Cuzco is the archaeological capital of the Americas and the continent's
oldest continuously inhabited city. Cuzco also used to be the capital
of the Inca Empire (the Inca called it
Qosqo) and the "belly button of the world".
Historians see Cuzco as the archaeological capital of the Americas.
Massive Inca-built stone walls line most of Cuzco's central streetsand
form the foundations of colonial and modern buildings. Since
theInca-architecture was too solid to destroy, the Spaniards simply
puttheir own houses on top of the Inca buildings and robbed all the
gold.
Nowadays Cuzco is the capital of its department and has about250,000
inhabitants. The city is situated in the southern Andes at 3326metres
above sea level, just south of the beautiful Valle Sagrado, the Sacred Valley
of the Inca's.
At walking distance from Cuzco, in the surrounding mountains,lies the
(probably religious) Inca site Sacsayhuáman, which means
Falcon's Nest. This is a jewel of Inca architecture. The remaining
buildings were made with massive stones. Some stones are as heavy as an
entire jumbojet! It is a mystery how the Inca's managed to get those
stones up here. It must have taken at least 20,000 people to pull
stones like that from their place.
