Differential Mortuary Treatment among the Andean Chinchorro Fishers: Social Inequalities or In Situ Regional Cultural Evolution?1

Chinchorro artificial mummification practices, starting at 6000 cal BC and declining around 2000 cal BC, reveal an intriguing and sophisticated socio-religious milieu for an early Andean preceramic hunter-gatherer fishing society. On the basis of the burial patterns, Standen has argued that Chinchor...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Current anthropology 2005-08, Vol.46 (4), p.662-671
Main Authors: Arriaza, BernardoT, Doubrava, Matthew, Standen, VivienG, Haas, Herbert
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Adults
Archaeology
Cemeteries
Cervical vertebrae
Fishing
Inequality
Mud
Mummies
Mummification
Muscle tissues
Prehistoric era
Radiocarbon dating
Social evolution
Wigs
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Summary:Chinchorro artificial mummification practices, starting at 6000 cal BC and declining around 2000 cal BC, reveal an intriguing and sophisticated socio-religious milieu for an early Andean preceramic hunter-gatherer fishing society. On the basis of the burial patterns, Standen has argued that Chinchorro mortuary treatment was selective--that not everyone was mummified and that bodies with different treatment or different styles of mummification found buried together were in fact contemporaneous.
ISSN:0011-3204
1537-5382
DOI:10.1086/432747