One of the world’s most mysterious archaeological sites lies approximately eight thousand feet above sea level in the Peruvian Andes Mountains and a good fifty, nearly inaccessible, miles from the nearest city of any size.  More questions than answers abound regarding the legendary Lost City of the Incas, Machu Picchu—the Old Peak.

We do know it was built by the Incas around 1430, around 70 years prior to the wide-scale arrival of Western Europeans in the New World, including French, English, and Portuguese intruders but principally Spanish explorers, missionaries, and conquistadores.  We know it was built in the classic Inca style, utilizing dry-stone walls and block-style construction.  And we know that less than a century after it was completed, Machu Picchu lay essentially abandoned.

Why was it built—to what purpose?  One prevalent theory is that it was built as a sanctuary or temple to house “The Virgins of the Sun,” chosen young women in service to the Incan gods.  Research has also supported the theory that the city was built as an imperial residence for the Inca chief Pachacuti; alternatively, some speculate that it might have been used as a prison for particularly violent offenders, due to its remote and relatively inaccessible location.

As big a mystery as the purpose of the structure is, so is the answer to the question of why the site was abandoned by the Incas less than a hundred years after its construction.  Speculation centers on the possibility the community was wiped out by smallpox, but no one is certain.  The Spanish evidently knew nothing of Machu Picchu’s existence, as there is no mention of the place in any of the journals and reports of the time, and the site had not been raided by the conquistadores based on the amount of archaeological treasure recovered in the early 20^th century explorations of the area.  There was no mention of the city in Incan literature, because the Incans had not developed the art of writing.

For most of the ensuing four centuries, the site was abandoned.  Mother Nature began reclaiming the area, although the buildings were used from time to time by itinerant natives.  Knowledge of the site faded away until the explorations of Mr. Hiram Bingham in 1911.

Bingham, the son of a missionary and born in Hawaii, was a lecturer in South American history at Yale University.  He traveled extensively throughout the continent from 1908; in 1911, he wrote a book describing his discoveries and observations in the not-so-pithily titled Across South America; an account of a journey from Buenos Aires to Lima by way of Potosí, with notes on Brazil, Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, and Peru.

Bingham returned to the continent in 1911 with the Yale Peruvian Expedition.  On 24 July, a local native of the Urubamba River valley, Melchor Arteaga, led Bingham and his team to the Machu Picchu site.  Upon his return to the States, Bingham proclaimed he had “discovered” the Incan lost city.

History seems very tolerant of the claims of “discovery” of lands and areas previously or even currently occupied by aboriginal proples.  Columbus’s “discovery” of America, Père Jacques Marquette’s “discovery” of the Mississippi River, Bingham’s “discovery” of Machu Picchu… how can one claim to have “discovered” a site that he was led by the hand to, as in Bingham’s case?

Regardless of his claim, Bingham certainly did popularize the site in the eyes of the world.  Machu Picchu is now one of the most visited sites in South America, largely due to his best-selling 1948 book, Lost City of the Incas.  The road leading to the site is called the Bingham Highway; the deluxe train running from the city of Cusco to Machu Picchu is named after him as well.  But Bingham’s expeditions were not without incident; Peru has sued Yale University for the return of some 40,000 artifacts Bingham removed from Machu Picchu.  The issue is still under judication today.

As a postscript to the story, Hiram Bingham was quite a character besides his amateur archaeological exploits.  He married Alfreda Mitchell in 1899; Mitchell was the granddaughter of Charles Tiffany of jewelry fame.  In 1924 the Republican Bingham was elected Governor of Connecticut; one month later he was elected to take the Senate seat of Frank Brandegee, who had committed suicide.  Bingham served one day as Governor, resigned, and then assumed his duties as Senator.

Senator Bingham became involved in a questionable arrangement with a lobbyist he retained on his staff.  After a series of investigations, the Senate voted to issue him a resolution of censure, 55-24 in 1929; his Senate career ended when he failed to win reelection in the Democratic landslide of 1932.  He was appointed chairman of the Civil Service Commission’s Loyalty Review Board in 1951; he retained that post until 1953, during the heyday of Senator Joseph McCarthy’s “witch hunts” of suspected Communists in government.

Many people believe that Hiram Bingham was the prototype for the Stephen Spielberg movie character Indiana Jones.