Buried Civilizations of the Americas

5. "Altering the Earth" at Chavín de Huantar

• Archaeology & the Environment
• Environmental Possibilism- the environment constrains but does not determine human action.
• Carrying capacity - how many people one can support in an area, given crops and technology
• Agriculture
• Incredibly important technology;
• necessary to support large populations and population densities
• associated with sedentism, year-round occupation of a dwelling
• New World: primarily corn, beans, and squash
• dry farming, runoff, irrigated agriculture
• Types of Environments
• semi-arid or arid environments: dry farming is impossible, need water control
• jungle, slash and burn agriculture
• temperate woodland: dry farming
• Pastoralism herding
• No herd animals in North or Mesoamerica
• In South America, camelids: guanaco, vicuna, alpaca, llama
• Also domestic (not herded) turkey and dog; in South America, guinea pigs
• Note: no wheeled vehicles in prehispanic New World
• Andean Vertical Ecology
• Coastal Desert
• extremely dry, cut by short rivers, due to the due to Peru Current, a north-flowing cold current; El Niño is a south-flowing warm current that every several years or so overpowers the Peru current
• soils fertile and well drained, good for agriculture w/ water
• characterized by lomas vegetation
• above the desert is the Yunga (warm valley) zone 1600-7500'
• Highlands, Andes Mountains
• Quechua zone - highland valleys, 9200'-11,500', lower terraced and irrigated
• Puna - high plateau grasslands above 13,000'
• Suni - narrow zone between quechua and Puna 11,500-13,000'
• Sierra - mountains, Huascarán 22,205'
• Jungle - the upper Amazon basin
• Selva Alta high altitude jungle (montaña)
• Selva lower Jungle
• Environment
• Natural Disasters
• earthquake, tidal waves, avalanches
• volcanic eruptions
• El Niño > coastal floods, droughts in S. Andes
• Ecology
• Domestic Animals: llama & alpaca by 3500BC; guinea pig
• Domestic Plants full range by 3000BC: potatoes, quinoa, beans, squash, corn

• Middle Preceramic Period - 6000-3000BC
• Preceramic means before ceramics
• Sedentary villages ca. 5700-3000BC
• Mainly maritime (from the sea) subsistence
• Elaborate burials and mummification
• Late Preceramic 3000-1800BC
• Earliest monumental architecture in New World
• Coastal tradition of U-shaped temples & plazas
• El Paraíso (central coast site, Chillón Valley)
• U-shaped Temple, wings 1300' long, 340,000m³, 100,000 tons of stone, estimated 2,000,000 person days labor, ca 128acres
• Stone-walled rooms filled with shicra, net bags filled with stones from a nearby quarry,
• Argued a population in the 1000s
• Settlement Pattern: centers near the coast and small coastal villages
• Maritime Hypothesis - Michael Moseley - argument for a maritime rather than agricultural basis for early complex society.
• Compare: Karl Wittfogel's hydraulic theory of the origin of the state - bureaucracies develop to build and manage large scale irrigation.
• While there was agriculture, and reliance on cotton, food is nearly all maritime.
• Society
• How do you get all this stone moved around?
• no burial evidence for differentiation
• Initial Period 1800-800BC
• Agriculture intensifies
• Development of pottery late, 1000 years after other places in South America
• Central Coast
• Building of U-shaped temples expands
• La Florida, 6.7M person days, 365x155x23m
• Settlement pattern: coastal villages, centers inland on valley floors; and inland villages
• North Central Coast
• Many more temple complexes, which move inland, suggesting agriculture
• Sechin Alto in the Casma Valley, the largest new world monument in 2nd millennium BC, 250x300mx44m.
• Sechin Alto is argued to be the center of Initial Period coastal state but: no elite burials, little standardization in style, no fortifications and lots of sacred themes in art.
• At Cerro Sechin, military scene carved in stone; show trophy heads, victorious in battle
• Highlands
• Terrace natural hills to make huge pyramids with platforms characteristic of the highlands
• Early Horizon; 800BC-200BC
• Chavín de Huantar 1000-200BC Major Site
• Chavín References
• 1994 Richardson, James B, III. People of the Andes. St. Remy Press, Montreal.
• 1992 Burger, Richard L. Chavín and the Origins of Andean Civilization. Thames and Hudson, London.
• History
• Visited by Cieza de León in 1548
• Julio Tello: San Marcos & Harvard educated highland Indian; 1919 excavated Chavín; argued it was oldest Andean civilization.
• Richard Burger. Recent work at Chavín.
• John Rick. Mapping, see web site.
• Location
• 10,300', 33" rainfall, good access to highlands, coast, & jungle
• Layout
• 2 temples, U-shaped with sunken courts
• Old Temple
• sunken plaza 70' in diameter for worshipers
• around plaza, tenoned heads show transformation of priest into jaguar
• within temple are stone tunnels or galleries, air and water channels
• in main chamber is the lanzón, 15' granite sculpture of a feline, with body parts kenned (turned into other animal parts)
• The lanzón is believed to represent the central god in the central god and was perhaps associated with an oracle
• Tello Obelisk has cayman (alligator relative) iconography depicting a mating of the underworld and the world above.
• New Temple
• Black and White Portal - includes a 33' cared stone lintel with hawks and eagles
• Raimundi Stone, 6.5' tall, bas-relief sculpture, of Chavín staff deity
• has a much larger plaza, but also has galleries, air ducts and drainage system
• Sequence
• early, 500 people, mixed hunting and agro-pastoralism, probably a local center
• middle, 1000 people, irrigation systems built in valley, more herding and agriculture
• late, 2000-3000 people, small urban center, increase in long distance trade & influence
• Luis Lumbreras (leading Peruvian archaeologist) argues an earthquake led to the end of Chavin
• Coast
• Population decline, no more building of U-shaped temples, most were abandoned
• Why was there a decline and abandonment? El Nino floods? tidal wave?
• Late in the Early Horizon on the north coast there was population growth and construction of fortifications suggesting unsettled times
• Implications: What does it all mean?
• Was Chavín a complex society politically?
• Craft Specialists
• Chavín period, fluorescence of gold working.
• Textiles improve and change
• Stone sculpture taken to new levels
• Ceramics quite elaborate
• at least some roads date to this period
• Chavín iconography is widespread. There is Chavín, but not exclusively Chavín, iconography at a number of other highland centers
• Origin of the iconography is the coast, but it shows a new pantheon of gods and becomes a horizon style (style marking a period found over a wide area) at the end of the Early Horizon
• Cemetery near Paracas on the south coast: a 14'x9' textile used as a mummy wrap w/ Chavín iconography, probably temple hanging.
• Was there an economic hierarchy, social stratification, wealth of priests and leaders?
• no exotic tombs at Chavín, some found at other highland centers with Chavín iconography including gold crowns, pectorals, & ear spools
• Best argument is for cult focused on an oracle, like Pachacamac, with satellite oracles.
• Burger calls Chavín the first Andean "Civilization"
• Burger characterizes "civilization" by a high level of cultural achievements in arts and sciences, made visible through material objects
• How would you define civilization?