Changes in pottery production under Inca rule in a frontier site in the Tafí Valley, Argentina: a mineralogical analysis

Abstract

In pre-Hispanic Andean societies, archaeologists have argued that the dynamic methods involved in ceramic production, in part, reflect, prevailing social and political conditions in a given time. According to this, the aim of this work is to evaluate the changes and continuities in the ceramic manufacturing pattern occurred after the Inca presence in northwest Argentina, as indicated through a comparative analysis of the ceramic pastes from four archaeological sites within Tafí valley (Tucumán province), two from the Regional Developments Period and (ca. AD 900–1480) and the Inca Period/Late Horizon (AD 1480–1530). The results indicate the persistence in the use of some local traditional techniques, while new pyroclastic components were incorporated as a separate and distinctive feature of the Inca period with a wide regional dispersion.