Inca Imperialism in North- West Argentina, and Qiaco Buricdmornu

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Inca Imperialism in North- West Argentina, and Qiaco BuricdMornu -

Danish Scientific Investigations in Argentina under the Auspices of the Fundacion Williams

By NIEI.S FOCK

[n 1958 my wife and I undertook an ethnographical and archaeological expedition lo North Argentina under the auspices of the Argentinian Fundacion Williams. The main purpose was an ethnographical investigation of the Mataco Indians near the central Pilcomayo, but for nearly a month we made an archaeological reconnaissance of the western section of the Argentinian Chaco, immediately south of the Rio Bermejo. When rain made it impossible to continue with these excavations we ended the expedition by excavating in the Valle de Lerma, near the town of Salta. Although the archaeological investigations thus extended over a belt of about 400 kilometres running from west to east, it is not unreasonable to consider together the results achieved. From the point of view of the history of culture they belong decidedly together in many ways (cf. map, fig. g). The Valle de Lerma was the frontier region between the high culture of the Andean people and the hordes of the Chaco; archaeology shows that the partially east-orientated Candelaria people were overlaid by Indians of the highlands, and historical sources give us an account of the revenge taken by the Lule, a Chaco people, in the years around the Spanish invasion. Incidentally, the south-west border of the Mataco Indians lay only about 100 kilometres distant from Lerma, so that the strong—though indirect—influence they and the other Chaco tribes obtained from the mountains, particularly from the Inca culture, is easily explained. This influence, on which Nordenskiold (igig) has reported, comprises such important features as agriculture, the products, implements and methods of which are thoroughly Andean, and pottery, which is characterized by aryballo- like water pitchers and the presence of flat bottoms and lugs. This cultural influence was effected, inter alia, through the Valle de Lerma. In regard to burial forms also there are still unsolved problems that link Lerma and the Chaco together. Thus traces are to be found in the Valle de Lerma of direct urn burial of adults in the Candelaria fashion and direct urn burial of small children in the Diaguita style, which causes Lerma to belong to the small, '^explicable enclave of direct urn burial in north-west Argentina. As a result of 68 FOLK 3> 1961 our finds in the Chaco, the urn burial area has been considerably increased. The fact that archaeological evidence of urn burial is found everywhere in the western Chaco, but that this burial custom is never referred to by the earlier Spanish chroniclers, suggests that a change-over to ordinary interment took place in the late pre-Columbian era. It also seems reasonable to attribute responsibility for this influence to the Andes Indians, in casu the Inca. But let us proceed to the Valle de Lerma.

Finca San Manuel near Pucara de Lerma lies 25 kilometres south-west of the town of Salta in north-west Argentina. It belongs to the fertile valley of Lerma, a triangular plain with an area of about 400 square kilometres, bordered by Campo Quijano, the town of Salta and the confluence of the rivers Arias and Lerma (25° southern latitude, 65western longitude). The Lerma valley has an altitude of 1500-2000 metres, and is surrounded by mountains which to the west rise to 5000-6000 metres. Despite its apparently isolated situation the population of this valley has been subject to outside influence. The Candelaria culture, the centre of which lies about 150 kilometres to the south-west (Ryden 1936), has left behind clear traces in the form of large, coarse funeral urns at many places in the Lerma valley (Boman 1908, p. 256 El Carmen, p. 258 Carbajal, La Canada and Salta). I myself discovered a burial place of the Candelaria type near Finca de Pucara, 5 kilometres south of Finca San Manuel and near Finca La Estela, 2% kilometres east of San Manuel. Similarly there are in Lerma signs of influence from the Diaguita culture, the centre of which lay in the Calchaqui valley, about 100 kilometres to the south- west. Thus Boman (1916 p. 527) found near Tinti, about 10 kilometres from San Manuel, a child's burial urn of the Diaguita (Santa Maria) type, undecorated, with red paste and grey slip. Boman (1908 p. 294) and the author (see below) found similar Diaguita burial vessels near San Manuel. Finally, there is evidence in the Valle de Lerma of the Inca coming from the north-west in the form of a find of aryballos (Boman 1908 p. 295) and typical Inca figurines (Rosen 1924 p. 190). These latter traces are the more understandable when it is remembered that an Inca road via Morohuasi reaches to Incahuasi in Quebrada del Toro, only 30 kilometres north-north-west of San Manuel (Boman 1908 p. 347), and that Incas presumably used as a signal post the top of the 6100 metre Chani mountain, which lies only 90 kilometres north-northwest of San Manuel (Rosen 1919 p. 175). Cf. stippled line and cross north-west of Salta in map, fig. 9. Nothing is known of the influence of these three cultures on each other beyond the fact that the Inca first gained contact with this area under Topa Inca, who reigned from 1471-93, and at a relatively late period of his reign. We must assume that the first Incas reached north-west Argentina about 1480-go (see Rowe 1946 p. 208). l ock Inca Imperialism in North-West Argentina 69

Fig. 1.—San Manuel, Valle de Lerma. Part of the mound system viewed obliquely towards the north-west. The mountains in the background rise to over 6000 m. The south-eastern end of the Inca road is 30 kms. from this site. Fot. Fock.

Though Ambrosetti (1906) in Pampa Grande found Diaguita ceramics super- imposed on Candelaria ceramics, there is apparently no real supporting evidence for assuming a greater general antiquity of the Candelaria culture, as for instance Bennett (1948 p. 98) and others do. The lack of Inca features in the Candelaria culture is rather due to spatial than to temporal separation. In the Salta region, at any rate, there is—as will be shown below—no reason for doubting Candelaria's contemporaneity with the local Diaguita and Inca cultures. The similarities between Diaguita and Candelaria, incidentally, are highly indicative of particular influences from a common source. The next evidence about Lerma is of an historical nature, deriving from the first Spanish conquistadores in 1536 and from the foundation of the city of Lerma in 1581. On account of changing geographical names these statements often con- flict. I shall confine myself to referring to Canals Frau (1943 p. 207-248) and calling attention to certain important evidence. When Almagro travelled through the southern part of the Inca kingdom, the hrst European to do so, he found the Lerma valley (called Provincia de Chicoana) depopulated and laid waste as a result of the warlike inroads of the Chaco Indians coming from the east. The fertile valley still showed the ruins of old buildings (Oviedo and Valdes, 1855 IV p. 263-4). 7° FOLK 3, '961

One of the reasons why Hernando de Lerma selected Salta's site in 1588 was because he had been told that the Lerma valley was fertile and suited to cultivation. The royal road of Peru ran from there and there were irrigation canals and terraces constructed in the Inca period (Levillier 1931, III p. 270). The last source to be mentioned is P. Lozano (1874 IN", p. 8), who, concerning the Inca domination of the ancient 'I'ucuman province to which Lerma belonged, refers to an old tradition that Inca rule began near Lerma. The Inca are said to have despatched to this valley a force originally stationed in the Chicoana valley near Cuzco. They therefore called the place Chicoana in remembrance of their home district. It should be added in explanation that the locality of Chicoana in the Valle de Lerma today lies 20 kilometres south of San Manuel, and that the Peruvian locality Valle de Chicoana lies halfway between Cuzco and Titicaca in the Aymara-speaking province of Cana (Brehm 1885 p. 428). Lozano's description corresponds closely to the well-known mitima institution whereby a loyal group of people from the central Andes was moved and exchanged with a politically unreliable frontier population. Apart from the historical and archaeological evidence about the Valle de Lerma here mentioned, there is only one thing to refer to, though it is the most famous: the mysterious mound complexes of Campo del Pucara. Boman (1908 p. 279 et seq) first investigated them in 1901, and since then the one interpretation has succeeded the other without any satisfactory solution having been found. It was in investigating Boman's mound group C, lying on the present Finca San Manuel, that the Danish expedition in 1958 found the trace of a pre-historic village near by that may be able to lift the veil from Campo del Pucara. Finca San Manuel lies 7 kilometres due east of Campo Quijano and the mound complex begins 50 metres south of the main building. This system of mounds consists of dead straight rows of artificial earth mounds, each about 2% metres in diameter and 2% metres distant from each other. The complex follows the points of the compass, so that there are 16 rows in a north-south direction and 32 in an east-west. The 512 mounds, some of which in the most southerly row have been partially obliterated, constitute an exact rectangle 80 x 160 metres, encircled by a trench about 1 metre broad with a barely traceable rampart outside. Each mound is circular, surrounded by a stone circle, in some cases consisting of two layers of stone, the one on the other. The centre of the mounds is about 30 centimetres above the level and on average 50 centimetres above the lower edge of the stone circles. The stones lie close together and are 10-20 centimetres in diameter; they are all water-worn. The earth in the mounds is a coarse gravel mixture containing smaller stones of precisely the same character as the substrata under the top soil if the larger stories found there be ignored. The soil of the mounds cannot therefore be said to be rich in nutritious matter; nor can it retain moisture to any extent, being if anything drained of water, which the surrounding ditch also suggests. The whole system slopes slightly southwards. 6 l ock Inca Imperialism in North-West Argentina

Fig. 2.—The roundhouse at San Manuel, seen from the north-east, with wall foundation of stone, diameter 6 % m. The clay floor is filled with potsherds and utensils. Fot. Fock.

Despite persistent test diggings the Danish expedition, like Boman, when he was there, did not succeed in finding the slightest trace of any culture remains within the area of the mound system, and the two most likely possibilities: settlement or burial place had therefore to be discarded. The theories concerning a system of cultivation beds or a fourth interpretation will be discussed later. The other three spots at which finds were made were concentrated in an area about 500 metres south-east of the mound system on both sides of a road running north-south, and about 200 metres north of a dried-up creek bed. 1) In a pit where the present owner of the Finca, Sr. Fernando Oliveros, obtains clay for adobe, he had found several whole clay vessels: 4 cups, 2 flat plates, 2 pucos with handles in the form of animal heads, and so forth. We dug over the rest of the 4% X 2 metres clay area to a depth of one metre. Under a thin layer of top soil (0-5 cms) was found a culture layer of hard clay (5-35 cms) and below this a thin belt of stone-mixed gravel (35-40 cms). Lowest (40-100 cms) lay an untouched layer of sandy clay. The culture remains, which for by far the greater part consisted of potsherds, were scattered at depths of 5-20 cms, in closer proximity Irom 25-30 cms. In the gravel belt (35 cms) there were also scattered sherds. It could be proved by an analysis that the sherds from the various depths were connected either in regard to examples or by type. It could also be determined that all the types were found again at the two sites mentioned below, so that they can be analysed together later. The character of the finds: coarse and fine fragments "f vessels, bola stones, crushing stones, arrow heads, charcoal and lama bones FOLK 3. '96I suggest that it is a dwelling site, presumably an adobe house, that in its col- lapse has left behind in the rubble splintered clay vessels. Test diggings towards the south and east over the potsherd-carrying area provided no evidence of stone foundations or such like. Towards the north and west the digging of adobe had made it impossible to ascertain anything. 2) 100 metres to the south of the adobe pit lies a field that has been under plough for many years. The top soil there is thick and several test diggings only- brought to light a thin layer of re-distributed culture remains. Several surface finds from here were collected such as 2 fragments of bronze axes, bronze tumi. spindle whorls, lama bones, a clay whistle and large quantities of sherds of both coarse vessels and fine pucos and aryballos. As the potsherds in type all correspond to the site mentioned above and below they will be referred to later. The extent and dispersal of the finds indicate that we here face a major habitation. 3) The last find proved to be the most valuable. In a field 100 metres east of 2), and about 500 metres south-east of the mound system on the far side of a field track was found at a depth of 25 centimetres the completely preserved foundation of a round house with an outer diameter of 6% metres. The stone circle was 50 cms broad and arranged with two rows of stones with an average diameter of 20 cms with smaller stones and clay in between. Directly to the south the foundation narrowed, both from outside and inside, so that for a length of 30 cms it consisted only of a 15 cms broad central foundation. As this was the only deliberate breach of the foundation it must be assumed to derive from a door opening. Over the hard-packed clay floor lay a mantle of clay, presumably from the adobe walls when they fell in. On the floor of the house lay large quantities of crushed clay vessels and so forth. In the south-west sector were discovered the sherds of two large clay vessels, pedestal bowls, cooking vessels, aryballos and pucos (open bowls) with animal head handle, a half stone spindle whorl, a clump of copper ore and an obsidian nodule. In the north-west sector were found sherds of red and black puco, large cooking pots and other vessels of the Diaguita burial urn type, 5 bola stones and a hammer stone. In this sector, about 70 cms from the centre of the house a layer of ashes and fire-marked stones indicated the position of the hearth. Directly on the layer of ashes lay the ring-shaped head of a stone club, and directly underneath, at a depth of 40 cms, on the surface of the sterile subsoil lay a star-shaped head of a club of pecked green sandstone. It looked as though the club had some connexion with the hearth and that the six-starred club head, characteristic of Inca areas, had been placed under the hearth when the house was built. North-east of the sector the ground was covered by sherds of several large, coarse vessels, including one with incisions on its cylindrical collar in drag-and-jab design, plus sherds of good black ware. In the south-east sector were found 2 pucos, fragments of a pedestal bowl, thin sherds of hard-burnt, light pottery. Here also were the lower jaw of a lama, a grindstone and a mortero, square at the top. l ockInca Imperialism in North-West Argentina 73

Earlier, a big rorker-mano for the milling of maize had been found near the round house. From the inventory of the house, which consisted of weapons, implements, household utensils, cooking, storage and decorative vessels, it appeared that it was a dwelling house. Towards east and north on the same field the contours against the light seemed to indicate 6-7 similar round houses, but lack of time prevented us from making any further investigation. About 300 m east of the round house there is what appears to be an entrench- ment about 6 m high with a slightly sunk space of about 6 x 12 m in the middle. This may derive from a pucara, but a brief search unearthed no culture remains to clear up the matter. (See also Boman 1908 p. 288. Boman's sketch, p. 288, shows our finds 1), 2) and 3) halfway between "Tertre artificiel" and "tumulus groupe B"). In order to determine the affiliation of the finds, pottery, particularly, is of importance. It is therefore worthy to be recorded that apart from two cases all the types represented are unconnected with the culture areas immediately adjacent: Candelaria, Diaguita and Humahuaca. The closest parallels are to be found in ihe Bolivian highlands, for example near Cchaucha del Kjula, Marca and Palli \larca, 50 kms west of La Paz (Ryden 1947, p. 182 et seq.) and in the Cuzco district as, for example, Sacsahuaman (Valcarcel 1934 and 1935), and other scattered sites incontestably of Inca character. In the diagram (fig. 3) the fragments certainly recognisable are arranged. In regard to comparison identical types and patterns are found again in Bolivia and Peru: aryballos (Ryden 1947, pp.'267, 272, 187 and Valcarcel 1934, p. 35), bowls or pucos (Ryden 1947, pp. 237, 187, 306, 310 and Valcarcel 1934, p. 36; 1935, p. g), cups (Ryden 1947, p. 241 and Valcarcel ig34, p. 223), pedestal bowls (Ryden ig47, pp. 187, 24g and Valcarcel 1935, p. 21), cooking vessels (Ryden '947> PP- 253, 306 and Valcarcel ig34, p. 225), chicha jars (Ryden 1947, pp. 261, 306), narrow-lipped vessels (Ryden 1947, pp. 241, 311). As appears, all these types, I-VII, are characteristic of the Inca culture to the least detail such as black rhomb figures in bands 011 a red base on the aryballos, pucos with duck head handle (fig. 4), rim knobs and patterns like llamita, that is to say the little lama, which resembles an oblique double H (fig. 3, IID), and spiral-on-triangle pattern. The pedestal bowl, specifically Inca, also evinces identical details like the two knobs with vertical fissures. The abundance of such specialities and the quantity of the finds suggest that it can neither be a case of import, which would have been extremely difficult at such a scale over 1000-1500 kms of mountain roads, or of simple local imitations. The clay vessels alone there- lore seem to indicate that the Inca road, that ends 30 kms from San Manuel, not only led the Inca army, but also a colony or mitima down to the Valle de 1-erma as Padre Lozano' report lets it be supposed. However, two types of clay vessel sherds must be separated from the Inca Fig. 3.—Classification of clay vessel sherds from San Manuel according to type I-IX. In each column is stated the number of fragments found of the vessel part in question. l ockInca Imperialism in North-West Argentina 75

Fig. 4.—Zoomorfic pottery lugs from San Manuel. To the left, cord lugs from aryballo-like jars; to the l ight, handles of Hat pucos, usually representing ducks.

types. The first (VIII) consists of coarse badly-burnt, large vessels, usually with llat base and a wall thickness of 1 cm. The most typical feature about these vessels is, however, that they are nearly all striated by means of a shelled maize cob. Unfortunately we have not material from San Manuel to reconstruct these vessel forms, but the characteristic striated sherds are met with again at finds in the neighbourhood. Thus the Danish expedition dug out funeral urns of the Candelaria type only 2 kins east of San Manuel on Finca La Estela. These funeral urns and lidded vessels possessed the same striation and consistency; each contained the skeleton of an adult (see fig. 8). Striation and coarse burial urns are typical of the Candelaria culture (see Ryden 1936, p. 39) and in the Valle de Lerma are found also near Tinti (12 kms south of San Manuel) (Boman 1916, p. 540 lam. XV) in the form of large, open, flat bottomed vessels. The other type is the Diaguita burial urn which—even if not quite identical with the Calchaqui urns—has a clear resemblance to them (fig. 3, IXA-C). It appears to have been covered with red paint or slip, but without black pattern, thus corresponding to Boman's find in Tinti (Boman 1916, p. 527) and one of the urns found by him on San Manuel's ground only about 300 m north of our round house. A curious thing about our Diaguita urn was that it was discovered without skeletal remains in the round house itself. Two other sherds, presumably from an urn and from a puco with intertwined black patterns (fig. 3, IX D), also derive horn Diaguita-like types. (Becker-Donner 1951, p. 249). Of the clay objects mention FOLK 3, '961

1 rr^ust finally be made of a 3 /2 cm high, pear-shaped bottle (fig. 7), presumably a whistle, for it can be so used. Quantitavely both the Candelaria and Diaguita types of sherds were far in- ferior to the Inca types, but they were found at all three sites and one must thus assume that a few of the local population—at all events women—have lived together with the Inca colonists. Whether this population consisted of one homo- geneous people or of two, as the finds at first sight suggest, it is as yet too early to say. In the meantime much goes to show that the Diaguita-stamped find, at all events, represents the Pular nation as historical sources indicate. (Boman 1916. p. 538, Canals Frau 1943, p. 229). A technical examination of the various types of clay vessel sherds from San Manuel showed that, at all events, by far the greater part was tempered with sand and mica. Mica was specially prominent in the goblet and pedestal bowls, where it constituted the main part of the tempering. Otherwise the mixture contained fine sand for the aryballos and pucos, and coarser for the cruder vessels. The coarse sherds with striation effected by means of a shelled maize cob formed an exception. They, like the funeral urn from La Estela, were all tempered with a coarse, crushed porpyry-like rock, a characteristic of the Candelaria urns (Ryden. 1936, p. 28). In the clay vessel shaped like Diaguita urns, the mixture was apparently coarse, but with rounded porphyry-like grains of sand. The other Diaguita sherds were mixed with quartz and mica, as is general in the whole of the Andean area as opposed to the Chaco, for example. It should be mentioned in regard to the San Manuel pottery that now and again there are faint traces of black painting on a red ground; but the painting has often disappeared completely, assumedly on account of the particularly fine consistency of the clay soil. In addition to the pottery from San Manuel there are several other objects that mainly point to the Central Andes and the Inca. The shape of the round house cannot be said to be specially Inca, though in regard to the dwelling types and clay vessel forms of the Central Andes archaeologists' general ignorance and lack of interest in the daily life of the layman is regrettable. On the other hand, the round house appears to be the most common form of dwelling for the Aymara people (Metraux 1936, p. 194), and Cobo (1890-93 IV p. 166-67) gives a good description of one such in the Aymara area. Accordingly, we must imagine an adobe wall and a vaulted or cone-shaped roof of straw and branches. The stone foundation has particularly served to prevent water dripping from the roof from spoiling the lower wall. From Candelaria, on the other hand, no house construc- tions are known, and Diaguita is characterized by rectangular dwellings, which is also the case with Tinti. The stone objects from San Manuel are primarily agricultural implements and weapons. Several forms of mortero were found; with a deep, hollow cavity, with a broad, flat cavity, some round and some square at the top. A pestle presumably l ockInca Imperialism in North-West Argentina 77

• I Fig. 5.—San Manuel. Two-handed rocker-mano of green pecked stone. Length 60 cm., weight

17 V2 kgs.

belongs to the round mortero, whereas an egg-shaped muller stone has been used with the square morteros, possibly also a one-handed rocker-mano. Finally, a 60 cm long two-handed rocker-mano, weighing 17% kgs (fig. 5) has been used on the big stone slabs. Whereas the sole-shaped muller stone is also known from Candelaria (Ryden 1936, p. 226), the egg-shaped one is known both from Cande- laria (Ryden 1936, p. 245) and from north-west Bolivia (Ryden 1947, p. 269). The heavy two-handed rocker-mano is found sporadically in the Andes area and was used by the Inca. Of the implements from San Manuel special mention must be made of stone hammers with grooves for shafting, both for flat and pointed surface of impact, presumably used in working with bronze. Stone weapons included the disc-shaped and six-starred club heads, the last-mentioned being typical of the Inca culture (fig. 6). In addition were found, several grooved bola balls of limestone and arrow- heads with fine parallel re-touching of light flint, some of them with concave base, others tanged (fig. 7). Obsidian seems rare, but a single block was found in the round house. More frequent are the small, disc-shaped spindle whorls, about 3 cm in diameter, one of them made from clay slate and beautifully carved in the lorm of a rosette (fig. 7). Of the objects supposedly for decoration there were two perforated mussel shell discs about 1 cm in diameter, a 5 cm pendant, and a cylindrical, perforated turquoise bead (fig. 7). The most elegant piece, however, was a cylindrical jasper bowl, 9 cm in diameter and 3 cm high (fig. 6); this type of stone bowl is specific to the Inca culture (see, for example, Valcarcel 1935, P- >95)- Of the ten finds of bones at San Manuel nine proved to derive from domesti- 7» FOLK 3- '96I

Fig. 6.—San Manuel. Cylindrical jasper dish, diameter 9 cms, and 6-starred club head of green sandstone. They are both typical of the Inca culture.

cated lama (Lama glama), which apparently were kept as domestic animals in the Valle de Lerma. Clear cut marks at the joints and jaw must presumably mean that the skins were used. A single lance head of lama bone, 6 % cms, with a concave base is the only evidence of bone objects. The only non-lama bone is the second toe joint of Cervus sp.. As this greatly resembles an animal head (fig. 7) it must— in view of its isolated existence—be regarded as a toy, doll or idol. Some of the most interesting items found at San Manuel were the bronze objects. Two fragments of axes and a tumi were dug up and in the round house a clump of copper ore was found (fig. 7). As the axe blades were incomplete their type is difficult to decide with any certainty, but everything suggests that it is a question of Inca T-axes. The tumi. at all events, is typically Inca. A qualitative spectral analysis showed that all three objects contained ample tin (about 10%). The copper ore, which must be assumed to be local, was bornite covered by mala- chite and azurite, and contained the tracers cobalt (Co), nickel (Ni) and iron (Fe), of which nickel in copper seems to be characteristic of Argentina (Norden- skiold 1921, p. 139). These same three tracers were found in the two axes, but, apart from the iron, were lacking in the tumi. It thus looks as though the axes were of local make, but that the tumi did not derive from Argentina. If we now look at the tracers that in given circumstances must have accompanied the tin in the two axes, we find that in both cases it is a matter of arsenic (As), antimony (Sb), bismuth (Bi), lead (Pb) and silver (Ag). Of these five constituents only two —lead and silver—are found in the tumi, which causes one to think that the tin ore must also have been different in its case. Arsenic is lacking in the tumi, a characteristic deficiency in the highlands of Peru and Bolivia, but the element is l ock Inca Imperialism in North-West Argentina 79

ll x-

Fig. 7.—Minor objects from San Manuel. Two axes and tumi of bronze, arrow heads of flint and bone, doll made out of a toe joint, spindle whorl, pendant, clay whistle, and beads of turquoise and mussel shell.—Scale, ab. 1:3.

lound in northwest Argentina (Nordenskiold 1921, p. 138). There is no antimony in the tumi. This element is not reported from the Cuzco area, though it is from Argentina (Nordenskiold 21, p. 138). Bismuth in bronze objects is only known Irom Bolivia and north-west Argentina. This clear agreement must mean that the axes were made locally, in or near the Valle de Lerma, whereas the tumi was brought to Lerma from the Peruvian highlands. The bronze objects from San Manuel are therefore further evidence that the Inca colonists settled there and formed a mitima. If an impression is to be formed as to whence this mitima came, the round houses, which seem particularly characteristic of the Aymara, must be taken into consideration as well as the bronzes and all the Inca inventory of clay and stone. When the Inca advanced in north-west Argentina the northerly Aymara had for generations been loyal vassals and much under Inca influence. The most likely starting point for the mitima was therefore the most northern section of the Aymara area, which is completely in accord with Lozano's tradition previously referred to. According to this the Inca sent their faithful subjects from the Valle de Chicoano i" the Valle de Lerma, and Valle de Chicoano is stated (Brehm 1885, p. 428) to lie in the Aymara-speaking province of Cana, about 200 kms south-east of Cuzco. We now return to the first problem in this article: the interpretation of the mysterious system of 512 small mounds in dead straight lines. Boman (1908, p. 279) FOLK

Fig. 8.—Sketch of a funeral urn with lidded jar of the Candelaria type from La Estela, Valle de Lerma. Scale, ab. i: 16.

discovered two other mound systems in the neighbourhood, one double as large and one smaller. On account of the proximity of our system to an Inca village, and by reason of its preciseness and extent, it is reasonable to take it for a con- temporaneous Inca system despite the fact that definite evidence of this is lacking. Other circumstances favour this assumption, primarily the fact that another system of 10x20 mounds, precisely similar to that at Lerma and also without culture remains, has been found in north Chile, near Copiapo (Latcham 1927, p. 279), and that Copiapo was the end point of one of the southern Inca roads (Boman 1908, p. 717). In addition, it is possibly the same kind of construction as that near Puerta Tastil, about 50 kms north-west of San Manuel, where, within a square of 80x80 m a number of circular stone piles was found, 2-2.80 m in diameter, by Boman (1908, p. 359). There seemed to be no culture remains there. Nordenskiold (1915, p. 135-40) reports from the undoubted fortress, Incallacta, on the eastern slopes of the Andes (17%° southern latitude, 65° western longitude), built by Topa Inca for a mitima, that round stone-walling was discovered, but no culture remains. On account of the area of distribution and character we must therefore conclude that it is a matter of an Inca system. The continual lack of culture remains—also in the dry Copiapo—rules out the possibility of burial places or settlements. The area of their distribution also excludes any possibility of them having been cultivation beds especially for manioc, l ock Inca Imperialism in North-West Argentina 81

Fig. 9. Map of the north-west Argentinian Chaco. The dried-out river beds are represented by stippled lines. Squares indicate former archaeological finds in the border area; the numbered ones are those located by Biro de Stern. Triangles indicate author's sites from 1958. The Pozo Bravo site was identical to Quirquincho in regard to ceramic style. as the Valle de Lerma is too cold and Copiapo too dry for this plant, and consequently nothing has ever been heard of its cultivation at these places—which, incidentally have widely different climates (Rosen 1924, p. 187; Candia 1931, p. 223 et seq.). To explain the mounds as being for religious purposes conflicts with the fact that the Inca religion in Peru is well known and that one would hardly have ignored big religious works; their siting on the outskirts of the Inca kingdom, in unstable districts, and the painful accuracy of the system must indicate that these are military works. I find it most reasonable to assume that these stone-encircled mounds were the ioundations of an Inca tent camp that had to be ensured against flooding from heavy rain, and that the stones may have been used to keep the canvas down. This last can only be an hypothesis, as we have no information concerning the appearance of Inca tents. That they existed we know, for Prescott (1898, I p. 285) quotes an anonymous Spanish conqueror who wrote of the occasion when Pizarro 82 FOLK 3. '96I first saw the Inca army at Atahualpa's camp in Cajamarca: 'along the slope of the hills a white cloud of pavilions was seen covering the ground, as thick as snow- flakes, for the space, apparently, of several miles, "So many tents, so well appointed, as were never seen in the Indies till now!" (p. 288)—before they had gone a league they came in front of the Peruvian encampment, where it spread along the gentle slope of the mountains. The lances of the warriors were fixed in the ground before their tents,...' The mobile Inca warriors had only brought their most necessary equipment, and took it away with them. On account of the density of the tents they presumably ate outside the camp. The hypothesis of a military tent camp thus seems not only possible but—with the material available—the only explanation possible.

One of the unsolved problems in connexion with the San Manuel finds was the presence of the Diaguita child urn and the traces of Candelaria burial urns. We do not know whether it was a matter of coalescent influences in the Pular tribe or of two peoples only brought under the same roof (the round house) as a result of the short-lived Pax Incaicum in Lerma about 1480-1530. In view of the distribution of finds in the Valle de Lerma the latter is the more probable. The Lule, who about 1530 broke in over the Valle de Lerma, practised (cf. P. Lozano 1941, p. 103) burial in a sitting posture with the chin against the knees, and the dead were carried to the grave in a net. That the Lule did not use stone graves or cliff caves as was the Inca custom can be explained ecologically, and the Inca's litter used for the carrying of corpses (Guaman Poma 1936, p. 289) was replaced by the hammock everywhere in the South American lowlands. Thus the Lule may originally have practised urn burial, but were influenced by their radiant neigh- bours, the Inca. At all events urn burial is found to the south in the Candelaria and Santiaguena cultures (Wagner 1934) and to the north near Santa Barbara (Nordenskiold 1903). Our archaeological reconnaissances in the western, arid half of the Chaco in 1958 further extended the area. As no archaeological finds had ever been made in this huge area, I assumed that the traces of earlier cultures were to be found in or near the innumerable dried-out river beds that to this day leave their traces across the Chaco. The three large rivers that find their way from the Andes across the gently-sloping alluvial plain towards the Rio Paraguay and Parana have frequently changed their beds. The old courses are now either well-defined canadas, often over 100 metres wide and many kilometres in length, or crescent-shaped lakes, the remains of the deeper, convex meanderings of the river bed, called lunas or pozos. The results were really amazing. No less than 4 different ceramic styles and 3 different burial types were disclosed at the first investigation of 6 sites. They did not in any way recall the pottery style of the modern Chaco Indian, a style which —as already mentioned—seems particularly inspired from the highlands. Proceeding from west to east, from the outer foothills of the Andes to the central l ock Inca Imperialism in North-West Argentina 83

Fig. 10.—Pottery from Lomas de Olmedo. The big burial urn (left) has cord decoration. The flat bowl may have been used as lid. Lugs and decorated sherds.

Chaco, the first find, Lomas de Olmedo, still evinces strong Andean links. Lomas de Olmedo (with the Arroyo Retiro site) is situated 30 km east of the railway station La Estrella (Salta) near permanent springs from low hills. It is, among other things, characterized by its stone tools, not only the primary weapons and tools like the T-shaped and the grooved axes in fine polished green porphyry and the arrow points, but also by its secondary tools, the wedge, the hafted and unhafted hammerstones and whetstone (fig. 12). From here an export presumably took place to the Quirquincho area more to the east, where the T-shaped axe reappears. The way of burial seems to be simple interment of adults, but direct urn burial of small children. The burial urn (fig. 10) is decorated by cord impressions, and its neck has an inner diameter of 14 cm. We here find both flat bottoms and lugs, but only incised or impressed decoration (fig. 10 right). The second find—Quirquincho—bordering a dried-out river bed 7 km north of La Union, has on the other hand only round-bottomed vessels, always suspended by means of string-holes, bored or punched through the edge of the vessel or vertically through the lug. The decoration, like all our archaeological finds from the Chaco, is incised or impressed, but never painted. A typical decoration is the combination of punctations and lines. Finger and fingernail impressions are also used. Three examples were here discovered of secondary urn burial in egg-shaped, grooved clay vessels with lids (fig. 11, left). T-shaped axes extended to this area (fig. 12, upper left). In the much-eroded surface, which prevented stratigraphical 84 FOLK '961

Fig. 11.—Quirquincho. (left) Urn for secondary burial with diagonal hatching and lid. Howls and (upper right) cooking pot with string holes for suspension.

excavations, were also found many fragments of what were apparently idols or dolls, some cylindrical and some double conical L-shaped (fig. 12). These recall the Parana littoral (Outes 1918) and the Santiaguena culture (Wagner 1934). All ceramics were a good, smoothly-polished ware, almost comparable to the Santiaguena phase, Las Mercedes, which consists of incised pottery, and to the pre-Guarani phase of Parana. The third place where finds were made—Naranjo or Paso el Sauce—did not lie, as did the others, by a dried-out river bed, but near a permanent lake approxi- mately 20 km north of Rivadavia. All that was found here was a large and a small burial vessel, both presumably used for direct burial (fig. 13). The big vessel, which had a complicated cord decoration on the neck, contained the skeleton of a child and of an adult, whose upper arm and thigh bones had apparently been cut through and broken. This process was necessary to force the corpse of an adult person through the mouth opening with an inner diameter of 22 cm. The cranium of the adult was hyper-dolichocephalic with an approximate index of 72. Present- day Chaco Indians are in general mesocephalic with index 78 and individual variations from 74-83, whereas the lately-arrived Amazon people, like the Chiri- guano, Chane, Guana etc. are brachycephalic with an index of 82. Although l ock Inca Imperialism in North-West Argentina 85

Fig. 12.—(Lower left) T-shaped axe from Quirquincho with propeller-shaped blade. Wedge, T-shaped and grooved axes in green porphyry, and arrow heads from Lomas de Olmedo. 1 Upper) Characteristic clay fragments from Quirquincho: cylinders, some with "noses", and turtle-shaped attachments, conical and L-shaped fragments show outlines—for instance of eyebrows —as a result of removing the slip layer; they seem to resemble sitting figurines. —Scale 2: 7. nothing general can be stated on the basis of a single skull, one is reminded of the lagide racial group. The bottom of the jar had once been repaired by crack-lacing, and as the bottom-sherd was missing this seems to indicate that the jar had formerly been used for other purposes, presumably as a container for aloja or chicha. The inner diameter of the little urn measured 12% cm, perhaps indicating that this had been made to serve as an urn. (Compare our Olmedo and Boman's Sta. Bar- bara children urns). It contained the skeletal remains of an 8 months old foetus. The last-mentioned vessel, with its simple finger impressions and form, recalled the ceramics of the present-day Chaco Indians. The cord ornamentation of the big jar and the bowl-shaped lid are, however, unknown nowadays, and the same is the case with the form of burial. Once before a potsherd with string decoration has been found in the Chaco, by Ryden (1948), about 150 km to the north, and this decoration is known to the Caduveo. The fourth and last place where things were found—Pocitos—was of a slightly different character. Here were found two round-bottomed, well-polished jars respectively 30 and 40 cm high. Unfortunately, both lacked nearly the whole of 8b FOLK 3. '96I the neck, which seems to have been decorated by deep and close incisions in checker board. The form—like an inverted onion—vaguely recalls Guarani style. The interesting thing about the Pocitos site was, however, the long rows of small, artificial mounds and ponds. Each pond, "pocito", measured about 4 m in diameter as did its corresponding mound. Only in one case were potsherds found on a mound, and a thorough digging produced no sign of any remains. It must therefore be assumed that the ponds were the primary; presumably made as water reservoirs for rain, dew or flood water. Reichlen (1940, p. 209) found in the northern Santiago del Estero, about 200 km to the south, similar ponds in connexion with larger settlement mounds of the Santiaguena type, and attributed the ponds, which chronologically must be younger than the settlement mounds, to the forest workers at the end of the 19th century. However, this can hardly be correct, as Camano y Bazan (1931, p. 321) reports from 18th century sources that the Vilela tribe, who were said to live between the Rio Salado and the Bermejo, drank rainwater which they collected in hand-dug pozos. Another source (Cartas anuas 1927), from 1609, remarks about this area: "Here dwell industrious (that is to say, agricultural) clothed people in many villages with round houses and regular streets. There are no rivers, but only pozos". Today it is about 80 km from Pocitos to the nearest permanent watercourse, and one cannot but be astonished at the daring idea of constructing rainwater ponds in the inner, arid Chaco. The most likely explanation is that people may originally have dwelt by a river that changed its bed, and for fear of neighbouring tribes which upheld their territorial rights, were compelled to invent the artificial dew or rainwater ponds. This theory is not unreasonable, as even to this day a whole network of old river courses having the knee of the Rio Salado as a centre can be detected. Today the Salado runs from the knee southwards; Reichlen determined its earlier course towards the south-east in connexion with excavations in northern Santiago del Estero. I have myself noted its earlier bed towards the east, and local people and existing maps—notice the 200 m contour on the map—confirm that once it must have had a north-easterly course and have been a tributary of the Bermejo. When this was the case it passed close to the Pocitos site. A closer study of the dry river beds of the Chaco and their respective links with pre-historic cultures will in the future probably provide a background for chronological determinations. The Bermejo's former bed, which it left in the previous century, was navigable about half way up from the Rio Paraguay. With the Salado as a tributary this must have been even more the case. One more geographical problem must be taken up for consideration. The idea of the arid Chaco as a thorny wilderness without forests and floor vegetation is in the main a post-Columbian picture. The introduction of the goat into these districts by the Jesuits at the beginning of the 17th century caused the natural l ock Inca Imperialism in North-West Argentina 7

Fig. 13.—Burial urns from Naranjo. The big jar shows cord decoration like the lid bowl (upper right). The little foetus urn is decorated with finger impressions. The big urn had earlier been mended by crack-lacing, and thus perhaps originally served as a chicha or aloja jar. vegetation to suffer considerably, and soil erosion has since completed the work, so that the land lies naked and poor, cactus and thorny shrub enjoying ideal con- ditions. The places from which goats are kept away today can boast of big forest sections and good floor vegetation. There is no real reason for assuming that the Chaco with forest and navigable rivers should have frightened Tropical Forest Indians who came down along the Rio Paraguay and Parana. Much suggests that the Mataco Indians had many of their cultural contacts from the west, and both they and the Highland Indians were definitely foot and land people. Independent of this west-east movement, perhaps even simultaneously with it, there can have been a stream in the opposite direction along the rivers irom east to west. These will often have been of short duration and as unstable as the river courses they followed, yet possibly they are responsible for inexplicable similarities between the Parana area and the Andean culture in north-west Argen- tina. Finally, I shall make a few comparisons with surrounding areas. A technical analysis of the pottery shows that tempering with crushed potsherds was used in all instances, as is the case in the Chaco today, in Mojo, with the Chiriguano, and at the mouth of the Amazon. But at our most eastern find, Pocitos, there were traces of plant fibre in the ware, greater porosity, and the surface was in some cases covered with a slip. Vegetable fibres as aplastics are known only 88 l'OLK 3. 1961 from the Pampa, and slip is mentioned from middle Parana and the Parana delta (Linne 1925). The clay vessels discovered at all sites seem to have been burnt in kilns with draught, as they are of a reddish material, and black below the surface. They are better burnt and better polished than the clay vessels of the Mataco. In regard to form, only the most western find, Olmedo, had flat-bottomed bowls, whilst all others were simple sub-globular, that is to say, beyond Andean influence. It was the same with lugs; only the Olmedo have lugs, whereas the next most westerly, the Quirquincho, merely have string-holes for suspension, and the two most easterly finds had neither. Therefore only Olmedo falls under the area influenced by the Andes culture, but it had not adopted the painting technique like, for example, the Chiriguano. In addition to the Chaco, string-holes are also found near the Parana and the mouth of the Amazon. Ornamentation is solely plastic, but with some variation. The Quirquincho's incisions and punctations, usually in bands below the rim, are strongly reminiscent of the Pampa and Parana pre-Guarani style. On the other hand we find in Naranjo the rare cord ornamentation printed on the big burial urn and below the rim of the bowl-shaped lid. This ornamentation seems to point eastwards, as according to Metraux (1934) it is only found on the upper Rio Paraguay (Guana, Caduveo) and in the pre-Guarani ceramics of the Parana delta. The Naranjo find combines cord decoration with direct urn burial of both adult and—in a separate burial urn—of an 8 months foetus. Nearly the same combination was rediscovered in Olmedo where a burial urn also had cord impressions below the rim, and contained the skeletal remains of a little child, whereas the adults were apparently cases of simple interment. The Olmedo find can undoubtedly be regarded as the most eastern representative of Boman's and Nor- denskiold's Sta. Barbara culture (Nordenskiold 1903), where both vessel shapes and burial customs are as at Olmedo. It was on the basis of urn burial in the Valle de Lerma, Candelaria and San- tiago del Estero that Boman (1908) advanced his theory about a Guarani influence from the east in north-west Argentina. He also thought that later an influence, characterized by urn burial for children, came from the opposite direction, from Diaguita towards Sta. Barbara. The theory was sternly opposed in regard to the Guarani people. Our combination in Naranjo of direct urn burial both for adults and for small children makes it unreasonable—recalling the spherical forms and the ornamentation of Sta. Barbara and Olmedo burial urns—to rely on this theory of Boman's. Rather the opposite has been the case, so that all direct urn burial spread in the same direction from east towards west. The material of geographical and archaeological character here produced would seem to support the first part of Boman's theory as regards influences coming from the east. The forms here described are on a level with Guarani ceramics and have the same function, but are not in Guarani style. It must consequently be assumed that a pre-Guarani influence has emanated from the Parana system across the southern Chaco, bring- Fock Inca Imperialism in j\unn-vve$i sugmimu ing with it the custom of direct urn burial, which is found, for example, on th Rio Parana with the Guayana (Caingang). The secondary urn burial we found near Quirquincho can with considerabl certainty be attributed to a corresponding—though presumably older —influent from the east, as it is particularly widespread in the Amazon area, and is foun in the Parana delta.

NOTE Miss Me Mouritzen, civil engineer of the Mineralogical Museum, Copenhagen, lias prepare I he pottery for analysis. Mr. U. Mohl, Curator of the Zoological Museum, Copenhagen, has undertaken the ide tification of the animals bones; Mr. Ib Sorensen, civil engineer of the Mineralogical Museum, Copenhagen, undertook tl qualitative spectral analysis of the bronzes; Mr. Preben Geertinger, Doctor of the Medico-Legal Institute, Copenhagen, has unde taken the identification of the human skeleton parts. The author wishes to express his hearty thanks to these persons and institutions.

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NIELS FOCK, Copenhagen, October, i960