The iconic Inca citadel, Machu Picchu, It is considered one of the seven wonders of the modern world and an important tourist destination in Peru, as its beauty and history have attracted millions of visitors since it was discovered in 1911 by the American explorer, Hiram Bingham.
The place of stones and mountains has panoramic views that allow you to see the great Inca architecture, which is said to have been intentionally built on sedimentary faults, according to a study by the Geological Society of the United States.
“The location of Machu Picchu is not a coincidence, since theGeological faults facilitated the work given that the stones were already weakened and it was easier to shape them,” Rualdo Menegat, a geologist at Brazil’s Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul and author of the research, said in a statement.
The magnificence that the site demonstrates is not only an archaeological distinction, but also a spiritual and natural one, since the citadel is a hybrid between the building and the ancestral Andean cosmogony, where the mountains were considered protective deities.
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However, in Machu Pichu there are remnants of an element that for some anthropologists may have meant the connection with time and the mystical beliefs that it professed: ‘the Intihuatana stone’.
The Intihuatana stone
This symbol is considered cultural heritage of humanity since 1983 by UNESCO, as it represents the astronomical wisdom and spiritual connection of the Incas with nature.
According to the Director of the National Museum of Anthropology and Archeology and History of Peru, Federico Kauffmann Doig, the intihuatana stone It was used by the Incas to perform ritual ceremonies in honor of the sun and to maintain the balance between the physical and spiritual worlds.
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” The voice intihuatana It is a name for runasimi or Quechua and in its plural form it is vocalized by means of the word intihuatana-cradle. which translates as ‘tie the Sun’, linguistic turn that transports us to the world of the supernatural, of the magical, according to the belief, the intihuatana they made up altars,” wrote Kauffmann in his study on the role played by these stones in Machu Pichu.
In addition, this rock carved in the shape of a pyramid is located on top of the mountain of the Inca city, from which there are a series of angles and marks aligned with the winter and summer solstices as a solar calendaraccording to the anthropologist, Germán Zencenarro, a professor at the National University of San Antonio Abad of Cusco.
Undoubtedly, this element is a clear example of the symbolic intention that experts attribute to nature and the architecture of the Andean people.
NATHALIA GOMEZ PARRA
DIGITAL SCOPE WRITING
TIME
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