City of Tawantinsuyu, the Inca empire, built 13th or 14th - 15th century.
The fortress city of Machu Picchu was established only 80 km north west of Cuzco, the capital of the Inca empire. Situated at 2450 m height on a narrow saddle between two peaks above the Urambamaba River, it was in such difficult terrain high in the Andes that it escaped the attention of the Spanish conquerors.
Machu Picchu shows the great administrative and building skills of the Inca. The city was carefully planned: Terraces in the south were used for agriculture and defence, while the residential quarters were in the north. These were subdivided into the western sector with substantial stone buildings with exactly worked stones that did not require mortar and the eastern sector, where the buildings were smaller and made from rubble and mortar. A water supply system covered the entire city. The total area of the city is 13 square kilometres.
Although the city escaped the barbarous Spanish conquest the Inca abandoned it after the fall of their empire in 1532. As a result, Machu Picchu is today one of the best preserved sites of the Inca culture. It was rediscovered in 1911 by Hiram Bingham of Yale University (USA).