This volume is the result of a 2016 SAA symposium on Instrumental Neutron Activation Analysis (INAA) studies conducted at the Missouri University Research Reactor (MURR) of South American ceramics and comparative materials. The chapters presenting these studies cover a wide range of regions, countries, time periods, and cultures, and they offer valuable perspectives on ceramic production and exchange in South America. Several of these studies combine the use of different analysis techniques (not necessarily conducted at MURR), allowing for a higher level of data interpretation. This integrative trend is now strong in ceramic analysis and few projects can go without it.
The volume opens with a chapter by Glascock explaining the methodology of INAA at MURR, which eliminates the need to repeat this information in each chapter. The subsequent chapters relate to studies in the Andean-Amazonian frontier of Southwest Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Chile, Argentina, Eastern Lowlands of Bolivia, and Central Amazon, Brazil, which are briefly introduced below. All INAA and LA-ICP-MS studies were conducted at MURR, except were specified. The first study is by Giraldo, Speakman, Glascock, and Gudiño (Chapter 2), who analyze corrugated ceramics along with a small set of raw materials from the southwestern highlands of the San Agustin area and nearby Amazonian region in Colombia. The authors examine the direction and number of wares circulating, challenging the common views regarding the relationships between the two regions.
Lippi and Gudiño (Chapter 3) present the result of the INAA study in northern Ecuador of three ceramic assemblages from the Inca period found at and around Palmitobamba, along with a large number of local clays, which enhanced data interpretation. In another study in Ecuador, Masucci, Neff, Glascock, and Speakman (Chapter 4) look at Guangala finger-painted pottery on the southern coast to explore relationships between material choices, technology, and cultural meaning. Petrography facilitated choosing a subset of samples for INAA, while the comparative materials help tie the INAA results to geoenvironmental and mineral data.
The next eight studies deal with Peruvian material, from the north coast (Chapters 5, 6, and 7), the highlands (Chapters 8 and 10), the central coast (Chapter 9), and the south coast (Chapters 11 and 12).
Hayashida (Chapter 5) presents a very good summary of several INAA and other studies (technology, XRD, Moessbauer, petrography) that she conducted in years past. To highlight the implication of consumption contexts, she contrasts workshops 15 km apart for the production of beer jars for the Incas. Shimada (Chapter 6) also summarizes earlier studies, notably on the Poma kilns and ceramic production of Early Horizon Cupisnique, emphasizing the importance of a holistic approach, which combines results from petrography, XRD, Moessbauer, INAA, field experiments, and ethnography. Matsumoto (Chapter 7) uses INAA and petrography to study the composition of serving vessels from the great plaza in Sican to determine if the site was a pilgrimage center. His discussion about the decision steps taken when conducting the statistical analysis, such as identifying outliers, is exemplary, as are his reasons for accepting or rejecting the chemical groups proposed.
Toohey (Chapter 8) presents a preliminary study of the movement of Cajamarca-style ceramics in the Cajamarca region. Ethnographic studies led him to realize the possibility of itinerant productions, and that extensive sampling of clays, as well as mineralogical studies, are needed to complement his INAA study. Davenport (Chapter 9) looks at the use of pigments for Inca period ceramics at Pachacamac, integrating LA-ICP-MS and INAA data. Burger, Salazar, and Glascock (Chapter 10) present a study of Inca pottery production in the Cuzco region. It shows the benefits of doing long-term research and combining sets of data analyzed many years apart, in addition to recovering earlier INAA analysis conducted at the now closed Berkeley lab. This chapter is also a testimony that careful statistical analysis can make sense of data from different laboratories.
Conlee, Boulanger, and Glascock (Chapter 11) examine the composition of paste and paint pigments of ceramics from the Nasca region over a 1,500-year period in two INAA and one LA-ICP-MS studies. This research builds upon seven previous INAA ceramic and clay studies and two LA-ICP-MS studies of paint and paste by Vaughn and different colleagues, as well as one LA-ICP-MS study at the Field Museum in Chicago. Williams, Nash, Cook, Isbell, and Speakman (Chapter 12) contrast Inca, Nasca, and Wari ceramic productions as seen via INAA and LA-ICP-MS (Field Museum in Chicago) to contextualize Wari ceramic production at Cerro Baúl and other parts of the Moquegua Valley. The results build upon an intensive program of clay characterization by LA-ICP-MS at the Field Museum.
Studying ceramics from Bolivia from excavations along a future gas line, Gilstrap, Myers, and Neff (Chapter 13) look at provenience and technological traditions across three regions of the dry eastern lowlands.
The next four studies involve Chilean material from Formative to Late periods. Correa, Gallardo, Uribe, Echenique, Blanco, Flewett, Boulanger, and Glascock (Chapter 14) study ceramics and clays from the Atacama Desert coast with INAA and petrography, while Uribe, Vidal Montero, Glascock, Menzies, Muñoz, and Roush (Chapter 15) look at ceramics from the Tarapacá coastal region with petrography, QEMSCAN (Quantitative Evaluation of Minerals by Scanning Electron Microscopy, an automatic mineral analysis), and INAA. Both studies aimed to shed light on production patterns and distribution routes. Falabella, Alfaro, Planella, Boulanger, and Glascock (Chapter 16) analyze Llolleo pottery and ceramic smoking pipes from central Chile with binocular microscopy, INAA, and residue analysis to understand group integration. Cecil, Dillehay, and Glascok (Chapter 17) offer a summary of their INAA study of Araucan pottery and clays, adding to earlier stylistic and petrographic studies, to explore social networks and the integration of lineages in the Purén and Lumaco Valleys in south-central Chile.
For Argentina, three chapters relate to studies in the northwest and one in the centerwest of the country. Williams, D'Altroy, Neff, Speakman, and Glascock (Chapter 18) present the analysis of prestige ceramics in Inca Qollasuyu and the role of provincial subject elites as part of a larger INAA study of Inca-time ceramics and clays. Lazzari, Pereyra Domingorena, Stoner, Scattolin, Korstanje, and Glascock (Chapter 19) look at social interaction and communities of practice in northwest Argentina during the Formative period via INAA, LA-ICP-MS, and petrographic analyses of ceramics, obsidian, and volcanic rocks, summarizing here only the ceramic results. Giesso, Laguens, Bertolino, Boulanger, and Glascock (Chapter 20) present an overview of their INAA ceramic and clay studies, which examine the distribution of Aguada pottery in the Ambato Valley, with a brief mention about earlier petrographic analyses. Finally, Sugrañes, Ots, Glascock, and Neme (Chapter 21) investigate exchange between farmers and hunter-gatherers based on ceramics from central-western Argentina.
Chapter 22 by Neves, Munita, Hazenfratz, and Mongeló closes this round of INAA studies, looking at exchange networks in the Central Amazon (Orinoco Basin) in Brazil—a much welcome and needed window on this extensive area. The compositional “bias” introduced by the use of silica spicules from freshwater sponge for tempering the ceramic paste is carefully examined, and ethnographic and historic backgrounds prior to the nineteenth century allow the reader to grasp the characteristics of the Amazonian societies studied.
In the final chapter (Chapter 23), Neff and Vaughn present a historic account of INAA in the United States, comparing analysis trends presented in this volume and those presented by Glowacki and Neff 2002 (Ceramic Production and Circulation in the Greater Southwest: Source Determination by INAA and Complementary Mineralogical Investigations, Monograph 44, Cotsen Institute of Archaeology, University of California, Los Angeles). They evaluate the role of technology in relation to composition, geochemical patterning, social organization, and interactions based on INAA data. They see INAA as the technique of choice in Andean ceramic studies, but they do not consider that LA-ICP-MS is picking up speed, along with petrography and many other techniques, nor the impressive volume of archaeometric ceramic studies conducted in South America. These involve chemical and mineral analyses with XRD, SEM-EDX, Raman spectroscopy, petrography, Moessbauer, QEMSCAN, XRF (regular, portable, and micro), and INAA, notably in Argentina. The June 2019 Latin American archaeometry meeting in Bogotá, Colombia, attests to the high level of ceramic studies conducted in Latin America using a combination of analysis techniques. This does not reduce the excellent value of the MURR studies but puts them in perspective.
This volume shows the importance of well-designed studies and the advantages of combining different analytical approaches to reach a higher understanding of not only the data but also the producers, the consumers, and the society they lived in.
