travels with tio hernan

Hernan Ponce travelled all over Peru in the early part of the twentieth century with America's first indigenous archaeologist Julio C Tello. His job - to illustrate and record 'el sabio' Tello's legendary discoveries. Along the way, the young artist wrote a collection of anecdotes describing the adventures and mishaps of Tello and his intrepid band of explorers. These are his stories.

Thursday, 12 November 2015

A scientist in the making

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In the foothills of the central Andean highlands to the east of Lima is the province of Huarochirí. The ravines here are studded through ...
Monday, 9 November 2015

This little piggy

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The young Hernan was always quick to poke fun at any kind of affectation.  Here he is again at his most ruthless .  ...
Friday, 9 October 2015

The celebrity ruins of Celendín

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the route from Celendín to Leymebamba  photo - Omar Carbajal  ©PromPeru  About 100 kilometres east of Cajamarca, is the town o...
Tuesday, 6 October 2015

The law of the jungle

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Rio Marañon in Chachapoyas photo - Omar Carbajal ©PromPeru  After their extended stay in the Casma valley, the Marañon expedi...
Saturday, 3 October 2015

Casma ('s) bull

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Tello’s 1937 expedition to explore the Upper Marañon river basin and Peru’s northern coastal valleys was aimed at uncovering evidence tha...
Wednesday, 16 September 2015

Don Timo's turtle

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fig. 1 Julio C. Tello was convinced that pre-hispanic Andean cultures were much older than his contemporaries believed. Up until then...
Thursday, 3 September 2015

Lost in translation

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A short snippet this week. There’s not much more I can add to this one. For those of you who speak Spanish, you will be familiar with the ...
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Alison
I am an English born writer who met a Peruvian diplomat and ended up following him round the world. Hernan Ponce Sanchez was my husband's uncle. I first found his book of anecdotes in 1992. Back then, freshly arrived in Lima, a new wife with a small toddler, I struggled to find my feet in a city that was itself reeling under terrorist attack, water rationing, power outages and curfew. Even more frustrating, travel was hazardous outside the capital in the rural parts of the country I most wanted to visit. Tio Hernan’s stories did much to keep me going in that first dismal winter. Happily Peru has changed since then and so have I. I’m planning on retracing tio Hernan’s footsteps now; to see for myself all those places where the young idealistic artist accompanied the aging archaeologist Tello and discovered many of the treasures that can be seen in the country’s museums today.
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