ARCHAEOLOGISTS HAVE FOUND A 4,000 YEAR OLD TEMPLE IN PERU

A 4,000-year-old temple filled with murals has been unearthed on the northern coast of Peru, making it one of the oldest finds in the Americas, Walter Alva, a leading archaeologist has announced. The temple, inside a larger ruin, includes a staircase that leads up to an altar used for fire worship at a site scientists have called Ventarron. It sits in the Lambayeque valley, near the ancient Sipan complex that Alva unearthed in the 1980s. Ventarron was built long before Sipan, about 2,000 years before Christ, he said.

"What's surprising are the construction methods, the architectural design and most of all the existence of murals that could be the oldest in the Americas," Alva said.

Lambayeque is 472 miles from Lima, Peru's capital. Discoveries at Sipan, an administrative and religious center of the Moche culture, have included a gold-filled tomb built 1,700 years ago for a pre- Incan king. "The discovery of this temple reveals evidence suggesting the region of
Lambayeque was one of great cultural exchange between the Pacific coast and the rest of Peru," said Alva.