City of Machu Picchu

City of Machu Picchu. Central highlands, Peru. Inka. c. 1450–1540 C.E. Granite (architectural complex).

• It was built as a royal estate for the first Inka emperor, Pachacuti Inka Yupanqui, in the middle of the 15th century. It was intended as a place where the Inka emperor and his family could host feasts, perform religious ceremonies, and administer the affairs of empire, while also establishing a claim to land that would be owned by his lineage after his death.
• The site was chosen and situated for its relationship to the Andean landscape, including sight lines to other mountain peaks which have long been considered ancestral deities throughout the Andes.
• The site contains housing for elites, retainers, and maintenance staff; religious shrines, fountains, and terraces. 
• The site features architecture, from houses to terraces, built by carefully fitting individual stones against each other. Terraces were a common element of highland agriculture. 
• They increased the arable land surface and reduced erosion by creating walled steps down the sides of steep mountains. Each step could then be planted with crops. Terracing took advantage of the landscape and provided some sustenance for the emperor and his entourage during his visits, as well as producing ritually-important maize crops. 
• Water management at the site was crucial, and throughout Machu Picchu a system of stone channels drains water from rainfall and from a spring near the site. 
• The walls were built of stones that had been individually shaped to fit closely with one another, rather than being shaped into similar units; protection against earthquakes. Entryways were in the unique Inka shape of a trapezoid, rather than a rectangle. 
• The emperor and his retinue would only reside at Machu Picchu for part of the year. Graves at Machu Picchu have yielded evidence that many of the yanaconas there were craftspeople, including metalsmiths, who came from all over the empire. The ability to command people across the empire and to oblige them to work for the Inka nobility was an expression of imperial power. 
• The buildings of Machu Picchu clearly show the social divisions of the site, with most of the high-status residential buildings in a cluster to the northeast. The emperor himself lived in a separate compound at the southwest of the site, indicating his unique status as the ruler
• Lived near observatory, emphasizing the relationship between the elites, religious ritual, and astronomical observation, including Pachacuti’s claim as both a descendant of the sun (whom the Inka called Inti) and the sun himself.
• The number of religious structures at Machu Picchu is high: elevation meant for rituals, communication with gods.