South American mummies: culture and disease

Abstract

BLACK AND RED CHINCHORRO MUMMIES OF PERU AND CHILE Many scholars have emphasized that the preceramic Chinchorro fishers of southern Peru and northern Chile had the oldest system of artificial mummification in the world (Bittmann and Munizaga 1976; Allison et al. 1984; Arriaza 1995a). Although this is interesting, the anthropological significance of the Chinchorro society and its mummies has greater relevance. The Chinchorros lived year round along the Atacama coast. They were not nomadic or semi-nomadic bands as was previously suggested by various scholars (Nunez 1969; Bittmann 1982; Rivera 1991). The debate over early Chinchorro sedentism is significant because an evolutionary model is often evoked for preceramic societies. They have been seen as highly mobile groups in constant search of food, following the groups of animals they hunted. In contrast, sedentism allowed a population to increase its birth rates, life expectancy, and population density. Higher population density normally increased socioeconomic and political competition, and craft specialization became a necessity. On the negative side, sedentism and high population density might contribute to environmental contamination and epidemics. The Chinchorro archaeological evidence also was interpreted using this preceramic model. Mostny (1944) even suggested that the Chinchorros transported the mummies when they moved along the coast, but the presence of cemeteries, the high energy input of artificial mummification, external auditory exostoses (lesions associated with chronic auditory canal irritations due to continuous underwater shellfishingand fishing) and specialized maritime tool kits all point to sedentism.

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