The Bones of a Community: Mortuary Contexts over Time at Waywaka (Andahuaylas, Peru)

Summary

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2021: General Sessions" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Bodies formed a significant component of the ritual practice at Waywaka, an early farming village in the Andean highlands (Andahuaylas, Apurímac, Peru) that was occupied from 1600 BC - AD 700. Recent excavations from 2019 show that the village's early inhabitants buried their dead in their domestic areas and used parts of bodies of the dead in various ways throughout the occupation areas. Excavations uncovered a total of 15 mortuary contexts with the remains of a minimum of 20-25 individuals. These individuals were excavated from both primary and secondary mortuary contexts, the latter including skull offerings, foundational offerings, and the deliberate association of parts of bodies with ritual artifacts. The high variability of types of human burials suggests the presence of dynamic mortuary practices at Waywaka. Preliminary results may indicate a shift from primary, individual burials to communal, commingled burials over time, which could possibly reflect the origins of ancestor cults and the heightened and increasingly formalized influence of extended kin groups.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 86th Annual Meeting, Online (2021)   •
• SAA 2021: General Sessions

Keywords

Spatial Coverage

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 33458