Excavation in Peru

Professor of Anthropology John Verano’s excavation of the site of a 500-year-old mass child sacrifice that took place on the northern coast of Peru is featured in the February National Geographic magazine. The article, “An Unthinkable Sacrifice,” provides details about the findings, including how some of the children were killed, how they were buried and the growing number of skeletons recovered from ongoing excavations. Verano and Gabriel Prieto of the Universidad Nacional de Trujillo along with a team of students from their respective universities have been working at the Huanchaquito site since 2011 when children playing in the sand dunes found human bones scattered over the surface.

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