LOS ANGELES, Dec 8: The 79-year-old swashbuckling adventurer regarded as the model for the movie hero, Indiana Jones, pledged to continue his exploits despite criticism from archaeologists that his expeditions ruin ancient sites in Peru, the Los Angeles Times said on Tuesday.

"I would rather die out there than not explore," said Gene Savoy, who is widely seen as the world's foremost chronicler of a forgotten civilization known as the Chachapoya, or Cloud People, which once flourished in the northern Peruvian mountains known as Ceja de Selva. Mr Savoy was reacting to criticism from archaeologists that his adventures actually inhibit research at ancient sites.

"Savoy's involvement in the Chachapoya saga clouds the scientific issues, attracts a lot of crackpots and scares off serious researchers, who don't want to constantly have to deal with Savoy's tedious legacy of lost cities/El Dorado fantasies and delusions," said archaeologist Keith Muscutt of the University of California, Santa Cruz.

Mr Muscutt's comments reflected the growing concern that Gene Savoy's discoveries were exposing the ancient sites to plunder after they were preserved in the jungle for more than 500 years. The most recent controversy centres on an area known as Gran Saposoa, where Mr Savoy discovered one ancient site in 1999 and five new sites last year.

Archaeologists claimed that the sites "discovered" by Mr Savoy had actually been known to locals for decades and that the vegetation he cleared there exposed the monuments' walls to danger from new plant growth.

Mr Savoy said that the complaints were motivated by professional jealousy and because the "fuddy-duddy academics" did not relish being beaten by an untrained explorer. "Exploring is the key," Mr Savoy said defiantly. "The scientist tells you what you found, but you have to find it in the first place. Let the scientists come in later." -dpa