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Copyright of Confluenze. Rivista di Studi Iberoamericani is the property of Universita di Bologna, Dipartimento di Lingue, Letterature e Culture Moderne and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Journal of Latin American Studies is the property of Cambridge University Press and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

• New radiocarbon dates from area II of the Rapayán site confirm the Late Intermediate Period origin of surface stone architecture, notably house structures and multi-story buildings. • Centrally located above-ground and tall multi-storied tombs housed specific founding ancestors within residential settlements. • Selected families constructed their house structures at the foot of some multi-storied tombs and thereby monopolized access to the community's mummified founding ancestors. • Political authority was legitimized through privileged interactions among high status individuals and primordial ancestors. • The data presented evidence more individualized expressions of political authority as opposed to corporate forms of governance documented elsewhere in the Andes at the same time. This paper addresses the cosmological foundations of political authority in the Rapayán-Tantamayo region of the highlands of Peru during the Late Intermediate Period (1000–1450 CE). The people of this region organized their residential settlements around large and elaborate multi-storied tombs where mummified founding ancestors dwelled. The evidence presented reveals that selected families at each settlement built their houses at the foot of these above-ground tombs. By doing so, they controlled the access to the communities' founding ancestors who were thought to hold cosmological vitalizing energy necessary for the reproduction of the collectivity. Using ethnohistorical analogy, I argue that the heads of such households, through privileged interactions with potent deceased, acted as intermediaries between the life-giving force of primordial ancestors and the well-being of their community. The manifestations of political authority built around the relationship of specific individuals with powerful ancestors represent one of the main contributions of this investigation as the relational agency among these protagonists has proven difficult to identify in the archaeological record elsewhere in the Andean highlands. The results of our investigation therefore contrast with interpretations emphasizing the collective agency of "ancestors" in the legitimization processes of depersonalized cooperate political authority. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

ABSTRACT 'Community' is an important analytical lens for investigating the emergence of social hierarchy and shared religious tradition. Burials from the Titicaca Basin of Peru and Bolivia dating to the Early Horizon (800 B.C.E.-C.E. 200) provide an opportunity to investigate how socio-economic changes may have impacted and been structured by existing community structures. Specifically, I use biodistance and strontium isotope analyses to identify kinship and migrant relationships for individuals buried at temple and non-temple sites on the Copacabana Peninsula. I find that despite an emerging ritual tradition and change in subsistence strategy, individuals were likely not creating social hierarchies, but instead, structuring communities around ancestry and extended kin networks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]