Peru accuses Yale of undercounting Machu Picchu artifacts

A hotly disputed claim to artifacts from Machu Picchu heated up again this weekend when Peruvian officials claimed researchers at Yale University have severely undercounted the number of items in question.

Peruvian officials say that more than 40,000 artifacts from the famed ‘lost city’ of the Incas are in the possession of the university – ten times the amount the school has claimed.

The dispute is the latest disagreement between the country and the university over the artifacts that were taken from the ruins by Yale alumnus Hiram Bingham who rediscovered the site in 1911. Today, Yale’s Peabody Museum holds the artifacts that the explorer brought back from multiple expeditions to Peru between 1912 and 1915.

Peru claims the artifacts were a short-term loan but the university disagreed. Last year, Peru threatened to take the matter to court but relented in September when the university agreed to work to find a resolution to the matter.

Last month, researchers from Peru traveled to New Haven, Conn. to examine the artifacts in question. In addition, the university also published a catalog of the items on the internet.

Yale researchers say the discrepancy is accountable due to disagreement over what items represent “museum-quality” pieces and which can be classified as non-museum-quality.

According to the agreement between Peru and the university, the museum-quality pieces would be returned to the country following an international exposition. The non-museum-quality pieces would remain at the university museum for another 99 years.