Sumer was the oldest urban civilization, but not by much.  Second place followed quickly, and incredibly was across the ocean in South America.

People on the coast of modern Peru kickstarted a multi-millennium wave of Andean civilization, passing down a legacy of culture, religion, and cuisine all the way down to the Incas, and do so with methods that will turn everything anthropologists thought they knew about civilization on its head.

We’ve neglected the Andeans thus far, but no longer. It’s time to take a closer look.

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BIBLIOGRAPHY

THE HANDBOOK OF SOUTH AMERICAN ARCHAEOLOGY, “Plant Domestication and the Shift to Agriculture in the Andes”‘

1491, by Charles C. Mann

THE POTATO CROP, “History of the Potato”

OXFORD REFERENCE Timeline of Andean Civilization

ANCIENT ORIGINS, “The Norte Chico Civilization: Ancient Peruvian Civilization or Complex Society?”

ENCYCLOPEDIA BRITANNICA, “The Moche”

NPR: “The Ancient Andean Tradition of Eating Clay May Have Helped To Protect Health”

FAO: “High Andean Cuisine”