A Sacred Frontier? Inka Settlement at Salapunqu

Summary

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

During the 14th-16th centuries, the Inka Empire transformed Peru’s Urubamba Valley, located in the piedmont foothills of the eastern Andes, into an integrated landscape that was both economically productive and spiritually sacred. Extensive surveys have identified a shift whereby the Inka appear to have relocated settlements at higher elevations to the valley floor, coinciding with dramatic agricultural expansion and the construction of royal estates. The extent to which the Inka built their sites atop older sites is less well known in this region, especially since documented sites in the piedmont prior to 1000 CE are sparse. This study presents new 87Sr/86Sr data from individuals (N=39) interred at the Inka site of Salapunqu, considered an administrative outpost and symbolic gateway to Machu Picchu. Tooth enamel 87Sr/86Sr varies widely, including values as high as 0.73032. These high values suggest some individuals spent their early lives in the Cambrian-Ordovician zone further north and east, approaching the Amazon region. Moreover, preliminary AMS dates for the study sample span two millennia, indicating the possibility that a known, much older site in the Urubamba Valley, with ties to the Amazonian foothills, was co-opted by the Inka when they built Salapunqu.

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): 39424.0