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Offical name
Republic of Peru
Capital
Lima
Government type
constitutional republic
Language
Spanish, Quechua
Area
1,285,220 sq km
Population
28,302,603 ( 2006 est.)
Currency
nuevo sol (PEN)
Religion
Roman Catholic
Time zone
GMT/UTC -5 ()
Country dialing code
51
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By the Andes Mountains, Peru is mainly divided into three regions; the coast region (Costa) bounded by the Pacific Ocean east to the Andes, the mountainous region (Sierra) of the Andes, and the forest region (Montana) around the Amazon River. Especially, the forest region takes up more than half of Peru’s territory. Each of the three regions shows different climates and characteristics of a desert, alp, jungle, etc. Peru is a country where many ancient civilizations originated from. The most famous one among these civilizations is the Incan Civilization, which enjoyed rich development in various fields of social, political and architectural science. Many Incan remains can be observed in Cuzco, the old capital of Inca. Among these remains, the most famous site, Machu Picchu, is built on the cliffs of the Urubamba Valley. Geographically, Machu Picchu was alienated from the outside world and remained as a ‘secret city’ for centuries. In the Southern Nazca city, there is the ‘Nazca Line,’ where more than 70 gigantic pictures of monkeys, birds, plants and abstract patterns are drawn on the ground. These pictures are so big that they can only be observed in airplanes. The reason why these pictures were drawn is still unknown.
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