Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant: The Process of Agricultural Transformation among the Coastal Osmore Springs of Southern Peru

University Of New Mexico, Albuquerque NM

Investigators

Abstract

With National Science Foundation support, Mr Gregory Zaro will conduct doctoral disserrtation research on the far south coast of Peru. The study seeks to explain the process of agricultural development in the coastal Osmore region of southern Peru between AD 300 and 1700 by understanding the interplay of both cultural and ecological variables that condition agricultural decisions. Previous research suggests the coastal Osmore springs fell in and out of production throughout the period of investigation, and today some remain under cultivation while others lie completely abandoned. For millennia the climate of this typically dry region has experienced punctuated interruptions in the form of periodic el Nino events, tectonic activity, and gradual oscillating periods of above- and below-normal highland precipitation. The Osmore drainage also played host to a complex history that witnessed the rise and fall of ancient political powers such as Tiwanaku and Wari. An adequate understanding of how agriculture transformed along this hyper-arid coastline requires archaeologists to first identify the often-ephemeral indicators of past agrarian activities and situate them in their cultural and ecological contexts. For this study, emphasis is placed on the well-preserved site of Wawakiki, one of a series of prehistoric/historic spring-fed agricultural systems along the desert coast. The project will document diachronic changes in agricultural infrastructure and crop selection at Wawakiki, and place them in the context of wider patterns of resource exploitation among its neighboring spring systems north of the Osmore River. The resulting data will be analyzed using ESRI ArcGIS Desktop and ultimately interpreted against already defined sociocultural and environmental sequences from the main Osmore River valley. Excavations at Wawakiki are designed to generate data pertaining to the chronology of agricultural infrastructure and crop selection at Wawakiki, while analyses of semi-regional patterns of resource exploitation along the coast will be achieved using a survey database generated by Peruvian archaeologist Adan Umire. Wawakiki exhibits a well-preserved array of stone-faced terraces, furrows, seedling beds, and water impoundment tanks, and chronological development of these features represents agrarian technology, engineering skills, and the relative amounts of labor invested at a site. In addition, plant materials in archaeological contexts may provide direct insight into the nature of prehistoric agricultural production activities. Changes in crop selection reflect changing emphases on subsistence crops (e.g., maize), industrial crops (e.g., cotton), or both, and relative proportions of specific plants suggest the degree to which farmers specialized their production of particular cultigens. To determine the kinds of plants cultivated prehistorically, phytoliths, pollen, and macrobotanical remains from ancient fields at Wawakiki will be analyzed. Finally, these data will be contextualized within the regional sociopolitical and environmental setting of the Osmore drainage to understand the interplay of cultural and ecological variables that shape agricultural decisions at the local level. This research is important for several reasons. It will highlight the manners in which local communities sustained themselves agriculturally in this hyper-arid environment, and explain the degree to which cultural and natural factors contributed to agricultural decline and rebirth among the coastal Osmore springs.