Ancient City Penico

Ancient City Penico

Archaeologists (考古学家) have discovered an old city in Peru, South America. It dates back 3,500 years. On July 3, a team showed videos of the city called Penico. It's an amazing place. It has a round structure(结构), a big open area and other buildings made of stone and mud. The archaeologists have worked on the site for eight years. They found temples, houses, and sculptures of people and animals.

The archaeologists believe that Penico served as a city where people met to buy and sell things—a place known as a market. It brought the people from the Pacific coast of Peru and the people from the Andes mountains and the Amazon area together. Penico is in Barranca province, about 120 miles north of the capital city, Lima. The site is near the Supe Valley. That's where the Caral civilization(文明) began to grow 5,000 years ago.

Ruth Shady is the lead archaeologist who works on the Penico site. She has studied Caral city since the 1990s. Caral was badly hurt by climate change: long dry weather made the river dry up, and earthquakes(地震) and floods also hit the city. Shady and her team think that Penico became a city after the Caral civilization ended.