Peru's Great Urban Experiment

[ivanjoz]

I live in Trujillo, near to Chan Chan, is a very interesting experiment as a city but not near what Incas have done in Cusco with giant stones, the infraestructure still in use today and the way they blend with nature and resists natural fenomena but maintaining a cohesive spatial organization is impressive.

[buntsai]

I find the efforts of the archeologists not to apply cultural norms particularly interesting:

In other circumstances, a caste system might be seen in a less favourable light:

> I like the egg myth because it suggests that the Chimú understood that social and political inequality is ‘baked in’ to humanity from the beginning,” says anthropologist Robyn Cutright of Centre College.

Similarly the discussion of preferring other people's children for child sacrifices. This is ascribed to their support desire for cultural diversity and laying new cultural roots. > “The Chimú had the ability to draw on a large terrain, and I think they were reaching out to diverse regions to find children for the sacrifices” > By sacrificing the children and burying them, they were, in a way, planting new ancestors.”

I hope the original archeologists have not been quoted out of context or that I have not misinterpreted them.

Either way it is quite amusing. I do not think I would regard child sacrifices in entirely the same positive light or even neutrally ...

[DoreenMichele]

The Moche River Valley in northern Peru was an unlikely place to build a city. Though barely 1,000 feet from the Pacific Ocean, the valley received less than a tenth of an inch of rain per year.

It's a lost civilization that existed for 500 years. The language is extinct. Archeologists are still puzzling some things out. There's little or no written records about them.

[youngNed]

I mean, its basically Vegas, city built in the desert, no one knows why it exists, enormous social differences, and it had a different architectural style to other areas.

Most importantly, it had a strict code 'what happens in Chan Chan stays in Chan Chan'

[chmod600]

"I like the egg myth because it suggests that the Chimú understood that social and political inequality is ‘baked in’ to humanity from the beginning,"

A strange statement and I'm not sure I understand the meaning.

Such a myth serves the same purpose pretty much everywhere since a long time ago: to try to convince people of lower status that there is no hope for them to become high status. Perhaps it also shows some self-deception among the high status people.

It shows no profound understanding of anything; it's just a manipulative tactic.

And I'm not even sure what the speaker is trying to say. If it's that humanity is collectively unequal, well, duh, it always has been. If it's that an individual's status is predetermined at birth, then that's simply false.

[kikeap]

I visited Chan Chan and other excavations of the area two months ago. Quite impressive the size, culture, and technology for a culture way more ancient that the inca and Machu Pichu. There was not many people and totally recommended

[jimmyed]

Every once in a while, I get to read about what I call the "Invisible countries". These are the countries that are apparently there, but have no weight at the global scale. I don't know anyone from there, don't know what their cities are called, don't hear any news from there. Peru falls squarely in that category. Others are Turkmenistan, Gabon, Monaco, Senegal etc.

[rootw0rm]

I created a little news site (https://magnetoid.com) specifically to try to get stories from every country in the world. Most countries are directly represented, though there are a few exceptions like Andorra (maybe 20 total?), where there's not a terribly great English news source for me to pull from. Countries not directly represented are still covered by regional sites that I scrape.

It's made with Python, SQLite, OpenResty, and Redis. no ads, tracking, or javascript

[justrealist]

Peru has been in the news recently because of the presidential attempt to seize power + protests.

I don't think you're wrong about coverage though. People are downvoting because they they think you're saying this is a good thing, but the fact is that no major media outlet regularly features stories from the non-BRICS developing world.

[Thorrez]

There are a fair number of Peruvian restaurants in the Bay Area, due I believe to a fair number of Peruvian immigrants. There are apparently 720,626 Peruvians in the US, and 91,511 in California.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peruvian_Americans

[phreack]

Not even Lima, the capital? Is it not common to study what all countries and their capitals cities are called in school where you're from?

[mejutoco]

Not judging you, but havent you heard of machu pichu. That is in Peru.

[benatkin]

Hmm, I don't understand this classification at all. Monaco is pretty well known for its population. There are countries with huge populations that I think most US college students know very little about like Indonesia.

[nrp]

If nothing else, you need to go out of your way to get familiar with Peruvian food, which is some of the most interesting in the world. It’s a blend of pre-Incan (relevancy to the article), Incan, Spanish, Japanese, and Cantonese cuisines. You end up with wonderful stuff like ceviche, chifa cuisine, and pisco sours.