Precolumbian Metallurgy at the Late Moche–Transitional site of Huaca Colorada, Jequetepeque Valley, North Coast of Peru

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Bridging Time, Space, and Species: Over 20 Years of Archaeological Insights from the Cañoncillo Complex, Jequetepeque Valley, Peru, Part 2" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Since 2009, the Late Moche–Transitional site of Huaca Coloroda (ca. 700–900 CE), located in the Jequetepeque Valley on the North Coast of Peru, has been a focus for excavations by the Proyecto Arqueológico Jatanca-Huaca Colorada-Tecapa. These excavations have produced definitive evidence for the production and consumption of metal objects at Huaca Colorada. To date, more than 2,000 metal objects and hundreds of crucible, slag, and gangue fragments have been excavated from this site. Such an assemblage of materials spanning the entire metallurgical production sequence is rare at Moche and early Middle Horizon period (ca. 600–1000 CE) sites and thus presented a unique opportunity to investigate precolumbian metallurgy on the North Coast during this time. This paper presents a summary of the extensive typological and archaeometric analyses conducted on this assemblage to date. This dataset has been used to reconstruct the chaîne opératoire(s) of metallurgy at Huaca Colorada, and when combined with Bayesian chronological modeling of over 70 radiocarbon dates from the site, how these practices varied diachronically. The results also elucidate the interrelationships between metallurgy and other craft production activities at Huaca Colorada, as well as the important role of metallurgy within the site’s ritual economy.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Bridging Time, Space, and Species: Over 20 Years of Archaeological Insights from the Cañoncillo Complex, Jequetepeque Valley, Peru, Part 2   •
• Society for American Archaeology 89th Annual Meeting, New Orleans, LA (2024)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 39125.0