Who Founded Quilcapampa?

Abstract

During the Middle Horizon (600–1000 CE), the Wari state’s influence expanded across a broad swath of the central Andes. To better understand the organization of this state and its relationship to outlying regions, we conducted a social network analysis with a database of human images—cataloged as “agents”—as depicted on Wari-associated art. Agent analyses depended on trained, visual acuity for interpreting ancient artistic expressions that distinguished individual identities among various Middle Horizon cultures. The social network analysis used agent locations and co-occurrences on the same object to model the period’s complex social dynamics. The resulting networks suggest a Wari political structure that was more fractured and decentralized than previously imagined during the early Middle Horizon. This article explores aspects of these networks in relationship to four agents excavated at Quilcapampa, a short-lived Wari-affiliated enclave founded during the ninth century on the coastal plain of southern Peru. Considering the place of these agents within Middle Horizon social networks—when combined with what is known about Quilcapampa, the southern Peruvian coast, and the period in general—allows for a reconstruction of who founded Quilcapampa and the possible reasons for the settlement’s founding. The results provide insights into ninth-century changes to Wari’s organization that would be difficult to obtain from purely descriptive analyses of each agent, demonstrating the utility of social network analysis of the human image for investigating political relationships in societies without writing.