham first published his work, we didn't really know that much about the archaeology of the Inca empire.

"Machu Picchu wasn't the only royal retreat. There were literally dozens of them. Machu Picchu is the best preserved and the most beautiful. We can look at other country palaces, and we can compare Machu Picchu to them, and it looks very similar. When you have that sort of foundation from the work at all these other sites, you can look at Machu Picchu and say, 'Where does it fit in to this large pattern?' "

'Very cosmopolitan'

Researchers now have more advanced tools and techniques to work with. Materials unearthed nearly a century ago at Machu Picchu have all been re-analyzed, Richardson says, allowing archaeologists to rediscover Bingham's rediscovery. "We know a lot more about daily life."

Salazar's analysis of burial goods revealed items from all over the empire, indicating that people were buried with heirlooms they brought from their home territory. Physical anthropologists studying cranial deformation among different peoples were able to trace the many geographic origins of the residents of Machu Picchu. Burger's chemical analysis of bones showed the same results.

"There's a tendency to think of Machu Picchu being like a small village. In some ways, it was more like New York City -- very cosmopolitan, people speaking different languages, different kinds of dress," Burger says. "It wouldn't have been at all like a modern peasant village."

Visitors who enter the exhibit watch a short video that provides an overview on the history of Machu Picchu and the Incas. After the film, the screen is raised, providing a dramatic entrance into the exhibit itself.

The structure of the exhibit reflects a painstaking attention to detail. The backdrop is rich brown stone walls that are actual plaster casts of the stone used to build Machu Picchu. "You're getting the flavor of the magnificent stone work of the Inca," Richardson says.

Visitors pass from one area to the next through a trapezoidal door, which is typical of Incan architecture. Real Peruvian ichu grass was used for the thatched roofs instead of domestic or artificial grass.

Bingham's panoramic photographs of the site, camera equipment and detailed research journals also are on display. Bingham "was very fastidious," Richardson says. "He kept very detailed dairies and [took] thousands of photos."

The "Curator's Tour" section has a detailed scale model of Machu Picchu.

A video presentation by Salazar and Burger explains different sections of the site and what they were: Each is highlighted on the model as the video progresses. After the film, there are aerial photos taken in 1931 and present-day satellite images of the ruins.

Visitors walk on a replica of one of the roads built by the Incas, who had a highly developed network of highways. They also will tour a replica of one of the rooms in a ruler's palace and see how royalty lived.

"Daily Life" features examples of textiles and metalworking and illustrates sacred and religious rituals. Exhibits on archaeoastronomy show how the Incas viewed the skies and universe and used skywatching to measure time and plant crops.

The next section brings the visitor back to the present, showing how archaeologists research the past. Interactive computer displays let visitors take their own virtual tour of the site and unearth their own discoveries.

The last section looks at the demise of the Incan empire following the Spanish invasion.

Significant artifacts

The centerpiece of "Machu Picchu" is the more than 400 Incan artifacts dating from 1450 to 1532 -- from everyday tools and implements to sacred objects used in rituals. Many are significant, because they are one of a kind and have been found only at the Machu Picchu site, and reflect different aspects of life there.

There's a solid silver plumb bob, an instrument used in surveying. "It's beautifully hammered and polished. No one has ever found anything comparable," Burger says. Recent field studies suggest that the famous semi-circular building at Machu Picchu was used for observing the solstices, Burger says. Astronomy and archaeology researchers believe they would have hung a plumb bob in the middle of the window where the observation was made. "This may have been used in those kinds of ceremonies."

The exhibit also features Bingham's favorite object -- a straight knife depicting a struggle between fisherman and giant fish. In a book he later published, Bingham mourned that the piece had been lost. But it turned up among the Peabody collections. It has never been shown in public.

The Carnegie's refurbished exhibition space has a climate-controlled area for fragile artifacts. "We could not hold this exhibit -- or any other exhibit with perishable materials -- without the controlled environment," Richardson says. Highlights include a vicuna wool tunic that would have been worn by a high-ranking official or emperor. Burger says it must have been kept in a dry cave or desert area to survive this well. "It's amazing that something like that was preserved."

Burger hopes visitors will leave "Machu Picchu" with an appreciation of the amazing artistic and technological achievements of Incan culture and a clearer understanding of what Machu Picchu was.

"It's important to share with the U.S. audience a much more sophisticated idea of what Inca culture was like, as an example of one of the great civilizations of Latin America before the arrival of the Europeans.

"Machu Picchu is probably the best known archaeological site in the Americas, and yet most people are completely puzzled about what it was. For them it's a picture you see in commercials for SUVs or tourist pictures of a beautiful place to go. But it doesn't really have any meaning."

Finally, he says, the exhibit is designed to show how archaeologists go about the work of reconstructing the distant past.

"One of the purposes is to show how the collaboration of scientific and historical research can allow you to get a progressively better understanding of a poorly understood phenomena. That message is important now because there's so much pseudo-scientific stuff out there. Most of it gives you a very distorted idea of the world and the history of these areas. It's important that people who devote their careers to this say, 'Well, this is how we do this.'

"We're still figuring things out. Archaeology and history are ongoing investigations."

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