The scientific study of grave contexts and associated remains has a long history in the Andes. Most early chronological sequences were based on ceramics and other artefacts from burials. More recently, however, archaeologists have begun to look beyond grave goods and started to pay significant attention to skeletal remains, especially through bioarchaeology and fine-grained considerations of taphonomy and other micro-processes involved in the treatment of bodies, both pre- and post-interment. The two edited volumes under review here exemplify this boom in the archaeological study of death and the dead, and the associated rituals, practices and expressions therein in the ancient Andes. Both volumes aim to provide insight into current theoretical perspectives on death, in particular living-dead interactions, as well as a sample of recently discovered grave contexts. Each volume, however, takes a different approach, providing complementary additions to the archaeological literature on death in the past.
It is valuable to consider these two volumes together in order to contrast two principal theoretical trends in the study of ancient Andean mortuary rituals and conceptions of death: one that is mostly anchored in etic considerations or the cultural-historical, processual and, to some extent, neo-evolutionary paradigm, while the other highlights the value of an emic, symbolic, contextual and agent-centred approach. The volume by Shimada and Fitzsimmons aligns particularly well with the theoretical advances and trajectories taken by mortuary and bioarchaeology in the Pre-Columbian Americas, resonating with recent interests in ancestor veneration, social memory and the creation of the revered dead. As pointed out by Salomon in the concluding chapter of the Shimada and Fitzsimmons volume, two major changes have occurred since the publication of Tom Dillehay's Tombs for the living (1995). First, archaeologists have shifted their emphasis away from a sociology of death, meaning that focus has moved from corporate groupings and the relationships that the dead were made to embody, and towards emphasis on humans and objects, including mummies and ancestor figures, as actors. At the same time, scholars have begun to envision the dead as ‘dividuals’ made of different parts that can be assembled and disassembled through the creation of virtual persons. Indeed, the dead, as with the living, do not occupy unchanging social roles.
New data on funerary practices
The volume edited by Eeckhout and Owens, entitled Funerary practices and models in the ancient Andes, is the outcome of a symposium organised at the third International Congress of the Belgian Society for Americanists in Louvain-la-Neuve in 2008. This is a timely book that brings together 14 contributions written by 21 international authors, both emerging and established Andeanists. Their combined work sheds light on more than 3000 years of prehistory. Regionally, case studies range from Ecuador in the north, to Chile in the south, with a strong focus on the coastal sites of central and north Peru. On the central coast, late prehistory, in particular the Ychsma culture, is especially well represented with studies on the sites of Panquilma (Chapter 3), Pachacamac (Chapter 10) and Armatambo (Chapter 11).
Eeckhout and Owens introduce the volume with a discussion on the ‘impossibility of death’, by which they refer to humanity's capacity to rationalise the impossible. While the editors highlight the inherent methodological problems related to the archaeological study of fragmentary mortuary contexts and skeletal remains, they cogently point out that attitudes towards death can bring major insights into the emotional, physical and financial resources invested by different human groups. From this standpoint, the editors set the stage for the processual flavour of most of the volume's contributions.
Most chapters provide detailed descriptions of excavation procedures, grave arrangements, funerary paraphernalia, burial types, funerary structures and treatment of the body, among other variables. Chapters 3 and 8 provide a contrast by elaborating theoretical models to be tested through the examination of primary mortuary data; they explore issues of ancestor veneration and political competition, as well as social identities, craft specialisation and mortuary paraphernalia, respectively. Chapter 2 stands on its own by offering a tentative synthesis of burial patterns during the Formative Period. Early grave contexts are also reported at the early Initial Period temple structure of San Juanito in the Santa Valley (Chapter 4). Most of the remaining contributions are notable for the sheer size of the burial samples, with minimum numbers of individuals in the hundreds at Palpa (Chapter 6), Pachacamac (Chapter 10) and Armatambo (Chapter 11), as well as Wari and Tiwakau (Chapter 9).
The editors deserve recognition for organising a volume heavy with unreported data. Indeed, they invited “the contributors to focus on the provision and analysis of new field data, from which to create a new range of paradigms to focus on current and future work in Andean funerary archaeology” (p. 2). Most authors accordingly present data-rich contributions emphasising detailed descriptions of unpublished excavation contexts, with special reference to cemeteries and interments associated with religious monuments, and laboratory procedures including the unwrapping of mummy bundles (Chapter 11) and the pharmacological analysis of Nectandra seeds from funerary contexts (Chapter 14).
Most contributions are ‘theory-free’ and proceed directly to the data and their interpretations. The editors recognise this situation in the introduction, pointing out that the chapters were written on the “basis of new field data, rather than purely theoretical, model-heavy works based on extensive data” (p. 7). Although implicit, most contributions address cultural historical, typological, and, to some extent, processual questions. For instance, recurring concerns centre on the identification of burial patterns, normal vs “deviant” mortuary behaviours, the materialisation of social identities and social differentiation as visible through the degree of energy investment. The volume is navigated via a useful index, and a high number of illustrations are provided, although some of the latter are too small to be fully appreciated.
Living-dead interactions
The volume edited by Shimada and Fitzsimmons, Living with the dead in the Andes, is the second to result from a symposium organised at the seventieth Annual Meeting of the Society for American Archaeology in Salt Lake City in 2005. The first collection (Fitzsimmons & Shimada Reference Fitzsimmons and Shimada2011) focused on mortuary rituals in Mesoamerica; this second volume concerns the Andes and includes 10 chapters from 14 international contributors. It is a well-crafted volume that builds on the theoretical and methodological discussions in sociocultural anthropology, social archaeology and bioarchaeology over the last three decades. The editors deserve praise for bringing together a group of seasoned scholars whose research agendas and long-term programmes allow for major theoretical advances in the discussion of the myriad material expressions of living-dead engagements in the Andes.
As outlined by the editors, the book “focuses on variability among expressions of the living-dead relationships in the Andes” (p. 4). Concepts of the dead, ancestors, death, life, personhood and the body, although critical in the Andean world, have received insufficient archaeological, and especially bioarchaeological, treatment. The aims of the book thus include documenting the variability in the treatment of the dead, defining conceptions of the dead and their symbolic transformations, exploring the persistence and varied living-dead interactions, and advocating innovative methodologies, perspectives and approaches.
Most contributions focus on bodies, their parts and representations as instantiations of key, powerful beings that were sources of life, kinship, politics and more. Some of the themes explored include: the reuse of ancient ruins for the ritual killing of camelids and the burial of children (Chapter 2); the imagery and symbolism associated with decapitation practices and severed heads (Chapter 3); human sacrifices and associated practices of organ removal (Chapter 4); ancestor veneration, visual representations and the creation of simulacra (Chapter 5); dead body politics (Chapter 6); and the symbolism associated with concepts of separation and life-death cycles (Chapter 8). While the contributions validate, to some extent, the editors’ premise that living-dead relationships in the Andes can be understood through ‘lo andino’, or Andean uniformitarianism, they underscore the value of considering the ‘dividual’ nature of human, animal and even object agents. In terms of data, the authors rely on a variety of ethnohistorical, ethnographic, archaeological, visual art and bioarchaeological sources.
Most contributions are firmly grounded in the social theory literature and explore the value and applicability of some concepts and approaches to living-dead interactions in the ancient Andes. Inspired by the work of Braudel, the dead are considered in highland Ancash through the instrumentalisation of the concept of the longue durée to consider living interactions as palimpsests of the composition and decision making of descendant groups over time (Chapter 5). The discussion mainly centres on formal variability through time, including choices of locations, containment, nurture and regeneration, necropolis and objectified histories, engaging and revitalising the dead, and the proliferation of simulacra. A similar concern resonates in the examination of bioarchaeological data from Pachacamac, Sicán and Huaca Sialupe (Chapter 3). The authors are notably interested in explaining the persistence and variability of living-dead mortuary practices and their material correlates, and they champion a cross-contextual, diachronic and multidisciplinary approach. Marilyn Strathern's (Reference Strathern1988) concept of Melanesian personhood as amalgams of relationships and substances pervades contributions, with most authors recognising the ‘partible’ aspect of people, their identities, bodies and representations.
Methodologically, the most refreshing developments are perhaps linked to the bioarchaeological study of the micro-processes involved in the treatment of bodies before, during and after burial. This archaeothanatology allows the tracking of indigenous mortuary rituals on the north coast of Peru through the colonial period as seen through the case study of the Chapel of San Pedro de Mórrope (Chapter 7). Results indicate the evident discrepancies between Native Andean and basic Christian ideological precepts. Contrary to the Christian idea that the dead are meant to rest for eternity, grave reopenings and related post-interment manipulations were not only common, but also expected in the ancient Andean world.
In summary, the two volumes persuasively advocate the development of multi- and inter-disciplinary collaborations, between skeletal and archaeological specialists. Shimada and Fitzsimmons's volume will be of significant interest to a broad range of academic archaeologists. Moreover, as it goes beyond the traditional focus on mortuary archaeology to look at the multitude of ways through which living-dead interactions and associated practices are materialised, the book will appeal to scholars from various disciplines including art history, sociocultural anthropology, bioarchaeology and religious studies. The book by Eeckhout and Owens provides an astounding amount of unreported data that will be of great value to regional specialists. Together, these two volumes exemplify the dynamic empirical and theoretical climate of bioarchaeology and mortuary studies in the Andes, both within the confines of cemeteries and beyond.
