Word: andean
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...stone throne supported by a carved, crouching man shows the Andean fondness for working the most stubborn materials. It is further demonstrated by photographs of temples near Cuzco, 11,000 feet up. Built during Europe's Dark Ages, the temples were constructed of granite blocks weighing up to 50 tons each. No one knows how the blocks were heaved into place. Even more impressive is the fact that they were matched and fitted so precisely that a knife blade cannot be slipped between them...
Before Pizarro, the Andes have no recorded history. One tribe, the Mochicas, may have developed a system of hieroglyphics similar to the Mayan, but like the Mayan it has never been deciphered. Having no records to go by, archeologists are necessarily vague in categorizing Andean art, but laymen may find a certain poetic fascination in the mere names of the main civilizations: Chavin, Cupisnique, Salinar, Cavernas, Quimbaya, Chanapata, Chiripa, Mochica, Tiahuanaco, Chimu, Chibcha, Inca...
...most surprising things about Andean art is its variety. At various points it seems to relate more to alien cultures than to itself. Shown on the following pages are an early stone puma that resembles nothing so much as an ancient Chinese bronze, a gold figurine that looks like a Javanese puppet, a double-image vessel that prophesies cubism, and a portrait head worthy of Sir Jacob Epstein...
...shoes showed the common ingenuity of the world's cobblers: a wooden Dutch shoe for the wet lowlands, a cool leather sandal for Arabia's hot sands, a warm quilted-cotton boot for Manchuria's bitter winters. Wooden manikins wore beautifully embroidered costumes from the Andean highlands and a fascinating suit of woven palm-fiber armor made for a South Sea island warrior. There were tiny statues, ceremonial masks, hoes and puppets from such widely separated areas as Borneo, Europe and Africa, all done with the same careful skill. And outside, the museum will soon...
...really murdered by the Kalapalos chieftain who confessed the crime (TIME, April 16, 1951)? The bones said to be Fawcett's were later proved to be those of another man. Then could Fawcett possibly have reached the mysterious lost city of "Z," the mother remnant of the pre-Andean civilization, which he was certain still stood in the darkest midmost of Brazil...