This article has been reviewed according to Science X's editorial process and policies. Editors have highlighted the following attributes while ensuring the content's credibility: Deep in Peru's Acarí Valley lie the ruins of Tambo Viejo, an Inka provincial center where excavations have uncovered tasseled sacrificial llamas and brightly adorned guinea pigs. But save for a few seeds and some stored leaves, evidence of how the Inka used one of their most sacred plants in rituals remained elusive.
Now, archaeologists have discovered coca leaves still stuck in the wool of some sacrificed llamas. The discovery, reported in the journal Ñawpa Pacha, is the first direct evidence of coca in a ritual at the site. It contradicts what Spanish chroniclers reported hundreds of years ago: that coca was burned or bundled up during ritual offerings.
"Above all, coca was a sacred plant to the Inkas and according to written records was used in almost every single ritual activity," Lidio Valdez, an archaeologist at the University of Calgary in Canada, said. "I had been looking for it for a while, when finally I found it." Founded in the early 1400s, Tambo Viejo was built atop an abandoned fortified settlement on Peru's southern coast, the study reported. Excavations have been ongoing since 2018, uncovering plazas, cobblestone-walled buildings, more than a dozen adorned sacrificial llamas and more than 200 guinea pigs.
Archaeologists have rarely found coca leaves in Inka ritual contexts, possibly because they don't survive well in the damp highlands where most ancient Inka sites lie. But Tambo Viejo's bone-dry climate preserves even the most fragile plants. According to the study, the Inka believed the world was filled with spirits that needed ritual offerings in return for good favor.
Coca was one such offering. Spanish chroniclers reported that the Inka would hold its leaves in their mouths to gain strength and vigor and stave off hunger—benefits the spirits were thought to desire, too. Investigations had already turned up some coca seeds and a few leaves in a storage structure, suggesting the plant may have been cultivated locally.
But efforts to uncover coca leaves in ritual settings had been unsuccessful until 2024, during the excavation of Structure 4. Beneath its dusty old floors, researchers uncovered a group of nine young llamas adorned with tassels, their faces painted with red dots and lines, and their legs folded and tied with ropes as if resting. Stuck in the wool of three of these sacrifices were coca leaves.
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