Encyclopedia of

Latin America
?  Volume I  ç
Amerindians through Foreign Colonization
(Prehistory to 1560)

J. Michael Francis
Volume Editor

Thomas M. Leonard
general Editor

ELA_v1_PF.indd 3 3/18/10 9:29:35 AM

 ?  W
warfare
Caribbean
The early European chroniclers generally described
the Taino inhabitants of the Greater Antilles as peace-
ful, in contrast with the warlike Carib who lived on the
Lesser Antilles to the east and on the coastal mainland of
South America. However, both Taino and Carib warriors
proved to be skillful fighters, as well as resourceful and
brave defenders of their lands.
Among able-bodied Taino males, warfare was a
secondary activity to farming, fishing, and hunting.
There is little evidence of internal conflict among
Taino bands or even against the archaic indigenous
inhabitants of the islands, who survived in areas of
Cuba and Hispaniola until the European conquest.
However, raids by the aggressive Carib launched from
South America displaced the Taino from the eastern
Caribbean and from as far as the Virgin Islands by
1492. This threat led to a corresponding militarization
of Taino culture in Puerto Rico and Hispaniola, whose
inhabitants were the most vulnerable due to their prox-
imity to the Carib-held islands.
Taino men were physically fit and were expert swim-
mers. Because they were defending their home islands and
villages, they also enjoyed the advantage over their ene-
mies of knowing the terrain. They were skilled in the use
of their traditional weapons, which evolved from modified
tools. For hand-to-hand combat, the weapon of choice
was the macana, a paddlelike sword made from especially
dense hardwood; macanas measured about three feet (1
m) long. The wood was highly polished and sometimes
embellished with carvings or paint. Other close-quarter
weapons included axes and knives made from highly pol-
308
ELA_v1_PF.indd 308
 ç
ished and sharpened stones. Defensive equipment such as
shields, helmets, and body armor were unknown.
The Taino arsenal also included missile weapons such
as bows and arrows, several examples of which have been
recovered in Cuba. Bows tended to be about five feet (1.5
m) tall and crafted from a single piece of wood. Arrows
were about three feet (1 m) long, with feathers (fletches)
fixed at the base of the shaft to help ensure accuracy.
Arrowheads were made from diverse materials, including
stone (chert and flint), shell, fire-hardened wood, stingray
spines, and fish teeth used both as points and as barbs.
Taino warriors also used light spears or javelins of about
six feet (1.8 m) in length and dart throwers (similar to
the atlatl used in Mesoamerica); the latter were used to
launch darts, four to five feet (1.2–1.5 m) in length, which
had great penetrating power at close range.
A toxic coating of ají (chili) paste or poisonous tree
sap was added to all of these missiles. A version of tear gas
was also sometimes used; perforated gourds were filled
with ground chilies mixed with ashes and flung, creating
a cloud of irritating dust. Before and after combat, Taino
warriors would join the rest of village in a spiritual cer-
emony, or areyto, which required the purging of the body,
inhalation of cohoba (a hallucinogenic herbal mixture) and
tobacco smoke, dancing and offerings to the cemíes, or
ancestral spirits. These ceremonies provided psychologi-
cal support and enhanced warrior morale. Afterward, the
cacique, or chieftain, would address the men to make
sure they understood the goals of the operation and
shared any available information about the enemy. The
typical Taino force could range from a few dozen to a
few hundred warriors; however, Spanish chroniclers
indicate that they faced large armies numbering in the
thousands in both Hispaniola and Puerto Rico.
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Logistical support was minimal, usually consisting
of a water bottle made from a gourd and casabe (yucca
bread), since the Taino as a rule always operated in their
home territory, close to food and other supplies. While
the local cacique was in command of the warriors from
his own village, overall command of larger forces was
held by a designated supreme cacique.
In terms of military tactics, the Taino favored surprise
and stealth, such as ambush, using the thick tropical vegeta-
tion as cover, and predawn attacks on enemy encampments
or villages. After hitting the enemy with missiles, the war-
riors would dash in to engage in hand-to-hand combat.
Once the battle started, warriors would engage in single
combat with the closest enemy, with the caciques shouting
encouragement but having little overall control of the fight.
The caciques would also lead the chase if the enemy broke
or direct the retreat if the Taino were forced to withdraw.
Since killing or driving off raiders and recovering any cap-
tives were the main purposes of military expeditions, there
was little emphasis on taking prisoners. There are some
accounts of combat at sea between Taino and Carib raid-
ers, although this seems to have been the result of chance
encounters rather than planned naval battles.
For Carib males, to be a man was to be a warrior. The
Caribs thus developed a fearsome reputation not only
because of their deadly seaborne raids but also because
they practiced cannibalism. Men achieved prestige and
honor by obtaining captives to serve as laborers or con-
cubines or to be ritually eaten. Carib villages did not have
a clearly defined social hierarchy; rather, a well-respected
and successful warrior leader, or ubutu, would approach
the village warriors and convince them to launch a raid.
Other villages might also join in the expedition. These
were launched during favorable seasons when the seas
were relatively calm. The typical Carib raid involved
eight to 10 piraguas, or large canoes, with about 500 war-
riors and several dozen women to serve and cook.
The typical Carib raider was a seasoned sailor and
warrior. His weapons were almost identical to those used
by the Taino, such as the butu, or hardwood war club, akin
to the macana, two to three feet (0.6–1 m) in length, three
inches (7.6 cm) thick, and elaborately carved. The Carib
also excelled as archers; their bows were described as simi-
lar to the English longbow; they were roughly six feet (1.8
m) long and fired poisoned barbed arrows. The Carib also
used blowguns, but apparently only for hunting.
Because their raids could often take them hundreds of
miles into enemy lands, Carib warriors had to carry some
provisions with them, usually casabe bread and smoked
fish. Upon reaching enemy territory, the Carib would
send scouts to determine the location of villages and other
useful information. Once ready, the Carib would wait until
dawn to attack; night attacks typically occurred when there
was a full moon. The warriors would paint their bodies
with black dye and would surge into the unsuspecting
village amid loud cries and shouts aimed at terrifying the
inhabitants. If the element of surprise was lost, the Carib
ELA_v1_PF.indd 309
warfare ç 309
would shoot incendiary arrows into the village, setting the
huts on fire and forcing the defenders into the open. They
would capture men, women, and children, as well as pro-
visions for the return voyage. The Carib would also take
with them the bodies of fallen comrades.
Upon arriving to their home island, the captives
would be divided among the warriors and a feast would
take place, in which selected enemy males would be
cooked and eaten as part of the victory ritual. Other cap-
tives would be traded with neighboring Carib villages or
to other ethnic groups along the South American main-
land (see trade).
Mesoamerica
The history of pre-Columbian Mesoamerica was one of
violence, though no more so than that of any other region
of the ancient world. It was a universe of shifting alliances
and mutual antagonisms, in which increasingly strong
political entities forged themselves and then broke apart.
Indigenous peoples throughout the Americas lived in
bands that sometimes came together to form chieftaincies,
from which occasionally emerged paramount chieftain-
cies or confederacies. These in turn occasionally became
centralized enough to constitute states, and twice in the
Americas—in the case of the Aztecs and the Incas—states
expanded their power over others to form empires, though
even in these cases the leading city-state (or ethnic state)
did not have an unshakable grasp on power. Mesoamerica
had the oldest tradition of agriculture in the hemisphere.
Populations there were thus denser and accumulations of
wealth greater than in most other regions. The stakes in
warfare were therefore higher: States came to power and
ultimately crumbled, leading to widespread dislocation.
The Olmecs were the first Mesoamerican group to
expand their influence. Although they developed a mili-
tary force, they seem to have done so only to protect the
trade on which they depended, rather than to conquer new
territory. By contrast, Teotihuacán is considered the first
center of military expansion in the Mesoamerican world,
dominating the central valley of Mexico and surrounding
area (perhaps even dispatching military expeditions as far
as Maya territory) from about 100 to about 750 c.e. After
its decline, other powerful entities emerged. From 950
to 1150, the Toltecs and their allies dominated Central
Mexico. Toward the end of the Toltec domination,
nomads (called Chichimecas by their descendants) began
to come down from the north, disrupting the settled
peoples of Central Mexico. In the early 15th century, the
Mexica-Tenochca (now often called the Aztecs) emerged
as the dominant Chichimec group, establishing a tight
alliance with Texcoco, Tlacopan, and other smaller
groups (see Triple Alliance).
Until the 1970s, many scholars believed that the Maya
were unique among Mesoamericans and did not actively
participate in the cycles of alliance building and warfare.
The now largely decoded Maya glyphs tell us otherwise,
however. The Maya made war as readily as all others and
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 310 ? warfare
saw many of their own states rise and fall. Nonetheless,
the most detailed information on war relates to the
Aztecs. Historical annals written in Nahuatl in the 16th
century, when there were still people alive who remem-
bered the old oral histories, include many details and even
the Aztecs’ thought processes regarding warfare.
Some recurrent myths are associated with Aztec
warfare, such as that the warriors did not fight to kill
but only to take captives to be used as sacrificial vic-
tims (see human sacrifice). While it is true that most
Mesoamerican war parties wished to return home with
prisoners suitable for sacrifice, there was almost always
a wider political purpose for war, and this determined
the nature of the fighting. One ethnic state might attack
another merely to remind disgruntled tribute payers who
had the upper hand, and thus take only a few prisoners.
A state might also launch a war against another people
who had long prevented them from dominating a region
and for that reason might kill thousands. Aztec annals
record, for example, that when the Mexica and their
allies attacked the Huastecs, it had been their goal to
wipe the Huastec nation from the face of the earth. Such
an agenda was quite rare in the history of Mesoamerican
warfare, however; most of the time, no single state had
sufficient power to eliminate all its enemies.
It is also true that Aztec understandings and rep-
resentations of warfare revolved around the religious
practice of human sacrifice (see religion). Warriors
rose through the ranks to attain fame and glory, which
was based on the number of captives they acquired and
the circumstances of their capture. To go to battle was
to accept the possibility of oneself’s being sacrificed to
the gods. Women also partook of the honor associated
with war. When they gave birth, it was said that they
had seized a human soul from the cosmos; if they died
in the process, they went to the same heaven reserved
for men who died in battle. Again, however, wars were
rarely undertaken for spiritual reasons alone but rather
to gain control over chiefly lines and thus over resources.
When the Aztecs fought the people of Cuauhnáhuac
(Cuernavaca), for example, they took home not only pris-
oners to sacrifice but also a woman of the ruling Tlahuica
line to marry their king so that her children would be
Aztecs as much as Tlahuicas. It was through such mar-
riages that the Aztecs gained control over the majority of
Mexican territory where cotton was cultivated.
In Mesoamerica, as elsewhere, the mechanics of war-
fare changed over time. With farming came a settled, as
opposed to a nomadic, existence, and fortifications were
built to protect communities. Over time, a fort or cluster of
forts might grow powerful enough to prevent potentially
hostile peoples from passing through an area. This was
a significant step toward being able to farm more inten-
sively, which led to better food supply and thus population
growth. Teotihuacán was the first to amass a group of men
large enough to be classified as a true “army.” Because
many men could go into battle, projectile weapons such
ELA_v1_PF.indd 310
as slings, spears, and dart throwers were developed, and
padded cotton armor was invented. On the other hand,
the Maya states that dominated their surrounding regions
had smaller populations and continued to rely principally
on hand-to-hand combat. Later, the Toltecs invented a
short sword, which was both lighter than previous blades
and more efficient; the same man could now carry a dart
thrower with shield and quiver as well as a lethal blade.
When the Chichimecas migrated to Central Mexico from
the north, they brought with them the bow and arrow (see
migration). This weapon made small, lightly loaded forces
more powerful than before as they could inflict more dam-
age from hidden vantage points.
The Aztecs appropriated the best weapons from
both the ancient Mesoamerican and invading Chichimec
peoples. They used darts and dart throwers (atlatl), bows
and arrows (mitl), stones and slings, long spears, bladed
and knobbed clubs, and, especially, a newly invented
sword (macuahuitl) that contained several projecting
obsidian blades and delivered a deadly, slashing blow. (It
rapidly became the weapon of choice throughout much
of Mesoamerica.) The Aztecs also improved cotton armor
and developed a lighter shield made, not from wood, but
other fire-hardened plant materials. The Aztec army was
highly organized at all levels, from generals to novice foot
soldiers. All Aztec boys went to school to learn the arts
of war. Most of the time, men lived as farmers and/or
artisans, but when they were called to go on a military
expedition, they knew what to do. On taking his first cap-
tive, a novice attained a higher status, was given certain
prizes, and was grouped differently the next time he went
to war. The same process occurred after the second, third,
and fourth captives were taken. Few men, apparently, ever
captured more than that. If they did, however, and if they
took them from a particularly fearsome set of enemies,
such as the Huexotzinco, they became commanders.
Aztec society was so deeply committed to warfare
that it spawned the notion of staged battles, called
“flower wars,” or xochiyaoyotl, with rival states. In these
prearranged conflicts, Aztec forces frequently faced off
against the unconquered people of Tlaxcala, for exam-
ple. Although the wars were prearranged, the losers still
faced death on the field or sacrifice afterward. Whether
these wars were designed to keep the population of
young men on their toes or for some other reason is not
certain. One theory suggests that the flower wars were a
long-term military strategy designed to weaken powerful
polities over time and thus avoid the heavy casualties that
would result from a single conquest campaign.
Once a group began to attain power over its neigh-
bors, a “snowball effect” was often seen, with more and
more communities succumbing to the dominant power.
However, large territories of subject peoples were diffi-
cult to control in an era before rapid communication was
possible, thus power was always somewhat tenuous. The
Aztec state famously crumbled when the Spanish appeared
on the scene, and this was not a new phenomenon.
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 warfare ç 311

Named after the Spanish viceroy of Mexico Antonio de Mendoza, the Codex Mendoza was compiled roughly two decades after
the conquest of the Aztec Empire. The information contained in this remarkable work was gathered from indigenous scribes and
interpreters who had firsthand knowledge of the Aztec Empire before the arrival of Europeans. This image shows various Aztec
priests and their captives, as well as the assorted regalia they wore as signs of their military achievements.  (Codex Mendoza, Courtesy
of Frances F. Berdan and Patricia Reiff Anawalt)

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 312 ? warfare
Long before, Teotihuacán, Tula, and the Classic Maya
city-states had met a similar fate.
South America
Warfare, rebellion, and other forms of interregional
conflict and violence were once so prevalent in ancient
Peru that archaeologists subdivided the region’s pri-
mary cultural and temporal developments on the basis
of conquest events and periods of political and social
consolidation, instability, and fragmentation. Organized
violence and the use of coercive force arose in tandem
with the evolution of state-level societies and complex
civilizations the world over. Patterns of warfare and social
violence initially surfaced in Peru with the advent of the
Initial period (ca. 1800 b.c.e.) and soon proliferated with
the expansion of the Chavín Horizon at 800 b.c.e. These
patterns were soon institutionalized with the rise of Wari
and Tiwanaku in the highlands around 600 to 1000 c.e.
The Late Horizon (1450–1532), in turn, corresponded
with the dynamics of Inca conquest, expansionist warfare,
the violent suppression of ethnic rebellion, and the rise
and fall of empire (see Incas). Because the Incas were ulti-
mately toppled through the coincidence of a protracted
civil war, pandemic disease, and the violent and the direct
onslaught of Spanish forces and their indigenous allies,
Inca imperial warfare and military institutions are among
the most thoroughly documented contact-era forms of
organized (state-level) violence in all of South America.
The complexities of the chronological subdivisions in
question should therefore provide some sense of the many
groups, cultures, and civilizations that rose to prominence
and statehood on the basis of protracted episodes of con-
flict, the deployment of coercive force, and the escalation
of ritualized forms of violence that culminated in the pre-
Hispanic era, with the fall of the Inca Empire in 1532.
The emergence of complex states is largely identified with
the harnessing of coercive force and the use of organized
violence for political ends, and in ancient Peru, such forms
of conflict and violence are seen to coincide with the
emergence of the Initial period in 1800 b.c.e. While inter-
regional conflict and violence can be traced to far earlier
periods in Peru and South America more generally, it was
only with the advent of intensive farming, irrigation sys-
tems, public works, and the growth of large towns and cit-
ies that scholars see an escalation in the ubiquity of human
trophies, cranial trauma, and the portrayal of militaristic
themes and the iconography of violence in art.
Early evidence for the bloody aftermath of early forms
of interethnic conflict and warfare has been identified on
Peru’s north coast, at the site of Cerro Sechín within
the Sechín Alto platform complex. Touted as the largest
early monument complex in the Americas, archaeolo-
gists recovered a “macabre megalithic wall” composed of
sculpted monoliths dating to 1200 b.c.e. The megalithic
wall depicts dismembered human remains, decapitated
heads, stacked skulls, severed limbs, torsos, and viscera
interspersed with helmeted and armed warriors brandish-
ELA_v1_PF.indd 312
ing shock weapons such as pikelike clubs or stone maces.
At the nearby highland settlement of Chavín de Huántar
(dated by radiocarbon assay to ca. 800 b.c.e.), a constel-
lation of particularly graphic and supernaturally inspired
iconography devoted to the depiction of mutilated ene-
mies and human trophies has similarly been identified.
Such depictions were but one of the many technologies
of terror that were refined over the course of Peruvian
prehistory to exalt the exploits of the victors, intimidate
enemies, perpetuate fear in subject populations, and reify
the status of warrior elites and the patrons of war.
The Moche civilization of Peru redefined the art of
war and ritual violence by fabricating a massive corpus
of particularly graphic depictions of warfare in ceramics,
paint, and related works of art. The multitude of finely
detailed ceramic depictions of pitched battles, elaborately
dressed warriors, weaponry, competing elites and warlords,
and supernaturals provides a major resource for the study
and interpretation of Peruvian warfare and ritual violence;
it also reflects the growing importance of militarism and
the martial arts with the emergence of the Moche state in
the Early Intermediate period (ca. 200 b.c.e.–600 c.e.).
The rise of the early highland expansionist states of the
Wari (Peru) and Tiwanaku (Bolivia) serve to define those
forms of Andean warfare and attendant forms of social
violence and bloodshed; these forms prevailed well into
the Late Horizon period (1450–1532) and culminated with
the collapse of the Inca Empire in 1532. Middle Horizon
(600–1000 c.e.) patterns of warfare specific to the Wari
and Tiwanaku coincide with the emergence of elaborate
militaristic displays at major centers and Wari colonies in
the Cuzco and Moquegua regions, albeit with initially lim-
ited evidence for violent conflict, conquest, or provincial
resistance. A recent forensic study of drilled, perforated,
and suspended human trophy heads from the Wari site
of Conchopata (600–1000 c.e.) suggests that the taking of
heads largely took place among fresh kills or freshly dis-
patched war captives, primarily men and children.
Wari rule from 650 to 800 was specifically correlated
with high levels of violence and cranial trauma, with
upward of 33 percent of the adult samples from Beringa,
26 percent from Conchopata, and 31 percent from La
Real exhibiting such trauma. Interestingly, wound pat-
terning in females differs from that of males, with females
bearing wounds primarily on the posterior of the cra-
nium and males on the anterior. This may indicate that
the females were dispatched or executed with blows to
the back of the head, whereas males tended to be felled
during hand-to-hand combat.
During this same period, Wari influence became
widespread in highland contexts; Wari centers emerged in
regions once thought to constitute the exclusive domain
of the Tiwanaku state. While Wari sites in the core area
are only marginally retrofitted or strategically located
with defensive consideration in mind, Wari provincial or
frontier centers exhibit elaborate defensive features. The
frontier hill fort at Pikillacta consists of a large walled
3/18/10 9:32:35 AM

complex with a supporting suite of regional settlements
and strategically situated hilltop emplacements located
over mountain passes within striking distance of key
exchange routes in the highlands.
With the emergence of the Late Intermediate period
(ca. 1000–1450), much of Peru and the Andean highlands
was dominated by fragmented regional polities and
pervasive warfare. At the same time, little in the way of
militaristic iconography or martial themes prevails in any
given region, despite the intensification of warfare and
other forms of social violence. Despite this fact, indig-
enous informants recalled the period as that of the auca
runa, or the “time of warriors,” fragmented polities, and
constant warfare. With the exception of the Chimú state
of north coastal Peru, the highlands were dominated by
pukaras, or hilltop forts and redoubts, with extensive evi-
dence of violence and conflict.
The Ecuadorean highlands, for example, saw the pro-
liferation of hilltop sites and fortifications and significant
quantities of stone and bronze mace heads, axes, and related
shock weapons (see Ecuador). Other highland regions
witnessed the development of fortified hilltop settlements
or forts, replete with walls, ditches, towers, and defensive
terrace systems. The escalation of conflict corresponded
with the growing deployment of bolas (sling stones), stone
and bronze mace heads, and an increase in craniofacial
trauma borne in the skeletal remains of period populations.
Scholars interpret these findings as reflections of the tandem
emergence and proliferation of small, fragmented, raiding
polities and the occasional expansion of the conquest state
in the wake of the decline of both the Wari and Tiwanaku
ca. 1000 c.e. This, in turn, coincided with the emergence
of kuraka lords, hereditary warlords, and sinchi war leaders;
the proliferation of hill forts or pukaras with concentric
fieldstone walls, parapets, and baffled or staggered gates;
the proliferation of stone mace heads, projectile points, and
sling stones; and the coincident balkanization, or fragmen-
tation, of the former political and economic integrity of the
Titicaca Basin in the period from 1000 to 1450.
The fractious polities and wars of the Late Intermediate
period were quelled with the emergence of the Incas as a
formidable sociopolitical and economic bulwark of high-
land Andean civilization in the mid- to late 15th century.
While the preceding Late Intermediate period was one
of political and economic fragmentation and internecine
warfare, the Inca juggernaut fashioned order out of chaos,
all through an ambitious and determined program of
conquest and consolidation. Archaeological evidence and
historical accounts indicate that target groups that readily
surrendered or submitted to Inca authority were treated
with considerable lenience; however, groups that resisted
Inca control were systematically eliminated through out-
right conquest, genocide, and deportation. Resettlement
programs were undertaken to assuage or minimize the
potential for ethnic rebellions within the empire, a pre-
occupation that appears to have weighed heavily on the
nature of Inca military strategy (see mitmaq).
ELA_v1_PF.indd 313
warfare ç 313
Significantly, period accounts make clear the Incas’
ability to rapidly mobilize and deploy vast armies of
citizen-soldiers, mita (labor service or tax) conscripts
and auxiliaries, porters, women, llama pack trains, and
related support personnel often numbering into the
tens of thousands, and in some cases, the hundreds of
thousands. Spanish victories over the massive Inca forces
make clear that the Incas were predisposed to traditional
military deployments that relied on massing, or the con-
centration of armed forces in overwhelming numbers, a
command structure that relied on the physical leader-
ship of officers at the helm of major engagements, and
the deployment of flanking movements and the three-
pronged attack.
In addition to the aforementioned command orienta-
tion and numbers, Inca armies drew heavily on highland
and coastal resources and access, including the vast road
and transport networks, distant storage facilities number-
ing into the thousands, ancient Wari civic-ceremonial
and military installations, an effective organizational and
bureaucratic framework, and the creation and mobiliza-
tion of a host of allies across the length and breadth of
the Andean cordilleras. In this way, the Incas launched
an effective and overwhelming program of conquest.
Through intermarriage, they established a complex net-
work of alliances. Together, these strategies characterized
the expansion and consolidation of the Inca Empire,
the largest empire ever forged in the Americas prior to
European contact.
See also military (Vols. II, III, IV); presidio (Vol. II);
riots and rebellions (Vol. II); war (Vol. II).
—Francisco J. González
Rubén G. Mendoza
Camilla Townsend
Further reading:
Elizabeth N. Arkush. “Collapse, Conflict, Conquest: The
Transformation of Warfare in the Late Prehispanic An-
dean Highlands.” In The Archaeology of Warfare: Prehisto-
ries of Raiding and Conquest, edited by Elizabeth N. Arkush
and Mark W. Allen, 286–335 (Gainesville: University
Press of Florida, 2006).
Richard J. Chacon and Rubén G. Mendoza, eds. Latin Amer-
ican Indigenous Warfare and Ritual Violence (Tucson: Uni-
versity of Arizona Press, 2007).
Inga Clendinnen. Aztecs: An Interpretation (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1992).
Terence N. D’Altroy. The Incas (Malden, Mass.: Blackwell
Publishers, 2002).
Ross Hassig. Aztec Warfare: Imperial Expansion and Political
Control (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1988).
———. War and Society in Ancient Mesoamerica (Berkeley:
University of California, 1992).
Peter Hulme and Neil L. Whitehead, eds. Wild Majesty:
Encounters with Caribs from Columbus to the Present Day
(Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1992).
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 314 ? Wari

Irving Rouse. The Tainos: Rise and Decline of the People Who
Greeted Columbus (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University
Press, 1992).
Linda Schele and David Freidel. A Forest of Kings: The Untold
Story of the Ancient Maya (New York: Morrow, 1990).
Samuel L. Wilson, ed. The Indigenous People of the Caribbean
(Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 1997).

Wari  (Huari)  Between 600 and 1000 c.e., the larg-

est Andean power was the Wari Empire. Its capital city,
Huari, located near the modern city of Ayacucho, was
a dense urban settlement that covered more than 1.5
square miles (3.9 km2). At its height, the Wari Empire
controlled some 800 miles (1,287.5 km) of the Peruvian
Andes, from Cajamarca to Moquegua. Before the rise of
the Incas, the Wari built a vast network of roads to con-
nect administrators in different areas to the central capi-
tal and facilitate the movement of goods and information
(see trade). The Wari Empire coexisted with the north
coast Moche civilization and the Tiwanaku state to the
south in Bolivia. Wari society was characterized by its
unique standardized architecture, agricultural innova-
tions, and lavish imperial goods (see agriculture).
The Wari built administrative centers in many
highland regions, such as Azangaro and Jincamocco in
Ayacucho, Pikillacta in Cuzco, Cerro Baúl in Moquegua,
and Viracochapampa in Huamanchuco. Smaller centers
have been uncovered in the coastal Nazca and Majes
Valleys. While no Wari installations have been found in
the coastal areas between the Moche and Nazca drain- Large Wari drinking vessels, called k’ero, were used at ceremo-
ages, societies living in this area imitated Wari-style nial events to drink chicha. Ritually smashed in the Wari brewery
goods and obtained a few high-quality imports made at Cerro Baúl, this example depicts the head of the front-face
deity, with surrounding decorative animal heads drawn in a
in the imperial capital. It remains unclear if the Wari
similar manner to the Tiwanaku style. Such Wari-Tiwanaku
Empire ever conquered or controlled these groups.
hybrids provide evidence of the frontier interaction between the
Wari centers of administration are easily identified Wari and Tiwanaku people in the Moquegua Valley of southern
in aerial photographs because they used a unified spatial Peru.  (Courtesy of Donna Nash/Photo credit Ryan Williams)
design. Large walled complexes were subdivided into
smaller rectilinear compounds that consisted of lateral
halls built around a central open patio space called a maize. During Inca times, maize was valued because it
“patio group.” Such units were sometimes adjoined to was made into a fermented drink called chicha. The brew-
open plazas or clusters of small irregular rooms. Some ing of chicha at Wari sites, depictions in Wari art, and
Wari sites had D-shaped temples; others had large rect- elaborate decorated drinking vessels show that chicha was
angular buildings with a series of interior wall niches. equally important in Wari society (see alcohol).
Both were related to ancestor worship or the dedication Wari ritual and luxury items shared several fea-
of offerings (see religion). Wari imperial architecture tures with Tiwanaku art, such as the icon of the “staff
contrasts with that of Moche and Tiwanaku because it god,” a human or supernatural person grasping a staff in
does not include pyramidal monuments. each hand. The staff god is depicted on both Wari and
Wari installations were often affiliated with subsid- Tiwanaku textiles, as well as other kinds of goods. Wari
iary settlements and a sophisticated system of agriculture. designs are highly variable and reflective of multiethnic
Since Wari colonies occupied areas that required irriga- interactions within the empire; however, some goods, such
tion to grow crops, some scholars have suggested that as the “face neck jar,” appeared throughout the empire (see
they developed the technology to build canals across rug- ceramics). Decorated as persons of different ages wearing
ged terrain and perhaps were the first to terrace steep hills diverse clothing, these jars came in various sizes, and
below the altitude of seasonal rainfall. Irrigation technol- some were life size. Face neck jars were used to serve chicha
ogy allowed more land to be used for agriculture in areas and often bore intricate designs. Depictions of Wari elites
with warmer climates that were favorable for growing show that women wore long dresses overlaid by a cloak or

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