This book examines the varied faces of war, politics, and violent spectacle over thousands of years in the pre-Columbian Andes.

Warfare in the pre-Columbian Andes took on many forms, from inter-village raids to campaigns of conquest. Andean societies also created spectacular performances and artwork alluding to war – acts of symbolism that worked as political rhetoric while drawing on ancient beliefs about supernatural beings, warriors, and the dead. In this book, Elizabeth Arkush disentangles Andean warfare from Andean war-related spectacle and offers insights into how both evolved over time. Synthesizing the rich archaeological record of fortifications, skeletal injury, and material evidence, she presents fresh visions of war and politics among the Moche, Chimú, Inca, and pre-Inca societies of the conflict-ridden Andean highlands. The changing configurations of Andean power and violence serve as case studies to illustrate a sophisticated general model of the different forms of warfare in pre-modern societies. Arkush's book makes the complex pre-history of Andean warfare accessible by providing a birds-eye view of its major patterns and contrasts.

Addresses the importance of the human head in political, ritual and symbolic contexts in the ancient and modern Andes.

Andean peoples recognize places as neither sacred nor profane, but rather in terms of the power they emanate and the identities they materialize and reproduce. This book argues that a careful consideration of Andean conceptions of powerful places is critical not only to understanding Andean political and religious history but to rethinking sociological theories on landscapes more generally. The contributors evaluate ethnographic and ethnohistoric analogies against the material record to illuminate the ways landscapes were experienced and politicized over the last three thousand years.

Front Cover -- Title Page -- Copyright -- Contents -- List of Illustrations -- Acknowledgments -- 1: Biographies of Place -- 2: Place-Making and Politics -- 3: The Lake Titicaca Basin, Past and Present -- 4: The Site of Khonkho Wankane -- 5: Making Ritual Places: Caravan Routes and the Founding of Khonkho Wankane -- 6: Experiencing Ritual Places: Stelae, Sunken Courts, and the Creation of an Axis Mundi -- 7: The Power of Ritual Places: Politics and Social Difference through Time -- 8: The Political Cartography of an Axis Settlement -- Appendix -- Notes -- References -- Index -- Back Cover

The Ancient Andean States combines modern social theory, recent archaeological literature, and the experience of the author to examine politics and power in the great Andean pre-Hispanic societies. The ancient Andean states were the great shapers of Peruvian prehistory. Social complexity, architectural monumentality, and specialized economic production, among others, were features of these sophisticated societies known by professionals and travelers from around the world. How and when these states emerged and succeeded is still debated. By examining Andean pre-Hispanic societies such as Caral, Sechín, Chavín, Moche, Wari, Chimú, and Inca, this book delves into their political and economic structures as well as explores their ideological worldviews. It reveals how these societies were organized and how different social groups interacted in the states. Archaeologists and anthropologists interested in Peruvian archaeology and the political and social structures of ancient societies will find this book to be a valuable addition to their shelves.

For more than two millennia prior to the Spanish conquest, the southern region of the central Andes was home to dozens of societies, ranging from modest chiefdoms to imperial states. Attempts to understand the political and economic dynamics of this complex region have included at least two major theories in Andean anthropology. In this pathfinding study, Charles Stanish shows that they are not exclusive and competing models, but rather can be understood as variations within a larger theoretical framework. Stanish builds his arguments around a case study from the Moquequa region of Peru, augmented with data from Puno. He uses the "archaeological household" as his basic unit of analysis. This approach allows him to reconcile the now-classic model of zonal complementarity proposed by John Murra with the model of craft specialization and exchange offered by Maria Rostworowski de Diez Canseco. These models of political economy are analyzed with the concepts of economic anthropology in the tradition of Karl Polanyi. For students of archaeology, Andean studies, anthropology, and economic history, Ancient Andean Political Economy will be important reading.

New data and interpretations that shed light on the nature of power relations in prehistoric and contemporary Indigenous societies This volume explores the nature of power relations and social control in Indigenous societies of Latin America. Its chapters focus on instances of domination in different contexts as reflected in archaeological, osteological, and ethnohistorical records, beginning with prehistoric case studies to examples from the ethnographic present. Ranging from the development of nautical and lacustrine warfare technology in precontact Mesoamerica to the psychological functions of domestic violence among contemporary Amazonian peoples, these investigations shed light on how leaders often use violence or the threat of violence to advance their influence. The essays show that while social control can be overt, it may also be veiled in the form of monumental architecture, fortresses or pukara, or rituals that signal to friends and foes alike the power of those in control. Contributors challenge many widely accepted conceptions of violence, warfare, and domination by presenting new evidence, and they also offer novel interpretations of power relations in the domestic, local, and regional spheres. Encompassing societies from tribal to state levels of sociopolitical complexity, the studies in this volume present different dimensions of conflict and power found among the prehistoric and contemporary Indigenous peoples of Latin America. Contributors: Stephen Beckerman | Richard J. Chacon | Yamilette Chacon | Vincent Chamussy | Peter Eeckhout | Pamela Erickson | Mariana Favila Vázquez | Romuald Housse | Nam C. Kim | Krzysztof Makowski | Dennis E. Ogburn | Lawrence Stewart Owens | James Yost

​Over the millennia, from stone tools among early foragers to clays to prized metals and mineral pigments used by later groups, mineral resources have had a pronounced role in the Andean world. Archaeologists have used a variety of analytical techniques on the materials that ancient peoples procured from the earth. What these materials all have in common is that they originated in a mine or quarry. Despite their importance, comparative analysis between these archaeological sites and features has been exceptionally rare, and even more so for the Andes. Mining and Quarrying in the Ancient Andes focuses on archaeological research at primary deposits of minerals extracted through mining or quarrying in the Andean region. While mining often begins with an economic need, it has important social, political, and ritual dimensions as well. The contributions in this volume place evidence of primary extraction activities within the larger cultural context in which they occurred. This important contribution to the interdisciplinary literature presents research and analysis on the mining and quarrying of various materials throughout the region and through time. Thus, rather than focusing on one material type or one specific site, Mining and Quarrying in the Ancient Andes incorporates a variety of all the aspects of mining, by focusing on the physical, social, and ritual aspects of procuring materials from the earth in the Andean past.

A major contribution to debates about Latin American state formation, Political Cultures in the Andes brings together comparative historical studies focused on Colombia, Ecuador, Bolivia, and Peru from the mid-eighteenth century to the mid-twentieth. While highlighting patterns of political discourse and practice common to the entire region, these state-of-the-art histories show how national and local political cultures depended on specific constellations of power, gender and racial orders, processes of identity formation, and socioeconomic and institutional structures. The contributors foreground the struggles over democracy and citizens’ rights as well as notions of race, ethnicity, gender, and class that have been at the forefront of political debates and social movements in the Andes since the waning days of the colonial regime some two hundred years ago. Among the many topics they consider are the significance of the Bourbon reform era to subsequent state-formation projects, the role of race and nation in the work of early-twentieth-century Bolivian intellectuals, the fiscal decentralization campaign in Peru following the devastating War of the Pacific in the late nineteenth century, and the negotiation of the rights of “free men of all colors” in Colombia’s Atlantic coast region during the late colonial period. Political Cultures in the Andes includes an essay by the noted Mexicanist Alan Knight in which he considers the value and limits of the concept of political culture and a response to Knight’s essay by the volume’s editors, Nils Jacobsen and Cristóbal Aljovín de Losada. This important collection exemplifies the rich potential of a pragmatic political culture approach to deciphering the processes involved in the formation of historical polities. Contributors. Cristóbal Aljovín de Losada, Carlos Contreras, Margarita Garrido, Laura Gotkowitz, Aline Helg, Nils Jacobsen, Alan Knight, Brooke Larson, Mary Roldan, Sergio Serulnikov, Charles F. Walker, Derek Williams