Hiram Bingham - Inca Land: Explorations in the Highlands of Peru (Illustrated)

Something hidden. Go and find it. Go andlook behind the RangesSomething lost behind the Ranges. Lost andwaiting for you.Go!

Kipling: The Explorer

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The following pages represent some of theresults of four journeys into the interior of Peru and also manyexplorations intothe labyrinth of early writings which treat of the Incas and theirLand. Although my travels covered only a part of southernPeru, they took me into every variety of climate and forced me to campat almost every altitude at which men have constructedhouses or erected tents in the Western Hemispherefrom sea level up to21,703 feet. It has been my lot to cross bleak Andeanpasses, where there are heavy snowfalls and low temperatures, as wellas to wend my way through gigantic canyons into thedense jungles of the Amazon Basin, as hot and humid a region as existsanywhere in the world. The Incas lived in a land ofviolent contrasts. No deserts in the world have less vegetation thanthose of Sihuas and Majes; no luxuriant tropical valleyshave more plant life than the jungles of Conservidayoc. In Inca Landone may pass from glaciers to tree ferns within a fewhours. So also in the labyrinth of contemporary chronicles of the lastof the Incasno historians go more rapidly from factto fancy, from accurate observation to grotesque imagination; nowriters omit important details and give conflicting statementswith greater frequency. The story of the Incas is still in a maze ofdoubt and contradiction.

It was the mystery and romance of some ofthe Pageviii wonderful pictures of a nineteenth-century explorerthat first led me into the relatively unknown region between theApurimacand the Urubamba, sometimes called the Cradle of the Incas. Althoughmy photographs cannot compete with the imaginativepencil of such an artist, nevertheless, I hope that some of them maylead future travelers to penetrate still farther intothe Land of the Incas and engage in the fascinating game of identifyingelusive places mentioned in the chronicles.

Some of my story has already been told in Harper'sand the National Geographic, to whose editorsacknowledgments are due for permission to use the material in itspresent form. A glance at the Bibliographywill show that more than fifty articles and monographs have beenpublished as a result of the Peruvian Expeditions of YaleUniversity and the National Geographic Society. Other reports are stillin course of preparation. My own observations arebased partly on a study of these monographs and the writings of formertravelers, partly on the maps and notes made by mycompanions, and partly on a study of our Peruvian photographs, acollection now numbering over eleven thousand negatives.Another source of information was the opportunity of frequentconferences with my fellow explorers. One of the great advantagesof large expeditions is the bringing to bear on the same problem ofminds which have received widely different training.

My companions on these journeys were, in1909, Mr. Clarence L. Hay; in 1911, Dr. Isaiah Bowman, Professor HarryWard Foote,Dr. William G. Erving, Page ix Messrs. KaiHendriksen, H. L. Tucker, and Paul B. Lanius; in 1912, ProfessorHerbert E. Gregory, Dr. George F. Eaton, Dr.Luther T. Nelson, Messrs. Albert H. Bumstead, E. C. Erdis, Kenneth C.Heald, Robert Stephenson, Paul Bestor, Osgood Hardy,and Joseph Little; and in 1915, Dr. David E. Ford, Messrs. O. F. Cook,Edmund Heller, E. C. Erdis, E. L. Anderson, ClarenceF. Maynard, J. J. Hasbrouck, Osgood Hardy, Geoffrey W. Morkill, and G.Bruce Gilbert. To these, my comrades in enterpriseswhich were not always free from discomfort or danger, I desire toacknowledge most fully my great obligations. In the followingpages they will sometimes recognize their handiwork; at other timesthey may wonder why it has been overlooked. Perhaps inanother volume, which is already under way and in which I hope to covermore particularly Machu Picchu and its vicinity, they willeventually find much of what cannot be told here.

Sincere and grateful thanks are due also toMr. Edward S. Harkness for offering generous assistance when aid wasmost difficultto secure; to Mr. Gilbert Grosvenor and the National Geographic Societyfor liberal and enthusiastic support; to PresidentTaft of the United States and President Leguia of Peru for Page x officialhelp of a most important nature; to Messrs. W. R. Grace &Company and to Mr. William L. Morkill and Mr. L. S. Blaisdell,of the Peruvian Corporation, for cordial and untiring coperation; toDon Cesare Lomellini, Don Pedro Duque, and their sons,and Mr. Frederic B. Johnson, of Yale University, for many practicalkindnesses; to Mrs. Blanche Peberdy Tompkins and MissMary G. Reynolds for invaluable secretarial aid; and last, but by nomeans least, to Mrs. Alfred Mitchell for making possiblethe writing of this book.Hiram BinghamYale UniversityOctober 1, 1922 Pagexi

Manypeople have asked me how to pronounce Machu Picchu. Quichua wordsshould always be pronounced as nearly as possible asthey are written. They represent an attempt at phonetic spelling. Ifthe attempt is made by a Spanish writer, he is alwayslikely to put a silent h at the beginning of such words as huilcawhich is pronounced weel-ka. In the middle of a word h is alwayssounded. Machu Picchu is pronounced Mah'-chew Pick'-chew.Uiticos is pronounced Weet'-ee-kos. Uilcapampa is pronouncedWeel'-ka-pahm-pah. Cuzco is Koos'-koh.

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Sketch Map of Southern Peru.

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A kind friend in Bolivia once placed in myhands a copy of a most interesting book by the late E. George Squier,entitledPeru. Travel and Exploration in the Land of the Incas. In that volumeis a marvelous picture of the Apurimac Valley. Inthe foreground is a delicate suspension bridge which commences at atunnel in the face of a precipitous cliff and hangs inmid-air at great height above the swirling waters of the greatspeaker. In the distance, towering above a mass of stupendousmountains, is a magnificent snow-capped peak. The desire to see theApurimac and experience the thrill of crossing that bridgedecided me in favor of an overland journey to Lima.

As a result I went to Cuzco, the ancientcapital of the mighty empire of the Incas, and was there urged by thePeruvian authoritiesto visit some newly re-discovered Inca ruins. As readers of AcrossSouth America will remember, these ruins were at Choqquequirau,an interesting place on top of a jungle-covered ridge several thousandfeet above the roaring rapids of the great Apurimac. Page2 There was some doubt as to who had originally lived here.The prefect insisted that the ruins represented the residence ofthe Inca Manco and his sons, who had sought refuge from Pizarro and theSpanish conquerors of Peru in the Andes between theApurimac and Urubamba rivers.