Distinguished photographer Edward Ranney presents nearly one hundred extraordinary photographs of the Peruvian huacas--the sacred rock shrines carved by Inca artisans roughly between 1440 and 1532 AD.

Ranney's photographs evoke the sacred power that the highland landscape around Cusco held for the Incas, revealing how aspects of nature such as caves and springs, in addition to rock outcrops, were integral to Inca culture and served as a focus of ritual attention. This extended to items on a more intimate scale, as with special stones or unusual landscape details. The book concludes with an extensive series of pictures featuring the shrines and landscape of Machu Picchu. In her closing essay, Lucy R. Lippard discusses the cultural context of the huacas and how contemporary research and thinking view this unique achievement of ancient America.