Having been to Peru, I can tell you that there are Inca ruins everywhere. A few are signposted and tourist attractions, but many many more are just abandoned in the mountains. There are enough that if you take a hike off the footpath, there's a good chance you'll just come across one.
Not quite the same level of antiquity as Inca ruins, but I have family in Peleliu which was the site of a major WWII skirmish between Allied forces and the Japanese (specifically). There are so many ruins everywhere that people don't think much of them at times. I once came across part of a plane wing just haphazardly buried on a beach and we just sort of marvelled at it for a moment and moved on.
There are obviously designated areas and monuments (to both sides) and there is a museum but throughout the island it is scattered with remains everywhere that it isn't uncommon even know to run into things.
Skirmish? Wikipedia says it lasted two months, one week, and five days, with nearly 11 thousand casualties on each side. (The US casualties about 20% dead, the Japanese nearly 100%.)
I was underplaying the severity of it. It was quite the site of battle. It was actually one of the two routes the US was planning to use to attack Tokyo, the other being the Philippines.
Same thing happens in Greece, where if you want to build a house in, say, Athens, you run the real risk of finding ancient artifacts when digging the foundation and having your build halted so archeologists can come in and take them.
Same thing all over and I know for a fact that construction companies in my home town would often simply destroy or bury artefacts they found, rather than risk a long and costly halt to a job.
The London Crossrail project (underground railway) specifically disallowed any employee to look at the dirt they were digging, just incase they saw a bone or an ancient pot. They put extra covers and opaque screens in the conveyor belts for dirt so that none could be seen by accident.
There's always the problem that Mexico has seen - it's not cheap or easy to protect ruins once they're discovered. In some places, there are tons of artifacts so once they're on the map, you have to expend resources protecting them. If they're not of academic/historical importance, it could be better to leave them 'undiscovered' so they're not pillaged.
In my experience, that's rarely a good idea. No documentation means no ability to do regular monitoring or tie records together over years, irrespective of funding. Simply put, not ideal. The way it's handled in the US is to simply require auth on the site databases.
"In 1535 Diego de Almagro was commissioned by the Spanish crown to occupy Collasuyu, the southernmost region of the Inca empire. With 200 Spanish soldiers and 2000 Indian mercenaries from Peru, he marched over the Puna de Atacama into what are today the provinces of Jujuy and Salta."
Fantastic, thanks so much for the assist! Incredibly interesting, I love Saguaro (live in Tucson so they are everywhere). It's interesting these ones have mescaline in them too! The flowering looks a bit different though.
