South America (Geographic Keyword)
476-500 (1,326 Records)
In the context of a pluridisciplinary mission organized by the French government in Chile, Argentina, Peru and Bolivia in 1903, archaeological excavations were conducted in the monumental site of Tiahuanaco by the naturalist Georges Courty. During his 3-month stay, he conducted extensive fieldwork in the Akapana mound, the Sunken Temple, the Kalasasaya, and the Chunchukala and Putuni structures. The material corpus unearthed is estimated to consist in over 1400 artifacts, later divided between...
From "Nation" to "Indio" and "Español": Transitions in Indigenous Culture in the Missions of San Antonio (2018)
The Spanish colonial advance into Texas during the late 17th century resulted in the establishment of several missions to house members of dozens of indigenous groups and a handful of presidios to protect the missions from raiding bands of Comanches and Apaches. The Padres that were in charge of the missions enforced systematic policies and procedures to affect change in the identity of the resident indigenous nations. The policies and procedures specifically targeted religious believes,...
From Bedrock to Biface: An Examination of Wari Lithic Technology within the Moquegua Valley of Southern Peru (2015)
This research investigates lithic artifacts, and debitage recovered from Middle Horizon (A.D. 550 – 1000) households in the Moquegua Valley, Peru to assess models of Wari state expansion and polity interaction. While lithic technology, in the form of formal and informal flake tools, are present throughout complex societies, they are traditionally overlooked by archaeologists and result in few published studies. This study examines two Wari sites (Cerro Baul and Cerro Mejia) in the upper Moquegua...
From Cooking to Smelting, the Social Technology of Pyrotechnology of Earth Ovens (2018)
The effects of earth ovens on societies is a topic that has not been consider much, mainly because the limitation of archaeological findings. Because our research has been mainly concentrated in floodplains environments, we have been successful in recovering a large sample that allows to propose explanations on the variability of them, and the relationship that features have in understanding some basic aspects of the social characteristic of the societies that created them. As a study case, we...
From Dispersal to "Disappearance": AD 1000-1250 in the Upper Moquegua Valley, Peru (2015)
In the Moquegua Valley, Peru, the decline of the greater Tiwanaku system circa AD 1000 was accompanied by a shift to a more dispersed settlement pattern, as populations moved out of the large towns of the middle valley and established smaller sites on the coast and in the upper valley. In this paper I focus on the upper valley, where the longevity of occupation at post-expansive sites and the presence of secondary occupations offer an opportunity to examine the centuries’ long trajectory of...
From ethnography to archaeometry: ceramic production and styles in the Río Grande de San Juan Basin, Bolivia (2016)
The Yavi-Chicha phenomenon in the circumpuneño Andes has been extensively discussed, however, little systematic research has focused on systems of ceramic production. Consequently, multiple questions remain unanswered regarding the organizational systems of Chicha communities during the Late Intermediate Period (ca. A.D. 1000-1450). Today, the core region of the Chichas is an exceptional area of ceramic production. Nearly 70% of the inhabitants of the town of Chipihuayco are actively producing...
From foragers to producers: desert gardening at the Archaic Peruvian site of Quebrada de Burros (2015)
Research at the Peruvian site of Quedrada de Burros (Dep. of Tacna, Peru) evidenced a very early settelement of fiserhmen and shel-gatherers on the desert Pacific littoral. The campsite has been occupied during the Early and Middel Holocene, between 10'000 and 6'000BP. The analysis of organic remains indicate that since the beginning, the different groups not only relied on ocean resources but also exploiter the surrounding vegetation. In particular, phytolith analyses show that the settlers...
From Frontier to Forefront: Microbotanical Evidence of Early Holocene Horticulture in the Middle Cauca Valley, Colombia (2015)
Archaeological research in the Middle Cauca region of Colombia has identified significant human presence during the early to middle Holocene (10,600-3600 uncal BP), associated with lithic technology focused on plant processing (e.g. handstones, milling stone bases, and "hoes"). Starch residue analysis on these tools has documented the early availability and use of several domesticates; both exogenous, such as maize (Zea mays) and manioc (Manihot esculenta), and possibly indigenous, such as...
From herders to wage-laborers and back again: mountain mobility in the Puna of Atacama, northern Chile. (2016)
Towards the end of the 19th Century, the subsistence mode of indigenous Atacameño society transited from an agricultural-pastoral economy to a more diversified capitalist-based one. This transformation resulted from a growing mining industry in the northern region of Chile. While part of the indigenous population migrated to the new productive enclaves, others remained in their territory, especially the herders of the puna. These highlanders, however, also took part of the new capitalist order...
From Los Tapiales to Cuncaicha: Terminal Pleistocene humans in America’s high-elevation western mountains (2017)
Among Ruth Gruhn’s remarkable archaeological accomplishments has been the investigation of the first truly high-elevation Paleoindian sites discovered in the Americas. The open-air camps of Los Tapiales and La Piedra del Coyote in the Guatemalan highlands, located respectively at 3150 and 3300 meters above sea level, contained fluted Fishtail projectile points and rich, diverse tool and flake assemblages. Importantly, both sites were securely dated to ~12,500 cal BP, indicating early use of...
From Maps to Lives: Participatory Archaeology and the Fate of the Amazon in the Digital Age. (2016)
The collaborative turn in archaeology has had important impacts on Amazonian research over the past several decades. It uses participatory research strategies and public archaeology to promote inclusive research partnerships. One aspect of collaboration that is still seldom addressed is the use of digital technology in archaeological analysis and dissemination. The Xingu project, which included local digital documentation and video and a long-standing project of archaeological GPS mapping and...
From Roads to Ritual: Comparing Logics and Scale of GIS Analyses of Inka Imperial Landscapes (2017)
During their expansion throughout the Andes, the Inka Empire restructured a cultural and physical landscape to meet objectives of logistical and ideological control over their subjects. While this process is embodied by archaeological features such as large-scale infrastructure and the strategic positioning of sacred places, interpreting these datasets require appropriately scaled analyses for which GIS is uniquely suited. In this paper, I explore this topic by comparing two geospatial analyses,...
From the first to the last terras pretas: changes in cultural behaviour and terra preta formation in the Upper Madeira river, SW Amazonia (2017)
Terras pretas (TPs) are arguably the most visible and widespread artefacts of pre-Colonial occupations in Amazonia. Accumulated as the result of waste management practices by at least partly-sedentary populations, they are seen to mark the beginnings of landscape domestication and more agricultural-based societies starting ca. 3000 BP. On the bluffs of the Upper Madeira river, exceptionally early TP deposits were found dating more than 3000 years before TP sites in the rest of the basin. While...
From the sky to the Andes: intersection between traditional survey and satellite multispectral analysis (2017)
In recent years, the use of multispectral imagery has become increasingly important in archaeological research, site detection, and classification of site functions. As the use of these images becomes more common, we must test their accuracy in order to assess their utility and potential problems with their uncritical application. In this presentation we examine the advantages and limitations of using multispectral imagery as a general survey tool. First, we use multispectral imagery from the...
From Trash Pile to Temple Wall: The distribution of Formative Period sherds in adobes at the Omo M10A Tiwanaku temple (2015)
This project addresses site formation and construction processes in the Omo M10A provincial Tiwanaku temple in the Osmore drainage of southern Peru (ca. AD 500-1100). We will test the hypothesis that this structure was constructed using adobes made from soil deposits containing cultural materials from local, Formative Period Huaracane occupations (ca. 1750 BC–AD 600). This will be done by detailing the manufacture of Tiwanaku adobe bricks and charting the association of Huaracane style ceramic...
Frontier, Inka craft production and the Kallawaya territory (2015)
In this paper I will evaluate the nature of Inka specialized craft production in the province of Kallawaya, and the ways in which the manufacture and distribution of imperial pottery was an avenue to enhance status. I have two goals in this presentation. First, using archaeological and ethohistoric data, I will assess the nature of production in the ceramic workshop of Milliraya and the role of specialized mitmaqkuna colonies in such processes. Second, I will illuminate the ways in which the...
Funerary Bundles from the Storeroom: Conservation Choices and Research Opportunities in Alejandro Pezzia’s Salvage Collections. (2016)
Until recently, most textile collections from Peru’s Middle Horizon were the product of looting operations. Fine tunics and headdress elements abound in museum collections, but their relationship to a deceased individual and full textile assemblage is unknown. As a result, items classified as “Wari” have been disconnected from the complex social identities and relationships that they once influenced in life, or reconfigured after death. Several mortuary contexts with unknown provenience have...
Galapagos marine plastic pollution: a perspective from contemporary archaeology (2024)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Marine plastic pollution is an issue threatening most places around the world, including the remote and unique Galapagos archipelago, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Building on how archaeology of the contemporary world can help address urgent and global environmental issues, this paper offers suggestions for an archaeology of plastic pollution in Galapagos....
Galindo: a Study in Cultural Transition During the Middle Horizon. In Chan Chan: Andean Desert City (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.
Gallinazo Maize from the Chicama Valley, Peru (1980)
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.
Gardens and Forking Paths: A Genealogy of Landscape and Subject Formation in the Zaña Valley, Peru (2015)
Recent archaeological research has called attention to the performative dimensions of imperial built environments, shedding new light on how regimes and subjects emerge (and persist) in acts of place-making, urban planning, and monumental construction. However, our focus on clarifying the semiotics of imperial architecture has drawn attention away from longer-term process of subjectification and elided the role that landscapes play within them. The study of landscapes in Peru's Zaña valley...
Gastrointestinal parasites of the camelids of the archaeological site of Huanchaquito (Peru): first results. (2017)
The health status of domestic’s camelids is an original research topic in the past Central Andes. The discovery of more than 200 well preserved camelids in Huanchaquito in the northern coast of Peru was the opportunity to perform paleoparasitological analyses on twenty samples taken from preserved intestines and faeces recovered during the excavations. Extractions of the parasites using RHM standard protocol raised to the observation in 55% of the samples of several helminth taxa belonging to...
Gender, Class and Textile Production: An Analysis of Casma Spindle Whorls from El Purgatorio, Peru (2016)
Spindle whorls have historically been subjected to less archaeological attention than other artifact classes. This dearth of analysis may reflect an underestimation of the insights to be gained from spindle whorls, in terms of archaeological interpretations of gender, status, and exchange patterns, which may be much greater than previously acknowledged. The case study presented here examines a sample of spindle whorls from the Casma capital city of El Purgatorio, Peru. We examine their...
The Gendering of Children at Chiribaya Alta (2017)
At the site of Chiribaya Alta (900-1350 AD), located in the Osmore Valley of southern Peru, certain Chiribaya grave goods are associated with either adult males or females. For example, females are often buried with weaving tools, and males with musical instruments. It is not possible to estimate the biological sex of children from their skeletal remains. Therefore, children are often excluded from studies addressing gender identities. Here, we use grave goods known to be associated with sexed...
Genealogy, Solidarity and Relatedness: Limits To Local Group Size and Patterns of Fissioning in an Expanding Population (1975)
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.