Chachapoya culture

So strangely enough, as it may seem, more local peoples had-- or kept joining the besieged Spaniards during the whole, uh, battle of, of Cuzco, which played out over many, many months.

And the Spaniards end up with more allies than they started, uh, during this battle because there were so many people within the Inca Empire, the, from the Cañari who were from Ecuador, to the Chachapoya from the Amazon basin, uh, to even the Aimara, who used to be rivals with the Inca for control of Cuzco itself, increasingly side with the Spaniards, and that local manpower was the critical asset.

Without that, yeah, they would've been wiped out at Cuzco.

So again, it's the Spaniards inserting themselves into an imperial orbit, um, which from a distance looks impressive with its geographic expanse and its total population, but which had been ruthlessly dictated to by a, a tiny elite of a hierarchy who had imposed themselves over the entire system.

Well, we think it was north Peru, but we're not absolutely sure.

In his notes, Taylor describes the mummy as Chachapoya, a culture known as the cloud people because they lived high up in the cloud forest, a remote part of the highlands of northern Peru.

They were a warrior race, famed for burying their dead on perilous rock ledges high up on cliff faces.

What exactly are our parameters for this investigation?

I've never seen a skull like that.

That is just such an extraordinary shape.

They think it's Chachapoya.

I know nothing about the Chachapoya people.