Gas workers in Peru find 1000-year-old mummy of boy
AFP
In this aerial view an archaeologist cleans a skull attributed to the pre-Inca Chancay culture accidentally unearthed by workers installing a gas pipeline in Lima's Puente Piedra district, on July 31, 2025.
Photo:
CONNIE FRANCE
A crew of Peruvian workers have accidentally discovered a mummy more than 1,000 years old while installing gas pipes in Peru's capital Lima, their employer and archaeologists say.
The mummy of a boy aged between 10 and 15 was found last week in a tomb 1.2 metres underneath a street north of Lima, archaeologist Jesus Bahamonde said.
The mummy was covered in a shroud in a seated position, arms and legs bent.
"The burial and the objects correspond to a style that developed between 1000 and 1200," he said.
Pottery was also found in the tomb which was dated to the pre-Inca Chancay civilization that lived around the Lima region between the 11th and 15th centuries.
It was believed to be part of a large, ancient cemetery.
An archaeologist cleans a skull attributed to the pre-Inca Chancay culture accidentally unearthed by workers installing a gas pipeline in Lima's Puente Piedra district, on July 31, 2025.
Photo:
CONNIE FRANCE
Lima, a city with over 10 million inhabitants, also houses more than 500 archaeological sites.
Utility companies in Peru must hire archaeologists when drilling the earth because of the possibility of hitting upon heritage sites.
Gas company Calidda has reported more than 2,200 chance archaeological discoveries since 2004.
- AFP
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RNZ News
2 days ago
- RNZ News
Gas workers in Peru find 1000-year-old mummy of boy
By AFP In this aerial view an archaeologist cleans a skull attributed to the pre-Inca Chancay culture accidentally unearthed by workers installing a gas pipeline in Lima's Puente Piedra district, on July 31, 2025. Photo: CONNIE FRANCE A crew of Peruvian workers have accidentally discovered a mummy more than 1,000 years old while installing gas pipes in Peru's capital Lima, their employer and archaeologists say. The mummy of a boy aged between 10 and 15 was found last week in a tomb 1.2 metres underneath a street north of Lima, archaeologist Jesus Bahamonde said. The mummy was covered in a shroud in a seated position, arms and legs bent. "The burial and the objects correspond to a style that developed between 1000 and 1200," he said. Pottery was also found in the tomb which was dated to the pre-Inca Chancay civilization that lived around the Lima region between the 11th and 15th centuries. It was believed to be part of a large, ancient cemetery. An archaeologist cleans a skull attributed to the pre-Inca Chancay culture accidentally unearthed by workers installing a gas pipeline in Lima's Puente Piedra district, on July 31, 2025. Photo: CONNIE FRANCE Lima, a city with over 10 million inhabitants, also houses more than 500 archaeological sites. Utility companies in Peru must hire archaeologists when drilling the earth because of the possibility of hitting upon heritage sites. Gas company Calidda has reported more than 2,200 chance archaeological discoveries since 2004. - AFP
RNZ News
5 days ago
- RNZ News
'It'll be the talk of the town' - Tākaka home proposed for ancient waka
The Anaweka waka was dug up 13 years ago and is almost finished being preserved before it can be displayed to the public. Photo: LDR/Max Frethey Work is now well-underway to plan a home for Aotearoa's "most significant archaeological find" in the Tasman town of Tākaka. It's been 13 years since the 700-year-old Anaweka waka was found on Golden Bay's west coast by a family on a picnic. The artefact is a 6-metre fragment of what would have been a much longer, double-hulled, ocean-going waka. For most of the time since its discovery, the waka has been submerged in a polyethylene glycol solution in a shed, away from public view, to preserve it. But now, the waka is expected to be finished drying by the end of the year and planning is underway for a facility which would keep the Anaweka waka in Golden Bay. A relief of a turtle on the waka indicated that it was an ocean-going, voyaging waka that was intended to return to the Pacific. Photo: LDR/Supplied/Ngāti Tama The three local iwi that make up Manawhenua ki Mohua - Te Ātiawa, Ngāti Rārua, and Ngāti Tama - and Ngāti Kuia discussed options before eventually landing on their preferred approach. That plan would see a purpose-built home for the taonga - a wharewaka - constructed adjacent to the Golden Bay Museum on the corner of Commercial and Reilly Streets. The land, currently home to Pioneer Park, is already designated for use as a museum. Tasman District Council agreed to the location in principle last month, subject to public consultation. Ngāti Tama ki Te Waipounamu Trust chair Butch Little. Photo: LDR/Supplied/Ngāti Tama Butch Little, chair of the Ngāti Tama ki Te Waipounamu Trust, said the decision showed that local stakeholders - the council, iwi, and ahikā (local whānau) - were prepared to work together on the project. "Obviously, there has to be a consultation process with the community, but then we can start looking at funding, because it will be significant." The wharewaka would properly recognise the mana of, what he said had been described as, the country's "most significant archaeological find ever". He also envisioned the facility as a museum about the history of local Māori and their mātauranga (knowledge) of celestial navigation and waka-building. "More than just a waka sitting there, there's going to be an opportunity to tell stories, to see other artifacts, to hear the history of voyaging… that's the vision, I suppose - telling our own stories and hopefully inspiring generations," Little said. "We're looking for something that the community can be really proud of and also in awe of." The wharewaka is proposed to be built adjacent to the Golden Bay Museum on land currently used as a park that was designated for use as a museum. Photo: LDR/Max Frethey Once complete, Little thought the wharewaka would be an international drawcard for visitors to the region and could capitalise on the already-existing waka tourism in the Abel Tasman. "It blows people's minds," he said. "There will be people coming to the Bay just to see that, that will be their sole purpose. It's going to attract visitors that might not have otherwise come." The prospect of neighbouring the wharewaka was a "real honour" for the Golden Bay Museum. "It'll really be a huge boost to history, to let people know what a big historical significance Golden Bay has with the waka, and previously with the first encounter between Māori and Europeans," said museum board chair Frank Susko. Golden Bay Museum chair Frank Susko and services manager Karen Johnson welcomed the possibility of having the wharewaka next door. Photo: LDR/Max Frethey Services manager Karen Johnson added that the museum looks after other Māori artefacts, with only a "teeny" portion on display, and so the wharewaka would provide additional opportunities to show more of the taonga. "There's just so much that you could incorporate." Though the site has been agreed to in principle, there was still "plenty" of work to do before shovels entered the ground, including further analysis, designs, fundraising, and community consultation. "We want to do it properly, we want to make it relevant in terms of what else was shown in there," Little said. "The whole community will be able to celebrate that. 'Wow, this was found here'. It'll be the talk of the town for a long time once it's up and running." The Anaweka waka is currently drying in a shed away from public view but is intended to be displayed in a purpose-built museum. Photo: LDR/Supplied/Ngāti Tama Polynesian ocean-voyaging canoes are incredibly rare, with the Anaweka waka being only the second one known to have survived into the modern day. Parts of the first canoe were discovered in 1978 on the island of Huahine in French Polynesia, while hundreds of fragments of a potential third were recently uncovered on the Chatham Islands. - LDR is local body journalism co-funded by RNZ and NZ On Air
Scoop
13-05-2025
- Scoop
Commemorating Mummy: Reflections On Mother's Day
Commercial gimmicks are sometimes impossible to beat off. Their stench and pull follows, even as you look the other way. One occasion is most prominent in this regard. Nostrils get clogged and eyes get fogged, and the message is this: Remember Mommy. Mothers' Day is rarely more than the draw and pull of extracted business and mined guilt. This is the worshipped and leveraged, the human breeder elevated and remembered, if only for one day. It resembles, in some ways, the link between poverty and the church box of charity. Give a few coins and save the child. Your conscience can rest easy. The day itself denigrates the mother in false respect and guilts the family for ignorance to that fact. It sanctifies a family relation for reasons of commercial worth. Suddenly, Mummy escapes her metaphorical sarcophagus, the nursing home, the flat, and finds herself seated at the end of a table with regrets. The hideous spectacle follows. The grumbling, the sneers. Mummy wonders what she is doing there. Monument? Reminder? A disgusting reminder to die off? Thoughts turn to the will. It was not necessarily intended that way. In the aftermath of the American Civil War (1861-65), Julia Ward Howe, author of the Battle Hymn of the Republic, proposed that women unite in common cause and promote peace. In time, it would become the Mother's Day Proclamation. In 1908, the idea became more concrete with West Virginian Anna Marie Jarvis's church memorial in honour of her mother, Ann Reeves Jarvis. Ann Jarvis had been a committed peace activist aiding wounded soldiers during the Civil War. On May 9, 1914, US President Woodrow Wilson officially announced the establishment of Mother's Day as an occasion of national observance to be annually held on the second Sunday of May. Such observance was to involve the display of the American flag on government buildings and private residences 'as a public expression of our love and reverence for the mothers of our country.' Mother's Day in Australia only took off with Sydney's Janet Heyden, who insisted in 1924 on remembering the aging mothers at Newington State Hospital, many of whom had been widowed by the calamitous slaughter of the First World War. As an activist, she encouraged local schools and businesses to furnish the ladies with donated gifts. In its more modern iteration, it has evolved into a family affair. As Australian historian Richard Waterhouse benignly describes it, 'It's not just about recognising the role of mothers, though that's still there, but it's really recognising Mother's Day as a day in which families can get together.' As with other days of elected memory, Mother's Day draws in the retail and restaurant dollars. Guilty emotions are easy fodder for the capitalist impulse. Unremarkably, it was the United States that propelled its commercialisation, beginning with card companies like Hallmark and enterprising florists keen to make a profit. Jarvis, so instrumental in establishing the tradition, took to loathing it, attacking such marketing gimmicks as 'Mother's Day Salad'. For years, she harangued politicians, organised protests and sought audiences with presidents to arrest the trend towards commodification. Such efforts eventually exhausted her, leading to a lonely, poor death in a sanatorium. Even as the Second World War raged, the scope of merchandise in anticipation of the day burgeoned. An April 1941 issue of New York's Women's Wear Daily notes how 'Mother's Day as a gift event has continued to grow in importance, and is now second only to Christmas'. In Dallas, one Margaret Evans, promotion manager of A. Harris & Co., enthused at the growing number of departments offering gift choices for the occasion. These included bags, gloves, hosiery, handkerchiefs, toiletries, and jewellery. Eventually, women's libbers cottoned on to the idea that a commemorative occasion supposedly emphasising the importance of mothers had been hijacked and shamelessly exploited. In 1971, a pamphlet issued by the Adelaide women's liberationists suggested that the woman remained invisible, a chained martyr to the home, a slave to domestic chores and the cult of domesticity. Mother's Day was that one occasion of the year that a woman's invaluable role in the home was acknowledged, and even then, only imperfectly. Such a mother's 'basic needs', including a degree of independence from their children, remained unmet. But the pamphlet went further, arguing that women 'renounce [their] martyrdom' and reenvisage themselves as human beings and 'not just 'mum'.' The nexus with children was also a point of comment in that decade. Radical feminist Shulamith Firestone's The Dialectic of Sex: The Case for Feminist Revolution, took solid aim at the distorting role played by parenting, and mothering, in the formation of children. Implicit in her argument was that both the mother and the child needed emancipation. It remains a pertinent point, even as the swamp of commercialisation looks deeper than ever.
