Life And Death At Paloma: Practices In Peruvian Village

Preface

Preface One of the hallmarks of Precolumbian Peru is its many well-preserved and elaborate burials. In the postconquest period, the mummies of the Inca attracted the attention of the Spanish because of the reverence and wealth accorded the dead rulers. The cemetery of Anc6n excavated by Reiss and Stubel in the 1870s was among the first subjects of Peruvian archaeological study, and much is still being learned from well-preserved burials found in coastal Peru (e.g., Donnan and Mackey 1978). Despite , or perhaps because of, the attention given to later prehistoric burials, few studies of preceramic interments (circa 10,000-1500 B.C.) have been conducted. The only monograph presenting detailed information on large numbers of early Peruvian burials (Engel 1963) deals with relatively late interments dating to 1200 B.C., when pottery was already used in some parts of Peru. Although detailed studies have recently been made on early burials in northern Chile (Allison and Gerszten 1982; Allison 1985; cf. Bird 1943) and Ecuador (Stothert 1985), these regions are outside the core area of the Andes where civilization emerged. Scholarly neglect of preceramic burials has thus impeded an understanding of the development of Peruvian mortuary customs and the societies which practiced them. Burials have held untapped information on the social organization of preceramic people and the changes which coastal cultures experienced during the development of complex Peruvian societies. Lack of information on social change in preceramic Peru is also partially due to the fact that the concept of a Peruvian Preceramic Stage has only recently developed. It was primarily through the work of Bird (1948) and Engel (1957a, b, 1960) in the 1940s and the 1950s that this long period was defined. Much effort since has been spent in developing a chronology for the period (fig. 1) and in investigating economic and settlement systems . Even today, the great achievements of preceramic peoples are only gradually being realized; some large sites, long thought to date to later periods, have now been identifled as the products of preceramic societies (Moseley and Willey 1973; Donnan 1985). The first occupants of Peru are thought to have relied primarily upon hunting; but by about 7000 B.C., fishing and the gathering of plants and shellfish became important in the subsistence strategies of coastal dwellers, or, at least, became more noticeable in the archaeological record. About 2500 B.C., the last phase of the Preceramic Stage began. By its end, agriculture, monumental architecture, and complex social and political organizations had been developed. The introduction of pottery , circa 1700-1500 B.C., true weaving, and corn agriculture occurred after the establishment of many of the basic patterns of Peruvian civilization. The Paloma site, a coastal preceramic village dating from about 5000 B.C. to 2500 B.C., was discovered in 1961 by a survey crew of xiv Preface l.I.I c:~ INITIAL l.I.I~ 3= ASIA PERIOD oI: ~c: 0 _1,700 w.. EL PARAISO QUIANI RIO SECO ~ Q,) c. LA GALGADA UI c. ::l ALTO SALAUERRY u = BANDURRIA ASPERO f- 2,500- 5~ c: = HUACA PRIETA U PARACAS OSSUARY ~ PI EDRRS NEGRAS - 4,200 Q ,) PRRACAS 514 3 CHILCR I Q ~ PALOMA IU UEGRS ERRLY CH INCHORRO -6,000- - - TRES UENTANAS III PRRACAS 96 - 8,000 - u II :: I- -9,500 - :::3 I 20,000? MONTE UERDE ? EARLl EST AYACUCHO STRATA? YEARS B.C. SOUTH NORTH 1. Chronologies of some early Andean sites. Dates not calibrated. Most sites located at date averages. (Roman numerals are preceramic periods after Lanthe Centro de Investigaciones de Zonas Aridas (CIZA) of the National Agrarian University of Peru and given the number 12b-VII-613 in the CIZA catalogue. Limited excavations were carried out until 1973, when the first fullscale work took place under the direction of Frederic-Andre Engel. Two large trenches were placed in the center of the largest midden concentration at the site. This excavation uncovered forty-two houses and ninety burials. In 1976, a team of researchers from the University of Missouri, Columbia, under the direction of Robert Benfer, was invited by eIZA to continue excavations at the site. At this time, I began my participation in the project as burial furniture analyst. The joint project lasted six months. During this fieldwork , two-thirds of the effort was devoted to cleaning the trenches, locating partially excavated burials, studying materials stored in the ning 1967. Vertically written periods are after Lumbreras 1974, for the central coast of Peru. See chapter 6 for details...