Buena Vista, Peru

Buena Vista is a roughly 8 hectare (20 acre) archaeological site located in the Chillon River Valley north of Lima, Peru. The site was first excavated by Frederic Engel (1987). He obtained radiocarbon dates that pertained to the Early Preceramic Period (9700+/-200 uncalibrated radiocarbon years before present), and to the Early Intermediate Period (1960+/-80 uncalibrated radiocarbon years before present).

In 2006, archaeologist Robert Benfer of the University of Missouri announced the discovery of a 4200 year old observatory at Buena Vista. Named the "Temple of the Fox" by archaeologists, the observatory is located atop a small pyramid. Features of the temple's construction produce alignments that mark that the summer and winter solsticesBenfer (2006)] Benfer et al. (2006)] . Radiocarbon dating of organic materials recovered from sealed contexts within the temple resulted in an age of ca. 2200 cal B.C. This date makes the Temple of the Fox the oldest observatory presently known in the Americas.

External links

* [http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2006/05/observatory-peru.html National Geographic story]

Notes

References

*Harvard reference
author=Benfer, R. A.
year=2006
title=Were Constellation Alignments Used to Orient Early Peruvian Monumental Architecture?
periodical=71st Annual Meeting of the Society for American Archaeology
issue=
*Harvard reference
author=Benfer, R. A., Jr., Ojeda, B., Duncan, N. A., Ludeña, H., Vallejos, M., Adkins, L. R., Rojas, V., Ocas, A., Ventacilla, O., Villarreal, G. & Ramírez, M.
year=2006
title=Los Alineamientos Astronómicos y esculturas más tempranos del Perú en el sitio de Buena Vista
periodical=V Simposio Internacional de Arqueología: Procesos y Expresiones de Poder, Identidad, y Orden Tempranos en Sudamérica
issue=