The Petroglyphs of Quilcapampa la Antigua

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Wari and the Far Peruvian South Coast: Final Results of Excavations in Quilcapampa" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

The site of Quilcapampa la Antigua is hypothesized by Jennings et al. (in press) to be a "moving place", strongly associated with roads leading up out of the valley bottom onto the pampa above. As the roads near the site, they pass beneath white sandstone cliffs. The visually striking cliff face is incised with hundreds of petroglyphs, with designs ranging from simple camelids and foxes to what appear to be representations of mummy bundles, solar figures, and perhaps even hallucinogenic plants. These petroglyphs vary greatly in size and visibility. Some are only seen as one passes near them on the road while others are visible from across the valley. Some petroglyphs are hidden from sight almost entirely. This paper presents our analysis of the designs as they relate to Quilcapampa’s own unique culture history as well as the broader petroglyphic tradition of the Sihuas region, an area replete with petroglyph and geoglyph sites contemporaneous to the era. Following the methodology proposed by Berquist et al. 2018 we also investigate how the designs were distributed in space as well as differential patterns of visibility. Finally, we evaluate whether certain designs were associated with specific routes or destinations.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Wari and the Far Peruvian South Coast: Final Results of Excavations in Quilcapampa   •
• Society for American Archaeology 84th Annual Meeting, Albuquerque, NM (2019)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 24239