Standardized Icon or Alter Egos? Reassessing the Perceived Uniformity of Form and Material Essences of Funerary Masks at Sicán

Summary

This is an abstract from the "From Ores to Ontologies: Recent Research in South American Archaeometallurgy" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

While masks and masking rituals are well-documented in the archaeological, ethnographic, and ethnohistorical records in the Andes, few examples are as recognizable as the funerary “masks” of the Sicán/Lambayeque culture. The repetition of striking features, often on planes of gold, has made these masks a mainstay in museum collections. However, despite—or perhaps because of—their ubiquity, analyses often assume that redundancy and abstraction equate to cultural homogeneity, centralization, or even monotheism, and their architectural construction may be dismissed as shoddy or piecemeal, leading to the conclusion that minimally, this is a group that prioritized quantity over quality. This paper challenges the perceived iconographic and material uniformity of Sicán masks by synthesizing compositional analysis with new observations on sculptural techniques and stylistic details from a set of contextualized sheet metal masks excavated at the site of Sicán (CE 900-1100). By comparing masks found with individuals to representations of the visage in associated clay, textile, and painted objects, we can then contend with the complex and inherently agentive role of masks, not just in marking group affiliation, but also their potential to signify alterity within the group.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 90th Annual Meeting, Denver, CO (2025)   •
• From Ores to Ontologies: Recent Research in South American Archaeometallurgy

Keywords

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 52857