By Angela Ponce
HUARAL, Feb 25 (Reuters) – Peruvian archaeologists have discovered tombs and remains from the pre-Inca period, more than 800 years old, in Huaral, on the northern coast of the city of Lima.
The more than 30 funerary bundles found belong to the Chancay culture, which was mainly located between Ancón in the south and the Supe Valley in the north, and whose economic activity included ceramics and textiles.
“In recent days, we have discovered around 30 Chancay culture bundles in the Cerro Macatón cemetery, located in the Huaral Valley,” archaeologist Pieter Van Dalen, a professor at the Universidad Mayor de San Marks.
Among the pieces found, vessels of different sizes have been unearthed, some decorated with the black and white color characteristic of this culture.
“The tombs we find in these excavations correspond to the year 1000 to 1400 AD,” added Van Dalen, stressing that the discovery will allow us to know more about this little-studied pre-Inca culture. .
The burial monuments belonged to people of various social statuses, and those corresponding to people from the elite of the Chancay culture are up to five meters deep and very elaborate, according to the team’s findings.
Archaeologists have carefully dusted and stored the remains found at this vast site on Peru’s north central coast, some 75 kilometers north of the city of Lima, which adds to the more than 2,000 graves discovered in recent years from the Chancay culture. (Report by Angela Ponce in Peru, Aida Peláez-Fernandez and Valentine Hilaire in Mexico)