Watching the sky from the ushnu: The sukanka-like summit temple in Pueblo Viejo-Pucara (Lurin Valley, Peru)

Abstract

Seen from the 'ushnu' platform in the palatial complex of Pueblo Viejo-Pucará, near Pachacamac, built by the Huarochirí people, the visual axis extends southwards towards two circular structures of the summit temple. Of these structures rising up from a monumental platform, one contains a sacred rock to which gold, silver and Spondylus princeps. were offered and the other housed a huanca-idol. These structures, and the ushnu, marked points and directions that are relevant for the organization of sacred geography, but whose location does not correspond to orientations that are astronomically relevant for calendrical calculations, contrary to the initial hypothesis. © International Astronomical Union 2011.