THE TWICE BURIED EL SENOR

The most fascinating aspect to my visit to Star & Roger's land "Chaska" in San Sebastian in the Sacred Valley was Roger's casual mention of an event that occurred some years before, on the neighboring property.

It seems that the neighbor wanted to erect a structure on his property line and a very old, very large tree was in the way. So he ordered his workers to cut it down. As the workers were nearing the end of their task, they glanced into a hole in the trunk, now grown nearly closed. To their astonishment, they discovered an ancient burial that had been placed in the hole while the tree was still living. Inside the cavity, reposing in fetal position, was an adult male, wrapped in now tattered garments and accompanied by ritual objects. This style of burial far antedated the Inca's. To remove him, they had to take a saw and enlargen the entry, as the tree, which continued to grow long after the internment, had grown over the hole till it was nearly sealed shut.

An object of local curiosity, the skull was placed in a crotch of the remains of the tree, but, so the story goes, El Senor was not happy being on public display, and the skull rolled out of the tree crotch every night, to be found each morning on the ground. The land owner consulted a local wise man and it was decided to have El Senor re-interred in one of the nearby cliff side caves used by the Inca for their burials. There El Senor rests today, and his tree trunk burial niche is still to be seen embedded in the wall built by Roger and Star's neighbor..

El Senor's first burial