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Irrigation canals from the Calchaqui valley (province of Salta, Argentina)
Abstract
The archaeological site of Las Pailas, located in the north of the Calchaquí valley (province of Salta, Argentina), is one of the largest agricultural areas developed in the region during the Late Period (900-1430 CE) and the Inca Period (1430-1530 CE). The site consists of a residential area and an extensive area of cultivated land criss-crossed by a dense network of canals, both with and without stone lining, used for irrigation of the fields. This paper presents the results of the topographic contour and architectural mapping of the lined canals, located in a sector of the archaeological site. The canals have stone lining on their walls and ceilings, and most of them are below ground surface, covered by a layer of sediment. Larger and smaller canals distributed water from river intakes to cultivated fields. This required the development of a technical knowledge that included the control of slopes, the management of water flow velocities and discharge values, and the covering of pipes to avoid sediment accumulation and clogging. The analysis of the density of the canals suggests that the irrigation of the fields was a task of great importance for pre-Hispanic peasants.
... The cultivated area follows the slope of the site, in a NE-SW direction, with altitude differences ranging from 2960 to 3380 m asl at the highest point. The entire surface is crossed by an irrigation network that distributes water throughout the fields (Páez and López, 2019). Parts of the canals are dug in the ground, without lining, while others have rocks on the sides and rooves to protect them from sedimentation and eventual clogging. ...
... Parts of the canals are dug in the ground, without lining, while others have rocks on the sides and rooves to protect them from sedimentation and eventual clogging. The network is composed of water intakes, including primary canals, approximately 1 m wide, and drainage canals, mostly ranging between 0.12 m and 0.23 m, which enter the fields irrigating the planted surface (Páez and Giovannetti, 2014;Páez and López, 2019). ...
Traditionally, in archaeological and anthropological literature, the environment of the Andean valleys of northwest Argentina has been considered a mainly arable agricultural region, in contrast to the environment of Puna where the traditional way of life was generally associated with pastoral activities and seasonal mobility. However, new evidence suggests greater importance for animal grazing and associated mobility strategies strongly connected with arable agriculture in the valleys. This work is framed as an ethno-archaeological research project that aims to explore multiple dimensions of practices involving animal management and its relevance to the way of life in the Northern Calchaquí Valley (Salta, Argentina) and how they contribute to shape archaeological landscape. A mixed methodological strategy was applied to construct a contemporary model providing analytical tools for the study of archaeological landscape. This model looks at an agropastoral way of life in this region since pre-Hispanic times, on the basis of a strategy that combines ethnographic information and GIS-based spatial analysis, supported by archaeological evidence. Is expected that this work could make a contribution to the interpretation of the archaeological record and the study pre-Hispanic landscapes in the area, through a greater understanding of the local way of life, its spatial dimension and its temporal depth.
En la matriz de pensamiento indígena, la incorporación de las entidades no humanas, pertenecientes al terreno de lo natural y lo sagrado, son la garantía de reproducción de la vida y el cosmos, junto al hombre. Así, en la intersección entre lo sagrado, lo natural y lo humano es que debe entenderse también la fertilidad, donde la reciprocidad y el sentido colectivo representan sus pilares principales. En este artículo abordaremos estos conceptos a partir del análisis de las wankas, bloques de piedra ubicados en medio de los campos agrícolas de Las Pailas, un sitio prehispánico ubicado en el sector norte del Valle Calchaquí (Salta). Los resultados nos permiten sostener que, más allá de la instancia votiva que habría tenido lugar, el hecho mismo de colocarlas allí ya representa per se una reclamación ritual, fundacional para estas ontologías donde la reproducción de la vida atraviesa el cosmos en su totalidad.
Desde una tradición de trabajos antropológicos y arqueológicos en las áreas de valles andinos mesotermales del Noroeste Argentino, se ha tendido a poner el acento en la agricultura como actividad productiva dominante, considerándose a la cría de animales como una práctica accesoria limitada sobre todo al consumo familiar. Sin embargo, estudios recientes señalan que la cría de animales pudo haber tenido una mayor importancia en la configuración de las estrategias productivas en estas zonas, dando lugar al concepto emergente de agropastoralismo. Este trabajo apunta a explorar las distintas formas en que las actividades agrícolas, y aquellas vinculadas a la cría y pastoreo de animales, se entrelazan en el Valle Calchaquí Norte. Para ello, se recurre al estudio de los aspectos materiales asociados a estas prácticas coordinadas y la información construida sobre la base de trabajo de campo etnográfico, a partir de observaciones y la memoria oral de los interlocutores. Consideramos que este tipo de abordaje nos permitirá establecer pautas que enriquezcan el análisis del registro arqueológico local y tener una mirada integral respecto a la complementariedad de dichas prácticas. Los resultados obtenidos otorgan una primera contribución al abordaje del agropastoralismo en el área, evidenciado a partir del análisis de la materialidad, dinámicas de organización y movilidad coordinadas en los diversos espacios que componen la vida en el valle.
Este trabajo apunta a dar fundamento teórico-metodológico al estudio arqueológico de la dimensión espacial de la vida en la región andina del Valle Calchaquí Norte(Dto.de Cachi, Salta, Noroeste Argentino)en el contexto actual de desarrollo de las llamadas corrientes post-interpretativas. En particular, se discute el concepto de paisaje(landscape)como categoría analítica representacional y se propone la noción de taskscape acuñada por Tim Ingold como alternativa no-representacional para el abordaje analítico de la cuestión espacial en este planteo de investigación.
Se procede entonces, a mostrar la aplicabilidad de este concepto clave, y otros del armado teórico de Ingold, para el estudio del modo de vida agropastoril en el área mencionada, mostrando su compatibilidad y potencia explicativa a la hora de analizar los resultados obtenidos hasta el momento.
Por último, se destacan dos problemas de tipo teórico–metodológico, que surgen de la aplicación de estos conceptos: a)su aparente incompatibilidad con la definición entidades discretas y estables como unidades de análisis para el abordaje metodológico, y b)una posible carencia en la articulación con nociones propias de la ontología local que esta propuesta teórica en principio no contempla, y que resulta fundamental para una aproximación más completa a la complejidad del modo de vida en el Valle.
Campos de cultivos amurallados han sido registrados en la costa norte como parte de instalaciones productivas creadas durante periodos tardíos. Los casos reportados de este tipo de instalaciones agrícolas se encuentran relacionados con los gobernantes o con sus familiares. A pesar de la importancia que este tipo de instalaciones agrícolas presenta para entender el funcionamiento económico durante épocas tardías, no se han reportado correspondientes estudios arqueológicos. Los trabajos de las autoras en los campos de cultivo amurallados en la pampa de Chaparrí (provincia de Ferreñafe, departamento de Lambayeque), focalizados en las técnicas constructivas y uso de los mismos, ofrecen interpretaciones sobre el manejo de estas instalaciones agrícolas desde una perspectiva arqueológica dentro de un sistema regional agrícola.
La gran extensión de tierras cultivadas durante tiempos prehispánicos en Las Pailas y la tecnología desplegada para tal fin constituyen uno de los aspectos más distintivos del sitio. Cerca de 500 ha de canchones de cultivo divididas en dos sectores, Las Pailas 1 y Las Pailas 2, habrían sido regadas por una amplia red de canales que distribuían el agua proveniente de los ríos de deshielo y de vertientes en los cerros. Diversos tipos de canales aéreos de tecnología simple, cavados en tierra sin revestimiento, se combinan con complejos canales subterráneos revestidos en piedra, los que habrían supuesto un avanzado conocimiento hidráulico. En este trabajo se presentan los primeros resultados en torno a la descripción de ambos tipos morfológicos, su distribución espacial y posible articulación dentro de una red que habría permitido el riego artificial de las tierras cultivadas. Asimismo, se discuten parámetros de carácter cronológico relativo a los Períodos Tardío (900 – 1480 d. C.) e Inka de la región (1480 – 1532 d. C.).
Understanding the relationship between drought and population dynamics is increasingly important, particularly in areas where high population growth corresponds with increasing drought risk due to climate change. We examine the relationship between drought events and population dynamics using a stylized hydrology-demography model that has been calibrated to simulate plausible feedbacks for the population decline of the Ancient Maya of Central America. We employ a deterministic and a stochastic approach.
We find that the impact of drought increases abruptly once a critical threshold of population density is exceeded. The critical threshold depends on the intensity and duration of the drought as well as on the level of technology adopted by society, the extent of markets and societal behavior. The simulations show that, for a society to be as food secure post-climate change as they are pre-climate change, strategies would have to be adopted to not only increase the region's capacity to provide sufficient resources for its growing population, but also to buffer the impact of a drier climate on productivity. This study provides suggestions on how technological, societal and economic development can modify the system to mitigate the impacts of climate change on the human population.
Archaeologists measure features in archaeological seeds primarily to document domestication during the Neolithic period. These same methods are less frequently used to study morphological changes associated with cultural selection of landraces later in time. For example, researchers have documented domesticated forms of chenopods during the Formative period in the Andes, yet there remains very little research on postliminary chenopod morphology. In this study, I use techniques developed to understand domestication, including scanning electron microscopy, to analyse charred archaeological Chenopodium spp. seeds recovered from the site Ayawiri located near Puno, Peru and dated to the Late Intermediate period (ad 1100–1450), almost 4,000 years after incipient domestication of quinoa (Chenopodium quinoa). I found that this assemblage of chenopod seeds does not morphologically conform to modern varieties. Rather, these seeds are smaller than their modern counterparts. These findings indicate there was appreciable cultural selection of larger chenopod seed stock over the last 550 years.
Se aplican técnicas de evaluación multicriterio con metodología fuzzy que permiten avanzar en la validación
de modelos de aptitud espacial para el desarrollo de la agricultura prehispánica y actual en un sector del
valle de Yocavil meridional (Catamarca, Argentina). Se emplea asimismo el método de Combinación Lineal
Ponderada utilizando Sistemas de Información Geográfica. Se observó que el área con mayor potencial
para la agricultura coincide principalmente con el registro arqueológico prehispánico. La evolución histórica
de la producción agrícola desde tiempos prehispánicos hasta el presente permite postular que las condiciones
ambientales no son las únicas ni las que más influyen en la organización económica.
Within Inka spatial planning, rocky bodies that are worked and shaped for use in particular activities are incorporated and are as important as water transport. Here we present a recent monumental architecture find concerning the channeling of water for the El Shincal de Quimivil zone, home to the eponymous site, which served an important function as state capital. The Piedra Raja has five sections that allow for the distribution of large volumes of water in different directions. Our parallel aims are to correlate this finding with the phenomenon of carved rock systematically primarily recorded in the Central Andes and to discuss the incorporation of distant spaces within Tawantinsuyu through the continuity of sacred points in space.
With population growth, increasing water demands and climate change the need to understand the current and future pathways to water security is becoming more pressing. To contribute to addressing this challenge, we examine the link between water stress and society through socio-hydrological modeling. We conceptualize the interactions between an agricultural society with its environment in a stylized way. We apply the model to the case of the ancient Maya, a population that experienced a peak during the Classic Period (AD 600-830) and then declined during the ninth century. The hypothesis that modest drought periods played a major role in the society's collapse is explored. Simulating plausible feedbacks between water and society we show that a modest reduction in rainfall may lead to an 80% population collapse.Population density and crop sensitivity to droughts, however, may play an equally important role. The simulations indicate that construction of reservoirs results in less frequent drought impacts, but if the reservoirs run dry, drought impact may be more severe and the population drop may be larger. Index terms: 1812 Drought (4303) 1834 Human impacts (4323) 4330 Vulnerability. Keywords: socio-hydrology, Ancient Maya, drought, vulnerability. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.
Pre-Columbian raised field agriculture in the tropical
lowlands of South America has received increasing attention and been the
focus of heated debates regarding its function, productivity, and role in
the development of pre-Columbian societies. Even though raised fields are
all associated to permanent or semi-permanent high water levels, they occur
in different environmental contexts. Very few field-based studies on raised
fields have been carried out in the tropical lowlands and little is known
about their use and past management. Based on topographic surveying and
mapping, soil physical and chemical analysis and OSL and radiocarbon dating,
this paper provides insight into the morphology, functioning and time frame
of the use of raised fields in the south-western Llanos de Moxos, Bolivian
Amazon. We have studied raised fields of different sizes that were built in
an area near the town of San Borja, with a complex fluvial history. The
results show that differences in field size and height are the result of an
adaptation to a site where soil properties vary significantly on a scale of
tens to hundreds of metres. The analysis and dating of the raised fields
sediments point towards an extensive and rather brief use of the raised
fields, for about 100–200 years at the beginning of the 2nd millennium.
Pre-Columbian raised field agriculture in the tropical lowlands of South America has received increasing attention and been the focus of heated debates regarding its function, productivity, and role in the development of pre-Columbian societies. Even though raised fields are all associated to permanent or semi-permanent high water levels, they occur in different environmental contexts. Very few field-based studies on raised fields have been carried out in the tropical lowlands and little is known about their use and past management. Based on topographic surveying and mapping, soil physical/chemical analysis and OSL and radiocarbon dating, this paper provides insight into the morphology, functioning and time frame of the use of raised fields in the south-western Llanos de Moxos, Bolivian Amazon. We have studied raised fields of different sizes that were built in an area, near the town of San Borja, with a complex fluvial history. The results show that differences in field size and height are the result of an adaptation to a site where soil properties vary significantly on a scale of tens to hundreds of meters. The analysis and dating of the raised fields sediments point towards an extensive and rather brief use of the raised fields, for about 100–200 years at the beginning of the 2nd millennium.
El dominio inca en los Andes del sur se basó en el manejo simultáneo del control militar, la ideología y la hospitalidad ceremonial. La comida y las celebraciones públicas fueron fundamentales para el surgimiento de jerarquías sociales y en la negociación del poder mediante la creación de alianzas y relaciones de reciprocidad. En el Noroeste Argentino, la administración inca ejerció un gobierno directo en ubicaciones clave. Para poder obtener una visión más clara de los procesos micropolíticos que se desarrollaron en algunos valles mesotermales del Noroeste Argentino bajo el dominio inca se intentará conocer la importancia que las fiestas o ceremonias tuvieron para las elites estatales al crear límites sociales por medio del consumo de alimentos especiales y del uso de formas cerámicas distintivas. Para ello, el Estado invirtió energía en ampliar las áreas agrícolas como una estrategia de producción y administración de bienes y servicios mediante el dominio del espacio productivo, el cual fue apropiado por el Inca a partir del ya existente vínculo pukara-ancestros-fertilidad de las chacras.
Large-scale irrigation agriculture formed the economic backbone of civilizations on the north coast of Peru. Contrary to the notion that large systems required the guiding hand of the state, historical sources suggest that management was largely local and segmentary. At the same time, water and land are a potential source of economic and political power for state administrators who may intervene in the supervision and management of farming. The Pampa de Chaparrí, in the Lambayeque region, is an unusually well-preserved system of canals, fields, and settlements where the dynamics of water, land and politics can be observed. Systematic survey documented a Middle Sicán (A.D. 900-1100), Late Sicán (A.D. 1100-1375), Chimú (A.D. 1375-1460) and Inka (A.D. 1460-1532) occupation. During Middle and Late Sicán, settlement patterns reflect the segmentary organization described in historical accounts. With conquest by the Chimú and Inka Empires, state administrative centers were constructed, existing social groups were reorganized and communities and households were transformed. Thus, though local management is an effective and stable strategy for managing large irrigation systems, the wealth and power that these systems represent make them potential targets for more direct state control, with significant consequences for local inhabitants.
RESUMEN Las Pailas constituye uno de los sitios arqueológicos con evidencias de explotación agrícola de mayor exten-sión y relevancia en los Valles Calchaquíes. La superficie cultivada habría alcanzado cerca de 500 ha, regadas por una compleja red de canales que distribuye el agua proveniente del deshielo de los picos nevados. El área agrícola se divide en dos sectores denominados Las Pailas 1 y 2, separados por un cordón montañoso que es atravesado por un camino arqueológico. Esta vía de comunicación entre ambos sectores encuentra continuidad hacia el oeste hasta llegar al Nevado de Cachi. El reconocimiento y estudio de la configuración agrícola del sitio constituye el punto de partida para analizar la relación de los pobladores con la tierra a lo largo de los dos milenios de ocupación de Las Pailas. Palabras clave: Valle Calchaquí Norte, tecnología agrícola, campos de cultivo, redes de riego. Las Pailas. New Contributions to the Understanding of Prehispanic Agriculture in the Northern Calchaqui Valley ABSTRACT Las Pailas is one of the most extensive and most important archaeological sites with evidence of farming at the Calchaquí Valley. The cultivated area has been of 500 ha, irrigated by a complex network of canals to distribute water from the melting of snow peaks. The agricultural area is divided into two sections called Las Pailas 1 and 2, separated by a mountain range which is crossed by an archaeological way. This channel of communication between the two sectors is continuing west to get to Nevado de Cachi. The survey and study of the agricultural setting of the archaeological site is the starting point for analyzing the relationship of people to land during two millennia of occupation in Las Pailas.
The Horn of Africa and Southwest Arabia are less than 30 km apart, yet the timing and nature of transitions to agriculture along the margins of the southern Red Sea differ substantially. This paper compares and contrasts the beginnings of agriculture in highland Ethiopia/Eritrea and
Yemen. We evaluate the applicability of general models, emphasize social circumstances and particularities, and highlight the importance of differing spatiotemporal scales from interregional perspectives that address millennia-long changes across continents to local choices during human lifetimes.
We consider why agriculture appears so much later than it does throughout the eastern Mediterranean and argue that the traditionally rigid distinction between the "origins" and "spread" of agriculture oversimplifies transitions along the southern Red Sea in which agriculture
in some ways diffused to, and in other ways, uniquely originated in Southwest Arabia and the Horn of Africa. We concordantly maintain that, particularly when agriculture is considered a societal transformation, regions where agriculture appears comparatively later are as important to understanding
transitions to agriculture as regions where agriculture appears earliest.
Recent research in the Late Intermediate Period (ad 1000-1480) north-central Andes has emphasized the segmentary and egalitarian nature of late prehispanic Huaylas communities in the region. This form of devolved power nevertheless conceals investiture of authority in a person or group, albeit temporarily. Given the ubiquitous importance of water in the Andes, I suggest that this type of power could well have rested on special 'managers' closely involved in the organization of water and its concomitant hydrological infrastructure, working for the wider community and its leaders. Centring on archaeological evidence from the Cordillera Negra in the Ancash highlands the area demonstrates the development of a complex suite of hydraulic technology. It is this unique setting, including previously sparsely recorded structures such as silt dams and silt reservoirs, which provides the technological suite necessary to test these preliminary ideas. The approach taken here is an attempt to revisit some of Karl Wittfogel's concepts, adapting them to include a community-based bottom-up perspective to the 'hydraulic hypothesis'.
Dentro de la planificación espacial inkaica, se encuentran incorporados cuerpos rocosos que por lo general son trabajados y formatizados para su aprovechamiento en alguna actividad importante como es el transporte de agua. En este esquema intervienen también componentes sagrados donde se funden elementos divinizados como las rocas, el agua y el espacio mismo. En esta presentación mostramos un reciente hallazgo de la monumentalidad inka en relación al fenómeno de la canalización del agua para la zona de El Shincal de Quimivil donde se emplaza el sitio homónimo que funcionara como importante capital del Estado. La Piedra Raja presenta cinco secciones para permitir la distribución en diferentes direcciones de grandes caudales de agua. Se intenta, paralelamente, poner en relación este hallazgo con el fenómeno de las carved rock registrado sistemáticamente sobre todo en los Andes Centrales y discutir la incorporación de espacios distantes del Cusco dentro del Tawantinsuyu a través de la continuidad de puntos sagrados en el espacio. Within Inka spatial planning, rocky bodies that are worked and shaped for use in particular activities are incorporated and are as important as water transport. Here we present a recent monumental architecture find concerning the channeling of water for the El Shincal de Quimivil zone, home to the eponymous site, which served an important function as state capital. The Piedra Raja has five sections that allow for the distribution of large volumes of water in different directions. Our parallel aims are to correlate this finding with the phenomenon of carved rock systematically primarily recorded in the Central Andes and to discuss the incorporation of distant spaces within Tawantinsuyu through the continuity of sacred points in space.
Extensive agricultural fields are frequently linked with processes of political centralization. The assumption is that the expansion of agricultural fields is related to the emergence of an authority with the capacity to mobilize the labor force that is needed for the construction of infrastructure and its management. However, the use of such an indicator can lead us to misunderstand the relevance of the appropriation strategies of peasant production units, which design their crop areas to ensure present and future access to production and the means of production. This article presents a study of the Tebenquiche Chico (Catamarca, Argentina) irrigation network design, reconstruction of which allowed us to interpret the temporal and spatial scales of peasant labor and the way in which the Tebenquiche Chico agricultural landscape reaches a remarkable extension without necessarily involving supra-domestic social scales.
As an archaeologically less-known region, Southwest Arabia offers new insights that can contribute to interregional understanding of agriculture's beginnings. The relative importance of environmental and social factors is an issue that has proven particularly contentious for both general and regionally focused explanations of transitions to agriculture. Geomatics analyses of landforms and runoff and ethnoarchaeological consideration of cairn tombs and water rights along the Wadi Sana drainage of Hadramawt Governate, Yemen, highlight the joint importance of two proximate dimensions of environmental conditions and social relations - hydrology and ideologies of territoriality. In contrast with a focus on one or the other, perspectives that draw on the strengths of both scientific quantification and humanistic interpretation provide for more accurate understanding of the circumstances that shaped the lives and livelihoods of early farmers.
The Pampa de Chaparrí (Pampa) in hyperarid northwest coastal Peru is an ideal area to study late prehispanic agricultural technology and production because irrigation canals and furrowed fields have been preserved since abandonment approximately 500 years ago. We collected 55 samples for soil characterization, fertility, and micromorphic analyses and compared these results to a noncultivated control soil previously sampled in an adjacent valley. Natural soil fertility levels for maize, cotton, and bean production were generally high during late prehispanic cultivation in the Pampa. Maintaining adequate nitrogren levels for production, however, would have required external inputs from livestock manure, guano, or leguminous plants. The management of low soil salinity levels was possible because of rapidly permeable soils and irrigation waters low in salt. Based on available water capacity and climate conditions, the Blaney-Criddle Equation yields evapotranspiration rates indicating that irrigation frequency was necessary in a range of every 10–16 days during the growing season. © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Irrigation systems were clearly important in ancient times in supplying crops with water. This requires physical distribution
facilities and socio-political arrangements to coordinate between actors. Resulting systems are highly diverse, and are being
studied extensively within archeology and history. Whether initiated by a central authority or emerging from small-scale initiatives,
irrigation systems are shaped through activities of individuals, households, and small groups into patterns and landscapes.
This article discusses how hydraulic modeling techniques are powerful methodologies to study such irrigation development.
Modeling daily interactions by agents and water fluxes will build better understanding of irrigation systems as anthropogenic
landscapes. Three case studies will be used to illustrate this argument. A current irrigation system in Arequipa, Peru, shows
that one can relate irrigation infrastructure and social action. A second case from Peru on a pre-Colombian irrigation system
suggests that one can link irrigation system, water flows, and settlement. In the third case in the Jordan Valley, this possible
link between irrigation and settlement is further studied.
KeywordsIrrigation-Modeling-Management-Spatiality-Power
In southern Peru near Lake Titicaca, at the Colla hillfort town of Ayawiri, archaeological data indicate that the construction of a large terrace complex and the production of agricultural staples were managed in a decentralized manner. The layout and engineering qualities of the terraces surrounding Ayawiri reveal that the construction, maintenance, and cultivation of these systems was managed through household labor rather than a central political authority. This agrarian landscape and labor regime provided households with what I term ecological resistance—human modifications to ecosystems that provide individuals with the capacity to resist the establishment of hierarchical authority and subjugation by imperial powers. The built agricultural landscape and accompanying agrarian labor regimes made the Colla difficult to subjugate by neighboring enemies and in the 15th century, when Inka forces attempted to conquer and incorporate the Colla into their empire. The Colla were only successfully integrated into the Inka Empire after the Inka employed their own ecological tactics. This case study provides key insights into the ways that humans modify their environment to build and perpetuate ecological resistance.
Archaeological, ethnohistoric, and ethnographic evidence provides ample indication that water was a key symbol in Andean thought. During the late precolumbian era, the attention lavished on waterworks and features by the Inca emphasizes a clear concern with control over water and its
movement. This paper examines the way in which specific relations of power and identity were constructed through Inca management of water. To this end, I offer a comparative analysis of water-related features from different sectors of the Empire, representing different moments in its historical
development. The intent is to further our understanding of how the manipulation of water figured in the imperializing process and how its use and meaning may have evolved over time. The architectural evidence from the sites included in the study suggests that conspicuous exercise of control
over the movement and flow of water may have been more critical to the establishment of Inca hegemony than to its subsequent maintenance.
Among archaeologists concerned with the study of cultural regularities in the evolution of the early civilizations, few general hypotheses have stirred such controversy as that which postulates a causal link between the phenomenon of irrigation agriculture and the origins of the state. Adumbrated initially by Karl Wittfogel in the 1920s and stated by him most completely in Oriental Despotism (1957), the hydraulic theory has been subject to much discussion and to varying fates in recent literature and research history. Although Wittfogel's original formulation was based chiefly on Old World data, the theory has had major impact on research and interpretation in the New. The first large-scale use of the approach in American archaeology followed World War II, when the Institute of Andean Research sponsored the Viru Valley Project in North Coastal Peru (Bennett, 1948; Willey, 1953). In recent years American archaeology has become concerned with questions of process beyond the limits of simple historical reconstruction (Binford and Binford, 1968). Concepts derived from systems theory (Flannery, 1968a; Hole and Heizer, 1969) are increasingly invoked to explain the cause-and-effect feedback mechanisms involved in the evolution of culture. Concomitantly, a virtual explosion of data has occurred concerning the chronology, size, and sociological and demographic matrix of New World irrigation systems. Thus, both investigative techniques and theoretical frameworks have undergone considerable recent modification and the body of relevant data is large and growing. While some might consider the hydraulic agriculture hypothesis a dead issue, such is not the case. Changes in the total conceptual context of any theory, and new evidence both pro and con, necessitate reevaluation of the theory.
Utilizing data from six seasons of field research, this article focuses on the question of the technology and social organization of intensive agricultural production in the Andean state of Tiwanaku. Recent literature in Andean archaeology and ethnohistory asserts the dominance of local kin groups in the organization of agricultural production rather than supracommunity state authority. The analysis presented here takes issue with this perspective as applied to the core territory of the Tiwanaku state during the period from ca. A. D. 400 to 1000 (Tiwanaku IV-V). I conclude that in this period: (1) the technology of Tiwanaku intensive agricultural production turned on the creation of an artificial regional hydrological regime of canals, aqueducts, and groundwater regulation articulated with massive raised-field systems, and (2) the organization of agricultural production in this core territory entailed structured, hierarchical interaction between urban and rural settlements characterized by a substantial degree of political centralization and the mobilization of labor by social principles that reached beyond simple kinship relations.
Documentary research combined with field study has made possible the reconstruction of the sociopolitical organization of the Late Prehispanic Chimu and Chimu-Inca polities of the North Coast of Peru. Many aspects of the management of the large-scale irrigation networks of the region are integrated into that organization. Rights to the water of a particular canal-and to the lands it watered-can be shown to have been vested in socio-political groups which occupied different hierarchical positions according the size of the canal. Maintenance, repair, and distribution of the water were carried out by these groups; there was no centralized state bureacracy to oversee hydraulic affairs. Understanding the organization of the canal system permits a series of hypotheses for the reconstruction of ancient territorial units and the organization of settlement patterns within them.
In the Lake Titicaca Basin of the Andes, narratives of agricultural change have focused exclusively on a single innovation: raised fields. In this article, I examine macrobotanical remains and other archaeological datasets to elucidate a wider range of past farming practices that contributed to processes of agricultural change on the Taraco Peninsula, Bolivia, during the Formative Period (1500 B.C.E.-C.E. 500). This analysis reveals strong continuities in crop selection through time, with farmers gradually diversifying a basic set of cultigens-quinoa and tubers-but never abandoning them. Patterns in wild plant species indicate continuity in agropastoral land use up to the Late Formative Period (second century C.E.) when the unintended consequences of long-term tilling and camelid grazing transformed the botanical landscape into one that required a new set of practices to remove weeds and replenish nutrients to the soils. Examining how these practices and the farmers enacting them articulated with broader processes of demographic, environmental, and sociopolitical change reveals dynamic, multivariate courses of agricultural change even before the inclusion of raised fields.
On the Calchaquí valley the setting of population in conglomerate sites was in IX-X A.D. After this, the population was concentrated on this main valley. The distribution of the greater sites suggests that population articulated spaces on the subsidiary basins for managing the accessibility to important agriculture areas and ways of interregional connection. To evaluate this proposal it is necessary among other aspects to deepen in the environmental features, resources areas, reminds of productive substructure of de secondary basins of the Calchaquí valley. From the point that basic production involves at least one space of local production and another larger and not necessarily continuous we analyze the river Molinos basin. The basin permanent flow and the soil formation make it the major of the Central Calchaquí River. Also to west it is a connection to Puna, to east to Calchaquí Valley and to its way to orient. For agricultural and livestock societies fertile soil it is of main importance. This area is scarce in this resources. Cartographic, satellite and aerial photography analysis allow to identify and measure productive spaces and productive substructure in Molinos River basin.
Based on microfossil and soil data, we discuss a different methodological approach to agricultural and domestic archaeological studies, taking two Formative sites in the north-west Argentinian high valleys (province of Catamarca) as case studies, independently of traditional datasets and historical analogies. As a result of our investigations we not only recognised the vegetal species cultivated in ancient fields (dated to c. AD 800) but also distinguished some of the agricultural practices, such as crop rotation and alternation, use of animal fertilisers and irrigation resources, as well as the abandonment of the site. From this perspective, corral episodes could also be distinguished. In residential enclosures, we obtained results concerning activity areas, the definition of floors and the identification of reoccupations.
Agricultural terraces in the Colca Valley of southern Peru facilitate the irrigation necessary for agriculture in this semiarid environment. Terrace expansion and contraction, in turn, are closely related to the availability of water. In the short term, households abandon terraces because of constraints in the system of water distribution. In the longer term, periodic droughts trigger water conservation practices which curtail expansion and lead to terrace abandonment. Cyclical patterns of terrace contraction and expansion suggest that repeated observations of land use over time are necessary for an understanding of agricultural intensification and deintensification. -from Author
Theory linking labor inputs of irrigation agriculture to social organization is briefly reviewed. Labor input is distinguished into five tasks: construction, maintenance, allocation, conflict resolution, and organization of ritual. A sample of world communities is canvassed in search of structural variation. A rationale for studying these phenomena in a local, rather than a society-wide, context is presented. Types of ties of the locality with the larger system are explored. Several propositions about pervasive external linkages with local phenomena are presented. Millon's results, showing no relationship between size of irrigation system and centralization, are challenged. It is found that often irrigation management roles are embedded in other socially powerful roles rather than forming part of a specialized bureaucracy. Conditions for role embeddedness are explored.
A research methodology for the study of prehistoric irrigation canals is suggested which uses detailed excavation and survey techniques to generate data suitable for analysis by the principles of open channel hydraulics. The results indicate that these principles were empirically understood, even when the question of transporting water down steep slopes is considered, and that prehistoric canal discharge was a function of the farmer's perception of the hydrology of the agricultural system. -Author
During the last 20 years, research on the agricultural alternatives developed in the Central Andes and Mesoamerica has burgeoned, especially in the Maya area. Descriptions of ancient irrigation, raised fields, terracing, sunken fields, and other systems show that there was a wide range of complex systems in operation in many areas during various time periods. They were practised on various levels of complexity requiring corporate organisation of varying types.-J.Sheail
Excavation of Aztec-period agricultural features at the sites of Capilco and Cuexcomate in Morelos, Mexico, provides new data on the construction, function, and significance of agricultural terraces in Late Postclassic central Mexico. Stratigraphic and chemical analyses of alluvial deposits associated with cross-channel terraces (“check-dams”) reveal that these features served an agricultural function. Terrace walls were built gradually in small increments, and associated sediments were created by alluvial deposition of eroding topsoil. These findings, together with demographic and social data from nearby excavated houses, suggest that Late Postclassic agricultural intensification was a household-level response to population pressure.
The effect of climatic change on human and natural populations is most readily discernible in geographic locations where climate is a significant factor in limiting the range of activities. Today, as in the past, severe minimum temperatures at high altitudes limit the range of production of various crops in the Peruvian Andes. Periodic climatic cooling, as evidenced by the deposits from two recent glaciations, lowered the upper elevation limit of maize and significantly reduced the area available for its cultivation in the northern Mantaro River Valley. Paleoethnobotanical data from the same area suggest that during the most recent period of climatic cooling, less maize was produced compared to the warmer time periods that bracket this event. During the cooler phase, climatic constraints on maize production could have exacerbated already existing social tensions, perhaps leading to an increased establishment of more defensive settlements. This study shows how climate can affect human actions. This does not mean that climate dictated the major social and political changes seen in the archaeological record; but including environmental constraints and climatic change in discussions about the past can, given appropriate data, provide a more complete picture of cultural change.
Similar forms of subsistence and social organization have emerged in different parts of the world in response to similar ecological, technological, and demographic factors. For example, moldboard plow agriculture evolved in many places as the result of high population density, availability of large domesticable animals, presence of wet and heavy soils, and such staples as wheat, barley, rye, and buckwheat, which required extensive land preparation and “considerable surface area to produce the food calories necessary to feed a family” (Pryor 1985:732). Wolf long ago (1957) noted that the colonial experience had helped to promote the development of closed, corporate communities in rural societies of Mesoamerica and Indonesia.
The absolute chronology of the agricultural soil from organic matter has always been difficult to measure due to several reasons. In our work on the Prehispanic agriculture in the Calchaqui Valley – Argentina, however, an absolute chronology is necessary to distinguish the Inca prevalence of the previous agricultural structure. Instead of looking for a new dating methodology, we have used the 14C method trying to eliminate the error sources typical of soils. Thus, we have dated new types of agricultural structures, with the assumption that they would have worked as archaeological “seals”. In the present paper we show that the dating of the beginning of the use of the Prehispanic agricultural systems has been successful.
This paper examines the hydraulic properties (i.e. velocity and discharge) of the main late prehistoric canals of the Moche Valley. Velocities, estimated from excavated canal sections using the Manning flow equation, are compared to tables of maximum permissible velocities and reveal that canals were constructed to transport water efficiently, but that on gradients steeper than 1:100 the Chimu and Inca engineers were unable to transport large discharges without severe erosional problems. Discharge estimates are compared with modern field requirements, using a known ethnographic watering cycle. This demonstrates that in almost every instance the channel size was of the same order of magnitude as that predicted from the requirements. The construction of the Inter-valley canal to bring water to the state lands in Moche was a technological disaster.