South America: Andes (Geographic Keyword)
351-375 (845 Records)
Huari Urban Prehistory: An Introduction to the Excavations of 2017 From June through mid-August archaeological excavations were conducted at the Patipampa section of Huari, Ayacucho, Peru, where prehistoric constructions are not preserved on the surface. The goal of this first season of excavation was to detect and expose outlines of the built environment in approximately a hectare of space believed to contain primarily residential remains. As spatial organization becomes clear, individual...
Human Biogeography, Life Histories and Bioavailable Strontium in the Southern Andes (Argentina and Chile) (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Patagonian Evolutionary Archaeology and Human Paleoecology: Commending the Legacy (Still in the Making) of Luis Alberto Borrero in the Interpretation of Hunter-Gatherer Studies of the Southern Cone" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. While regionally focused in Patagonia, Luis Borrero’s research has contributed to shape archaeological practice beyond this region, encompassing South America at large. As a regional case...
The Hydrologic and Geologic Dynamics of the Las Peñas Spring (2018)
This presentation addresses the hydrology of agricultural terraces and a spring associated with the Late Intermediate Period (post AD 1200) site of Las Peñas located in the Moquegua Valley of Peru. Positioned 150 meters northwest of Las Peñas, the spring is located at roughly 2,700 meters in elevation and sits at the base of several agricultural terraces. This field system was presumably in production at the time Las Peñas was occupied and is still in use today. Using coring techniques, sediment...
Iconographic Depictions of Spear-Thrower Use in the Ancient Andes (2018)
Spear-thrower devices held a role around the world as a primary weapon and tool before slowly falling out of favor in certain areas for other projectile weapons. While it is widely accepted that spear-throwers were used by the people of the ancient central Andes, comparatively little research has gone into the role that they had as weapons of war, hunting tools, and objects of ceremonial reverence. Many Andean societies have rich traditions of art and iconography, often portraying human and...
Iconographic, Technological, and Contextual Analysis of Wari Pyro-Engraved Gourds from Castillo de Huarmey, Peru (2023)
This is an abstract from the "A Decade of Multidisciplinary Research at Castillo de Huarmey, Peru" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The technological, stylistic, and iconographical aspects of decorated gourds are yet insufficiently addressed by researchers of precolumbian Andean art. This paper investigates Wari pyro-engraved gourd vessels that have been discovered during the excavation process at Castillo de Huarmey since 2013. The archaeological...
Identification of Bilateral Congenital Radioulnar Synostosis in an Early Horizon Burial from the Site of Atalla, Peru (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Bioarchaeological research can help trace the development and distribution of rare pathologies across space and time, aiding in our understanding of how past peoples experienced and made sense of a variety of conditions and diseases. Congenital radioulnar synostosis (CRUS), a developmental condition resulting in fusion of the proximal radius and ulna, is one...
Identifying Strategies of Integration and Cooperation during the Late Intermediate Period (AD 1000–1480) at Sangayaico, South-Central Andes, Peru (2018)
The Late Intermediate Period (LIP) in the highlands of the Central Peruvian Andes was characterized by a marked intensification in economic specialization. In contrast to the preceding periods, in which mixed agro-pastoral groups appear to have dominated highland Peru, many LIP populations seem to have adopted increasingly specialized pastoral or agricultural strategies. This increased economic specialization would likely have fostered inter-group cooperation, as subsistence generally required...
Identifying Use and Consumption Patterns through a Quantitative, Qualitative, and Comparative Analysis of Mollusks at Huaca Menocucho, Moche Valley Peru (2023)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Excavations at Huaca Menocucho in the Moche Valley, Peru, revealed occupation sequences from the Initial period to the Middle Horizon with large amounts of malacological remains. Quantitative, qualitative, and comparative analyses are being conducted to interpret the role of gastropods, bivalves, and other mollusks at the site. A quantitative analysis will...
Identity through Movement: Domestic Political Units and Pan-Andean Relations in Early and Middle Cajamarca Periods (50 BC–AD 750) (2021)
This is an abstract from the "Them and Us: Transmission and Cultural Dynamism in the North of Peru between AD 250 and 950: A Vision since the Recent Northern Investigations" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The purpose of this project is to investigate the relationship between environmental factors and cultural dynamics as manifested in the development of specialized pottery production as a symbol of an ethnic identity in the valley of Cajamarca,...
Ideological Infrastructures and Bio-Political Ecology: Investigating Colonial-Era Entanglements of New Food and Religious Systems (Sixteenth Century, Ayacucho, Peru) (2023)
This is an abstract from the "Unsettling Infrastructure: Theorizing Infrastructure and Bio-Political Ecologies in a More-Than-Human World" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. ThThe extended Spanish conquest of Indigenous groups in the sixteenth century prompted infrastructural collisions of governance, foodways, and religious ideologies that indelibly altered Indigenous physical and ritual landscapes. Through the entanglement of new European foods and...
Images of the Living Past: 19th-Century Moche Archaeological Photographs and Everyday Indigeneity in the Northern Peruvian Andes (2018)
This presentation analyzes late 19th-century photography of Moche pre-Columbian buildings, as a way to inspect the buildings’ incorporation into everyday indigenous lives. I will focus on the work by German scientist Hans Heinrich Brüning (1848-1928). First arrived as an engineer hired by the most important sugar haciendas of the region, Brüning’s interests quickly shifted towards archaeological and ethnographic studies during his stay in the Northern Peruvian Andes between 1875 and 1920. His...
Imperial Space Appropriation and Colonialism during the 16th Century in the Ecuadorian Andes (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The Inka Empire began its process of conquest and colonialism in 1420 in ancient Ecuador. The inkas reproduced their own social spaces for the public, the sacred, and the economic over local spaces. However, such Inka layers of transformation were suddenly truncated by the Spanish arrival at around 1530, which again brought different kinds of populations that...
The Implications of Amaranthaceae Cultivars at the Tiwanaku Site of Cerro San Antonio, Locumba, Perú (2021)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2021: General Sessions" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The Tiwanaku civilization (ca. A.D. 500-1100) originated in the Bolivian Altiplano (3800 masl) of the south-central Andes and grew frost-resistant crops, such as quinoa (Chenopodium quinoa), kiwicha (Amaranthus caudatus), and potatoes (Solanum tuberosum). Throughout the Middle Horizon (A.D. 600-1100), the Tiwanaku expanded into Peruvian coastal valleys (~900...
In the Heart of the Inca: An Osteobiography at Huanacauri (Cusco, Peru) (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This study takes an osteobiographical approach to describe the archaeological significance and life history of the only known individual buried within Huanacauri (Cusco, Peru), one of the most sacred sites in the Inca Empire (ca. 1400-1533 CE). Given the significant location of the burial—in the center of the place the Incas perceived as the foundation of...
In the Land of Llamas and Ají: New Insights into the Late Horizon Inca Occupation of the Middle Sama Valley, Southern Peru (2018)
Since the 1970s, the Sama valley on the far south coast of Peru has been known to house the Inca site of Sama Grande since the excavations of German archaeologist Hermann Trimborn. Situated at the crossroads of the Quapaq Ñan running parallel to the Andean foothills and from the coast to the highlands, Sama Grande was assumed to direct people, animals, and goods across the region during the Late Horizon (14th-15th century AD). In 2017, full-coverage pedestrian survey of the coastal desert plain...
The Inca Administration of the Middle Cañete Valley, Peru (2021)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2021: General Sessions" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The historical accounts of the Cañete valley, recovered by the Spanish conquistadores, inform that the Incas found two different kinds of reactions to their conquest attempts: while the Guarco kingdom, in the lower valley, resisted the Incas domination; the Lunahuná kingdom, in the middle valley, supported the Inca troops and generals. While this information...
Inca Imperial Colonization and Ethnicity of Northern Chile (2018)
Were the Inca aware of the restrictive possibilities for labor and productivity in the extreme arid territories of the Atacama Desert of northern Chile? How did the Inca officials manage to obtain information that enabled them to identify (i) strategic enclaves for farming, installing administrative and political nodes, exploiting and processing ores, and (ii) a selection of conspicuous mountains to place hilltop shrines? Here we discuss the idea that the rapid, extensive, and efficient...
The Inca State from the South. Agricultural Landscape and Transformations in Pozuelos (Jujuy, Argentina) (2018)
The aim of this paper is to discuss the results of the research conducted at the Moreta settlement in the Pozuelos (Jujuy, Argentina) where we have detected an extensive agricultural area built by the Incas. A critical reading about agrarian landscapes is fundamental in order to recognize the different strategies that Inca state applied in its conquest and control of the Argentinian Northwest. This region experienced a series of transformations during the second millennium CE; in this sense,...
Inca Stone Sources, Quarrying, and Transport (2019)
This is an abstract from the "How Did the Inca Construct Cuzco?" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Stone was fundamental to building Cuzco and there was significant variability in the sources and sizes of stones employed. To understand the history of construction, we must take into account relationships with the people and resources of the wider region, which impacted where the stones originated and how they were worked, transported, and used....
The Inca Transformation of the Lucre Basin (2019)
This is an abstract from the "How Did the Inca Construct Cuzco?" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In the study of archaic states and empires, much can be gained from analyzing how imperialist regimes transform and modify the landscape and built environment in the pursuit of their political goals. The Inca Empire, which expanded out of the Cusco Valley in the south-central Peruvian Andes ca. 1400 CE, provides an ideal case study to understand this...
Inca Views of the Native Groups of Southern Ecuador (2018)
Over time, the Incas created varying narratives surrounding the native groups of southern Ecuador, including the Paltas, Cañaris, and coastal groups, such as the Punaes. I examine these narratives through historical accounts from both northern sources and Cusco-centric writers, which serve as our primary sources of information, and compare these to archaeological data, which are mainly limited to the Cañari region. These narratives are the product of the history of Inca interactions from initial...
Incas and Yumbos at Palmitopamba, Tulipe and Other Notable Sites on the Northwestern Periphery of Tawantinsuyo (2018)
Survey and excavation data from the western Pichincha cloud forest of northwestern Ecuador have provided tantalizing evidence of an unusual relationship between Incas and the autochthonous Yumbo populations. The monumental pool site of Tulipe, the terraced hill complex of Palmitopamba, and the pucaras of Chacapata and Capillapamba all provide an extraordinary view of the tentative, late expansion of Tawantinsuyo into the sub-Andean jungle of northern Ecuador. After a dozen seasons of excavation...
The Incas in Nasca: A Review of Data from the Northern Drainage (2018)
Little research has been conducted in the Nasca region to explicitly improve our understanding of the nature of Inca occupation in the region. A while back, Menzel (1959) noted the lack of local monumental architecture associated to Inca sites in Nasca. In contrast to the Ica valley, surface data from sites in the Nasca area suggest that local populations lacked socio-political complexity and were organized at the level of simple chiefdom structures. Later on Schreiber (1992) suggested that the...
Incas, locales y otras identidades: Dinámicas materiales en el norte de Chile en tiempos del Tawantinsuyo (2018)
Los estudios arqueológicos en Chile plantearon la ausencia de una conquista incaica propiamente tal en esta parte del Desierto de Atacama, puesto que sus poblaciones se hallaban insertas dentro de sistemas de complementariedad ecológica preincaicos, cuyas cabeceras o "señoríos" se encontraban en el altiplano del lago Titicaca. Y las que, una vez anexadas al Tawantinsuyo, implicaron un dominio casi automático de las restantes entidades ubicadas en lugares más alejados como las del norte chileno,...
Initial Period Friezes and Architecture at Taukachi-Konkan, Casma Valley, Peru (2018)
Recent excavations at a number of intermediate-sized mounds of the Initial Period (2100-1000 B.C.) site of Taukachi-Konkán in the Casma Valley of Peru have uncovered surprising new evidence of clay friezes and architectural forms previously unknown for the Initial Period along the coast of Peru. One U-shaped mound complex has an associated sunken rectangular plaza that contains distinct friezes on all four of its sides. The content of the friezes includes two sea lions, a large feline and two...