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In this paper we review the growing evidence of anthropogenic landscapespresent in the semi-deciduous neotropical forest biomes of eastern NW Argentina,which have remained relatively neglected in favour of arid to semi-arid western Andean regions. The evidence gathered in de El Alto-Ancasti provides animportant case study where multidisciplinary methodologies have beenapplied to sites that document the emergence and variability in food productionstrategies across the eastern Andean forests and grasslands of NWArgentina. We discuss evidence offarming structures from archaeological surveys, plant management from phy-tolith analysis, and the tempo and nature of settlement from archaeological excavations undertaken at a variety of sites in the El Alto Ancasti mountainrange. We suggest that the communities that inhabited this region during thefirst millennium AD (ca. 1500–1000 BP) established a strategy of 'overlappingpatchworks' of food production that were able to contend with considerableseasonal variability. We argue that, through the use of cross-channelling, low river areas, erosion control techniques and the establishment of mesothermal crops,including maize, legumes, and tubers, throughout the region, these societies adopted flexible strategies to adapt to life in a region prone to climatic change [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The means by which past complex societies thrived at high altitudes remain puzzling. In this paper I suggest that religious ideology and ritual practice shaped the cultural processes that fostered Tiwanaku state rise in the south-central Andean highlands. Physical changes in the monumental core of the state's principal centre are particularly revealing. Material transformations in monumental axiality, spatiality, materiality and iconography were critical elements in a changing religion that sought to integrate the symbolism of prominent generative forces such as mountains, vital elements such as water and recurring celestial cycles. After ad 500, Tiwanaku's innovative religion meshed imposing natural features with timeless solar cycles. This embodiment and objectification of nature was increasingly critical for a polity that thrived precariously on an effective coordination of fishing, herding and new technologies of high-altitude farming. The symbolic appropriation of the natural world and its immanent spiritual forces was constitutive of Tiwanaku's political integration of diverse societies and productive landscapes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Archaeological research in the Andes has emphasized agriculture to the detriment of all other modes of production. A marked bias towards research on the coast, where crop farming predominates, and prejudices arising from the prevailing agro-centric perspective has given rise to a wealth of information concerning agricultural adaptations to this vertical environment. This paper seeks to redress the balance by investigating the precocious nature of agro-pastoralist traditions in the north-central highlands of Peru (ad 1000–1570). I challenge current ideas concerning the mainstay of subsistence in the Prehispanic high Andes that essentially emphasize farming to the detriment of other modes of production. Rather, I argue for a rich tableau of closely articulated groups of agro-pastoral and mixed farming communities ensconced in the kichwa , suni and puna areas of the cordillera. In these mixed communities the archaeological evidence suggests that it is the camelid herders who controlled and exercised power over the mixed farming communities with a concomitant specialization and intensification of the pastoralist economy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

False heads have been a recurring accessory for Andean mummies since the Middle Horizon (ca AD750-1000). Made of ceramic, wood, or cloth, they show schematic human features and are placed on the funerary bundles that contain the bodies of the deceased. From a corpus of nearly 80 pieces from the Pachacamac site (excavations and museum collections), a typology is proposed, accompanied by a chronology based on a series of absolute dates. False heads also have recurring characteristics that allow us to understand their particular function. It appears that these objects are associated with certain important ancestors, whom their descendants worshiped. They were active agents, participants in the ritual traditions discussed ethnohistorically. The false head plays a crucial role in the relationship between the dead and the living and sheds light on the specific ontological position of the dead in the ancient Andes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Chavín de Huántar has long been recognized as a site of pan-regional importance in the first millennium bce Central Andes. Multiple lines of evidence link the site to costa, sierra and selva. Using exotic goods for which provenance is known – for example, obsidian, cinnabar, selected ceramics and marine shell – specific areas with which Chavín interacted can be identified. These interactions are considered in the context of distinct ways of thinking about Central Andean space – a least-cost transportation surface, the Inca road network and ethno-historically reconstructed territories. I argue that explicitly modeling the implications of connecting such nodes and considering distance in multiple ways facilitates a better characterization of interregional interaction. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The rich prehistoric archaeological record in Andean South America has obscured the importance of post-conquest historic sites in the region. Archaeologists researching the former Spanish colonies have long turned to the US ‘Borderlands’ and the Caribbean for models defining the archaeology of Spanish colonialism. Recently, however, Andean archaeologists have begun to create new emphases on the archaeology of colonialism and archaeologies of the later Andean republics. This region was a core area of Spanish overseas expansion in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, with much of the precious metal wealth of the empire produced in Andean mines. Today archaeologists in the Andean republics of Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, Chile and Argentina, and the foreign researchers who also work in the region, are overcoming geographic, financial and linguistic barriers to create a unified Andean historical archaeology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]