Tiahuanaco is the most impressive of many sites of ancient ruins in
Bolivia. With a history of 3000 years and evidence for an asiatic connection,
Tiahuanaco is thought to be the birthplace of civilization in the Americas.
I hope you enjoy my photos of Tiahuanaco. Or is that Tiahuanacu, Tiajuanacu or
Tianjuanaco?
I don't know, but it's possible to find a lot of different spellings, and I
don't think there's any consensus on which might be correct.
Tiahuanaco is a large, sprawling set of ruins about 50 miles west of La Paz.
Although many of the relics and statues are now scattered to various museums
around the world, the walls and remaining statues, as well as it's history, are
fascinating and well worth a visit.
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Some people at Tiahuanaco had holes cut into their skull and lived to tell
about it. Skulls with such holes, and signs of healing have been found here.
The elite class at Tiahuanaco were identifiable at a glance. From birth,
children of the elite had straps tightly wrapped around their skulls,
eventually deforming and elonging them to about twice the normal length of a
human skull. Pretty bizarre.
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This is the Gate of the Sun. Like the Incans, these people that preceded them
also were reasonably advanced astronomers, capable of accurately predicting
the vernal equinox.
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There are still a number of very large, beautiful stone sculptures at
Tiahuanaco. Engravings around the circumference are still not understood.
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