Wari Architecture

Wari architecture is the building tradition of the Wari civilization, which built an empire across the Peruvian highlands with its capital located eleven kilometers northeast of present day Ayacucho. Its administrative centers were typically built from rough fieldstones coated in white plaster, arranged as large rectangular enclosures with no windows, only a few entrances, and no central gathering space for rituals or ceremonies, a marked contrast to the more open layouts of the contemporary Tiwanaku civilization. A distinctive Wari structural form was the D-shaped building, generally small at around ten meters and most often used as a temple. Pikillacta, near Cusco, stands as a major provincial administrative center demonstrating Wari urban planning across the empire. The Wari also developed terraced field technology to extend cultivation across the landscape, a technique later adopted by the Inca.