Excavations in the valley of Tumbes, Peru

Abstract

The University of Tokyo Scientific Expedition to the Andes was sent to South America in 1958 to carry out a general survey in Peru and Bolivia. Small scale excavations at Garbanzal near Tumbes City turned out to be very interesting. Many objects, dishes, bowles, goblets and jars so far unknown to the Peruvian archeology, which suggest the relationship with those of the northern Andes, were discovered, and a goblet with a high leg has an evident similarity with that of Guangala, Ecuador. Carbon analysis applied to the fragmentary wood revealed the date to be 1740 B. P.±70, which is consistent with the date of Guangala estimated by Estrada (1958). We published the results obtained in Andes, the Report of the University of Tokyo Scientific Expedition to the Andes in 1958.A group of our Second Expedition in 1960 digged new pits at Garbanzal and also at Pechiche nearby to examine the stratigraphic contex of the Garbanzal culture. Archeological sites of Pechiche showed good stratigraphy, the excavation of which confirmed us the existence of something like a dwelling bed at a depth of 70 centimeters, a stratum of yellow clay lower than 180 centimeters well discriminative from the upper layer, and a virgin soil. Vessel shards of Garbanzal type (Fig. 2, 3, 10) were unearthed from the layer above the 180 centimeter level, while the lower layer yielded different and more artistic types of ceramics : a black bowl with anthropomorphic face representing a left half of it, a brown vessel with an annular base and broad incisions of standing human figure, and a shard with corrugated face which has a round protuberance with a hole in the center at the glabella, etc. (Fig. 5, 6, 7). Some of them are painted after baking and have high relieves with deep incisions. These characteristics may suggest correspondence of the culture of lower layer at Pechiche to that of middle or late formative period in the Andes. The absolute date of the material will be reported in near future by the analysis of carbon which was collected abunduntly.