Why Peru Was Built This Way

According to Delsi Espinoza, everything the Incas did was strategic. The Cusco-born archaeologist is showing us around Tambomachay, a ceremonial site known for its sophisticated waterworks, when she pulls out a sheet of paper and begins sketching a series of lines. Her drawing represents the Ceque System, a network of ritual pathways connecting sacred sites across the Cusco Valley. 

“The Ceque System transforms the way we understand and value archaeological sites, shifting our perspective from viewing them as distant monuments to recognizing them as interconnected spaces within a social and sacred system,” says Espinoza.

“These were lines that the Incas drew to keep society connected and in balance,” the archaeologist continues.

“This system consisted of 41 conceptual lines radiating outward from the Qoricancha (in Cusco), which tells us the Temple of the Sun wasn't just a building, but the precise center of the Inca universe,” contextualizes Daniel O’Shea, who co-hosts Fernwayer's archaeologist-guided experience. He explains there are approximately 328 huacas (sacred spaces) strung along these pathways, including springs, rocks, outcrops, and buildings.

The archaeologist hosts of Fernwayer’s Saqsaywaman experience explain the Ceque System.

Hannah Cooper

“Even a site as massive as Saqsaywaman transforms under this lens; rather than just an isolated complex, it was the grand ceremonial anchor for the upper half of Cusco,” continues O’Shea.

As we explore the archaeological sites of Tambomachay, Puka Pukara, Qenqo, and Saqsaywaman, the significance of these connections becomes clearer as the ruins reveal the relationships between political power and sacred geography.

Saqsaywaman: Architecture as power

Pulling up visuals on her cellphone, Espinoza tells us that archaeologists have interpreted Cusco’s urban plan as representing a puma, a creature sacred to Andean cultures.

Manco Cápac, the first Inca ruler, is credited with founding Cusco (Qosqo) in the 12th century as the capital of the Inca Empire (Tawantinsuyu). The ninth ruler, Pachacuti Inca Yupanqui, oversaw major expansion during the 15th century, which saw the construction of Saqsaywaman — a mighty complex overlooking Cusco and a relative contemporary of Machu Picchu. The exact purpose of the “head of the puma” is hotly contested, although evidence suggests a multifaceted purpose of ceremonial, defensive, and administrative functions.

“Architecture reflected power and hierarchy, demonstrating the ability to mobilize labor and available resources; religion controlled the ideology of every member of society, and rituals served to unify and subjugate society,” explains Espinoza.

Archaeologists refer to the Suchuna diorite bedrock at Saqsaywaman as the “Inca Slide”.

Hannah Cooper

Besides expressing power through scale, Saqsaywaman’s monumental stone terraces honor geography by charting the shape of the surrounding apus (sacred mountain peaks). Our hosts also explain that those emblematic zigzagging walls — representing the puma’s teeth — directly follow the natural contours of the hillside ridge. Across all four sites, the archaeologists point out the “Mother Rock”, the natural bedrock, and show how laborers worked around what was already in existence.

“Archaeology shows that the Inca treated the Roca Madre as a core part of their design rather than just a foundation to build on,” explains O’Shea. “At Saqsaywaman, they integrated the Suchuna diorite bedrock outcrop directly into the complex by carving steps, seats, and platforms straight into the living rock next to the massive limestone walls.”

With Suchuna being the Quechua word for slide, pondering whether the so-called “Inca Slide” may have been a prototype for a playground is just one of the lingering questions historians, and travelers, puzzle over.

Ollantaytambo: Building around the mountain

Tambomachay, Puka Pukara, Qenqo, and Saqsaywaman impress with their earthquake-resistant, mortarless masonry while investigations carried out by the likes of Espinoza qualify that each site had purpose — whether that was for defense, ceremonies, astronomy, agriculture, or funerary rituals.

Further afield in the Sacred Valley, Pisac’s agricultural terraces descend across the mountainside, while Moray’s concentric stone rings are an example of Inca landscape engineering. Both sites reveal how the Incas adapted cultivation and settlement to the demanding terrain, although the precise functions of some structures remain debated.

Ollantaytambo is known as the “Living Inca Town” due to the continuity of Inca urban design and uninterrupted habitation.

Hannah Cooper

Few sites leave visitors as breathless as Ollantaytambo, Pachacuti’s royal estate and, later, the stronghold of Manco Inca Yupanqui during the resistance against Spanish invaders. Often called the “Living Inca Town”, Ollantaytambo retains a strong connection to its Inca past, from its stone streets and water channels to its agricultural terraces and monumental Temple of the Sun etched into the mountainside.

“We can see that there was no separation between the built environment and the natural world; for the Incas, the mountains, the huacas, Pachamama, water, and other elements were sacred beings that possessed life and were an integral part of the whole,” says Espinoza.

“The Incas did not claim ownership of nature; they built to honor, accompany, and maintain balance with forces they considered to be living and sacred.”

Tipón and Tambomachay: Mastering water

Water was among the most sacred elements of the Inca world; springs and other natural features were among the huacas linking religious practice with the surrounding environment. At the monumental site of Tambomachay, we hear how the Incas developed canals, aqueducts, and terraced waterfalls around underground springs.

“The Incas possessed an extraordinary understanding of water as a vital resource, a natural force and a sacred entity, all integrated into a system of engineering that combined science, adaptation to the terrain and their worldview,” says Espinoza.

Tambomachay shows how the Incas developed canals, aqueducts, and terraced waterfalls around underground springs.

Hannah Cooper

This may stem from Inca cosmogony, which tells that the creator and sun deities (Viracocha and Inti) originated in Lake Titicaca. The birthplace of the Incas and the world’s highest navigable body of water connects to Cusco via the Collasuyu quadrant. The South Valley’s Tipón is an older example of a sacred water temple and royal estate. It’s less monumental but highly sophisticated in terms of architecture.

“Tipón and Tambomachay demonstrate that the Inca were master civil engineers who treated water as a force to be precisely measured and displayed,” says O’Shea.

“At Tipón, mountain springs flow through stone channels with calculated slopes and zigzag bends, slowing the water to prevent erosion while keeping it moving to avoid stagnation. At Tambomachay, the focus is on hydraulic balance, where underground channels bring spring water to the surface. The main engineering feat here is splitting a single stream into twin waterfalls with stone outlets so perfectly matched that both discharge the same volume at the same speed, maintaining a balance that has functioned for centuries,” he explains.

All roads lead to Cusco

Back in Cusco, a stroll around the city’s plazas and labyrinthine streets reveals a hybrid of Indigenous foundations and European colonial styles, as Spanish architecture was introduced to the existing urban space. Espinoza and O’Shea explore their overlapping histories on their archaeologist-guided tours of Qoricancha and Cusco's Andean Baroque architecture. The Experience Makers encourage visitors to look more closely at the sites around Cusco, Machu Picchu, the Sacred Valley, and the South Valley.

“To truly understand Cusco’s archaeology rather than just photograph it, look past the visual scale of the stones to spot the engineering logic underneath, starting with the junctions where human masonry meets the Roca Madre,” advises O'Shea.

“Notice how windows and doorways were intentionally aligned to frame sacred mountain peaks or track the sun as a landscape calendar. Finally, trace the stone-lined channels and fountains cut into the floors, which show how natural springs were integrated into the ceremonial flow of sites.” 

Exploring these sites with Espinoza and O’Shea offers a different way of seeing the Cusco Valley. Only with an archaeologist’s insight can the stones reveal connections between architecture, engineering, and the sacred landscape.