The Casma Valley Sechin Alto Archaeological Sites Group

The Sechin Alto Complex included a proto-urban settlement of approximately 4 miles in diameter and included the sites of Sechin Bajo, Taukachi-Konkan, and Cerro Sechin. Julio Tello was the first archaeologist to survey Sechin Alto in the late 1930s; later investigators have included Donald Collier, Donald Thompson, Rosa Fung, Carlos Williams and Sheila and Thomas Pozorski.

Sechin Temple Complex

Sechin is an important archaeological monument, given its age, architectural complexity and cultural content. It has a unique facade built with stone slab engraved with suggestive subjects of warriors in procession, whose meaning has not yet been fully defined. It was initially discovered by Julio C. Tello in 1937.

Sechin archaeological site is located in Ancash province of Casma and 5 kilometers from the city of the same name, on the north slope about 90 meters above sea level.  The weather is hot, dry and with little rainfall annually. The sea is a little more than 10 kilometers away.

The site covers an area of 5 hectares.  Sechin is a complex formed by seven architectural structures, six of them built with mud (adobe) and stone, typical of the Archaic Period (1600 BC).  There are two main structures occupy the central part of the complex, one of them being the "Main Building" (rectangular, curved corners and 51 meters long each side), that were carved with reliefs of various kinds.  The other four structures are placed in pairs on both sides of the Main Building.

The outer palisade.

The Sechin Temple palisade wall

The wall is constructed of hundreds of carved rocks

Strangely, there does not appear to be a consistent flow to the carvings, rather they appear to have been randomly assembled from an outside source.

The author's hypothesis is that the stelle were not originally part of a palisade wall - they were either part of an earlier alignement that were integrated into the temple wall when the temple was built, or were brought down from the hill above to create the wall.

The wall appears to be constructed from stones from another site without the intent to produce anything more than an attractive pattern.

Satellite view of the Sechin complex.

The Main Building with carved figures.

One of the Sechin Temple wall carvings

Julio C. Tello "in situ" working the Sechin site.

Idealized Diagram Of Templo Sechin

The site is covered to permit excavation and restoration

Note that not all stones are carved, and that the groupings do not appear to "tell" a logical story.

Cerro Sechín Mount

In close proximity to the Sechin Temple, and raising above it is the Cerro Sechin site.  The Initial period reconstruction of the pyramid measures about 53 m on each side.

The main Sechin Complex below may have actually been the entry point to this hill top complex.  It is not known if the hill top complex was a fortress or simply a walled ceremonial center.

The two separate sites are frequently referred to as simply Cerro Sechin.  It is therefore important to differentiate between the lower main Sechin Temple Site with it carved monolithic walls, and the hill top complex shown here.

The view from the hill top site with Sechin below

Craved stones that may have numbered in the hundreds before the Temple wall below was built

Relative locations of the Sechin and Cerro Sechin sites

The archaeological site called Sechin Alto is the capital of a pre-Incan culture located on the northwest coast of Peru, occupied between approximately 1800-900 BC. The site is remarkable for its enormous mound, the largest of its time period, measuring some 990 feet long, by 825 feet wide by 145 feet tall.

Sechin Alto is located on the left margin of the Sechin River, along the road to Huaraz.  This temple site is the largest of the Prehispanic/Pre-Columbian monuments of Peru, and is the largest of the Casma Valley structures.  It was constructed from dressed stone and "conical" style adobe, with a U-shaped monument plan covering about 200 hectares. Five plazas extend about a mile (1.4 km) from the central mound, three with central sunken courts, one of which is about 250 ft (80 meters) in diameter. The main mound is 44 meters high by 300 meters by 250 meters., making it the largest single construction in the New World during the second millennium B.C.  The mound was faced with granite blocks, some weighing over 2 tons. Sechin Alto's great size may represent a 1000 year building span.

Possible depiction of the central structures

Fortress Of Sechín Bajo

All the Sechin Alto sites are large complexes with large structures, squares and connecting roads. The basic structure of the main building platform installations are made of stone and clay (adobe) mortar, where smaller internal structures with different functions were built.

One of these complexes is Sechin Bajo. During 1992 the first detailed surveys were conducted (Patzschke 1993), it was also at this time that the first geodesic plans were created. Since then there have been several excavations covering a total of three major areas with more than 1000 m² excavated.

Sechin Bajo is part of the overall Sechin Alto complex, and dates from the same period.  Like Sechin Alto, it too was constructed of quarried stone and adobe.

Sechin Bajo Site Plan

Sechín Bajo Glyphs

Glyph Wall

Numerous carved glyphs adorn the complex walls.  Note the contrast between these glyphs and those of the Sechin Temple (at the mound)

Taukachi-KonKan Complex

Another of the best-preserved Sechin Alto sites is Taukachi-Konkan. The site's center is open, formed by several large rectangular plazas lined by intermediate-size mounds. Two large mounds open toward sunken circular plazas similar to the one adjacent to Huaca A. Radiocarbon dates of six samples range from about 2000 to 1300 B.C., contemporary with other Sechin Alto sites.

Plan of the Mount of the Columns Structure