The North Countries – Part IV

Continued from the previous post regarding the north countries of the Nephites, and their relationship to the north lands of Andean Peru.

“The Lamanites did come upon us with exceedingly great power, insomuch that they did frighten my armies; therefore they would not fight, and they began to retreat towards the north countries” (Mormon 2:3)

Now, as the Nephites under Mormon’s command retreated further into the “north countries,” they would have encountered an area today called La Congoña of the Chachapoyas culture that was built of stone and placed symmetrically with clay amalgam located in an area of humid forest in the central Andes at an altitude of 9300-feet, about 50 miles northeast of Chiclayo, 80 miles north and a little west of Cajamarca, and 95 miles west and a little north of Kuélap, which was another formidable mountain fortress.
     Though the true dating is unknown, archaeologists have considered the questionable dating they use that is much later than the Nephites, though the fortress is claimed to have been built in the Middle Horizon period, which pre-Hispanic Andean scholar, archaeologist and anthropologist John Howland Rowe, places at 500 AD. The interesting description about the site was its isolated location and most importantly that it was built as a military fort for defense. 
    Not much is known about the Chachapoyas or when they dominated the north country but their culture left a significant number of large stone monuments, such as Kuélap, Purum (Purumllaqta), and Cerro Olán, the latter a hilltop stronghold with 500 buildings placed along a half moon shape. These “Warriors of the Clouds,” so named byh others because their cities were hill or mountain-top fortresses built high up in the cloud forests of the Andes toward the central and eastern reaches of the land. In fact, the Quechuan name “Chachapoya” itself means “Cloud Forest.”
    Located about 340 miles north of Lima, their territory encompassed the basin 150 miles long by 60 miles wide within the triangular region on the eastern flank of the Andes formed by the confluence of the Marañón River and the Utcubamba in Bagua Providnce up to the basin of the Abiseo River where the Gran Pajáten is located. In fact, the archaeological site of Gran Pajáten sits on a hilltop above the Montecristo River valley, and consists of a series of at least 26 circular stone structures atop numerous terraces and stairways, occupying an area of about 65,617 square feet. The principal buildings are decorated with slate mosaics which ceramic samples and radiocarbon dates show that the area was occupied as early as 200 BC., and ceramic technology existed much earlier. According to archaeologists, this site was first developed as a hill-top fortress to defend against enemy incursions from the south.

Hill-top fortresses commanding 360º views of the approaches marked the Chachapoya hill-top fortresses

Another site in this area is Gran Saposa, a series of cloud forest ruins that includes hundreds of round stone structures and covers approximately 80 square miles, and was home to about 20,000 occupants. Another was Atumpucro is a complex of over a hundred and fifty circular Chachapoya-stye buildings within an impressive stone fortification, similar to the Kuélap fortress, and perched on Atumpucro hill along the western shores of the Utcubamba River in the province of Luya. The city extends for more than two hectares, at an altitude of over 11,000 feet with the structures built on large terraces dug along the ridge of the mountain, with the old city surrounded by a wall 165 feet long and ten feet wide, with the complex described as being in a good state of preservation.

High walls with extremely narrow entrances mark the perfect arrangement for a easily defended fortress

There were many other pre-Columbian and pre-historic sites located in northern Peru, both along the coast and within the interior highlands of which their remains have been uncovered in surviving pyramids, buildings, and the ruins of their culture.
    Just about everyone who knows of Peru, has heard of Machu Picchu, and to a lesser extent, Pachacamac, Nazca, Kuélap and other large tourist attractions; however, the hundreds of other sites are far less known or visited, nor today the object of archaeological study and field work. Occasionally a new site is located, such as the massive Llanganates pyramid about fifty miles south of Quito and 20 miles northeast of Banos de Agua Santa (near Ambato), in the remote jungles of Ecuador, Ecuador, standing 260-feet tall and 260-feet wide made up of hundreds of two-ton stone blocks with the possibility of additional similar constructions over a square mile, claimed to have been built prior to 500 BC. Bruce Fenton, an Ecuador-based Briton and researcher into the region’s indigenous cultures, and Benoit Duverneuil, a French-American archaeologist, believe the site could contain a city, perhaps the size of Machu Picchu, and much older than 500 BC. “This could be one of the biggest archaeological discoveries ever,” Fenton said of the site. “It would be huge. We just don’t have structures of this type and size in this part of the world.”

Left: The huge stone pyramid in the Llanganates National Forest; Right: The Hummingbird Pyramid near La Maná, which are only two of the many discoveries made in the jungles of Ecuador that go unnoticed by archaeologists

At 8,500 feet above sea level and in cloud forest where it rans most of the time, the precise extent of the structure and the possible wider development has not yet been gauged. The actual shape of the structure cannot be determined because it is covered by mud and vegetation, but it is massive and definitely man-made, ready for extensive excavation, study and evaluation. Unfortunately, Ecuador’s archaeological ruins attract a limited number of tourists and government spending is limited. Or the recently discovered Hummingbird Pyramid and megalithic ruins that was uncovered just south of La Maná, Ecuador, along the Calopoe River, when road workers set of a dynamite blast that uncovered the pyramid.
    However, the extensive archaeological work accomplished by BYU and other North American groups in Mesoamerica, have seldom, if ever, ventured into South America, with only a few European archaeologists working in the Andean area. As a result, the work being done down there is mostly by Peruvian or Ecuadorian archaeologists and the press coverage of such work is seldom of major interest in North America.
    Consequently, the largest and oldest pre-historic sites ever uncovered in the Americas, in fact the entire Western Hemisphere, are seldom known, and their artifacts seldom reach museums in the United States—mostly kept in Peru, Ecuador and Chile, though some have made their way into European museums. This has led to, over the years, so many theorists making the claim that those who find Andean South America the location of the Land of Promise have no “evidence,” no “artifacts,” no important discoveries.
    What is also interesting is that while Peru and Bolivia have experienced some archaeological work, especially Peru, Ecuador, Colombia and Chile have had very little work done, undoubtedly making this area one of the most neglected territories archaeologically speaking. According to many archaeologists, it is in these countries where most of South America’s ancient ancestors’ treasures are hidden.
    It is also interesting to know that while North American archaeologists claim they have found arrowheads that date to approximately 10,000 B.C., these same non-building evidences (such as bones and charcoal) existing in South America date to 16,500 B.C., at Monte Verde in southern Chile (Mark Rose, “The Importance of Monte Verde,” Archaeology, Archaeological Institute of America, October 18,1999). This is seven thousand years older than the previous dates of the Clovis of North America at 9500 B.C. In fact, nothing dates in North America before 10,000 B.C. (Please note that we are using the established carbon dates used by geologists and other scientists in order to show earlier and later periods—the actual dates would be much different, but the differences in dates would not be affected; that is, 16,500 is much older than 10,000, irrespective as to what the actual scaled-down calendar dates would be in accurate measurement).

The many different cultures that anthropologists claim existed during the Jaredite and Nephite time period throughout Andean Peru; however, they have ignored the many relationships that tie these groups together

Yet, using settlement structures and not a scattering of arrowheads, but actual ruins of major developments, Huaca Prieta, north of Lima, dates to 5800 B.C., Sechin Bajo, Ancash, Peru, dates to 3600 B.C., Huaricanga (in the Fortaleza Valley, dates to 3500 BC, Caral-Supe dates to 3300 B.C., and predated the Mesoamerican Olmec (1200 BC) civilization by nearly two millennia (Charles Mann, 1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus, Vintage Books, 2006, pp199-212).
    The oldest mine ever found in the Americas is an iron oxide mine near Taital in northern Chile that marks the oldest evidence of organized mining ever found in the Western Hemisphere, dated to 10,000 B.C., and the Huentelauquen culture, who extracted 700 cubic meters and 2,000 tons of rock were extracted. Carbon dates for charcoal and shells found in the mine suggest is was used continually for some 1500 years, and then again in 2300 B.C. (Diego Salazar et al., Current Anthropology, Vol.552, No.3, June, 2011). Compare with the oldest copper mine in North America dated between 2500 B.C. and 600 B.C. (University of Chicago Press Journals, Science Daily, 20 May 2011).
(See the next post, “The North Countries – Part V,” for more about the Peruvian north countries and its relationship to the events of Mormon’s eventual retreat toward Cumorah)