Last summer, the Australian Museum lit up the sunny season in Sydney with Ramses and the Gold of the Pharaohs, a blockbuster exhibition filled to the brim with priceless Egyptian artefacts. It drew every amateur Egyptologist out of the woodwork, attracting more than 508,000 visitors and contributing more than $57 million to the NSW economy – and also earning a nod in the inaugural Time Out Sydney Arts & Culture Awards. This year, the country’s oldest museum is transporting visitors into the ancient Andes, sharing the secrets of five distinctive Peruvian Empires with Machu Picchu and the Golden Empires of Peru.
Exclusive to Sydney, this carefully-curated summer blockbuster showcases 134 artefacts including exquisite gold and silver ornaments, astoundingly-well-preserved ceramic objects (including depictions of x-rated scenes, and drinking vessels that were used in ceremonies of human sacrifice) and textiles that you won’t believe are thousands of years old (such as a wall hanging made out of brightly pigmented parrot feathers!). Plus, you can add on a pretty next-level VR experience called Machu Picchu and the Spirit of the Condor, which includes a bird’s-eye tour of Machu Picchu – which was filmed during the height of the Covid pandemic, a rare moment when the landmark wasn't swarming with tourists.
Once again, Time Out Sydney teamed up with local comedian and ancient history nerd AJ Lamarque to take a deep dive into the year’s biggest museum exhibition, and bring you some fun facts to “help you sound smart” when you’re trying to impress someone with your knowledge of ancient Andean cultures.
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Fun facts for your visit to Machu Picchu and the Golden Empires of Peru
In ancient Peru, elite fashion was a serious statement
Only society’s elite were permitted to wear exquisite accessories made out of precious metals, like those that you’ll see in Machu Picchu and the Golden Empires of Peru. These exclusive fashion statements were symbolic of who their wearers were on Earth, and who they could become after death. These rulers personified the forces that made life possible by channeling the power of the stars and planets – gold represented the sweat of the Sun, and silver represented the tears of the Moon.
The Incan Empire overlapped with Tudor England
Sometimes, when we try to put historical events into perspective, the timelines just feel wrong. Like, did you know that wooly mammoths were still alive at the time that the first pyramids were being built in Egypt? Or, that Rosa Parks only passed away quite recently, in 2005, which means that there’s a chance she might have seen the first two Shrek movies!? Now, what if we told you that the peak of the Incan Empire was happening during the Tudor period in England? And what if we told you that at the exact same time, the Incan Empire was a lot bigger than the English Empire? England had two-million people at that time, whilst the Incan Empire had 10-12 million.
Human sacrifice was not considered barbaric
One commonly associated aspect of Ancient South American cultures is the idea of human sacrifice; an element that was a fundamental part of their religious practices. But from what we understand, it was not viewed as an act of barbarism or bloodlust, more so an earthly reflection of the sacrifice that the gods themselves gave to ensure regeneration, regrowth and rebirth. Two of the most sacred items from these private ceremonies were the sacrificial blade and the cups which collected the blood to honour the gods (and you can see artefacts of both these items in Machu Picchu and the Golden Empires of Peru).
In Machu Picchu, beer was made with human spit
Would you drink beer made from spit? Grapes can’t grow at high altitudes like the Andean mountains, so if the folks living there in ancient times wanted a bevvie, wine was off the table, and beer was their only choice. Ancient Andean cultures didn’t bake, so the main way to start the fermentation process was to grab maize and to chew it – that grinding process introduced the yeast, which you could use as a starter, leave it for a few days to ferment, and voila! And whilst that may seem gross to us today, this style of beer (known as ‘Chicha’) was so beloved in Incan times, that drinking water instead was actually used as a punishment.
Keen to discover more? Machu Picchu and the Golden Empires of Peru is now open at the Australian Museum. Tickets start at $37.50pp, and the VR Experience is an additional $22. Plus, the AM’s Journey to Peru event series is a chance to deepen your connection to the treasures and tales of Peru with culinary experiences, expert talks, and after-dark events with live music and pop-up bars. Find out more over here.
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