Caral-Supe
From Wiki Sumaq Peru
Location
The archaeological site of Caral is in the department of Lima, Barranca province, district of Supe in the valley of the Supe river, in the north central coast of Peru, to 350 ms on the level sea. It is located in an alluvial terrace, in the left margin of the river. The climate is tempered, the river takes water only in the months of summer, although in the zone there are water outcrops by the little depth of napa phreatic.
The city of Caral was constructed by one of the most important civilizations of the planet created by the organized work of its settlers in a territory of resisted geographic configurations.
Origins of the Civilizations in the World
It took five million years for human beings to initiated civilizations on the planet, but only six thousand years to costruct urban centers and to integrate networks of interaction of long distances.
Six societies anywhere in the world could change their ways of life and generate the conditions that made the civilization possible, the State and the formation of the cities: Mesopotamia, Egypt, India, Peru, China and Mesoamérica. It is important to know each one of these civilizations because they influenced in the unfolding of other contemporary populations and had a fundamental roll in the development of the societies that formed later in time.
Unlike the civilizations of the old world that maintained among them a system of interaction and interchange of goods and knowledge that allowed them to take advantage of the experiences of the set, in Peru the process occurred altogether because Caral went ahead in at least 1500 years to Mesoamérica being developed in the 2500 to the 1600 ac. constituting the other civilization center of the New Continent.
Archaeological discovery
The first person that called attention on Caral was an American Paul Kosok who visited the place along with another American archaeologist Richard Schaedel in 1949. In their report published in the Life book, Land and Water in Ancient Peru in 1965, mentioned that Chupicigarro (as was known to him then as Caral) had to be very old, but could not show how much. In 1975 the Peruvian architect Carlos Williams made a registry of most of the archaeological sites in the valley of Supe, between which he registered to Chupicigarro, from which he made some observations on the development of the architecture in the Andes, that presented/displayed in the article "To for Scheme the Monumental Early Architecture of the Central Coast of Peru" published in 1985 in the book "Ceremonial Early Architecture in the Andes". The French archaeologist Frederic Engel visited the place in 1979 making a survey and excavating himself. In his book "Of the Begonias to the Maize" published in 1987, Engel affirmed that Chupacigarro (as it is known today as Caral) could have beeen constructed before the appearance of the ceramics in the Andes (1800 aC), but their affirmations were not accepted by the Andean archaeologists. In 1994 Ruth Shady crossed the valley again of I knew and identified 18 sites with the same architectonic characteristics, between which were the four well-known ones like Chupicigarro Grande, Chupicigarro Center, Chupicigarro Oeste and Chupicigarro. In order to differentiate them Shady denominated them, Caral, Chupicigarro, Miraya and Lurihuasi. Caral, Miraya and Lurihuasi are the quechua names of the towns nearest the sites. Chupicigarro is the Spanish name of a bird of the place. Shady excavated in Caral as of 1996 and presented/displayed its data in 1997 for the first time in the book "City Sagrada of Caral-Know in the dawn of the civilization in Peru." In that book it openly sustained the preceramic antiquity of Caral, affirmation that consolidated of irrefutable way in the following years, through intensive excavations in the place.
The Special Project Archaeological Caral-Know is in charge of the works in situ. Archaeologist Ruth Shady travels to this city frequently to continue the work of the excavations and discoveries in this part of an archaeologically rich country and diverse millenarian cultures.
Importance
Many know Cusco as the capital the Empire Inca and Machu Picchu. Like the estate of one of the last Incas, but few still know that the City Sagrada of Caral was built by the first political states that formed in Peru 4400 years before they governed the Incas.
Caral-Supe represents the oldest civilization of America. Developed with those of Mesopotamia, Egypt, India and China almost simultaneously. The inhabitants of Peru went ahead in, at least, 1500 years to those of Mesoamérica, the other civilization center of the six recognized world-wide and in more than 3000 years to the society that built the recognized Mayan cities.
The precocious development of the society of Caral-Supe turned it the oldest civilization of the New World but, unlike other civilizatorios centers, like Mesopotamia, Egypt and India, that interchanged knowledge and experiences, Caral-Supe obtained an advance without precedents in complete isolation of its contemporary ones of America and the Old World.
In Peru, the forms of economic, social and political organization of the populations of Caral-Supe caused strong impact in the history of the area; the space and the time extended, and laid the foundations of the social political system that would have the populations of Central the Andes.
In the norcentral area of Peru, the model of organization designed and implemented by the State of I knew, lead by several centuries driving of the individuals in the different fields: economic, social, political and religious.
The Society of Supe in the Dawn of the Civilization
Caral is the most outstanding establishment of the 18 identified throughout 40 km of the low valley and average of I knew, each one of which reunites to buildings public with the characteristic sunk circular seat, in addition to a set of domestic units. It is not the most extensive Caral, but the one that shows an architectonic design planned and a strong investment of force of work in the construction of the piramidales buildings. By the extension of the establishments and the inverted amount of work it becomes evident that they have a hierarchized ordering and that there was a unified social organization in the valley. This distribution pattern can also extend to valleys of Pativilca, Fortaleza and Huaura, which, next to I knew, had to constitute the territory base of formation of the prístino State.
The city of Caral is in the beginning of the average sector of the valley of Supe, Ravine province, to 184 km to the north of Lima in the north-central area of Peru. It is the urban establishment more outstanding by the extension and architectonic complexity of all identified in Peru between the years of 2000 and 3000 years a.d.
Caral occupies 66 has, in which it distinguishes a nuclear zone and a marginal zone. In the nucleus, the constructions are distributed in two great halves: a discharge where the piramidales constructions can be appreciated more outstanding, a sunk circular seat, two spaces of massive public congregation, in addition to the domestic units and storage of the civil employees, as well as an extensive residential set. Low half has buildings of smaller dimensions, although it emphasizes the architectonic complex of the Amphitheatre, and a residential set, also, of smaller extension. The zone in the periphery has numerous grouped houses, distributed as a “small barren island” archipelago, throughout the terrace that is contiguous with the valley.
Millions of stones were cut and transferred to the city for the construction of the public buildings to remodel the architectonic designs or to bury them cyclical and to construct a new one.
Caral and the social self-esteem
The first contribution of Caral to the present society is in the field of the historical knowledge when showing the great antiquity of the civilization in Peru and America and to modify with it conceptions on the human condition in the planet. In the most concrete case of our country, the investigation on Caral allows us to know the answers given by societies that was inhabited by an east millenium territory before us; we can take advantage of the positive experiences and reject those insolvent ones.
From the cultural perspective, Caral is called to become one of the most important instruments to improve the self-esteem of the Peruvians and to constitute themselves in the most outstanding symbol of the national identity, for being the first civilization, the oldest of America and model of a social political organization that would develop other societies in later periods in the territory of Peru. It puts in evidence the creative capacity to us of the inhabitants of this dissimilar territory who, with effort and organization managed to enter the stage civilizatorio a millenium and means before other populations of the continent.
The economic aspect, the putting in value of Caral, through actions of investigation, consolidation and restoration of its imposing monumental constructions, will turn it a tourist destiny of first order on national and international scale, and a source of income important to improve the conditions of life of the population of the locality and the country in general. By its historical, cultural and economical value, destining bottoms to Caral is not a cost, it is an investment that will contribute to the development of the country. We trusted the change of attitudes, in the recognition of the values of our millenarian history, that all Peruvians must make to affirm and to conduct themselves surely, sesionado of the same vision of development in benefit of which we conformed this nation.
Economic organization
The settlers of Caral-Supe took advantage of different natural zones from its territory to obtain an ample product range; they had access to the resources of the valley, the river, the ribereños puquiales, humedales, hills, forests and mounts.
In the valley the farmers excavated and cleaned drains and took care of their cultures of zapallo, frijol, pumpkin, cotton, sweet potato, red pepper, kills and tutumo. Also, they cultivated or they collected pacay and guayaba. To his authorities they gave part to them of his harvests and they served to them when the territories and buildings of the Gods were summoned for the collective works in.
In the river they extracted shrimp and fish. They hunted deer and vizcachas or they collected fruits, roots and snails in hills. In the humedales they cut to rushes and totoras, necessary for the elaboration of shicras and bed rolls.
By the side roads of the coast, mountain range and forest the valley retailers took fishing agricultural products that were interchanged by logs, medicinal grass, seeds, pigments, plants and snails, originating from distant establishments; which made circulate, simultaneously, by the costeños towns.
The fishermen of the coast extracted anchovies and sardines, in addition to males and choros. They dried fish and they separated the moluscos destined for the interchange. Like the farmers, gave part of the extracted resources and were to the service of their authorities.
The agriculturists supplied cotton to the fishermen, fiber indispensable for the preparation of the extensive networks that used to use; on a par, the settlers of the valley acquired marine products that were necessary to complement their feeding. The first social economic integration between regions formed therefore giving rise to a mutual dependency and the occupational specialization.
The men of Caral also had commercial relations with settlers of other regions, mainly with those of the coast, that supplied fish and moluscos for them. Also they exchanged products with the costeños of Pativilca and Fortaleza, and inclusively they had bonds with distant places like Kotosh in the Huallaga, the Galgada in Tablachaca, Santa, Piruro in the Marañón and Huaricoto in the Alley of Huaylas.
The intense exchange of goods generated a dynamic economic process between regions and fomented the accumulation. Those conditions allowed the society of Caral-Supe to fortify their process of political integration under the form of a state government and favored the formation of social classes. The effectiveness of this form of government can be cuantificable by the height of the constructions of great monumental sets that the State undertook.
Political organization
For some it is required to state the presence of troops to prove the existence of the state political organization, but the first State did not have enemies with whom it could compete. Its power was in the capacity to unite different communities in a same ideology. Now which 10 years are marked from the redescubrimiento of the deposit, the Greater Pyramid, Pyramid of the Gallery, Pyramid of the Huanca, Pyramid Smaller and Pyramid of the Quarry have appeared imposing, that grant to him to Caral, to say of the specialists, a tourist potential similar to the one of ciudadela Inca of Machu Picchu in Cuzco. Now which 10 years are marked from the redescubrimiento of the deposit, the Greater Pyramid, Pyramid of the Gallery, Pyramid of the Huanca, Pyramid Smaller and Pyramid of the Quarry have appeared imposing, that grant to him to Caral, to say of the specialists, a tourist potential similar to the one of cities Inca of Machu Picchu in Cuzco.
The religion was the force that used the first State to implant the labor and social discipline. The governors were priests, administrators and scientists, ordered of the ceremonies; they directed the acts and public rituals, prepared the collective works and administered the collected goods, collated the astronomical data and elaborated the calendars to fit the activities of the town. On the other hand, the agriculturists and fishermen recognized the power of their governors paying tributes in sobrework and services, in benefit of the satately class.
The popularized certainty that was had the Gods would have taught to them to prepare their small farms, to draw up their channels, to seed the plants and to construct their landmarks; thus it was necessary to make ritual propiciatorios and to fulfill the calendar of ceremonies and rites to the sun, the water and the Earth. All administrative and governmental the activities, domestic of production, construction, made in Caral, are of one or another form related to offerings, ceremonies, rituals and sacrifices.
In the different constructions or they are residential or public, the presence of furnaces used can be observed for usage in offerings; generalized custom that considered to the average fire like communicating with the Gods. The great amount of temples and the constant remodelings that are observed demonstrate a dynamic relgious system, in constant renovation and, at the same time, the social power of the religion and the voluminous work invested by the settlers with the purpose of pleasing the Gods. there have been different offerings in ceremonial contexts and the fillings from the constructions:
- Clay statuettes without cooking, to way of symbolic burials, representing women related generally to rituals of propiciación or fertility.
- Burned textiles and baskets.
- Burned foods.
- Woven crossings or “Eyes of God”.
- Burials of children or adults, some adorned with necklaces, indicators of stop estatus.
- Semiprecious stone accounts, lascas or fragments,
- Spondylus, quartz.
- Leaves, you kill.
- Interlaced vegetables.
- Buns of willow leaves.
- Shells of Choro mytilus with human hair, quartz
The Political Aspect
The material evidence indicates the existence of social classes, differentiated by their location in the productive process. The class leader made intellectual, administrative, political tasks and religious. It enjoyed the excess produced socially, lived in extensive houses and it counted on luxurious objects, as quartz axes, seats of whale vertebrae and necklaces of exotic accounts. Their houses ample and were very elaborated. On the other hand, it laclase more numerous was dedicated to the agricultural works, and served in the city. Their houses were small and simple.
Ritual Human sacrifices
Burials of children, apparently treated have been excavated like related offerings to constructive events or underneath a wall or of a floor. Some were buried with dresses and necklaces, an expression of their elevated social position.
On the other hand, when an adult was sacraficed, they buried it naked with the hands and the cut fingers, some of these were recovered in hornacinas of the enclosure also buried ritually. It is possible to emphasize the combed elaborated one that Lucia the individual, of approximately 23 years.
Reconstruction of a settler of Caral of 5,000 years ago
Experts of different disciplines reconstructed the image of the settler of Caral witht he remains of a man in 2002 in the Greater Temple that was one of the main buildings of ciudadela of mud raised to 182 kilometers to the north of Lima.
The archaeologists of the Special Project Caral found the skeleton of a man of about 20 years of age under a layer of earth and stones naked and with his arms crossed in the back.
He presumes that the man of 1.68 meters of height, was sacrificed by blows in the face and the skull, that caused his death, of the incisive teeth and two fractures in the occipital bone.
Due to the injuries found in the lumbar zone of the spine and in the joints of both feet, experts believe that he dedicated himself to the transport of materials for the construction or that he crossed great distances to make commercial transactions.
The face presented/displayed a wide face, inclined and in front small, eyebrows a little populated, with an outlined straight nose, thin lips, and coiled, straight hair with cotton threads.
In the excavations that were made in Caral they were in addition “quipu”, braided thread set to register musical facts or accounts, balls and instruments like antaras (similar to the quenas), sonajas and flautas made with animal bones.
In addition, a hundred of found mud figures in the place allowed to discover hair styles used by men and women, according to their age and social condition.
Women used long braids that were gathered with mantillas, while the men of the nobility were different because they used flequillo, in addition to braids held with threads.
The dresses were made of cotton, like the sandals they wore.
“The specialists have managed to reconstruct the face, the hairstyle, the clothes, the footwear and to investigate the strengths and nourishing deficiencies of an inhabitant who lived 5,000 years ago in the sagrada city of Caral”, she stated to the AFP Jeanet Guillergua, spokeswoman for the press of the Project.
The archaeologists found a skeleton for years ago in Caral (about 300 km to the north of Lima)- that calculates, it was a young person of approximately 20 years between a layer of earth and stones.
“He was naked with the arms crossed in the back and it did not take any offering”, added the institution in an official notice.
With base in that skeleton and leaning in forenses techniques, a reconstruction was obtained that gives us an idea of what the person may have looked like.
“The sculptor Edilberto Mérida, with the support of specialists of the police had reconstructed a man of 1.70 cm. on the basis of fiber glass, similar to which it took control of Mr. de Sipán”, Guillergua added.
Mr. Sipán is a set of bones and armor of an old head of the Mochica culture which was composed of gold and silver.
With base in the reconstruction he knows himself that in Caral “the young people shone cerquillos, long hair and braids who surrounded with cotton threads and held with accounts, the combed women laborious that covered with mantillas”, indicated.
In the reconstruction he managed to determine the facial characteristics of the man of Caral. It is possible to be said that he had a wide face, in front inclined and small, semipopulated eyebrows, straight nose, thin lips, triangular chin, he carves average of 1.68 M.s and coiled straight hair with cotton threads.
The Oldest Quipu
One inquired that the archaeologists of the Caral Project recently found quipu with an antiquity approximately of two thousand years before Christ, a crab seller, antaras, sonajeras and balls, among other things.
Quipus is cords of branches with knots and several colors, with which the Peruvians gave reason of histories, the news and of the accounts.
According to archaeologist Carlos Leiva, member of the Caral project, is a valid form of equal registry that of the hieroglyphic cuneiform or was used by the mesopotamios or the Egyptians.
The Quipu is a mechanism of knots used to transmit detailed information. Found salary one in the oldest city of America, reveals that 5,000 years ago a system of writing in this part of the world existed. In the image, the Peruvian archaeologist Ruth Shady shows to a figure during an exhibition in the National Museum of Lima July 18,2005.
Interesting data of Caral
The discovery of Caral by its characteristics, is one of most important of the last years for world-wide archaeology. One of the peculiarities that to date call the attention is that no military complex in this zone has yet been discovered.
In Caral there are indications of military with no violence. Although yes there was violence for which it did not fulfill the norms of the society; the control came through the religion. The agression and reference instrument was the religion that the society had and that was exerted by the group that directed it. The power in the population of Caral held a group of individuals, on the base of its direct tie knowledge with the reproduction of the material conditions for the survival of the population. This group of leaders was the one in charge to make the astronomical observations to elaborate the calendar and thus to indicate the more advisable periods of time to make the diverse economic activities. They fixed the dates of seedtime and the harvest; they directed to the construction of the culture terraces and the opening of the irrigation channels; they lead the commerce between fishermen and agriculturists; and they exchanged goods by long distances, in the coast, mountain range and forest.
The constructions that became in Caral were related to certain directions obtained by astronomical observations and is probable that they were erected for certain stars, that they represented the Gods, regulators of the social life. To the Sun, the Moon and the four sawhorses, the lucero, etc. (that they represented as divine beings) constructed temples for them in which a series of rituals of recognition by the benefits was celebrated that they received. In those ceremonies and rituals they jeopardized all the society. In some, the power which they reached these gentlemen was laid the foundations in the knowledge that they had and in the being intermediary with the Gods, to guarantee the social order and the reproduction of the material conditions of life of the society. They developed knowledge of mathematics, geometry, medicine that were shaped in the works that now we excavated the archaeologists. We have discovered temples of 18 meters tall that have stayed stable for thousands of years that were constructed with stones and mud, conformed by terraces and seats. Also we observed the medical treatments that they administered, for example, with willow leaves, that now we know contained salicílico acid, active principle of the aspirina and is used to alleviate the pain; and prepared others whose evidences are even estan recovering.
The Religion like means of domination
The religion then was the control, but it was a domination instrument also. To that it did not fulfill, to that it was not going to work to the city, in the construction, the cleaning and maintenance of the channels, in taking care of seedtime and of the small farms of the Gods, then was going to him to go badly, was not going to have good harvests, his actions would fail. Through the religion on the other hand, those forms of collective life were managed to fix, fortifying the congregation and the celebration in certain dates. Thus, people were developing a group identity of group. The religion fulfilled a very important role in this stage of the development of the civilization. Like social domination and control of the population for the fulfillment of the norms that the class leader imposed.
Plagiarism by North American archaeologists
In words of Dr. Ruth Shady Solíz, director of the Special Project Archaeological Caral-Know:
“The North American archaeologists who appear in some documentary one that he became on Caral, and that was in some European countries, they appeared before us showing its desire to help us, but later they showed its true interest to happen like the investigators of Caral, like the directors of the Project, thing who never were. We did explanations pertinent, we recognized his contribution economic for accomplishment of some analysis radiocarbónicos of Caral, with bottoms that they obtained from the institutions for which they work, but we have been emphatic in affirming that they never made excavations in Caral, that did not participate in the investigations in the site and which they did not comprise of the Archaeological Project.
They initially offered themselves to help to obtain bottoms us of the foreigner, to which we did not refuse in view of the economic situation which we crossed. For it, we accepted to altogether present/display an article, by means of which we presented the results the radiocarbónicos dated ones of Caral the world, published by the Science magazine. Nevertheless, taking advantage of the publicity that accompanied this article, they appeared like the discoverers and investigators of Caral, like the directors of the Archaeological Project.
Simultaneously, in the official pages Web of their institutions they appeared like investigators of Caral, like directors of the Archaeological Project. After this bad experience they tried to allege that everything had been malentendido caused by the press; a false argument in view of which they had published in his pages Web. In spite of all this, they insisted on its proposal to obtain bottoms for the Project in return that we gave the direction to him. We did not accept and we decided to continue single, poor, but with dignity with our work. It was a bad experience."
Investigations
The Special Project Archaeological Caral-Know (PEACS) is a unit executor of the National Institute of Culture of the Peruvian State that has raised a program an investigation, conservation and putting in value of the archaeological patrimony with an integral, sustainable and multidisciplinary approach. For that reason one comes parallelly working in the scientific study from the archaeological sites of the valley of I knew, in the physical conservation of monuments, in the restoration and putting in value of these with tourist aims and in the diverse search of the application of other projects with the purpose of fomenting the socioeconomic development of the populations of the district of I knew and the Ravine province. One looks for to turn to the rich cultural patrimony of Caral-Know, the oldest civilization of America, in the axis that foments better conditions of life for the present society.
With this perspective the PEACS comes making archaeological excavations in Caral and other sites bordering and contemporary to this one; it studies and it analyzes the obtained materials; it develops to a permanent program of monitoreo and conservation of the architectonic structures of the site; it elaborates scientific information and of spreading; it designs tourist circuits of visit; it organizes events for the suitable diffusion of the historical-cultural importance of the place; and, it promotes the integral development of the local and national population. As of year 2005 beginning will occur to first of the projects of the integral program, promoted by the PEACS, of application in the agrarian aspect of the zone, that will be executed by the Institute of Development and Medio Ambiente (IDMA) with the economic support of the Bottom of Las Américas (FONDAM).
The investigation activities in the valley of I knew, Ravine province, developed from 1994, have demonstrated that I knew was the seat of the first formed political State in Peru, with greater dating of this continent and that Caral is the urban establishment with older monumental architecture of America. Its antiquity has been confirmed by cuarentidós dated radiocarbónicos, between the 3000 and 2000 years before ours it was.
References
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