Viceroyalty of Peru: Did you mean...?

The galleon (Spanish: galeón, French: galion) was a type of sailing ship used for both cargo carrying and as a warship. Galleons dominated the seas in the second half of the 16th century, and with their lower superstructures, they were much...

Sir Francis Drake (c. 1540-1596 CE) was an English mariner, privateer and explorer who in 1588 CE helped defeat the Spanish Armada of Philip II of Spain (r. 1556-1598 CE) which attempted to invade the kingdom of Elizabeth I of England (r...

Mutapa (aka Matapa, Mwenemutapa, and Monomotapa) was a southern African kingdom located in the north of modern Zimbabwe along the Zambezi River which flourished between the mid-15th and mid-17th century CE. Although sometimes described as...

Viracocha was the supreme god of the Incas. He is also known as Huiracocha, Wiraqoca and Wiro Qocha. Considered the creator god he was the father of all other Inca gods and it was he who formed the earth, heavens, sun, moon and all living...

Cuzco (also Cusco or Qosqo) was the religious and administrative capital of the Inca Empire which flourished in ancient Peru between c. 1400 and 1534 CE. The Incas controlled territory from Quito to Santiago, making theirs the largest empire...

Copper was probably the first metal used by ancient cultures, and the oldest artefacts made with it date to the Neolithic period. The shiny red-brown metal was used for jewellery, tools, sculpture, bells, vessels, lamps, amulets, and death...

The qanat (called foggara in North Africa and the Levant, falaj in the United Arab Emirates and Oman, kariz in Iran, and puquios in Peru) is an ancient Middle Eastern irrigation technique in which a long tunnel is dug into arid land that...

Pedro de Alvarado (c. 1485-1541) was a Spanish conquistador who became the first governor of Guatemala in 1527. Living an extraordinary life of adventure, Alvarado participated in separate expeditions to Mexico, Central America, South America...

Trephination (also known as trepanning or burr holing) is a surgical intervention where a hole is drilled, incised or scraped into the skull using simple surgical tools. In drilling into the skull and removing a piece of the bone, the dura...

The Sacsayhuaman (also Saksaywaman or Saqsawaman, meaning 'Royal Eagle') fortress-temple complex lies at the northern edge of the former Inca capital Cuzco. Constructed during the reign of Pachacuti (1438-1471 CE) and his successors, its...