The Peruvian government is claiming that Yale has ten times as many artefacts from the Machu Picchu site as previously believed.

Last year we noted that Yale had agreed Peru was the rightful owner of artefacts sent to it from the Inca site by Hiram Bingham. Then it was believed this was around 4,000 items.

Now Peruvian politician Hernan Garrido Lecca, says his investigators have found 40,000 artefacts at Yale (various, eg Reuters).

Yale says this isn’t a serious disagreement and is all down to how you count. “We’re talking about the same inventory we shared with them last month,” says spokesman Tom Conroy (Fox).

Richard Burger, the Yale archaeologist responsible the 4,000 items number, told the Yale Daily News. “Counting is complicated. Do you count lots or do you count every piece? There may be tens of thousands of objects if you count each finger bone in a skeleton.”

Yale and Peru are still settling exactly how the 4,000 or 40,000 items will be returned. Some will remain at the university for research, some will form part of a touring exhibition and other will go to a permanent museum in Peru.

The Incas themselves had an intriguing counting system that used knots on string rather than writing. Read more.

Image: Machu Picchu by Allard Schmidt / via WikiMedia