Inca Empire: Machu Picchu
Strip the City uses stunning CGI animation to strip the ancient city of Machu Picchu naked of its stonework – block by block – to explore the secret technology and infrastructure that enabled it to be built.
Perched on slopes 11,000 feet up in the Andes, Machu Picchu was home to over 1000 people. Built as a royal retreat for the emperor it took a thousand stonemasons almost a hundred years to complete. Constantly under threat from earthquakes, landslides and floods how did this ancient city survive for over 400 years?
This film strips it temples, buildings and terraces to reveal their secret inner workings and the ingenious techniques that allowed the city to be built without modern tools in one of the most inhospitable regions on earth. The engineers and archaeologists who know this place best reveal how the Inca’s quake proofed their walls with precision cut granite blocks and built a sophisticated canal system which fed its residents water all year round.
Stunning CGI animation peels back it terraces and reveals the stonework that made Inca roads one of the most advanced highway systems in the ancient world.
The film explores the geology that shaped this ancient’s city’s past and challenges its future, from the steep granite slopes it’s built on to the threat of deadly landslides.