Chauchilla Cemetery
This post is based on a journal entry originally recorded on May 26, 2008.
Pati arrived back at the airport to collect us and we drove away to visit an ancient, Pre-inca cemetery. I was the last one in the van and so had to sit in the backward-facing seat. The bumpy road and lack of a stable horizon made my nausea return in full force. I leaned back, shut my eyes, and waited for us to arrive. After what seemed like an eternity bumping and sliding down roads made of compacted sand, we pulled up under a thatched shade overlooking a sandy plain that sloped down to a green valley lined with huarango, or South American carob trees.
At first glance I saw nothing but sand, rocks, and a few shallow depressions. Small wood-and-thatch sun shades dotted the plain, connected by rock-lined paths. My feet sank into the fine sand as we walked. Susi explained that this place was a cemetery for the local Nazca people, and that it had been extensively plundered by grave robbers, ancient and modern. Because of the dry conditions in Nazca (most years get less than 4 inches of rainfall) the graves were little more than shallow, stone-lined pits that were easily accessible to anybody who happened by. In the 1940s there was a severe drought in Nazca. The people applied to the government for help, and the government suggested that the Nazcans dig up the tombs and sell the grave goods to buy food. Many people did just that, taking the precious metals and fine textiles and leaving the mummies sticking out of the sand, exposed to the elements.
Looking across the plain, I saw now that each depression was in fact a disturbed grave. More touchingly, I saw that many of the bits of trash strewn across the sand were grave goods; pieces of pottery, cloth, cotton wrappings, and even small bleached human bones strewn about, destroying their archaeological value and displaying an appalling lack of respect for the people that lived and died here.
We made a slow loop around the cemetery, visiting all the thatched awnings. Underneath each one was a pit where archaeologists had gathered up some of the scattered mummies and their grave goods to show what an undisturbed burial might look like. Susi told us that the Nazca people believed their loved ones weren’t dead as long as they remembered them, so they regularly visited and cleaned the tombs until the Spanish came and put a stop to it.
More pictures of Chauchilla cemetery (warning: includes photos of human remains) »
