mirrored file at http://SaturnianCosmology.Org/ For complete access to all the files of this collection see http://SaturnianCosmology.org/search.php ========================================================== Emergence of Civilizations / Anthro 341: Class 23 The Emergence of Civilization in the Andes: Moche ã Copyright Bruce Owen 2002 * Early Intermediate Period 200 BC-500 AD * We will handle this in a bit more detail than Wenke does * highly varied from place to place and over time * emergence of complex chiefdoms and states with obvious very high status elites in several distinct regions, with different traditions * Moche, probably the largest and most complex, which we will focus on here * Nazca, on the coast to the south * Chiripa and Pucara, antecedents of the Tiwanaku state on Lake Titicaca * some, like the Moche, arose in areas that had experienced Chavín influence * others, like Nazca and, especially, the Lake Titicaca area, were not affected by Chavín development of highly elaborated ceramics, metalwork, and other crafts in many wildly different styles * generally quite different from the Early Horizon styles that preceded them rise of sizable residential towns (formerly few) rise of fortified settlements (as opposed to fortresses without permanent occupation) * these were clearly intended for real defense * but lack water, so they were defending against raids, not standing armies * i.e. probably local conflicts, not regional conquest earliest at the valley necks, where the earliest canals were built * suggests that raids might have been over control of water and canal flows * as is expected in growing agricultural societies but many people still lived in indefensible, small hamlets, too tensions may have been triggered by the filling up of easily irrigated farmland, and the increase in competition and need for organization of larger reclamation works (canals) by 100 BC, Gallinazo culture in the Moche valley (to about 500 AD) * Gallinazo style mounds and pottery found all the way up to the Ecuadorian border * direct predecessors of the Moche culture * marked population growth (reached all-time highs in Virú and Santa valleys) * large areas irrigated in the fans along the valley mouths * using canals starting at the valley necks settlements became less defensible over time, suggesting regional unification 4-level settlement hierarchy developed * from relatively uniform-sized villages prior to Gallinazo * presumably similar activities carried out at each * and presumably roughly equal in power to a range of sizes in Gallinazo times * many small, rural settlements, as before, plus: * some larger towns ("tertiary" or 3rd-level) * a few towns that were larger yet ("secondary centers") * one huge main site in each valley (several square km, although population estimates are still only in the "several thousands") suggests a single, valley-wide organization in each valley * based at the largest site in each valley drastic variations in housing, from cane-walled shanties to solid adobe * suggesting significant differences in social status and material standards of living monumental platforms built on the slopes of and on top of natural hills * mold-made adobe bricks * "segmented" construction * columns or layers of bricks * bonded and mortared within the column * but just resting against adjacent columns * taken to suggest corporate work groups, like villages that each had to do their own segment of the project surrounded by settlements of up to 3000 people plus the immense "Gallinazo group" in the Virú valley * by far the largest Gallinazo settlement * covers 8 square kilometers with platform mounds, plazas, and residences * some rich burials * probably the center of a polity that included the whole valley; some have suggested a multi-valley polity * but probably most valleys were separate political units or sets of units Moche, starting around 1 AD, lasting to around 600 AD * chronology is debated, variable, partly contemporary with Gallinazo in places * Moche may have been essentially a new ideology and corresponding art style that was developed by elites of certain Gallinazo groups * that is, a form of propaganda or supernatural justification for their position and demands on the society * because the main difference is just in the style of decorated ceramics; the rest of life does not seem to have changed much started with cultural and political unification of Moche valley and neighboring Chicama valley * centered at Cerro Blanco (also called Moche) * eventually unified (culturally, maybe politically) most of the north coast * unfortunately, they had no writing system and left nothing as obviously historical as the palette of Narmer, so they can't tell us what the nature of the "unification" was * shared political ideology? * actual administrative, political unity, maybe through conquest? * shared religion? ... or? the site of Cerro Blanco * two huge adobe brick platform mounds with buildings on top * Huaca del Sol and Huaca de la Luna separated by a large space filled with courts, residences, workshops, and cemeteries still over a square mile in area, originally more before Spanish destroyed an unknown fraction to mine the Huaca del Sol Huaca del Sol * originally the largest structure of solid adobes ever built in the New World * and among the biggest three mounds of any type in the New World only a part remains, because in 1602, Spaniards diverted the Moche river to hydraulic mine the mound the scant records indicate that they found royal burials with lots of gold, which they melted down recent work also finds high-status burials with decorated ceramics and occasional small amounts of gold and copper 380 m long, 160 m wide, 40 m high (1,235 x 520 x 130 feet) (about 1/4 mile long) estimated over 143 million adobe bricks built in the columns mentioned above, bricks in each column have a distinctive mark over 100 such marks known, suggesting that over 100 communities helped build it had complexes of rooms on top * including courts, corridors, rooms that accumulated refuse, suggesting secular use by lots of people * built of wooden poles, probably thatched roofs * often with clay architectural ornaments (birds, war clubs, etc.) along the ridges or eaves * these are known both through representations in art, and because pieces have been found some rooms were small, elevated, and contained a "throne" repeatedly rebuilt and enlarged over most of the span of Moche culture Huaca de la Luna * Numerous painted relief murals * Unlike Huaca del Sol, it was kept clean * suggesting that it had a different function * Huaca del Sol is thought to have been more administrative, with politics and business conducted there * Huaca de la Luna is thought to have been a more ritual or religious structure Contained at least two high-status burials * with the same kind of copper cups that are shown with "sacrificer" figures on pots * that is, these burials contain the exact paraphernalia that is shown in what might seem to be mythological scenes on the ceramics * an even richer one was apparently looted in the nineteenth century, with numerous gilt copper masks, etc. And an area with layers of 35-40 sacrificed bodies * neck cutting trauma, random positions, left in open air and rain * possibly the result of rituals shown on pottery and performed by the people in the high-status burials between them, a large (500 m wide) space full of perishable residences and craft shops * this was totally covered by sand; once thought to have been an empty courtyard, as in Initial period sites * but excavation has shown that the concept of this center was completely different from the Initial period ones - people lived there * the residences are said to be of three levels of quality * closest to Huaca de la Luna * on the slope of Cerro Blanco and middle of space * stone and adobe construction * storage bins and niches * more fancy goods: decorated pots, copper tweezers and knives, beads middle of space * similar but less fancy closest to Huaca del Sol * small, irregular rooms of cane on stone and mortar bases * least fancy artifacts that is, social status variation * with the highest status people living near the ritual monument of the Huaca de la Luna * and the lowest status ones living near the secular administrative center of the Huaca del Sol evidence of craft work * beads, raw material (lapis), and stone drills * ceramics, metalwork, maybe shell work evidence of long-distance trade for craft materials * Spondylus shell from Ecuador * lapis from northernmost Chile (if correctly identified) Numerous other Moche sites also have big adobe platform mounds, often with painted relief murals Moche art * sophisticated but highly standardized style * clearly implies manufacture by specialists * who must have had extensive esoteric knowledge of the iconography, not to mention the technology and art of ceramic production * much as the designers of stained glass windows had to know a tremendous amount of church arcania mold-made ceramics * sculptural vessels * many are realistic human heads, so individualized that they are taken to represent specific people * actually, a limited number of people, shown at different ages fine-line painting on simpler shapes * often showing the same standard scenes, or parts of them, that apparently were rituals carried out by costumed specialists Drastic variation in burial richness indicates extreme status differences * Ordinary burials with nothing or a few pots * Medium-status Moche burials * extended body in a cane casket * a few pots, sometimes some other goods High-status burials * such as the "Warrior Priest" * extended body in a cane casket * surrounded by lots of pots and other goods * (This is not the same burial as the "warrior priest" from Sipan mentioned in Wenke) Extremely rich burials at numerous Moche sites * Some in platform mounds (although this does not seem to have been the principal use of the mounds) * Looted from Huaca del Sol * Already mentioned at Huaca de la Luna * in small funerary mounds between the Cerro Blanco huacas Some in deep, underground tombs without any surface structures Sipán "royal" burials * several separate burials * in a mud-brick platform mound * lots of copper, silver, gold, ceramics, beadwork, human and animal sacrifices * specific burials correspond to specific figures depicted on Moche pots, based on unique ornaments and paraphernalia * thought to be specific ritual roles in ceremonies, occupied like political offices by a series of people * at Sipán, there are two burials of people who played the central figure's role Other sites with similar burials * Señor de Sicán, similar * at San José de Moro, one was a high-status woman, also clearly linked to a specific character on Moche pots implications: * the scenes on Moche pots really happened, or if mythical, were reenacted in reality by the people in these tombs * these people presumably comprised a powerful ruling class, based on or supported by their religious roles * they must have commanded huge resources of skilled labor and food production to produce the things in their tombs and elsewhere large-scale specialized production inferred, and some found at various administrative/ceremonial sites * pottery factories with molds, kilns, etc. * deep, extensive piles of reject fragments, molds, ash, etc. copper processing and fabrication shops * special hearths for smelting ore into copper * special grinding stones for breaking up slag and extracting the droplets of copper * metalworking shops with polished stone tools for hammering sheet metal, raising designs, etc. must have been similar gold and silver shops, although they have not been found yet weaving centers shown on ceramics, maybe found at Pampa Grande BIG canal systems * large, planned field complexes, some with regularly-spaced mounds thought to have been for administrative purposes * more total area was irrigated in Moche III and IV than ever again until this century (and some Moche field areas still have not been reclaimed) * i.e. some production was organized by, and was presumably for the purposes of, the state or ruling elites * but note: the big field complexes appeared no earlier than 300 AD (Moche III), well after both Gallinazo and Moche were established * big agricultural works may have contributed to increasing complexity, but apparently not to its beginning While the inland people specialized in farming, people living on the coast specialized in fishing and shellfish gathering * must have been constant exchange between them Warfare * debated how much was "real" and how much was ritualized * maybe some of both, at different times and in different contexts walls enclose some ceremonial and high-status residential districts * this could be for actual defense * or to restrict access for ritual reasons iconography * on pots and big murals * maces, shields, battle scenes, bound prisoners being shown to an enthroned figure, sacrifices * but some suggest that the hand-to-hand battle of overdressed warriors may be ritual, not literally warfare in our sense * maybe a variant of tinku, again? weapons in burials * spear throwers, spear heads, maces, decorative armor, etc. * again, mostly highly decorated, maybe more for imagery than heavy use but defensible sites went out of use * ineffective against a standing army? * maybe the Moche state forced people abandon them, as the Inka did later? Writing: none * despite the very complex iconography, nothing has been found that seems to record accounts or spoken language * even when the Spanish arrived 1000 years later, there was still no writing system * although by then the Inkas did use a system of knotted cords for recording numerical information * and possibly as memory cues to help experts accurately recall essentially oral accounts * the Moche might have had something similar, although no traces have yet been found and here we leave the Moche, clearly "civilized", just before they really did conquer the valleys to the south, grow increasingly secular, and eventually collapse... Opinions on when and where civilization arose in the Andes * Late Preceramic, especially the Supe valley, with Aspero and Caral (3000 BC - 2000 BC) * Pro: Just for the sake of argument * monumental architecture * organization to build mounds and carry out ceremonies * possible status differences indicated by housing at Caral * possible complex economy indicated by exchange of fish and shellfish inland to Caral * maybe a few thousand people at Caral Con: most archaeologists * too few people * little or no specialization other than farmers vs. fishers * no centralized storage * no high-status burials Initial Period, Casma valley (2000 BC - 800 BC) * Pro: Pozorskis * Huge labor mobilization * Storage suggests centralized redistribution * restricted access suggests control, administration * access-monitoring rooms * barred and gated doorways high-status textiles, beads, wooden figurines in Huaca A * suggest high-status people in it, not commoners status differences in housing, best near Huaca A, suggest privileged administrators Cerro Sechín carvings suggest monopoly on use of force? Taukachi-Konkan: * residence with 100-columned hall * suggests a very high status residence of a ruler Con: Burger and Moche proponents * Populations too small * no cities * no complex economy, craft specialization, storage (or yes?), etc. * no clear elite or class distinctions * construction was by accumulation, not huge single projects Chavín (800 BC - 200 BC) * Pro: Burger * monumental architecture * widespread influence * sophisticated artistic tradition * based on his definition: "A high level of achievement" * residential status differences * high-status burials on the coast with gold Chavín paraphernalia * considerable craft specialization Con: much the same as above Moche (200 BC - 500 AD) * Pro: * cities * settlement hierarchy suggesting several levels of hierarchical administration * monumental architecture * sophisticated art * canals and huge irrigation projects (but when?) * monopoly on the use of force? * extreme social differentiation in burials * very marked labor specialization * apparently at least partially sponsored and controlled by elite long-distance trade * Spondylus shell from Ecuador, lapis from Chile, probably copper ores, pigments, etc. Con: * no one would deny that the Moche were civilized * but they might argue that they were not the first... Compare how these cases differ from the others we have looked at...