Lords of Sipan: A Tale of Pre-Inca Tombs, Archaeology, and Crime

Tells of Dr. Walter Alva's experinces in Peru as he struggled to excavate and protect the pre-Inca treasures at the lost tombs of the Lords of Sipan

Kirkpatrick ( A Cast of Killers ) engagingly recounts how Peruvian archeologist Walter Alva out-maneuvered huaqueros (grave robbers), international smugglers and governmental interference to successfully excavate one of the richest deposits of pre-Columbian artifacts in South America. Alva, who publicized his discovery in National Geographic , mobilized a depleted local police force, recruited indigenous laborers, ingeniously neutralized community resistance, and raised sufficient funding to painstakingly sift through a Huaca Rajada burial site for evidence of Moche royalty in the coastal valleys of northern Peru, skillfully unfolds this stirring drama of one man's fight to preserve his country's cultural heritage. Photos not seen by PW.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Around midnight on February 25, 1987, local police awoke Walter Alva, inspector general of archaeology for the Peruvian province of Lambayeque along Peru's north coast. The police informed Alva that they had seized a rice sack of artifacts plundered from a local Moche tomb at nearby Huaca Rajada. Thus begins the tale, written like a mystery, of the discovery and excavation of the richest archaeological find in pre-Columbian America. Kirkpatrick follows the trail of the illegal artifacts as they pass from Peru to London and then into the hands of U.S. collectors in California, juxtaposing chapters on the actual excavation. The six-level tomb yielded a remarkable collection of finely crafted objects, large figurines, and beautifully preserved pottery dating from A.D. 100 to 300. Kirkpatrick, whose previous A Cast of Killers (NAL-Dutton, 1992) made the New York Times Best Sellers list, based this mesmerizing tale on interviews with Alva, the Peruvian police, U.S. customs agents and collectors, and the looters themselves. It's a book the reader won't be able to put down.
- Brian E. Coutts, Western Kentucky Univ. Libs., Bowling Green
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.