18 INSTITUTE OF SOCIAL ANTHROPOLOGY—PUBLICATION NO. 5 
Highlands of Peru; the railways signed the death 
warrants of some towns and increased the impor- 
tance of others. For commerce, which had for 
centuries passed up and down the length of the 
inter-Andean valleys, was now directed chiefly in 
an east-west direction, from the Sierra to the 
Coast. Seaports assumed a new importance and 
coastwise shipping largely took over the functions 
of the King’s Highway. 
The first railway to be built in Peru was the 
short line, completed in 1851, from the port of 
Callao to Lima. Plans for the construction of the 
Central and Southern Railways were not made 
until some 17 years later. By 1876 the Southern 
Railway, which was begun first, had been extended 
from the port of Mollendo to the city of Puno on 
Lake Titicaca in the heart of the southern Peru- 
vian Highlands.** While the Southern Railway 
was being built, work on the Central Railway was 
begun. The strain, however, on national finances 
caused by the simultaneous construction of two 
major lines brought operations to a standstill in 
1876, and railway construction was further inter- 
rupted by the war with Chile. In 1890 a corpo- 
ration was formed in London to take over the 
chief Government railways in return for the cancel- 
lation of a debt owing to British creditors. Raul- 
way building operations were resumed, and the 
Central line to La Oroya was completed in 1893, 
while the Southern line from Puno to Cuzco was 
finished in 1908 
Railway construction in Central Peru was ac- 
companied at every stage by the development and 
expansion of mining activities. The Cerro de 
Pasco Copper Corp., organized first as the Cerro 
de Pasco Mining Co., entered the field in 1902, 
and other mining companies followed shortly 
afterward. At the time when La Oroya was the 
Highland terminal of the Central Railway, this 
smelter town functioned as a ‘terrestrial port” 
into which flowed the mineral riches of Cerro de 
Pasco, Morococha, and Yauli (Romero, 1944, pp. 
73-74). The mines, which form the principal 
nuclei of industrial activity in the Central High- 
land region, expanded radially as the railway 
pushed forward, deeper into the Sierra zone. By 
1907 the Cerro de Pasco Mining Co. had con- 
structed its line from La Oroya to Cerro de 
Pasco, and a year later the Central Railway from 
La Oroya to Huancayo was opened to traffic. In 
31 Material on the construction of the Peruvian railways has been taken 
chiefly from Dunn, 1925, pp. 47-78. 
turn the towns of Cerro de Pasco and Huancayo 
each became ‘terrestrial ports,’ and networks of 
roads spread out from these centers to the punas 
and to the jungles of the Montana. The con- 
struction of a narrow gage railway from Huancayo 
to Huancavelica revived in the latter Department 
the mining activities which had declined greatly 
in late Colonial times. At the present time the 
Central Railway dominates not only the valleys 
of Lima Department but also the central Sierra 
between Cerro de Pasco and Huancavelica. By 
extension, through a connecting system of auto- 
mobile roads, all Highland Peru between Hudnuco 
and Ayacucho lies within the sphere of influence 
of the Central Railway, and most of the commerce 
of this region centers upon the port of Callao 
which is its Coastal terminal. 
Road construction on an extensive scale in 
Peru is a recent development; roads were formerly 
considered of less importance than railways. In 
fact, a definite policy regarding the building of 
roads may be said to have been formulated as 
recently as 1916, at which time a special corps of 
highway engineers was created by the Peruvian 
Government. Dunn (1925, pp. 85-87), writing 
during the 1920’s, states that Sierra roads were 
chiefly ‘mule trails,” but that ‘cart roads,’ most 
of which were designed for future motor traffic, 
were contemplated. However late road construc- 
tion began, the various regions of Highland Peru 
which were formerly remote and inaccessible are 
today knit together by an admirable system of 
highways and roads which, taken together with 
the railways, have already begun to effect pro- 
found changes in the lives of the Highland peoples. 
The rapid and recent increase in means of com- 
munication has had sweeping effects on the popu- 
lation of all Peru. During the past century the 
population tended to be static in a geographical 
sense, and the country was characterized by a 
municipal organization which tended to be 
strongly local in character, and by a regional 
economy (Romero, 1944, pp. 61-62). This was 
followed by extensive movements of population 
which depopulated certain regions and greatly 
increased the populations of others. With an 
increase in means of communication and a subse- 
quent increase in industrial and commercial 
activities, there has been a general movement of 
population toward the centers best situated for 
commerce. The rapidly growing populations of 
Lima, Trujillo, and Arequipa bear witness to this 
