Jacob Taubes: Looking into the Beauty of the Night (original) (raw)
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The Cupisnique-Chavín Religious Tradition in the Andes
Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Anthropology , 2023
Between 1400 and 500 BCE, communities of the central Andes gradually adopted a visual culture dominated by images of predation in nature. Fangs became pervasive in images and were incorporated into beings that naturally lacked them, such as humans and birds. Composite beings, articulating parts of different predators, became popular, being depicted in multiple media. This shared visual culture resulted from the expansion, adoption, and local adaptation of the Cupisnique-Chavín religious tradition, one of the earliest and most clear cases of religious integration in the Andes. The results of archaeological research in the 20th and 21st centuries have provided abundant information to approximate the ritual practices associated with this religious tradition. In the ceremonial centers—designed to accommodate large audiences—friezes and sculptures depict nonhuman beings with attributes of predators. During ceremonies, people feasted, played music, shared knowledge and experiences, and interacted with these images of supernatural characteristics. The middens surrounding these temples are filled with the remains of these activities, such as broken ceramics, food remains, ritual paraphernalia, and even friezes—discarded during work feasts dedicated to architectural renovation. Traditionally, these images depicted in sculptures and friezes have been considered representations of a pantheon of divinities. These interpretations were based on theoretical assumptions about the relationship between sacred and profane, nature and culture, human and nonhuman, and personhood. In theoretical frameworks that reevaluate the ontology of Indigenous people of the Ancient Americas—such as adaptations of Viveiros de Castro’s multinatural perspectivism and theory on Andean huacas—these stone sculptures, buildings, and landscape features can be considered powerful nonhuman persons and important members of the communities. These ancient Andean beings must have acquired power from their relationship with the community and local landscapes. This sets them apart from the view of omnipresent divinities in modern world religions. In a world where one’s knowledge is acquired through experiencing the world, a way to acquire new knowledge may have involved seeing the world through the eyes of other beings. In the Cupisnique-Chavín world, the most powerful and wise of these nonhuman entities may have been those stone beings with multispecies abilities housed in the temples. The institution of pilgrimage may have emerged because of the need to acquire new knowledge from these extraordinary beings believed to dwell throughout the central Andes. While scholarly research is thriving in the first decades of the 21st century, there are obstacles in the way of sharing these results with the nonscholarly public. Involuntarily, the reconstruction of the ceremonial temples has created solemn and sterile images of these ancient ceremonial temples, very far from the archaeological description of the findings in these places. This creates a continuing gap between what is known about these Cupisnique-Chavín ritual practices—and the role of the nonhuman in them—and the perception of the public as to this tradition.
Anthropology and Humanism, 2018
This remarkable book comes at an opportune time when many anthropologists have been reflecting upon what has become known generally as "the ontological turn." Frank Salomon has immersed himself in the lifeways of Andean highland peoples over the course of his distinguished career. Reflecting on what I had learned from his latest oeuvre, I realized that despite the intentions of anthropologists to avoid the pitfalls of distorted continuity, there was, indeed, a welcome continuity to the theoretical framework that Salomon has deployed in making sense over time of Andean conceptualizations of their world. This continuity is found in his exploration of indigenous chroniclers and the struggles they faced in communicating the dynamics of the revolutionary upheaval of spatial and temporal anchors and orientations (in Quechua, pachakuti) ushered in by the Spanish invasion; his translation and exhaustive annotation of The Men and Gods of Huarochirí; and his challenge to us to recognize that the world of letters was far from alien for Quechua-speaking dwellers from the early days of colonial rule-interfacing in distinctive ways with khipus (knotted cords) and other modes of record keeping and mnemonic devices. Salomon has always been attuned to disjunctures and intersections as they unfold through both practice and cognition among Quechua-speaking peoples. Now there is this work, in which he tackles the history, meanings, and uses of two buildings in Rapaz, a central Andean highland village. One is a wind shrine called Kaha Wayi, which houses a hanging rack of khipus as well as a ceremonial table where sacrifices were performed to control the weather. The other, Pasa Qulqa, was used for fertility ceremonials for crops and livestock, and stored the community harvest on its upper levels, while miraculous animals and waterfowl occupied the lower level where there once was a lake. Over eight years, Salomon immersed himself in the lives of Rapacinos, learning about their history and daily lives, and, especially, their relationship to these sites that were desperately in need of conservation. His findings constitute a fascinating ethnography, providing us with fresh ways of understanding how the
Toward an Archaeology of Ritual Practice in southern Central America (2018, Paris)
Archaeology studies past practices through fields of action. In Mesoamerica, such fields exist across different scales of analysis, and for example lead research to identify individual or family routines in domestic and workshop settings. At the opposite end of this are large-scale periodic communal practices, often referred to as political or ritual. In these latter fields, insights into longue durée transformation are prone to be foregrounded at the expense of insights into human actions and its transmission within a group. The settings for such rituals are invariably referred to as 'public', 'ceremonial' or 'communal', depending on the archaeological region of period in question. Ritual practices in indigenous societies in Central America are mostly explained by viewing ritual in systematic terms, echoing Sahlins and Geertz. Chiefly authority is seen to be combined with that of ritual practitioner, rendering ritual itself seemingly a-historical and closely linking it to questions of political power. Ritual activity, and its pertaining material culture, is thus proposed as an irreducible functionalist fact, typically regarded for divination, communication with supernatural realms, and symbolic violence. Here, I will argue for a historical view on ritual in the prehistories we assemble and study, focusing attention on the question of ritual landscapes in southern Central America-a region with ample indicators for ritualized activity, but archaeologically challenged by a material culture with an abstract visual language, and a historical record lacking in individual events, except perhaps for volcanic eruptions. Spanish: La arqueología estudia prácticas pasadas a través de campos de acción. En Mesoamérica, tales campos existen en diferentes escalas de análisis, y por ejemplo apoyan a identificar rutinas individuales o familiares en entornos domésticos y en talleres. En el extremo opuesto, se encuentran las prácticas comunitarias periódicas a gran escala, a menudo denominadas 'políticas' o 'rituales'. En los últimos campos, los conocimientos sobre la transformación longue durée son propensos a ser enfocados a expensas de la comprensión de las acciones humanas y su transmisión dentro de un grupo. Los espacios para tales rituales se denominan invariablemente como 'públicos', 'ceremoniales' o 'comunales', dependiendo de la región o período arqueológico en cuestión. Las prácticas rituales en las sociedades indígenas en el sur de Centroamérica se explican mayormente viendo a rituales en términos sistémicos, haciéndose eco de Sahlins y Geertz. La autoridad principal se considera combinado con la del especialista ritual, convirtiendo el ritual en algo aparentemente a-histórico y vinculándolo estrechamente a cuestiones de poder político. La actividad ritual, y su cultura material pertinente, se propone, así como un hecho funcionalista irreductible, típicamente destinado a la adivinación, la comunicación con los ámbitos sobrenaturales y la violencia simbólica. Aquí, propondré una visión histórica en las prehistorias que reunimos y estudiamos, enfocado en los paisajes rituales del sur de Centroamérica-una región rica en referencias a actividad ritual, pero desafiada arqueológicamente por cultura material con lenguaje visual abstracto, y un registro histórico que carece de eventos individuales, a excepción quizás de las erupciones volcánicas. 2
The PARI Journal, vol. XX, núm. 4, 2020
In 1989 Nikolai Grube, Stephen D. Houston, and David S. Stuart deciphered the T539 grapheme of Maya hieroglyphic writing as WAY, which is the morphemic root of 'dream' and 'dream'. Although this sign appears relatively frequently in the inscriptions, the most common support where it was represented are the ceramic vessels, places where it refers to some fantastic beings represented in the iconography. Since then it was quite common among epigraphers and among Mayanists in general to consider that these wahy beings were co-essences of the human soul, similar to the tonas of other Mesoamerican cultures (tonalism). This situation changed radically in 2005 when Stuart reformulated our way of interpreting wahy beings, noting that they do not correspond to the concept of co-essence or tone, but to that of nagual in its meaning of an entity that adopts zoomorphic characteristics to personify diseases sent by the Maya rulers through witchcraft or sorcery. Other characteristics of wahy beings, such as the evasion of the president's own name when he is the owner or user of one of them, as well as the discovery by Marc U. Zender (2004) in the sense that wahy is an inalienable part of body whose usual state is to be accompanied by possessive pronouns, led to the interpretation of wahy or wahyis beings manifested in this essay. This is in general agreement with the basic idea of Stuart (2005) and defended with more arguments by several colleagues (eg Helmke and Nielsen, 2008; Sheseña Hernández, 2010; Moreno Zaragoza, 2011; 2020), despite having received some fair criticism (Garza Camino, 2012) that are also mentioned in this work. On the other hand, I echo an idea suggested by Sebastián Matteo and Asier Rodríguez Manjavacas (2009) in the sense that some scenes of dance and ritual personification are public manifestations of this complex of beliefs. I accept these last ideas, but I enrich them by taking up and resignifying a couple of concepts coined years ago by Afredo López Austin (1980): esoteric nagualism and exoteric nagualism. En 1989 Nikolai Grube, Stephen D. Houston y David S. Stuart descifraron el grafema T539 de la escritura jeroglífica maya como WAY, que es la raíz morfémica de ‘soñar’ y ‘sueño’. Aunque este signo aparece con relativa frecuencia en las inscripciones, el soporte más habitual donde se representaba son las vasijas de cerámica, lugares donde hace referencia a unos seres fantásticos representados en la iconografía. Desde entonces fue bastante común entre los epigrafistas y entre los mayistas en general considerar que dichos seres wahy eran coesencias del alma humana, semejantes a las tonas de otras culturas mesoamericanas (tonalismo). Esta situación cambió radicalmente en 2005 cuando Stuart reformuló nuestra forma de interpretar los seres wahy, al observar que no corresponden al concepto de coesencia o tona, sino a la de nagual en su acepción de una entidad que adopta características zoomorfas para personificar enfermedades enviadas por los gobernantes mayas a través de brujería o hechicería. Otras características de los seres wahy, como por ejemplo la evasión del nombre propio del mandatario cuando es poseedor o usuario de uno de ellos, así como el descubrimiento de Marc U. Zender (2004) en el sentido de que wahy es una parte inalienable del cuerpo cuyo estado habitual es estar acompañada por pronombres posesivos, condujeron a la interpretación de los seres wahy o wahyis manifestada en este ensayo. Esta va en consonancia general con la idea básica de Stuart (2005) y defendida con más argumentos por varios colegas (v.g. Helmke y Nielsen, 2008; Sheseña Hernández, 2010; Moreno Zaragoza, 2011; 2020), a pesar de haber recibido algunas críticas justas (Garza Camino, 2012) que también se mencionan en este trabajo. Por otra parte, hago eco de una idea sugerida por Sebastián Matteo y Asier Rodríguez Manjavacas (2009) en el sentido de que algunas escenas de danza y personificación ritual son manifestaciones públicas de este complejo de creencias. Acepto estas últimas ideas, pero las enriquezco al retomar y resignificar un par de conceptos acuñados hace años por Afredo López Austin (1980): el nagualismo esotérico y el nagualismo exotérico.
2019
The Moche culture thrived in the north coast of Peru between the second and ninth centuries AD. While still a point of debate, many consider the Moche one of the first state-level societies in the pre-Columbian Americas. One fascinating aspect of this society is the elaborate burials, with sumptuous displays of wealth. Traditionally, scholars have envisioned Moche death as an inherent and static manifestation of hierarchy, status, and power. My dissertation moves away from such object-centered approaches, studying death and its effects as a historically and culturally situated phenomenon. My dissertation draws on extensive archaeological excavations conducted in Huaca La Capilla, a monumental adobe structure located within the Late Moche elite cemetery of San José de Moro, Jequetepeque Valley. Based on the striking similarities between the architectural enclosures discovered in this huaca and those represented in the Moche "Burial Theme," I suggest that Huaca La Capilla was one of the loci where Moche funerary performances systematically occurred. These performances constituted large public spectacles orchestrated around the physical transformation of the corpses of elite individuals and their preparation for their symbolic journey into the afterlife: a process of transformation from a human to a divine entity, of becoming ancestors. Integrating multidisciplinary methods of analysis, my dissertation presents a comprehensive study of Huaca La Capilla, its architectural layout, and its many (and still enigmatic) transformations. I examine the role of Huaca La Capilla within the dynamic deathscape of San José de Moro, providing new insights on the relationship of huacas with death, the regeneration of life, and the cosmological order in the Moche world. In the context of political balkanization that characterized the Jequetepeque Valley during Late Moche times, I argue that the participation in these ritual spectacles was a key means for the creation of political and religious subjectivities. Ultimately, this case study offers novel anthropological perspectives on how the dramatic nature of the rituals orchestrated around the burial of elite individuals (the-body-as-spectacle, sensu Foucault 1977) constituted a means through which pre-modern states were held and constantly reproduced. v ACKNOWLEDGMENT This dissertation would never have been possible were it not for the support and encouragement of a great number of institutions and individuals. My excavations in Huaca La Capilla-San José de Moro were carried out within the frame of the San José de Moro Archaeological Program, which I had the opportunity to direct from 2013 to 2016. My excavations were funded by the has been not only an extraordinary advisor but also a true father and friend during my years at Stanford. My research incredibly benefited from his thoughtful advice, inquisitive perspectives on the data, and hard-science-oriented approach. I owe John many abilities I developed during grad school. My recent fascination with dating techniques and Bayesian statistics is due vi to the influence of his remarkable contributions to Andean chronology. John always pushed me to go further and taught me to "think critically." What else can a student ask for from an advisor? I am extremely grateful to him and Rosa Rick for having always made me feel at home. I will never forget the endearing fiestas peruanas, with their respective huaynitos, celebrated at the always-welcoming Rick´s house. Lynn Meskell has been for me a constant source of inspiration and motivation throughout grad school. Lynn has always been there for me, and I am incredibly thankful to her for her continuous support. My admiration for her work is profound and my own research has been greatly influenced by her ideas and publications. Lynn´s work is a proof of how multifaceted and sophisticated archaeology can be! Lynn also introduced me to the fascinating world of heritage ethics. And although my dissertation mainly focuses on my excavations in Huaca La Capilla, I also carried out, under Lynn´s guidance, ethnographic research in different heritage communities in northern Peru. This work is the material for some of my recent publication. I will always remember the adventurous 2014 trip to Peru along with her and the great IPINCH people! Ian Hodder has been, and is, a true example to follow for any archaeologist. I feel incredibly fortunate to have had someone such as Ian on my dissertation committee. Ian´s theory classes at Stanford were truly eye-opening for me. Ian´s advices critically gave shape to my research as well as my long-term theoretical interest. I am very thankful to Ian for all his guidance during these years and for having dedicated time within his busy agenda to reading my proposals and developing with me such a memorable reading class about performance in 2015.
This study falls into the category of Cultural Astronomy or Astronomy in Culture. It is focused on the research carried out by the American anthropologist Frank G. Speck in the 1930s and 1940s on the cosmology of the Algonquian people. His works highlight their rich and multifaceted view of the sky, associated animist beliefs and ritual practices, all of which were summarized in Speck’s remarkable, yet little known investigation called The Celestial Bear Comes Down to Earth: The Bear Ceremony of the Munsee-Mahican in Canada as Related by Nekatcit (1945). I must confess that my own interest in his research was motivated by my earlier work on the remnants of bear ceremonialism which have survived in Europe. These survivals are exteriorized each year in a vast variety of performances, classed primarily as folklore, although in more recent years as a combination of tangible and intangible heritage. When studied more carefully, the performances, rather than standing alone, form part of a complex meshwork of beliefs centered on bears, including the earlier belief that these animals possessed healing powers as well as the conviction that humans descended from bears, a belief retained by the Basque people of Western Europe but also implicit in other aspects of the European material. But before continuing I want to let the readers of these words know that I am aware that most of you probably have never heard of this thing called bear ceremonialism and have never pondered the question of why humans came up with a belief system in which bears were so venerated. And even if you are familiar with some of the strange furry costumes worn by European performers still today, it probably never occurred to you to relate them to what has been extensively documented for Native people across much of North America and northern Eurasia. As you will soon see, ritual performances in which the bear plays a key role, such as those exhaustively documented by Speck in the case of the two Lenape dialect groups, the Munsee-Mahican and the Unami, were focused on expressing respect for the animal and ritually fusing the landscape and skyscape together. Moreover, the admiration for the animal was intricately interwoven into an animist relational ontology where the notion of reciprocity was fundamental and the Celestial Bear, incarnate in the Dipper stars, played a key role. In short, the fact that remnants of bear ceremonialism are well documented in the case of Europe makes it even more important that we examine with great care the Algonquian sources for they could shed light on the kind of performances that in the past may have characterized those that were taking place in Europe. More importantly, the celestial coding found in these Native American materials is totally unique in the way that it incorporates the ursine genealogy, conceptually blending together two spaces, sky and earth. Therefore, it may provide a means of recuperating this aspect of the ,European performances. At the same time, it is quite possible that certain aspects of these European survivals might help fill in gaps left in our understanding of the Algonquian materials, as will be shown in what follows. In short, this means that the Native American beliefs and ritual practices may well serve to illuminate residual elements of bear ceremonialism still found across much of Europe today. The cross-cultural approach utilized in this study provides a means of retrieving earlier and deeper meanings associated with these European materials, at least hypothetically, by comparing them to the social practices and beliefs that characterized the Algonquian worldview in times past. Plus, these elements, documented in the ethnographic and ethnohistoric record of the past two hundred years, form part of a rich legacy that has been explored in depth by Speck and others. Thus, in what follows you will see that there is a kind of feed-back loop operating when the two sets of cultural conceptualizations and ritual practices are compared. And in this respect, there is no question that the Algonquian skylore provides a template whose value until now has not been sufficiently studied or appreciated.