Unit III Review

From Tiahuanaco through Inca

 


Unit III geographically includes the following periods and cultures of Pre-Columbian Peru and Bolivia:

Middle Horizon:

Late Intermediate Period:

Late Horizon

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TIAHUANACO


Located in the barren highlands of Bolivia near Lake Titicaca, Tiahuanaco was a key ceremonial and pilgrimage center surrounded by agriculturally productive ridged fields during the Early Intermediate Period and, especially, the Middle Horizon.

Tiahuanaco's ruins consist of several rectangular structures oriented to the cardinal directions (see diagram). This is stone architecture of massive proportions and clean-cut geometric lines. Kalasasaya (a rectangular platform 445 feet by 425 feet), appears to have been the main administrative structure of the site. It number 3 on the diagram. Another important building, the Akapana, was a U-shaped mound 690 feet square formed by three rectangular pyramids (number 7 on the diagram). It is joined by the large Puma Punku structure, some of whose stones weigh up to 100 tons apiece. In much of its architecture, Tiahuanaco displays a sophisticated use of insets, tenons, and notches. Copper clamps were also utilized to join stones together, a structural use of metal which antedates every other example in the Americas.


This photo, taken from atop Akapana, shows the Kalasasaya compound.



The geometric rigor and right-angled regularity of Tiahuanaco's architecture pervade its sculptural output as well. The Gate of the Sun, the example to the right, is a huge monolithic gateway of a single block of lava. Its edges are squared off, its doorway is inset, and its motifs are arranged like textile patterns in horizontal bands across its surface. The focal point of the composition is a staff-bearing god similar in concept to the Chavín jaguar deity; radiating lines from his head suggest solar associations; the stepped platform which supports him suggests mountain symbolism. Winged man and bird-man figures holding darts dash toward the large central deity. These display the running pose, weeping eyes and condor and puma attributes that appear wherever Tiahuanaco's influence spread. The Gate of the Sun is now located at the east end of Kalasasaya, though its original position is uncertain.



One of several features shared with the Chavín culture is the use of tenoned heads in Tiahuanaco architecture. This photograph shows a small sunken temple with geometric, tenoned heads projecting from its walls. Archaeologists speculate that the heads represent trophy heads of defeated enemies or, possibly, the various peoples comprising the Tiahuanaco empire.




The Bennett Stela (seen here), a huge monolithic Tiahuanaco sculpture, was contemporaneous with Kalasasaya. Found resting in the semi-subterranean courtyard, this 24 foot high monolith depicts a rigidly frontal figure holding a kero (beaker) in one hand and a knife in the other. Its legs bear relief designs suggesting metal disks; over the rest of its body are incised birds, fish, anthropomorphic jaguars, human beings, and geometric patterns. The kero held by the Bennett Stela deity is identical in form to one of the major ceramic types manufactured at Tiahuanaco.



One of the most popular Tiahuanaco ceramic forms was the kero. It is a simple beaker shaped vessel characteristically painted in dark red, black, and white with angular, precise designs (often a puma with a vertically divided, half white/half black eye). Condor and puma kenning frequently appear, as does a step pattern along the border of the major figural motifs . Another popular vessel form was the "fumigator." It possesses a kero shaped body with vertical handles or a wavy rim and was used as an incense burner (see example). A modeled puma head is often attached to the fumigator's rim, as is also true with a third important ceramic shape, popularly called the "gravy boat." The gravy boat is a horizontally oriented effigy ware incense vessel.

MIDDLE HORIZON: Wari

Tiahuanaco's artistic and cultural influence was somewhat limited during its initial stages. But, around A.D. 800, there was a sudden proliferation of Tiahuanacoid ideas in both northern and southern Peru. The locus of this spread was apparently not only Tiahuanaco, but also Wari, a culture located in the south central highlands of Peru. Its remains consist of groups of rectangular stone buildings enclosed by high walls. Occasional galleries, aqueducts, and subterranean stone-lined rooms demonstrate affinities with Tiahuanaco, as does Warišs emphasis on fairly large stone sculpture. Yet Wari's architecture and sculpture are technically inferior to Tiahuanaco's. By A.D. 750, Wari had adopted many Tiahuanacoid motifs and religious symbols; shortly thereafter they are found throughout Peru.




Textiles are by far the most significant contribution of Wari to Pre-Columbian art history. and while not as tightly woven as Paracas examples, Wari ponchos display a complexity of design unrivaled in Peru. Many of the extant examples may have been official garments or uniforms, for three major types of textiles exist: staff god decorated cloths, cloths bearing composite motifs, and those with alternating motifs. The example seen here shows the use of alternating designs.



Several of Wari's staff god textiles are divided into vertical panels, with the size of the panels and the motifs within them expanding in breadth at the front and back, and compressing inward at the sides of the garment (as in this textile). Visually exciting, these compressed and ballooning patterns also produce an effect of massive, bulging, aggressiveness appropriate to its expansionist civilization.




Beautifully decorated, pile cut caps graced the heads of Wari elite. As with most examples of this type of status marker, the cap to the right has a four pointed top.



During Wari's expansion after 750 A.D., Peruvian coastal ceramics began to reveal typical Wari motifs. This effigy vessel comes from the Santa River area of northern coastal Peru. The cap is of Wari style, as is the painted feline design on the front of the ceramic. The subject of the vessel is a man trimming his facial hair with tweezers!.



This Wari vessel comes from southern coastal Peru; it possesses Wari trapezoidal-headed figures and feline deities with vertically split eyes.

LATE INTERMEDIATE PERIOD

The Wari empire was short-lived. By the 11th and 12th centuries A.D., many regional cultures had begun to reassert their local traditions. Chancay (or Cuismancu) on the central coast, Ica (or Chincha) on the southern coast, and Chimú in the northern coastal region all rose during this period.



Chancay Culture The ceramic above is from the Chancay culture. Painted in a matte black and crumbly-looking cream color, the figures are comically simple and often possess "racoon-style" face painting designs. Chancay ceramics are noteworthy by the number of "failed" pieces that were kept and used a funerary offerings!




This is another example of the crude craftsmanship of the Chancay ceramicists. It represents a largely nude female standing figure. Frontal poses such as this seem to characterize much of the effigy ware of the Late Intermediate Period.



Although Chancay ceramics are sorely lacking in finesse, this culture's textiles are often finely woven. Gauze fabrics were a specialty of this central coast group; they also manufactured some interesting slit tapestry "dolls" engaged in various activities. This is a scene of weavers at a back strap loom.

Late Intermediate Period: Ica Culture

On the southern coast during the Late Intermediate Period, the Ica or Chincha culture flourished in the Ica River drainage. Thin-walled, geometrically embellished ceramics were this culture's artistic forte; vessels like this one, ornamented in red, black and white patterns, were exported as far as the central highlands of Peru. When Ica was conquered in the Late Horizon by the Inca culture, the Inca prohibited the manufacture of this ware because it was such a source of regional pride.








One of the finest of Ica ceramics is located in Lima's Archaeological Museum. It sports a "flying" (shamanic?) figure modeled atop a finely painted vessel.

Late Intermediate Period: The Chimú

Of the regional cultures that emerged after Wari's collapse, Chimú was the most important. Its capital, Chan-Chan, was located where the modern city of Trujillo now exists on the north coast of Peru.




The Chimú capital, Chan Chan, was one of the largest cities of Pre- Columbian times with 50,000 to 250,000 people. Sophisticated urban planning resulted in grid-patterned sites, in which large pyramids, temples, and blocks of buildings called ciudadelas were located in the center, and smaller structures and dwellings of the common man were spaced more closely together on the peripheries.

The city planning of Chan-Chan is indicative of the powerful, well organized and stratified society. At their height, the Chimú had a despotic state which influenced 600 miles of Peruvian coastline. They held the reins of a large trade network, built extensive road systems punctuated by cities and fortresses, and engineered great irrigation works. Chimú society was subdivided into distinct levels with specialists emerging in the crafts and in religion. This plan is an aerial view of Chan Chan showing several heavily walled-in ciudadelas. The ciudadelas were carefully divided into sectors; they probably served as palaces for the Chimú kings, treasuries for valuable goods and food products, and as tombs of their royal residents at death. Inside the ciudadelas were courtyards, kitchens, burial platforms (with accompanying human sacrifices), storerooms, and small U-shaped rooms called audiencias, which may have been used to control access to the storerooms.




The external mudbrick walls of ciudadelas occasionally rose 27 feet high. Exterior and interior walls bore mud relief friezes of repeating bird, crab and crustacean motifs arranged on diagonal or horizontal lines.




The Huaca del Dragón is a magnificent example of the Chimú mud relief technique. Inside the structure are storage pits and a long wall covered with relief sculptures. The Huaca del Dragón reliefs show a double-headed snake that likely represents a rainbow; the small figures at the edges of the rainbow appear to be carrying digging sticks. The theme of the sculpture, thus, is the fertility that rainfall brings to the coastal areas.




The tight control evidenced in Chimú city planning and social organization also pervades Chimú artistic endeavors. Theirs was a technically accomplished art, but one leaning heavily toward mass-production and standardization. Ceramics were mold-made and generally of stirrup spout form with a rectangular loop. Modeled figures, which frequently embrace the spoutšs base are clumsy compared to Moche images. The most attractive of Chimú vessels are those in a smoked, highly burnished blackware bearing pressed relief designs. This example is a double spout bridge vessel, but it is the standard monochromatic blackware and has the typical Chimú pressed relief "hobnail" pattern and monkey figures at the base of the spouts.




This is a second example of the luminous blackware of the Chimú tradition. The mythological scene on the front was produced by the pressed relief technique; such designs were part of the molds used to produce the vessel's body and stirrup.




Chimú textile patterns mirror those on ciudadela walls; precisely delineated birds and fish are forced into monotonous diagonal or horizontal rows (see textile to the right). Standardization is the watch-word in virtually all Chimú arts and crafts.




Chimú craftsmen excelled in metalwork. Their skill in metallurgy was such that Chimú artisans and their handiwork were brought by the Inca to Cuzco after the Inca conquered Chan Chan. Gold ceremonial knives (called tumi) with crescent blades and human or animal effigy handles were a speciality (see example). Bronze ceremonial staffs, hammered silver vessels, human-headed gold beakers, death masks, and funerary gloves with delicate repoussé designs were also delicately crafted.

The Chimú, in many ways, anticipate later Inca developments. Their success in planning, engineering, and architecture, and their administrative skills were seemingly inherited by the Inca, as was their geometric, controlled approach to art. The Chimú also initiated the tradition of keeping the mummies of deceased leaders in their palaces. With all the similarities, however, these two peoples were bitter enemies. The Chimú kingdom stubbornly resisted Inca expansion until 1471 and (according to legend) fell only when the Inca cut off its water supply by destroying its irrigation networks.

THE LATE HORIZON: The Inca Empire

The people who finally overthrew the Chimú represent the chronological culmination of the Pre-Columbian Peruvian cultural development. According to their legends, the first Inca (Manco Capac) was sent to the earth by his father, the Sun, to teach people the art of agriculture and a settled way of life. Manco Capac was told to found the Inca nation wherever his golden staff disappeared when plunged into the ground. This miraculous event supposedly occurred in the hills south of Cuzco, which became thenceforward the "navel" of the Inca territory. The empire grew slowly, but at its zenith, it was the largest of the Pre-Columbian Americas, blanketing 357,000 square miles and including 3,000 miles of coastline (see map). Like the Chimú, the Inca possessed a highly stratified society coupled with a totalitarian, well-organized government. Inca expansion was begun by Pachacuti in 1438 and was ruthlessly continued by his successor and son, Tupa Inca. Hostages (idols of the most important gods and sons of local leaders) from newly acquired territories were taken, malcontents were relocated, and farmland and textile production were carefully monitored and heavily taxed in kind. It has been said that this society was so regimented, so geared to benefit the group over the individual, that laziness was punishable by death.







Cuzco was the capital and focal point of the great Inca empire. Much of Chimú's urban planning is evident here, along with the tradition of royal palaces functioning as royal mausolea for the mumies of dead rulers. Cuzco appears to have been primarily a politico-religious site, housing rulers, high officials and servants. The rabble lived outside Cuzco in 12 satellite towns.




Architecturally, Cuzcošs buildings were massive and superb. The key structure of the capital was the Coricancha (the "golden enclosure"). The several chambers of the Coricancha were dedicated to various gods. The most important was the Temple of the Sun (see photograph), dedicated to Inti. It was built of smooth, unbeveled stones, a technique used only for the most important examples of Inca architecture. Gold sheathing covered the interior walls, thick gold plates were afixed to the doors, and a 3 foot wide gold frieze extended along the exterior. According to the Spanish reports, temple grounds included a garden of gold, gem-encrusted plants, and a collection of lifesize humans, llamas, reptiles, and spiders of gold and of silver that were absolutely incredible.

INCA RELIGION

Inca religion largely focused on astronomical bodies, the forces of nature, and the power of the earth caves. In legend, the Inca were said to have emerged from the earth, from the central of three cave mouths. Their preoccupation with stone construction and the use of natural outcroppings may be reflective of their earth worship. The two most important deities were Viracocha, a creator god who brought culture to his people, then transformed himself into a bearded man who walked across the Pacific, and Inti (the Sun god), who was closely associated with gold and the Inca king. Lesser gods include those of the earth, moon, thunder, the stars, and sea. The Inca gods received rich and varied offerings: food, coca, gold and silver figurines, textiles, llamas, and even prisoners of war and children. Such sacrifies were presided over by priests who habitually fasted and partook of ceremonial coca and chicha (an alcoholic beverage made from maize)..




The stones of Inca palaces at Cuzco are so closely spaced they prevent the insertion of a knife blade; the example seen here is the Palace of Huayna Capac. It is of rectangular beveled masonry.



Just to the north of Cuzco, shielding the upland side of the capital, stood the fortress site of Sacsahuaman. Its series of zigzag walls are composed of gargantuan polygonal stones weighing approximately 20 tons apiece (see photograph). These were carefully fit together so as to avoid any hint of a space between boulders. The precision evidenced here characterizes nearly all Inca masonry structures.




The fascination of Inca architecture not only lies in its technical precision and scale, but also its variety. Beveled rectangular blocks (as in the palace of Huayna Capac at Cuzco), plain rectangular blocks (Cuzco's Temple of the Sun), polygonal masonry (Sacsahuaman), and block and spall forms (Ollantaytambo) were all experimented with by Inca architects and engineers. Rough masonry embedded in mud mortar (pirka) was used for utilitarian structures such as field terracing. This is another view of the huge zigzag walls of Sacsahuaman. Some believe the conformation of these walls imitates the shape of lightning and that the site was dedicated to the god of lightning, Illapa.




The fortress site of Pisac was located, like many Inca centers, at the intersection of important valleys. The lower part of Pisac has farmers' quarters and carefully terraced fields; the upper part, seen here, possesses a temple to the sun and palace structures for the elite of rectangular masonry.




Ollantaytambo was the administrative center of the eastern quarter of the Inca Empire, Antisuyu. Its "Temple of the Sun" (seen here) is made of gorgeous pink granite that was hauled down a mountain side, across the Urubamba River, and up another mountainside to be placed in this block and spall wall.




Inca architects seemingly had a gift for constructing buildings in difficult terrain. Machu Picchu, high above the Urubamba Valley in the Andes, is the most spectacular instance (seen here). The site teeters on an angular saddle of the Andes, its agricultural terraces clambering up the steep slopes surrounding its ceremonial center. Rectangular masonry predominates in the religious sector of Machu Picchu. Its semi-circular tower and other structures were carefully constructed of heavy stones hoisted into place by wood and bronze crowbars. A key feature of Machu Picchu is the Intihuatana ("Hitching Post of the Sun"), a natural rock outcropping shaped by the Inca to serve in calendrical studies and sun rituals. A similar structure stands proudly within the enclosure of Pisac's Temple of the Sun.




Gold and silver figures and containers proliferated during the Inca era. Small doll-like male and female human effigies dressed in miniature ponchos were dedicated to the gods, as were silver and gold alpacas and llamas (see the silver llama). Metallic vessels, some of them in human form, were also manufactured.




Perhaps the most appealing of Inca art works were the small stone carvings of alpacas and llamas which may have served as amulets or talismans (see the stone alpaca). Some of these, called conopas, have a depression in their backs for llama fat and were buried in llama corrals to increase the animalsš fertility. Their strong, compact form and bold stylization are combined with smooth surfaces and a respect for the natural grain of the medium. They possess an honesty and down-to-earth simplicity which breaks through the rigidity and control of Inca reserve.



As with the Chimú, Inca artistry was technically accomplished, but lacked the verve and inspiration of some earlier Peruvian civilizations. Both textiles and ceramics are characterized by mass production, standardization, clear geometric forms, and balanced compositions. Repeating abstract motifs dominate ceramics, which are well-made, harmoniously proportioned vessels. The aryballus (seen here), flat plates with knob handles, and pedestal bowls were particularly popular shapes. The aryballus was a liquid container; its height varied from a few inches to a few feet. A strap was looped through the low handles on the vessel's body and over a peg so that it could hang from a home interior's wall.




A favorite poncho design involved a red, black and white checkerboard pattern (see example). As with Wari textiles, different styles of poncho seem to have reflected social distinctions.

THE CONQUEST OF THE INCA

The Inca had the unfortunate distinction of being the rulers of Peru at the time of Pizarro's arrival. During the early 1500's, the Inca had been shaken by soothsayers' predictions of the empirešs collapse, and by the spread of smallpox initiated by the first contacts with Europeans. In 1525 the Inca leader, Huayna Capac, contracted a disease (probably smallpox) and died. The empire was divided between two of Huayna Capac's sons, Atahualpa and Huascar. Civil war inevitably ensued, ultimately resulting in Huascaršs defeat and eventual death. Atahualpašs victory was short-lived, however, for Pizarrošs cunning resulted in the capture of the Inca king. Ransomed for two rooms full of silver and one of gold, Atahualpa was never released. Instead, Pizarrošs men garroted him, and in the process brought to a close the greatest empire of the Pre-Columbian Americas. The Inca, and their Aztec counterparts in Mexico, had been the culmination of thousands of years of artistic, intellectual, and political development, yet their civilizations crumbled under the onslaught of Spanish weapons, disease, and greed. In a few short years, the magnificence of Pre-Columbian achievements had been covered by a shroud of death and destruction, as people were massacred, temples plundered, and golden objects melted down. Only in the last century has the magnitude of our loss been fully realized.