In 2006, archaeologists opening the seal on a burial chamber at El Brujo, a site on Peru’s northern coast, were unprepared for what they found. There was a woman within. She was about twenty-five, tattooed from head to toe, and wrapped in layers of cloth. Gold headdresses and ceremonial weapons surrounded her, along with over a hundred metal ornaments, nose pieces, earspools and gleaming face decorations that would have made her look almost otherworldly when she was alive. This was the Lady of Cao, and she changed everything.
A burial that did not fit the script
