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This ignorance led the Peruvian geographers Raimondi and Paz Soldan to conclude that Choqquequirau, the only ruins reported between the Apurimac and the Urubamba, must have been the capital of the Incas who took refuge there.
Looking up and down the 73d meridian as it crossed Peru from the Amazon Valley to the Pacific Ocean, I saw that it passed very near Choqquequirau, and actually traversed those very lands "behind the Ranges" which had been beckoning to me. The coincidence was intriguing.
After their expulsion from the Spanish colonies at the end of the eighteenth century, Huadquiña was bought by a Peruvian. It was first described in geographical literature by the Count de Sartiges, who stayed here for several weeks in 1834 when on his way to Choqquequirau.
The walls, of unhewn stone laid in clay, were not particularly well built and resemble in many respects the ruins at Choqquequirau. The rooms of the principal house are without windows, although each has three front doors and is lined with niches, four or five on a side. The long, narrow building was divided into three rooms, and had several front doors.
The name, Vilcabamba, is also applied repeatedly to a town. Titu Cusi says he lived there many years during his youth. Calancha says it was "two days' journey from Puquiura." Raimondi thought it must be Choqquequirau. Captain Garcia's soldiers, however, speak of it as being down in the warm valleys of the montaña, the present rubber country.
Nevertheless, if Machu Picchu was "finer than Choqquequirau" why had no one pointed it out to them? Peruvian Expedition of 1915 To most of our friends in Cuzco the idea that there could be anything finer than Choqquequirau seemed, absurd. They regarded that "cradle of gold" as "the most remarkable archeological discovery of recent times." They assured us there was nothing half so good.
He was convinced that I should find great riches at Choqquequirau and that I was in receipt of a very large salary! He refused to believe that the members of the Expedition received no more than their expenses. He told me confidentially that Professor Foote would sell his collection of insects for at least $10,000!
One of Señor Lomellini's friends, a talkative old fellow who had spent a large part of his life in prospecting for mines in the department of Cuzco, said that he had seen ruins "finer than Choqquequirau" at a place called Huayna Picchu; but he had never been to Choqquequirau. Those who knew him best shrugged their shoulders and did not seem to place much confidence in his word.
There seemed to be an unknown region, "behind the Ranges," which might contain great possibilities. Our guides could tell us nothing about it. Little was to be found in books. Perhaps Manco's capital was hidden there. For months afterwards the fascination of the unknown drew my thoughts to Choqquequirau and beyond.
This view had been held by the French explorer, Count de Sartiges, in 1834, who believed that Choqquequirau was abandoned when Sayri Tupac, Manco's oldest son, went to live in Yucay. Raimondi's view was also held by the leading Peruvian geographers, including Paz Soldan in 1877, and by Prefect Nuñez and his friends in 1909, at the time of my visit to Choqquequirau.
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