MAKING THE DESCENDANTS: The Return of Machu Picchu's Artifacts to an Inca Nation

Abstract

This thesis examines the return of artifacts from Machu Picchu by Yale University in 2011, with a particular focus on how claims to an Inca identity as reason for the artifacts’ return reconfigured a facet of Peruvian nationalism. The artifacts themselves were not legally repatriated to the country of Peru, but rather returned upon a negotiated Memorandum of Understanding– in bypassing traditional court systems, the objects legitimized not necessarily Peruvian patrimony, but instead the existence of Inca descendants. As “Inca” is not a legally designated group, I explore the history of the term and those who assert it to explain why it was powerful enough to successfully lay claim to the objects. To understand where this broadly defined concept of claiming Inca descent emerged, I traveled to Peru for three weeks in August 2016 to visit museums and conduct interviews, and analyzed material from both the Cusco Library Archives and Yale Peruvian Expedition Archives from Sterling Memorial Library.