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Bingham carefully cultivated his swashbuckler image and frequently had himself photographed in dashing poses, such as this one at Espiritu Pampa. (Yale Peruvian Expedition Papers, Manuscripts and Archives, Yale University)

Bingham’s best-known book, Lost City of the Incas, inspired the 1954 B-movie Secret of the Incas, a major influence on Raiders of the Lost Ark. (Courtesy of the author)

Newly unearthed film production memos indicate that the connection between Bingham and Indiana Jones is closer than previously known. (© Sunset Boulevard/Corbis)

Decades after his death, Bingham made headlines again in 2008 when Peru’s former first lady Eliane Karp-Toledo (shown with her husband, President Alejandro Toledo) prodded Peru to sue Yale University for the return of artifacts Bingham had taken from Machu Picchu. (© Paolo Aguilar/EFE/Corbis)

The same year, Alaskan researcher Paolo Greer published an article that raised new doubts about Bingham’s status as the discoverer of Machu Picchu. (Courtesy of Paolo Greer)

A section of the hand-drawn map that led Greer on a twenty-year odyssey. (Courtesy of Paolo Greer)

Bingham located the Inca Trail during his final attempt to prove his Lost City theory. The agricultural settlement of Patallacta, near the trail’s start, fed multitudes at Machu Picchu. (Courtesy of the author)

The author takes a break with his Inca Trail guide, Efrain Valles. One of these men has walked the trail three hundred times. (Courtesy of John Leivers)

John Leivers approaches the Sun Gate, the pilgrim’s entrance to Machu Picchu. (Courtesy of the author)

On the morning of the June solstice, a beam of sunlight shoots down this corridor in the ruins of Llactapata. A gold reflector at its end may have blasted the light back across the valley to Machu Picchu. (Courtesy of John Leivers)

The same day, the sun can be seen from Machu Picchu rising directly over the top of Cerro San Gabriel. (Courtesy of the author)

Mystically inclined visitors congregate at Machu Picchu for the solstice. (Courtesy of the author)

Machu Picchu today. The Torreon, scrubbed to its original brilliant white, can be seen in the bottom right corner. The Intihuatana stone is half way up on the left. The Sacred Plaza, including the Principal Temple and the Temple of the Three Windows, is at the base of the small terraced hill on which the Intihuatana stone sits. (Courtesy of the author)

Acknowledgments

The Incas had a three-pronged Golden Rule, still widely repeated in the Andes: ama sua, ama llula, ama cheklla. Translated, it means “do not steal, do not lie, do not be lazy.” There’s not much I can do about my un-Bingham-like laziness at this point in my life—the only way I’m ever going back to Choquequirao is in a helicopter—but I would be lying if I did not admit to stealing hours of valuable time from some very busy people while writing this book. I am deeply indebted to each of them.

My foremost gratitude is to John Leivers, who not only dragged my sorry behind through much of Peru but subsequently answered hundreds of questions, always cheerfully, patiently and in minute detail. Mike Benoist, Cliff Ransom and Steve Byers, all adventurous types, gave invaluable comments on an early draft. The always blunt Gillian Fassel prevented me from indulging my worst authorial instincts, in the nicest way possible. Ryan Bradley ventured into the jungles of Beverly Hills and elsewhere to track down rumors and factoids, then returned to civilization to give insightful notes. The librarians at Yale’s Sterling Memorial Library and The New York Public Library (Jay Barksdale in particular) were extremely kind and helpful. My brother Jason Adams, as always, helped me get to the finish line. Paolo Greer delved repeatedly into his personal archives to answer even the most obscure questions I had about Machu Picchu. Dan Ferrara, who hired me at Outside magazine in 1992, is still cleaning