The Architecture of Machu Picchu - Part 2

hello wall and welcome back to Uncharted X my name is Ben and this is part 2 of my investigation into the beautiful sight of much you picked you if you haven't seen part 1 of this video I'd recommend checking that out before watching this as I'm going to assume that you have seen it this video will be a little different it's a little less formal but I wanted to take a look at some of the different areas of much you picked you and take a closer look at some of their features and their architecture I also want to further explore some of the things that hiram bingham wrote in his book from 1913 and along with that I want to talk a little bit about my experience in visiting this site and to give you some recommendations for how you might structure your own visit to this iconic place there are several distinct areas too much' picked you and we'll take a look at each of these in turn starting with the terracing system or the system of retaining walls that surrounds the site this is a common feature found across the incan territory but there are some unique aspects to this that we'll explore further there is also the urban area which surrounds the core of much' picture this is something that I think was mostly all built by the Inca but it does encompass a very unique and beautiful megalithic portion known as the Sun temple as well as running water channels throughout this whole space behind much you've picked you in all of the iconic photographs looms quiner picture which is the neighboring mountainside this very steep mountain also has a lot of building work done on it and there's a really entertaining tail in hiram bingham book about the attempts they made to climb this peak and then of course there is the megalithic core of much who picked you this area extends upwards and behind the walls that we've already seen in part one to the highest point on the site that includes the in - etana or the hitching post of the Sun and we'll get into some of the details around that interesting little carving the terracing system that was used by the Inca is very interesting you find it all over the place on all of the steep mountainsides across the Sacred Valley and some of these terraces are still in good use and that's for good reason the Inka were an expert agricultural society and they needed this terracing system in order to grow to the size or the population base that they did which was millions of people this terracing allowed them to farm what would otherwise have been untenable farming land and they did this up and down the mountain sides all throughout the Sacred Valley with a purpose and their system is explained here by rajulio so in my to speak to we wanna find three important sectors where we are now it was the agricultural sectors the steel there is are all controversies about what the Incas grow in this place so probably all these terraces only was as a big garden just to grow the most important plant in that time what is the most important front coca coca plant why because between the Andes and the real jungle so we are in the center part is where the big coca plant grows really well really tiny but has the power power poor yeah all the lips all the mountain people prefer the tiny lips why because the tiny leaves has more power things of course more below you can find coca plant but is quite tall and has big lips but has no the same quality the same power amigos huh that's why probably one of the theory said that this area was only as as a big place as a greenhouse only for coca plant yeah so yes two hours walking or following the inca trial there is huge farming places three inca sizer that they have like at 35 between 60 terraces like this so mostly this place it was to grow crops because just two hours working the Incas can find saw the different different type of crops we're talking about winner whiner in dupatta and come to pata witches behind this mountain yam roughly take two hours so the people maybe in units than you will make inca trial so you will prove that yeah there is terraces located in three different labels one is over 2100 meters a roll of farm and price you can see from the train from the train when you came here before you get hours calientes that's one farming place the other one is over 2700 meters the same levels and sacred valley of the incas and the other one has 3600 meters already three inca sites and the same part but in this different levels so in the Incas they can have in the same times or all the year around different type of crops we're talking about down below close to the river tropical fruits a different type also you capitate owes sweet potatoes things over 2700 meters where is another inca site and a lot of terraces they can grow the same team that grow in the Sacred Valley what does mean that a lot of type of cone yeah over 3600 meters which is the another inca site so they can grow only different type of potatoes so they can have in the same times three different type of potato crops and just to support people here yeah so that is the point here I think that 99% of the terracing that you find throughout the Sacred Valley is the you can pocha or the Incan style architecture you see it up and down all of the mound sites as you drive around it's complete with stone staircases and it's just an incredible amount of work that's clearly gone into creating garden beds and flat patches to farm land on you do also find it very often around the actual megalithic sites and in some areas you'll also see that it's incorporated into sections of megalithic retaining walls and here and there you can see where I think some of this megalithic work has been repaired at much who picked you I think you see a mix of what I would say megalithic and Inka work when it comes to the retaining walls and terraces and that is because I think and this is just my impression of it that it was originally a megalithic site that was destroyed and then later rebuilt and then expanded on by the Inka some of these retaining walls that you see around the place are just absolutely huge and because they lack the real precise nature of the megalithic walls and the core of the site it certainly is possible that the Inka did this work but it's not a common approach for them to use very large stones in their retaining walls and terracing systems although they were known and we have some recorded accounts of them trying to move very large stones my guess on these imprecise but massive retaining walls and it guess is really all that it is is that I think these are older and that they're part of the original landscaping and retaining walls used at the site take a look at this area these retaining walls even though there's nothing that seems to be on top these are just absolutely huge relative to the rest of the work around the site it's not very precise but it does seem to match the granite material that's used in the core of the site this white granite it's also next to some very interesting walls that quite clearly show how the Inka built their walls on top of the older megalithic style here's a few more examples of this at Machu Picchu [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] as I said the inker were actually observed trying to move around or moving around some very large stones and this happened in particular at Sacsayhuaman by some of the 16th century Spanish chroniclers that were observing the inker actually doing some work on the site I think that the bearer observing was repair and restoration work but there are some interesting quotes that get used typically as proof that the Inka were responsible for building all of these sites so it's a worthy sidebar to explore this to see well could this be interpreted as you know repair and restoration work translating from the original Spanish in the books that come directly from a couple of the 16th century chroniclers a couple of quotes here Juan de betanzos said that quote tapa this guy ordered the entire crowd to pull the ropes with which it was tied end quote he's describing how they were trying to move the stones Garcilaso de la Vega a guy that I've mentioned before also expands on this observation he writes quote they did not have any ingenuity to climb and descend the stones they did everything by force of arms end quote de la Vega also describes the method in which stonemasons were shaping stones and he says here quote the stonemasons had no other instruments to carve the stones than some black pebbles they called hyuana with which they carve them by crushing rather than cutting end quote I think we can agree that this is describing fairly primitive efforts but what I think they're describing here is repair and restoration work rather than actual construction work going on at Sacsayhuaman certainly the method of stone shaping by banging on them with other rocks can really not explain that incredible precision that we see in a lot of the tight-fitting megalithic walls but it certainly does explain how the oaken putter work or the Incan style work might well have been done de la Vega noted in his observation here that he didn't see them using levers or wheels or rolling around the big rocks on stone balls or with logs that they did everything by main force so the Inka would just apply people and force to the problem rather than any forms of even basic technology they just take a bunch of ropes that were made out of llama hair and leather they'd wrap those around a big rock and then they'd get a few thousand of their high altitude athletic buddies to pull on the ropes and you can eventually move or stand up some big stones and I think put them back into position which is exactly what I think we're hearing about with these quotes now I'm not saying that they rebuilt all of the megalithic work I do think that some parts of the original megalithic installations survived whatever cataclysmic destruction that they obviously went through in the distant past but it certainly does seem likely that the Inka picked up a lot of this megalithic work and did their best to restore parts of these sites and I think that these descriptions really fit that sort of activity another Spaniard from the 16th century Gutierrez de Santa Clara he described how they would stack larger stones together by building earthen ramps and then hauling the stone up to the height that they needed it to be by main force once again very primitive methods that would put that stone in place then that would remove the earthen ramp so again no leverage no wheels no technology at all I'm not sure how you can really take these examples and use them as proof that the Inka built all of these sites because there is another less often reported tale that comes from these same 16th century chroniclers that also describes the nearest quarry for saqsaywaman as being 25 kilometres away and the farthest quarry for that site was around 75 kilometers away this is all over some incredibly difficult terrain take a minute to consider how difficult this task really is I think you have to have quite an imagination to truly believe that this primitive method as described by these chroniclers of thousands of people simply yanking on a rope with no leverage no rolling stones or logs is enough to move a 10 or a 20 30 or even 50 ton stone more than 25 maybe even 75 Lamas through the Andes mountain range and get it done you are talking about terrain that's over 10,000 feet in height and some extremely steep slopes something else to keep in mind is that the Inca civilization were only here for a short time a little less than 150 years and it was this period that they were supposed to have built all of these sites all of the megalithic work and all of the terracing so even if you insist that enough effort and enough people using these primitive methods will get the job done and by the way this is the same national project or beer and blankets approach used to explain the Great Pyramid by guys like Zahi Hawass in Egypt I think that you're still up against some serious time challenges for the amount of work that we're looking at whether or not everyone agrees that these primitive methods were responsible for all of the megalithic work in Peru I think we all can agree that doing the work of this way dragging huge stones with ropes and shaping them by chipping on them with pounding stones would take an awful long time and require and awful lot of people there's one more significant piece of evidence that I think suggests that the Inka were not responsible for the original megalithic work and this piece of evidence is located in Cusco I've used this clip before but it's worth showing here again because I think it's quite compelling particularly so if again you keep in mind that were only talking about a period of around a hundred and fifty years which is really not enough time to go through the massive up-and-down in architectural technology that is suggested by all the different building styles we see in Peru here's Brian Forrester really good evidence that Cusco existed before was the fact that the Inka a thousand years ago were kicked out of Lake Titicaca by the Aymara people and so rather than dispersing they went they knew that they would find a place to resettle and they followed a road that existed north and when they got to within one hour's drive of Cusco there is a big wall with a gate in it that's called the anti punku that is megalithic as they followed the gate they encountered megalithic structures by the time they reach Cusco itself they found an abandoned city that was megalithic and so blown away by this fact that I'm sure they said maybe this was the city of the gods this is where we're going to build our new capital and so the quarry Kancha existed at that time and because of its energetic nature I believe and profound construction I believe that kapa simply said this is too profound for me to live in I get first choice of all of the other megalithic structures and so he looked up on the hill which is exactly where we are and he found what is called san cristobel or san cristobol and he said rebuild this megalithic ruin and make it my palace and a policy of the Inca was that each of the 12th Inca in succession had what was called a pinaka and that means they chose who did what like who was in charge of the military who was in charge of the the priesthood etcetera etc and it had to be a member of the family but when that high Inca died the son who inherited the title of High Inca got to choose his own government in people which is a very smart move so what you had was the son of Monaco copic could not live where we are in in Mong Kok at bucks palate so he had to find another place to live and so he would have one of the other megalithic courtyards rebuilt by the time you get to the eighth high Inca there were no more megalithic ruins to be restored so that's where we find that the ninth the 10th the 11th all had to build their structures from scratch and what we see there is they're all made of little blocks or Adobe no megalithic work so if the Inka were responsible for the megalithic work it meant they have had profound capability in the beginning and slid downhill for the next five hundred years which is not the case they simply found an abandoned megalithic city and rebuilt it the urban area at much' picked you is characterized by what must be a couple of dozen of these quite well made dwelling structures here Hiram Bingham describes the common form that these dwellings take along with a couple of their notable features quote one of the most striking characteristics of much who picked you architecture is that a large majority of the houses are of a story and a half in height with gable ends these Gables are marked by cylindrical projecting stones carrying out the idea of the wooden rafters which have disappeared in the case of these two adjoining houses the southern Gables alone are standing the northern Gables having been knocked off either by earthquakes or owing to the destructive forest vegetation end quote in general my impression of these houses is that this is some quite well made you can pitcher or Incan style work I think that all of this type of area was rebuilt and remade by the Inka in many cases built on top of megalithic foundations and in fact when you talk about the cylindrical projecting blocks and the shapes of the windows what we see here is an imitation of the style that's carried out to a far finer degree of precision and accuracy in their core megalithic work the cylindrical blocks themselves are fairly interesting they were most likely for attaching to rafters that then you would lay your roof structure on as shown here in this picture you can see that the cylindrical blocks have been used to tie the rafters to the house what's interesting is that you can also find these cylindrical blocks just left lying around perhaps this is a consequence of the destruction that happened to the site in modern times and in some cases you can also find these blocks simply used as filler in some of the rough stone walls so either there was an overproduction of these things or they were just left lying around from megalithic times I'm not really sure what to make of them this shape is also a feature of some of the megalithic work in the core you can see the same type of protruding cylindrical shape or in some cases a square shape forming part of the megalithic core walls I do want to acknowledge that there is an alternative argument to be made here because we have the same shapes reflected in the Incan style architecture and in the megalithic architecture the cylindrical blocks the shapes of the windows that could be used as an argument to suggest that these same people or the same culture built all of this same architecture now obviously if you've watched any of my videos about South America or even Egypt you'll know that I don't think this is the case I think that we're looking at the work of two separate and very distinct cultures at least two and much longer timelines but it's worth reinforcing that ultimately I think the only answer somebody can come to today is really I don't know there just isn't enough evidence to conclusively prove this one way or the other my opinions on this are really based on the available data things like the Incan origin stories what they said themselves about their own history some of the evidence coming from adjacent fields of science the Younger Dryas the extension of the human timeline and it's based on an analysis of the level of technology that is involved in actually creating these various styles of architecture still when it comes to South America this is all really circumstantial evidence there isn't enough here to conclusively prove this one way or the other and I try to remain open to new ideas and to new theories on this these urban spaces also contain a couple of just beautiful megalithic structures the one that is probably best known is the Sun temple which features this curved wall this type of a curved rounded shape to the wall is quite rare in Peru although not unheard of there are other examples of this type of thing that korikancha comes to mind but typically that curved shape is associated with the Sun so today we call these sun temples although we really have no way of knowing whether or not that had anything to do with their original purpose or function this building in particular does cast an auspicious shadow on the dates of the Solstice as we'll find in many of the other megalithic remains around Peru what I find interesting about the Sun temple is that when you look at this structure from above and behind which is not a common angle that people take you can see that it seems to be rapping protectively around a huge carved piece of bedrock which is a pretty prime example of Hannan pocha architecture this is also an excellent example of the circular protection or the general respect and reverence that the builders seem to have had for this older form of megalithic work one thing's for certain having this giant piece of carved stone in the middle of the building produces its functionality for use as a building you can also see that on top of the Sun temple there's been some effort at restoration the work clearly becomes more inferior in the top couple of layers of masonry beneath this structure is one of the more remarkable pieces of megalithic work that you can find anywhere in much you picked you it features a quite astonishing collection of just curved and flowing blocks that seem to form in with the native rock that's here there's no access allowed into this specific area today they've got it roped off but if you dig back through some archival photographs we can find some indications of what the work in here looks like note the protruding cylindrical shape the same thing we see in the urban area I'm not sure you can attribute this to any form of rafter system given it's in a cave and there is also something in here that I can only describe as looking like the in - etana stone or a hitching post stone although I'm not quite sure if that makes sense given this isn't really open to the sky another notable megalithic construction in the urban area is what Hiram Bingham called the best made wall in all of much' pics you I think its location being right in the middle of the urban area is a great example of the contrast and the quite clearly different levels of Technology involved in the different building styles again my impression of this whole urban area is that it's been constructed on top of what well may have been an earlier megalithic construction throughout this area and as well as throughout other parts of much' picture you can find water channels that have been carved into the stone in some cases these water channels are still running and most of the quality of the stone work here is quite high as you go around and look inside many of these houses you'll find other blocks that have clearly been carved to be part of this watering system these channels are quite narrow and interestingly hiram bingham really thought that there wasn't enough water here to support a large population which is perhaps one reason why the site was abandoned by the Inca well before the Spanish arrived on the continent he traced the origin of this water back to some springs that is perhaps a mile away along the mountainside but he didn't think there was enough water here to support a large population there also seems to be a system of underground channels that are used to move water because you'll find these channels emerging out of like the side of blocks that are underground at high levels and some of them are still running with water in a few places you can find these indications of what must be a deeper layer architecture and much have picked you several of the structures in this urban area also have stone basins and again you can find many of these carved channel blocks lying almost randomly around the place perhaps as a result of some form of destruction on the site stepping back to the macro view of much you picture one of the dominating features of all of the iconic imagery of this site is Juana picture which is the very steep mountain that sort of sits in the background and looms over the city itself it's also had a lot of work done to it there is a path that has been carved into the mountainside to get up there as well as several terraced areas and even a couple of the similar type of gabled and dwelling structures up there as you can see there are people all over this it is a special ticket if you go too much it picked you and you want to climb Juana picked you it's not for the faint of heart it's very steep it's a fairly rigorous climb and it does require a special ticket to be able to get up there it takes probably half the day to get up and then come back down from wanna picture as you could imagine in hiram bingham time this mountain was completely overgrown there was no indication of a path or of any of the work that we can see up there today as most of one a picture has actually been cleared in our modern times there's a an amazing account of assistant topographer Heald who was one of the members of Horan binghams team as he attempted over several days to get to the peak of picked you and investigated he had a really close scrape with death and I want to tell that story from Hiram binghams book as I read this the footage that you'll see in the background is of another area that you can go to so if you want it if you don't want to climb quiner picked you but you kind of want a taste of some of those steep edges and drop-offs and a little bit of hiking away from much it picked you you can get to an area known as the inca bridge this is over the back if you like away the opposite direction from Piner picks you there's a trail that takes a few minutes to get to and it culminates with this just incredible part of an inca trail that's carved into what is just an absolutely sheer precipice in this giant granite wall on a mountain site you'll see this trail marked by the green vegetation line along the sheer wall of the cliff and it's it's quite amazing to imagine people going back and forth on this trail the last part of this trail that is available to tourists before you get to what is a locked wooden gate preventing people from going out onto the inca bridge itself also has a very steep drop off to the right and it does take a little bit of screwing up if your courage to go out there particularly if you have any fear of heights reading now from assistant topographer heald's account of his climb of hawaiian apicture as reported in hiram bingham book quote quiner picked you lying to the north of machu piccu and connected with it by a narrow neck rises some 2,500 feet above the Urim bomba river which runs around its base on one side the south this elevation is reached by what is practically one complete precipice on the other while there are Shira sense there are also slopes and according to the account of one Arteaga who claims to have explored the forests which cover a good deal of it was once cultivated the slopes being converted into level fields by low earth terraces my first trip to reach the summit of wana picked you and to ascertain what ruins if any were on it ended in failure the only man who had been up RTA ger who lives at mandal Pampa was drunk and refused to go with me so I decided to try and find a way without his help I knew where his bridge crossed the Ihram bamboo river and where he had started up when he went the year before with these two things to help me I thought that I could very likely find as much as he had accordingly I started with four peons and Thomas conveners the soldier to have a look the river was passed easily on the rather shaky 4-pole bridge and we started off the slope cutting steps as we went for it was almost vertically about 30 feet up it moderated however and after that while it was steep we seldom had to cut steps for more than 20 to 30 feet on a stretch the greatest hindrance was the cane and long grass through which it was hard to cut away with the machetes our progress slow at first got absolutely snail-like as the men got tired so getting impatient I resolved to push on alone telling him to follow the marks of my machete and charging Thomas to see that they made a good trail and did not loaf I pushed on up the hill clearing my way with the machete or down on all fours following a bear trail of which there were many stopping occasionally to open my shirt at the throat and cool off as it was terribly hot the brush through which I made my way was in great part Mesquite terribly tough and with heavy strong thorns if a branch was not cut through it one blow it was pretty sure to come whipping back and drive half a dozen spikes into hands arms and body luckily I had enough practice to learn how to strike with a heavy shoulder blow and for the most part made clean strokes but I didn't get away untouched by any means finally about 3 p.m. I had almost gained at the top of the lowest part of the ridge which runs along like the back plates of some spined dinosaur the trees had given way to grass or bare rock the face of the rock being practically vertical a cliff some 200 feet high stood in my way by going out to the end of the ridge I thought I could look almost straight down to the river which looked more like a trap broker than a river at that distance though its roar in the rapids came up distinctly I was just climbing out on top of the lowest back plate when the grass and soil under my feet let go and I dropped for about 20 feet there was a slope of about 70 degrees and then a jump of some 200 feet after which it would be bump and repeat down to the as I shot down the sloping surface I reached out and with my right hand grasped a mesquite branch that was growing in a crack about five feet above the jump-off I was going so fast that it jerked my arm up and as my body was turning pulled me from my side to my face also the jerk broke the ligaments holding the outer ends of the clavicle and scapula together the strength left the arm with the tearing loose of the ligaments but I had checked enough to give me a chance to get hold of a branch with my left hand after hanging for a moment or two so as to look everything over and to be sure that I did nothing wrong I started to work back up the hardest part was to get my feet on the trunk of the little tree to which I was holding on the fact that I was wearing moccasins instead of boots helped a great deal here as they would take hold of the rock it was distressingly slow work but after about half an hour I had gotten back to comparatively safe footing as my right arm was almost useless I at once made my way down getting back to camp about 5:30 taking the workman with me as I went on this trip I saw no sign of inca work except one small ruined wall end quote about a week later mr. healed did actually go back up and he did conquer the top of wanna picture this time with the help of his drunken mate Artur Hagar and although there doesn't seem to be any real megalithic work up here the fact that the Inka came up here and still used this area to do as much farming as they could perhaps as a signal station or a small outpost for a somebody to look out or something like that it's just remarkable these people who were truly mountain goats I think and this tale from hiram bingham book really reads like it should be something in there cliffhanger movie or out of an Indiana Jones movie I think he would be much more deserving of that title than our modern-day pampered archaeologists like mr. Hawass let's now turn to some of the features of the megalithic core of much of picture which is personally my favorite place on all of the site these walls and structures are the products of some true masters of stonework and I also think there is some evidence for restoration and rebuilding work by the Inka here on one of these main walls you can see that there's been some sinkage in the ground that has caused the whole structure to tilt over although it hasn't toppled over entirely which i think is testament to the earthquake-proof nature of a lot of this megalithic construction one of the more interesting aspects of this area is what's known as the temple of the three windows hiram bingham thought that these three windows were quite significant and that it might have had a connection to the legend of the Inka origins that was the story that I read out in part 1 of this series this detailed three brothers leading the tribes to Cusco and that the rise of the Inca as a civilization and as the story goes they led those tribes by exiting through three windows or three caves and he thought that this could be that place that mythical origin place of the Inca themselves he detailed this connection extensively in his book and he planned to try and settle the debate as to whether or not this was in fact this mythical origin location for the Inka I think he was most likely incorrect on this I don't think this was the origin point for the Incas much a picture is north of Cusco and most evidence today suggests that the Inka originated from the southwest of Cusco in the direction of Lake Titicaca and tiwanaku which is in modern-day Bolivia quoting Hiram Bingham from his book quote the fact that one of the most important buildings was marked by three large windows a rare feature in Peruvian architecture and that many of the other buildings had windows added to the significant circumstance that the city was located in the most inaccessible part of the Andes inclined me to feel that there was a chance that much you picked you might prove to be Tampa taco that mythical place from which the Incas had come when they started out to found cusco and to make the beginnings of that great empire which was to embrace a large part of south America end quote that's quite a single sentence there mr. Bingham one of the reasons that I'm not sure about this connection is that in this wall there appears to be more than three windows on one side of it you can see that there are more than three of these actual window frames if you like but we still have stones inside the frames it may well be the case that there were originally stones in these open windows much like there are in the windows on either side of it that are blocked up it's possible that the Inka remove them at some point in fact Hiram Bingham actually notes this same feature that there are some windows that appear to be blocked up and you can see this quite clearly from the backside of the wall he makes note of this on the caption to this photograph quote an exterior view of part of the temple of the three windows showing the location of a formal window which was filled up at some time in the past when it was considered suitable to reduce the number of windows in this remarkable structure from five to three tradition says that the Incas ancestors came out of three caves or windows end quote walking away from this central megalithic area you ascend some staircases to get to what is the highest point at all of much apicture itself and here we find one of the most interesting pieces of stonework on all of the site the hitching post of the Sun or the in - etana stone quoting Hiram Bingham again quote the place to which the Sun is tied on top of the beautifully terraced hill behind this temple is a stone generally agreed to be and into etana stone or sundial the intuit onna being the quote placed to which the Sun is tied end quote similar stones were found by the Spanish conquerors in Cusco P sack and allanté Tambo end quote now some people seem to think that this is a sundial other people seem to think that it's a marker for the solstices however I think the best explanation for what this is is as a marker for the equinoxes while the four faces of this stone do mark the cardinal directions of north south east and west what's quite remarkable is that on the equinoxes when the Sun is over the top of the stone it casts no shadow at all and this is only possible because the top of the stone is the top part of it is angled very slightly it has a 13 and 1/2 degree tilt to it this matches the latitude of much you've picked you which is located at around 13 and a half degrees south on the globe this is a very interesting connection to me because it marks the celestial event of the equinoxes twice a year when the day and the night or the length of the day and the night is equal on those days and because the tilt of this rock matches the latitude of the location of Machu Picchu this stone casts no shadow and I'm fairly convinced that this isn't accidental it seems to me that this is somewhat of a contradiction to the mainstream story of the origins for Machu Picchu which states that this whole place was built as a refuge for patchy cutie and then abandoned within around 80 years so was this place just a refuge for their royalty or was it perhaps something more significant a solar observatory used for longer periods of time it seems possible that this stone is part of a much larger carving if you look at the edges of the platform that the into Itano stone sits on it seems to be all part of one just huge piece of Han and putter architecture in order to mark the equinoxes and to get the degree of this stone exactly right you either need to know exactly where much of picture is on the globe and you have to know the latitude so you can get that tilt right or you have to know exactly what the date of the equinoxes is so that you can carve your stone or at least mark out where it should be when the sun's overhead it's something of a chicken and egg problem you have to have a fairly sophisticated understanding of the movement of the heavens and how those movements of the heavens work relative to where you are on the ground as Bingham said there are other examples of Intuit honest tones and one is still standing at pisac all of the others were destroyed by the Spanish naturally because they thought it was some form of a cult pagan worship and went against their faith so should therefore be eradicated although the into etana stone at much of picture used to be opened for tourists to touch and to look at closely today its roped off you can't really get that close to it this stone was damaged in the year 2000 by of all things the filming of a beer commercial and apparently according to the story a thousand-pound crane actually fell on the into etana stone and it chipped off a section of one of its edges which led to some significant protests by their local people I think very well founded protests this is definitely not the type of thing we should be doing to these types of sites I think we should be preserving and protecting them and making them available for research in the future the last thing I wanted to cover here was just some tips and advice on how you might structure a day should you want to visit much who picked you I've been to this site a couple of times myself and it can be something of a tourist trap if you aren't prepared or you haven't done enough planning just given the number of people that come here ever since they had the revolution in Egypt it seemed like much who Picchu replaced the pyramids for a lot of people and for the last couple of decades it feels like this place has been sort of crammed to the rafters with tourists it is Peru's number-one tourist destination so if ever you're planning a trip to Peru and you want to visit this site my advice would be to structure the whole trip around the dates that you can get your tickets too much a picture so within whatever window you want to travel the first thing you should do is look for your tickets too much' picture you also at that point want to choose the train time so that the main thing that works around this is the tickets that you can get on the train that takes you up to aguas calientes from al ante Tambo it's a beautiful train journey takes a couple of hours goes down through the jungle then ascends up to the mountains but my advice would be to get the earliest train ticket you can it's a it's a very early start in some cases but if you can catch that first train or a couple of the earliest trains that's the best way to see much you picked you get there early get up to the site early take the earliest bus you can get into the site and and get away from the entrance and you're going to have a few hours at least where you're avoiding most of the hoards because by you know eleven o'clock towards lunchtime the site will be at maximum capacity for the rest of the day and if you can stay ahead of where people are you're going to have a better experience unfortunately I believe these days that is pretty much of a one-way journey through much of picture the times that I've been there previously you were pretty much free to roam all over the site but they're fairly strict now about trying to keep the flow of people going in one direction which is a little unfortunate but there are some areas where you can kind of escape the the overview of the hawkish inspectors and I'd encourage you to do that wherever you can push the boundaries a little bit obviously treat the site with respect but don't be afraid of them tweeting a whistle at you they do it all day long definitely take some food and some water with you in a backpack when you go there is a concession stand or some food sales up at much of picture itself although typically being the captive audience that it is it's quite expensive toilet papers not a bad idea either you generally have to pay for that sort of thing as you go at much you've picked you and there are restrooms available up there as well and then the last recommendation that I have is that if you're in any way in decent physical shape I'd recommend walking back down for much you picked you to aguas calientes you probably want to take the bus on the way up it's a fairly strenuous hike up but you can take the inca trail down and walk back to aguas calientes I think from memory it takes a couple of hours it's a steep trail down there's a lot of steps down but it's quite a lovely journey through the jungle and looking at all of the surrounding landscape and then you get back to aguas calientes I also wouldn't be afraid of booking a later train ticket home aguas calientes is a nice little tourist town there are quite a number of bars and restaurants and just cool little areas to hang out there's a lot of shops where you can buy stuff and after a day at much' picked you it's nice to hang out there and have a couple drinks and just relax a bit before you catch your train back to town any trip to Peru really should include a visit too much who picked you and the train tickets and the tickets to the site itself are difficult to get so those are the ones you want to get well in advance and then for me I'd be structuring my whole trip around those dates around the dates that I want to be at to picture in general as cliche as it sounds it really is one of my favorite places in Peru it's just such a beautiful and picturesque environment and I think the world really has a gift in much a picture it's that rarest of discoveries like King Tut's tomb it's something that comes to us from ancient times that has somehow escaped the destruction of of subsequent civilizations so let's continue to respect and preserve this amazing place so that we might also be able to continue to study it and then hopefully uncover its secret past thanks for watching well hey that's it that wraps up my machu picchu series and yes this is one of those series that I have actually managed to to complete please do let me know what you think about much you picture or if you have any questions about the site down there in the comments section I'm going to start doing fairly regular Q&A videos where I'll go and select questions from YouTube comments from patreon messages and from emails and take some time to answer all of those also as usual I really want to express my thanks to everybody that supports Uncharted X and supports the channel via the value for value model you guys are what makes this possible if you like what I'm doing or you you're interested in supporting the channel there's lots of ways to do that it's all outlined at uncharted XCOM slash support I hope that everyone is finding a way to navigate safely through these strange times that we're all living in and that you're all doing well I'm going to keep doing what I'm doing here I've got a few things planned for the coming weeks so until then I'll see you all in the next video Cheers

Channel: UnchartedX

Views: 143,918

Keywords: megalithic, granite, peru, Bolivia, Giza, Technology, ancient aliens, Ancient, History, Egyptology, graham hancock, Underground, Catacombs, Caves, Tunnels, Roman, Masonry, brien forester, younger dryas, comet, evidence, science, scientific, dynastic, joe rogan, documentary, national geographic, animals, Inca, Inca empire, archaeology, Andes mountains, Picchu, machu picchu, architecture, testament, why was it built, inka, intipunku, sun gate, UNESCO world heritage site, scenic, tour, travel, 4K, tourism

Id: 31SFLloQ-hU

Length: 46min 41sec (2801 seconds)

Published: Tue Apr 14 2020