Long-Distance Contacts along the Coast of Greater Chiriquí

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Coastal Connections: Pacific Coastal Links from Mexico to Ecuador" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

The location of the Greater Chiriquí archeological region in southern Central America and the available and valuable resources in it (gold, coastal resources) were favorable for the emergence of a complex society that interacted with long-distance contacts for the acquisition of exotic goods. I highlight several places within Greater Chiriqui that were important for navigating along the Pacific coast and that could have been points of reference for longer distance movement. Among these are: Caño Island, Burica Peninsula, and the islands of the Gulf of Chiriquí. The role of islands as a "port of trade" where exchanges between different ethnic communities were made without entering the main centers of power on the mainland have been considered as a possibility. Likewise, our current data from the two proposed subregions of the Greater Chiriquí (Chiriquí and Diquís) indicates two different preferences regarding the origin of extraregional ceramics: Chiriquí with Gran Coclé in Central Panama and Diquís with Guanacaste in northwestern Costa Rica. While it is true that there is relatively little evidence of long-distance contacts in Greater Chiriquí, the examination of its geographical location and extraregional contacts can contribute to the understanding of those.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 84th Annual Meeting, Albuquerque, NM (2019)   •
• Coastal Connections: Pacific Coastal Links from Mexico to Ecuador

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 23673