Lane, Kevin and Jennifer Grant, 2016.

A Question of Altitude: Exploring the limits of highland pastoralism in the

prehispanic Andes. In The Archaeology of Andean Pastoralism, edited by J. M. Capriles and N. Tripcevich, pp.
139-157. University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque.
Chapter

A Question of Altitude
exploring the limits of highland pastor alism in the prehispanic andes
Kevin Lane and Jennifer Grant

Los lmites marginales de llamas y alpacas reflejan la marginalidad

a la que se ha sometido a las poblaciones que los pastorean.
Jorge Flores Ochoa (1980:65).

way of life under the twin pressures of a collapsing animal

and human population. Modern Andean camelid herders
are still living the effects of this ancient debacle (Bonavia
1996; Flores Ochoa 1980; Gade 1999).
The past though, offers a very different picture.
Sarmiento de Gamboa (1999 [1572]:49, 7475) in the sixteenth century attests to the importance of the llama
especially the white-coated and sacredly significant
napato Inka hagiography and to their concepts of
wealth. While the various early administrative visitas attest to the vast numbers of camelids in the highlands
owned by the inhabitants of, for example, Huaylas,
Titicaca basin, Ayacucho, and Cajamarca (e.g., Espinoza
Soriano 1978; Murra 1968; Rostworowski and Remy 1985;
Stern 1993) among others. Brotherston (1989) also mentions that the first skill for which Inka mitimaes were selected was herding.
Extrapolating from early ethnohistoric records backward toward the Late Intermediate Period (10001450
CE) established the presence of two important groups in
the central to north-central highlands: the Huari or
Llactayoc farmers and the Llacuaz or Yaros herders
(Duviols 1973, 1986, 2003; Rostworowski 1988b). Often

he study of modern Andean pastoralism is a study

in marginality. Against the image of the poor yet
sustainable cordilleran peasant farmer (Doughty
and Doughty 1968; Mayer 2002; Wolf 1955), one has the oftreiterated image of the marginal puna herder (Flannery et
al. 1989; Flores Ochoa 1968; Kuznar 1995). Yet this herder
marginality is the result, on the one hand, of postconquest
European agro-centrism (Lane 2006b) and, on the other,
the consequences of over-exploitation, as well as
the sixteenth- and seventeenth-century decimation of
camelid herds due to mange plaguesknown as qarachi
in Quechua and sarna in Spanishbrought literally on the
backs of then-recently introduced European animals such
as sheep and goats (Wheeler 1995:286). The effects of these
mange plagues have been alluded to by Flannery and colleagues (1989) and described by Bonavia (2008); they have
been estimated by Flores Ochoa (1980) to have resulted in
up to a 90 percent reduction in the number of herd animals during the first century of contact. Consequently,
this reduction brought with it animal substitutionovicaprids in the place of camelidsand an implacable socioeconomic crisis among high-altitude camelid herders,
who experienced the almost complete disappearance of a

139

140

Lane and Grant

these Huari-Llacuaz groups formed dual complementary

asymmetric herder-farmer ayllus or communities. The
herder Llacuazes, venerating the lightning deity Llibiac,
and documented from Junn up to the Piuran highlands
(Astuhuamn 2008; Parsons et al. 1997; Perales Mungua
2004; Vera Roca 2009), held economic and socialsome
documents even claim militarymastery over the agricultural Huari (Gose 1993; Rostworowski 1988a). While
the true composition, or even identity, of these two
groups may never be satisfactorily known (see Lane
2010:185188 for a detailed discussion of this point), what
is readily apparent is the social and economic preeminence of herders for the Late Intermediate Period; a preeminence that is reflected further south by Titicaca basin
herders, the Aymara-speaking, Lupaqa groups (Graffam
1992; Murra 2002; Stanish 2001). Further back in time, for
the Middle Horizon Wari, scholars speculate on a mixed
maize-camelid economy underpinning this polity
(Finucane 2009; Finucane et al. 2006; Meddens 1989),
while Tiwanaku has long been associated with extensive
camelid exploitation (Kolata 1993, 1996; Lynch 1983). Even
further back the evidence is equally tantalizing
(Browman 1989; Mengoni Goalons 2008; Miller and
Burger 1995; Wheeler 1984). Indeed one could speculate
that it would be impossible to understand prehispanic
highland culture without understanding the pivotal role
pastoralism played in its development.
Reassessing the importance of herding in the past necessarily calls into question many assumptions held about
the limits or constraints of prehispanic pastoralism.
Elsewhere we already described how technologically
savvy herder-farmer communities employed hydraulic
technology at the community level to maximize agropastoralist productivity in the Cordillera Negra of the northcentral Andean highlands, especially that of herding
(Lane 2006b, 2009).
Following from this, here we develop a point made
(Lane 2006b:504505) concerning the limits of prehispanic high-altitude pastoralism during the Late
Intermediate Period (10001450 CE). The evidence increasingly suggests that specialized high-altitude pastoralism was not only practiced in the puna but also,
conservatively, in the upper suni (Pulgar Vidal 1946; Tosi
1960), an ecozone situated between 3,6003,900 m asl (see
Table 9.1 for a description of the ecological zones considered in this chapter). The implications for the Central
Andes are huge, greatly increasing the known available
pastureland and thereby the number of camelids in the
landscape. It should be stated that this pushing of the

pastoralist frontier was undertaken at the community

level, emphasizing the herder-centric makeup of the late
prehispanic social landscape.
Furthermore, the ecological evidence does not suggest
that climate was a determining factor in this alternative
use of the suni. The period between the eleventh and fifteenth centuries saw both a warmer spellMedieval
Climatic Anomaly (MCA)and a colder spellthe start
of the Little Ice Age (LIA). Rather it would seem that
human agency, enshrined in the then-dominant discourse of a herder political ecology, was the defining feature in pursuing this downward extension of the
pastoralist frontier.
This chapter then briefly presents the ecological evidence for climate change during the Late Intermediate
Period (LIP) and the Late Horizon (LH), before caveating
this evidence with a consideration of political ecology
and its interpretative implications for Andeanand pastoraliststudies. A case study regarding this time period
from the north-central Andean highlands is then addressed before a discussion of the implications and future
directions opened up by this chapter.

ecol ogy a nd cl im at e dur ing

t he l at e in t er medi at e per iod
a nd t he l at e hor izon

Paleoenvironmental data in the Andes has been advancing by leaps and bounds so that a more subtle and detailed appreciation of past climate is now within our
grasp. The main data collection from ice cores in Peru
(Huascarn and Quellcaya) and Bolivia (Sajama) has
been undertaken by Lonnie Thompson and his team over
the past few decades (Thompson et al. 1985; Thompson et
al. 1995; Thompson et al. 1998) while another recent ice
core was taken from the Nevado Illimani in Bolivia
(Ramirez et al. 2003). These initial investigations have
been augmented by other studies, such as a study measuring the ammonium content in the ice cores (Kellerhals
et al. 2010), including oxygen isotopic ratios (18O); ITAZ
(Inter-Tropical Convergence Zone); a study of migration,
ammonium, and nitrate concentration (Thompson et al.
2013); and studies of other proxies such as lakes (Baker et
al. 2001; Chepstow-Lusty et al. 2003) and coral reef cores,
among others. These initial and subsequent papers provide a series of proxies with which to elucidate past climate change and how it impacted prehispanic cultural
development (e.g., Shimada et al. 1991).

A Question of Altitude

141

T a ble 9.1. The differ ent cl assifications for ecologica l zones in the A ncash highl a nds .
ECO-ZONE
C L ASSIFICATION
(I NRENA 2000)

ECO-ZONE
CL ASSIFICATION
(TOSI 1960)

ECO-ZONE
CL ASSIFICATION
(PULGAR VIDAL
1946)

Desert shrub Montane

Tropical Lowland
[md-MBT]

Spinous steppe
Montane Lower
[ee-MB]

Kichwa

2,100 to 3,100

250 to 500

Agriculture: potato,
beans, peas, maize

Desert shrub Tropical

Mantane [md-MT]

Desert weeds
Montane [md-M]

Suni / Jalka

3,100 to 3,600

250 to 500

Agriculture: potato,
maize, tarwi beans

Steppe Tropical Montane

[e-MT]

Montane steppe
[e-M]

Suni / Jalka

3,600 to 4,100

250 to 750

Agriculture: potato
(bitter); Herding

Paramo humid, Tropical

Subalpine [ph-SaT]

Humid paramo
Subalpine [ph-SA]

Puna baja

4,100 to 4,600

500 to 1,000

Agriculture: some potato,

fodder; Herding

Humid tundra Tropical

A lpine [th-AT]

Tundra muy
hmeda Alpino
[tmh-A]

Puna brava

4,600 to 5,100

500 to 1,000

Herding

Even given the caution with which geological and

archaeological chronologies can be matched and associated (Calaway 2005), it seems evident that both the
Medieval Warm Periodalso known as the Medieval
Climate Anomalyand the Little Ice Age had an impact
on the Andes. This resulted in the warmer MCA period
between ~1050 and ~1300 CE followed by a highly unstable period before the onset of the LIA ~1400 CE according to Kellerhals and colleagues (2010) and Neukom
and colleagues (2011); while Thompson and colleagues
(2013) agree on the dates for the MCA, they place the LIA
somewhat later at ~1500 CEalthough this is based solely
on the Quellcaya data, the results of which are skewed by
the Amazon basin signalwith the period in-between
showing an unstable climatic pattern.
Even given these minor incongruities in climatic
chronology we would seem to have had a warmer, drier
period during the earlier LIP followed by a period of unsettled climatic conditions before the advent of colder,
wetter conditions toward the end of the LIP (Baker et al.
2001). The Laguna Pumacochas, located in the eastern
Central Andes, proxy on sedimentary 18Ocal level further supports this conclusion with the added detail that
the period between 9001100 CE, during the MCA, was
particularly arid, while the period 14001820 CE, during
the LIA, was particularly wet (Bird et al. 2011); this is
reiterated in Mchtle and Eitels (2012:68) exhaustive and
informative table on the south-central Andes.
A broad reading of the paleoenvironmental evidence
would therefore suggest that although the agricultural
frontier would have benefitted from the warmer

ALTITUDE
[IN M ASL]

R AINFALL
[IN MM]

PRIMARY L AND USE

conditions in the eleventh to early fourteenth centuries,

the increased aridity would probably have necessitated
a greater investment in water procurement technology.
Likewise the wetter, colder conditions beginning in the
early fifteenth century would seem to have favored pastoralism, as farming became increasingly difficult at
high altitudes. Indeed, it would seem then that the Inka
Empire expanded during a period particularly favorable
for pastoralism, although local conditions could vary
(Chepstow-Lusty et al. 2009). But this simple reading of
the evidence fails to take into consideration the predominance of pastoralism during most of the LIP, a predominance which we believe has less to do with climate
than with human agency, framed here under the tenets
of political ecology.

a pol i t ic a l ecol ogy a pproach

to t he a ndes

The Andean environment has been widely interpreted as

representing the primacy of nature over human culture.
It has long been argued that if humans altered the Andean
environment, the effects were negligible (Cardich 1985;
Paulsen 1976). Denevan (1992:46), among others, has
punctured this myth of the pristine Americas, arguing
for a more proactive role for humans in the shaping of
their environment. Erickson (2000:317) sees humans as
heavily involved in changing their environment and argues that a major part of the Andean landscape is in fact
a human construct. Humans are therefore to be perceived

142

Lane and Grant

as active agents of wide and comprehensive change involving local ecology and landscape. As Ellenberg
(1979:401) suggests, the human is not only a partner of
the ecosystem he lives in, [but] has become more and
more a super-organic factor.. . . He changed, and continues to change, the water balance and nutrient turnover of
nearly all ecosystems. This leads toward an espousal of
what Karl Zimmerer (1994) describes as New
Ecologya view of ecology in which the stability or
homeostasis of the environment is disputed, opting
rather for disequilibria, instability, and even chaotic
fluctuations in biophysical environments, both natural
and human-impacted (Zimmerer 1994:108, emphasis
added). This position opposes trends that emphasize an
ecological determinism in which humans are the passive
victims of climate and of the environment in general (for
an application of this hypothesis see Binford et al. 1997)
and moves toward the more anthropogenic interpretations of political ecology (Greenberg and Park 1994;
Robbins 2004).
Given the difficulties in aligning geological or ecological chronologies with archaeological ones (Calaway
2005), it is hardly surprising that human decisions are
increasingly proposed as the prime mover in areas such
as landscape use, resource access, and marginality
(Paulson et al. 2003). These are some of the key issues that
are slowly being brought to bear on archaeological case
studies (e.g., Beresford-Jones et al. 2009). In the case of
the altitudinal limits of Andean camelid pastoralism a
similar human-influenced, paradigm-busting explanation is sought here to counter the modern agro-centric
dominant narrative.
Therefore here we do not contest the relevance of environmental issues in the past, but we do contend their primacy. As Zimmerer (1994:112) states, Explanations of
human behavior based primarily, or entirely, on ecological
concepts of adjustment and adaptation ... overlooked the
roles of ethnicity and power in shaping human behavior.
This concept of human decision-making regarding uses of
the environment leads toward an anthropocentric perspective (Erickson 2000:316) on ecology in which the landscape is modified from a standpoint of a prevailing and
structured social logic that covers economic, political,
social, and religious pressures. Zimmerers (1991) political
ecology stresses this relationship between human politicoeconomic decisions and ecology, while a critical realist approach (Bhasker et al., 2010; Vayda and Walters 1999;
Walker 2005) anchors our use of political ecology around
a concrete archaeological case study.

Within this context of political ecology, we understand

as political those aspects of an economy that mediate
land use through strategies of domination, accommodation, and resistance (Zimmerer 1991:444). Nor is this
social relationship necessarily a top-down one, given that
individual or household agents could have negotiated
these external demands using the broader political structures with recourse to existing local social practices. What
we mean by this is that in some cases it was the smallholders and communities who determined land-use strategies
(sensu Netting 1993). This is particularly pertinent for explaining the economic landscape of the Late Intermediate
Period (10001450 CE) highlands where the lack of a strong
centralizing power effectively delegated economic policy
to the checkerboard petty cacicazgos and communities
that comprised the periods sociopolitical units.
In this scenario, the limitations of a community or
polity, be they technological, social, or due to population size, would initially shape and structure their interaction with an areas ecolog y and landscape,
circumscribing a particular political ecology for that
group. In an archaeological context, time would also
function as a constant mediator renegotiating a new and
evolving polit ical ecology as local social, political, and
ecological conditions fluctuated and changed. Indeed
time constitutes one of the generators of plurality within
political ecology discourse; time is understood as the
many different human positions, perceptions, interests,
and rationalities in relation to the environment
(Paulson et al. 2003:205206).
In ecological terms, then, political ecology stresses
that, although crops do have micro-environmental limits, these are flexible and, to a large extent, it is humans
who impose the physical limits on their production; as
Zimmerer (1994:114) states, Niche specialization (of
crops) is not somehow immutable and given; its properties must be demonstrated rather than assumed.
Likewise, Enrique Mayer (2002:245) suggests that these
niches, or production zones as he terms them, constitute
a productive resource in which crops are grown in distinctive ways and suggests that they are therefore to a
large extent artificially constructed micro-environments.
Let us also recognize that if these constraints of production, encompassing the limits of where plants can thrive,
can be pushed, as Brush (1976) suggests, then this creates
the difference between effective crop limits and the absolute crop limits. This is a crucial factor to bear in mind
when we deal with the theme of natural ranges for domesticated camelids in the Andes.

A Question of Altitude
Political ecology therefore stresses the whole spectrum of human actions at different levels and scales and
by different actors, underlining the manner in which
human action can proscribe the specific physical limits of
a resources production without an overt emphasis on the
resources supposed biological or ecological limits.
For instance, the general postcontact altitudinal increase in agricultural cultivation along the slopes of the
Andes that Cardich (1985:305) observed200 m in the
last 150 yearscould be reinterpreted not as a condition
primarily of a general amelioration of climate but rather
to changing circumstances in a community-based, local
political ecology ensconced in a larger regional and
national political ecology that emphasized agricultural
products over animal ones. Archaeologically, the growth
of maize around Lake Titicaca through the use of raised
fields (camellones) displays a similar forcing of a crop
(Erickson 1986; Graffam 1992). Likewise, a pattern of increased wetland colonization and production has been
identified by Zimmerer (1991) among the modern communities of Colquepata in Southern Peru. As an exponent of political ecology, Zimmerer has reasoned that the
demands for agricultural products from external markets
has led to the increased exploitation of these previously
abandoned lands. It is time to apply this self-same reasoning embedded in human agency and political ecology
to prehispanic camelid pastoralism and the limits of its
altitudinal range.

pa s t o r a l i s m a n d t h e c o r d i l l e r a n e g r a

Numerous ethnographic studies describe the diversity

of agropastoralist adaptations in the Central Andes
(e.g., Allen 2002 [1988]; Bolin 1998; Flannery et al. 1989;
Flores Ochoa 1968). These ethnographic studies have
largely been conducted in southern Peru, where the
widest expanses of contiguous grasslands are concentrated. Few significant studies (see Doughty and
Doughty 1968; Stein 1961; Vasquez and Holmberg 1966)
have been undertaken in northern Peru, and only recently has the question of agropastoral land-use systems
in the Cordillera Negra, Ancash, started to be examined
(Lane 2006a). Few communities currently practice
large-scale herding in the area, but this, as mentioned
above, is more a reflection of postcolonial changes in
land-use strategies than of the amount of land available
for pastoralism. Within the study area (see Figure 9.1)
our investigation into the Chorrillos micro-valley of the

143

Chaclancayo River in the Nepea headwaters zone demonstrated that the areas grazing capacity per km 2 was
equal to that of the Ayacucho area and the Titicaca
basin (Lane 2006b:505).
If present economic productivity is low, the highlands
nevertheless have a long tradition of sustaining and encouraging large populations (Murra 1978 [1955]). As
Brush (1976:160) reiterated, it is evident that the major
prehispanic settlements were significantly higher than
they are today. Most were located in the upper jalka
[puna] zone, just below the jalka fuerte [puna brava]
zone. The reason for siting these settlements in the inaccessible upper limits of the cordillera cannot have been
just a factor of defense but was also a matter of basic economics. Settlements were located alongside or near to the
upper suni and puna ecozones, which would thereby represent their production zones.
To reiterate and expand, a production zone as defined by Mayer (2002:241) is a culturally constructed
plot of managed land with the added implication that it
is possible to push or move a given biomass, be it a plant
or an animal, into a particular ecological location according to human needs. As we have argued above, the
rules used in the management of production zones do
not necessarily correspond to the assumed ecological
limits of the crop or animals in question. These rules are
rather political decisions that human agents make
within a given ecology and they often push the limits of
a crop or animal even when this renders the resource
economically risky, ecologically fragile, or borderline
viable, as is the case of maize in the circum-Titicaca area
(Erickson 2000:324).
Our central argument in this chapter though does not
entail pushing camelids to areas where they are economically unviable given that they (especially the llama) can
subsist in almost all Andean environments (Franklin
1982). Rather, we are arguing for a push downward of agriculture to accommodate greater camelid numbers in
the top bracket of the suni area (3,6003,900 m asl), thus
greatly expanding camelid numbers for the period in
question. The evidence presented here for this discussion
is mainly derived from a detailed landscape analysis of
the sites, technology, and features in the study area (see
Figure 9.1) of the Cordillera Negra of the Peruvian
Province of Ancash.
To this end we concentrate on three zones within this
area: the Rico and Huinchos micro-valley and confluenceZone A; the Chorrillos micro-valleyZone B; and
the lower-lying Pamparoms open valleyZone C;

144

Lane and Grant

Figure 9.1. Map of study area, showing total area surveyed. Coutesy of Kevin Lane.

additionally, we refer to the un-zoned lakes area situated

above Zone C (see Figure 9.2). Of these zones the first two
straddle the suni and puna ecozones, while Zone C covers
the kichwa and suni ecozones (see Table 9.2). What is readily apparent is that this was truly an agropastoralist landscape that unified both pastoralism and agriculture into a
highly successful, integrated economic system; it was a system though that by the Late Intermediate Period (LIP) and
Late Horizon (LH) seems to have prioritized pastoralism
over farming. That we can date the sites and this landscape
to the LIP and LH is due to a detailed study of the ceramic
recovered through excavations and surveys (Lane
2006a:Chapter 6 and Appendix C; Lane et al. 2004; Lane
and Lujn Dvila 2009) and 10 radiocarbon dates from the
sites of Intiarn (Co 2: 1 date), Yurakpecho (Cho 3A: 1 date),
and Kipia (Puk 9: 8 dates), which chart use of this area
from the late Middle Horizon through the LIP to the early
colonial period (see Table 9.3).

A general observation can be made across all three

zones, that being that even those settlements located in
the kichwa are close to this liminal altitude area (3,600
3,900 m asl), dividing exclusive farming from herding, so
that the sites associated to Atunhirka (Lla 1) hug the
3,5003,700 m asl bracket even if their cultivation fields
lie below this level on the adjacent slopes. The only possibly exclusive farming enclave consists of the sites along
the San Juanito ridge (Zone C, SJ 15), which lie between
2,8003,100 m asl comprising three settlement sectors (SJ
2, 3 and 5) and two important feeder reservoirs (SJ 1 and
4) for terraced slope cultivation. Strategically, this cluster
of sites is also located along the coastal access to the suni
and puna sites located further upslope.
Even compensating for survey biasin which valleybottom sites are underrepresentedthe difference in the
number of sites above and below 3,900 m asl is at first
light insignificant: 26 versus 31, but obviously tilting

A Question of Altitude

145

Sites surveyed during 19992005

Sites surveyed during 20062008
Figure 9.2. Map of surveyed sites divided into three zones: A, B, and C. Black dots = sites surveyed during 19992005; light dots =
sites surveyed during 20062008 (illustration by A. Amaya).

toward favoring a farming-landscape conclusion. Yet if

we consider only settlements, estancias,1 and farmsteads
this is then reduced to 16 versus 11, favoring a herding
paradigm. If we divide this further in these types of settlements then we see a pattern of 9 estancias2 recorded
against 7 farmsteads,3 and 7 settlements above4 3,900 m
asl against 8 below.5 In this case, while the estancias outnumber the farmsteads, it would seem that on settlements the number is more or less equal. Even ascribing
the two sites in the liminal zone (Cho 11 and Puk 5) between 3,600 to 3,900 m asl to the highlands the difference
is not significant. Yet this last point does not take into
consideration size, other than the strategically important
site of Atunhirka (Lla 1), straddling the pass between the
Jimbe Valley to the north and Chaclancayo Valley to the
south; the agricultural-zone sites are considerably
smallerbetween 2.58 hathan their counterparts upvalley, which reach up to 38 ha in the case of Intiauran

(Co 2). Even so, this dense settlement pattern across these
three ecozoneskichwa, suni, punashows the almost
seamless progression between farming and herding
among the communities in this area of the Andes, further emphasizing the need to consider these activities as
integral aspects of a conjoined, interrelated economic
system combining both farming and herding.
Nevertheless, a much more important marker of
which type of economy predominates is technology, as
found embedded in the landscape (Lemonnier 1993). It is
to this that we turn to next. Zones A and B (see Figure
9.2) covers primarily the suni and puna areas of the
Chaclancayo River, and the focus of these two areas is
Cerro Rico (5,100 m asl), the apex of both the Rico (Zone
A) and Chorrillos (Zone B) Valleys. Of the two areas, the
Chorrillos was the more densely populated, with settlements stretching from approximately 3,650 m asl [Cho
11] through to the main settlement of Yurakpecho at

Lane and Grant

146

T a ble 9.2. S ites surv ey ed under the Pa r a C o P roject (19992008).

SITE CODE

SECTOR

SITE NAME

ALTITUDE (M)

NOTES

Zone A
Br 1

4100

Chullpa

Br 2

38004010

Necropolis

Br 3

39004050

Farmstead

Br 4

4050

Estancia

Br 5

4000

Estancia

Br 6

4075

Estancia

Br 7

4025

Chullpa/Estancia

3825

Silt dam

Co 1

Copalococha

Co 2

Intiaurn

38003920

Intiaurn

3900

Estancia

Intiaurn

3985

Silt reservoir

3950

Necropolis

Co 4

3930

Chullpa/Estancia

Co 5

3900

Estancia

3800

Water reservoirs

3800

Estancia

Co 3

Cj 1

Nununga

Cj 2
Cj 3

Settlement

3850

Necropolis

3890

2x Silt reservoirs

Cj 5

3951

Settlement

Cj 6

4313

Estancia

Cj 4

Represa Decisin

N/A

Ricohirca

4600

See Kinzl (1942/1943)

Ra 1

Ricococha Baja

4485

Water dam

Ra 2

Ricocochoa Alta

4560

Water dam

Ra 3

4656

Chullpa

Rac 10

4721

Estancia

Zone B
Cho 1

Yanacocha

4550

Water dam

Cho 2

Olern Cocharuri

4200

Silt dam

Cho 3

Yurakpecho

4570

Settlement

Yurakpecho

4412

Estancia

Yurakpecho

4375

Estancia

Yurakpecho

4380

Estancia

4660

Water dam

Cho 6

Orconcocha

Cho 7

Putacayoc/ Kaukayoc

37504050

Silt reservoirs/Estancia

Cho 8

Llanapaccha

36003750

Necropolis/Water reservoirs
and terraces

Cho 9

Kakacucho

3990

Necropolis

Cho 10

Torreqaka

4312

Settlement

Cho 11

Kunka

3666

Settlement

Zone C
Lla 1

Atunhirca

3500

Settlement

Atunhirca

3475

Settlement/Chullpa

Atunhirca

3500

Settlement/Chullpa

Lla 2

2850

Farmstead?

2875

Ceramic scatter

2938

Ceramic scatter

Lla 3

A Question of Altitude

SITE CODE

SECTOR

SITE NAME

ALTITUDE (M)

Zone C
Lla 4

147

NOTES

Racratumanka

3302

Settlement

Racratumanka

3295

Settlement

Racratumanka

3349

Settlement

Racratumanka

3350

Water reservoir/Carved stones

Lla 5

Putaqaqa

3373

Necropolis

Pa 1

Punepampa

3025

Farmstead?

Cajarumi

3627

Necropolis

Cajarumi

3630

Necropolis

Pa 3

Tayapucro

4250

Estancia

Pa 4

Racracocha

4350

Water dam

Puk 1

Cruzqaqa

3275

Machay

Badaquishar

3375

Necropolis

Pa 2

Puk 2

Caschapampa

3275

Terraces/Settlement?

Puk 3

Kolmut

3225

Settlement

Puk 4

Atamar

3562

Chullpa

Cruzpunta kunka

3649

Chullpa

Kiapampa

3698

Chullpa

Cruzpunta

3659

Settlement

Puk 6

Titatuscar

3610

Terraces

Puk 7

Artesaqaqa

3557

Necropolis

Puk 5

Puk 8

Campanarumi

3000

Farmstead

Kipia

3306

Settlement

Kipia

3286

Carved stones

Corpus Rumi (?)

3328

Settlement

3332

Pukullo 2

Puk 10

Colpan

2588

Farmstead

Puk 11

Corpas Rumi

3316

Necropolis?

Capliacasha

3399

Farmstead?

Puk 9

Puk 12

Capliacasha

3453

Terraces?

Puk 13

Intirumi

3434

Chullpas 2

Puk 14

Pumpumyac

3617

Huancas

3187

Platform/Huanca

Puk 15
Puk 16

3591

Chullpas 3

San Juanito

3088

Water reservoir

San Juanito

3073

Settlement/Carved stones

SJ 1
SJ 2

SJ 3

San Juanito

3100

Settlement

San Juanito

3127

Settlement?

San Juanito

3111

Settlement

Warunpunku

3047

Settlement

Warunpunku

3050

Settlement

Tunanquita

2807

Water reservoir

SJ 4
SJ 5

Markita

2881

Settlement/Necropolis

Markita

2827

Settlement

Markita

2820

Settlement

Lane and Grant

148

T a ble 9.3. R a dioca r bon dates from sites in the surv ey a r ea ca libr ated using the O x C a l 4.2 progr a m a nd the
I nt C a l 09 ca libr ation curv e .
SITE

SITE
CODE

L AB NO.

14

C YEARS
B.P.

CAL 1
R ANGE

CAL 2
R ANGE

PHASE
A SSOCIATION

CONTEXT AND
M ATERIAL

Intiraurn

CO 2

A13211

35040

1455
1637 CE

1440
1653 CE

Late Intermediate
Period/Inca/Colonial

Destruction level above floor,

Central Structure, Sector A

Yurakpecho

CHO 3

A13212

66035

1275
1395 CE

1266
1406 CE

Late Intermediate
Period

Offering Pit, Struture 1

Kipia

PUK 9

MAMS15861

48922

1411
1445 CE

1401
1453 CE

Late Intermediate
Period

B:2-Primary fill (34) of

offering pit [22]

Kipia

PUK 9

MAMS15862

46923

1416
1451 CE

1407
1467 CE

Late Intermediate
Period

A:3-Floor level (28) of

Room 1

Kipia

PUK 9

MAMS15863

97622

1016
1154 CE

995
1157 CE

Middle Horizon/Late
Intermediate Period

A:3-Floor level and fill (28) of

offering pit(?) [48] in Room 1

Kipia

PUK 9

MAMS15864

39423

1441
1620 CE

1436
1633 CE

Late Intermediate
Period/Inca/Colonial

A:3-Ashy midden spread (34)

over terrace floor (3)

Kipia

PUK 9

MAMS15865

80222

1208
1273 CE

1171
1278 CE

Late Intermediate
Period

B:2-Primary fill (72) of

offering pit [71]

Kipia

PUK 9

MAMS15866

35818

1459
1632 CE

1450
1635 CE

Late Intermediate
Period/Inca/Colonial

B:4-Fill (13) for subsequent

floor

Kipia

PUK 9

MAMS15867

48219

1415
1445 CE

1408
1450 CE

Late Intermediate
Period

B:6 [RF4]-Primary fill (20) of

offering pit [19]

Kipia

PUK 9

MAMS15868

35920

1455
1632 CE

1449
1636 CE

Late Intermediate
Period/Inca/Colonial

B:4-Fill (13) for subsequent

floor

4,570 m asl (Cho 3). The Chorrillos-Pukio Canal links

the settlements of the Chorrillos Valley with the settlements in Pamparoms area (Zone C), bringing water
from this mainly herding valley directly to the kichwa
zone.
The orientation of the Chorrillos Valley and its sites
channels the attention of the visitor upward toward the
series of large puna lakes between 4,200 and 4,660 m asl.6
All the various settlement sites, farmsteads, and estancias
are located around the water resources in the area, with the
site at Yurakpecho (Cho 3) commanding a strategic vista of
both the upper lakes and all approaches to the valley.
The upper portion of the other valley, the Rico, is also
centered around twin artificial lakes, in this case those of
Ricococha Baja (Ra 1) and Alta (Ra 2), which complement
the adjacent large settlement site of Ricohirca, first recorded by Hans Kinzl (1943) in the 1930s. The dearth of
other similarly sized or ancillary settlement sites in the
upper portion of the Rico Valley, other than the odd estancia, suggests that this area was perhaps also tied to the
centers in the Chorrillos Valley. Nevertheless, there was
a concentration of population congregated farther down
around the silt dam at Collpacocha (Co 1), at the LIP occupation of Intiaurn with neighboring hamlets in the

Breque Valley, and around the modern village of

Cajabamba Alta, 1.5 km downstream.
Indeed Collpacocha (Co 1)located at 3,825 m asl,
within the 3,6003,900 m asl upper-suni ecozone, and
straddling the Huinchos Riverlies at the center of a
technologically complex pastoralist landscape that never
theless incorporates farming as an important complementary economic activity (see Figure 9.3). Collpacocha
(Co 1) stands at near to 100 m in length orientated at a
north-south angle. At its widest it is 11m thick and is constructed of three major stone steps, in-filled with medium
and small stones compacted with silty clay. The total
height of the structure is 5.4 m. Collpacocha (Co 1) is a silt
dam (Lane 2009), in which water and soils are dammed
to create artificial bofedales or moors to increase the
availability of pasture. Archaeological auguring of
Collpacocha (Co 1) supports its interpretation as an artificial bofedal (Lane 2006a:Appendix D). Water egress
below the silt dam was probably used for farming activities, as the remains of abandoned field systems would
seem to collaborate.
The bofedal, or silt basin, at Collpacocha (Co 1), at over
28 ha (see Figure 9.4), would have concentrated large
numbers of animals in this area in close association with

A Question of Altitude

149

Figure 9.3. Map of Co 1Co 2 agropastoralist landscape. Note corral areas (Co 2, Sectors: 6 & 7; Co 4 and Br 4) and terraced area
(Co 2, Sector: 2). Courtesy Kevin Lane and Luis Coll.

the large and important LIP and subsequent Inka settlement site of Intiaurn (Co 2) (Lane 2011). Numerous estancias7 were also associated with the Collpacocha (Co 1),
further reinforcing the importance of this technology for
the local agropastoralist economy.
Farther upstream toward the twin dammed lakes of
Ricococha Baja (Ra 1A) and Ricococha Alta (Ra 2) are
remains of silt reservoirs similar to those found along the
Chorrillos Valley (see Figure 9.5ad). In a similar fashion
to silt dams, but on a much smaller scale, silt reservoirs
create a small area of biomass-rich pasture (Lane 2009).
Furthermore the dam at Ricococha Baja (Ra 1A) shows
signs of having had water siphoned off below it to create
an area of bofedal through the use of canals (see Figure
9.6ab), a technique similar to that employed by the herders of Chichillapi in Puno (Palacios Ros 1977, 1981, 1996).

The technology employed is simple: two canals divert

water from the main sluice toward the eastern and western
edge of the valley, from where water is allowed to flow back
toward the center of the basin by means of smaller outlets,
thus irrigating the intervening area. It was possible to see
remains of the eastern canal, 1m wide at its widest and
30 cm deep, stretching about 150 m south along the valley.
There is evidence to suggest that the canal was stone lined.
The western canal is almost completely destroyed: only a
few stretches of stone-lined walling can be seen. A line of
ichu grasses along the course of the canal, probably a relic
of some persistent water flow along the buried course of
the canal, is also suggestive of its presence.
Both the canals peter out beyond 150 m, suggesting
that either it never extended beyond this boundary or
that the remaining course has been completely destroyed.

150

Lane and Grant

Figure 9.4. Aerial photograph of Co 1 showing silt basin. Based on the Peruvian IGN (1960).

By these means an area of at least half a hectare could

have been irrigated for use as pasture. In itself this is not
much, but in combination with the extensive silt reservoirs in existence throughout the lower Rico Valley these
canals have made another important area of silt entrapment and pasture production. Altogether, this suggests
that together with Collpacocha (Co 1) we have a technologically adapted landscape between the Ricococha dams
(Ra 1A and Ra 2) at 4,560 m and at least 3,800 m, this last
being below the normally accepted lower altitude ceiling
for herding in the area.
Parallel to the Rico River is a small stream that leads
from the natural bofedal at Pampa de Sanigana (sites Cj
16) to the HuichosChaclancayo River bypassing the
Collpacocha (Co 1). Again, at a smaller scale, the pattern
is repeated. A number of estancias (Cj 2 and Cj 6) and a
minor settlement (Cj 5) are linked to silt reservoirs (Cj 4).
Interestingly, these silt reservoirs and the Cj 2 estancia
are within the 3,6003,900 m asl suni ecozone, amply
demonstrating that herder hydraulic technology is being
utilized below the strictly puna ecozone.
Zone B has been described in greater detail elsewhere

(Lane 2006); suffice to say that a system of water dams

(Cho 1 and Cho 6), a silt dam (Cho 2), and a large concentration of silt reservoirs (Cho 7) link settlements8
across a technologically pastoralist landscape located
between 3,7504,660 m asl (see Figure 9.5). Below this lie
the agricultural terraces of Llanapacha (Cho 8). In total
over 200,000 m 2 of artificial pasture would have been
added to the preexisting pasture by technological
means.
As described above, Zone C would have comprised the
main agricultural area of the valley, although even here
there are signs that belie a preoccupation with herding.
Crucially, the main cosmological site identified for the
whole study area, the site of Kipia (Puk 9), is dedicated to
SantiagoSt. James (Lane 2011). In Andean Christian
syncretism the cult to Santiago masks an earlier cult to
the lightning deity, the deity responsible for herders and
their herds (Hernndez Lefranc 2007). Linked by canal to
the water-rich Chorrillos Valley, the area comprising
Pukio (Puk 116) was partially reliant on the herders of
the adjacent valley for a reliable and constant water supply. Finally, the whole of Zone C is oriented upward

A Question of Altitude

151

C
D

Outtake
sluice

Figure 9.5. Photographs of pastoralist landscape features, including silt reservoirs: (a) silt reservoir of Patoparinan (Cho 2C), (b) silt
reservoirs on the Rico Valley (note change in pasture tone denoting bofedal vegetation), (c) detail of silt-reservoir dam wall located
in the Rico Valley (with G. Contreras), (d) silt reservoir at Putacayoc (Cho 6C) with outtake sluice at center of structure. Courtesy
Kevin Lane.

toward the lake zone at the summit of this cordillera,

comprising a series of water and silt dams feeding into
Zone C below.9 This upper area is the pastoralist hinterland to the kichwa-suni farming area below.
Finally there is another point to consider: the positioning and extension of known agricultural terracing
systems. In Zone C, we have two possibly verifiable terraced areas in existence, those of Titatuscar (Puk 6:
3,6003,700 m asl) and possibly Capliacasha (Puk 12:
3,4003,450 m asl). Although the area above and beyond
these terraces becomes increasingly steep, it would not
have been an impediment to further terracing, especially

when fed by water from the dams farther upslope. This

then begs the question: Why does this technology stop
here? Nor is this a phenomenon particular to Zone C;
the terraces of Llanapacha (Cho 8) in Zone B finish at
3,750 m asl, while the possibly Inka bench terraces of
Intiaurn (Co 2) peter out at 3,850 m asl. All of these terracing systems within this liminal zone have helped us
define the real boundary between farming and herding.
Reverting to the main argument of this chapter, we
would argue that this altitudinal limit to agricultural
terraces obeys a human imperativeto benefit the herders of these agropastoralist communities.

Lane and Grant

152

East Canal

Ricococha
Baja

West Canal

Figure 9.6. Photographs of Ricococha Baja (Ra 1A) basin, showing: (a) route of East and West canal and (b) detail of eastern canal.
Courtesy Kevin Lane.

conclusions

The description of sites above presents considerable evidence of a farmer-herder landscape in which water, and
also soil, was managed at the community and ayllu level
across whole watersheds or valleys (Lane 2009). It is imperative to emphasize this, to wit, that it is a farmerherder landscape, albeit one in which the herders were
the dominant political power. Hence, given that the location of the majority of these dams and reservoirs was in
the upper altitudinal bracket3,800 m asl and aboveof
the cordillera, it would not be remiss to state that control
must also have been exerted primarily from this area. The
number of large, defensible settlements in this upper
zone further supports this suggestion. By implication
then, the dominant political-ecology narrative would
seem to be pastoralist in nature.
Nevertheless, in a bid to avoid the fallacies of old by
just inverting the old agro-centrist argument into a
herder-centric one, we should not obviate the rich agricultural component in this valley. Indeed, we are in the
presence of a truly agropastoralist landscape, agropastoralist insofar as both economies are strongly interrelated and integrated across the communities that
inhabited the whole of the kichwa, suni, and puna
ecozones in this area.

Even so, given the elaborate nature and maintenance

exigencies of these hydraulic systems, it is obvious that
by the Late Intermediate Period and Late Horizon we
are looking at technologically complex herders and
farmers. The complexity of the hydraulic system probably implies a further specialization in each economic
sphere, so that by this period we are experiencing a
growing tendency toward economic exclusivity, whereby
a technologically rich landscape is producing increasingly specialized farmers and herders as twinned poles
of a self-same community (Grant and Lane 2013), perhaps even the Huari and Llacuazes of the ethnohistoric
literature.
What is also apparent is that the pastoralists are not
bivouacked exclusively in the puna as is the case now
adays; rather their use of the landscape and its resources
was much more flexible with the pastoralist frontier effectively in, at least, the upper-suni ecozone of the area.
An extension of 100300 m downslope might seem like
very little, but for the Chorrillos Valley (Zone B) this
would have represented an increase in pasture by half
from 2,430.08 ha to 3,684.05 haof that available from an
exclusive use of just the puna (Lane 2006b:503504). A
similar pattern and productive expansion occurs in Zone
A, as it does in the interaction zone between the lakes
area (un-zoned sites in Figure 9.2) and the predominantly

A Question of Altitude
kichwa Zone C. What we are seeing here then is a progressive pushing of the limits of pastoralism downward
to include the more marginally productive agricultural
lands in the suni zone, lands which when rendered to
herding represented a manifold increase in pasture and
animal-carrying capacity.
The other main point to highlight is that ecological
limits are not rigid. If, as we know, maize is sometimes
grown well above its optimal ecological level, then it is
perfectly plausible that other plants and animals were
similarly pushed or shifted from their assumed traditional boundaries. In describing agropastoral communities in the north-central Andes during the late
prehispanic period, we argue that the animals, artificial
pasturage, and probably fodder cultivation produced a
productive suite that was pushed down from the puna
into the cultivated suni zone. This pushing did not
necessarily obey an ecological imperative, rather it was
the result of decisions taken by the dominant section of
a dyadic agropastoralist societyin this case the
herders.
With this in mind it might be necessary to reassess
the role and extent of pastoralism across the Central
Andes. For instance, if we take the limits of agricultural
terracing as a possible cue for determining agricultural
limits and the start of herding in a given area, we can
see that even a cursory survey of existing literature
across such divergent areas as the Colca Valley (Treacy
1994), the middle Mantaro Valley (Bonavia 1968), the
upper Mantaro Valley (DAltroy 1992), Huamachuco
(McGreevy and Shaughnessy 1983), and Chachapoyas
(Schjellerup 1986) all coincide with terraces petering out
in the 3,6003,900 m asl bracket, well within the suni
ecozone. The only exception to the rule is the circumTiticaca region (Erickson 2000), where the presence of
the lake ameliorates the atmospheric temperature, permitting agriculture at a higher elevation.
This begs the question asked throughout this chapter:
What then is happening in this liminal zone? Here we
suggest that human agency allied to a specialized pastoralism within a herder-farmer economy is using this area
to maximize herding production from at least the LIP
through to the LH. More work is obviously necessary to
assess, reinforce, or discard this hypothesis across the
Central Andes. Nevertheless, preliminary work in the
upper Ica Valley (French et al. 2012) is again reinforcing
this pattern with terracing finishing at, or near to, the
3,700 m asl mark before giving over to the sloped and
rolling uplands of the Ica highlands. The implications of

153

this expansion of the herder frontier across the Central

Andes would have serious repercussions in how we
viewsocially, economically, and politicallythese supposedly marginal herders of yesteryear.

ack now ledgmen ts

The results of this chapter were made possible through

funding from the British Academy, the Leverhulme
Foundation, the Humboldt Foundation, and the
University of Manchester. We would like to thank the
communities of the Cordillera Negra for their unstinting
generosity and welcome. We also thank everyone who
has ever participated in our projects past and present;
this chapter would be impossible without your help.
Finally, thanks to Jos Capriles and Nicholas Tripcevich
for their generous invitation to participate in this volume
and even more for their enduring patience. Needless to
say all mistakes and omissions remain our own.

not es

1. Designating a small habitation site with associated corrals.

2. Br 4, 5, 6, 7; Co 4, 5; Cj 2, 6; Pa 3.
3. Br 3; Puk 2, 12; SJ 2, 3; Pa 1.
4. Co 2; Cj 5; Cho 3, 7, 10; Rac 10 and Ricohirca (Kinzl
1942/1943).
5. Cho 11; Lla 1, 4; Puk 3, 5, 9, 10; SJ 5.
6. These are, starting from the bottom: Oleron Cocharuri
(Cho 2), Yanacocha (Cho 1), and the twin lakes of Orconcocha and Warmicocha (Cho 6).
7. Br 4, 5, 6, 7; Co 4, 5.
8. Cho 3, 4, 911.
9. Pa 5, 6; Rac 27; Uc 2water dams; Rac 1; Uc 3silt dam;
Uc 1estancia.

r efer ences ci ted

Allen, Catherine J.
2002 [1988] The Hold Life Has: Coca and Cultural Identity in an
Andean Community. Smithsonian Institution Press,
Washington, DC.
Astuhuamn, Csar
2008 The Organisation of the Inka Provinces within the Highlands of Piura, Northern Peru. PhD dissertation, Institute
of Archaeology, University College London, London.

154

Lane and Grant

Baker, Paul A., Geoffrey O. Seltzer, Sherilyn C. Fritz, Robert B.

Dunbar, Matthew J. Grove, and Pedro M. Tapia
2001 The History of South American Tropical Precipitation for
the Past 25,000 Years. Science 291(5504):640643.
Beresford-Jones, David, Susanna Arce, Oliver Q. Whalley, and
Alex J. Chepstow-Lusty
2009 The Role of Prosopis in Ecological and Landscape Change
in the Samaca Basin, Lower Ica Valley, South Coast Peru
from the Early Horizon to the Late Intermediate Period.
Latin American Antiquity 20(2):303332.
Bhaskar, Roy, Cherly Frank, Karl Georg Hyer, Petter Nss, and
Jenneth Parker
2010 Interdisciplinarity and Climate Change: Transforming
Knowledge and Practice for our Global Future. Routledge,
Abingdon.
Binford, Michael W., Alan L. Kolata, Mark Brenner, John W.
Janusel, Matthew T. Seddon, Mark Abbott, and Jason H.
Curtis
1997 Climate Variation and the Rise and Fall of an Andean
Civilization. Quaternary Research 47(2):235248.
Bird, Broxton W., Mathias Abbott, Mark B. Vuille, Donald T.
Rodbell, Nathan D. Stansell, and Michael F. Rosenmeier
2011 A 2,300-year-long Annually Resolved Record of the South
American Summer Monsoon from the Peruvian Andes.
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA
108(21):85838588.
Bolin, Inge
1998 Rituals of Respect: The Secret of Survival in the High Peruvian Andes. University of Texas Press, Austin.
Bonavia, Duccio
1968 Investigaciones Arqueolgicas en el Mantaro Medio. Revista del Museo Nacional 35:211294.
1996 Los Camlidos Sudamericanos: Una Introduccin a su Estudio. IFEA-UPCH, Lima.
2008 South American Camelids. Cotsen Institute of Archaeology, University of California, Los Angeles.
Brotherston, Gordon
1989 Andean Pastoralism and Inka Ideology. In The Walking
Larder: Patterns of Domestication, Pastoralism and Predation, edited by Juliet Clutton-Block, pp. 240255. UnwinHyman, London.
Browman, David L.
1989 Origins and Development of Andean Pastoralism: An
Overview of the Past 6,000 Years. In The Walking Larder:
Patterns of Domestication, Pastoralism and Predation, edited by Juliet Clutton-Block, pp. 256268. Unwin-Hyman,
London.
Brush, Stephen B.
1976 Mans Use of an Andean Ecosystem. Human Ecology
4(2):147166.
Calaway, Michael J.
2005 Ice-Cores, Sediments and Civilization Collapse: A Cautionary Tale from Lake Titicaca. Antiquity 79(306):778
790.

Cardich, Augusto
1985 The Fluctuating Upper Limits of Cultivation in the Central Andes and Their Impact on Peruvian Prehistory. Advances in World Archaeology 4:293333.
Chepstow-Lusty, Alex J., Michael R. Frogley, Brian S. Bauer,
Mark B. Bush, and Alfredo Tupayachi Herrera
2003 A late Holocene Record of Arid Events from the Cuzco
Region, Peru. Journal of Quaternary Science 18(6):491
502.
Chepstow-Lusty, Alex J., Michael R. Frogley, Brian S. Bauer, M. J.
Leng, K. P. Boessenkool, C. Carcaillet, A. A. Ali, and
A. Gioda
2009 Putting the Rise of the Inka Empire within a Climatic and
Land Management Context. Climate of the Past 5:114.
DAltroy, Terence N.
1992 Provincial Power in the Inka Empire. Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington, DC.
Denevan, William M.
1992 The Pristine Myth: The Landscape of the Americas in
1492. Annals of the Association of American Geographers
82(3):369385.
Doughty, P. L., and M. F. Doughty
1968 Huaylas: An Andean District in Search of Progress. Cornell
University Press, Ithaca, New York.
Duviols, Pierre
1973 Huari y Llacuaz: Agricultores y Pastores. Un Dualismo
Prehispnico de Oposicin y Complementaridad. Revista
del Museo Nacional 39:153191.
1986 Cultura Andina y Represin: Procesos y Visitas de Idolatrias y Hechicerias, Siglo XVII. Centro de Estudios Rurales Andinos Bartolom de las Casas, Cusco.
2003 Procesos y Visitas de Idolatras: Cajatambo, siglo XVII.
IFEA, PUCP, Lima.
Ellenberg, Heinz
1979 Mans Influence on Tropical Ecosystems in South America: The Second Tansley Lecture. Journal of Ecology
67(2):401416.
Erickson, Clark L.
1986 Agricultura en Camellones en la Cuenca del Lago Titicaca. In Andenes y Camellones en el Peru Andino: Historia, Presente y Futuro, edited by Carlos de la Torre and
Manuel Burga, pp. 331350. Consejo Nacional de Ciencia
y Tecnologa (CONCITEC), Lima.
2000 The Lake Titicaca Basin: A Precolumbian Built Landscape. In Imperfect Balance: Landscape Transformations
in the Precolumbian Americas, edited by David L. Lentz,
pp. 311356. Columbia University Press, New York.
Espinoza Soriano, Waldemar
1978 Huaraz: Poder, Sociedad y Economa en los Siglos XV y
XVI. Reflexiones en Torno a las Visitas de 1558, 1594, y 1712.
Universidad Nacional Mayor de San Marcos, Lima.
Finucane, Brian
2009 Maize and Sociopolitical Complexity in the Ayacucho
Valley, Peru. Current Anthropology 50(4):535545.

A Question of Altitude
Finucane, Brian, Patricia Maita Agurto, and William H. Isbell
2006 Human and Animal Diet at Conchopata, Peru: Stable Isotope Evidence for Maize Agriculture and Animal Management Practices during the Middle Horizon. Journal of
Archaeological Science 33(12):17661776.
Flannery, Kent V., Joyce Marcus, and Robert G. Reynolds
1989 The Flocks of the Wamani: A Study of Llama Herders on
the Puna of Ayacucho, Peru. Academic Press, San Diego,
California.
Flores Ochoa, Jorge A.
1968 Los Pastores de Parata: Una Introduccin a su Estudio.
Serie Antropologa Social 10, Instituto Indigenista Interamericano, Mexico, DF.
1980 Causas que Originaron la Actual Distribucion de las Alpacas y Llamas. In El Hombre y su Ambiente en los Andes
Centrales, edited by Luis Milliones and Hiroyasu Tomeada, pp. 6392. Senri Ethnological Studies, Osaka.
Franklin, William L.
1982 Biology, Ecology, and Relationship to Man of the South
American Camelids. In Mammalian Biology in South
America, edited by Michael A. Mares and Hugh H. Genoways, pp. 457489. Special Publication Series, Pymatuning Laboratory of Ecology, University of Pittsburgh,
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
French, Charles, David Beresford-Jones, and Kevin Lane
2012 Changes in Ancient Land and Water-Use along the Ro Ica,
South-Central Andes. Leverhulme Large Research Project,
University of Cambridge, Cambridge.
Gade, David W.
1999 Nature and Culture in the Andes. University of Wisconsin
Press, Wisconsin.
Gose, Peter
1993 Segmentary State Formation and the Ritual Control of
Water under the Inkas. Comparative Studies in Society
and History 35(3):480514.
Graffam, Gray
1992 Beyond State Collapse: Rural History, Raised Fields, and
Pastoralism in the South Andes. American Anthropologist
94(4):882904.
Grant, Jennifer L., and Kevin Lane
2013 La Evolucin del Pastoralismo Sudamericano: Una Perspectiva desde los Andes Centrales y Centro-Sur. In
XVIII Congreso Nacional de Arqueologa Argentina, edited by Daniel E. Olivera. Sociedad de Arqueologa Argentina, La Rioja.
Greenberg, James B., and Thomas K. Park
1994 Political Ecology. Journal of Political Ecology 1(1):112.
Hernndez Lefranc, Harold
2007 De Santiago Matamoros a Santiago-Illapa. Arqueologa y
Sociedad 17:313341.
INRENA
2000 Base de Datos de Recursos Naturales e Infrastructura:
Departamento de Ancash-Primera Aproximacion.
INRENA, Ministerio de Agricultura, Lima.

155

Kellerhals, T., S. Brutsch, M. Sigl, S. Knusel, H. W. Gaggeler, and

M. Schwikowski
2010 Ammonium Concentration in Ice Cores: A New Proxy for
Regional Temperature Reconstruction? Journal of Geophysical Research 115:D16123.
Kinzl, Hans von
1943 Die Anthropogeographisches Bedeutung der Gletscher
und die Knstliche Flurbewsserung in den Peruanischen
Anden. Sitzungsberichte Europischer Geographen 253
380.
Kolata, Alan L.
1993 The Tiwanaku: Portrait of Andean Civilization. Blackwell
Publishers, Cambridge.
Kolata, Alan L. (editor)
1996 Tiwanaku and Its Hinterland: Archaeology and Paleoecology of an Andean Civilization, Vol. 1: Agroecology. Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington, DC.
Kuznar, Lawrence A.
1995 Awatimarka: The Ethnology of an Andean Herding Community. Harcourt Brace Publishers, Fort Worth, Texas.
Lane, Kevin
2006a Engineering the Puna: The Hydraulics of Agro-Pastoral
Communities in a North-Central Peruvian Valley. PhD
dissertation, Department of Archaeology, University of
Cambridge, Cambridge.
2006b Through the Looking Glass: Re-assessing the Role of
Agro-Pastoralism in the North-Central Andean Highlands. World Archaeology 38(3):493510.
2009 Engineered Highlands: The Social Organisation of Water
in the Ancient North-Central Andes (AD 10001480).
World Archaeology 41(1):169190.
2010 Hacia Dnde se Dirigen los Pastores? Un Anlisis del
Papel del Agropastoralismo en la Difusin de las Lenguas
en los Andes. Boletn de Arqueologa PUCP 14:181198.
2011 Hincapi en los Andes Nor-Centrales: La Presencia Inka
en la Cordillera Negra, Sierra de Ancash. In Arquitectura
Prehispnica Tarda: Construccin y Poder en los Andes
centrales, edited by Kevin Lane and Milton Lujn Dvila,
pp. 123170. UCSS, CEPAC, Lima.
Lane, Kevin, Alexander Herrera, and Claudia Grimaldo
2004 Proyecto de Investigacin Arqueolgico Paurarku: Informe
Preliminar de las Labores Realizadas durante la Temporada de Campo 20023. Report submitted to the Instituto
Nacional de Cultura del Per, Lima.
Lane, Kevin, and Milton Lujn Dvila
2009 Proyecto Arqueolgico Regin AncashCochayoc
(ParaCo): Informe Final de las labores Realizadas durante
la Temporada de Campo 2008. Report submitted to the
Instituto Nacional de Cultura del Per, Lima.
Lemonnier, Pierre (editor)
1993 Technological Choices: Transformation in Material Cultures since the Neolithic. Routledge, London.

156

Lane and Grant

Lynch, Thomas F.
1983 Camelid Pastoralism and the Emergence of Tiwanaku
Civilization in the South-Central Andes. World Archaeology 15(1):114.
Mchtle, B., and B. Eitel
2012 Fragile Landscapes, Fragile Civilizations: How Climate
Determined Societies in the Pre-Columbian South Peruvian Andes. Catena 103:6273.
Mayer, Enrique
2002 The Articulated Peasant: Household Economies in the
Andes. Westview Press, Boulder, Colorado.
McGreevy, Tom, and Roxanne Shaughnessy
1983 High Altitude Land Use in the Huamachuco Area. In Investigations of the Andean Past: Papers from the First Animal Northeast Conference on Andean Archaeology and
Ethnohistory, edited by Daniel H. Sandweiss, pp. 8286.
Latin American Studies Program, Cornell University,
Ithaca, New York.
Meddens, Frank M.
1989 Implications of Camelid Management and Textile Production for Huari, in Peru. In The Nature of Wari: A Reappraisal of the Middle Horizon Period in Peru, edited by
R. Michael Czwarno, Frank M. Meddens, and Alexandra
Morgan, pp. 146165. BAR International Series 525, British Archaeological Reports, Archaeopress, Oxford.
Mengoni Goalons, Guillermo L.
2008 Camelids in Ancient Andean Societies: A Review of the
Zooarchaeological Evidence. Quaternary International
185:5968.
Miller, George R. and Richard L. Burger
1995 Our Father the Cayman, Our Dinner the Llama: Animal
Utilization at Chavin de Huantar, Peru. American Antiquity 60(3):421458.
Murra, John V.
1968 An Aymara Kingdom in 1567. Ethnohistory 15:115151.
1978 [1955] The Economic Organisation of the Inka State. JAI
Press, Greenwich.
2002 El Mundo Andino: Poblacin, Medio Ambiente y
Economa. Pontificia Universidad Catlica del Per, Instituto de Estudios Peruanos, Lima.
Netting, Robert McC.
1993 Smallholders, Householders: Farm Families and the Ecology of Intensive, Sustainable Agriculture. Stanford University Press, Stanford, California.
Neukom, R., J. Luterbacher, R. Villalba, M. Kttel, D. Frank,
P. D. Jones, M. Grosjean, H. Wanner, J.-C Aravena, D. E.
Black, D. A. Christie, R. DArrigo, A. Lara, M. Morales,
C. Soliz-Gamboa, A. Srur, R. Urrutia, and L. von Gunten
2011 Multiproxy Summer and Winter Surface Air Temperature
Field Reconstructions for Southern South America Covering the Past Centuries. Climatic Dynamics 37(12):3551.

Palacios Ros, Flix

1977 Pastizales de Regado para Alpacas. In Pastores de Puna:
Wywamichiq Punarunakuna, edited by Jorge Flores
Ochoa, pp. 155170. Estudios de la Sociedad Rural 5, Instituto de Estudios Peruanos, Lima.
1981 Tecnologa del Pastoreo. In La Tecnologa en el Mundo
Andino: Runakunap Kawsayninkupaq Rurasqankunaqa,
edited by Heather Letchman and Ana Mara Soldi,
pp. 217232. Universidad Nacional Autnoma de Mxico,
Mexico, DF.
1996 Pastizales de Regado para Alpacas en la Puna Alta (El
Ejemplo de Chichillapi). In Comprender la Agricultura
Campesina en los Andes Centrales: Per-Bolivia, edited by
Pierre Morlon, pp. 207212. Institut Franais dtudes
Andines (IFEA), Centro Bartolom de las Casas (CBC),
Lima.
Parsons, Jeffrey R., Charles M. Hastings, and Ramiro Matos
Mendieta
1997 Rebuilding the State in Highland Peru: Herder-Cultivator
Interaction during the Late Intermediate Period in the
Tarama-Chinchaycocha Region. Latin American Antiquity 8(4):317341.
Paulsen, Allison C.
1976 Environment and Empire: Climatic Factors in Prehistoric
Andean Culture Change. World Archaeology 8(2):121132.
Paulson, Susan, Lisa L. Gezon, and Michael Watts
2003 Locating the Political in Political Ecology: An Introduction. Human Organization 62(3):205217.
Perales Mungua, Manuel F.
2004 El Control Inka de las Fronteras tnicas: Reflexiones
desde el Valle de Ricrn en la Sierra Central del Per.
Chungara: Revista de Antropologa Chilena 36(2):515523.
Pulgar Vidal, Javier
1946 Historia y Geografa del Per. Universidad Nacional de
San Marcos, Lima.
Ramirez, E., G. Hoffmann, J. D. Taupin, B. Francou, P. Ribstein,
N. Caillon, F. A. Ferron, A. Landais, J. R. Petit, B. Pouyaud, U. Schotterer, J. C. Simoes, and M. Stievenard
2003 A new Andean deep ice core from Nevado Illimani (6350
m), Bolivia. Earth and Planetary Science Letters 212(3
4):337350.
Robbins, Paul
2004 Political Ecology: A Critical Introduction. Blackwell Publishing, Oxford.
Rostworowski, Mara
1988a Conflicts over Coca Fields in XVIth-Century Peru. Memoirs of the Museum of Anthropology 21, University of
Michigan Press, Ann Arbor, Michigan.
1988b Estructuras Andinas del Poder: Ideologa Religiosa y
Poltica. Instituto de Estudios Peruanos, Lima.

A Question of Altitude
Rostworowski, Mara, and Pilar Remy
1985 Las visitas a Cajamarca 157172/1578: Documentos. Volumen I. Instituto de Estudios Peruanos, Lima.
Sarmiento de Gamboa, Pedro
1999 [1572] History of the Inkas. Dover Publications, London.
Schjellerup, Inge
1986 Andenes y Camellones en la regin de Chachapoyas. In
Andenes y Camellones en el Peru Andino: Historia, Presente y Futuro, edited by C. de la Torre and M. Burga, pp.
133150. CONCYTEC, Lima.
Shimada, Izumi, Crystal B. Schaaf, Lonnie G. Thompson, and
Ellen Mosley-Thompson
1991 Cultural Impacts of Severe Droughts in the Prehistoric
Andes: Applications of a 1,500-Year Ice Core Precipitation
Record. World Archaeology 22(3):247270.
Stanish, Charles
2001 Aymara Kingdoms. In Encyclopedia of Prehistory, Volume
7: South America, edited by Peter N. Peregrine and
M. Ember, pp. 3437. Kluwer Academic/Plenum Publishers, New York.
Stein, William W.
1961 Hualcn: Life in the Highlands of Peru. Cornell University
Press, Ithaca, New York.
Stern, Steve J.
1993 Perus Indian Peoples and the Challenge of Spanish Conquest: Huamanga to 1640. University of Wisconsin Press,
Madison.
Thompson, L. G., E. Mosley-Thompson, J. F. Bolzan, and B. R.
Koci
1985 A 1500-Year Record of tropical Precipitation in Ice cores
from the Quelccaya Ice Cap, Peru. Science
229(4717):971973.
Thompson, L. G., E. Mosley-Thompson, M. E. Davis, P. N. Lin,
K. A. Henderson, J. Cole-Dai, J. F. Bolzan, and K. B. Liu
1995 Late Glacial Stage and Holocene Ice Core Records from
Huascarn, Peru. Science 269:4650.
Thompson, L. G., E. Mosley-Thompson, M. E. Davis, V. S. Zagorodnov, I. M. Howat, V. N. Mikhalenko, and P. N. Lin
2013 Annually Resolved Ice Core Records of Tropical Climate
Variability over the Past ~1800 Years. Science
340(945):945950.
Thompson, L. G., M. E. Davis, E. M. Thompson, T. A. Sowers,
K. A. Henderson, V. S. Zagorodnov, P. N. Lin, V. N.
Mikhalenko, R. K. Campen, J. F. Bolzan, J. Cole-Dai, and
B. Francou

157

1998 A 25,000 Year Tropical Climate History from Bolivian Ice

Cores. Science 282(5295):18581864.
Tosi, J. A.
1960 Zonas de Vida Natural en el Peru: Memoria Explicativa
sobre el Mapa Ecolgico del Per. Instituto Interamericano de Ciencias Agricolas de la Organizacin de Estados
Americanos (OEA), Zona Andina, Lima.
Treacy, John M.
1994 Las Chacras de Coporaque: Andenera y riego en el Valle
del Colca. Translated by A. de la Cadena and E. Neira.
Instituto de Estudios Peruanos, Lima.
Vasquez, Mario C., and Allan R. Holmberg
1966 The Castas: Unilineal Kin Groups in Vicos, Peru. Ethnology 5(3):284303.
Vayda, Andrew P., and Bradley B. Walters
1999 Against Political Ecology. Human Ecology 27(1):167179.
Vera Roca, Jeffry Jonatthan
2009 Comentarios Arqueolgicos sobre las Ocupaciones Prehispnicas en las Cuencas de Paucartambo y QuiparacraHuachon y la Regin de Pasco. Ai Apaec: Arqueologa
del Per. http://w w w.deperu.com/arqueologia/
paucartambo.html, accessed February 8, 2014.
Walker, Peter A.
2005 Political Ecology: Where is the Ecology? Progress in Human Geography 29(1):7382.
Wheeler, Jane C.
1984 On the Origin and Early Development of Camelid Pastoralism in the Andes. In Animals and Archaeology 3: Early
Herders and their Flocks, edited by Juliet Clutton-Brock
and Caroline Grigson, pp. 395410. BAR International
Series 202, British Archaeological Reports, Oxford.
1995 Evolution and Present Situation of the South American
Camelidae. Biological Journal of the Linnean Society
54(3):271295.
Wolf, Eric R.
1955 Types of Latin American Peasantry: A Preliminary Discussion. American Anthropologist 57(3):452471.
Zimmerer, Karl S.
1991 Wetland Production and Smallholder Persistence: Agricultural Change in a Highland Peruvian Region. Annals
of the Association of American Geographers 81(3):443463.
1994 Human Geography and the New Ecology: The Prospect
and Promise of Integration. Annals of the Association of
American Geographers 84(1):108125.