Chavin de Huantar

9.5890°S, 77.1737°W.

Chavín de Huántar in the Mosna Valley, Áncash Region, Peru — the central pyramid complex of the Chavín culture, built between approximately 1200 and 500 BCE in the eastern foothills of the Cordillera Blanca. Original base 75 metres per side; original height 13 metres on three terraces, with an internal labyrinth of stone-lined corridors and chambers built into the body of the pyramid itself. The interior contains the Lanzón — a 4.5-metre carved granite monolith depicting an anthropomorphic deity with feline fangs, serpent hair, and clawed feet — set as the central cult image at the intersection of the principal interior corridors. Excavated by Julio C. Tello in 1919 and continuously since by Peruvian and American missions including Richard Burger from 1975 onward. The Chavín culture was the first Andean civilisation to produce iconography and religious architecture that spread across the entire Peruvian coast and highlands — the foundational pan-Andean religious tradition. UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1985.

The pyramid containing the Andes' first widely worshipped god, in a stone labyrinth built into the body of the building itself.