Machu Picchu and the Golden Empires of Peru
One of the strangest things one learns about the Spanish conquest of Peru is that the conquistadors called the Incas orejones - “Big Ears” - because of the heavy ornaments they wore which stretched and deformed the earlobe. Undoubtedly somebody has already written a Cultural Studies paper on this topic, tracing the progress of Western imperialism from the Andes to Enid Blyton, but there’s not much else to laugh about when we think what the Spanish did to the mighty civilisation of the Incas. That story is told in bloodcurdling detail by chroniclers such as Pedro de Cieza de León, albeit from the winners’ point of view.
The invaders get off lightly in the Australian Museum’s Machu Picchu and the Golden Empires of Peru, which focuses on how the Incas lived for over 3,000 years, not their sudden downfall in 1532.
Like the AM’s very successful Ramses and the Gold of the Pharaohs from early last year, this is another blockbuster put together by the international touring agency, Cityneon and partners. It’s an arrangement that has its good and bad points. The good bit is the access to an extraordinary array of artefacts of a quality that any local museum would struggle to secure. This is because of a deal the group has struck with the Museo Larco in Lima, which has contributed more than 200 pieces from its collection.