Caral 4.28

Caral, or Caral-Chupacigarro, was a large settlement in the Supe Valley, near Supe, Barranca Province, Peru, some north of Lima. Caral is the most ancient city of the Americas and a well-studied site of the Norte Chico civilization.Caral was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2009.HistoryCaral was inhabited roughly between the 26th and 20th centuries BCE, enclosing an area of more than. Caral was described by its excavators as the oldest urban centre in the Americas, a claim that was later challenged as other ancient sites were found nearby, such as Bandurria, Peru. Accommodating more than 3,000 inhabitants, it is the best studied and one of the largest Norte Chico sites known.Archaeological findingsPaul Kosok discovered Caral in 1948, but it received little attention at the time because it appeared to lack many typical artefacts that were sought at archaeological sites throughout the Andes at the time. In 1975, the Peruvian architect Carlos Williams made a detailed record of most of the archaeological sites of the valley of Supe, among which he recorded Caral, from which he made some observations about the development of architecture in the Andes. Ruth Shady further explored the 4,000- to 4,600-year-old city of temples in the Peruvian desert, with its elaborate complex of temples, an amphitheatre and ordinary houses. The urban complex is spread out over 150 acres (607,000 m²) and contains plazas and residential buildings. Caral was a thriving metropolis at roughly the same time that Egypt's great pyramids were being built.