Lima Treasure
buried hoard OPEN fame 4/5
The "Treasure of Lima" — colonial church wealth of Lima said to have been entrusted in 1820 to Captain William Thompson for safekeeping during Peru's war of independence, then stolen and allegedly buried on Cocos Island, Costa Rica. More than 300 expeditions have searched the island without a verified recovery.
Scorecard
Exists
CONTESTED
band 3/5 · raw -0.36
- -0.42 · Despite more than 300 recorded expeditions over two centuries — including one by…
- +0.07 · Popular accounts trace the treasure to the 1820 evacuation of Lima ahead of José…
Findable now
PLAUSIBLY-FINDABLE
band 4/5 · raw +4.19
- +3.00 · technique_term
- +2.00 · location_term
- -0.42 · Despite more than 300 recorded expeditions over two centuries — including one by…
Findable (frontier)
PLAUSIBLY-FINDABLE
band 4/5 · raw +4.19
- +3.00 · technique_term
- +2.00 · location_term
- -0.42 · Despite more than 300 recorded expeditions over two centuries — including one by…
Location hypotheses
The interactive map (Leaflet + OpenStreetMap tiles) is the one part of this page that needs a network connection; the hypothesis list below is the offline-readable source of truth.
| Hypothesis | Coords | Radius | Prior | Posterior | Note |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Wafer Bay caches, Cocos Island | 5.552, -87.061 | 3 km | 0.35 | — | The bay where Gissler concentrated his multi-year search. |
| Chatham Bay, Cocos Island | 5.556, -87.038 | 3 km | 0.30 | — | The island's other main anchorage and a recurring expedition target. |
| Interior ravines below Cerro Iglesias, Cocos Island | 5.535, -87.055 | 5 km | 0.15 | — | The theory that the cache was carried inland from the landing bays into the island's highland interior. |
What would it take?
No emerging or speculative technique changes the picture yet — the frontier findability band (PLAUSIBLY-FINDABLE) equals the current band. A breakthrough here would need a genuinely new capability, not just a maturing one.
Evidence ledger (4 verified facts)
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Popular accounts trace the treasure to the 1820 evacuation of Lima ahead of José de San Martín's advance, when Spanish colonial and church valuables were loaded aboard the trader Mary Dear under Captain William Thompson.known by 1900-01-01 · diagnosticity medium · confidence 0.55↳ Wikipedia: Treasure of Lima journalistic
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Cocos Island, an uninhabited Costa Rican island roughly 550 km offshore, is the location named in nearly every retelling and has drawn hundreds of documented treasure expeditions since the 19th century.known by 1900-01-01 · diagnosticity medium · confidence 0.70↳ Wikipedia: Cocos Island journalistic
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Despite more than 300 recorded expeditions over two centuries — including one by August Gissler, who lived on the island for years as governor — no verified portion of the treasure has ever been produced.known by 1950-01-01 · diagnosticity high · confidence 0.85↳ Wikipedia: Treasure of Lima journalistic
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Costa Rica declared Cocos Island a national park in 1978 and a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1997, and now prohibits treasure hunting there — a legal barrier that caps present-day findability regardless of whether loot exists.known by 1997-12-01 · diagnosticity medium · confidence 0.90↳ Wikipedia: Cocos Island journalistic
Technique matrix
| Technique | Family | Maturity | Applicability | Rationale |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Airborne LIDAR | airborne space | available | 3/3 | Canopy-penetrating LIDAR could map the jungle island's micro-topography for disturbed ground. |
| Magnetometry | terrestrial geophysics | available | 3/3 | Fast metal-anomaly coverage of the two candidate bays if permits allowed. |
| Ground-penetrating radar (GPR) | terrestrial geophysics | available | 2/3 | Sub-surface imaging of a localized cache once an anomaly is flagged. |
| Predictive terrain / site modeling | computational | available | 2/3 | Ranks the island's terrain by burial plausibility to focus a survey. |
| Archaeological excavation | ground truthing | available | 1/3 | Definitive but legally barred inside the national park; confirmation only. |
Search history (negative evidence)
| Years | Technique | Coverage | Detection | Result | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1889–1908 | excavation | 40% | 50% | null_result | Lived on Cocos Island for nearly two decades searching; recovered only a handful of coins. |