Peruvian Black Pottery Production and Metalworking: A Middle Sicern CraftWorkshop at Huaca Sialupe
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Peruvian Black
Pottery Production and Metalworking: A Middle Sicán Craft Workshop at Huaca Sialupe Izumi Shimada and Ursel Wagner
Introduction The technical sophistication and virtuosity of prehispanic Andean ceramics are so often praised in the literature that it may appear that there is a large body of supportive, empirical findings. To the contrary, in-depth technical and more comprehensive technological studies have been rare. To achieve a comprehensive understanding of the many facets and stages of the technology and organization of craft production requires a correspondingly comprehensive, sustained effort—one built on interdisciplinary collaboration and longterm regional study of environmental, historical, social, and technological factors. A holistic and contextual approach has been used by the Sicán Archaeological Project that began in 1978 in its effort to understand the craft production, particularly ceramics and metallurgy, of the Middle Sicán culture that flourished on the northern coast of Peru some 1000 years ago.1,2 This approach (Figure 1) has combined (1) archaeometry, the application of methods derived from the physical and natural sciences to archaeology; (2) archaeology, both regional surveys to establish resources and their human use and site excavations of ceremonial, residential, and workshop complexes; and (3) field and laboratory experimentation to recreate and test technology hypothesized with input and help from modern local artisans and experts with scientific and technological knowledge.3
MRS BULLETIN/JANUARY 2001
The aim of this article is to present and interpret the emerging results of our ongoing analysis of the 1999 excavation of a Middle Sicán craft production site at Huaca Sialupe on the northern coast of Peru.
Research Issues Among notable Middle Sicán legacies are its ceramic and metallurgical technologies. The metallurgy was characterized by unprecedented, large-scale production of arsenical bronze and tumbaga, low-karat alloys of gold, silver, and copper employing intentional surface corrosion or depletion processes to develop a rich silver or gold color.4,5 The bronze replaced pure copper permanently as the utilitarian metal in northern Peru. Following a trend set by the preceding Moche culture, Middle Sicán potters relied heavily on molds to produce diagnostic, decorated ceramics such as widely distributed, single-spout bottles.6 These vessels were made using one or more pairs of molds. Our examination of broken and whole vessels from tombs and a wide range of other contexts indicates the pervasiveness of mold-made vessels. Middle Sicán pottery is also characterized by its preference for a black finish (Figure 2). Although blackware ceramics were made by earlier cultures, including the Cupisnique that dates back to the first millennium B.C., they had never attained the prominence or consistent blackness of their Middle Sicán counterparts. In fact, early Middle Sicán blackware (ca. A.D. 900–950) appears to have spearheaded an unprecedented “craze for monochrome blackwa
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