South America (Geographic Keyword)
226-250 (1,291 Records)
How small communities of coastal Colesuyo were transformed under Inca authority? What roles were played by local and regional elites? Previous worked conducted at the coastal site of Tacahuay has suggested that this site was an altiplano enclave controlled by more powerful Lupaca group. This enclave was established with the aim of obtaining coastal products, and in return Tacahuay elites would have access to Inca sumptuary goods. In this session I present different lines of analyses for future...
Colonial Funerary Rituals at the Templo San Ignacio in Bogotá, Colombia (2018)
This research analyzes the funerary customs in the sixteenth to nineteenth centuries as recovered through archaeological exploration in the Jesuit church named Templo San Ignacio in downtown Bogotá, Colombia. These skeletal remains illustrate how from the moment the church was constructed in 1610, the deposition of the deceased beneath the floor was an integral part of the occupation of this sacred space on the periphery of the Spanish colonial empire. While we recovered human remains from...
Colonial Practices in the Imperial Heartland: The Inca Conquest and Transformation of the Lucre Basin, Cuzco, Peru (2016)
This paper will present data from the author’s dissertation research at the site of Minaspata, located in the Lucre Basin at the eastern end of the Cuzco Valley, Peru. Minaspata has a long history of occupation, dating to the Early Horizon to the end of the Late Horizon, but was conquered as the final component of the Inca heartland immediately prior to the early imperial excursions by the Inca. The results of recent excavations at Minaspata and the different phases of occupation and material...
Colonial process in the Portuguese America: Tupi settlement at the Brazilian Southern shore (2016)
This represents a preliminary paper about the colonial process in Portuguese America and the development of the historical archaeology of indigenous peoples in Brazil. It uses as reference the archaeological remains of a Tupi settlement, on the south shore of the state of Sao Paulo, called Peruíbe. For many years Brazilian historiography built a history of America’s discovery and European colonization with indigenous peoples treated as passive victims of colonial encounter, fated to...
Colonialism and Tupi Persistence on the South shore of São Paulo state - Brazil (2017)
During the last few decades, many studies deconstructed the traditional colonial narratives about the Americas. They rethought the history with a less eurocentric point of view, emphasizing the dynamic cultural values established among European, Indigenous peoples and Africans, contributing together to combine new and old social practices in colonial situations. This work aims an alternative narrative about Brazilian indigenous peoples, which uses a Tupi settlement located in Peruíbe on the...
Colonization as Imperial Strategy: the Wari Settlement of Moquegua, Peru (2016)
When Wari colonists arrived to Moquegua (ca. 600CE) there were several groups occupying different valley ecozones but a relatively small population. In order to establish the colony Wari officials invested a great deal of labor and resources in the upper drainage, which engaged local and colonial populations. In this paper I consider imperial expansion as a process, which was a multi-generational affair. I examine the construction of three major sites: Cerro Baúl, Cerro Mejía, and Cerro...
Colonization of Paradise: Historical Ecology and Archaeology of El Progreso Plantation, Galápagos (1870–1904) (2017)
Colonization of the Galápagos Islands started soon after Ecuadorian separation from the Gran Colombia in 1830. During this decade the Islands were legally claimed by the Republic of Ecuador and colonization projects started. Exploiting concessions were approved to national and international companies. One of these concessions was assigned to Ecuadorian businessmen Manuel J. Cobos and José Monroy to create an agricultural colony on San Cristóbal Island; 1000 km west from the Ecuadorian coast in...
Color and Q'iwa: Expecting the Unexpected in Andean Textile Design (2016)
Color is one of many key expressive modes for textiles in particular. Intense, communicative, and not always predictable, Andean textile coloration is a complex issue. Rather than submitting to a "cookbook" delineation of color symbolism (red means blood, etc.), the abstract mindset of ancient and modern Andean societies means that color has many more complex, even philosophical, roles to play in the fiber arts of this area. For instance, purposeful rupturing of regular color patterning...
Color in Wari and Inka Khipus (2016)
This paper analyzes the uses of color in the Wari and Inka khipus. The focus of the study will be on the ranges and ways of combining colors used in each tradition. The central question to be addressed is: How was color used as a medium of coding information in each tradition and what can we say about how and why the system of color may have changed as it did from Wari to Inka times?
Color patterns and aspects of significance in the Paracas Necropolis (2016)
Anne Paul (1998) observed that the Paracas Necropolis embroiderers seem to explore all possible color repeat patterns in their mantle design. At the same time, a few dominant color combinations recur throughout the assemblage. Like speech, color is a system of difference, hues perceived relationally through contrast with those adjacent. Dyed color is produced by chemical processes on natural fiber with pre-existing tones, and changes over time in diverse environmental conditions. These factors...
Color, Structure, and Meaning in Middle Horizon Khipus (2016)
Inka khipus used cord color, knots, cord attachment, final twist, and sometimes material (e.g., colored camelid hair) to encode information. Middle Horizon (Wari) khipus used all these conventions and more. For instance, the thick, white, cotton pendant cords of MH khipus were routinely wrapped with brightly colored (usually camelid hair) yarns that most likely conveyed meaning. The thickness and structure of pendant-cords themselves likely held significance. Further, while Wari khipu makers...
Color, Structure, and Society in the Tiwanaku State (2016)
In the Andes, weaving and wearing cloth are essential for shaping identity and social relations. The weavers of the south-central Andean Tiwanaku state (Middle Horizon period A.D.500-1100) possessed knowledge of plant and animal fibers, weave techniques, dyes, and iconography which allowed them to produce a wide range of textiles, from the monochrome cloths of daily life to the vibrantly colored tapestries. Examining textile evidence from burials at the provincial center of Omo M10 (Moquegua,...
The Colors of the Coya's Robes (2016)
Of the many surviving pre-Columbian Inka textiles, especially those made in tapestry and featuring tukapu (rectangular design blocks), only a few full-size garments are associated with females. There are, however, many miniature female garments. Inka textiles also tend to follow a limited number of color combinations, although some textiles show a more diverse, even exuberant mixture. Felipe Guaman Poma de Ayala, in his section on the coyas (queens), attributes a specific set of colors to each...
Combined use of different lines of evidence for the analysis of polychrome archaeological ceramics of the Quebrada de Humahuaca, Jujuy, Argentina. (2016)
Polychrome archaeological ceramics called "vírgulas or comas" hold a comprehensive but an unequal space distribution. They are found in limited quantities in achaelogical sites in regions as North and Central Puna, Quebrada de Humahuaca, Jujuy and Northeast areas of Argentina.These ceramics vessels had been used in both regions since 900 AD until the Spanish post-colony. Then, we come to the conclusion about the movement of these ceramics pieces with a significant use and a ritual or ceremonial...
Combining GPR and Archeological Excavations at Los Morteros: Looking "Inside" a Complex Preceramic Coastal Peruvian Site (2016)
The Los Morteros archaeological site is located on the desert north coast of Peru. This large, elliptical mound (ca. 225x200 m, with relief of 14.5 m) is situated on a 3 m high Mid-Holocene shoreline. Limited excavations in the 1970’s identified preceramic midden deposits. Subsequent ground-penetrating radar (GPR) survey at the site revealed interior stratigraphy inconsistent with a sand dune or bedrock-cored sand deposit, suggesting human agency in the construction of the mound, rather than...
Comment On Ross (1978)
This resource is a citation record only, the Center for Digital Antiquity does not have a copy of this document. The information in this record has been migrated into tDAR from the National Archaeological Database Reports Module (NADB-R) and updated. Most NADB-R records consist of a document citation and other metadata but do not have the documents themselves uploaded. If you have a digital copy of the document and would like to have it curated in tDAR, please contact us at comments@tdar.org.
Common Meals, Noble Feasts: An Archaeological Investigation of Moche Food and Cuisine in the Jequetepeque Valley, Peru (2016)
In the North Coast of Peru, relatively little is known about the majority of the population that supported the lifestyles of the elite. In this paper, I discuss the concept of a Moche cuisine through a study of the foodways of both elite and commoner classes, drawing on archaeobotanical data from a feasting preparation area located in the elite cemetery of San José de Moro and from a humble household situated near the base of the fortified hilltop settlement of Cerro Chepén. Cuisine can be...
Communities of practice and variability/standardization of the ceramic assemblages: the indigenous people Asurini do Xingu (2017)
I intend to present some results of my ethnoarchaeological research (1996-2016) on the ceramic technology of the Asurini do Xingu, an Amazonian indigenous people (Tupi-Guarani linguistic family) who lives on the banks of the Xingu River - Pará, Brazil. Based on collected data, I will demonstrate the relationship between the social organization of ceramic production and the standardization/variability of these artifacts over time. I will show how in Asurini context, teaching-learning framework,...
Community and Ancestors in the Titicaca Basin during the Formative Period (2015)
The Formative Period (1500 BC-AD 200) in the Titicaca Basin was a time of important social and economic changes, such as the establishment of sedentary settlements and long distance trade routes, increasing horticultural investment, and an emerging regional ritual tradition, Yaya-Mama. However, while archaeologists have documented and described these changes, less is understood about how they impacted local communities. In particular, Yaya-Mama has been interpreted in a variety of ways: as a...
Community and the Contours of Empire: The Hacienda System in the Northern Highlands of Ecuador (2017)
Recent archaeological studies of Spanish colonialism have redirected scholarly attention both to the workings of imperialism and the multitude of ways in which marginalized populations navigated and remade the grids of power that constitute empire. A focus on the household and the materiality of everyday life has generated a rich body of evidence by which to tack between multiple scales of social life and foreground the material culture of daily life as constitutive elements in the making of...
Community Organization Reflected By the Household: a Study of Pre-Columbian Social Dynamics (1982)
This resource is a citation record only, the Center for Digital Antiquity does not have a copy of this document. The information in this record has been migrated into tDAR from the National Archaeological Database Reports Module (NADB-R) and updated. Most NADB-R records consist of a document citation and other metadata but do not have the documents themselves uploaded. If you have a digital copy of the document and would like to have it curated in tDAR, please contact us at comments@tdar.org.
Companions or Counterparts: Considering the Role of Animal Depictions in Moche Ceramics from Northern Peru (2015)
The Moche Period (1-850AD) is well known for its iconography with naturalistic depictions of a variety of different figures and themes. One aspect of the corpus that has been under-analyzed is the common representation of plant and animal life. The ceramic assemblages of the Moche depict numerous animal species from coastal, highland and Amazonian locations. Recent work conducted at the Larco Herrera Museum reveals that various animal species may have been considered important symbols of group...
Comparative characterization and sourcing of pottery styles from the Lurin valley, central coast of Peru (2016)
Our goal is to reconstruct networks of ceramic production and exchange on the Peruvian central coast through a comparison of compositional datasets on pottery and soil samples from the Lurin valley. While one dataset from Villa El Salvador dates to the late Early Horizon, most of the pottery sample comes from Late Horizon occupations at the Pachacamac, Pueblo Viejo, and Huaycan de Cieneguilla sites. In Tawantinsuyu, the products and networks of exchange connected heterogeneous populations, and...
Comparative Micro-Usewear and Residue Analyses on Late Pleistocene Unifacial Tools from Huaca Prieta, Peru, and Monte Verde, Chile (2018)
This study presents the results of a comparative multi-year analysis of high and low power micro-usewear and residue patterns on 14,000-10,000 cal BP unifacial stone tools from the late Pleistocene archaeological sites of Huaca Prieta on the north coast of Peru and the Monte Verde I and II sites in south-central Chile. The archaeological stones from these sites are also compared with experimental assemblages employing various actions (e.g., scraping, cutting, gouging, perforating) to work...
The comparison of central and peripheral household compounds at the site of Panquilma, Peruvian Central Coast (2015)
This paper explores the hierarchical differences between households at the site of Panquilma. Previous studies at the site have identified two types of household compounds: central and peripheral. Despite the fact that central compounds are bigger and located closer to the public buildings of the site, no other difference has been identified that can point towards the presence and the nature of any type of hierarchical distinction between both types of domestic compounds. Using 3-D...