Sobre la secuencia cerámica del período formativo de tarapacá (900 A.C.-900 D.C.): Estudios en Pircas, Caserones, Guatacondo y Ramaditas, Norte de Chile

Abstract

This paper presents the analysis of pottery from surface collections and excavations at the sites of Pircas, Caserones, Guatacondo and Ramaditas, corresponding to key settlements of the Formative Period in the Tarapacá and Guatacondo ravines. These sites are notable in that they exemplify processes of social complexity and evolution experienced by the people inhabiting the Western Valleys of the South Central Andes. We present the classification of household materials using a known typology for this region and examine it quantitatively, chronologically and functionally. Our purpose is to offer a ceramic sequence that provides an approach to the regional Formative process and to present complementary information for use with other materials from this period. With these results, we share our ideas about ceramic analysis, the uses of pottery and social evolution, and propose three probable situations or scenarios of increasing social complexity that took place diachronically and synchronically over the course of nearly two thousand years. Consequently, our study offers an empirical basis for future and deeper investigations of the Early and Late Formative periods and the beginning of the Late Intermediate Period in the Pampa del Tamarugal and coast of Tarapacá.