Archaeologists in Peru have found skeletons of children who may have been buried in the 16th century. The bones are being examined for that too. HighlightThe children may have been victims of the smallpox virus, which also caused a rare bone infection.
Around 1540, a smallpox epidemic probably broke out in Huanchaco, now a popular seaside resort. It is certain that the infection did not stop at the city wall, but may have spread to neighboring areas as well. In recent years, archaeologists have discovered mass graves of more than 260 children in the city cemetery. Many of them had their hearts removed, leading researchers to believe they were sacrificed in a ritual 500 years ago.
However, recent excavations have also found another cemetery, located near a church built by Spanish colonists around 1535. Here they found 120 graves with the bodies of Europeans and indigenous Chimu-Inca. The indigenous people were buried adorned with crosses and beads of European origin, proving that they had converted to Christianity.
However, many of them contracted smallpox, and it is assumed that the disease was brought to the indigenous population by European invaders, because no such epidemics had ever occurred before in this region. Smallpox ravaged mainly the inhabitants of the northern coast of the Andes and may have arrived with Francisco Pizarro in the 1630s.
The rebel conqueror
Pizarro first visited the coastal regions of Peru between 1526 and 1528, and was amazed by the Inca's wealth. After recovering from the initial shock, he sailed home and quickly gathered money and soldiers so that he could return once again and conquer the luxurious Inca empire with royal permission. On the second expedition, he reached the city of Cajamarca and began his series of adventures.
The natives welcomed the Spaniards sympathetically, admired their shining armor, called them “sons of the sun,” and told them all about the Inca Empire.
In 1532, Pizarro's army of 200 men defeated the Inca army of 80,000 men due to superior firearms, after which Pizarro offered to the Incas that he would not kill their ruler if they filled a room with gold. He obtained the room full of golden objects, but executed Governor Atahualpa, and captured Cuzco, the capital of the Inca Empire, with 180 men. Pizarro became master of Peru and in 1535 began the founding of Lima.
By 1620, introduced infectious diseases had wiped out more than 70% of the indigenous population on the northern coast of Peru, with children with weakened immune systems suffering the most. In the Huanchaco cemetery, more than 67% of the graves belong to infants and children under 12 years of age.
Archaeologists have now examined the skeletons of two children who died aged 1 and 2, and have found incredible deformities. Numerous puncture wounds on the shoulders, elbows, wrists, hips, knees and ankle joints. There is no reliable data on the spread and effects of the disease, but it is assumed that the children may have lived with smallpox for several weeks after the onset of symptoms, enough time for the bones to become severely infected.
These lesions are signs of variola osteomyelitis, a bone infection caused by the smallpox virus.
These were the first cases of smallpox osteomyelitis in South America, but after that more and more cases of smallpox occurred, even epidemics.
Bone deformity is not always associated with smallpox, but it is often present, and it is also likely that a smallpox epidemic would have altered the population for many years after it had subsided.