"Gold" is the magic word that attracted the Spaniards across the Atlantic Ocean. When asked by an Indian why white people love gold so much, the Spanish conquistador Hernan Cortez could only answer that "they suffer from a special heart disease, which can only be cured by gold."
For the Incas, gold was only the sacred metal of the sun god.
Inca Golden Wall at Museum of Peru
When Francisco Cortes, another Spanish conquistador, captured the Inca leader Atahualpa, he offered so much gold for his freedom that they could cover the floor in the room where they were. But, apparently, noticing the distrust in the eyes of the Spaniards, he said that there would be more gold in this room than his height. And Pizarro agreed.
Throughout the Inca empire, messengers of Atahualpa were sent out with a kipu - a fringe of long cords tied in knots of various shapes: the Incas used a knotted script. The chief's subjects collected gold vessels and jewelry from palaces, temples and public buildings for ransom. A few weeks later, a room of about 70 cubic meters was filled with gold and silver, and Pizarro became the owner of treasures that no European monarch possessed.
In 1533, at the end of the Inca empire, not too many Spaniards landed on the coast of South America. But, skillfully taking advantage of the internecine war between the heirs of the Great Inca, the brothers Atahualpa and Huascar, they quickly became the actual masters of the country.
Pizarro promised Atahualpa help in the fight against his brother, lured him to his camp and actually took him prisoner. The treacherous Spaniard did not let him go after he filled the notorious room with gold. Pissarro understood that the Indians still had a lot of gold.
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Atahualpa, while in captivity, managed to achieve the death of his rival. Pizarro ordered Huascar to be stabbed, but immediately accused Atahualpa of fratricide and condemned in all form of Spanish jurisprudence. On August 24, 1533, Atahualpa was sentenced to death at the stake. The Inca agreed to renounce the laws of their ancestors and be baptized … And the "servant of God, Francisco de Atahualpa", the godson of Pizarro, was not burned, but … strangled with an iron collar - a garrot.
On the eve of his death, Atahualpa managed to convey his last farewell letter to the faithful. What was in it is unknown, but the remaining gold of the Inca empire disappeared without a trace …
A few months later, the Spaniards set out on a campaign to the capital of the empire - the sacred city of Cuzco. They were attracted by the building of Coricancha - the temple of the Sun, surrounded by a cornice of pure gold soldered into the stones. The statue of the Sun and statues of other gods, as well as the famous large disc, personifying the Inca, were made of gold. There were also numerous golden musical instruments in the temple, such as drums, adorned with precious stones.
The Coricancha temple was destroyed after the invasion of the conquistadors. Today, there are temple ruins in the center of Cuzco, Peru. After a strong earthquake in 1650, the Cathedral of Santo Domingo (St. Dominic) was built over them.
There was also a golden garden at the temple. One of the Spaniards described it like this:
“In this garden were planted the most beautiful trees, the most wonderful flowers and fragrant herbs that only grew in this kingdom. Many of them were cast from gold and silver, and each plant is depicted more than once, but from a small shoot, barely visible above the ground, to a whole bush in its full growth and perfect maturity.
There we saw fields strewn with corn. Its stems were of silver, and the ears of gold, and all this was depicted so truthfully that one could see leaves, grains and even stripes on them. In addition to these wonders, the Inca garden contained all kinds of animals and beasts cast in gold and silver, such as rabbits, mice, snakes, lizards, butterflies, foxes, and wild cats.
We found birds there, and they sat as if they were about to sing; others seemed to sway on the flowers and drink the flower nectar. And there were also golden roe deer and deer, cougars and jaguars - all animals in small and mature age. And each of them occupied a corresponding place, as befits its nature."
The main square of the city was surrounded by a chain of pure gold 350 steps long (about 250 meters), weighing several tons. During religious holidays, the Incas danced holding it in their hands, and to do this, the strength of two hundred people was required.
Inca gold in the museum
But when they came to the Indian capital, the white people found that all this unheard-of wealth, all this gold had disappeared somewhere. There were no Indians in the city.
Francisco de Perez wrote in his work "The Conquest of Peru and the Province of Cuzco";
“But when, after the conquest of the country, Inca Manco II met with the Spanish ambassador, he poured a bowl of corn grains in front of him. And he took one of them in his hands and said; "This is all that you were able to steal from our gold" and pointed to the rest: "And this is left with us."
Until now, historians argue about where the wealth of the Inca empire disappeared. Many suggest that the Indians could have hidden their treasures in the Peruvian jungle, in the legendary city of Paititi, founded as a transit point between the capital and the gold mines.
This city was considered just a beautiful legend, until at the beginning of the 20th century there were accidentally two workers of the same hacienda, who fled from the owner.
For four days they wade through the impassable jungle, and on the fifth day they ended up in an abandoned city, all the destroyed buildings of which were filled with many golden things.
Taking as much as they could carry, the fugitives managed to find their way to civilization. But, realizing that people were already close, they began to share the treasures, and only one of them returned to Cuzco. He could not find the way to the golden city again - his own greed punished him …
In 1925, six members of the Catholic Jesuit Order decided to find the ancient city. Having hired a dozen porters and guides, they set off. But on the way, they were attacked by Indians, and only the guide Sanchez managed to escape from the poisonous arrows.
He was the only one to find a city lined with golden statues. There, Sanchez chopped off the little finger of one of them to have proof that he was not crazy. But his precious find, fearing the wrath of the Indian gods, he kept secret all his life and was revealed only before his death to the scientist R. I. Ordonez.
He unconditionally believed the dying man and equipped the expedition. But despite a lavishly subsidized search, the "golden city" was never found. After years of unsuccessful searches, many decided that Odonies was simply making a name for himself by buying a finger at a sale.
A new version has appeared about where the treasures of the Incas lie. The eyes of the white people turned to the El Sangay volcano, located at the junction of the western and eastern parts of the Cordillera. Sangay is the sacred god of Fire of the ancient Incas, and the slopes of the volcanoes serve as the burial place of leaders and heroes for the Hivaro Indian tribe to this day.
Dr. Kurt von Ritter of Quito, an Ecuadorian of German origin, began developing this version in the early 1960s and even lived for a time with the Jivaro Indian tribe, who are known as "bounty hunters." After asking the Indians about the finds on the slopes of the mountain, he got his hands on a tiny carved statuette of the Inca goddess of Creation, Ilya-Tiku, cast from pure gold
After the doctor was shown the place of the find - a high, more than two thousand meters, cliff, turning into a gigantic gorge, Ritter began excavations. And very soon he found a human skull, whose owner underwent a complex operation during his lifetime. It is known that the Incas not only engaged in surgery, but also successfully performed craniotomy. Soon, the archaeologist also discovered a scalpel - a thin gold plate.
Returning to Quito, Ritter published information about the finds, but warned that it was hardly possible to find the treasure without. a very large investment - the volcano continues to work, and every year its ash raises the soil level on Sangay by at least a few centimeters.
Despite the scientist's warnings, a genuine gold rush began in Ecuador. Teams of excavators were hammered together, specialists were hired, investments were sought … Another thing is that no one was able to find the necessary amount for excavation. But this did not stop anyone …
A month later, the first expedition arrived at the foot of the Sangay. They were two young Americans, Frank Rocco from Pennsylvania and Robert Kaupp from California. The official goal of the expedition was to search for "valuable metals". The Americans were supposed to go down to Quito by Christmas, but they never showed up. In mid-January, a joint American-Ecuadorian rescue expedition set out for them.
Almost at the crater of the volcano, their last camp was discovered. Things were scattered in the snow, and the traces of the Americans were lost on the road to the Culebrillas Valley. Descending into the valley, the expedition found Robert Kaupp, dying of exhaustion, on the floor in a collapsed Indian hut. He said that when he and Frank Rocco almost climbed to the top of Sangay, they felt that they could not breathe because of the poisonous volcanic gases and something strange began to happen to them.
The Americans were seized by a fit of anger, their consciousness became clouded, they no longer understood where they were and where they should go. Soon, for some reason, they ended up on the eastern side of the volcano, although they were climbing the southern one, the very one where Ritter found gold. Kaupp began to persuade Rocco to return to the last camp, but he refused: “It's here, Kaupp. I feel it is here."
Kaupp abandoned his insane comrade, and he himself does not remember how he ended up downstairs. He was taken to a hospital in Riobamba. A few days later, after being discharged from there, he disappeared without a trace. They tried to find him in order to take testimony and see if the Americans had seen anything that could lead to the trail of gold. But unsuccessfully.
Soon one of the members of the rescue expedition gave an interview to a local newspaper. He argued that rescuers found two chains of tracks stretching to the eastern slope, then crushed snow - traces of a fight, and then there were only one tracks. There was no blood, however, as the rescuer claimed. Soon, another American expedition, sponsored by Rocco's relatives, arrived, but she could not find either Rocco himself or any trace of his stay in the mountains.
Several more expeditions, trying to find gold, returned from Sangay empty-handed. Many said that Dr. Ritter simply threw on the mountain the Indian rarities bought on the occasion to create a name for himself in scientific circles. But there is still no clear evidence confirming this version or refuting it.