Ryan Clasby and Jason Nesbitt
- Published in print:
- 2021
- Published Online:
- May 2022
- ISBN:
- 9780813066905
- eISBN:
- 9780813067131
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University Press of Florida
- DOI:
- 10.5744/florida/9780813066905.003.0001
- Subject:
- Archaeology, Prehistoric Archaeology
This chapter introduces the archaeology and history of the Upper Amazon. Although little studied in comparison to Andean archaeology in the neighbouring highlands, the Upper Amazon (a region ...
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This chapter introduces the archaeology and history of the Upper Amazon. Although little studied in comparison to Andean archaeology in the neighbouring highlands, the Upper Amazon (a region including waterways such as the Amazon River and Marañon River) has long thought to have been an important region to the development of social complexity in western South America. Through an overview of the volume, this chapter highlights major issues and themes that have been the focus of Upper Amazonian archaeology, including exchange and trade, frontiers and borderlands, and interregional interaction. It finishes by suggesting future directions for the field.Less
This chapter introduces the archaeology and history of the Upper Amazon. Although little studied in comparison to Andean archaeology in the neighbouring highlands, the Upper Amazon (a region including waterways such as the Amazon River and Marañon River) has long thought to have been an important region to the development of social complexity in western South America. Through an overview of the volume, this chapter highlights major issues and themes that have been the focus of Upper Amazonian archaeology, including exchange and trade, frontiers and borderlands, and interregional interaction. It finishes by suggesting future directions for the field.
Ryan Clasby and Jason Nesbitt (eds)
- Published in print:
- 2021
- Published Online:
- May 2022
- ISBN:
- 9780813066905
- eISBN:
- 9780813067131
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University Press of Florida
- DOI:
- 10.5744/florida/9780813066905.001.0001
- Subject:
- Archaeology, Prehistoric Archaeology
This volume brings together archaeologists working in Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia to construct a new prehistory of the Upper Amazon, outlining cultural developments from the late third millennium B.C. ...
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This volume brings together archaeologists working in Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia to construct a new prehistory of the Upper Amazon, outlining cultural developments from the late third millennium B.C. to the Inca Empire of the sixteenth century A.D. Encompassing the forested tropical slopes of the eastern Andes as well as Andean drainage systems that connect to the Amazon River basin, this vast region has been unevenly studied due to the restrictions of national borders, remote site locations, and limited interpretive models.
The Archaeology of the Upper Amazon unites and builds on recent field investigations that have found evidence of extensive interaction networks along the major rivers—Santiago, Marañon, Huallaga, and Ucayali. Chapters detail how these rivers facilitated the movement of people, resources, and ideas between the Andean highlands and the Amazonian lowlands. Contributors demonstrate that the Upper Amazon was not a peripheral zone but a locus for complex societal developments. Reaching across geographical, cultural, and political boundaries, this volume shows that the trajectory of Andean civilization cannot be fully understood without a nuanced perspective on the region’s diverse patterns of interaction with the Upper Amazon.Less
This volume brings together archaeologists working in Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia to construct a new prehistory of the Upper Amazon, outlining cultural developments from the late third millennium B.C. to the Inca Empire of the sixteenth century A.D. Encompassing the forested tropical slopes of the eastern Andes as well as Andean drainage systems that connect to the Amazon River basin, this vast region has been unevenly studied due to the restrictions of national borders, remote site locations, and limited interpretive models.
The Archaeology of the Upper Amazon unites and builds on recent field investigations that have found evidence of extensive interaction networks along the major rivers—Santiago, Marañon, Huallaga, and Ucayali. Chapters detail how these rivers facilitated the movement of people, resources, and ideas between the Andean highlands and the Amazonian lowlands. Contributors demonstrate that the Upper Amazon was not a peripheral zone but a locus for complex societal developments. Reaching across geographical, cultural, and political boundaries, this volume shows that the trajectory of Andean civilization cannot be fully understood without a nuanced perspective on the region’s diverse patterns of interaction with the Upper Amazon.
Estanislao M. Pazmiño
- Published in print:
- 2021
- Published Online:
- May 2022
- ISBN:
- 9780813066905
- eISBN:
- 9780813067131
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University Press of Florida
- DOI:
- 10.5744/florida/9780813066905.003.0007
- Subject:
- Archaeology, Prehistoric Archaeology
In recent years there has been a growing archaeological interest in the emergence of social complexity in the Upper Amazon, resulting in a number of new investigations within the region. These ...
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In recent years there has been a growing archaeological interest in the emergence of social complexity in the Upper Amazon, resulting in a number of new investigations within the region. These investigations have not only documented the existence of complex cultural developments within the upper Amazon but have provided alternative approaches for understanding of the emergence of social complexity. This work examines recent research within the Upano Valley in the Upper Amazon of Ecuador, which present a model of complex social organization and the emergence of ancient urbanism based on systematic landscaping strategies. Between 400 BC and AD 400, the Upano culture would construct highly organized, and densely occupied settlements and earthworks that would result in the dramatic modification of the Upano River Valley landscape. This chapter discuss the tangible effects of the landscape modification in the Upper Amazonian cultural developments of pre-Columbian Ecuador.Less
In recent years there has been a growing archaeological interest in the emergence of social complexity in the Upper Amazon, resulting in a number of new investigations within the region. These investigations have not only documented the existence of complex cultural developments within the upper Amazon but have provided alternative approaches for understanding of the emergence of social complexity. This work examines recent research within the Upano Valley in the Upper Amazon of Ecuador, which present a model of complex social organization and the emergence of ancient urbanism based on systematic landscaping strategies. Between 400 BC and AD 400, the Upano culture would construct highly organized, and densely occupied settlements and earthworks that would result in the dramatic modification of the Upano River Valley landscape. This chapter discuss the tangible effects of the landscape modification in the Upper Amazonian cultural developments of pre-Columbian Ecuador.
Warren R. Deboer
- Published in print:
- 2021
- Published Online:
- May 2022
- ISBN:
- 9780813066905
- eISBN:
- 9780813067131
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University Press of Florida
- DOI:
- 10.5744/florida/9780813066905.003.0014
- Subject:
- Archaeology, Prehistoric Archaeology
This chapter provides a conclusion to the volume by discussing the archaeological evidence presented in the previous chapters in relation to new advances in the fields of linguistics, epigenetics, ...
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This chapter provides a conclusion to the volume by discussing the archaeological evidence presented in the previous chapters in relation to new advances in the fields of linguistics, epigenetics, paleodemography, and paleoclimatology. Through an interdisciplinary approach that bridges archaeology with other sciences, scholars can better reconstruct the history of the peoples of the Upper Amazon.Less
This chapter provides a conclusion to the volume by discussing the archaeological evidence presented in the previous chapters in relation to new advances in the fields of linguistics, epigenetics, paleodemography, and paleoclimatology. Through an interdisciplinary approach that bridges archaeology with other sciences, scholars can better reconstruct the history of the peoples of the Upper Amazon.
Eduardo Kohn
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- September 2014
- ISBN:
- 9780520276109
- eISBN:
- 9780520956865
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of California Press
- DOI:
- 10.1525/california/9780520276109.001.0001
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Anthropology, Theory and Practice
Can forests think? Do dogs dream? This book challenges the very foundations of anthropology, calling into question our central assumptions about what it means to be human—and thus distinct from all ...
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Can forests think? Do dogs dream? This book challenges the very foundations of anthropology, calling into question our central assumptions about what it means to be human—and thus distinct from all other life forms. Based on four years of fieldwork among the Runa of Ecuador’s Upper Amazon, the book draws on ethnographic research to explore how Amazonians interact with the many creatures that inhabit one of the world’s most complex ecosystems. Whether or not we recognize it, our anthropological tools hinge on those capacities that make us distinctly human. However, when we turn our ethnographic attention to how we relate to other kinds of beings, these tools (which have the effect of divorcing us from the rest of the world) break down. This book seizes on this breakdown as an opportunity. Avoiding reductionistic solutions, and without losing sight of how our lives and those of others are caught up in the moral webs we humans spin, it skillfully fashions new kinds of conceptual tools from the strange and unexpected properties of the living world itself. The work takes anthropology in a new direction—one that offers a more capacious way to think about the world we share with other kinds of beings.Less
Can forests think? Do dogs dream? This book challenges the very foundations of anthropology, calling into question our central assumptions about what it means to be human—and thus distinct from all other life forms. Based on four years of fieldwork among the Runa of Ecuador’s Upper Amazon, the book draws on ethnographic research to explore how Amazonians interact with the many creatures that inhabit one of the world’s most complex ecosystems. Whether or not we recognize it, our anthropological tools hinge on those capacities that make us distinctly human. However, when we turn our ethnographic attention to how we relate to other kinds of beings, these tools (which have the effect of divorcing us from the rest of the world) break down. This book seizes on this breakdown as an opportunity. Avoiding reductionistic solutions, and without losing sight of how our lives and those of others are caught up in the moral webs we humans spin, it skillfully fashions new kinds of conceptual tools from the strange and unexpected properties of the living world itself. The work takes anthropology in a new direction—one that offers a more capacious way to think about the world we share with other kinds of beings.
