Underwater ritual offerings in the Island of the Sun and the formation of the Tiwanaku state

Significance Ritual and religion are significant factors in primary or archaic state formation. These beliefs and practices not only legitimize these new political organizations in their ability to control supernatural forces, but also incentivize intragroup cooperation by punishing freeloading and rewarding cooperative behavior. Recent archaeological excavations from an underwater ceremonial location near the Island of the Sun in Lake Titicaca have revealed the remarkable constituent elements of repetitive rituals practiced by the Tiwanaku state between the 8th and 10th centuries CE. Evidence of animal sacrifice and high-value offerings of vessels, gold, shells, and lapidary stones on a strategically located reef illustrates how power was consolidated in one of the earliest Andean states. Considerable debate surrounds the economic, political, and ideological systems that constitute primary state formation. Theoretical and empirical research emphasize the role of religion as a significant institution for promoting the consolidation and reproduction of archaic states. The Tiwanaku state developed in the Lake Titicaca Basin between the 5th and 12th centuries CE and extended its influence over much of the south-central Andes of South America. We report on recent discoveries from the first systematic underwater archaeological excavations in the Khoa Reef near the Island of the Sun, Bolivia. The depositional context and compositional properties of offerings consisting of ceramic feline incense burners, killed juvenile llamas, and sumptuary metal, shell, and lapidary ornaments allow us to reconstruct the structure and significance of cyclically repeated state rituals. Using new theoretical tools, we explain the role of these rituals in promoting the consolidation of the Tiwanaku polity.

[1]  S. deFrance,et al.  Plotting abandonment: Excavating a ritual deposit at the Wari site of Cerro Baúl , 2019, Journal of Anthropological Archaeology.

[2]  D. Gifford-Gonzalez.  An Introduction to Zooarchaeology , 2018 .

[3]  C. Delaere.  The Location of Lake Titicaca’s Coastal Area During the Tiwanaku and Inca Periods: Methodology and Strategies of Underwater Archaeology , 2017, Journal of Maritime Archaeology.

[4]  C. Stanish.  The Evolution of Human Co-operation: Ritual and Social Complexity in Stateless Societies , 2017 .

[5]  S. Guédron,et al.  A ~6000 yr diatom record of mid- to late Holocene fluctuations in the level of Lago Wiñaymarca, Lake Titicaca (Peru/Bolivia) , 2017, Quaternary Research.

[6]  C. Delaere,et al.  Le patrimoine subaquatique du lac Titicaca, Bolivie. Utilisation et perception de l’espace lacustre durant la période Tiwanaku (500-1150 PCN) , 2016 .

[7]  Scott Atran.  Moralizing religions: Prosocial or a privilege of wealth? , 2014, Behavioral and Brain Sciences.

[8]  Melanie J. Miller,et al.  Transformations in ritual practice and social interaction on the Tiwanaku periphery , 2014, Antiquity.

[9]  Q. Hua,et al.  SHCal13 Southern Hemisphere Calibration, 0–50,000 Years cal BP , 2013, Radiocarbon.

[10]  Antonio de la Calancha,et al.  Historia del santuario de Nuestra Señora de Copacabana (1653) , 2011 .

[11]  C. Stanish,et al.  War and early state formation in the northern Titicaca Basin, Peru , 2011, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

[12]  Christine S. Vanpool.  The signs of the sacred: Identifying shamans using archaeological evidence , 2009 .

[13]  A. Shariff,et al.  The Origin and Evolution of Religious Prosociality , 2008, Science.

[14]  M. Aldenderfer,et al.  Four-thousand-year-old gold artifacts from the Lake Titicaca basin, southern Peru , 2008, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

[15]  Carmen Beatriz Loza.  El atado de remedios de un religioso/médico del periodo Tiwanaku: miradas cruzadas y conexiones actuales , 2007 .

[16]  K. V. Flannery,et al.  The coevolution of ritual and society: New 14C dates from ancient Mexico , 2004, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.

[17]  Matthew T. Seddon.  Excavations at the Site of Chucaripupata:: A Tiwanaku IV and V Temple and Domestic Occupation , 2004 .

[18]  M. Glascock,et al.  Evidence for Early Long-Distance Obsidian Exchange and Watercraft Use from the Southern Lake Titicaca Basin of Bolivia and Peru , 2002, Latin American Antiquity.

[19]  Geoffrey O. Seltzer,et al.  The history of South American tropical precipitation for the past 25,000 years. , 2001, Science.

[20]  M. Brenner,et al.  A 350014C yr High-Resolution Record of Water-Level Changes in Lake Titicaca, Bolivia/Peru , 1997, Quaternary Research.

[21]  E. Durkheim.  FROM THE ELEMENTARY FORMS OF THE RELIGIOUS LIFE , 1996, The New Economic Sociology.

[22]  R. Cohen,et al.  Origins of the State: The Anthropology of Political Evolution. , 1980 .

[23]  Sister Mechtraud join,et al.  The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life , 1955 .

[24]  N. D. Newell.  Geology of the Lake Titicaca region, Peru and Bolivia , 1949 .

[25]  B. Malinowski,et al.  Magic, science and religion : and other essays , 1948 .

[26]  U. Fink.  Ritual And Pilgrimage In The Ancient Andes The Islands Of The Sun And The Moon , 2016 .

[27]  C. Hastorf.  The Formative Period in the Titicaca Basin , 2008 .

[28]  A. Korpisaari.  Death in the Bolivian High Plateau: Burials and Tiwanaku Society , 2006 .

[29]  C. Stanish,et al.  Archaeological research on the Islands of the Sun and Moon, Lake Titicaca, Bolivia : final results of the Proyecto Tiksi Kjarka , 2004 .

[30]  C. Stanish.  Ancient Titicaca: The Evolution of Complex Society in Southern Peru and Northern Bolivia , 2003 .

[31]  M. Capriles.  Intercambio y uso ritual de fauna por Tiwanaku: Análisis de pelos y fibras de los conjuntos arqueológicos de Amaguaya, Bolivia , 2002 .

[32]  P. Boyer.  Religion Explained: The Evolutionary Origins of Religious Thought , 2001 .

[33]  Christopher Bronk Ramsey,et al.  DEVELOPMENT OF THE RADIOCARBON CALIBRATION PROGRAM , 2001 .

[34]  Matthew T. Seddon.  Ritual, power, and the development of a complex society : the Island of the Sun and the Tiwanaku state , 1998 .

[35]  Alan L. Kolata.  Tiwanaku and Its Hinterland: Archaeology and Paleoecology of an Andean Civilization , 1996 .

[36]  M. Bermann.  Lukurmata: Household Archaeology in Prehispanic Bolivia , 1994 .

[37]  Alan L. Kolata.  The Tiwanaku: Portrait of an Andean Civilization , 1993 .

[38]  Claude Dejoux,et al.  Lake Titicaca : a synthesis of limnological knowledge , 1992 .

[39]  LAKE TITICACA,et al.  Lake Titicaca , 1992, Monographiae Biologicae.

[40]  Bernabé Cobo,et al.  Historia del Nuevo Mundo , 1956 .

[41]  A. F. Bandelier.  The islands of Titicaca and Koati , 1910 .