Who Found Machu Picchu?
Broadcast Wed 5 Oct 2011, 11:00
160/44; 31.9 MB; sound quality excellent
The story of Machu Picchu's discovery is one of myth, court cases and controversy. The popular account involves the central character, the prototype for India Jones, Hiram Bingham, who in 1911 stumbled upon the ancient ruins of an Inca city lost in the jungle. As Peru celebrates the centenary of it being found, explorer Hugh Thomson follows in Bingham's footsteps into the Andes to unearth the truth and the controversies about its discovery.
So, was Bingham the first person to see Machu Picchu? A re-examination of his classic book, Lost City of the Incas, which describes the expedition and subsequent archaeological studies of the site, says otherwise. Behind the words is a determined and ambitious Yale professor who saw Machu Picchu as his ticket to world renowned. In his quest, Bingham all to often blurred fact with fiction.
As a historian, he was ill-equipped to interpret the artefacts he'd brought back to Yale but nevertheless put forward suppositions about why the Inca's built Machu Picchu and what they used it for. Inflating its importance and hence his own, these myths - for example, that it was a spiritual retreat for the Virgins of the Sun - perpetuate today. So what was its real purpose?
The thousands of Incan artefacts Bingham took out of Peru have been cause for controversy as well, culminating in a fiercely fought court case. The Peruvian government sued Yale university for breaking the contract to return the Machu Picchu artefacts. Finally, the case has been settled and many of the artefacts have been returned, and just in time for Peru's centenary celebrations, which are as much about reclaiming national pride and identity as world heritage.
Producer: Dom Byrne
A Blakeway production for BBC Radio 4.
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Replies
Thanks again, Rick!
Thank you
You are as much the history buff as I am, with me it is the stranger the better too. In my college yearbook each of us had a saying that was indicative of at least a part of our personaly researched and picked by others. Mine said, "Things Forbidden have a Secret Charm" If they only knew how right they were. LOL ----------------------- R
Thanks you so much for a programme that teaches me something I didn't know.
Bob
I find a lot of those. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Rick