The 2023 Excavations at the Cosma Archaeological Complex, Ancash – Peru: A Journey Down the Rabbit Hole into the Andean Late Preceramic

Summary

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Excavations at the Cosma Archaeological Complex, located in north-central Peru, have revealed a potential missing link, both temporally and geographically, in understanding the origins of corporate labor and the construction of public monuments associated with the Late Preceramic period. A suite of radiometric dates at two temple mounds with Kotosh-Mito style chambers ranging from 2900-2475 BCE were recovered from excavations at Cosma between 2014-2016. During the summer of 2023 excavations at the Kareycoto mound, the largest mound in the Cosma basin, exposed a previously unknown underground gallery system, reminiscent of those constructed at the site of Chavín de Huantar located in the Callejon de Conchucos. Previous gallery systems at the sites of Chavín and La Galgada date back to the Initial (1800-900 BCE) and Early Horizon periods (900-200 BCE), while the Kareycoto gallery was found in association with Late Preceramic floors and architecture at the site. This suggests that these architectural features may in fact date earlier than previously thought. This paper will present on the 2023 discovery and its implications for our current understanding of gallery systems in association with the Kotosh-Mito tradition.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts   •
• Society for American Archaeology 89th Annual Meeting, New Orleans, LA (2024)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 38631.0