In-class activities for students: Try these activities with a
classmate or two or on your own!
Imagine yourself standing in the middle of the silent Incan ruins of
Machu Picchu, surrounded by the majestic mountain scenery, the clouds
almost touching you. What do you feel as you stand in el ombligo del
mundo? You probably would wonder how the Incas reached the top of
this mountain before the Inca Trail was built and why they chose such an
inaccessible place to create a settlement. As you search for answers,
you will encounter a magnificent civilization that founded a vast
empire. With a partner, visit these Web sites and explore the jewels of
the Inca empire: Cuzco and Machu Picchu. Take turns asking and answering
these questions in Spanish. Always answer in complete sentences.
¿Quiénes eran los incas? ¿En qué zonas
de Sudamérica se establecieron? ¿Dónde estaban sus
ciudades principales?
¿Quién fue su primer líder? ¿Cómo se llamaba el
último?
¿Qué idioma o lengua hablaban los incas?
¿Quiénes llegaron a Perú y eliminaron la cultura inca?
¿Cuántos años hace que desapareció la cultura
inca?
Did you know that the name of the city of Cuzco derives fron the
Quechuan word qosco, meaning "the navel of the world"? Why do you
think the Incas referred to Cuzco and Machu Picchu this way? Browse
these Web sites for more fascinating information on the Incas.
Before the Incas built their empire by conquering other South American
cultures, the Moches (or Mochicas) were another great pre-Columbian
civilization of Peru. In 1987, the Royal Tombs of Sipan were discovered
in northern Peru, an archaeological discovery considered to be the most
important of recent years. This discovery included great numbers of gold
artifacts and jewels found at the burial sites, providing new
information on a vanished culture. Unlike European kings and queens, who
passed on to the next generation their jewelry and other valuable
emblems of their royal status, the Moche royal members were buried with
all their wealth. The treasures of Sipan have traveled to Los Angeles
and Washington D.C., where they were exhibited at the Smithonian in
1995. Be a true archaeologist and explore these sites to find out more
about the Moche culture. Write the answers to these questions with
complete sentences as you browse:
¿Dónde floreció la cultura moche?
¿Qué técnicas desarrollaron y perfeccionaron los pintores
moches?
The mystery of the Nasca geoglyphs (huge drawings on the earth) is
another fascinating area of Peru's past. Why were these line drawings
made? What significance do they have? Such questions have archaeologists
and mathematicians scrambling to find answers. Some of the drawings can
only be appreciated fully from the air because of their large
dimensions. That fact has been the reason for many conjectures and
hypotheses about extraterrestrial involvement in the making of the Nasca
lines. Visit the following Web sites and gather information so that you
can write your own brief hypothesis about who made them and their
function. You could start as follows:
Yo creo que ___________ hicieron las líneas de Nasca
porque querían ______________. Ellos...
