Society for American Archaeology

Filtration-Gallery Irrigation in the Spanish New World

Author(s): Monica Barnes and David Fleming
Source: Latin American Antiquity, Vol. 2, No. 1 (Mar., 1991), pp. 48-68
Published by: Society for American Archaeology
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/971895
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 FILTRATION-GALLERYIRRIGATION
IN THE SPANISH NEW WORLD

MonicaBarnesand David Fleming

It has been claimed that the puquios, a subterraneanirrigationsystem of the Nasca drainage,are a unique
Prehispanicinnovation.However,documentaryevidence indicates that many puquios were constructedand
managedby Spaniards.In Iberiasuch systems werebuilt by Islamic engineersand wereextendedby Christians
aftertheMoorswereexpelledin 1492. TheSpaniardsbroughtthis technologyto Mexico and theAndes,beginning
in the mid-sixteenthcentury.Theyemployedit in agriculture,in urbanwatersystems, and to drain mines. This
paperpresentsnewevidenceon the21 Andeanareaswherepuquios wereconstructedand controlledby theSpaniards
and evaluatesargnmentspertainingto the origin of the Nasca puquios.
Se han hecho afirmacionesque el sistema de irrigacionsubterraneade la cuenca de Nasca llamado puquios,
es una innovacionprehispanicasin antecedentes.Sin embargo,documentoscolonialesen el ArchivoGeneralde la
Nacion (Peru)indican que variossistemas de este tipofueron construidosy manejadospor los espanolesen el
Nuevo Mundo. En Iberia, sistemas de galerfasfiltrantesfueron realizadospor ingenierosislamicos y fueron
extendidospor los cristianosdespuesde la reconquista.Los espanolestrajeronla tecnologiade los qanats a Mexico
y a los Andes, a mediadosdel siglo dieciseis. En America los qanats fueron utilizadosen el desarrollode la
agricultura,en sistemas de agna potable,y en el drenajede minas. Este informepresentanuevaevidenciasobre
las 21 areasandinasdondegalerfassubterraneas,o puquios,funcionaronen la epocavirreinaly examina algnnos
argnmentosen pro y en contradel origenprehispanicode las galerfasfiltrantesde Nasca.

A persistent question in the archaeologyand history of the New World is the degree to which
cultures and usages of European invaders supplanted those of native inhabitants. The sharpest
debates over what is indigenous and what is introduced have taken place in the realms of the
nonmaterial,because it is thoughtthat with artifactsand architecture,at least, one can show clearly
what was Preconquest.However, this comfortableassumptionmust be questioned,because recent
work in archaeologyand history suggeststhat long-held beliefs concerningthe indigenous origins
of certain New World physical remains may no longer be tenable. In particular,we question the
hypothesisthat proposesthe unique and independentdevelopment in Peru in the mid-firstmillen-
nium A.D. of the water-managementsystem known in the Islamic world as the qanat (Lambton
1975:528),in Spainas the mina (Aznarde Polanco 1727), in Mexico as galerlasfiltrantes or apantles
contragaluces (Woodburyand Neely 1972:139), in the Andes as the puquiol, in mining terminology
as the socavon or adit, and which we call here the "filtrationgallery."
Althoughfiltrationgalleriesarecommon in the Old Worldand have been studiedin detail (English
1968; Lambton 1975), the origins of such waterworksin the Americas have not been thoroughly
examined. In the Andes the full number and extent of filtrationgallerieshave not yet been deter-
mined, but where they still function they are often consideredan indigenousinvention, in spite of
the Spanish masteryof this technology.
A filtrationgalleryis a tunnel cut on a gentle gradientinto the watertable within a hillside (Davis
and Wilson 1919). The aquiferis found by digginga series of vertical shafts in a straightline until
strikingwater, and then linking the bottoms of the shafts with the tunnel. If a system lacks either
the tunnel or the shafts, it is not a true filtrationgallery.Where the tunnel emerges into open air,

Monica Barnes,Departmentof Anthropology,McGrawHall, Cornell University,Ithaca, NY 14853

David Fleming, 377 RectorPlace, Apt. 11-J, New York,NY 10280

Latin American Antiquity, 2(1), 1991, pp. 48-68.

Copyright C) 1991 by the Society for American Archaeology

48
lBarnes and Flemingl FILTRATION-GALLERYIRRIGATION 49

SECTION OF TYPICAL FILTRATION GALLERY-

ALSO CALLED PUQU 10, A PA N T L 1, MINA OR OANAT

MOTHER WELL\

SHAFTS \
LUMBRERAS, RESPIRADORES, /\

IMPERMEABLE LAYER-

Figure 1. Longitudinal section of typical filtration gallery, showing terms used for the various components
and how the water table is tapped.

there is often a reservoirfrom which water is distributed,either to fields or for household use (see
Figure 1). The shafts are usually about 20-150 m apart, although this distance varies with the
steepness of the water-bearingstrata. Filtrationgalleries serve two broad functions:the provision
of fresh water and the draining of mines and wetlands. The largest and most highly developed
filtrationgalleriesare in Iran (see Figure 2).

THE DEVELOPMENTAND DIFFIJSIONOF FILTRATIONGALLERIES

The Old World
The earliest mention of a filtrationgallery is in a late eighth-centuryB.C. text of the Assyrian
king SargonII, who ruledfrom 722 to 705 B.C. in what is now Iraq(Lsss0e 1951:21-32; Thureau-
Dangin 1912:1ines202-204), and who describeda structurein Armenia that was most probablya
qanat. Filtration galleries were firmly established in western Asia by the Islamic conquest in the
seventh centuryA.D.
The obvious utility of qanats made them attractiveto the new Arab rulersof Iran, and they, in
turn, transferredthis technology to the Arabian peninsula and to North Africa. Huge stretchesof
Egypt,Tunisia, and Morocco still are wateredin this way (Colin 1932). The Arabs also introduced
the systems into Spain at Crevillente,Cordoba,and Madridand commented on a Roman filtration
gallerynear Murcia(Glick 1979:226). The Madridcomplex was begun by A.D. 1202 (Oliver Asin
1959). The topographyand waterregime of the Spanishcentralplateauresemblemany partsof the
Arab and Persianworld.
Without filtrationgalleries, Madrid'sperennial surfacewater would not have been sufficientto
supply the population of the medieval city, let alone the major national capital built by Philip II
(reigned1556-1598), and maintainedby his successors(Oliver Asin 1959). The expansionof Mad-
50 LATIN AMERICANANTIQUITY [Vol.2,No.1,1991

Figure2. Map of the worldshowingfiltration-galleryzones.

rid's water supplyin the reign of Philip III (1598-1621) shows that undergroundgallerieswere well
understoodand commonly used (HerreroGarcia 1930). Improvementand extension continued in
the late seventeenthcentury(Aznarde Polanco 1727:296-297). The needs of Madridwere wholly
met until the 1800s by a network of undergroundchannels (Troll 1963:326). Many of these may
still be seen, and their locations, lengths,flows, and constructionare all recorded(Aznarde Polanco
1727; Braun 1974; Garciade Cespedes 1606; Troll and Braun 1972). Elsewherein Spain, a system
of filtrationgalleriesserved Seville by the sixteenth century. These were believed to have been of
medieval Islamic or Roman construction (Caro 1634:f. 154r, col. 1). Another very old system
provided water in the Zalamea district approximately60 km northwest of Seville (Caro 1634:f.
154r, col. 1). Filtration galleries were brought to the Canary Islands at an unknown date (Colin
1932:40;Gavala and Goded 1930). The expansion of such systems in Spain when it was a colonial
power reveals that this technology was then currentand important.It was known to people from
the Meseta and Andalucia,who were among the first Spanish settlersto arrive in the New World.

The New World

Comingfrom an aridpeninsulawherevariouswater-managementtechniqueswerewell developed
and widely distributed,the Spanishconquerorsof the Americasvalued indigenoussystemswherever
they were encountered.This appreciationhad the royal approval of Charles V, who followed a
precedentestablishedduringthe reconquestof Islamic Spain by ordering,in 1536, that Preconquest
waterdivisions be maintainedand managedby the same native officialswho had held this authority
prior to the arrivalofthe Iberians(OdarSeminario 1929:1151; Quelle 1931:161).
In the course of their exploration of the New World, the Spaniardsfound indigenous systems
based upon artificialislands in the Basin of Mexico (Helms 1975), sunkenfields along the Peruvian
coast (Cieza de Leon 1553; Garcilaso de la Vega, el Ynga 1982 [1609]; Rowe 1969; Soldi 1979),
 *MINE
12ll.lCA
18PICA
20 *SANTA
*CHILLON
H DRAINAGE
UANCA\t 23and \_GUAYORI
^ MATILLA
\ E <>
S, -L 1** 16 I I ***\ 19*
CA *l
s:
' * ^* **^
,4 - :,, . j

FILTRATION-GALLERYIRRIGATION 51
Barnes and Fleming]

*DOCUMENTS ONLY B <> >. N |

10 *PISCO g

15.LOCUMBA Ug v * ***
17.PAMPA DE TAMARUGAL 2*Y_=J : :
19PUOUIO NUNEZ 7 *20 . *@s@

* FIELD OBSERVATIONS ONLY 1OX J * 24

12-0CUCAJE (?) 24 PAUCARTAMBO j< S l

*DOCUMENTS and OBSERVATIONS 12-\_/ <

3-7LIMA GROUP 16 AZAPA | r
8 *LURIN _t v
g *CHILCA | 14 } .*
13NASCA t/g7.*t.
14MOQUEGUA 15J. *'*

21 *SI BAYA :
2 2 *POTOS I - *21
17*
0 300 , 1 8- *. 2 2*

l K M | :

Figure3. Locationmap of Andeanfiltrationgalleries mentionedby numberin Table 1.

and numerous networks of canals throughout highland and coastal Peru and Mexico (Doolittle
1 990).
AlthoughSpaniardsoften eitherusurpedthese systems, or allowed Indiansto continue to manage
them, they also introducedtheir own irrigationtechnology,includingthe filtrationgallery.At least
32 examples of these waterworksexisted in the Americas before the twentieth century. Seven are
in Mexico:at Parrasin CoahuilaState;at SantaCatalina,Nuevo Leon;at Tecamachalco,Acatzingo-
Tepeaca,Tehuacan,and Puebla in Puebla State;and in the Huastecaregion,and include hundreds
oftunnels in all (Humlum 1964:Figures4 and 24, insert map; Seele 1969:3; Woodburyand Neely
1972). Seventeen are in Peru. Five can be found in Chile, one in Bermuda,and two in California,
at Los Angelesand SantaBarbara(Davis and Wilson 1919:59;Goblot 1963:504-505,513; Humlum
1964:insertmap; KatharinaSchreiber,personalcommunication 1990). Many of the filtrationgal-
leries in Mexico (Seele 1969:3) and most or all in the Andes have colonial origins(Figure3). Those
in Californiaare of uncertaindate. Filtration galleries were begun in Bermudain the nineteenth
century.
Filtrationgallerieswere firstbuilt by the Spaniardsin Mexico in 1526 (Seele 1969:3), before the
explorationof Peru, and in South Americaat Potosi in 1556. In the latterplace they were designed
by the Florentineminer Nicolas del Benino (Jimenezde la Espada 1965 [1573]:I:362-371).By 1585
eight filtrationgalleries functionedat Potosi (Bakewell 1984:23), and socavoneswere begun at the
Huancavelicamercurymines by 1587 (de Fonseca 1605:178-180).
Although Indians had alreadybuilt elaborateopen canal systems in the river valleys of coastal
Peru before the Spanish began to occupy these areas in the 1530s and 1540s, Spaniardsquickly
modified these systems. The best evidence for Spanish irrigationcan be found in documents in the
collection of the Archivo General de la Nacion (AGN), Seccion Colonial, in Lima, in the section
of the archive that preserves the papers of the Juzgado de Aguas, Peru's supreme water rights
tribunal.At Trujillothe Spanishcreateda new urbancanal networkby 1548, to supplyall the city's
houses (Cieza de Leon 1553:Chapters68 and 69, i. 73v [sic]-85r). Spanish settlersalso built their
52 LATIN AMERICANANTIQUITY [Vol. 2, No. 1, 1991

own waterworksat Lima, althoughthe site had previouslybeen irrigatedby Indian-builtopen canals
(AGN, Aguas 3.3.6.18. [1552]; Cerdande Landa 1793:180;Cieza de Leon 1553:Chapter71, f. 86).
The Spaniardswere eager to improve indigenous systems if they could because Spanish water
needs were greaterthan those of Indians. In addition to water for households, Spaniardsneeded
waterfor horsesand for irrigatingsugarcane. In arid workingconditions,a horse requires15 gallons
of waterper day, or the same as six or seven people (Engels 1978:125-127). Sugarcane, established
on the coast of Peru by 1548, requiresalmost three times as much water as native maize (Netherly
1984:Table2).
By the second half of the sixteenth centurythe Spanishhad begun to build gallerysystems in the
Andes for irrigationas well as for mine drainage.New waterworkswere constructedand old ones
expandedthroughoutthe seventeenthand eighteenthcenturiesso that by the time of independence,
filtrationgalleriesprovidedwaterto Spanishenterprisesfrom Peru'sSantaValley to Puquio Nunez
in Chile.
Moving from north to south, we learn that constructionof puquEosat Huambachoin the Santa
Valley was begun in 1590 and the system continued in use until at least 1666. At Guaral in the
Chillon Valley filtrationgalleries were started by 1570, at the latest. From the early seventeenth
century, filtrationgalleries were built and maintained by the Spaniardsto irrigate Lima and its
surroundings.Filtrationgalleries supportedhacienda agricultureat La Legua from ca. 1614 until
sometime after 1770 (AGN, Aguas 3.3.4.6., 3.3.6.25.; Figure 4). By the revolution, all household
water for urbanLima was provided by filtrationgalleries.
In the late eighteenthcentury,Ambrosio Cerdande LandaSimon Pontero,Peru'sJuez de Aguas,
publisheda detaileddescriptionof the capital'sundergroundwater-supplysystem (Cerdande Landa
1793:175-307). Some of Lima's filtrationgalleriescapturedwater from the aquifersof the Rimac
River and suppliedwaterto orchardsand fields, to public fountains,and to individual households,
where it was stored in undergroundcisterns called silos. Maps of the various tunnel layouts were
recordedin the Librosde Cabildode Lima (Cerdande Landa 1793). Cerdande Landawas able to
compare the filtrationgalleries of Lima favorably to those of Madrid (Aznar de Polanco 1727;
Cerdande Landa 1793:196). Filtrationgalleriesstill provide two percentof Lima'swater(Caravedo
Molinari 1983).
At Lurinfiltrationgallerieswere built before 1731, but were most probablynot in service in 1617
when Vazquezde Espinosa(1948 [1617]:1332)describedthe agricultureof the region.Use continued
until after 1838. The puquEoGuamaniat Pisco had two subterraneancanals, one of which provided
waterfor a monasterywhile the other was sharedbetweenthe Spanishtown and local Indians.This
irrigationwork was begun ca. 1702 with additionalconstructionin 1740 by the priests.At Ica there
were at least two puquEosystems. The Charalina-SanMartin waterworkoperatedfrom sometime
before 1648 to at least 1652. The Belenpuqudofunctionedbeforeand after 1784. In 1901 Max Uhle
observed what seems to have been a filtrationgallerysupplyingthe Ocucajevineyard (Uhle 1914:
5).
At Huayuri (Guayori)in the Santa Cruz Valley 20,000 jugs of wine were producedannually in
the earlyseventeenthcentury,usinga combinationof winterflood irrigationandpuquiowaterduring
those months when there was no surfacewater (Vazquezde Espinosa 1948 [1617]:1370).
Some 40 puquEoshave been noted by nineteenth- and twentieth-centuryobserversof the Nasca
drainage.Although the ultimate origins of the puquEosare disputed, one, Visambra, has been in
operationat least since 1692 when it was sold (AGN, Aguas 3.3.7.23.:f. 3v). It has been used ever
since (GonzalezGarcia 1934; Markham1978 [1856]:47;Rossel Castro 1977; Schreiberand Lancho
Rojas 1988). In the MoqueguaValley, two socavones, Sameguaand La Baja, provided waterin the
late eighteenthcentury.A gallerystill watersa vineyardin the lower MoqueguaValley (P. M. Rice,
personalcommunication 1990). Vazquezde Espinosa(1948 [1617]:1411)also reportsthat the only
good vineyard in the LocumbaValley was wateredwith a puquio, so its initial constructionmust
have occurredbefore 1617. In 1739 this system was extended or repaired(AGN, Aguas 3.3.4.39.).
In Chile, the Azapa Valley has had two puquEosystems at least since the mid-eighteenthcentury,
and these, or their successors,still function today. At the inland oases of Pica and Matillapuquios
were in operationby the early eighteenthcentury(O'Brien 1765; Villalobos R. 1979:97-99).
 FILTRATION-GALLERYIRRIGATION 53
Barnes and Fleming]

Figure 4. Redrawn 1704 plan of the La Legua (Lima) puquSo system.

Only one water-producingfiltrationgallerysystem has been reportedfor the Andean highlands,

in the PaucartamboValley. There tunnels are supportedby Polylepis(quenuar)logs. Although the
system is said to be Prehispanicin date, no evidence for this idea is given (Soukup 1970:271). The
Andean filtration-gallerysystems discussedabove, the dates they were in use, and the documentary
evidence for them is summarizedin Table 1.
Of all these filtration-gallerysystems, only those in the Nasca drainageand those in the Pica-
Matilla oases have been generallyrecognizedby historians and archaeologists.However, those of
the Chilca, Rimac, and Lurin valleys were excavated by Julio C. Tello, who wrote that they were
linkedundergroundand supportedthe Prehispanicagricultureof Pachacamac(Tello 1940a:2, 1940b:
 54 LATIN AMERICANANTIQUITY [Vol. 2, No. 1, 1991

Table 1. Time Span of FiltrationGalleryUse in the Andes.

Locationa Puquio Time Span Sources

1. Santa (Huambacho) Santo Thomas de la 1590-1599-1666 AGN, Aguas 3.3.2.2., 3.3.3.4.
Pampa, Cailan
2. Chillon (Guaral) La Galera, Retes, and I ?1562-1570-1609-1669- AGN, Aguas 3.3.6.22.,
unnamed 1723-1731-1746-1763- 3.3.11.34.
1769-1789 . . .
3. Lima various, including Sa- ... 1779-1787-1804- AGN, Aguas 3.3.10.73.,
bana (Cacaquan Val- present 3.3.12.3., 3.3.17.10.; Cerdan
ley and Surco) de Landa 1793
4. Lima (Ate) Toma de Cuyo ca. 1732-1782 AGN, Aguas 3.3.9.9.
5. Lima (Carabayllo) Talavera (2 galleries) ca. 1764-1784 AGN, Aguas 3.3.6.10.,
3.3.9.46.
6. Lima (Aznapuquio) Santillan Sca. 1675-1784 AGN, Aguas 3.3.9.44.
7. La Legua (Callao) Huaca Grande, Los ca. 1614-1617-ca. 1664- AGN, Aguas 3.3.4.6., 3.3.6.25.
Cardos, and 4 others 1670-ca. 1674-1704-
1709-1770 . . .
8. Lurin Buenavista (4 galleries) . . . 1731-1737-ca. 1739- AGN, Aguas 3.3.10.12.,
1749-1767-1785-18 18- 3.3.10.65., 3.3.17.12.; Tello
1838 . . . 1940a, 1940b, 1959
9. Chilca ? ? Tello 1959
10. Pisco Guamani (2 galleries) ca. 1702- 1740 AGN, Aguas 3.3.4.9.
11. Ica San Martin and Charal- ... 1648-1652... AGN, Aguas 3.3.2.2., 3.3.2.4.
ina
Belen 1784 . . . AGN, Aguas 3.3.9.47.
12. Ica/Ocucaje Ocucaje . . . ca. 1900 . . . Uhle 1914
13. Guayori ? . . . ca. 1617 . . . Vazquez de Espinosa 1948
[1617]
14. Nasca Visambra and some 40 . . . 1692-1698-1735- AGN, Aguas 3.3.7.23.; Gonza-
others 1738-1778-present lez Garcia 1934; Markham
1978 [1856]; Rossel Castro
1977; Schreiber and Lancho
Rojas 1988; others
15. Moquegua Samegua, La Baja ca. 1795 . . . present AGN, Aguas 3.3.14.20.; P.M.
Rice, personal communica-
tion 1990
16. Locumba ... 1613... 1739... AGN, Aguas 3.3.4.39.; Vaz-
quez de Espinosa 1948
[1617]
17. Azapa After 1619 . . . ca. Barnes and Fleming, personal
1760 . . . present observation 1989; Hidalgo
Lehuede 1990
18. Paucartambo ? ? . . . present Soukup 1970
19. Pica and Matilla various 1718-1756... present Barnes and Fleming, personal
observation 1989; Bermudez
Miral 1987; O'Brien 1765;
1765; Villalobos R. 1979
20. Puquio Nunez Bermudez Miral 1987
21. Eastern edge of Bermudez Miral 1987
Pampa Tamarugal
Socavones draining mines
22. Huancavelica N/A 1587-1622 Biblioteca Nacional (Madrid)
MSS Cod. J57, sig. 3041, ff.
178-180; de Aponte 1867
[1622]
23. Potosi N/A 1556-1585 ... Bakewell 1984; Jimenez de Es-
pada 1965 [1573]
24. Sibaya N/A 1758-1765 O'Brien 1765
Note: Dates are those during which systems were operational, according to documentary evidence. Italicized dates
are those in which documentary evidence indicates that major constructions, alterations, or reconstructions occurred.
Three dots after a date indicate that use continued after that date. Three dots before a date indicate that the puquio
was already in use by the first date mentioned.
a See Figure 3 for locations mentioned here by number.
Barnes and Fleming] FILTRATION-GALLERYIRRIGATION 55

7, 1940c:3, 1940d:13,1959:27). This observationis at variancewith the testimony of Cieza de Leon

and Vazquez de Espinosa, who do not report puquios as part of the indigenous irrigationof the
centralcoast.

THE PUQUIOS OF NASCA

The earliest known document that describes any of the Nasca puquEos in detail records a late
eighteenth-centurydispute over Visambra (Bisambra)(AGN, Aguas 3.3.7.23.). Ironically, large
portions of these papersare illegible because of water damage.In 1777 two local hacienda owners,
Don Fernandode Rosas and Don Tomas de Rivera y Arias were disputing rights to a portion of
Visambra'swater. Documents on paper restampedfor the years 1737 and 1738 are included with
the recordsof the proceedings.These referto events dating from 1692.
In 1698 there had been a division of water rights in Nasca in which Visambrawas included (f.
28). Elevendays of irrigationeach month wereassignedto the HaciendaVisambra.Anotherhacienda
was allocated four days of water. Five other Spanish landowners were allocated one day each.
Anotherwas assignedtwo days, as were the Nasca priests.The Indiansas a collectivityhad irrigation
wateron the four or five Sundaysof the month. Everyonegave up two hours of flow each morning
so that watercould run throughthe town of Nasca (f. 34v). This requirementsuggeststhat puquios
upstreamfrom Nasca, includingGobernadora,Huachuca,Cantayoc,and Tejejemay not have been
constructedyet. The water division was reconfirmedon June 4, 1738 (f. 55).
Since the late eighteenthcentury, it has been believed that the Nasca puquEoswere the work of
native engineers who constructed them before the arrival of the Spaniards.In 1794, during an
investigation into the water rights of the Ingenio Valley, Don Antonio Yazen testified that the
puquEosof Nasca were "builtby the force of a greatdeal of heavy work by the prechristianIndians"
(AGN, Aguas 3.3.13.28. [unfoliated],this and subsequenttranslationsby the authors).John Miller
(1829:220) remarksupon the undergroundwater system of Nasca in a context which implies it is
Incaic in origin. Sir Clements Markham (1978 [1856]:46-47), who visited Nasca in 1833, also
believed the puquios of that area were built by the Incas. The puquios are mentioned by Raimondi
(1874:166), and Tello and Mejia Xesspe examinedthese waterworksin the 1920s and 1930s (Mejia
Xesspe 1939:559-569). FranciscoGonzalezGarcia(1934:207-222; reprintedin Ravines [1978:129-
156]),a Peruvianirrigationengineer,made hydrologicalstudiesof them duringthe 1930s. Gonzalez
Garcia's(1934:207) descriptionsand illustrationsmatch those of qanats from the Iranianplateau
and North Africa.However, he dated the puquEosto the reignof Inca Roca becauseof construction
details and Garcilaso de la Vega's remark that Nasca was irrigatedwhen it was conquered.This
would, of course, make Nasca's irrigationsystems pre-Inca.
Furthercommentaryhas repeatedand elaboratedupon the basic work done by Gonzalez Garcia
with little critical examination of the similarity of the puquios to the many other systems of their
type. Both Mejia Xesspe's accountand those of Regal Matienzo(1943:210-213, 1964, 1970) assign
the constructionof the undergroundchannels to the Nasca cultureor its antecedents,althoughno
solid evidence is offered.Laterstudies by Auza Arce (1948:86-87), de Reparaz(1958:1-62), Hork-
heimer (1960:111-123), Kobori (1960:80-81, 83, 417-420), and Kosok (1965:58)do not resolve the
constructiondate of the Nasca filtrationgalleries.
PadreAlbertoRossel Castro(1942,1977: 167-194) providestechnicaldata on many ofthepuquios
including sections and plans preparedby Gonzalez Garcia. Rossel Castro (1977:175) argues that
these waterworksare pre-Incain origin becausethe Incas never transferredthis technologyto other
partsoftheir empire.He assertsthat "Thesegalleriesarefoundin intimaterelationwith the geometric
figuresdelineated on the surfaceof the soil in which the galleriesoriginate"(Rossel Castro 1977:
176).2This statement confounds the Nasca Valley floor with the Pampa de Nasca and its famous
lines. Rossel Castroplaces the puquEosin his Clasico Naska period, 300 B.C. to A.D. 500. In 1971
Peru's Oficina Nacional de Evaluacionde Recursos Naturales(ONERN) published a major study
on the Nasca drainage.The puquEos are mentioned in the context of a largerdiscussion of under-
groundwater and some are said to be pre-Inca,without any supportfor this attribution(ONERN
1971:1:12,202). In 1980 the engineerGeorgPetersenset forththe argumentthat settlementpatterns
56 LATIN AMERICANANTIQUITY [Vol. 2, No. 1, 1991

of the Nasca and Acari valleys, which show an increasein known sites of the middle and late Nasca
epochs, suggestthat the puquios are an artifactof the Nasca culture(Petersen 1980:21, 35, 43-44).
Most recently, since the mid-1980s, KatharinaSchreiberand Josue Lancho Rojas, a Peruvian
teacher, have been studying the puquios of Nasca. On the basis of architecturaland settlement
pattern studies, they also assign a Nasca-period constructiondate to these works (Schreiberand
LanchoRojas 1988:51-62; Schreiber1989:69-79),and theirpublicationsarealreadyfrequentlycited
(Clarkson1990:117, 119; Silverman 1990:440).
Thus, for the past 200 years Peruviansand Peruvianistshave believed that the filtrationgalleries
of Nasca are an invention of the Incas or their predecessors.Perhapsa lone voice of doubt among
Americanistshas been that of HermannTrimborn(1967:8), who stated that the question of local
invention or Spanish introductionhad not been resolved and had to be addressedby considering
Spanish sources to determinewhetherand when eyewitnessesreportedsuch systems.

THE PUQUIOS OF CHILE

Pica was settled by Spaniardsin the 1540s and was developed to support the silver mines at
Potosi. The Pica and Matilla puquEos are thought to have been built in the late sixteenth century
by miners (Troll and Braun 1972:21).While this is plausible,even likely, definiteproof has not yet
been produced.The earliest mention known to us of these filtrationgalleriesdates to 1718, when
a landownerextended several tunnels and therebyincreasedthe annualyield of his vineyardsfrom
500 to 800 casks of wine (Villalobos R. 1979:97-99). In 1765 the inhabitantsof Pica continued to
use puquEosto obtain water(O'Brien1765, BritishLibrary,Add. MS. 17,587, f. 16[4];corresponds
to Archivo Generalde Indias [AGI], Charcas490, pieza 12 a-n, f. 41 [4]). The galleriesof Pica and
Matillawere used throughoutthe nineteenthcenturyand remainimportant(BermudezMiral 1987;
Hidalgo Lehuede 1991; Villalobos R. 1979). In their present form they exhibit architecturaltraits
indicatingPostconquestconstructionor remodeling.These include barrelvaulting and bricks.The
1765 reportby O'Brienstates that in the Tarapacaregion socavones were also used to drain mines.
Near Sibaya,two mine ownersdrainedthe old Paguantamines, having beguntheir socavon in 1758
(O'Brien 1765, British Library,Add. MS. 17,587, f. 11; see also AGI, Charcas490, pieza 12 a-n).
By the second half of the nineteenth centurythe Pica-Matilla filtrationgallerieswere attracting
the attention of irrigationengineers(Billinghurst1886, 1893; Oficinade Hidrografiai Navegacion,
Chile 1879:18). By then at least 15 undergroundwater channels irrigatedan area of about 155 ha
(Billinghurst1893:75), had a total length of about 5.2 km (Billinghurst1886:102), and produced
about 3.5 million 1of watera day (Billinghurst1893:74). Billinghurst(1886:102) is vague about the
originsofthis system.VillalobosR. (1979:96)concludedthatpuquEotechnologymay have ultimately
come from North Africa, but that the Chilean examples probablyrepresenta local development,
an assertionfor which no supportis advanced.Osvaldo Ossandon(cited in BermudezMiral [1987:
53]), a Chilean educator, attributesan Armenian origin to the Chilean filtrationgalleries. Oscar
BermudezMiral, a local historian, concurs in the opinion that the filtrationgalleries of northern
Chile were built by Potosi miners. He does not offerany new evidence, but does provide a wealth
of regionaldetail.Othercommentatorswho have examinedthe Pica oasis and its water-management
systems have not added greatlyto our knowledgeof the development of filtrationgalleriesin Chile
(Bowman 1940:211-212; Bruggen1936; GarciaGorrono 1934; Kaerger1901:2:251;Krische 1907:
388; Quelle 1931:164).

THE CASE AGAINST THE PREHISPANIC

INVENTION OF FILTRATIONGALLERIES
Early Eyewitness Accounts
Althoughchroniclerswritingbefore 1560 often discuss water supplies,they describenothing like
the filtrationgalleries constructedby the Spaniardsin the Andes since 1556. Contraryto Kinzl
(1963:338), Ciezade Leon does not mention prehispanicundergroundwaterchannelsin his chapters
Barnes and Fleming] FILTRATION-GALLERYIRRIGATION 57

on the South Coast of Peru. In consideringthe problem of providing water for the Nasca Valley,
Cieza de Leon (1553:Chapter75, ff. 90v-91) simply remarksthat "the rivers irrigatedthe valley
fields in the order and manner already set down." Here Cieza de Leon intends us to refer to the
descriptionof Ica earlierin the chapter:
[B]eforethey were subjectedby the Spaniards,when they enjoyed the governmentof the Incas, in addition
to the canalswhich irrigatedthe valley, they had one much largerthan the rest, which carried[water]in good
orderfrom the heightsof the mountainsin such a mannerthat it ran withoutdiminishingthe nver. Now . . .
when they lack [water]and the large canal is in disrepair,from the same river they make large puddles at
intervalsand they drink from the water which remains in them and they run small canals to irrigatetheir
fields [Ciezade Leon 1553:Chapter75, i. 90v-91].
Although Ica utilized puquEowaters by 1648, when Cieza de Leon observed it a centuryearlier
water was provided in the dry season through a combination of long-distancecanals and stored
river water.This was still the case in 1617 when Vazquezde Espinosa(1948 [1617]:1352) reported
that the canals were fed with river water. The Lurin Valley was irrigatedin the first half of the
eighteenthcenturyby a filtration-gallerysystem (AGN, Aguas 3.3.10.12.,3.3.10.65.,3.3.17.12), but
when Cieza de Leon (1553:Chapter75, f. 88v) visited this area in 1548 the Indiansdependedupon
sunken fields to grow crops. He observed that in the 1540s water was obtained along the Peruvian
coast througha combination of water drawndirectlyoWrivers, long-distancecanals, vertical wells,
pits in dry river beds, water stored in ponds, and sunken fields.
In addition to the testimony of Cieza de Leon, we have remarkson coastal water suppliesby five
other early chroniclers.The first is the anonymous Noticia del Peru, written in 1535 by one of
Pizarro'scompanions.This eyewitnessalso mentions open canals in relationto coastal agriculture,
but does not mention other systems (Larrea1918:331-332, f. 11v).
Cristobal de Molina, a priest who accompanied Almagro's expedition to Chile, published a
historical description of the Andes in 1553. He mentions the use of rivers, natural springs, and
canalsfor coastal irrigation.He reportsthat in northernChile, the Indiansused a few small streams
(riachuelos)and spring-fedwater holes (agueyes) about seven to eight paces around (de Molina
1943 [1553]:20). Another source, de Oviedo (cited in Hidalgo Lehuede [1972:18]), adds the infor-
mation that these waterholescould supply five horsemenand their attendantIndians. If we assume
two servants for each Spanishrider, and if the travelersdrank,spent the night, and drankagain in
the morning,they would use approximately180 ImperialGallons(8001) in desertconditions(Engels
1978:125, 127). This is equivalentto the water in a horse troughand is a very small fractionof the
water suppliedby the filtrationgalleriesnow in northernChile.
Geronimo de Vivar (1979:12) describedTarapacabefore 1558. Then this region,laterdependent
upon filtrationgalleries,was irrigatedby open channels.Anothereyewitness,Reginaldode Lizarraga
(1968 [ca. 1605]), traveled the Andean coast in 1560. He describes open canal systems fed with
water from the sierra,but does not mention filtrationgalleries.
In the Nasca drainagethere seem to have been no puquEosfunctioningin the early seventeenth
century. Vazquez de Espinosa attributesa moderate annual productionof 30,000 jugs of wine to
the valley of the Rio Grandede Nasca and comments that althoughNasca wine was among Peru's
best, water was very scarceand often, when the grapeswere ripening,growerschanted litanies for
rain in the Sierrato fill the river. Around the same time Guaman Poma de Ayala (1987 [1615]:
1126 [1044, original foliation; 1052, refoliation])remarkedthat althoughNasca had bread, wine,
and meat in abundance,there was little water. These statementscould not have been made if the
Nasca puquEosystems, which produced as much as 32 million 1 per day in the 1930s (Gonzalez
Garcia 1934:210), were functioningin the early seventeenthcentury.
Spanishagriculturehad been conductedin the Nasca Valley since the 1540s, when the south coast
was divided into encomiendasand estates (Trelles 1983). Historicalevidence thereforesuggeststhat
the filtration-gallerysystems of Nasca were built after 1617 but before 1692.
In 1619 the complaint was raised that the Azapa Valley was virtually depopulatedfor lack of
water (Hidalgo Lehuede 1985). Even if the claim was exaggerated(Hidalgo Lehuede 1991) this
assertion could not have been made were the Azapa Valley supplied with puquEowater as it has
58 LATIN AMERICAN ANTIQUITY [Vol. 2, No. 1, 1991

been at least since the second half of the eighteenth century (AGI, Expedientes de Personas Seculares.
1629- 1633. Charcas 55, cited by Hidalgo Lehuede [1985:18F186]; Archivo Departamental de
Arequipa: "Anos 1795 a 1810, Gobierno Intendencia de Arequipa," "Promovidos por don Domingo
Martin Carrasco, dueno de la hacienda nombrada el Rosario en Arica sobre no deber atrasados del
censo de los mil pesos de principal a favor de la comunidad de indios de Pica" [sic] cited in Hidalgo
Lehuede [1990:18-19]). Vazquez de Espinosa makes no mention of puquEosin the oases of Pica
and Matilla, and archaeologists have found no evidence at Pica that Prehispanic settlement depended
upon filtration galleries (Bermudez Miral [1987] and references therein).
When taken together, the descriptions produced in the first 85 years after the Conquest leave us
with a picture of a coastal region in which native irrigation depended on open canals fed at irregular
intervals by rivers and on sunken fields. This is very similar to the irrigation systems described for
the north coast of Peru (Farrington 1974; Kosok 1965; Netherly 1984; Ortloff et al. 1982, 1983,
1985), but not at all like the filtration-gallery systems. If such systems existed, why was no mention
made of them in any early account? Given the copious descriptions of natural and architectural
materials the Spaniards left, their familiarity with underground water works, and their constant
alertness to the need for good water supplies, such reticence would be unexpected.

Indian Exclusionfrom Control

In all cases known to us, Indians were either excluded from access to puquEowaters, or were
assigned a disproportionately small share on Spanish sufferance. One of the most detailed examples
of this exclusion is recorded in the trial of Juan Antonio, a 60-year-old, Spanish-speaking laborer
of the Santa Valley. About 1550 the course of the Santa River had changed, making what had once
been a useful source of irrigation water nothing but a dry channel. In 1590, to restore the utility of
his lands in the Huambacho Valley, Diego de Azeuedo, a Spanish agriculturist created two puquio
systems at the cost of a great deal of money and labor. Both puquEosoriginated on the Hacienda
San Jacinto, a sugar-cane plantation. The puquEoLa Pampa was to be shared between the Hacienda
Santo Thomas de la Pampa and a hacienda owned by the Azeuedo family. The other puquio,Cailan,
was also to be used by the Azeuedos.
In August of 1666, in response to the worst drought in 40 years, Juan Antonio and other Indians
diverted puquiowater to their own fields, to preserve their crops. The owner of the Hacienda Santo
Thomas, Don Fernando Mateos de Anaya, pressed criminal charges. The owners of the Huambacho
haciendas argued that they had exclusive rights to filtration-gallery waters because these systems
had been built by a hacienda owner, because the water flowed under their lands, and because only
haciendas had used this water in the past. Confronted with the testimony of various witnesses, Juan
Antonio confessed and received a sentence of 100 lashes and a forcible haircut as punishment for
having opened an unauthorized water channel (AGN, Aguas 3.3.3.2.).
Two important points can be drawn from this case. The first is that a Spanish landowner built
the Huambacho puquiosystem in 1590 exclusively for the benefit ofthe local haciendas. The second
point is that the Indians had no recognized claim to the puquEosand had to petition Spanish
authorities for minimal quantities of water. This was the situation elsewhere on the Andean coast.
The Spaniards of Lima were required to shut off their water intakes during the night so that the
Indian community of Surco would not be utterly devoid of the water otherwise being channeled to
the capital (AGN, Aguas 3.3.1.1. [1577]).
In 1652, in Ica, Francisca Tuproca, an Indian woman from Lurin, successfully petitioned the
Juez de Aguas for the right to two days of irrigation water a month, from the puquEoSan Martin,
not on the basis of her indigenous status, but as the owner of a vineyard. Many years later, in 1784,
Don Pedro Nestares, a householder and hacienda owner of Ica, claimed that the waters of another
localpuquEo, Belen, had never been allocated to Indians (AGN, Aguas 3.3.9.47.). In 1784 the Indians
of Pachacamac and Lurin had to be forced to assist in the cleaning of the local puquEos(AGN, Aguas
3.3.10.65.). Their reluctance may have sprung from the fact that they received little or no benefit
from them, although they had been assigned a share in the water of the Buenavista puquEoin the
division organized by Spanish authorities sometime before 1739. In 1804, the Indians of Lurin
Barnes and Fleming] FILTRATION-GALLERYIRRIGATION 59

were still struggling to regain use of irrigation waters from Buenavista (AGN, Aguas 3.3.17.12.).
Had the filtration-gallery system concept been indigenous, seventeenth- and eighteenth-century
Indians would have been able to use the decree of Charles V, cited above, to press legal claims to
greater access to water.

andLinguisticArguments
Archaeological,
Architectural,
Schreiber and Lancho Rojas (1988) have proposed architectural arguments to support claims that
the filtration galleries in the Nasca drainage differ significantly from those in the rest of the Hispanic
world. In addition, they have espoused and developed an argument based on settlement patterns
first formulated by Georg Petersen (Petersen 1980:4344; Schreiber 1989:71, Figure 6; Schreiber
and Lancho Rojas 1988:60-61). They have also suggested that the use of Quechua loan words shows
a Prehispanic origin. Schreiber and Lancho Rojas (1988:66) conclude that the Nasca underground
canals are an independent Prehispanic invention that can be ascribed to the Nasca culture.
It has been suggested that while qanatsare totally subterranean, puquEos have large open portions
and sometimes consist only of open canals. However, such canals cannot be considered diagnostic
of ultimate Prehispanic origin. In Iran, the open part of the qanatbetween the end of the tunnel
and the water-collection point has a specific name, the haranj(Beckett 1953:51). In the early
seventeenth century, enough water flowed in the above-ground portion of Seville's Carmona filtra-
tion-gallery system to power six water mills (Caro 1634:f. 154r, col. 1). Aznar de Polanco's (1727:
224-328) detailed description of the Madrid system as it was in the early eighteenth century makes
it clear that the three watercourses belonging to the city contained above-ground, as well as below-
ground portions. Open sections also are found in systems in the Ahaggar Mountains of Algeria
(Humlum 1964: 119), at Tehuacan (Woodbury and Neely 1972: 141,143, Figure 73; Humlum 1964:
125), at Parras (Humlum 1964:127), as well as at Pica (Humlum 1964:129-131) and at Azapa.
In the recently remodeled filtration-gallery system in Chile's Azapa Valley cooperative members
have constructed 2 km of new open canals, linking them to a small preexisting underground canal
(A. Almonte Ku, personal communication 1989). The similarities between the Azapa canals and
those of Nasca are striking. Both, for example, use small water-rounded stones to line the canals
and incorporate open channels, showing that Nasca construction methods are still current. While
it is possible that their appearance at Azapa may represent a survival of Prehispanic building
techniques, it is also possible that parts of the Nasca puquios,in their present form, are architecturally
modern. A new gallery was being built at the Hacienda Huachuca, 1.5 km northeast of the town of
Nasca, in 1955 (Petersen 1980:21). New ventilation shafts forthe Cantayoc puquiowere built recently
(Schreiber and Lancho Rojas 1988:58), and modern repairs have been frequent.
It has been argued that Nasca puquEos also can be distinguished from Old World qanatsby the
fact that qanatsopen directly into irrigation canals while puquEos empty into artificial pools called
cochas(Schreiber and Lancho Rojas 1988:60). This is a false distinction. Water from filtration
galleries in the Ahaggar mountains of Algeria collects in reservoirs (Humlum 1964:Figure 14). The
Madrid system, as it functioned in 1727, contained more than 120 catchment pools, called arcas
(Aznar de Polanco 1727:226-328). We have observed the pools that are incorporated into the
Sevillian and Cordovan systems. Such pools are used in the Canary Islands (Humlum 1964:Figure
23). In Mexico, the colonial galleries at Tecamachalco, Puebla, and at Parras, Coahuila, also empty
into reservoirs (Humlum 1964:Figures 4, 18, and 29). There are open-air cochasin the modern
system at Azapa, in the presumably colonial systems at Pica (Hidalgo Lehuede 1990:Ilustracion
12), and in Lima's colonial systems.
The tunnels of the Nasca puquioshave been said to be smaller than those of qanats(Schreiber
and Lancho Rojas 1988:60). In fact, the differences between Nasca galleries and those of the Old
World are so slight as to be within the limits of constructional variation. The average dimensions
of Iranian qanats(a sample of between 22,000 and 40,000) are 1.2 m (4') in height by .9-1.7 m
(2.5-3') in width (Lambton 1975:530), while those of Nasca are an average of 1.2 m in height by
.6 m in width (Schreiber and Lancho Rojas 1988:55), or virtually the same.
 60 LATIN AMERICAN ANTIQUITY [Vol. 2, No. 1, 1991

It also has been claimed that the vertical shafts of puquiosare more closely spaced than those of
Old World filtration galleries (Schreiber and Lancho Rojas 1988:60). The distance between shafts
is a function of the slope of the water-bearing deposits. When these tilt steeply one can find water
at a closer horizontal distance from a dry well than one can when these slope only slightly. The
shafts of many Old World filtration galler]es are very closely spaced. In the Ahaggar Mountains
those of one gallery are only inches apart before the holes merge to form an open trench (Humlum
1964:Figure 20). At the Kharga Oasis in the Sahara, the shafts are approximately 10 m distant from
one another (Humlum 1964:Figure 22). Rossel Castro's (1977:172) examination found that the
shafts at Nasca are most often spaced at intervals of between 20 and 50 m, distances within the
Old World range.
Schreiber and Lancho Rojas (1988:60) assert that in contrast to puquEos, which are usually parallel
to rivers, qanats run at right angles to them. This distinction cannot be maintained. Filtration
galleries run where they are needed and where local topography permits. Many Mexican and Old
World systems also incorporate galleries running roughly parallel to watercourses. These include
the filtration galleries of Parras (Humlum 1964:Figure 18) and those of Madrid (Braun 1974:Figures
30 and 31).
A further architectural argument is that while the horizontal portions of puquEos extend beyond
the "mother well," the ventilation shaft farthest from the delivery point of the water, qanats do
not. While the early eighteenth-century Madrid and La Legua systems apparently do terminate in
wells, as do some at Tehuacan (Woodbury and Neely 1972: 141), in the qanats around Kirman, Iran,
the gallery extends beyond the "mother well" into the aquifer, as far as ventilation permits, to
increase water-yielding surfaces (Beckett 1953:51).
One important architectural difference between the puquEos of Nasca and the filtration galleries
of Mexico, Chile, and the Old World is not discussed by Schreiber and Lancho Rojas. This is the
difference in cross section between certain parts of the Nasca puquEos and many of those outside
the Nasca drainage. The difference is in part a response to local geological conditions, and also
reflects a different engineering technique by comparison with true filtration galleries consisting of
vertical wells linked by tunnels burrowed into consolidated deposits or rock. The immediate sub-
surface strata at the town of Nasca consist of some two and a half meters of unconsolidated alluvial
deposits resting on conglomerates. Because the aquifer is close to the surface, water can be reached
by digging trenches into the alluvium (Schreiber and Lancho Rojas 1988:55-58). Such ditches may
be the pozas observed by Cieza de Leon in the Ica and Nasca valleys. The open trench portions of
the Nasca puquEos may, in fact, have been begun well before the Spanish Conquest. These were
sometimes roofed over with either stone slabs or wooden beams and then covered with earth
(Schreiber and Lancho Rojas 1988:56-57), to reduce evaporation and contamination, thereby ac-
quiring a rectilinear section (Gonzalez Garcia 1934:208-209, figure reproduced in Aveni [1990:
27]). By contrast, filtration-gallery tunnel sections at Madrid, Pica, North Africa, and elsewhere are
tall and narrow with arched roofs (Bermudez Miral 1986:Figures 6-8, 11; Braun 1974:Figure 28;
Hidalgo Lehuede 199 1rIllustraciones 10 and 1 1; Oliver Asin 1959:Plates 1 1 and 12). However, the
sections of the horizontal galleries at Nasca that are cut into the conglomerate, and which, in some
cases, extend trenches dug into the alluvium, are scarcely described or illustrated. Gonzalez Garcia
(1934:208) commented that they do not have any form of internal support, and Miller (1829:220)
wrote that the puquEosof Nasca are arched, an observation not confirmed by other investigators.
Because the only indisputable subsurface mining techniques FKnownto the Prehispanic Andeans was
open-pit mining, it is probable that the extension of the water systems into the conglomerate and
the construction of the vertical shafts was accomplished by the Spanish, who were masters of
tunneling.
Schreiber and Lancho Rojas develop arguments first advanced by Petersen that settlement patterns
suggest construction of the puquEosduring Nasca times (Schreiber 1989:Figure 6; Schreiber and
Lancho Rojas 1988:61-62). According to this hypothesis, the middle portion of the Nasca drainage,
which has no perennial surface water for most of the year, would be impossible to settle without
filtration galleries. Although important Late Horizon sites are located in the puquEozone, the early
Nasca site of Cahuachi is in the lower valley where there is normally surface water all year. Therefore
 Barnes and Fleming] FILTRATION-GALLERYIRRIGATION
61

the puquEosmust have been constructed after the establishment of Cahuachi, and specifically in
Nasca Phase 5. This, however, ignores the eyewitness account of Cieza de Leon (1553:Chapter 75,
S. 90v-91) that suggests settlement at Nasca was sustained through the use of long-distance canals,
the sunken fields called hoyas, and stored river water. In modern times the depth of the water table
in the valley of the Rio Grande de Nasca has been between 1 and 5 m from the surface (ONERN
1971:I:l99). This makes it all the more plausible that the Prehispanic inhabitants of this valley
could have managed to withstand the dry season with the methods suggested by Cieza de Leon. At
Villacuri, for example, in early colonial times the sunken gardens were deep enough to hide a horse
and rider (Fernandez de Palencia 1963 [1567]: second part, book 2, chapter 37:378, cited by Rowe
[1969:222]). Schreiber's 1990 survey of the Nasca valley has not yet been published. She reports
some 250 sites in the survey area (Katharina Schreiber, personal communication 1990). Schreiber's
(1989:Figure 6) prior surveys were confined to the valley margins and therefore cannot be assumed
necessarily to reflect accurately complete Nasca settlement patterns, so that discussion of settlement
must be postponed until Schreiber's results are available.
However, on average, the water table may not have been as high at the beginning of the Early
Intermediate period as it is today. Under circumscribed geographical conditions, the development
of canal irrigation, bringing water from distances into a small area, can gradually raise the local
water table. Rowe (1969:320,324) suggests that this happened at various locations on the Peruvian
coast including Chilca, Villacuri, Chanchan, Viru, Santa, Cerro Azul, Canete, and along the Pan-
american Highway between Chincha and Pisco. We propose that as canal irrigation grew and was
extended in the Rio Grande de Nasca Valley during the first part of the Early Intermediate period,
the water table rose, making possible the construction of hoyas and simple wells in the middle
valley. These were eventually developed into those parts of the puquEos built by trenching as opposed
to tunneling. This would explain observed settlement patterns without invoking either radical
technological change or the rise and fall of a mini-empire (Rowe 1963: 11- 12) as causes.
It has been suggested all the terms associated with puquios are Quechua loan words (Schreiber
and Lancho Rojas 1988:60), though there is no contention that Quechua speakers built the Andean
filtration galleries. While it is true that the word puquio has been employed for such systems at least
since the early seventeenth century, and the word cocha, or "lake" in Quechua, has been used for
collection pools at least since the eighteenth century, Spanish terms, including socavon or tajo for
"tunnel," zanja for "trench," and manantial and vertientefor "natural springs" incorporated into
the systems, were used in the eighteenth century and remain current in Chile. Furthermore, Nahuatl
terms such as apantleare used for Mexican filtration galleries that are Spanish in origin. An exception
is at Parras, where the galleries are calledfuquEos (Robert C. West, personal communication 1990),
a borrowing of the Quechua word puquEo,which underwent an initial consonant shift when taken
into Mexican Spanish. The adaption of Amerindian words to Spanish technology probably was
facilitated by the nonspecificity of Iberian terms for filtration-gallery components. In Spain, as late
as the beginning ofthe eighteenth century, filtration galleries were simply called minasand ventilation
shafts pozos, though it is usually clear from context when qanat-typesystems are being discussed.
Unfortunately, further technical evidence for the dating of the Nasca filtration galleries is un-
available so far. The good coastal preservation of constructional timbers means that old beams
could be reused in later structures. Conversely, modern wood could be used as replacement supports
in old systems. Therefore, radiocarbon dates obtained on timbers do not necessarily correspond to
the age of the structures in which such wood is used. Dendrochronological dating of timbers cannot
be done because trees growing on the coast would draw directly from the water table rather than
depend on rainfall and would therefore not show significant growth patterns. However, Ronald I.
Dorn has obtained radiocarbon dates from deposits on stones built into the ventilation shafts of
two puquios (Clarkson and Dorn 1991). These results, including the locations where samples were
taken, have not been formally published, but according to an abstract of a paper to be presented to
the Association of American Geographers, the corrected dates, considered to be minimum age
estimates, center on A.D. 552 and 658 (Dorn and Clarkson 1991). This dating technique can still
be considered experimental, and the possibility of reuse of materials must be considered. Spaniards
had begun to mine Nasca tombs before 1548 (Cieza de Leon 1553:Chapter 75, S.90v-91). Excavation
62 LATIN AMERICANANTIQUITY [Vol. 2, No. 1, 1991

remainsthe only reallyreliablearchaeologicalmethod for datingpuquios.If the fill over the trench
portions of the puquios contains no sherds later than the Early Intermediateperiod, it would be
good evidence that these portions were completed then. There is no indication in any of the work
accessibleto us that excavation has yet been done.
Did IberiansappropriatePrehispanicfiltration-gallerysystems?Can we accept at face value the
many Spanish claims that they constructedfiltration-gallerysystems in the Andes? Is it possible
that when they wroteabout openingundergroundcanals,layingdrains,and constructingventilation
shafts, they really meant that they were discoveringand repairingPrehispanicpuquio systems still
unidentifiedby archaeologistsand invisible to the earliestchroniclers?Couldthese irrigationsystems
have been abandonedand forgottenas a result of the Indian depopulationand political collapse,
to be rediscoveredby Spanishplantersmany years later?This seems unlikelyin view of the history
of the earliestyears of the colony.
The first epidemic of an Old World disease to ravage the Andes was probably the smallpox
outbreakof 1524-1526, with an estimated mortality rate of between 50 and 33 percent.The next
epidemic-smallpox or measles-hit between 1530 and 1532. Mortalitywas probablybetween 30
and 25 percent. In 1546 there was plague or typhus with a death rate of 20 percent likely (Cook
1981:70). If one accepts Cook's estimate of a combined central and south coast population of
4,495,020 in 1520, the Indianpopulationin 1550 wouldhave been between 1,260,000and 1,800,000,
or between28 and 40 percentof what it had been immediatelybeforethe Europeanentryinto South
America, assuming that, were it not for the epidemics, birth and death rates would have been in
balance. Cieza de Leon, Cristobalde Molina, el Almagrista,and other commentatorsrecognized
this for the demographicdisasterit was, but nevertheless,native populationswould have remained
more than sufficientto maintain the passive puquEo systems, had they existed.
Today, in the AzapaValley,50 men, workingvery occasionally,and withoutpowertools, maintain
and are extendingtheirpuquEos (A. Almonte Ku, personalcommunication 1989). Furthermore,by
1550 Spaniardshad taken control of all the coastal valleys and oases of southernPeru and northern
Chile, at first settlingin the Inca towns (Rowe 1956:137, 140-141, 148). The Spaniardsquickly
replantedthe valleys with highly productive Europeancrops, including grapes, citrus fruits, and
sugarcane. For these they needed reliable water free of mineral contaminants.Surviving Indians
quicklylearnedSpanishagriculturaltechniquesand became involved in European-styleagronomy,
not just as laborers,but as owners. In 1569 Don Garcia Nazca, the curacaprincipal of Nasca, a
lineal descendantof one of the foundersof the Spanishtown (GuamanPoma de Ayala 1987 [1615]:
1126 [1044, originalfoliation; 1052, refoliation];AGI, DerechoIndigena[1648], Legajo7, Cuaderno
146) willed the proceedsof his vineyard in that valley be used for the benefit of the Indians of his
parcialidadand threeotherparcialidadesofthe Nasca region(AGN, DerechoIndigena[1569-1571],
Cuaderno616, Fascicle 18). It stretches credibility to suppose that the Spaniards,with filtration
galleriesin theirhome country,failedto recognizethem on theirestates,althoughthey weresearching
for irrigationwaterand held lands in proximityto those being farmedby Indians,who would have
been familiarwith Prehispanicwater resources.
Before abandoningthe idea of the Prehispanicorigin of the Nasca filtrationgalleries, we must
explain why some criollo landownersof Nasca, from the late eighteenthcenturyonward,chose to
argue that they were built by the Incas or by their predecessors.Were they were maintaining a
genuine folk memory of the waterworks'origins?This is unlikely in view of the contexts in which
argumentsfor Prehispanicorigins firstemerge-disputes over water rightsbroughtbefore the Juez
de Aguas. Under colonial law, if naturalor artificialwaterflows had existed before the firstSpanish
settlement in a given area, those waters were to be shared among the people occupying the land
throughwhich the waterspassed.However,if a new watersource,such as a puquio, becameavailable
by the expense of a particularlandowner,then he and his heirs would have exclusive rightsto those
waters,just as they would have the only rightsto the fruitsof vines or olives they might plant. This
argumentis usedin the disputeover the SantoThomasde la Pampaand CailanpuquEos at Huambacho
in the Santa Valley system and in a legal wrangle over the Cuyo water outlet at Ate, near Lima
(AGN, Aguas 3.3.3.2., 3.3.9.9.). Waterhas always been scarceand preciousin Nasca. Landowners
who did not have access to irrigationsometimes found it worthwhileto challengetheir neighbors
Barnes and Fleming] FILTRATION-GALLERYIRRIGATION 63

to produce documents going back more than a hundredyears to prove exclusive rights to water.
Should these neighborsfail to do so, watercould be subjectto redistributionalong supposedlymore
ancient patterns.Thus, the earliest assertions of the prehistoricorigins of Peruvianpuquios come
long afterthe filtrationgallerieswere established,and arose not from a pure folk tradition,but from
tenuous claims advanced in Spanish courts by rival landowners.

CONCLUSION
Having presentedthe documentaryevidence for the widespreademploymentof filtrationgalleries
in western South America duringthe Spanish colonial period, we expect that more archaeological
surveyswill begin to recordthese remains.That it is perfectlypossible to fail to notice monuments
if one is not looking for them is demonstratedby Strong's 1952-1953 systematic survey of the
Nasca and Ica drainages.Apart from a passing citation of Uhle's ambiguousremarkson filtration
at Ocucaje, Strong does not comment upon the water resourcesof Nasca and Ica (Strong 1957).
Becausefiltrationgalleriesare highly visible from the air, systematic examination of aerial photo-
graphs,combined with new field surveys, might confirmthe locations of systems now known only
from documents, as well as lead to the discovery of presentlyunknown waterworks.

Acknowledgments. This paper employs materialsin the AGN (Peru), the New York Public Library,the
BritishLibrary,and the HarryRansom HumanitiesResearchCenterof the Universityof Texas. The firstauthor
was supportedby a Wenner-Grengrantin 1989.
In Chile we benefitedfrom the local knowledgeof J. Hidalgo, L. Briones, and G. Focacci (Universidadde
Tarapaca),and A. Almonte Ku (Coop. Juan Noe). We thank Dr. Hidalgofor sharingunpublishedmaterialand
for helpingto preparethis paper.We also thanksix anonymousreviewersfor assistingin makingour arguments
more cogent. T. F. Lynch, J. S. Henderson,and M. Thomas (CornellUniversity), D. Bushnell(University of
Florida),and P. Gelles(HarvardUniversity)also made valuablesuggestionson earlierdrafts.We arealso grateful
to our friendsOscar Weiss and Anita Barkerde Weiss for their hospitalityand supportin Lima.
Special thanks go to K. J. Schreiber(University of California-SantaBarbara),Persis Clarkson(Athabasca
University), and Ronald I. Dorn (Arizona State University) for critical comments on previous drafts and
especiallyfor grantingaccess to unpublishedmaterial.Our disagreementsdo not diminish our appreciationof
new work on this subject.
R. E. Daggett(University of Massachusetts-Amherst)provided us with referencesto Tello's work at Pacha-
camac.G. Urton (ColgateUniversity)pointedout the importanceof AGN DerechoIndigena,Legajo7, Cuaderno
146 (1648). A remote ancestorof this paperwas presentedin 1988 by the second authorat the 7th Northeast
Conferenceon Andean Archaeologyand Ethnohistory,Amherst, Massachusetts.New materialwas presented
in papersdeliveredat the 1990 conferenceat Binghamton.

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NOTES
' Rowe (1969:321)assertsthat the termpuquio"is used loosely in PeruvianSpanishfor any place wherewater
is available."Particularlyin the Viru Valley it can denote a "sunkengarden"(Farrington1974; Ford 1949:26;
Willey 1953:17, 394). However, by the beginningof the seventeenthcenturypuquEomeant "filtrationgallery"
and was used in this sense throughoutthe Andes in colonial documents. In the cases we cite it is clear from
context whether filtrationgalleries or natural springsare meant. Possible exceptions are the San Martin and
Charalinapuquios at Ica for which documentation is terse. The puquios marked in Feyjoo de Sosa's mid-
eighteenthcenturymaps of the North Coast (Feyjoo de Sosa 1763:insets)are probablynaturalsprings,though
the text does not make this clear.
68 LATINAMERICAN
ANTIQUITY lVol. 2, No. 1, 1991

2 Rossel Castro(1977:175-176, 193-194) mentions an unverifiedfind in the E1Pamponpuquio of "a mag-

nificentlydecoratedspouted vessel or cooking pot of classic Nasca type, or a gold vase like an idol of the god
of the waters,the sea otter." Assuming a genuine provenience,no thought is given to the possibility that the
Nasca vessel might representan heirloom offering.
3 Many nineteenth-century and earliersourcesare cited in this paper.The originalspellingof these references
has been retained.Capitalization,however, has in many cases been alteredto conformto style guidelinesused
by Latin American Antiquity.

Received August 6, 1990; accepted January 30, 1991