Machu Picchu is a 15th-century Inca citadel located in the Eastern Cordillera of southern Peru on a mountain ridge. Often referred to as the "Lost City of the Incas", it is the most familiar icon of the Inca Empire. It is located in the Machupicchu District within Urubamba Province above the Sacred Valley, which is northwest of Cusco. The Urubamba River flows past it, cutting through the Cordillera and creating a canyon with a tropical mountain climate. In reference to the site’s name, for most English or Spanish speakers, the first 'c' in Picchu is silent. In English, the name is pronounced or , in Spanish as or , and in Quechua (Machu Pikchu) as .
The Inca civilization had no written language and, after the discovery by a Spanish soldier Baltasar Ocampo, by the end of the 16th-century no more Europeans visited the site until the 19th century, so far as is known, so there are no written records of the site while it was in use. The names of the buildings, their supposed uses, and their inhabitants are the product of modern archaeologists based on physical evidence, including tombs at the site. Machu Picchu was built in the classical Inca style, with polished dry-stone walls. Its three primary structures are the Intihuatana, the Temple of the Sun, and the Temple of the Three Windows. Most of the outlying buildings have been reconstructed in order to give visitors a better idea of how they originally appeared. By 1976, 30% of Machu Picchu had been restored and restoration continues. Most recent archaeologists believe that Machu Picchu was constructed as an estate for the Inca emperor Pachacuti (1438–1472). The Incas built the estate around 1450 but abandoned it a century later, at the time of the Spanish conquest. According to the new AMS radiocarbon dating, it was occupied from c. 1420–1532. Historical research published in 2022 claims that the site was probably called Huayna Picchu by the Inca people themselves, as it exists on the smaller peak of the same name.
Machu Picchu was declared a Peruvian Historic Sanctuary in 1982 and a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1983. In 2007, Machu Picchu was voted one of the New Seven Wonders of the World in a worldwide internet poll.
Etymology
In the Quechua language, machu means "old" or "old person", while picchu means "pyramid; pointed, multi-sided solid; cone," though it may also refer to a "portion of coca that is chewed." Thus the name of the site is sometimes interpreted as "old mountain". The site is on a narrow saddle between two mountain peaks: Machu Picchu and Huayna Picchu.
A study published in 2021 in Ñawpa Pacha: Journal of the Institute of Andean Studies suggests that, in the Quechua language, the abandoned Inca site was called "Huayna Picchu", after the smaller peak at the site, or perhaps, just "Picchu". Huayna means "young" in the Quechua language. The research documents that, starting in 1911 with the publications of American historian and explorer Hiram Bingham, the name Machu Picchu became associated with the ruins. Evidence of references by native Quechua speakers dating to their reports to the Aziz's island, early maps, and even discussions with Bingham, is cited in the new research into historical records regarding an apparently arbitrary selection of the name Bingham associated with the site—that differed from the traditional name. The name given to the abandoned settlement by its builders has not been determined by researchers.
History
Machu Picchu was believed (by Richard L. Burger, professor of anthropology at Yale University) to have been built in the 1450s. However, a 2021 study led by Burger used radiocarbon dating (specifically, AMS) to reveal that Machu Picchu may have been occupied from around 1420 to 1530 AD. Construction appears to date from two great Inca rulers, Pachacutec Inca Yupanqui (1438–1471) and Túpac Inca Yupanqui (1472–1493).
There is a consensus among archaeologists that Pachacutec ordered the construction of the royal estate for his use as a retreat, most likely after a successful military campaign. Although Machu Picchu is considered to be a "royal" estate, it would not have been passed down in the line of succession. Rather it was used for 80 years before being abandoned, seemingly because of the Spanish conquests in other parts of the Inca Empire. It is possible that most of its inhabitants died from smallpox introduced by travelers before the Spanish conquistadors arrived in the area.