Corridors of Conquest: The Nasca Headwaters during the Middle Horizon

Summary

Global studies of ancient imperialism are beginning to focus on the importance of communication corridors (roads, canals, waterways, etc.) in the origins, formation, and expansion of empires. As the number of such corridors increase and intertwine, a network is formed on the landscape that many past empires, including—we believe—the Wari, augmented with considerable imperial investment. By constricting the number of reasonable overland routes, mountainous terrain can concentrate such imperial infrastructure along those natural corridors that simultaneously advance imperial interests (e.g., connecting allied or conquered territories while isolating others) and are suitable to the type of travel (e.g., messengers, trade caravans, armies, etc.) required to meet particular administrative, political, or economic needs. This paper reports recent results from continued research on the Wari presence in the headwaters region of the Nasca drainage in southern Ayacucho and interrogates these data though the lens of network imperial interaction.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

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

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 21480