Peru as loose confederation of cities scattered along the coast of northern Peru and southern Ecuador, the Chimu flourished from about 1140 to 1450. Their capital was at Chan Chan outside of modern-day Trujillo. In the highlands, both the Tiahuanaco culture, near Lake Titicaca in both Peru and Bolivia, and the Wari culture, near the present-day city of Ayacucho, developed large urban settlements and wide-ranging state systems between 500 and 1000 AD. In the 15th century, the Incas emerged as a powerful state which, in the span of a century, formed the largest empire in pre-Columbian America with their capital in
Metallurgy in pre-Columbian America in spectacular and characteristically Andean gold objects made by the joining of smaller metal sheets, and also gold-silver alloy appears. Two traditions seem to have developed alongside each other – one in northern Peru and Ecuador, and another in the Altiplano region of southern Peru, Bolivia and Chile. There is evidence for smelting of copper sulphide in the Altiplano region around the Early horizon. Evidence for this comes from copper slag recovered at several sites, with the ore itself possibly coming from the south Chilean-Bolivian border. Extensive use of "portable" smelting kilns in the vicinity of Puma Punku, Bolivia and