Possible Funerary Structures Uncovered at Peru’s Huaca Bandera

LIMA, PERU—According to an Andina News Agency report, excavations in northern Peru at the Moche site of Huaca Bandera have uncovered a red- and cream-colored ceremonial bench, a wall containing rows of painted niches, and a burial on a pyramidal platform in an area of the site known as Walled Complex 2. Archaeologist Manuel Curo said that the structures date to around 850 B.C. Images of similar structures were also found in the depiction of the burial of an elite person on a Moche vessel. The structures may have been a symbol of power, Curo and his colleagues have concluded. For more on the Moche, go to "Painted Worlds."