La Otra Banda is an archaeological site in northern coastal Peru where a 4,000-year-old temple and theater were discovered in June 2024 by a team of archaeologists from the Field Museum in Chicago.

Excavations were led by Field Museum scientist Luis Muro Ynoñán.

[1][2][3] The temple walls were decorated with intricate images of figures with human bodies, bird heads, and reptilian claws.

[2] According to Muro Ynoñán, "This discovery tells us about the early origins of religion in Peru.

We still know very little about how and under which circumstances complex belief systems emerged in the Andes, and now we have evidence about some of the earliest religious spaces that people were creating in this part of the world.