Santoro Romero Standen_Prehistoric Burial Types_Groenlandia

8/9/2019 Santoro Romero Standen_Prehistoric Burial Types_Groenlandia

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/santoro-romero-standenprehistoric-burial-typesgroenlandia 1/5

Mummies in aNew Millenium

Proceedings of the 4th World

Congress on Mummy Studies.Nuuk, Greenland, September

4th to 10 th, 2001 Prehistoric Burial Types, PoliticalInteraction and Ethnic Boundaries in theSouth Central Andes

Niels Lynnerup, Claus Andreasen

and Joel Berglund, editors

Calogero M. Santoro, Álvaro Romero and Vivien G. StandenCentro de lnvestigaciones del Hombre en elDesierto, Universidad de Tarapacá, Arica, Chile

Greenland National Museum and Archives

and We will briefly discuss the political and economic

Danish Polar Center 2003arrangement reached by different political entities

from the coast and altiplano in the South Central An-

des, a region in western South America that encom-

passes southern Peru, northern Chile and the Boli-

vian altiplano. The first political group may corre-

spond to small-scale communities, the co le located

in the lower semitropical and arid valleys close to the

Pacific, according to historical records of the XVI-

XVIII century A.D. The other groups correspond to

larger scale societies, such as the caranga, with head-

quarters in the high Andean plateau, or the altiplano

in the region occupied today by Bolivia (1) (fig. 1).

The time span for this study is from the Xlth to the

XVlth century A.D. just few centuries before the Eu-

ropean invasion to the Americas.

We will present prehistoric archaeological data to

discuss the idea that these policies sanctioned and re-

duced the tension involved in the political and eco-

nomic interaction by using conspicuous funerarystructures made out of adobe bricks, known as chull-

pa, a typical monumental funerary and ceremonial

feature in the altiplanic region (2). Ritualization of

social activities it is still a common issue among

www.uta.cl/masma/yuta

http://www.uta.cl/masma/yuta



Figure 1. Valleys of Arica region in the Shouth Central Andes, showing Molle Pampa and Caillama sites.

nowadays indigenous Andean people, who do no

conceive economic and social activities without a cer-

emonial activity (3). In our prehistoric case, we are

dealing with a geopolitical expansion of Andean

groups that defended their rights in foreign territo-

ries by using this ideological or religious symbol:a

The Chullpas, whose scale and visibility impress inthe landscape, are currently known for their funerary

function. We propose that chullpas served also as

ideological features to secure the territorial expan-

sion of altiplanic people. In this way, the attempts to

have economic control over the territories was sup

ported by a process of sacralization of the landscape.

This is part of an ongoing project that have ana-

lyzed different lines of evidence such as settlement

patterns, pottery, chemical dietary analyses of hu-

man bones, coprolite analyses, and rock art studies in

more than 100 archaeological sites that have been

mapped, excavated, and classified in the last ten

years. This with the aim to shed light on the process

of cultural interaction among these people, and how

these processes shaped their way of life, and how

they maintained and/or transformed their cultural

traditions.

The Study Area

The western slope of the Andes is characterized bythe juxtaposition of different ecological floor, that

conform a very complex ecological mosaic from the

coast all the way up to the highland, over 4000 masl.

This includes: (a) the arid coast with no rainfall,

ephemeral vegetation consequence of an ocean fog

that typically overcast the littoral, specially in winter,

(b) coastal valleys running from the Andes, through

the desert, surrounded by hyper arid interfluvial

pampas (c) the basin between the Coastal Cordillera

and the western slope of the Andes. This included

the Lower sierra (3000 masl, 80 to 100 km from the

coast, rainfall = 50-60 mm per year, very disperse

vegetation of cactus and small shrubs, few animal,

low biomass production in general), (e) the upper

155



sierra (ca. 3500 masl, rainfall 200-300 mm per year,

larger biomass production associated with a great di-

versity of plant community, small and large mam-

mals in low concentration), and (e) the Andean high

plateau (4500 masl, no permanent snow, volcanoes of

6000 mast more, rainfall 300-350 mm per year, but

cold desert conditions, that allowed less biological

diversity and biomass production than at the sierra).

In sum, we deal with rather fragile and slim ecologi-

cal resources for human activity, which are widely

spaced in the landscape.

General Statements about Andean Political

Economy

The main characteristicof Andean culture, is that civ-

ilization or social complexity was not based on mar-

ket and tribute economy, with any group specializa-tion in one of the ecological floor described above. In-

stead Andean people, according to a model proposed

by John Murra early in the sixties, created a system

defined as vertical or ecological complementarity,

which means that each community tried to maintain

direct control over as many ecological possibilities as

possible, depending on the eizeof the community,

and its ability to maintain colonial settlements out-

side of their head towns, on the western and/or east-

em sides of the Andes (4). This was not only an aspi-ration or a political economic desire of the altiplano

people (the highlanders), as it has been emphasized

from the classic model of verticality or complemen-

tarity. Marginal populations of the coast and lower

valleys may have also attempted to control economic

resources toward the highland, as we have been dis-

cussing elsewhere.

The Case of Northern Chile and Southern Peru

In this study we are dealing with the attempts of the

caranga to control ecological floor of the Arica re-

gion. This is a political group, which maintained

their main center in the highland of Bolivia, south of

Lake Titicaca. It is described by written Spaniard

records of the XVlth to XVlllth century, as a group

that maintained settlements in the Sierra of Arica (1).

According to Durston and Hidalgo’s model (5), the

caranga tried to maintain colonial settlement in the

sierra of Arica (labeled as secondary center). The ter-

tiary centers, instead located in the lower or coastalvalleys were not directly controlled as caranga tried

to establish political arrangement with the people of

the valleys. In this way they did not take the risk of

sending their own people farther away from their

territories. In any case, we are certain now that these

highlanders, the caranga, managed to have direct or

indirect control over the Arica region, during the

colonial period.

Local people from these valleys were organized

under a non-centralized political structure during

prehistoric times. They are recognized as a political

entity as the cole in the ethnohistorical records, gen-

erated after the European invasion in the XVlth cen-

tury. They also tried to maintain control over marine,

valley and sierra resources, and in this enterprise

they ran into the highlanders, particularly in the

sierra.

If this was the prehistoric political scenario, the

question is how we identify the altiplanic people

(sensu caranga) and the local groups (sensu Cole) in

the archeological records, disperse in the verticallandscape. We have used several lines of evidence to

identify and explain the system of interaction be-

tween theses groups. Particularly, the pottery analy-

sis and settlement patterns show heterogeneous ar-

chaeological panorama: A palimpsest difficult to sort

out. The Caillama and Molle Pampa sites located in

the sierra and lower valley respectivelly, are gaod

study cases to shed light over our reserach question.

Both sites list among its features the presence of

chullpas, rather uncommon outside of the altiplano.

Caillama

At Caillama (in the sierra of Arica at 3000 masl) we

found two types of tombs or burials: (a) Cysts:

Above ground semi-circular stones chamber, com-

mon in the region; (b) Chullpas: Above ground rec-

tangular adobe brick structure (fig. 2). From a total of

46 tombs inventoried, 27 (59%) are cysts, and 19

(41%) are Chullpas (6).

Cemetery of Molle Pampa

At Molle Pampa Este (in the lover valley of Lluta, 20

km from the coast, 500 masl), a Late Period settle-

ment (1400-1500 A.D.), more than 70 tombs were

found. Among them there was just a small and badly

preserved adobe brick burial structure. The other

tombs correspond to different kinds of stone cysts,

common in the area. At Molle Pampa Medio next to

Molle Pampa Este, a Late Intermediate Period settle-ment (1100-1400 A.D.), we found more than 50

tombs, and one of them is also an adobe brick burial

structure (fig. 3).

15 6



plan view

,\

i ---: 2front

profileFigure 2. Display of an adobe brick chullpa at Caillama.

The statistical distribution of decorated pottery in

these sites shows a clear dominance of the local pot-

tery, both at the lower valleys as well as at the sierra

settlements. We use decorated pottery as a mean of

cultural marker to identify the political groups men-

tioned in the historical records.

At domestic domains the local decorated pottery was

a main commodity both in the sierra and in the

lower valley settlements. This data offer the follow-

ing possible political scenarios: (a) local population,

the Cole, were able to control territories and resources

from the coast all the way up to the sierra. In this sce-

nario, caranga did not have actual settlements in thesierra, as suggested by the ethnohistorical records.

The high presence of chullpas at Caillama tend to

distort this scenario. (b) The caranga did have a sec-

ondary center in the sierra of Arica, possibly, at Cail-

lama masked with an intense interaction with local

communities through social or ceremonial activities

that required important use of locally made decorat-

ed pottery. In this way the caranga did not make ma-

jor efforts to defend their position in the sierra in the

domestic domains, thus they incorporated into their

daily life the cultural material of the lower valley

population, the Cole. In another, possibly more inti-

mate domain the caranga built their chullpas, for in-

ternal social coherence, as well as to publicly show

an idiosyncratic symbol of prestige, power. In this

way they used an ideological symbol to defend and

mark their arrival into the region, through the chull-

pas, which ideological impact is obvious in the land-

scape. In the lower valley, in contrast, the impact of ideological control of the Caranga from the altiplano

is very weak, as few Chullpas were built.

Furthermore, we think that local cole leader may

157



A-

Figure 3. Display of an adobe brick structure at Molle Pampa

have been able to create certain political coalitions between them to negotiate the entrance of the

Caranga to the sierra.

This gave them the possibility to maintain their

own settlements in the sierra, about 60 km from the

lower valleys. They may also have arranged to have

access to the high plateau or altiplano resources

through exchange with the caranga or by sending

their own people up there, about 60 km from the

sierra (i.e. pukara Visviri). In the same way, the

caranga were able to obtain coastal resources.

Acknowledgements

Study supported by grants of Fondecyt 1970597 and1000457.

References

1. Hidalgo J., Durston A. Reconstitución Étnica Colonialen la Sierra de Arica El Cacicazgode Codpa, 1650-

1780. En Actas del IV Congreso lnternacional de Etno-historia Tomo II. Lima, Pontificia Universidad Católicadel Perú , 1998.

2. Hyslop J. Chulpas of the Lupaca zone of the Peruvianhigh plateau. Journal of Field Archaeology 1977; 4:149-170.

3. Van Kessel J. Tecnología aymara: Un enfoque cultural.En Tecnologla Andina Una Introducción, Medina J(ed.). La Paz, Hlsbol. 1990.

4. Murra J V. Los Iímites y la limitaciones del ‘archipiela-go vertical' en los Andes. En Homenaje al R. P. Gusta-vo Le Paige S.J. (Niemeyer, H. ed.). Santiago, Universi-

dad del Norte, 1976.5. Durston A., Hidalgo, J. La Presencla Andina en los

Valles de Arica, Siglos XVI-XVIII: Casos de Regen-

eración Colonial de Estructuras Archipielágicas. Chun-

gara 29:249-273. 1997.6. Romero A. El pukara de Caillama, Ias chulpas de barro

y el control politico de la sierra de Arica durante elPeriodo lntermedio Tardlo. Boletin-e Azeta. Febrero2002 (www.uta.cl/masma/azeta)

Santoro Romero Standen_Prehistoric Burial Types_Groenlandia

Documents