New Advances in Cusco Archaeology: From the Formative to the Late Horizon

This collection contains the abstracts of the papers presented in the session entitled "New Advances in Cusco Archaeology: From the Formative to the Late Horizon" at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Cusco has become synonymous with Tawantinsuyu’s political core and place of origin. But the Inkas’ occupation of this region was only one development in a long history of sociopolitical change situated locally in the broader Cusco region. The cumulative impact of research projects executed through international collaboration has facilitated unprecedented understanding of this topic. Over a century of multidisciplinary archaeology has allowed us to transcend the narrow purview of historical chronicles. Now, we can continue expanding our scope to understand how people made their own histories during more than two millennia across the Cusco region.

This session brings together new research from across the Cusco region, using diverse theoretical perspectives and methodological approaches. Participants will present novel insights on the coalescence of the earliest communities; local responses to Wari imperialism; the sociopolitical arena in which Inka state formation occurred; and Inka efforts to establish hegemony in the Cusco region. More than a decade since the last SAA session on archaeology in the Cusco region, we will take account of dissonances and patterns to generate fresh ideas on what the big questions are for archaeologists moving forward.