“The Andes” can refer to the mountain range that stretches along the west coast of South America, but is also used to refer to a broader geographic area that includes the coastal deserts to the west and into the tropical jungles to the east of those mountains. This region is seen as home to a distinct cultural area—dating from around the fourth millennium B.C.E. to the time of the Spanish conquest—and many of these cultures still persist today in various forms.
From the desert coast, the mountains rise up quickly, sometimes within 10-20 kilometers of the Pacific Ocean. Therefore, the people who lived in the Andes had to adapt to varying types of climate and ecosystems. This diverse environment gave rise to a range of architectural and artistic practices.
Table showing the time periods, cultures, and territories within Andean prehistory. While the table ends with the Spanish conquest of the Inka in 1532, native cultures continue in the Andes, with many changes from their pre-conquest forms.
Deserts, mountains, and farms
Though much of the Andean coast is near the Equator, its waters are cold, due to currents from the Antarctic. This cold water is rich in sea life; however, during El Niño years, warm water takes over, leading to large die-offs of fish and marine mammals, and often creating catastrophic flooding on the coast.
Ocean and cliffs near the site of Pacatnamú, Peru, with the foothills of the Andes visible in the distance (photo: Dr. Sarahh Scher)
In normal years, the coast is very dry. The rivers that run to the coast, fed by melting snow from the Andes mountains (called the Cordillera Blanca, or White Mountains, in contrast to the Cordillera Negra, or Black Mountains to the west where snow does not fall), create areas of agricultural lands interspersed with desert. Cultures eventually learned to create canals, allowing them to irrigate more land, and irrigation remains important to farming on Peru’s coast.
Cross-section showing typical change in elevation in the Andes (diagram: Dr. Sarahh Scher)
As the elevation climbs, different ecological zones are created, and people of the Andes used these to grow different products: maize (corn), hot peppers, potatoes, and coca all grew at different elevations. Some cultures (such as the Cupisnique and Paracas) developed on the coast, and incorporated seafood into their diet. They would trade with the cultures that lived in the highlands (such as the Recuay and the inhabitants of Chavín de Huantar) for the things they could not grow for themselves. The people in the highlands would likewise trade with the coastal peoples for dried fish and products that would not grow at their elevation, as well as exotic animals like parrots from the tropical jungles to the east.
Plants and animals
Leaves of an Erythroxylum coca plant, Colombia (photo: Darina, CC BY-SA 3.0)
The plants and animals of the Andes provided ancient peoples with food, medicine, clothing, heat, and many other resources for daily life. As noted above, the rapid change in elevation of the Andes meant that many different foods could be grown in a compressed area. Celery was a staple food of the highlands, and maize and manioc were important in the lower elevations.
Coca grew in the highlands but was traded all over the Andes. The leaves of this plant, when chewed, provide a stimulant that allows people to walk for long periods at high altitude without getting tired, and it suppresses hunger. It was used by travelers in the highlands, but was also used in ritual practices to endure long nights of dancing. In modern times, people drink it as a tea to help with the symptoms of altitude sickness.
Terraced hillsides at the Inka ruins of Písac, Peru (photo: Paulo JC Nogueira, CC BY-SA 3.0)
Farming in the steep topography of the mountains could be difficult, and an important innovation developed by the Andeans was the use of terracing. By creating terraces (essentially giant steps along the contours of a mountain) people were able to make flat, easily worked plots. The terraces were formed by creating retaining walls that were then backfilled with a thick layer of loose stones to aid drainage, and topped with soil.
The most important animals in the highlands were camelids: the wild vicuña and guanaco, and their domesticated relatives, the llama and alpaca. Alpacas have soft wool and were sheared to make textiles, and llamas can carry burdens over the difficult terrain of the mountains (an adult male llama can carry up to 100 pounds, but could not carry an adult human).
Left: Alpacas, Ecuador (photo: Philippe Lavoie, public domain); Right: Llama near Cusco, Peru (photo: Dr. Sarahh Scher)
Both animals were also used for their meat, and their dried dung served as fuel in the high altitudes, where there was no wood to burn. Andean camelids, like their African and Asian cousins, can be very headstrong. If they are overloaded, they will sit on the ground and refuse to budge. Because of this, the ancient people of the Andes did not have domesticated animals that could carry them or pull heavy wagons, and so roads and methods of moving people and goods developed differently than in Europe, Asia, and Africa. The wheel was known, but not used for transport, because it simply would not have been useful.
Textile arts
Weaving with traditionally dyed alpaca wool, Chinchero, Peru (photo: Rosalee Yagihara, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)
The ancient peoples of the Andes developed textile technology before ceramics or metallurgy. Textile fragments found at Guitarrero Cave date from c. 5780 B.C.E. Over the course of millennia, techniques developed from simple twining to complex woven fabrics. By the first millennium C.E., Andean weavers had developed and mastered every major technique, including double-faced cloth and lace-like open weaves.
Andean textiles were first made using fibers from reeds, but quickly moved to yarn made from cotton and camelid fibers. Cotton grows on the coast, and was cultivated by ancient Andeans in several colors, including white, several shades of brown, and a soft grayish blue. In the highlands, the alpaca provided soft, strong wool in natural colors of white, brown, and black. Both cotton and wool were also dyed to create more colors: red from cochineal, blue from indigo, and other colors from plants that grew at various elevations. Alpaca wool is much easier to dye than cotton, and so it was usually preferred for coloring. The extra time and effort needed to dye fibers made the bright colors a symbol of status and wealth throughout Andean history.
Ceramics
Oxygenated sculptural ceramic ceremonial vessel that represents a dog, c. 100-800 C.E., Moche, Peru, 180 mm high (Museo Larco).
Though ceramics were not as valuable as textiles to Andean peoples, they were important for spreading religious ideas and showing status. People used plain everyday wares for cooking and storing foods. Elites often used finely made ceramic vessels for eating and drinking, and vessels decorated with images of gods or spiritually important creatures were kept as status symbols, or given as gifts to people of lesser status to cement their social obligations to those above them.
There are a wide variety of Andean ceramic styles, but there are some basic elements that can be found throughout the region’s history. Wares were mostly fired in an oxygenating atmosphere, resulting in ceramics that often had a red cast from the clay’s iron content. Some cultures, such as the Sicán and Chimú, instead used kilns that deprived the clay of oxygen as it fired, resulting in a surface ranging from brown to black.
Non-oxygenated ceramic feline bottle, 12th–15th century, Chimú (Peru), 28.26 cm high (The Metropolitan Museum of Art)
Decoration of ceramics could be done by incising lines into the surface, creating textures by rocking seashells over the damp clay, or by painting the surface.
Some early elite ceramics were decorated after firing with a paint made from plant resin and mineral pigments. This produced a wide variety of bright colors, but the resin could not withstand being heated and so these resin-painted wares were only for display and ritual use. Most ceramics in the Andes instead were slip-painted. Slip is a liquid that is made of clay, and the color of the slip is determined by the color of the clay and its mineral content. Most slip painting was applied before firing, after the semi-dry clay had been burnished with a smooth stone to prepare the surface. The range of slip colors could vary from two (seen in Moche ceramics) to seven or more (seen in Nasca ceramics). Once fired, the burnished surface would be shiny. Ceramics, because of their durability, are one of the greatest resources for understanding ancient Andean cultures.
Female figurine, 1400–1533, Inka, Silver-gold alloy, 14.9 x 3.5 cm (The Metropolitan Museum of Art)
Knife (tumi) with Removable Figural Handle, Moche, 50-800 C.E., green copper with patina, 11.43 x 2.5 x 1.43 cm (Walters Art Museum)
Metalwork
Metalworking developed later in Andean history, with the oldest known gold artifact dating to 2100 B.C.E., and evidence of copper smelting from around 900–700 B.C.E. Gold was used for jewelry and other forms of ornamentation, as well as for making sculptural pieces. Inka figurines of silver and gold depicting humans and llamas have been recovered from high-altitude archaeological sites in Peru and Chile. Copper and bronze were also used to create jewelry and items like ceremonial knives (called tumis).
Architecture
The architecture of the Andes can be divided roughly between highland and coastal traditions. Coastal cultures tended to build using adobe, while highland cultures depended more on stone. However, the lowland site of Caral, which is currently the oldest complex site known in the Andes, was built mainly using stone.
Caral, Peru, founded c. 2800 B.C.E. (photo: Pativilcano, CC BY-SA 3.0)
Beginning with Caral in 2800 B.C.E, various cultures constructed monumental structures such as platforms, temples, and walled compounds. These structures were the focus of political and/or religious power, like the site of Chavín de Huantár in the highlands or the Huacas de Moche on the coast. Many of these structures have been heavily damaged by time, but some reliefs and murals used to decorate them survive.
Painted adobe relief, Huaca de La Luna,100 CE to 800 C.E., Moche (Peru) (photo: Marco Silva Navarrete, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)
The best-known architecture in the Andes is that of the Inka. The Inka used stone for all of their important structures, and developed a technique that helped protect the structures from earthquakes. Because of its stone construction, Inka architecture has survived more easily than the adobe architecture of the coast. Ongoing efforts by archaeologists and the Peruvian Ministry of Culture are also focused on restoring and preserving the great works of coastal architecture.
Inka stone doorways, Qoricancha, Cusco (photo: Jean Robert Thibault, CC BY-SA 2.0)
Ancient past, continuing traditions
From textiles to ceramics, metalwork, and architecture, Andean cultures produced art and architecture that responded to their natural environment and reflected their beliefs and social structures. We can learn much about these ancient traditions through the artifacts and sites that survive, as well as the many ways that these practices—such as weaving—persist today.
Source: Dr. Sarahh Scher, “Introduction to Andean Cultures,” in Smarthistory, October 6, 2017, accessed July 31, 2024, https://smarthistory.org/intro-andes/.
Early Cultures and Civilizations in South America
South of Mesoamerica and north of the Andes lies a dense tropical jungle that long prevented any regular communication or cultural transmission between the two areas. As a result, the early cultures and civilizations in South America developed in different ways and responded to different environmental factors. Neolithic settlements like Norte Chico in today’s Peru had already emerged by 3000 BCE. However, in the centuries following this, others proliferated in the Northern Highlands as well. These include sites known today as Huaricoto, Galgada, and Kotosh, which were likely religious centers for offering sacrifices. There was also Sechin Alto, built along the desert coast after 2000 BCE. Then, around 1400 BCE, groups in the Southern Highlands area around Lake Titicaca (on the border between Peru and Bolivia) began growing in size after adopting agricultural practices. The construction of a large sunken court in this area around 1000 BCE indicates they had their own sophisticated ceremonial rituals.
Around 900 BCE, the Andes region experienced a transformation when a single society, often called the Chavín culture, expanded across the entire area, opening what archaeologists call the Early Horizon, or Formative, period. The Chavín culture is known for its distinctive pottery style, which spread throughout the entire region and depicted numerous people, deities, and animals in a flowing and balanced manner.
The name Chavín comes from Chavín de Huántar, possibly the culture’s most important religious center. This site is more than ten thousand feet high in the Andes Mountains, to the east of the older Norte Chico settlements. Its dominant architectural feature was its large temple complex, which faced the rising sun and included a maze of tunnels snaking through. Deep within the tunnels was a large sculpture of possibly this culture’s chief deity, called El Lanzón (“great lance”) because of its long lance-like shape. The image of El Lanzón mixes both human and animal features, with flared wide nostrils, bared teeth, long fangs on either side of the mouth, and claws protruding from fingertips and toes. The temple was also decorated with many other sculptures of animals, human heads, and deities bearing the features of both, all probably intended to awe residents and visitors alike.
The inhabitants of Chavín de Huántar numbered about twenty-five hundred by 200 BCE as it slipped into decline. The site’s importance lay in its role as a religious or ceremonial site, not as a population center. But by around 400 BCE, the Chavín religion and culture had spread far and wide across the Andes region. Whether these influences were transmitted by trade or warfare is unclear. Eventually, however, they replaced other architectural and artistic styles and burial practices. Innovations in textile production and metalworking in gold, silver, and copper also proliferated around the region. Craftspeople in towns and villages produced textiles and metal objects, and traders moved them from place to place along improved routes and with the aid of llamas as pack animals.
Chavín Culture and Its Influence. Between about 900 and 200 BCE, the Chavín culture exerted a strong influence over much of what is today coastal and Andean Peru. (attribution: Copyright Rice University, OpenStax, under CC BY 4.0 license)
Beginning around 200 BCE, the influence of Chavín cultural styles and religious symbols began to wane. This came at a time of increased regional warfare among many groups, evidenced by the increasing use of defensive features like walls around settlements. The broader Chavín-influenced region then fragmented into a number of regional cultures that grew to full-fledged civilizations like the Moche, Nazca, and Tiwanaku.
Moche, Nazca, and Tiwanaku Cultures. The Moche and Nazca civilizations both emerged around 200 BCE in different parts of what had formerly been Chavín areas of influence. The Tiwanaku civilization also traces its roots back to about 200 BCE, but its major building period started around 100 CE. (attribution: Copyright Rice University, OpenStax, under CC BY 4.0 license)
The Moche civilization emerged in northern Peru and made major settlements with large pyramid-style architecture at Sipán, Moche, and Cerro Blanco. Its people were agriculturalists with a keen knowledge of irrigation technology, which they used to grow squash, beans, maize, and peppers. They were also a highly militaristic society; their art depicts warriors in hand-to-hand combat, scenes of torture, and other forms of physical violence. The Moche formed a politically organized state with a sophisticated administration system. Their cities and burial practices reflect a hierarchical organization, with powerful divine kings and families of nobles ruling from atop large pyramids. Below these two tiers was a class of many bureaucrats who helped manage the state. Near the bottom of the social order were the large numbers of workers, agricultural and otherwise, who lived in the many agricultural villages controlled by the elite.
The Moche at War. The Moche commanded a highly militaristic state that used war as well as ceremonial violence to subjugate surrounding populations. This colorful reproduction of a scene originally painted on a piece of Moche pottery (300–700 CE) shows a ceremony in which a Moche lord hands a cup to a high priest (top) as bound prisoners endure bloodletting at the hands of their captors (bottom). (credit: “Mural de la cultura Moche” by SCALA/Wikimedia Commons, CC0 1.0)
Far to the south of the Moche, along the dry coast of southern Peru, were the Nazca, whose culture also emerged around 200 BCE. While the terrain there is parched, with rainfall virtually unknown in some areas, the rivers that carry water from the mountains provided the Nazca with sufficient water for irrigation. Unlike the Moche in their large cities, the Nazca people lived mostly in small villages. However, they maintained important ceremonial sites like Cahuachi, where villagers made pilgrimages and witnessed elaborate fertility and other rituals.
Politically, the Nazca may have adopted a type of confederation made up of a number of important families. Apart from many human-altered hills, called huacas, they also left behind hundreds of geoglyphs, large artistic representations imprinted in the dry desert ground. These are sometimes referred to as the Nazca Lines, and they can be either geometric patterns or images of animals like birds, fish, lizards, and cats. Some are as large as twelve hundred feet long and were created by clearing stones away from the desert floor to reveal the different-colored ground beneath.
Nazca Lines. Between 200 BCE and 600 CE, the Nazca in modern southern Peru created massive images of animals and other shapes like this bird by moving rocks to reveal the different-colored desert floor beneath. (credit: “The Condor” by Roger Canals/Wikimedia Commons, CC0 1.0)
Whereas the Nazca lived in the arid coastal desert, the Tiwanaku civilization thrived high in the mountains near Lake Titicaca. Like the Moche and Nazca societies, this culture emerged in the wake of the collapse of Chavín culture around 200 BCE. Beginning around 100 CE, it entered a period of sustained building at its key city of Tiwanaku. There, residents built two large stone structures topped by additional buildings and carved stone artwork. A signature feature of the structures at Tiwanaku is the many “trophy heads” that poke out from among the stone blocks. Noting the different facial features on each head, some scholars have concluded that they represent important ancestors of the Tiwanaku elite or possibly the gods of various conquered groups.
Tiwanaku “Trophy Heads.” So-called trophy heads decorate the face of this wall built between the third and sixth centuries CE at Tiwanaku, near Lake Titicaca between Bolivia and Peru. (credit: modification of work “Tiwanaku23” by Alexson Scheppa Peisino (AlexSP)/Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain)
At its height, the city supported perhaps as many as forty thousand people and oversaw at least four smaller cities in the surrounding area. It may even have been the center of a type of imperial system, with colonies on both the Pacific coast and the eastern side of the Andes. To support Tiwanaku and the other related cities, the people irrigated massive fields with a network of canals to grow potatoes. They also raised domesticated llamas and used them as pack animals for long-distance trade.
Tiwanaku survived until about 1000 CE and may have declined as the water level in Lake Titicaca rose to flood its farmland. The other civilizations of this period—the Moche and the Nazca—had disappeared long before, between 500 and 600 CE, for reasons that likely included environmental transformations. Other Andean civilizations emerged in their wake, including the Wari of the highlands of southeastern Peru and the Chimor of coastal Peru. These later groups built upon the earlier cultures’ innovations in agriculture, art, manufacturing, and trade. While Wari declined around 800 CE, Chimor survived into the fifteenth century. It was only in the 1400s that Chimor was conquered by a new and expanding imperial system, the Inca.
Further reading and viewing:
Read or listen to a short expert description of the Chavín bottle with caiman presented by the Metropolitan Museum of Art, which holds this item in its collection.
In addition, you can explore a number of other artifacts from the period at the Met website.
The Nazca Lines in Peru have baffled scholars for many years. Watch this video about the Nazca Lines to learn more about how some are trying to understand these giant geoglyphs today.
Adapted from Smarthistory, Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License and from World History, Vol. 1, OpenStax (CC by 4.0)
LITERATURE
Ancient Andean art in context: An origin story (“The Legend of Ñaymlap”)
“In the Denver Art Museum’s Art of the Ancient Americas galleries, we worked with Mexico City-based animators Hola Combo to create animations to help tell the origin stories that explain the relationship between ancient American communities and the their environment. For the Andes, we chose a story that loosely relates to the works on display. “The Legend of Ñaymlap” is an ancient story from Peru’s northern coastal communities and supposedly records the origins of the Sicán or Lambayeque dynasty (about 750–1375 CE). Within this origin story, there is a moral about the relationship between the deities and the land. As the ruler turns away from the deities, rain and floods devastate the land, starving the community.”
The 5000-year-old 626-hectare archaeological site of The Sacred City of Caral-Supe is situated on a dry desert terrace overlooking the green valley of the Supe river. It dates back to the Late Archaic Period of the Central Andes and is the oldest centre of civilization in the Americas. Exceptionally well-preserved, the site is impressive in terms of its design and the complexity of its architectural, especially its monumental stone and earthen platform mounts and sunken circular courts. One of 18 urban settlements situated in the same area, Caral features complex and monumental architecture, including six large pyramidal structures. A quipu (the knot system used in Andean civilizations to record information) found on the site testifies to the development and complexity of Caral society. The city’s plan and some of its components, including pyramidal structures and residence of the elite, show clear evidence of ceremonial functions, signifying a powerful religious ideology.
The Andes region encompasses the expansive mountain chain that runs nearly 4,500 miles north to south, covering parts of modern-day Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, Chile, and Argentina. The pre-Columbian inhabitants of the Andes developed a stunning visual tradition that lasted over 10,000 years before the Spanish invasion of South America in 1532.
One of the most ecologically diverse places in the world, the Andes mountains give way to arid coastlines, fertile mountain valleys, frozen highland peaks that reach as high as 22,000 feet above sea level, and tropical rainforests. These disparate geographical and ecological regions were unified by complex trade networks grounded in reciprocity.
The Andes was home to thousands of cultural groups that spoke different languages and dialects, and who ranged from nomadic hunter-gatherers to sedentary farmers. As such, the artistic traditions of the Andes are highly varied.
Map of South America showing the Andes (map: Mapswire, CC BY 4.0)
Pre-Columbian architects of the dry coastal regions built cities out of adobe, while highland peoples excelled in stone carving to produce architectural complexes that emulated the surrounding mountainous landscape.
Artists crafted objects of both aesthetic and utilitarian purposes from ceramic, stone, wood, bone, gourds, feathers, and cloth. Pre-Columbian Andean peoples developed a broad stylistic vocabulary that rivaled that of other ancient civilizations in both diversity and scope. From the breathtaking naturalism of Moche anthropomorphic ceramics to the geometric abstraction found in Inka textiles, Andean art was anything but static or homogeneous.
Characteristics
While Andean art is perhaps most notable for its diversity, it also possesses many unifying characteristics. Andean artists across the South American continent often endowed their works with a life force or sense of divinity. This translated into a process-oriented artistic practice that privileged an object’s inner substance over its appearance.
Border fragment, Paracas, 4th-3rd century B.C.E., cotton and camelid fiber, 1.43 x 12.7 cm (The Metropolitan Museum of Art)
Andean art is also characterized by its environmental specificity; pre-Columbian art and architecture was intimately tied to the natural environment. Textiles produced by the Paracas culture, for instance, contained vivid depictions of local birds that could be found throughout the desert peninsula.
Hummigbird, Nasca geoglyph, over 300 feet in length, created approximately 2000 years ago (photo: Diego Delso, CC BY-SA 4.0)
The nearby Nazca culture is best known for its monumental earthworks in the shape of various aquatic and terrestrial animals that may have served as pilgrimage routes. The Inkas, on the other hand, produced windowed monuments whose vistas highlighted elements of the adjacent sacred landscape. Andean artists referenced, invoked, imitated, and highlighted the natural environment, using materials acquired both locally and through long-distance trade. Andean objects, images, and monuments also commanded human interaction.
A window frames a view of the surrounding mountains, Machu Picchu (photo: Sarahh Scher, CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)
Worn, touched, held, maneuvered, or ritually burned
Pre-Columbian Andean art was meant to be touched, worn, held, maneuvered, or ritually burned. Elaborately decorated ceramic pots would have been used for storing food and drink for the living or as grave goods to accompany the deceased into the afterlife. Textiles painstakingly embroidered or woven with intricate designs would have been worn by the living, wrapped around mummies, or burned as sacrifices to the gods. Decorative objects made from copper, silver, or gold adorned the bodies of rulers and elites. In other words, Andean art often possessed both an aesthetic and a functional component — the concept of “art for art’s sake” had little applicability in the pre-Columbian Andes. This is not to imply that art was not appreciated for its beauty, but rather that the process of experiencing art went beyond merely viewing it.
Mantle, created to wrap a mummified body (“The Paracas Textile“), Nasca, 100-300 C.E., cotton, camelid fiber, 148 x 62.2 cm (Brooklyn Museum)
Detail, Mantle, created to wrap a mummified body (“The Paracas Textile”), Nasca, 100-300 C.E., cotton, camelid fiber, 148 x 62.2 cm (Brooklyn Museum)
The supernatural
A bead from a necklace buried with the Old Lord of Sipán, 300-390 C.E., gold, 3 × 5.2 × 4.5 × 8.3 cm (photo: Sarahh Scher, CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)
At the same time that Andean art commanded human interaction, it also resonated with the supernatural realm. Some works were never seen or used by the living. Mortuary art, for instance, was essentially created only to be buried in the ground.
The magnificent ceramics and metalwork found at the grave of the Lord of Sipán on Peru’s north coast required a tremendous output of labor, yet were never intended for living beings. The notion of “hidden” art was a convention found throughout the pre-Columbian world. In Mesoamerica, for instance, burying objects in ritual caches to venerate the earth gods was practiced from the Olmec to the Aztec civilizations.
Works of art associated with particular rituals, on the other hand, were often burned or broken in order to “release” the object’s spiritual essence. Earthworks and architectural complexes best viewed from high above would have only been “seen” from the privileged vantage point of supernatural beings. Indeed, it is only with the advent of modern technology such as aerial photography and Google Earth that we are able to view earthworks such as the Nazca lines from a “supernatural” perspective.
Art was often conceived within a dualistic context, produced for both human and divine audiences. The pre-Columbian Andean artistic traditions covered here comprise only a sampling of South America’s rich visual heritage. Nevertheless, it will provide readers with a broad understanding of the major cultures, monuments, and artworks of the Andes as well as the principal themes and critical issues associated with them.
Feline-Head Bottle, 15th-5th century B.C.E., Cupisnique, Jequetepeque Valley (possibly Tembladera), Peru, ceramic and post-fired paint, 32.4 x 20.5 x 13.3 cm (The Metropolitan Museum of Art)
Speakers: Dr. Sarahh Scher and Dr. Steven Zucker.
Source: Dr. Sarahh Scher and Dr. Steven Zucker, “Feline-Head Bottle,” in Smarthistory, September 25, 2016, accessed July 31, 2024, https://smarthistory.org/feline-bottle/.
Chavín de Huántar
by Dr. Sarahh Scher
Archaeological site of Chavín de Huántar (photo: Apollo, CC BY 2.0)
Chavín de Huántar is an archaeological and cultural site in the Andean highlands of Peru. Once thought to be the birthplace of an ancient “mother culture,” the modern understanding is more nuanced. The cultural expressions found at Chavín most likely did not originate in that place, but can be seen as coming into their full force there. The visual legacy of Chavín would persist long after the site’s decline in approximately 200 B.C.E., with motifs and stylistic elements traveling to the southern highlands and to the coast. The location of Chavín seems to have helped make it a special place—the temple built there became an important pilgrimage site that drew people and their offerings from far and wide.
At 10,330 feet (3150 meters) in elevation, it sits between the eastern (Cordillera Negra—snowless) and western (Cordillera Blanca—snowy) ranges of the Andes, near two of the few mountain passes that allow passage between the desert coast to the west and the Amazon jungle to the east. It is also located near the confluence of the Huachesca and Mosna Rivers, a natural phenomenon of two joining into one that may have been seen as a spiritually powerful phenomenon.
The temple complex
Over the course of 700 years, the site drew many worshipers to its temple who helped in spreading the artistic style of Chavín throughout highland and coastal Peru by transporting ceramics, textiles, and other portable objects back to their homes.
Model of the temple at Chavín de Huántar archaeological site. Peru, 900–200 B.C.E. (photo: Sarahh Scher, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)
The temple complex that stands today is comprised of two building phases: the U-shaped Old Temple, built around 900 B.C.E., and the New Temple (built approximately 500 B.C.E.), which expanded the Old Temple and added a rectangular sunken court. The majority of the structures used roughly-shaped stones in many sizes to compose walls and floors. Finer smoothed stone was used for carved elements. From its first construction, the interior of the temple was riddled with a multitude of tunnels, called galleries. While some of the maze-like galleries are connected with each other, some are separate. The galleries all existed in darkness—there are no windows in them, although there are many smaller tunnels that allow for air to pass throughout the structure. Archaeologists are still studying the meaning and use of these galleries and vents, but exciting new explorations are examining the acoustics of these structures, and how they may have projected sounds from inside the temple to pilgrims in the plazas outside. It is possible that the whole building spoke with the voice of its god.
Lanzón Stela, Building B, Chavín de Huántar (photo: Cyark, CC BY-SA 3.0)
Encompassing the heavens and the earth
The god for whom the temple was constructed was represented in the Lanzón (left), a notched wedge-shaped stone over 15 feet tall, carved with the image of a supernatural being, and located deep within the Old Temple, intersecting several galleries.
Lanzón means “great spear” in Spanish, in reference to the stone’s shape, but a better comparison would be the shape of the digging stick used in traditional highland agriculture. That shape would seem to indicate that the deity’s power was ensuring successful planting and harvest.
The Lanzón depicts a standing figure with large round eyes looking upward. Its mouth is also large, with bared teeth and protruding fangs. The figure’s left hand rests pointing down, while the right is raised upward, encompassing the heavens and the earth. Both hands have long, talon-like fingernails. A carved channel runs from the top of the Lanzón to the figure’s forehead, perhaps to receive liquid offerings poured from one of the intersecting galleries.
Detail of carving, Lanzón Stela, Building B, Chavín de Huántar (photo: Cyark, CC BY-SA 3.0)
A mixture of human and animal features
Two key elements characterize the Lanzón deity: it is a mixture of human and animal features, and the representation favors a complex and visually confusing style. The fangs and talons most likely indicate associations with the jaguar and the caiman—apex predators from the jungle lowlands that are seen elsewhere in Chavín art and in Andean iconography. The eyebrows and hair of the figure have been rendered as snakes, making them read as both bodily features and animals.
Detail of carving, Lanzón Stela, Building B, Chavín de Huántar (photo: Cyark, CC BY-SA 3.0)
Further visual complexities emerge in the animal heads that decorate the bottom of the figure’s tunic, where two heads share a single fanged mouth. This technique, where two images share parts or outlines, is called contour rivalry, and in Chavín art it creates a visually complex style that is deliberately confusing, creating a barrier between believers who can see its true form and those outside the cult who cannot. While the Lanzón itself was hidden deep in the temple and probably only seen by priests, the same iconography and contour rivalry was used in Chavín art on the outside of the temple and in portable wares that have been found throughout Peru.
Nose Ornament, c. 500–200 B.C.E., Peru, North Highlands, Chavín de Huántar, hammered and cut gold, 2.3 cm high (Cleveland Museum of
The serpent motif seen in the Lanzón is also visible in a nose ornament in the collection of the Cleveland Museum of Art (above). This kind of nose ornament, which pinches or passes through the septum, is a common form in the Andes. The two serpent heads flank right and left, with the same upward-looking eyes as the Lanzón. The swirling forms beneath them also evoke the sculpture’s eye shape. An ornament like this would have been worn by an elite person to show not only their wealth and power but their allegiance to the Chavín religion. Metallurgy in the Americas first developed in South America before traveling north, and objects such as this that combine wealth and religion are among the earliest known examples. This particular piece was formed by hammering and cutting the gold, but Andean artists would develop other forming techniques over time.
Complexity and vision: the Staff God at Chavín de Huántar and beyond
by Dr. Sarahh Scher
Archaeological site of Chavín de Huántar (photo: Julio Martinich, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)
Art for the initiated
The artistic style seen in stone sculpture and architectural decoration at the temple site of Chavín de Huántar, in the Andean highlands of Peru, is deliberately complex, confusing, and esoteric. It is a way of depicting not only the spiritual beliefs of the religious cult at Chavín, but of keeping outsiders “out” while letting believers “in.” Only those with a spiritual understanding would be able to decipher the artwork.
Left: the Raimondi Stele, c. 900-200 B.C.E., Chavín culture, Peru (Museo Nacional de Arqueología Antropología e Historia del Peru, photo: Taco Witte, CC BY 2.0). Right: Line drawing of the Raimondi Stele (source: Tomato356, CC BY-SA 3.0)
The Raimondi Stele from Chavín de Huántar is an important object because it is so highly detailed and shows Chavín style at its most complex. It is easiest to see in a drawing, because the original sculpture is executed by cutting shallow but steep lines into the highly-polished stone surface, making it very difficult to make out the incised image. This style is deliberately challenging to understand, thereby communicating the mystery of the Staff God, and creating a difference between those initiated in the religion who can understand the imagery, and outsiders who cannot.
Powerful animals
The stele (see video directly below) shows the god holding staffs composed of numerous curling forms. Beneath the god’s hands we see upside-down and sideways faces, and the staffs terminate at the top in two snake heads with protruding tongues. The god’s belt is a compressed, abstracted face with two snakes extending from where the ears should be, perhaps substituting the snakes for hair, and turning the face with its snake-hair into a belt. The god’s hands and feet have talons rather than human fingernails, evoking felines and birds of prey.
These are references to animals that would have been exotic rumors to the people of highland Chavín: the jaguar, the harpy eagle, and the anaconda are all animals that dwell in the lush tropical jungle over the Andes mountains to the east. They are all apex predators, possessing physical qualities like strength, flight, and stealth that become metaphors for the power of the Staff God. Other supernatural imagery from Chavín includes images of caimans, crocodile-like animals that also inhabit the eastern jungles. Most people would never have seen these creatures, rendering them mythical in their own right, and suitable for depicting the mysterious nature of the god.
Multiple faces
The god’s face is actually composed of multiple faces (see video directly below). The eyes in the center looking upward are above a downturned mouth sporting feline fangs, but beneath that we can see another upside-down pair of eyes and a nose that use the same mouth. This is an artistic technique known as contour rivalry, where parts of an image can be visually interpreted in multiple ways. A similar thing is taking place on the god’s “forehead,” where we see another upside-down mouth with four large fangs protruding from it, which when associated with the eyes in the middle completes a full face. Above this multi-faced head is what appears to be an enormous headdress, which is composed of more faces that also multiply using contour rivalry, and have extensions emanating from them that terminate in curls and snake heads.
An intricate style
This intricate and confusing style was not just used for large monuments at Chavín. Smaller carved, decorative elements of the site’s architecture also display these kinds of supernatural figures. The two stone slabs seen below are examples of the kinds of sculptures found in cornices and other architectural elements at Chavín.
Stone sculpture (Museo Nacional de Chavín, photo and drawing: Dr. Sarahh Scher, CC BY-NC 4.0)
One of these depicts a standing figure with snakes for hair. It sports the same protruding fangs we see in the upside-down heads above the Staff God’s face. Large pendant earrings rest on its shoulders, and in its hands it holds two shells: a Strombus in its right hand and a Spondylus in its left. Spondylus shells are not native to Peru; they thrive in the warm coastal waters of what is now Ecuador, hundreds of kilometers from Chavín. Early on in the history of the Andes, there was a brisk trade in these shells as luxury items.
Carved Strombus shell trumpet (pututu) (Museo Nacional de Chavín, photo: Dr. Sarahh Scher, CC BY-NC 4.0)
Strombus can be found in Peruvian waters, but that is the southernmost reach of their range—they are more common in the north. A great number of carved Strombus shells turned into trumpets (called pututu) have been found at Chavín. Far from the ocean, these shells symbolized water and fertility. Furthermore, the Strombus is frequently associated with masculinity, while the Spondylus has feminine associations. The two together therefore signaled generative fertility and the power of the cult to foster agricultural prosperity.
Cornice sculpture (Museo Nacional de Chavín, photo and drawing: Dr. Sarahh Scher, CC BY-NC 4.0)
A second carved figure is more enigmatic, and is full of contour rivalry. The main figure appears to be composed of the head to the right, attached to a body with round spots, probably alluding to a jaguar. However, behind the head is another eye, nose, and fanged mouth, and the jaguar spots are joined by an eye with a profile mouth with fangs. Thus, what appears to be one creature at first glance may be as many as three. At the bottom left, we can see another fanged mouth, this one upside-down, but because the stone is broken, we’ve lost its context.
The spread of the Staff God
The image of the Staff God would spread throughout Peru. The imagery’s geographic reach gives us some insight into the contact between distant areas and the diffusion of imagery. Once thought to show the expansion of the cult of Chavín, today scholars are more hesitant to draw direct relationships between Chavín influence and these far-flung images. The Staff God may have had its roots in earlier cultural styles, including the one known as Cupisnique, making Chavín just one of many expressions of this deity. The Staff God’s imagery traveled extensively, far beyond the areas already mentioned.
Cupisnique-style crown, 800-500 B.C.E., gold, 24 × 15.5 cm (National Museum of the American Indian, Smithsonian Institution, photo: Dr. Sarahh Scher, CC BY-NC 4.0)
A Cupisnique gold crown from Chongoyape, Peru, also demonstrates the Staff God’s reach. The crown depicts a version of the god that is simpler than that seen in the Raimondi Stele, but it still uses contour rivalry and the trademark fanged mouths.
Textile fragment, 4th–3rd century B.C.E., Chavín culture, Peru, cotton, refined iron earth pigments, 14.6 x 31.1 cm (The Metropolitan Museum of Art, drawing by Dr. Sarahh Scher, CC BY-NC 4.0)
A painted textile fragment with the Staff God is thought to be from the southern Peruvian coast, hundreds of kilometers from Chavín (which is in the highlands). It is woven from cotton, which is a coastal agricultural product, and distinct from the camelid wool that came from the highlands. The Staff God here is shown with the head in profile, and with snakes emerging from the top of the head, with a feline-fanged mouth, snake belt, and taloned hands and feet. The figure is enclosed in a knot-like shape, composed of supernatural figures that blend snake and feline attributes. Other southern coastal textiles with Staff God imagery have been found, including some that render the Staff God as explicitly female, showing how this religious imagery transformed as it traveled.
The image of a divine figure holding staffs or similar objects in its hands would persist in Andean art long past the time of Chavín. The so-called “Sun Gate” at the site of Tiwanaku, near lake Titicaca in modern-day Bolivia, is 748 miles (about 1200 km) from Chavín. It dates from around 800–1000 C.E., and so is separated by at least a thousand years from the Raimondi Stele. However, like the Stele, it features an abstracted and intricate style that separates believers from outsiders.
Sun Gate, Tiwanaku, Bolivia (photo: Brent Barrett, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)
Tiwanaku style is more angular than Chavín, and the Sun Gate has a strong gridded organization that adds to the geometric feel. The central figure of the Sun Gate, while sharing the frontality of the Staff God and the familiar pose (arms at the sides, elbows bent, and vertical objects in its grasp), is also different from earlier iterations. The head is disproportionately large, rendered in a higher relief than the rest of the figure, and features projecting shapes that may represent the rays of the sun. Some terminate in feline heads in profile, a change from the earlier serpents seen at Chavín, Chongoyape, and in the textile fragment. In its hands it holds projectiles and a spear-thrower—weapons rather than elaborate staffs.
Sun Gate, Tiwanaku, Bolivia (photo: Ian Carvell, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)
The Sun Gate figure stands atop a stepped pyramid shape with serpentine figures emerging from it, a representation of the Akapana pyramid, which mirrored the nearby sacred mountain Illimani not only in shape but by having a series of internal and external channels that allowed rain water to cascade down the side of the structure like the above-and below-ground rivers of the mountain. Not only does it stand in the same pose as the Staff God; it, too, is associated with natural forces, like the mountain, the sun, and the waters of Illimani. The feline heads terminating the rays from the figure’s head are joined by the bird-human hybrid “attendant” figures in the rows to either side.
The meaning of the Staff God image was likely different in each of the places it has been found, an image of the sacred that came from afar and was adopted and adapted to the needs of the local people. In each case, however, we find that the intricate and often inscrutable imagery was a way of keeping believers separate from outsiders.
Source: Dr. Sarahh Scher, “Complexity and vision: the Staff God at Chavín de Huántar and beyond,” in Smarthistory, September 27, 2018, accessed July 31, 2024, https://smarthistory.org/staff-god-chavin/.