Wari Huari Art and Architecture PDF

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Wari (Huari) Art and Architecture

Susan E. Bergh
LAST MODIFIED: 25 FEBRUARY 2016

DOI: 10.1093/OBO/9780199920105-0079
Introduction
Art-historical investigation of the Wari (also spelled “Huari”), who created one of the ancient Americas’ most aesthetically and
technically accomplished corpuses of artworks, is relatively nascent. Fine textiles and ceramics have received the most attention; in
many cases, objects made of other materials—feathers, metal, shell, stone, and wood among them—await systematic description and
interpretation. Accordingly, art-historical studies are less amply represented in this article than is archaeological investigation, which
provides critical background on context. The Wari, whose homeland was the Ayacucho region of the south-central Peruvian Andes, held
power during the Middle Horizon period (AD 600–1000 CE). Through the quirks of history, it was not until the mid-20th century that
archaeologists identified the Wari’s sprawling, eponymous capital city, one of the largest ancient sites in South America. Since then,
archaeological study has focused on defining the development of the Wari civilization and the extent of its sphere of influence through
exploration of its heartland and far-flung provincial centers, all in the highlands or adjacent slopes and foothills, as well as western
Pacific coastal areas, where the Wari did not build much architecture but Wari and Wari-influenced artifacts are plentiful in tombs and
buried offerings. Although much has been discovered since the 1960s about the Wari’s transformational impact during their heyday,
there is still no agreement about the form that their political organization assumed. Some scholars believe they forged the central
Andes’ first empire, while others suggest alternative models that downplay the Wari’s dominance while recognizing the crucial role they
played in the period’s surging interregional interactions. One interpretive challenge is that the Wari did not use a writing system; thus,
modern knowledge is based solely on the remains they left behind. Historically, study of the Wari was closely tied to the contemporary
Tiwanaku (Tiahuanaco), whose heartland was on the Bolivian altiplano. Although today recognized as powerful, independent polities
with distinct material cultures, the two shared a few features that, until the Wari capital was identified, caused Wari-type artifacts to be
attributed to the Tiwanaku. Prominent among the shared features is a religious iconography so important that it functions as one of the
period’s signatures: a frontally posed staff-bearing deity often depicted with supernatural attendants or companions, here collectively
termed the “staff deity complex.” To date, no journals have been devoted entirely to Wari studies, although Boletín de Arqueología
PUCP, Latin American Antiquity, and Ñawpa Pacha are regular publishing venues. Also lacking are bibliographies, anthologies,
reference works, and textbooks.
General Overviews
General overviews are scarce. The only effort that focuses on Wari arts is Bergh 2012, which is intended for a general audience. For an
earlier overview of archaeology that emphasizes architecture, see Isbell and McEwan 1991, a landmark volume that helped define the
Wari as a legitimate focus of research and remains essential reading. Chapter 3 of Schreiber 1992 (cited under Perspectives on the
Wari Phenomenon) provides a more succinct summary of archaeological knowledge in the early 1990s.
Bergh, Susan E., ed. Wari: Lords of the Ancient Andes. Cleveland, OH: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2012.
A profusely illustrated exhibition catalogue that serves as a good introduction to the Wari and their arts. Essays by major specialists
offer summaries of counterpoint views of the Wari’s political structure as well as architecture, feasting traditions, staff deity iconography
and religion, major artistic media (ceramic, fiber, feathers, metal, shell, stone, and wood), and legacy in the Andes.
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Isbell, William H., and Gordon F. McEwan, eds. Huari Administrative Structure: Prehistoric Monumental Architecture and State
Government. Washington, DC: Dumbarton Oaks, 1991.
This still-important publication, which summarizes the state of archaeological research in the late 1980s, includes contributions focused
on architecture and site planning by major archaeologists working in the Wari heartland (the capital, Conchopata) and provincial centers
(Azángaro, Cerro Baúl, Jincamocco, Pikillacta, Viracochapampa). The introductory essay provides a useful synopsis of varying
interpretations of Wari political structure, the issue that prompted the volume’s production and remains relevant today (see Perspectives
on the Wari Phenomenon).
Archaeology
Many archaeological studies can be sorted according to the sites or regions on which they focus, a method of organization followed in
much of this section. The territory covered in the following multiauthor publications—Kaulicke and Isbell 2001, Kaulicke and Isbell 2002,
Rivera Díaz 1985, and Bazán 2001—is wider ranging.
Bazán, Pedro, ed. Wari: Arte precolombino peruano. Colección América. Seville, Spain: Fundación El Monte, 2001.
This multiauthor catalogue, prepared for an exhibition based on the holdings of Peru’s national anthropology museum, contains
Spanish-language essays about architecture and urbanism, architectural chronology, ceramic technology and iconography, D-shaped
structures, and figurines. Several of the contributions have appeared elsewhere in English.
Kaulicke, Peter, and William H. Isbell, eds. Huari y Tiwanaku: Modelos vs. evidencias; Primera parte. Boletín de Arqueología
PUCP 4. Lima: Fondo Editorial de la Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú, 2001.
The first volume of a two-part publication that also includes Kaulicke and Isbell 2002. This volume groups essays under three headings:
general themes, the Wari phenomenon in the northern and central Andes, and the Wari’s presence in the south.
Kaulicke, Peter, and William H. Isbell, eds. Huari y Tiwanaku: Modelos vs. evidencias; Segunda parte. Boletín de Arqueología
PUCP 5. Lima: Fondo Editorial de la Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú, 2002.
The second volume of a two-part publication that also includes Kaulicke and Isbell 2001. This volume opens with additional southern
Wari topics before turning to the Tiwanaku. In general, in neither volume do authors discuss models versus evidence or compare the
Wari and the Tiwanaku; rather, most concern themselves with specialized research topics.
Rivera Díaz, Mario A., ed. La problemática Tiwanaku-Huari en el contexto panandino del desarrollo cultural. Diálogo Andino 4.
Arica, Chile: Universidad de Tarapacá, 1985.
An edited volume with essays about Tiwanaku and Wari topics, the latter including Pikillacta, a formal comparison of Wari and Tiwanaku
architecture, and Wari offerings.
Chronology Studies
Archaeologists use two forms of dating to track the Wari’s development through time: an absolute chronology provided by radiocarbon
dates, and a relative chronology based on the study of stylistic changes in ceramics. Most Wari-period radiocarbon measurements are
scattered in literature devoted to broader discussions, but three exceptions appear here: Finucane, et al. 2007, which reports dates
from the Ayacucho Valley; Fonseca Santa Cruz and Bauer 2013, which concerns Espíritu Pampa in the Cuzco area; and Williams 2001,
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which deals with Cerro Baúl. Menzel 1964 and Menzel 1968 synthesize the relative chronology that, with refinements, remains in wide
use today; for refinements, see, for instance, Patricia Knobloch’s essay “Stylistic Date of Ceramics from the Huari Centers” in Isbell and
McEwan 1991 (cited under General Overviews), pp. 247–258. Menzel 1977 applies the chronology to coastal materials within a wider-
ranging discussion of the Andes.
Finucane, Brian Clifton, J. Ernesto Valdez, Ismael Pérez Calderon, Cirilo Vivanco Pomacanchari, Lidio M. Valdez, and Tamsin
O’Connell. “The End of Empire: New Radiocarbon Dates from the Ayacucho Valley, Peru, and Their Implications for the
Collapse of the Wari State.” Radiocarbon 49.2 (2007): 579–592.
The title of this article explains its content.
Fonseca Santa Cruz, Javier, and Brian S. Bauer. “Dating the Wari Remains at Espíritu Pampa (Vilcabamba, Cusco).” Andean
Past 11 (2013): 111–121.
A report on three radiocarbon dates from Espíritu Pampa, along with a brief description of the Wari occupation there.
Menzel, Dorothy. “Style and Time in the Middle Horizon.” Ñawpa Pacha 2 (1964): 1–106.
A monumental study in which Menzel sorts Wari and Wari-influenced ceramic styles into four temporal epochs; the Wari apogee
occurred during the first two. Most illustrations are referenced in 407 endnotes; culling them from the literature—and reading the text,
which beginners will find daunting—is a rite of passage for Wari specialists. Also see Menzel 1968.
Menzel, Dorothy. “New Data on the Huari Empire in Middle Horizon Epoch 2A.” Ñawpa Pacha 6 (1968): 47–114.
An addendum to Menzel 1964 that, on the basis of then newly available data, updates discussion of Middle Horizon 2A, one of the four
temporal epochs defined in the earlier study. Involves extensive consideration of ceramics from Ayapata.
Menzel, Dorothy. The Archaeology of Ancient Peru and the Work of Max Uhle. Berkeley: Robert H. Lowie Museum of
Anthropology, University of California, 1977.
In several chapters of this exhibition catalogue, Menzel applies her Wari chronology to coastal materials that the early archeologist Max
Uhle collected for the Hearst Museum of Anthropology (formerly the Lowie Museum) at the University of California, Berkeley.
Williams, Patrick Ryan. “Cerro Baúl: A Wari Center on the Tiwanaku Frontier.” Latin American Antiquity 12.1 (2001): 67–83.
A discussion of radiocarbon dates from Cerro Baúl that suggest the Wari and Tiwanaku occupations of the Moquegua Valley were
simultaneous, not sequential, and that the Wari expansion was later than previously suspected.
In the Heartland
The references in this section concern sites within the Wari’s Ayacucho heartland, including Huari, the underexplored capital;
Conchopata, which has been termed the Wari’s “second city”; and Azángaro and Jargampata, both smaller centers probably devoted to
state-controlled agricultural production that fed the population of the burgeoning capital.
Conchopata
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Although modern encroachment has profoundly affected Conchopata, archaeological research has uncovered the remains of elite
architecture as well as copious evidence of the presence of a community of accomplished ceramic specialists. Descriptions of
archaeological finds at the site can be found in Isbell and Cook 2002, Ochatoma Paravicino 2007, and Ochatoma Paravicino and
Cabrera Romero 2002. Isbell 2004 proposes a typology of tombs. Pozzi-Escot, et al. 1998 reconstructs the technology and organization
of ceramic production at the site, and Isbell 2007 proposes an alternative view in regard to craft organization. Some Conchopata pottery
is decorated with representations of the staff deity complex; Isbell 1984–1985 and Isbell and Cook 1987 examine the evolution of this
iconography and propose that crucial developments occurred at Conchopata, an idea that William Isbell revises in Isbell and Knobloch
2009 (cited under Art).
Isbell, William H. “Conchopata, Ideological Innovator in Middle Horizon 1A.” Ñawpa Pacha 22–23 (1984–1985): 91–126.
An argument that innovations in staff deity iconography were linked to the development of an ideology involving concepts of hierarchy
and centralization, and the suggestion that these innovations occurred at Conchopata rather than Tiwanaku.
Isbell, William H. “Mortuary Preferences: A Wari Case Study from Middle Horizon Peru.” Latin American Antiquity 15.1 (2004):
3–32.
A typology of “ideal” Wari tomb types that is based especially on Conchopata burials, and reflections on what the tombs may reveal
about sociopolitical hierarchy and ancestor rituals. Lidio M. Valdez and colleagues criticize the typology in “Mortuary Preferences and
Selected References: A Comment on Middle Horizon Wari Burials,” from World Archaeology 38.4 (2006): 672–689. Isbell proposes
refinements in “Burial in the Wari and the Tiwanaku Heartlands: Similarities, Differences, and Meanings,” coauthored with Antti
Korpisaari, which appears in Diálogo Andino 39 (2012): 91–122.
Isbell, William H. “A Community of Potters, or Multicrafting Wives of Polygynous Lords?” Paper presented at a symposium
held at the 2003 annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology in Milwaukee, WI. In Craft Production in Complex
Societies: Multicraft and Producer Perspectives. Edited by Izumi Shimada, 68–96. Foundations of Archaeological Inquiry. Salt
Lake City: University of Utah Press, 2007.
Isbell speculates about the practice of polygyny and the roles of elite wives as potters and brewers at Conchopata, touching briefly on
the thorny question of how to distinguish male from female representations in Wari iconography.
Isbell, William H., and Anita G. Cook. “Ideological Origins of an Andean Conquest State.” Archaeology 40.4 (1987): 26–33.
A reprise of the hypothesis that innovations in the evolution of staff deity iconography and associated politico-religious ideology
occurred at Conchopata, and that such innovations catalyzed the emergence of expansionist states in the Andes.
Isbell, William H., and Anita G. Cook. “A New Perspective on Conchopata and the Andean Middle Horizon.” In Andean
Archaeology II: Art, Landscape, and Society. Edited by Helaine Silverman and William H. Isbell, 249–306. New York: Kluwer
Academic / Plenum, 2002.
A review-style article about Conchopata archaeology that summarizes the history of research, suggests a typology for the many
ceramic deposits found at the site, reviews pottery production processes, classifies human burials, and surveys architectural forms.
Ochatoma Paravicino, José. Alfareros del imperio Huari: Vida cotidiana y áreas de actividad en Conchopata. Ayacucho, Peru:
Facultad de Ciencias Sociales, Universidad Nacional de San Cristóbal de Huamanga, 2007.
Documentation of archaeological investigations at Conchopata.
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Ochatoma Paravicino, José, and Martha Cabrera Romero. “Religious Ideology and Military Organization in the Iconography of
a D-shaped Ceremonial Precinct at Conchopata.” In Andean Archaeology II: Art, Landscape, and Society. Edited by Helaine
Silverman and William H. Isbell, 225–248. New York: Kluwer Academic / Plenum, 2002.
A description of excavations in one sector of Conchopata that focuses on a D-shaped temple, along with an illustrated discussion of the
impressively decorated ceramics found within the sector.
Pozzi-Escot, Denise, Marleni M. Alarcón, and Cirilio Vivanco. “Wari Ceramics and Production Technology: The View from
Ayacucho.” In Andean Ceramics: Technology, Organization, and Approaches. Edited by Izumi Shimada, 253–281. MASCA
Research Papers in Science and Archaeology 15, Supplement. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Museum of
Archaeology and Anthropology, 1998.
A reconstruction of the technology and organization of ceramic production at Conchopata, where archaeologists have found hundreds
of pottery-making implements and tons of ceramic sherds.
Huari, the Capital City
Some specialists adopt the convention, followed here, of applying the spelling “Huari” to the capital city to distinguish it from the wider-
spread Wari phenomenon. Huari is one of the largest ancient sites in South America but has received limited archaeological attention
due in part to political upheaval in the Ayacucho region that interrupted investigation in the 1980s and early 1990s. Rowe, et al. 1950
provides notes on an early, brief reconnaissance of the site. Since then, only four areas within the city have been somewhat extensively
investigated: Pérez Calderón 1999 discusses Monjachayoq, which includes a looted tomb so massive that it has been identified as
royal; González Carré and Bragayrac Dávila 1986; González Carré, et al. 1999; and Ochatoma Paravicino, et al. 2015 consider
Vegachayoq Moqo, which contains a D-shaped structure larger than any other so far documented; William Isbell and colleagues’
chapter “Architecture and Spatial Organization at Huari” in Isbell and McEwan 1991 (cited under General Overviews), pp. 19–54,
examines Moraduchayoq, interpreted as an example of residential-administrative architecture; and Mario Benavides Calle’s chapter in
Isbell and McEwan 1991, pp. 55–70, deals with Cheqo Wasi, another tomb complex. Isbell 1986 estimates the city’s population, and
Isbell 1997 proposes a construction chronology for the capital.
González Carré, Enrique, and Enrique Bragayrac Dávila. “El Templo Mayor de Wari, Ayacucho.” Boletín de Lima 47 (1986):
9–20.
A forerunner of González Carré, et al. 1999 that summarizes and is more easily located than its longer successor.
González Carré, Enrique, Enrique Bragayrac Dávila, Cirilo Vivanco Pomacanchari, Vera Tiesler Blos, and Máximo López
Quispe. El Templo Mayor en la ciudad de Wari: Estudios arqueológicos en Vegachayoq Moqo–Ayacucho. 2d ed. Ayacucho,
Peru: Laboratorio de Arqueología, Facultad de Ciencias Sociales, Universidad Nacional San Cristóbal de Huamanga, 1999.
A report on archaeological investigation of Vegachayoq Moqo and an interpretation of the complex as the city’s main ceremonial area.
Isbell, William H. “Emergence of City and State at Wari, Ayacucho, Peru, during the Middle Horizon.” Paper presented at an
Andean colloquium held 28–29 April 1981 at the University of Texas, Austin. In Andean Archaeology: Papers in Memory of
Clifford Evans. Edited by Ramiro Matos, Solveig A. Turpin, and Herbert H. Eling Jr., 189–200. Monograph 27. Los Angeles:
Institute of Archaeology, UCLA, 1986.
See especially for an estimate of the population of Wari’s capital city.
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Isbell, William H. “Reconstructing Huari: A Cultural Chronology for the Capital City.” In Emergence and Change in Early Urban
Societies. Edited by Linda R. Manzanilla, 181–227. Fundamental Issues in Archaeology. New York: Plenum, 1997.
Isbell proposes an architectural chronology for the capital that he terms “creative” and “bold” in light of the limited archaeological
fieldwork that has occurred there. He published a very similar essay, “Huari: A New Direction in Central Andean Urban Evolution,” in
Domestic Life in Prehispanic Capitals, edited by L. R. Manzanilla and Claude Chapdelaine (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan, Museum
of Anthropology, 2009), pp. 197–219.
Ochatoma Paravicino, José, Martha Cabrera Romero, and Carlos Mancilla Rojas. El área sagrada de Wari: Investigaciones
arqueológicas en Vegachayuq Moqo. Ayacucho, Peru: Universidad Nacional de San Cristóbal de Huamanga, 2015.
A well-illustrated report about the most recent and thorough archaeological exploration of the Vegachayoq Moqo sector on the basis of
excavations conducted in 2011 and 2012.
Pérez Calderón, Ismael. Huari: Misteriosa ciudad de piedra. Ayacucho, Peru: Universidad Nacional de San Cristóbal de
Huamanga, 1999.
A report on archaeological investigation of Monjachayoq, a multilevel, multichamber tomb that has been heavily looted since at least the
Spanish colonial period.
Rowe, John H., Donald Collier, and Gordon R. Willey. “Reconnaissance Notes on the Site of Huari, near Ayacucho, Peru.”
American Antiquity 16.2 (1950): 120–137.
One of the earliest archaeological reports about Huari that includes a useful history of investigation at the site.
Other Sites in the Heartland
One heartland site to have received archaeological attention is Azángaro, a medium-size installation that the Wari built in the Ayacucho
Basin some fifteen kilometers from their capital. Anders 1986a and Anders 1986b interpret the site, the function of which nevertheless
remains an unsettled matter; also see Martha Anders’s chapter “Structure and Function at the Planned Site of Azangaro” in Isbell and
McEwan 1991 (cited under General Overviews), pp. 165–198. Isbell 1977 documents Jargampata, a very small Wari facility probably
involved in state-controlled agricultural production that supported the nearby capital.
Anders, Martha B. “Dual Organization and Calendars Inferred from the Planned Site of Azángaro-Wari Administrative
Strategies.” 3 vols. PhD diss., Cornell University, 1986a.
Anders exhaustively presents her fieldwork at Azángaro. She relates the site’s architecture to agricultural calendrical rituals and argues
both that the Wari Empire adopted dualistic sociopolitical organization and that it was less centralized and secular than many other
scholars then believed. She discusses some Wari art forms, such as turquoise-colored figurines.
Anders, Martha B. “Wari Experiments in Statecraft: A View from Azángaro.” Paper presented at an Andean colloquium held
28–29 April 1981 at the University of Texas, Austin. In Andean Archaeology: Papers in Memory of Clifford Evans. Edited by
Ramiro Matos, Solveig A. Turpin, and Herbert H. Eling Jr., 201–244. Monograph 27. Los Angeles: Institute of Archaeology,
UCLA, 1986b.
Anders outlines findings of her fieldwork at Azángaro, arguing that several of the site’s features reveal the Wari state exploited widely
shared sacred concepts as it expanded and thus that religion served as an integrating force.
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Isbell, William H. The Rural Foundation for Urbanism: Economic and Stylistic Interaction between Rural and Urban
Communities in Eighth-Century Peru. Illinois Studies in Anthropology 10. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1977.
A report on archaeological exploration of Jargampata, which the author interprets here as an agricultural administrative locus but later
as an agricultural center and rural royal estate (see Isbell 2006, cited under Architecture).
Outside the Heartland
This section concerns highland and coastal sites outside the Wari’s Ayacucho heartland. Subsections are devoted to El Castillo in the
Huarmey Valley, where a large, elaborate tomb with Wari affiliations has been uncovered; Cerro Baúl and Cerro Mejía in the Moquegua
Valley, where Wari and Tiwanaku territories overlapped; the Cotahuasi and Majes Valleys in the Arequipa area, where Wari influence
was pervasive; Pikillacta in the Cuzco region, where the Wari created their largest colonial intrusion so far documented; and
Viracochampapa in Huamachuco, where the Wari initiated but did not finish construction of a provincial center. A final subsection
addresses other sites on the coast (Maymi, Pachacamac, Pataraya), in the highlands (Honcopampa, Jincamocco, Wari Wilka), and on
the eastern slope (Espíritu Pampa).
El Castillo and the Huarmey Valley
The nature of the Wari presence in the Huarmey Valley, on Peru’s southern north coast, is still coming into focus since Miłosz Giersz
and his colleagues excavated a sensational, complex mausoleum at the Castillo site in 2012. As Giersz and Pardo 2014 reveals, the
mausoleum contained more than seventy burials, most of them women, and a wealth of burial goods, many in Wari styles. Prümers
1990 documents textiles from El Castillo, including many in the so-called Moche-Wari style along with a few classic Wari
tapestry-woven examples; also see Heiko Prümers’s chapter “‘El Castillo’ de Huarmey” in Kaulicke and Isbell 2001 (cited under
Archaeology), pp. 289–312.
Giersz, Miłosz, and Cecilia Pardo, eds. Castillo de Huarmey: El mausoleo imperial wari. Lima, Peru: Asociación Museo de Arte
de Lima, 2014.
A well-illustrated, bilingual (Spanish and English) catalogue about the Castillo elite mausoleum that provides overviews of the tombs’
contents along with an interpretation of the Wari presence in the Huarmey Valley.
Prümers, Heiko. Der Fundort “El Castillo” im Huarmeytal, Peru: Ein Beitrag zum Problem des Moche-Huari Textilstils. 2 vols.
Mundus-Reihe Alt-Amerikanistik 4.1. Bonn, Germany: Holos Verlag, 1990.
The most substantial documentation available for the so-called Moche-Wari textile style. Includes a catalogue entry and black-and-white
illustration for each of nearly five hundred textiles from El Castillo, along with a German-language discussion of the style.
Cerro Baúl, Cerro Mejía, and the Moquegua Valley
The impressive provincial center on the summit Cerro Baúl—a towering, flat-topped mesa—and a settlement on the slopes of adjacent
Cerro Mejía both were components of the substantial Wari colonization of the Moquegua Valley in far southern Peru. Moseley, et al.
2005 provides a general overview of the occupation, and Williams and Isla Cuadrado 2002 describes the results of excavations on
Cerro Baúl. Nash 2010 and Williams, et al. 2008 explore evidence of the Wari’s use of feasting as an element of statecraft at both sites,
and Williams and Nash 2006 proposes that another Wari tactic to establish control of populations involved manipulating local religious
beliefs. Nash 2012 and Nash and Williams 2009 also investigate architectural spaces, among other things, for signs of the Wari’s
exercise of imperial control.
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Moseley, Michael E., Donna J. Nash, Patrick Ryan Williams, Susan D. deFrance, Ana Miranda, and Mario Ruales. “Burning
Down the Brewery: Establishing and Evacuating an Ancient Imperial Colony at Cerro Baúl, Peru.” Proceedings of the National
Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 102.48 (2005): 17264–17271.
A readable, brief description and interpretation of the Wari occupation of Cerro Baúl and Cerro Mejía.
Nash, Donna J. “Fine Dining and Fabulous Atmosphere: Feasting Facilities and Political Interaction in the Wari Realm.” In
Inside Ancient Kitchens: New Directions in the Study of Daily Meals and Feasts. Edited by Elizabeth A. Klarich, 83–109.
Boulder: University Press of Colorado, 2010.
An exploration of the relationship between feasting and political control, and of the nature of Wari feasting events at Cerro Baúl and
Cerro Mejía.
Nash, Donna J. “El establecimiento de relaciones de poder a través del uso del espacio residencial en la provincia Wari de
Moquegua.” Bulletin de l’Institute Franҫais d’Études Andines 41.1 (2012): 1–34.
An interpretation of elite residences at Cerro Mejía and Cerro Baúl as the locales of important political activities that assisted Wari
representatives in maintaining control of local groups.
Nash, Donna J., and Patrick Ryan Williams. “Wari Political Organization: The Southern Periphery.” In Andean Civilization: A
Tribute to Michael E. Moseley. Edited by Joyce Marcus and Patrick Ryan Williams, 257–276. Monograph 63. Los Angeles:
Cotsen Institute of Archaeology Press, 2009.
An investigation of the use of space, status emblems, and valued commodities at Cerro Baúl and Cerro Mejía for evidence of the Wari’s
direct imperial control of local labor and resources.
Williams, Patrick Ryan, and Johny Isla Cuadrado. “Excavaciones arqueológicas en Cerro Baúl, un enclave Wari en el valle de
Moquegua.” Gaceta Arqueológica Andina 26 (2002): 87–120.
Mainly a description of 1997 and 1998 excavations at Cerro Baúl, with sections concerning chronology and the Wari-Tiwanaku
relationship in the Moquegua Valley.
Williams, Patrick Ryan, and Donna J. Nash. “Sighting the Apu: A GIS Analysis of Wari Imperialism and the Worship of
Mountain Peaks.” In Special Issue: Archaeology at Altitude. World Archaeology 38.3 (2006): 455–468.
The authors suggest that the Wari co-opted important mountains in the Moquegua region to establish hegemony over locals who
revered the mountains as deities (apu) and places of ancestral origin.
Williams, Patrick Ryan, Donna J. Nash, Michael E. Moseley, et al. “Los encuentros y las bases para la administración política
Wari.” In Encuentros: Identidad, poder y manejo de espacios públicos. Edited by Peter Kaulicke and Tom D. Dillehay, 207–232.
Boletín de Arqueología PUCP 9. Lima: Fondo Editorial de la Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú, 2008.
An examination of the critical role and changing nature of feasting at Cerro Baúl and Cerro Mejía that involves analysis of the places
where feasts were produced and consumed, and a consideration of the relationship between cuisine and identity.
The Cotahuasi and Majes Valleys, Arequipa Region
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The three publications cited here—Jennings 2006, Jennings and Yépez Álvarez 2015, and Yépez Álvarez and Jennings
2012—document and interpret the results of archaeological fieldwork at several settlements in the Cotahuasi and Majes Valleys in the
Arequipa region. While recognizing that Wari influence was pervasive in the area, particularly in the later part of the Middle Horizon,
they do not attribute this influence to imperial activity.
Jennings, Justin. “Core, Peripheries, and Regional Realities in Middle Horizon Peru.” Journal of Anthropological Archaeology
25.3 (2006): 346–370.
Using the Cotahuasi Valley as a case study to query core-periphery models employed to interpret the Wari phenomenon, Jennings
asserts that Wari-like features in Cotahuasi architecture and ceramics can be explained not by Wari control of the region but rather by
emulation of Wari canons that local elites undertook to link themselves to Wari prestige.
Jennings, Justin, and Willy Yépez Álvarez, eds. Tenahaha and the Wari State: A View of the Middle Horizon from the Cotahuasi
Valley. Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 2015.
This collection of essays about Tenahaha archaeology is structured in much the same way as Yépez Álvarez and Jennings 2012 and
comes to similar conclusions about the Cotahuasi Valley’s relationship with the Wari state.
Yépez Álvarez, Willy, and Justin Jennings, eds. ¿Wari en Arequipa? Análisis de los contextos funerarios de La Real. Arequipa,
Peru: Museo Arqueológica José María Morante, Universidad Nacional de San Agustín, 2012.
An edited volume that summarizes archaeological research at La Real in the Majes Valley and attributes Wari influence in the region to
globalization, not imperial activity. Essays describe the site and its ceramics, textiles, featherwork, obsidian, botanical remains, snuff
paraphernalia, metals, leather and other materials, and human remains.
Pikillacta and the Cuzco Region
Pikillacta, located in the Lucre Basin in the vicinity of Cuzco, is the largest Wari center known outside of the capital city in Ayacucho.
McEwan 1992, McEwan 1996, and McEwan 2005 present the results of several seasons of archaeological exploration as well as
Gordon McEwan’s thinking about the site and its function as an imperial administrative node; also see McEwan’s chapter
“Investigations at the Pikillacta Site” in Isbell and McEwan 1991 (cited under General Overviews), pp. 93–120. Glowacki 2002 discusses
the underexplored and poorly understood but apparently significant Wari occupation of the nearby Huaro Valley; also see Mary
Glowacki and McEwan’s essay about Huaro in Kaulicke and Isbell 2002 (cited under Archaeology), pp. 31–50. Sillar, et al. 2013
documents and attributes to the Wari a large compound at Raqchi, a highland site south of Pikillacta better known for its Inka-period
construction.
Glowacki, Mary. “The Huaro Archaeological Site Complex: Rethinking the Huari Occupation of Cuzco.” In Andean
Archaeology I: Variations in Sociopolitical Organization. Edited by William H. Isbell and Helaine Silverman, 267–284. New
York: Kluwer Academic / Plenum, 2002.
A brief review of Wari finds made during preliminary archaeological research in the Huaro Valley, near Pikillacta. Glowacki suggests that
the Huaro complex, not Pikillacta, represents the main Wari occupation in the Cuzco region.
McEwan, Gordon F. “El Horizonte Medio en el Cuzco y la sierra del sur peruano.” In Estudios de arqueología peruana. Edited
by Duccio Bonavia, 279–310. Lima, Peru: FOMCIENCIAS, 1992.
A synthesis of the author’s research for his master’s and doctoral degrees that discusses evidence of Pikillacta’s function, analyzes
Wari impact in the greater Lucre Basin, identifies the site as an imperial regional capital, and places it in the context of other Wari
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provincial centers.
McEwan, Gordon F. “Archaeological Investigations at Pikillacta, a Wari Site in Peru.” Journal of Field Archaeology 23.2 (1996):
169–186.
A report on the first extensive excavations of Pikillacta, which provided evidence to address such long-standing questions as how the
site was abandoned.
McEwan, Gordon F., ed. Pikillacta: The Wari Empire in Cuzco. Iowa City: University of Iowa Press, 2005.
Those interested in Pikillacta should start with this volume, which summarizes the state of knowledge about the site in chapters devoted
to architecture, pottery, chronology, skeletal remains, metals, and hydraulic engineering. The final chapter outlines McEwan’s model of
Wari administration in the Cuzco region.
Sillar, Bill, Emily Dean, and Amelia Pérez Trujillo. “My State or Yours? Wari ‘Labor Camps’ and the Inka Cult of Viracocha at
Raqchi, Cuzco, Peru.” Latin American Antiquity 24.1 (2013): 21–46.
The authors identify an enclosure with 152 circular buildings at Raqchi as a compound that the Wari built to house seasonal laborers,
and they consider the implications for the later Inka occupation of the site.
Viracochapampa and the Huamachuco Region
It is not known why the Wari started but neither finished nor occupied Viracochapampa, which was poised to be a major provincial
center in the well-populated Huamachuco region, located in the highlands far to the north of the capital city. McCown 1945 documents
an early archaeological reconnaissance of Viracochapampa and other sites in the area. More recently, Topic and Lange Topic
1983–1985 and Topic and Lange Topic 1992 interpret the Wari presence in Huamachuco as nonimperial on the basis of the authors’
extensive fieldwork in the region, including at the Cerro Amaru water shrine. Also see Topic 1986 (cited under Architecture) as well as
John Topic’s chapter “Huari and Huamachuco” in Isbell and McEwan 1991 (cited under General Overviews), pp. 141–164.
McCown, Theodore D. “Pre-Incaic Huamachuco: Survey and Excavations in the Region of Huamachuco and Cajabamba.”
University of California Publications in American Archaeology and Ethnology 39.4 (1945): 223–399.
Includes an early description and plan of Viracochapampa.
Topic, John R., and Theresa Lange Topic. “El Horizonte Medio en Huamachuco.” Revista del Museo Nacional 47 (1983–1985):
13–52.
After reviewing the archaeology of the Huamachuco region, the Topics conclude that Wari influence in the region, although intense, was
brief, impermanent, and not based on militarism. They suggest that the Wari adopted a variety of prototypes from Huamachuco.
Topic, John R., and Theresa Lange Topic. “The Rise and Decline of Cerro Amaru: An Andean Shrine During the Early
Intermediate Period and Middle Horizon.” Paper presented at the Archaeological Association of the University of Calgary
annual conference held in 1990 at the University of Calgary, Calgary, AB. In Ancient Images, Ancient Thought: The
Archaeology of Ideology; Proceedings of the 23rd Annual Conference of the Archaeological Association of the University of
Calgary. Edited by A. Sean Goldsmith, Sandra Garvie, David Selin, and Jeannette Smith, 167–180. Calgary, AB: University of
Calgary, 1992.
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A consideration of the Cerro Amaru shrine and its regional context leads the authors to suggest that the most widespread political
structure in the highlands during the Middle Horizon was not imperial but rather a relatively egalitarian multilineage confederation.
Other Areas outside the Heartland
Mackey 1982 and Castillo Butters 2001 assess the Wari’s impact on Peru’s north coast, estimates of which have been scaled back
since the 1990s. Evidence of a Wari presence on the south coast is much stronger: Anders 1990 and Anders, et al. 1998 provide limited
information about a workshop that produced Wari-influenced ceramics in a complex, baroque style at Maymi in the Pisco Valley, and
Edwards and Schreiber 2014 analyzes Pataraya, a small Wari center in the upper Nasca Valley that may have served as a way station
for shipments of coastal goods to the highlands. For studies of the central coast and Pachacamac, where the Wari’s impact is under
evaluation, see, for instance, essays by Peter Kaulicke (“La sombra de Pachacamac”; pp. 313–358) in Kaulicke and Isbell 2001 (cited
under Archaeology) and by Giancarlo Marcone (“What Role Did Wari Play in the Lima Political Economy?”; pp. 136–154) and by Rafael
Segura Llanos and Izumi Shimada (“The Wari Footprint on the Central Coast”; pp. 113–135) in Jennings 2010 (cited under Perspectives
on the Wari Phenomenon). In the highlands, Tschauner 2003 examines Honcopampa, concluding that its identification as a Wari center
in the past is in error. Shea 1969 is a doctoral dissertation that reconstructs Wari involvement at Wari Wilka, a water shrine in the
Huancayo region, also north of the capital. Schreiber 2005 discerns Wari manipulation of sacred landscapes at Jincamocco, a small
Wari installation that seems to have served as an administrative locus in the southern-highland Sondondo Valley; for more on
Jincamocco, see Katharina Schreiber’s chapter (pp. 199–213) in Isbell and McEwan 1991 (cited under General Overviews) and
Schreiber 1992 (cited under Perspectives on the Wari Phenomenon). Finally, Fonseca Santa Cruz 2011 briefly reports on the first major
Wari settlement to be identified on the eastern slope of the Andes, in the Espíritu Pampa Valley, northwest of Cuzco; also see Fonseca
Santa Cruz and Bauer 2013 (cited under Chronology Studies).
Anders, Martha B. “Maymi: Un sitio del Horizonte Medio en el valle de Pisco.” Gaceta Arqueológica Andina 17 (1990): 27–39.
The most substantial and copiously illustrated of the brief reports that Anders published about her archaeological study of Maymi before
her premature death in 1990.
Anders, Martha B., Susana Arce, Izumi Shimada, Victor Chang, Luis Tokuda, and Sonia Quiroz. “Early Middle Horizon Pottery
Production at Maymi, Pisco Valley, Peru.” In Andean Ceramics: Technology, Organization, and Approaches. Edited by Izumi
Shimada, 233–251. MASCA Research Papers 15, Supplement. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Museum of
Archaeology and Anthropology, 1998.
A description of the Maymi ceramics workshop, an informative reconstruction of the pottery-making process, and an analysis of how the
production of fine and utilitarian wares was organized at the site.
Castillo Butters, Luis Jaime. “The Last of the Mochicas: A View from the Jequetepeque Valley.” In Moche Art and Archaeology
in Ancient Peru. Edited by Joanne Pillsbury, 307–332. Studies in the History of Art 63. Center for Advanced Studies in the
Visual Arts, Symposium Papers XL. Washington, DC: National Gallery of Art, 2001.
The final sections of this essay outline and interpret the evidence of Wari impact on the Moche society of Peru’s north coast from the
viewpoint of San José de Moro in the Jequetepeque Valley.
Edwards, Matthew J., and Katharina Schreiber. “Pataraya: The Archaeology of a Wari Outpost in Nasca.” Latin American
Antiquity 25.2 (2014): 215–233.
A summary of archaeological investigations of Pataraya and its regional context, including a Wari compound in the nearby Uchymarca
region, and a consideration of how this small provincial outpost may reflect Wari imperial strategies in the upper Nasca Valley.
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Fonseca Santa Cruz, Javier. “El rostro oculto de Espíritu Pampa, Vilcabamba, Cusco.” Arqueología Iberoamericana 10 (2011):
5–7.
Very little has been published so far about archaeological investigations at Espíritu Pampa. This very brief description of the elite tomb
can be found online. A slightly longer treatment by Fonseca is also online.
Mackey, Carol J. “The Middle Horizon as Viewed from the Moche Valley.” In Chan Chan: Andean Desert City. Edited by
Michael E. Moseley and Kent C. Day, 321–331. School of American Research Advanced Seminar. Albuquerque: University of
New Mexico Press, 1982.
This essay contests the early idea of overwhelming Wari influence on urbanism, architecture, and ceramic styles in the Moche Valley
and posits instead that the clearest evidence of such influence is in change in burial postures.
Schreiber, Katharina J. “Sacred Landscapes and Imperial Ideologies: The Wari Empire in Sondondo, Peru.” Paper presented
at a symposium at the 101st Annual Meeting of the American Anthropological Association, held on 20–24 November 2002 in
New Orleans, LA. In Foundations of Power in the Prehispanic Andes. Edited by Kevin J. Vaughn, Dennis Ogburn, and
Christina A. Conlee, 131–150. Archaeological Papers of the American Anthropological Association 14. Arlington, VA:
American Anthropological Association, 2005.
Within a general discussion of how empires manipulate belief systems to legitimate their dominion, Schreiber suggests that, in the
Sondondo Valley, the Wari built a small site near a local shrine in order to co-opt local beliefs and incorporate them into imperial
ideology.
Shea, Daniel. “Wari Wilka: A Central Andean Oracle Site.” PhD diss., University of Wisconsin, 1969.
The most comprehensive documentation of Wari Wilka, a highland site that Shea interprets as a branch shrine of the coastal
Pachacamac oracle. By analogy to the Inka, he argues that the creation of branch oracles was central to Wari expansion strategy.
Tschauner, Hartmut. “Honco Pampa: Arquitectura de élite del Horizonte Medio en el Callejón de Huaylas.” In Arqueología de la
sierra de Ancash: Propuestas y perspectivas. Edited by Bebel Ibarra Ascensios, 194–220. Lima, Peru: Instituto Cultural Runa,
2003.
Tschauner suggests that similarities between Honcopampa and Wari architecture are superficial, that Honcopampa architecture has
roots in indigenous north highland traditions, and that Honcopampa interacted with the Wari but was not part of their territorial domain.
Perspectives on the Wari Phenomenon
The Wari’s archaeological footprint is uneven: in some regions, they built impressive provincial centers with monumental architecture; in
others, architecture is lacking but small-scale Wari or Wari-influenced artifacts are plentiful; in still others, Wari traces are rare or absent.
This variability has given rise to different interpretations of the Wari phenomenon, ranging from empire—a model that Schreiber 1992
outlines in the most detail (also see Schreiber 2005) and many other studies also espouse (for instance, Lumbreras 1999, Lumbreras
1974)—to a number of alternative approaches that deemphasize the Wari’s dominance while recognizing the crucial role they played
during the Middle Horizon (Covey, et al. 2013; Jennings 2006; Jennings 2011). Essays in the edited volumes listed here—Castillo and
Jennings 2014; Czwarno, et al. 1989; and Jennings 2010—represent points of view across the spectrum. Also see Isbell and McEwan
1991 (cited under General Overviews), which is important in this regard, along with Kaulicke and Isbell 2001 and Kaulicke and Isbell
2002 (both cited under Archaeology). The debate, fueled by increasing archaeological research in far-flung regions of the Wari sphere,
is one of the most salient in Wari studies.
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Castillo, Luis Jaime, and Justin Jennings, eds. Los rostros de Wari: Perspectivas interregionales sobre el Horizonte Medio.
Boletín de Arqueología PUCP 16. Lima: Fondo Editorial de la Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú, 2014.
The essays in this edited volume address the Middle Horizon and the Wari phenomenon from a variety of interpretive and regional
perspectives, the latter including the Wari heartland, Ancash, the Jequetepeque Valley, Cajamarca, Arequipa, and Cuzco.
Covey, R. Alan, Brian S. Bauer, Véronique Bélisle, and Lia Tsesmeli. “Regional Perspectives on Wari State Influence in Cusco,
Peru (c. AD 600–1000).” Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 32.4 (2013): 538–552.
An analysis of settlement patterns and ceramic styles in the Cuzco area leads to the conclusion that the Wari’s influence, while strong in
the immediate environs of their administrative centers, was much more diffuse and variable across the rest of the region. In
consequence, the authors propose an archipelago model of Wari colonization.
Czwarno, R. Michael, Frank M. Meddens, and Alexandra Morgan, eds. The Nature of Wari: A Reappraisal of the Middle Horizon
Period in Peru. BAR International Series 525. Oxford: B.A.R., 1989.
An edited volume that provides differing views of the Wari’s role in the Middle Horizon via essays focused on Azángaro, Honcopampa,
the Huarmey Valley, Pikillacta, and Moraduchayoq in the Wari capital, among others.
Jennings, Justin. “Understanding Middle Horizon Peru: Hermeneutic Spirals, Interpretative Traditions, and Wari
Administrative Centers.” Latin American Antiquity 17.3 (2006): 265–285.
Jennings critiques the dominant model of Wari political structure as an expansionist state that controlled much of Peru. He proposes
instead that the Wari exercised little control over areas outside of their heartland, and that the spread of their material culture was linked
to its symbolic capital.
Jennings, Justin, ed. Beyond Wari Walls: Regional Perspectives on Middle Horizon Peru. Albuquerque: University of New
Mexico Press, 2010.
This book’s thirteen chapters offer a variety of viewpoints about the nature of the Wari phenomenon, largely on the basis of
archaeological research in regions that lack Wari centers, including the Majes-Camaná and Chicha-Soras Valleys, coastal areas, and
the northern highlands.
Jennings, Justin. Globalizations and the Ancient World. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2011.
Using Uruk-Warka, Cahokia, and the Wari capital as case studies, Jennings argues that the emergence of cities precipitated periods of
globalization—unprecedented levels of interregional interaction that occurred in the absence of political domination.
Lumbreras, Luis Guillermo. Las fundaciones de Huamanga: Hacia una prehistoria de Ayacucho. Lima, Peru: Editorial Nueva
Educación, 1974.
Lumbreras, the reigning dean of Wari studies, outlines the ancient history of Ayacucho’s Huamanga Valley, where the Wari capital city is
located, on the basis of his deep experience in the region. Chapter V, by far the book’s longest, presents the results of his
archaeological reconnaissance of the capital and nearby sites, along with his reconstruction of a Wari empire.
Lumbreras, Luis Guillermo. “Andean Urbanism and Statecraft (C.E. 550–1450).” In The Cambridge History of the Native
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Peoples of the Americas. Vol. 3, South America, Part 1. Edited by Frank Salomon and Stuart B. Schwartz, 518–576. Cambridge,
UK: Cambridge University Press, 1999.
Within a wider-ranging discussion of Andean urbanism, Lumbreras summarizes his reconstruction of a Wari empire.
Schreiber, Katharina J. Wari Imperialism in Middle Horizon Peru. Anthropological Papers 87. Ann Arbor: Museum of
Anthropology, University of Michigan, 1992.
The most complete argument that the Wari created an empire. To explain the variable distribution of Wari architecture and artifacts,
Schreiber introduces the influential idea that the Wari established different degrees of control from region to region, according to the
empire’s needs, logistical considerations, and local conditions. Several chapters deal with Jincamocco, the topic of Schreiber’s doctoral
dissertation.
Schreiber, Katharina J. “Imperial Agendas and Local Agency: Wari Colonial Strategies.” In The Archaeology of Colonial
Encounters: Comparative Perspectives. Edited by Gil J. Stein, 237–262. School of American Research Advanced Seminar.
Santa Fe, NM: School of American Research Press, 2005.
Schreiber explores ways that the Wari’s imperial agenda varied in the Nasca and Sondondo Valleys. Includes brief discussions of
Pacheco and deposits of shattered ceramics.
Sundry Topics
Several of the citations in this section involve exploring parallels between Wari and Inka practice in different arenas, at least in part:
Glowacki and Malpass 2003 analogizes Inka beliefs regarding sacred landscapes and ancestors to Wari concepts, Isbell 1988 credits
the Wari with originating a distinctive Inka economic strategy, and Schreiber 1991 reconstructs a Wari road system, in part on the basis
of comparison to Inka roads. In a different vein, Tung 2012 and Tung 2014 interrogate the human skeletal record at several Wari and
Wari-period sites for what it reveals about Wari imperial strategies.
Glowacki, Mary, and Michael Malpass. “Water, Huacas, and Ancestor Worship: Traces of a Sacred Wari Landscape.” Latin
An argument that, in response to a severe 6th-century drought, the Wari not only sought practical solutions by expanding into arable
foreign territories but also resorted to religious practices intended to restore fertility and justify land acquisition.
Isbell, William H. “City and State in Middle Horizon Huari.” In Peruvian Prehistory: An Overview of Pre-Inca and Inca Society.
Edited by Richard W. Keatinge, 164–189. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1988.
Isbell proposes that the Wari invented the “Inka mode of [economic] production” in this analysis of Wari political organization, which
includes a description of the capital and a comparison to Tiwanaku that touches on staff deity iconography.
Schreiber, Katharina J. “The Association between Roads and Polities: Evidence for Wari Roads in Peru.” In Ancient Road
Networks and Settlement Hierarchies in the New World. Edited by Charles D. Trombold, 243–252. New Directions in
Archaeology. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1991.
Schreiber builds a case for the existence of a Wari road system, mainly on the basis of the presence of Wari sites on roads maintained
by the later Inka, who may have reused Wari routes.
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Tung, Tiffiny A. Violence, Ritual, and the Wari Empire: A Social Bioarchaeology of Imperialism in the Ancient Andes.
Bioarchaeological Interpretations of the Human Past. Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2012.
On the basis of examination of human skeletons from Conchopata, Beringa, and La Real, Tung relates demographic profiles to
community organization and Wari imperial policies. She also considers violence-related trauma, including the practice of taking trophy
heads, and its relation to Wari strategies. A brief section discusses trophy heads in Wari art.
Tung, Tiffiny A. “Making Warriors, Making War: Violence and Militarism in the Wari Empire.” In Embattled Bodies, Embattled
Places: War in Pre-Columbian Mesoamerica and the Andes. Edited by Andrew K. Scherer and John W. Verano, 227–256.
Dumbarton Oaks Pre-Columbian Symposia and Colloquia. Washington, DC: Dumbarton Oaks, 2014.
An update of Tung 2012 that presents new data on violence-related cranial trauma from Wari heartland sites in the context of a
discussion of the valorization of war in Wari society and the interaction of military violence with social norms. Includes a section on
artistic representations of warriors.
Wari and Tiwanaku
The nature of the relationship between the Peruvian Wari and the Bolivian Tiwanaku remains a vexing question. Although the two
shared a limited set of features, especially staff deity iconography, their material cultures are distinct and there is little evidence of other
types of exchange. Nash and Williams 2005, Williams 2002, and Williams and Nash 2002 offer insights into the issue from the
perspective of the Moquegua Valley, the only known place where the two cultures’ territories overlapped geographically; also see
Michael Moseley and colleagues’ chapter “Colonies and Conquest” in Isbell and McEwan 1991 (cited under General Overviews), pp.
121–140. Isbell 2008 compares and contrasts Wari and Tiwanaku material culture and behavior. Otherwise, much of the literature in this
vein, such as Isbell 1983, is devoted to trying to determine whether the Wari or the Tiwanaku originated staff deity imagery and ideology
(also see Art and Conchopata); the lack of tight correlation between the two cultures’ chronologies clouds the effort.
Isbell, William H. “Shared Ideology and Parallel Political Development: Huari and Tiwanaku.” Paper presented at the First
Annual Northeast Conference on Andean Archaeology and Ethnohistory, held in 1982 at Cornell University, Ithaca, NY. In
Investigations of the Andean Past: Papers from the First Annual Northeast Conference on Andean Archaeology and
Ethnohistory. Edited by Daniel H. Sandweiss, 186–208. Ithaca, NY: Latin American Studies Program, Cornell University, 1983.
Isbell counters the then-common view of Tiwanaku as the Middle Horizon’s precocious innovator with the suggestion that the Tiwanaku
and the Wari developed through parallel evolution. He buttresses the argument with a hypothetical analysis of the development and
spread of staff deity imagery.
Isbell, William H. “Wari and Tiwanaku: International Identities in the Central Andean Middle Horizon.” In Handbook of South
American Archaeology. Edited by Helaine Silverman and William H. Isbell, 731–759. New York: Springer Science, 2008.
A discussion of Wari and Tiwanaku material culture, including staff deity imagery, which concludes that both societies developed
international identities and that the Wari’s behavior is more consistent with expectations of an empire than the Tiwanaku’s.
Nash, Donna J., and Patrick Ryan Williams. “Architecture and Power: Relations on the Wari-Tiwanaku Frontier.” Paper
presented at a symposium at the 101st Annual Meeting of the American Anthropological Association, held on 20–24
November 2002 in New Orleans, LA. In Foundations of Power in the Prehispanic Andes. Edited by Kevin J. Vaughn, Dennis
Ogburn, and Christina A. Conlee, 151–174. Archaeological Papers of the American Anthropological Association 14. Arlington,
VA: American Anthropological Association, 2005.
An examination of changes in power relations and political institutions on the Wari-Tiwanaku frontier, through the analysis of
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architectural spaces.
Williams, Patrick Ryan. “Rethinking Disaster-Induced Collapse in the Demise of the Andean Highland States: Wari and
Tiwanaku.” In Special Issue: Ancient Ecodisasters. World Archaeology 33.3 (2002): 361–374.
A reassessment of the causes for the collapse of the Wari and Tiwanaku colonies in the Moquegua Valley, orienting attention away from
drought, a common explanation, and toward other factors.
Williams, Patrick Ryan, and Donna J. Nash. “Imperial Interaction in the Andes: Wari and Tiwanaku at Cerro Baúl.” In Andean
Archaeology I: Variations in Sociopolitical Organization. Edited by W. H. Isbell and H. Silverman, 243–265. New York: Kluwer
Academic / Plenum, 2002.
The authors track the changing nature of the Wari-Tiwanaku interaction in the Moquegua Valley by examining occupational footprints,
agrarian development, and chronology.
Architecture
Monumental centers and architecture have received more scholarly attention than any other form of Wari material culture. The citations
in this section are concerned mainly with analyses of specific, widespread Wari building types and their functions: Cook 2001 discusses
D-shaped structures, McEwan 1998 and Topic 1986 consider niched halls, and Isbell 2006 presents a more sprawling consideration of
possible palaces. McEwan 1990 also examines similarities between Wari and later Chimú architecture, and Stone-Miller and McEwan
1990–1991 posits formal correspondences between Wari architecture and tapestry-woven tunics. See references elsewhere in this
article—especially in the subsections In the Heartland and Outside the Heartland—for discussions of architecture and architectural
typologies at individual Wari sites.
Cook, Anita G. “Huari D-shaped Structures, Sacrificial Offerings and Divine Kingship.” In Ritual Sacrifice in Ancient Peru.
Edited by Elizabeth P. Benson and Anita G. Cook, 137–163. Austin: University of Texas Press, 2001.
An examination of the Wari D-shaped structure—its distribution, possible depiction in Wari art, and ritual activities with which it may
have been associated, especially human sacrifice—and a discussion of sacrifice and sacrificers.
Isbell, William H. “Landscape of Power: A Network of Palaces in Middle Horizon Peru.” Paper presented in a symposium at the
annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology held in April 2000 in Philadelphia. In Palaces and Power in the
Americas: From Peru to the Northwest Coast. Edited by Jessica J. Christie and Patricia J. Sarro, 44–98. Austin: University of
Texas Press, 2006.
Isbell affiliates various Wari architectural forms, including the niched hall, with palatial function at Wari sites within and outside the
heartland. He published a very similar essay, “Palaces and Politics in the Andean Middle Horizon,” in Palaces of the Ancient New
World, edited by Susan T. Evans and Joanne Pillsbury (Washington, DC: Dumbarton Oaks, 2004), pp. 191–246.
McEwan, Gordon F. “Some Formal Correspondences between the Imperial Architecture of the Wari and Chimu Cultures of
Ancient Peru.” Latin American Antiquity 1.2 (1990): 97–116.
McEwan outlines formal similarities between the Wari architectural style and the ciudadelas (palaces) of the later north-coast Chimú
and attributes the correspondence to conscious Chimú imitation of a prestigious forerunner.
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McEwan, Gordon F. “The Function of Niched Halls in Wari Architecture.” Latin American Antiquity 9.1 (1998): 68–86.
McEwan argues that rectangular halls with internal wall niches served as places of ancestor worship, and he suggests that the halls
factored in the Wari strategy for integrating conquered populations. The argument involves discussion of a few Wari art forms (figurines
and urns from Pacheco).
Stone-Miller, Rebecca R., and Gordon F. McEwan. “The Representation of the Wari State in Stone and Thread: A Comparison
of Architecture and Tapestry Tunics.” RES: Anthropology and Aesthetics 19–20 (1990–1991): 53–80.
The authors discuss formal parallels between Wari tapestry-woven tunics and Pikillacta architecture, especially patterns of regularity
punctuated by variation. They hypothesize that this aesthetic relates to the state’s concept of a rigid, hierarchical social order enlivened
by individual expression.
Topic, John R. “A Sequence of Monumental Architecture from Huamachuco.” Paper presented at the Third Annual Northeast
Conference on Andean Archaeology and Ethnohistory, held on 27–28 October 1984 at the University of Massachusetts,
Amherst. In Perspectives on Andean Prehistory and Protohistory: Papers from the Third Annual Northeast Conference on
Andean Archaeology and Ethnohistory. Edited by Daniel H. Sandweiss and D. Peter Kvietok, 63–83. Ithaca, NY: Latin
American Studies Program, Cornell University, 1986.
Topic suggests a historical continuity of Andean niched halls, arguing that the Wari derived the form from earlier prototypes at
Marcahuamachuco in the northern highlands and carried it southward, where it provided the basis for the later Inka kallanka. He also
discusses the niched hall’s function in each cultural setting.
Art
Art-historical investigation of the Wari is nascent, particularly for non-fiber media. The most comprehensive general introduction to Wari
art is Bergh 2012 (cited under General Overviews), which takes the medium-based approach followed here. Several more general
references appear in this section, important among which is Pasztory 1990–1991, a reflection on pre-Columbian and Andean
aesthetics. Cook 1983, Isbell and Knobloch 2009, and Makowski Hanula 2009 concern themselves with iconography of the staff deity
complex, which crosses media-based categories. Cook 1996, Knobloch 2000, and Knobloch 2010 discuss other figures or motifs that
also repeat in various media. Finally, Bruhns and Kelker 2010 considers fakes and fakers.
Bruhns, Karen O., and Nancy L. Kelker. Faking the Ancient Andes. Walnut Creek, CA: Left Coast, 2010.
A lively, irreverent consideration of a crucial issue that takes in Wari examples and offers synopses of known fakers and suspicious
object categories. In some cases, the evidence offered to defend specific condemnations is impressionistic.
Cook, Anita G. “Aspects of State Ideology in Huari and Tiwanaku Iconography: The Central Deity and the Sacrificer.” Paper
presented at the First Annual Northeast Conference on Andean Archaeology and Ethnohistory, held in 1982 at Cornell
University, Ithaca, NY. In Investigations of the Andean Past: Papers from the First Annual Northeast Conference on Andean
Archaeology and Ethnohistory. Edited by Daniel H. Sandweiss, 161–185. Ithaca, NY: Latin American Studies Program, Cornell
University, 1983.
Cook concerns herself with tracing the evolution of Middle Horizon staff deity iconography from earlier precedents in the southern
highlands into a new hierarchical configuration that helped to legitimize elites.
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Cook, Anita G. “The Emperor’s New Clothes: Symbols of Royalty, Hierarchy and Identity.” In Special Issue: Structure,
Knowledge and Representation in the Andes: Studies Presented to Reiner Tom Zuidema on the Occasion of His 70th Birthday.
Journal of the Steward Anthropological Society 24.1–2 (1996): 85–120.
Cook interprets a human figure prominent in Wari art as an imperial officer or office, in part on the basis of costume, which, she
believes, is decorated with a geometric motif also found in Inka art. She suggests the motif may represent continuity between the two
cultures.
Isbell, William H., and Patricia J. Knobloch. “SAIS—the Origin, Development, and Dating of Tiahuanaco-Huari Iconography.”
Paper presented at a symposium held on 14–15 January 2005 at the Denver Art Museum, Denver, CO. In Tiwanaku: Papers
from the 2005 Mayer Center Symposium at the Denver Art Museum. Edited by Margaret Young-Sánchez, 165–210. Denver, CO:
Denver Art Museum, 2009.
A review of southern Andean styles from which staff deity imagery may have evolved, and an argument—which invests great faith in the
power of stylistic analysis—that staff deity ideology appeared synchronously among the Wari and the Tiwanaku and reflects tension
between shamanism and priestly religion. The authors published a very similar essay, “Missing Links, Imaginary Links: Staff God
Imagery in the South Andean Past,” in Andean Archaeology III: North and South, edited by Isbell and Helaine Silverman (New York:
Springer, 2006), pp. 307–351.
Knobloch, Patricia J. “Wari Ritual Power at Conchopata: An Interpretation of Anadenanthera colubrina Iconography.” Latin
Knobloch identifies a hallucinogenic plant, Anadenanthera colubrina, in Wari iconography and considers the implications for Wari
religious practice.
Knobloch, Patricia J. “La imagen de los Señores de Huari y la recuperación de una identidad antigua.” In Señores de los
imperios del sol. Edited by Krzysztof Makowski Hanula, 197–209. Colección Arte y Tesoros del Perú. Lima, Peru: Banco de
Crédito, 2010.
Knobloch has created a typology of human figures or “agents” that appear in Wari art. Here she describes several and suggests they
represent lineages or ethnic groups. Her complete typology, as well as an English-language version of this article, can be found online
at Who Was Who in the Middle Horizon?.
Makowski Hanula, Krzysztof. “Royal Statues, Staff Gods, and the Religious Ideology of the Prehistoric State of Tiwanaku.”
Paper presented at a symposium held on 14–15 January 2005 at the Denver Art Museum, Denver, CO. In Tiwanaku: Papers
from the 2005 Mayer Center Symposium at the Denver Art Museum. Edited by Margaret Young-Sánchez, 133–164. Denver, CO:
Denver Art Museum, 2009.
In an argument about Tiwanaku art that can be applied to Wari art, Makowski proposes an alternative approach to reading iconography
of the staff deity complex, in part by asking whether one or many staff deities are depicted artistically.
Pasztory, Esther. “Still Invisible: The Problem of the Aesthetics of Abstraction for Pre-Columbian Art and Its Implications for
Other Cultures.” RES: Anthropology and Aesthetics 19–20 (1990–1991): 104–136.
Although this essay concerns Mesoamerican art, many of the issues it raises fully apply to the Andean realm, including the Wari.
Reprinted in Pasztory’s Thinking with Things: Toward a New Vision of Art (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2005), pp. 189–196. Also
see Pasztory’s Inka Cubism: Reflections on Andean Art, available only online, for her thoughts on Andean aesthetics; the manuscript is
out of date, however, in some details of archaeological interpretation.
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Ceramics
There is no single Wari ceramic style, but rather a number of styles that developed over time and have been studied most intensively
from the point of view of chronology (see Chronology Studies). A related effort has focused on tracing the evolution of staff deity
complex imagery—prominent on Wari ceramics and Tiwanaku stone sculpture, as well as both cultures’ tapestry-woven textiles—from
its roots in earlier Andean styles, often with the elusive goal of determining whether it first appeared in Tiwanaku or Wari territory (see
Conchopata, Wari and Tiwanaku, and Art). There has been minimal true iconographic study of the staff deity complex, whether in
ceramics or other media; Anita Cook’s essay “The Coming of the Staff Deity” in Bergh 2012 (cited under General Overviews), pp.
105–124, and Makowski Hanula 2009 (cited under Art) offer exceptions. Knobloch 2000 and Knobloch 2010 (both cited under Art)
discuss other types of imagery that appear in ceramics and elsewhere. Three of the citations in this section concern the finely decorated
culinary ceramics, often very large in size and decorated with staff deity imagery, that the Wari deliberately shattered and then buried.
Such deposits have been recovered at Conchopata, as Cook 1984–1985 reports (also see Conchopata), and at Ayapata, documented
in Ravines 1968 and Ravines 1977; both sites are in the Wari heartland. A significant gap is the absence of a comprehensive study of a
huge, important cache of shattered ceramics from Pacheco in the Nasca Valley on Peru’s south coast; Lyon 1978 is one of the
scattered places where they receive attention. Cook and Glowacki 2003 analyzes culinary wares, including some shattered examples,
in a discussion of Wari feasting rites. Finally, González Carré and Soto Maguino 2004 documents a buried offering of intact small and
miniature ceramic vessels excavated at the Wari capital.
Cook, Anita G. “The Middle Horizon Ceramic Offerings from Conchopata.” Ñawpa Pacha 22–23 (1984–1985): 49–90.
The most extensive discussion available of the imagery of more than twenty large human effigy jars found in a shattered deposit at
Conchopata and a comparison of the imagery—especially the staff deity and its attendants—to that of other Wari shattered deposits.
Cook, Anita G., and Mary Glowacki. “Pots, Politics, and Power: Huari Ceramic Assemblages and Imperial Administration.” In
The Archaeology and Politics of Food and Feasting in Early States and Empires. Edited by Tamara L. Bray, 173–202. New
York: Kluwer Academic / Plenum, 2003.
A summary of evidence that the Wari used feasting as a key form of statecraft, on the basis of analysis of culinary wares, including
elaborately decorated examples, and a comparison of Wari and Inka feasting practices.
González Carré, Enrique, and Jorge Soto Maguino. Una ofrenda Wari. Cuaderno de Investigación, Serie Arqueología 2.2. Lima:
Museo Nacional de Arqueología, Antropología e Historia del Perú, 2004.
This report describes and illustrates the archaeological context and contents of a buried offering of miniature and small ceramics
excavated in the Monjachayoq sector of the Wari capital.
Lyon, Patricia J. “Female Supernaturals in Ancient Peru.” Ñawpa Pacha 16 (1978): 95–140.
Lyon identifies representations of female supernatural beings in many different Andean art styles, although opinion differs about her
Wari example, which appears on ceramics from Pacheco.
Ravines, Rogger. “Un depósito de ofrendas del Horizonte Medio en la sierra central del Perú.” Ñawpa Pacha 6 (1968): 19–45.
One of two articles about a buried deposit of elaborately decorated Wari ceramics at Ayapata, a site not far from the Wari capital. This
article documents limited preliminary excavations conducted in 1967. Also see Ravines 1977.
Ravines, Rogger. “Excavaciones en Ayapata, Huancavelica, Perú.” Ñawpa Pacha 15 (1977): 49–100.
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One of two articles about a buried deposit of fancy Wari ceramics recovered at Ayapata. This article presents the results of the second
field season at the site. Also see Ravines 1968.
Figurines
Figurines made of varied materials were an important art form among the Wari, who put them to use most notably in complex buried
offerings. All known examples of such offerings—a total of three to date—come from Pikillacta, the large Wari outpost near Cuzco.
Arriola Tuni and Tesar 2011 documents the excavation of one of these offerings. Cook 1992, Ramos and Blasco 1977, Trimborn and
Vega 1935, and Valcárcel 1933 discuss the other two, which locals found in the 1920s. The two are very similar and may have been
deposited during a single ritual event.
Arriola Tuni, Carlos A., and Louis D. Tesar. “The Pikillacta 2004 Eastern Gate Offering Pit.” Ñawpa Pacha 31.1 (2011): 1–44.
A detailed report on the archaeological context of the only Wari figurine offering to be excavated professionally so far. The discussion,
liberally illustrated with color photos, offers a typology of the figurines and links the offering to themes of conquest and sacrifice.
Cook, Anita G. “The Stone Ancestors: Idioms of Imperial Attire and Rank among Huari Figurines.” Latin American Antiquity
3.4 (1992): 341–364.
Cook discusses two very similar offerings, each with forty turquoise-colored human figurines that locals discovered at Pikillacta in 1927.
She suggests the figurines represent the founding ancestors of Wari royal lineages.
Ramos, Luis J., and María Concepción Blasco. “Materiales Huaris no cerámicos en el Museo de América: Orfebrería, textiles y
pequeña escultura (figurillas de Pikillajta).” Cuadernos Prehispánicos 5 (1977): 55–108.
Ramos and Blasco document one of the two figurine offerings found at Pikillacta in 1927, including a description and black-and-white
photographs of each figurine, and a correlation between figurines of the two sets. Today, this offering is in Madrid’s Museo de América.
Trimborn, Hermann, and Pilar Vega. Catálogo de la Exposición Arte Inca (colección J. L.). Madrid: Imprenta Martosa, 1935.
Trimborn and Vega comment on the archaeological context and offer an interpretation of the Pikillacta offering of turquoise-colored
figurines now housed in Madrid’s Museo de América. “J. L.” in the title refers to Juan Larrea.
Valcárcel, Luis E. “Esculturas de Pikillajta.” Revista del Museo Nacional 2 (1933): 21–35.
Valcárcel’s essay is still the only somewhat detailed description of one of the offerings of turquoise-colored figurines found in 1927 at
Pikillacta, now in Cuzco’s Museo Inka. He reproduces drawings of each figurine.
Khipus
The khipu (quipu), a fiber device made of cords, was put to use most famously by the Inka to record numerically based information
ranging from statistics to narratives. Much less is known about the so-called wrapped khipus that date to Wari times. Conklin 1982
describes and discusses one elaborate wrapped khipu. Urton 2014, the meatiest article about the subject so far, presents an enlarged
sample and makes intriguing suggestions for interpretation.
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Conklin, William J. “The Information System of Middle Horizon Quipus.” In Ethnoastronomy and Archaeoastronomy in the
American Tropics. Edited by Anthony F. Aveni and Gary Urton, 261–281. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 385.
New York: New York Academy of Sciences, 1982.
A pioneering outline of the differences between Inka khipus and wrapped khipus, which Conklin correctly attributes to the Middle
Horizon, and a detailed analysis of the largest wrapped khipu so far documented.
Urton, Gary. “From Middle Horizon Cord-Keeping to the Rise of Inka Khipus in the Central Andes.” Antiquity 88.339 (2014):
205–221.
Urton outlines the known sample of wrapped khipus, describes two subtypes, reports Middle Horizon radiocarbon dates for four
examples, attributes wrapped khipus to the Wari, and suggests both that wrapped khipus use a base-five number system and that the
Inka khipu emerged from the convergence of the two Wari types.
Other Media
Wari artworks made of feathers, metal, or shell have received minimal systematic art-historical attention. Analysis of featherwork is
plagued by attribution problems stemming from a lack of professionally documented archaeological context; King 2013 reexamines the
reported context of ninety-six feathered panels of known Wari affiliation that locals found at Corral Redondo on Peru’s south coast (also
see Giuntini 2012). The Wari did not work gold and silver as extensively as some other Andean cultures, but Chávez 1984–1985
describes a large set of metal ornaments, many made of silvered copper. Lechtman 2014 discusses Middle Horizon bronze technology.
Glowacki 2005 does not directly address artworks made of shell, but the article reviews the meanings of Spondylus (thorny oyster)
shell, which the Wari used to create intricate mosaic objects. See Susan Bergh’s essays in Bergh 2012 (cited under General
Overviews) for overviews of all these media as well as wood.
Chávez, Sergio Jorge. “Funerary Offerings from a Middle Horizon Context in Pomacanchi, Cuzco.” Ñawpa Pacha 22–23
(1984–1985): 1–48.
Chávez documents 141 metal objects, including many decorated plumes, unearthed by locals from one or more high-status tombs in
the Pomacanchi vicinity, southeast of Cuzco.
Giuntini, Christine. “Techniques and Conservation of Peruvian Feather Mosaics.” In Peruvian Featherworks: Art of the
Precolumbian Era. Edited by Heidi King, 89–100. New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2012.
Although this short essay does not directly address Wari featherwork, it provides an accessible overview of the materials and
techniques that Andean feather artists used.
Glowacki, Mary. “Food of the Gods or Mere Mortals? Hallucinogenic Spondylus and Its Interpretive Implications for Early
Andean Society.” Antiquity 79.304 (2005): 257–268.
This article and its bibliography provide a portal into existing research on the use and possible meanings of Spondylus (thorny oyster)
shell among ancient Andean societies, including the Wari.
King, Heidi. “The Wari Feathered Panels from Corral Redondo, Churunga Valley: A Re-examination of Context.” Ñawpa Pacha
33.1 (2013): 23–42.
In 1943, locals discovered a huge buried deposit of Wari featherworks at Corral Redondo. On the basis of reexamination of reports
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about the deposit’s archaeological context, King outlines contradictions in the published record and comes to fresh conclusions about
the purpose of the offering, which also included several large Wari human effigy vessels.
Lechtman, Heather. “Andean Metallurgy in Prehistory.” In Archaeometallurgy in Global Perspective: Methods and Syntheses.
Edited by Benjamin W. Roberts and Christopher P. Thornton, 361–422. New York: Springer, 2014.
The production of bronze alloys was a pan-Andean phenomenon of the Middle Horizon. In the context of a review of ancient central
Andean metallurgical traditions, Lechtman describes several bronze alloys and the regions where they were used.
Textiles
Among Wari art forms, tapestry-woven tunics—the garments of rulers and elites—are the most complex in artistic and technical terms,
and they have received the most art-historical attention. A fundamental problem has been to distinguish Wari from Tiwanaku tunics,
which are remarkably similar; Amy Rodman in Rodman and Cassman 1995 synthesizes a landmark technical dichotomy that has so far
withstood the test of time. Large samples of Wari tapestry-woven tunics are catalogued and interpreted in Bergh 1999, which focuses
on expressions of dualism (also see Bergh 2009), and Stone 1987, which largely concerns itself with color (also see Stone-Miller and
McEwan 1990–1991, cited under Architecture, and Stone-Miller 1992, cited under Collections and Collection Catalogues). An issue of
enduring interest has been distortion, a rule-bound method of manipulating tapestry-woven imagery that results in modernist-like
abstractions widely admired today. Sawyer 1963 offers the first definition and an interpretation of distortion; additional interpretive efforts
can be found in Conklin 1986 and scattered in studies that have broader focuses. Rowe 1979 and Rowe 1986 concern diverse topics.
Non-tapestry textiles have received less attention, but see Frame 1990 on four-cornered hats and both Frame 1999 and Ann Rowe’s
essay in Bergh 2012 (cited under General Overviews) for discontinuous-warp-and-weft, tie-dyed garments.
Bergh, Susan E. “Pattern and Paradigm in Middle Horizon Tapestry Tunics.” 2 vols. PhD diss., Columbia University, 1999.
The first volume describes the basic characteristics of Middle Horizon tapestry-woven tunics and relates aspects of their artistic
composition to Andean dualism. The second volume comprehensively describes a large sample of tunics through a catalogue and
summaries of major tunic groups. Illustrations include the only extensive set of tracings of tunic imagery.
Bergh, Susan E. “The Bird and the Camelid (or Deer): A Ranked Pair of Wari Tapestry Tunics.” Paper presented at a
symposium held on 14–15 January 2005 at the Denver Art Museum, Denver, CO. In Tiwanaku: Papers from the 2005 Mayer
Center Symposium at the Denver Art Museum. Edited by Margaret Young-Sánchez, 225–246. Denver, CO: Denver Art Museum,
2009.
Bergh discusses two groups of Wari tapestry-woven tunics, suggesting that the elites who wore the tunics functioned as ranked pairs,
one member of which held higher status than the other.
Conklin, William J. “The Mythic Geometry of the Ancient Southern Sierra.” Paper presented at the Junius B. Bird Conference
on Andean Textiles, held 7–8 April 1984 at the Textile Museum, Washington, DC. In The Junius B. Bird Conference on Andean
Textiles, April 7th and 8th, 1984. Edited by Ann Pollard Rowe, 123–137. Washington, DC: Textile Museum, 1986.
The author compares the distortion of imagery in Wari tapestries to khipus and Tiwanaku architectural sculpture, suggesting that all are
informed by a fascination with the horizon, the centerline of cosmic geometry. See p. 456 of William Isbell’s chapter in Kaulicke and
Isbell 2002 (cited under Archaeology) for a drawback to the interpretation.
Frame, Mary. Andean Four-Cornered Hats: Ancient Volumes; From the Collection of Arthur M. Bullowa. New York:
Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1990.
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This booklet-size catalogue for an exhibition of Wari and Tiwanaku four-cornered hats outlines the hats’ construction techniques and
other basic features.
Frame, Mary. “Nasca-Huari y otros textiles de la costa sur / Nasca-Huari and other south coast textiles.” In Tejidos milenarios
del Perú / Ancient Peruvian Textiles. Edited by José Antonio de Lavalle and Rosario de Lavalle de Cárdenas, 311–351.
Colección APU. Lima, Peru: Integra, 1999.
In a bilingual text, Frame summarizes south coast textiles that date to the transition between the Nasca and Wari cultures; the final
section addresses the discontinuous-warp-and-weft (interlocking-warp-and-weft) technique, including Wari-style tie-dyed examples.
Rodman, Amy Oakland, and Vicki Cassman. “Andean Tapestry: Structure Informs the Surface.” In Special Issue: Conservation
and Art History. Art Journal 54.2 (1995): 33–39.
Rodman and Cassman offer brief, clear summaries of the major structural features of four highland tapestry-weaving traditions: Recuay,
Tiwanaku, Wari, and Inka. Their description of the technical differences between Wari and Tiwanaku tapestry, on the basis of Rodman’s
dissertation research, is concise.
Rowe, Ann Pollard. “Textile Evidence for Huari Music.” Textile Museum Journal 18 (1979): 5–18.
Rowe discusses the representation of musicians and musical instruments in a small group of Wari tapestry-woven tunics. Part of the
discussion focuses on the musicians’ costumes, which may encode gender differences.
Rowe, Ann Pollard. “Textiles from the Nasca Valley at the Time of the Fall of the Huari Empire.” Paper presented at the Junius
B. Bird Conference on Andean Textiles, held 7–8 April 1984 at the Textile Museum, Washington, DC. In The Junius B. Bird
Conference on Andean Textiles, April 7th and 8th, 1984. Edited by Ann Pollard Rowe, 151–182. Washington, DC: Textile
Museum, 1986.
This article concerns two groups of objects recovered unscientifically in the 1960s from tombs on Peru’s south coast; both include
Wari-style tapestry-woven tunics. In an analysis oriented toward textile specialists, Rowe relates the groups to Dorothy Menzel’s Wari
chronology (see Menzel 1964 and Menzel 1968, cited under Chronology Studies).
Sawyer, Alan R. “Tiahuanaco Tapestry Design.” Textile Museum Journal 1.2 (1963): 27–38.
Sawyer’s seminal article—which misattributed Wari tunics to Tiwanaku during a period of shifting understanding—remains crucial for its
first-ever description of distortion. Milton Sonday’s classic drawings illustrate the discussion. Specialists debate the motivations behind
distortion; Sawyer suggests it has chronological import. Simultaneously published in Studies 3, Museum of Primitive Art, New York;
reprinted in Peruvian Archaeology: Selected Readings, edited by John Howland Rowe and Dorothy Menzel (Palo Alto, CA: Peek,
1967), pp. 165–176.
Stone, Rebecca R. “Technique and Form in Huari-Style Tapestry Tunics: The Andean Artist, A.D. 500–800.” PhD diss., Yale
University, 1987.
A study of Wari tapestry-woven tunics that discusses design standardization, identifies possible anomalies of color and form, and
relates regularity and deviation to the state’s desire to portray itself as the mediator of chaos through social order. Accompanied by a
catalogue and many graphics.
Collections and Collection Catalogues
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Wari art is held in dozens of museums around the world, with concentrations in Europe, particularly Germany (including Berlin’s
Ethnologisches Museum and Munich’s Staatliches Museum für Völkerkunde); Peru (especially Lima’s Museo Nacional de Arqueología,
Antropologia e Historia and Ayacucho’s Museo Histórico Regional “Hipólito Unanue”); and the United States (such as New York’s
American Museum of Natural History, Brooklyn Museum, and Metropolitan Museum of Art, as well as the Textile Museum in
Washington, DC). Some museums offer online collection catalogues that can be searched for Wari (Huari) holdings, which may be
catalogued as Tiwanaku (Tiahuanaco). Others have published print catalogues, a selection of which appears here. German collections
are documented in Eisleb and Strelow 1980, Schindler 2000, and Schmidt 1929; a Japanese collection is in Misugi 1985; a Peruvian
collection is in Pozzi-Escot and Falcón 2011; and US collections are in Boone 1996, King 1965, and Stone-Miller 1992.
Boone, Elizabeth H., ed. Andean Art at Dumbarton Oaks. 2 vols. Pre-Columbian Art at Dumbarton Oaks 1. Washington, DC:
Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, 1996.
Color photographs and extensive catalogue entries, which often include technical analyses, appear for each object in the Dumbarton
Oaks Andean collection, including Wari holdings.
Eisleb, Dieter, and Renate Strelow. Altperuanische Kulturen III: Tiahuanaco. Berlin: Museum für Völkerkunde, 1980.
This German-language catalogue of the Pucara and Tiwanaku collections at Berlin’s Ethnologisches Museum (formerly the Museum für
Völkerkunde) includes many Wari-style textiles, each illustrated and accompanied by a catalogue entry with technical analysis. Also see
Schmidt 1929.
King, Mary Elizabeth. Ancient Peruvian Textiles from the Collection of the Textile Museum, Washington, D.C. New York:
Museum of Primitive Art, 1965.
The Textile Museum in Washington, DC, holds one of the world’s largest and finest collections of Wari textiles, particularly
tapestry-woven tunics but also tie-dyed garments. A catalogue devoted to the Wari collection has never been published, but a few Wari
textiles, catalogued as Tiwanaku, can be found here.
Misugi, Takatoshi. The Andes: Textiles and Ceramics; The Collection of Ohara Gallery of Art. Kyoto: Sachio Yoshioka, 1985.
The small but interesting Ohara Gallery collection—part of the Ohara School of Ikebana—is often overlooked. This Japanese-language
catalogue, with minimal English translations, provides color photographs of some of the gallery’s ancient Andean holdings, including
Wari objects.
Pozzi-Escot, Denise, and Rommel Ángeles Falcón. Entrelazando el pasado: Textiles de Huaca Malena. Lima, Peru:
Universidad Nacional Mayor de San Marcos, 2011.
The principal investigators of Huaca Malena, on Peru’s central coast, outline the site’s archaeology and present color photographs of
100 textiles found there, including many Wari and Wari-period examples. All are in the collection of the Huaca Malena site museum.
Schindler, Helmut. The Norbert Mayrock Art Collection from Ancient Peru. Munich: Staatliches Museum für Völkerkunde, 2000.
This catalogue is valuable for its color photographs of the Wari objects that Norbert Mayrock donated to Munich’s Staatliches Museum
für Völkerkunde. The texts vary in reliability.
Schmidt, Max. Kunst und Kultur von Peru. Propyläen-Kunstgeschichte. Berlin: Propyläen-Verlag, 1929.
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Schmidt publishes photographs of some of the many Wari-period objects in Berlin’s Ethnologische Museum. A catalogue gives the
reported proveniences—often Pachacamac—and other details for each object. Also see Eisleb and Strelow 1980.
Stone-Miller, Rebecca R. To Weave for the Sun: Andean Textiles in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Boston: Museum of Fine
Arts, Boston, 1992.
A catalogue of the ancient Andean textiles collection at Boston’s Museum of Fine Arts that includes a chapter by Stone-Miller about
Wari textiles and, for the most important textiles, extended catalogue entries and color photographs.
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Wari (Huari) Art and Architecture

LAST MODIFIED: 25 FEBRUARY 2016

Huari, the Capital City

Other Sites in the Heartland

Outside the Heartland

El Castillo and the Huarmey Valley

Cerro Baúl, Cerro Mejía, and the Moquegua Valley

The Cotahuasi and Majes Valleys, Arequipa Region

Pikillacta and the Cuzco Region

Viracochapampa and the Huamachuco Region

Other Areas outside the Heartland

Perspectives on the Wari Phenomenon

Wari and Tiwanaku

Collections and Collection Catalogues

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