UPPER COLCA ARCHAEOLOGICAL
RESEARCH PROJECT
Arequipa, Peru
LITHIC PROCUREMENT AND EXCHANGE, AND THE DEVELOPMENT OF SOCIO-POLITICAL COMPLEXITY
IN THE SOUTH CENTRAL ANDESNSF Dissertation Improvement Grant, Project Summary
N. Tripcevich, March 2003
Research at major lithic sources around the world has allowed archeologists to track the distribution of raw materials from their respective geological source areas and to document the relationship between the production and circulation of valuables and the beginnings of social ranking.
i. Project Overview ii. Theoretical Issues iii. Methodology Description iv. NSF Proposal Summary
Studies have used system-based and actor-based models to address the link between the exchange of non-local materials, such as obsidian, and the rise of socio-political complexity. Because production, distribution and consumption of such resources are part of a single socioeconomic and political orbit, the scrutiny of raw material sources can shed light on consumption processes at a regional level. The Colca Valley in southern Peru was a primary source of obsidian for people in the south central Andes for over 8,000 years (Brooks, et al. 1997; Burger, et al. 1998; Burger, et al. 2000) . Throughout the region, people in cultural contexts ranging from small-scale groups to powerful states used obsidian for stone tools and exchanged the material in a variety of artifact forms. The role of exchange in “primitive valuables” such as gold and obsidian during a time of large-scale social transformation can be evaluated by looking at changes in production activities at the recently-discovered Chivay / Cotallaulli obsidian source in the Colca Valley.
This research project proposes to use data collected from archaeological survey and test excavations in the area of the Chivay / Cotallaulli obsidian source to evaluate models linking the rise of ranked social organization with raw material procurement and exchange in the South central Andean highlands between the Late Archaic (4,800–1,500 BC) and the Late Formative Period (AD 200–500) (Aldenderfer 1998a; Stanish 2003) . A century of research in the region has shown that one locus of this socio-political development was the Lake Titicaca Basin, 200 kilometers to the east of the Chivay source. Over 90% of obsidian artifacts excavated in the Lake Titicaca Basin are made from obsidian quarried at the Chivay source (Burger, et al. 2000; Frye, et al. 1997) , yet there has been very limited archaeological work that has focused on prehistoric procurement at the source itself. Anthropological theory suggests that long-distance social networks and the circulation of non-local commodities are significant components serving the political ambitions of aspiring leaders. As the procurement and initial processing of such items is linked with the transportation and the changing demand for a commodity, archaeological research at the raw material source will illuminate the nature of this connection.
This research project will survey 70 km2 at the quarry and in the adjacent river valley, and will conduct limited test excavations at the quarry and at two stratified sites. Prehistoric exploitation of obsidian in the source region will be documented through lithic reduction strategies at and near the high-altitude obsidian source, stratigraphic evidence from test excavations, and settlement pattern data from survey. By examining changes in lithic processing strategies at the obsidian source, as well as shifts in settlement pattern and debitage distributions in the nearby river valley, this project will connect behavior in the lithic procurement area and the residential Colca valley with political changes known to have taken place regionally.
The proposed investigation of the production of obsidian in the Colca area represents a case-study of the relationship between exchange and the evolution of social complexity that will be comparable to other regions in the world. This research will also address long-standing regional questions concerning the relationship between Titicaca Basin polities and raw materials from the western slope of the Andes. A central methodological aim of this research project is the integration of new geographical technology for approaching spatial analysis problems. Throughout the organization, design, acquisition, and analysis phases of the project remote sensing and geographical information systems (GIS) will have played a central role. This project aims to foster greater scholarly cooperation in the use of these technologies internationally and to educate interested students of both Peruvian or foreign backgrounds about the application of GIS to anthropological research questions.
Projection Description Pages
i. Project Overview ii. Theoretical Issues iii. Methodology Description iv. NSF Proposal Summary