Building Taypikala: Telluric Transformations in the Lithic Production of Tiwanaku

Abstract

Stone configured Tiwanaku construction and identity. A vital component of Tiwanaku’s most important monuments, it defined Tiwanaku as a place and a people. Here we summarize ongoing geoarchaeological research into the lithic production of Tiwanaku monumentality. We discuss our research on stone quarrying and monumental production in light of previous investigation on the topic. We conclude that monumental stone production was critical to Tiwanaku’s emergence as a central urban center. A shift in lithic materials, sources, and quarrying technologies propelled Tiwanaku’s rise as a primary urban center during the Andean Middle Horizon. This was a transformation from sandstone, quarried in the nearby Kimsachata Mountains, to the strategic inclusion of more durable volcanic andesite, quarried in several new more distant locations including the extinct volcano Mount Ccapia. Our research attests the telluric foundation of Tiwanaku urbanism and cosmology, which originated in Late Formative centers and interaction networks. It also attests the importance of the contrasting materiality of two classes of stone—their differing colors and durabilities, technologies of monumental production, and montane places of origin—for Tiwanaku’s emergent centrality and cosmology.