Fortifications as warfare culture: The hilltop centre at Yayno (Ancash, Peru), AD 400-800

Lau, George F. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0089-3625 (2010) Fortifications as warfare culture: The hilltop centre at Yayno (Ancash, Peru), AD 400-800. Cambridge Archaeological Journal, 20 (3). pp. 419-448. ISSN 1474-0540

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Abstract

This article evaluates defensive works at the ancient hilltop centre of Yayno, Pomabamba, north highlands, Peru. Survey, mapping and sampling excavations show that its primaryoccupation dates to cal. AD 400–800, by groups of the Recuay tradition. At the centre of a network articulating small nearby farming villages, Yayno features an impressive series of natural and built defensive strategies. These worked in concert to protect the community from outsiders and keep internal groups physically segregated. The fortifications are discussed in relation to local political organization and a martial aesthetic in northern Peru during the period. Recuay elite identity and monumentalism arose out of local corporate traditions of hilltop dwelling and defence. Although such traditions are now largely absent in contemporary patterns of settlement, an archaeology of warfare at Yayno has repercussions for local understandings of the past.

Item Type: Article
Faculty \ School: Faculty of Arts and Humanities > School of Art History and World Art Studies (former - to 2014)
UEA Research Groups: Faculty of Arts and Humanities > Research Centres > Sainsbury Research Unit for the Arts of Africa, Oceania and the Americas
Faculty of Arts and Humanities > Research Groups > Art History and World Art Studies
Depositing User: Vishal Gautam
Date Deposited: 09 Feb 2011 14:58
Last Modified: 11 Aug 2023 12:30
URI: https://ueaeprints.uea.ac.uk/id/eprint/21229
DOI: 10.1017/S095977431000048X

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