Bones Left Behind: Living Spaces at a Residential Compound at Cerro la Virgen, a Rural Chimu LIP Settlement

Summary

Cerro la Virgen (CLV) is a town-sized LIP site located in the Moche Valley a few kilometers from Chan Chan, the administrative and political center of the Andean polity of Chimu. Previous studies have focused on ceramics and regional politics (Keatinge 1974, 1975), the kinds of plant and animal remains found in residential dumps (Pozorski 1976, 1979; Billman et al in press), and multiple lines of evidence for the nature of the political relationship between the residents of CLV and the leadership and residential population at Chan Chan. What was life like at home for households at CLV? This study looks at the remnants of a single residential compound, originally one among hundreds, and asks how room sizes and spatial relationships, in conjunction with a detailed look at vertebrate remains left behind, both near the floors and in the fill above them, can contribute to a fuller understanding of the use and reuse of space within a residential context.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 83rd Annual Meeting, Washington, DC (2018)

Keywords

Spatial Coverage

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 20530