After 5 centuries, the last Inca bridge in Cusco fell due to lack of maintenance

The Queshuachaca Suspension Bridge, which dates back to the Inca Empire in Peru and whose conservation ritual is the intangible cultural heritage of humanity, collapsed due to the deterioration of the ropes which could not be renewed due to the pandemic, the cultural authority of Cusco reported today.

“They reported to us yesterday the collapse of the suspension bridge due to the lack of renewal due to the pandemic,” a source from the decentralized direction of culture of Cusco told AFP, which requested that his identity be reserved.

A technical team traveled from Cusco, the former capital of the Inca Empire (15th-16th centuries) in southeastern Peru, to assess the damage. The renovation of the rope walkway takes place every year between May and June, but mandatory confinements due to the coronavirus pandemic have prevented the work.

Since secular times, this task has been carried out by residents of four peasant communities in the district of Quehue, in the province of Cusco de Canas, near the bridge. The platform was located in Quehue, on the mighty Apurímac River, at an altitude of 3,700 meters.

The structure of the bridge, 28 meters long and just over a meter wide, is made by farmers, who work the plant fiber called ichu and braid it into ropes. The work lasts three days, until the knotted ropes shape the bridge. A popular festival closes the municipal task.

In 2013, Unesco included the Inca ritual and conservation techniques in the list of intangible cultural heritage of humanity. The Q’eswachaka Bridge “is a palpable example of the continuity of an existing cultural tradition since pre-Hispanic times”, according to Peruvian authorities.

“It is a historical icon of ancient Peru and its recognition by Unesco is a tribute to the original Quechua communities who, for centuries, preserve it and keep it in service”, he declared in 2013 to the AFP anthropologist Luis Guillermo Lumbreras, former director of the National Institute of Culture.

The Q’eswachaca is the last bridge of its kind preserved and which has retained its original state, from generation to generation, for more than five centuries.

Source: Telam

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