Fil-Canadian archaeology student helps find tomb of ancient Peruvian priestess

When you’re a 20-year-old archaeology student on your way to your first expedition, you don’t really expect to find a rare chamber tomb of what could probably be a highly esteemed Moche priestess from centuries ago.

But Filipino-Canadian archeology student Matthew Go experienced just that.

He was part of an expedition that discovered the lavish chamber tomb of a Moche priestess in the San Jose de Moro archaeological site in La Libertad province of north Peru, a coastal and arid desert.

Further study revealed that the remains were 1,200 years old and buried between AD 700-800. The tomb is only the eighth in a cluster of priestess tombs found since 1991 in the same site, reported Canadian news site The Star.

The Moche civilization thrived two thousand years ago in the northern coast of Peru. Yearly excavations are done in the San Jose de Moro site, which used to be a funerary complex in 400 to 1000 AD, in an effort to learn more about the Moche’s way of living.

The excavations

The team began their excavations in three areas of the site in late June this year. In late July, just when the excavation project was supposed to be wrapped up, they discovered a priestess chamber in one of the areas.

“We initially suspected the potential for a large tomb when we uncovered a change in soil color in the corner of one of the areas. Investigating further, we uncovered a grave marker, then the wooden beams that roofed the tomb, then the chamber itself filled with offerings,” Go told GMA News Online in an email interview.

Must be royalty

Inside the chamber were the remains of seven more individuals who accompanied her into the afterlife along with many fine vessels, including ceramics decorated with ornate designs and shaped like people’s faces, prawns and monkeys.

“These artifacts can help us reconstruct a story of how the Moche people viewed the afterlife, how they were organized politically and religiously, and even perhaps how they eventually vanished from the archaeological record,” Go said.

The priestess’ coffin was also decorated with several copper plates and a mask. She was wearing hundreds of beads with her hands resting on two pink spondylus shells placed on her pelvis.

“The tomb contains a great quantity of artifacts associated with elite status,” Go told Canadian news site Global News.

“This chamber is clearly one of royal proportions. Such a find gives archaeologists a glimpse into Moche social and political organization, as well as possible clues to questions about the society’s sudden collapse,” he adds.

Ongoing analysis, more to discover

With the data that they recover every year from the site, analysis never stops, said the 20-year-old archaeology senior.

Digging is only half the battle being done only one to two months a year. Lab work runs throughout the year, he said.

“We want to understand the Moche more fully. We want to know how they regarded their dead, how they practiced daily life, how they managed and governed their people, how they celebrated, how they eventually collapsed.”

“It is often with archaeology that answering one question opens a dozen more waiting to be answered. It is always exciting to see what we can and cannot yet know.”

The San Jose de Moro Archaeological Project publishes data every year for free on its website in its effort to make archaeology a more public science.

“Each year we return and collect data, we add to what we know about the Moche, in turn contributing to Peru's national identity and making it a very fulfilling endeavor,” Go said.

Future archaeologist’s plans

Go is a fourth year archaeology student of the Simon Fraser University (SFU) in Canada specializing in bioarchaeology.

He moved to Canada after finishing high school at Xavier.

“I was the project's bioarchaeologist, and as such was in charge of all human remains we encountered. I also advised and oversaw excavation of burials and analysis of the remains in the lab,” Go explained.

He was in charge of estimating the age and sex of the individual skeletons based on the anatomy and morphology of the bones.

“I can also describe any pathology and trauma that they may have experienced in life, and relate these with the archaeological context to build a story about who these people were,” Go said.

Peru is his first hands-on field experience and is planning to conduct research in China.

“It is unfortunate that archaeological focuses in the Philippines are given little attention or support. This in turns discourages further research in the region,” he said.

“This feedback loop of lacking support and initiative really steals away from our national potential. I would like to raise advocacy for archaeology in the Philippines in the hopes that people will start to see its value on both the national and global scales.” — BM, GMA News