New Methods for Duct Exploration and Gallery Discovery at Chavín de Huántar

Summary

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Originally the only known underground gallery between Building A and the Circular Plaza of Chavín de Huántar, the Caracoles gallery was long thought by Professor John Rick of Stanford University to be one of multiple chambers due to its three wall ducts, each exiting at an unknown location. This paper illustrates the methods developed for exploring these and other such ducts, namely the usage of cameras, light arrays, and laser rangefinding equipment with modular poles. During the 2017 field excavation season led by Professor Rick, these techniques resulted in the discovery of a gallery thought sealed since Chavín times, temporarily designated as ‘Gallery X.’ Using images obtained in this manner, Gallery X was confirmed via comparative photography to be a chamber mirroring the architecture of Caracoles, with Building A’s north entrance serving as an axis of symmetry. Two galleries were subsequently discovered in line with this pair (galleries ‘three’ and ‘four’), and during the 2018 season, these techniques were used to gather evidence for the presence of an additional row of four galleries 3.2 meters to the north.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 84th Annual Meeting, Albuquerque, NM (2019)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 25223