Revealing Buried Secrets of Chile’s Capital, Including Who Really ‘Founded’ It

Wielding a sword and protected by armor, the Spanish conquistador sits astride a horse in downtown Santiago, Chile. Each day, thousands of people pass this hefty statue of Pedro de Valdivia at Plaza de Armas (pictured in photo at top), the Chilean capital's busiest square, hemmed in by museums, shops, restaurants and a grand cathedral.

Tourists often pause in de Valdivia's shadow to photograph with the plaza's colorful STGO sign. But few know that these two adjacent objects hint at a historic puzzle. One is tied to Chile's complex history as a nation inhabited for at least 15,000 years before Spanish colonization.

The STGO sign is decorated with designs from the Inca, a South American people who commanded a vast, sophisticated empire from Chile north to Ecuador until the 1530s.

Then the invading Spanish, led by Valdivia and others, conquered them.

Valdivia has long been credited with founding Santiago in 1541 in the Mapocho River Valley. Now, however, that narrative is being challenged.

Researchers are investigating evidence that a lost Incan civilization that may be buried under Santiago. Such a discovery would predate colonialism and also would alter the city's timeline of history.

Lingering in Santiago

Santiago is the tourist gateway to Chile. Most travelers enter this South American nation through Arturo Merino Benítez International, Santiago's modern international airport. Many then venture into the snow-laced Andes mountains that loom above Santiago to its east. Or they head 70 miles west to Silversea port Valparaíso, where rainbow-hued homes and vibrant street murals explain its UNESCO listing as a Historic Seaport Quarter.

Those who linger in Santiago will likely stroll through the Plaza de Armas, a picturesque tourist attraction the Spanish built in the 1540s as the hub of their new colonial settlement. Today, it is dense with trees and dotted with monuments, and locals savor its shady, green setting while socializing with friends and family.

Plaza de Armas anchors Santiago's compact downtown. The main shopping precinct stands here, sprawling north to lively Santiago Central Market. Under the roof of that attractive 19th-century building, visitors bargain for crafts and try such Chilean dishes such as cazuela, usually chicken or beef whose ingredients are cooked separately before becoming a rich stew.

Santiago, Chile, Central Market displays fruits, soups (mussel soup, middle) and seafood, among other products./Getty Images

A church of many lives

Chile's largest church, meanwhile, towers over the plaza's western edge. When the Spaniards seized Chile they introduced Christianity, which predominates in Chile, and has its national headquarters here at the Metropolitan Cathedral, which dates to the 1540s.

The church has been rebuilt five times. Its current design was heavily influenced by Renaissance architecture in its 1748 reconstruction. Beyond the intricate stonework and dual towers which mark its exterior are three handsome naves.

The Cathedral of Santiago contrasts with its neighboring structure. At right a nave inside the cathedral./Getty Images

Each of these prayer halls is richly ornamented. Stained-glass windows beam polychromatic light onto the cathedral's Biblical murals, marble altars, gilded surfaces, geometric floor tiles and array of paintings. Some of those latter artworks depict former archbishops of Chile, who are entombed in the cathedral's crypt.

Clues to inhabitants

From the Chilean Museum of Pre-Columbian Art, from left: Toltec ceramic statue of Xipe Totec, known as the flayed-skin god; a pottery effigy in the shape of a child; and a stone sculpture of a man. Photo left by Bkwillwm; photos 2 and 3 by Koppas; Wikimedia Commons.

Santiago's most intriguing art gallery is directly south of the cathedral. Unlike some prominent museums that are dominated by Western-style painting and sculpture, the Chilean Museum of Pre-Columbian Art is different, as its name suggests.

This graceful, neo-classical building from the early 1800s displays works by ancient cultures and Indigenous groups from across South and Central America. Paintings, masks, sculptures, textiles, funerary objects, and artifacts are among this museum's eclectic collection of 5,000 pieces. Visitors can admire fine cloths, ceramics and metalwork from the Inca, whose civilization stretched to central Chile.

Santiago Museum Casa Colorada/Wikimedia Commons photo by Warko

You'll learn more about Incan heritage at another museum alongside Plaza de Armas. Within an earthen-red 18th-century mansion resides the modern Santiago Museum Casa Colorada, which recently reopened after an extensive renovation.

Using photos, paintings, artifacts, maps, and signage, it presents a detailed timeline of Santiago's past, including the "The Inhabitants of the Mapocho Valley" exhibit. This display acknowledges that the Mapocho River Valley in which Santiago lies, was home to South American peoples, such as Incas, for more than 1,000 years before the Spanish arrived.

Scant attention is paid to this topic at the nearby National History Museum, set in the former neoclassical Royal Courthouse, facing Plaza de Armas. Instead it focuses on Chile's colonial era, having closed its "First Inhabitants of Chile" exhibit that explained the original peoples of this nation.

Strangely, this museum may sit atop a lost Incan city. At least, that is what some Chilean scientists now believe. Their research suggests Santiago was built on a lie. Chile's history texts, written by its colonizers, have long said this city was founded on unoccupied land. Archaeological and written evidence now indicate it previously hosted an Incan civilization.

Did the 'Land of Four parts' exist here?

Chilean academics are investigating this theory. It was posited in 2012 in a text published by Chile's National Museum of Natural History, based on research by historian Gonzalo Sotomayor and archaeologist Rubén Stehberg.

"An urban center of Tawantinsuyu ["Land of Four" parts] may have existed under the old quarter of the city of Santiago, from which Inca pathways came out in different directions and whose subsistence base was the hydro-agriculture and the gold and silver mining," their paper says. "It's believed that the infrastructure of this building would have been used by Pedro de Valdivia to found the city of Santiago."

These researchers uncovered a Santiago City Council document from 1541 that referred to an existing building in Santiago that closely matches the appearance of a common Incan structure called a tambo, which modern-day Merriam Webster's defines as "an Inca inn or way station on the high roads of ancient Peru." Incans used the large building for storage and accommodation. Later colonial texts, meanwhile, referred to Incan roads and postal networks at Santiago.

Excavation of an Incan ceremonial platform in what is thought to be an Incan fortress San Bernardo, considered part of the urban area of Santiago, Chile./Photo courtesy of archaeologist Rubén Stehberg

Archaeological discoveries bolster that written evidence. Incan stones and ceramics have been unearthed during excavations of sites surrounding Plaza de Armas, including Santiago Cathedral and the Chilean Museum of Pre-Columbian Art. Mystery still shrouds this possible Incan settlement. Scientists continue to investigate Its size, design and significance.

Soon they may assemble facts and artifacts that end the debate about Santiago's origins. Evidence strongly suggests that tourists to Santiago's beautiful Plaza de Armas are, wherein fact, walking over a hidden Incan city that flourished here long before Spaniards stormed into the Mapocho River Valley.

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