Mummies discovered

last updated 8 January 2015

Lima, Peru

Archaeologists uncovered a rare collection of Incan mummies on the outskirts of Lima last week. City authorities had invited the researchers to inspect a corner of a vast, ancient cemetery, where construction was about to begin on a new highway. In what archaeologist Guillermo Cock called a “lucky find,” the teams uncovered 26 unusually intact tombs tucked into a barren hillside. Inside were adult and child mummies dating from 1472 to 1532, along with pots, corn, beans, and coca typically used in the funeral rites of middle-class Incas of the period. The city will delay the road work until the artifacts can be moved to a museum.