La Catedral de Lima

Lonely Planet Peru guide (6th ed., Feb. 2007), pp.93-96 "The original cathedral...was deemed too small for its congregation within a single decade, and work on its successor began in 1564, which was still unfinished when it was consecrated in 1625. It was badly damaged in the 1687 earthquake and almost totally destroyed by another earthquake in 1746. The reconstruction is based on the early plans." The remains of Francisco Pizarro, the Spaniard who colonized Peru and killed the Incan leader Atahualpa, are located in the cathedral's chapel. My Peru guide notes an interesting story about the remains..."A debate over the authenticity of the remains raged during the 1980s and early 1990s, especially after several bodies and a mysterious disembodied head were unearthed in the crypt in the late 1970s. After a battery of tests and speculation, the authorities concluded that the body previously on dipslay was an unknown church official and that a brutally stabbed and headless body from the crypt was indeed Pizzaro's, and was reunited with the head and transferred to the chapel." Good times in 16th-century Peru, my friends, GOOD TIMES.