A compositional perspective on the origins of the “Nasca cult” at Cahuachi

We provide a compositional perspective on the origins of the Cahuachi cult in Nasca, south coast of Peru. Instrumental Neutron Activation Analysis of ceramics from the Formative site of La Puntilla demonstrate that a small group of pottery known as Nasca 1 blackwares are compositionally consistent with Early Nasca polychromes originating at Cahuachi. These data suggest that the patterns of pilgrimage and group ceremonies exhibited at Cahuachi during Early Nasca began at least in the proto-Nasca phase of Nasca 1 during the Formative. We use these data to further document the Paracas to Nasca transition, a complex and dynamic period in south coastal prehistory.     

Geographies of religion and spirituality: pilgrimage beyond the ‘officially’ sacred

Abstract

The papers in this special issue, Geographies of Religion and Spirituality: Pilgrimage beyond the ‘Officially Sacred,’ are placed in the context of a comprehensive theoretical overview of the role that the sacred plays in shaping, conducting, controlling, and contesting pilgrimage. As scholarship examining the lived experiences of travelers has demonstrated, pilgrimages need not necessarily be religious in nature, nor be officially sanctioned. Rather, if pilgrimages are perceived as ‘hyper-meaningful’ by the practitioner, the authors in this special issue argue that a common denominator of all of these journeys is the perception of sacredness—a quality that is opposed to profane, everyday life. Separating the social category of ‘religion’ from the ‘sacred,’ these articles employ an interdisciplinary approach to theorize sacredness, its variability, and the ways in which it is officially recognized or condemned. Thus, the authors pay particular attention to the authorizing processes that religious and temporal power centers employ to either promote, co-opt, or stave off, such popular manifestations of devotion, focusing on three ways: through tradition, text or institutionalized norms. Referencing examples from across the globe, and linking them to the varied contributions in this special issue, this introduction complexifies the ways in which pilgrims, central authorities, locals and other stakeholders on the ground appropriate, negotiate, shape, contest, or circumvent the powerful forces of the sacred. Delving ‘beyond the officially sacred,’ this collective examination of pilgrimages, both well-established and new; religious and secular; authorized and not; the contributions to this special issue, as well as this Introduction, examines the interplay of a transcendent sacred for pilgrims and tourists so as to provide a blueprint for how work in the geography of religion and the fields of pilgrimage and religious tourism may move forward.     

The Good of Wrath: Supernatural Punishment and the Evolution of Cooperation

Abstract

Human cooperation remains a puzzle because it persists even in contexts where traditional theories predict it should not do so (i.e. among unrelated strangers, who never meet again and where reputation effects are absent). The leading explanation argues that cooperation occurs only if non-cooperators are punished. However, punishment is costly, so ‘second-order’ non-cooperators may arise who defect from contributing to punishment, thus unravelling this solution. We propose an alternative: during our history, the fear of supernatural punishment (whether real or not) deterred defectors and may therefore represent an adaptive trait favoured by natural selection. Supernatural beliefs are universal among human societies, commonly connected to taboos for public goods, so it seems plausible that they serve an important function in fostering cooperation. This hypothesis offers an explanation for (a) geographic variation in religious practices as solutions to local cooperation problems; and (b) the power of political appeals to religion to elicit cooperation.     

In haec signa: Pilgrim-badge trade in southern France

Medieval shrines acquired their wealth from the pilgrims who worshipped in them. Though a large part of this wealth come in the form of outright donations, shrines received a considerable income from the sale of pilgrims' badges and other souvenirs. Originally an ecclesiastical monopoly, the sale of badges became a bone of contention in many pilgrimage centers between the shrine proper and the surrounding town. This phenomenon can be seen in the shrines of St James in Compostela, St Mary Magdalen in Saint-Maximin, and the Virgin Mary in Rocamadour and Le Puy. During the later middle ages the development of a whole souvenir industry for pilgrims reflected the change in the popular attitude towards pilgrimages. The pilgrimage ceased to be a purely religious undertaking of someone who had severed himself from secular society for the duration of the journey. It became a social event which combined piety with tourism.     

In haec signa: Pilgrim-badge trade in southern France

Medieval shrines acquired their wealth from the pilgrims who worshipped in them. Though a large part of this wealth come in the form of outright donations, shrines received a considerable income from the sale of pilgrims' badges and other souvenirs. Originally an ecclesiastical monopoly, the sale of badges became a bone of contention in many pilgrimage centers between the shrine proper and the surrounding town. This phenomenon can be seen in the shrines of St James in Compostela, St Mary Magdalen in Saint-Maximin, and the Virgin Mary in Rocamadour and Le Puy. During the later middle ages the development of a whole souvenir industry for pilgrims reflected the change in the popular attitude towards pilgrimages. The pilgrimage ceased to be a purely religious undertaking of someone who had severed himself from secular society for the duration of the journey. It became a social event which combined piety with tourism.     

On the origin and presentation of images of traveling Buddhist monks on pilgrimage for sutras with tame tigers in the Dunhuang Mogao Grottoes

Abstract

The creation of the “images of traveling Buddhist monks on pilgrimage for sutras with tame tigers” preserved in the Mogao Grottoes resulted from a syncretic cultural and religious development in the Tang and Song dynasties. It was not drawn on the events of the pilgrimage of Xuanzang 玄奘, as is generally believed in academic circles. The intrinsic principles contained within the images transcend their external features: the development of Esoteric Buddhism and the phenomenon of traveling monks in the periods and their fusion with Central Plains folk culture imbued the images with the influence of both exoteric and esoteric schools of Buddhism, together with folk beliefs; on the other hand, the creation of the “images of traveling Buddhist monks on pilgrimage for sutras with tame tigers” reflected “Ratnasambhava tathāgata beliefs,” which were prevalent in the Dunhuang region in the Tang and Song dynasties. Via metaphorical presentations of iconized monks, these images provided the expression of multiple religious beliefs.     

Ceramic production in ancient Nasca: provenance analysis of pottery from the Early Nasca and Tiza cultures through INAA

We report the results of an instrumental neutron activation analysis (INAA) undertaken on a regional sample of pottery from the Southern Nasca Region. The samples included specimens primarily from the Early Nasca (ca. A.D. 1–450) and Tiza (ca. A.D. 1000–1476) cultures from a total of 16 different prehispanic sites. The results of the analysis demonstrate centralized production of Early Nasca polychromes and decentralized production of pottery from the Tiza culture. The results of this analysis confirm previous conclusions about the organization of these two indigenous cultures of the south coast of Peru and support the hypothesis of an excess production of polychromes at the ceremonial center Cahuachi for Early Nasca, and multiple centers of production for the Tiza culture.     

Regional integration and the built environment in middle-range societies: Paracas and early Nasca houses and communities

We use the built environment of residential sites (house form and community layout) to investigate the effects of increasing regional integration at the level of the community in middle-range societies. We consider spatial data on house form, arrangement of residences within settlements, site location, and organization of non-residential spaces to reveal specific social phenomena linked with pan-regional political organization and ethnic identity formation, and evaluate how macro-scale processes affect micro-scale phenomena. Specifically, we argue that architecture reflects different community patterns of ritual, integration, and inequality. As a case study, we employ a diachronic perspective for two periods in Peruvian south coastal prehistory to assess the magnitude of changes implied by the genesis of Nasca society out of the preceding Paracas. Survey and excavation data from residential sites in the southern Nasca region indicate that important modifications in local community organization accompanied the regional, wide-ranging effects of Nasca society and its innovative form of regional integration. Comparison of the residential built environment from both periods suggests important changes in ritual and patterns of status acquisition and maintenance. In addition, house form indicates that a greater level of household autonomy accompanied increasing regional integration and a decrease in conflict.     

Wari’s imperial influence on local Nasca diet: The stable isotope evidence

The highland Wari Empire established a presence within the Nasca region of south coastal Peru during the Middle Horizon period. To clarify the nature of this interaction, we analyzed stable carbon and nitrogen isotope ratios of human bone collagen from individuals living in the Southern Nasca Region (SNR) before (1–750 AD) and during (750–1000 AD) imperial influence. The stable isotope data do not indicate that the Wari Empire transformed maize agricultural labor in the Las Trancas Valley of the SNR. In fact, during both time periods, Nasca people had access to a wide range of food items.     

Wanderers in the shadow of the sacred myth: pilgrims in the 21st century

Drawing on qualitative interviews with people journeying to Santiago de Compostela in Spain, this paper examines contemporary forms of pilgrimage. The journeys are found to encompass elements of both pilgrimage and tourism, blending the sacred and the profane. Contemporary pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela is shown to be an expression of new forms of spirituality, as well as reflecting the global increase in tourism, rather than as a revival of a traditional religious practice. At one level, the sacred meaning of Santiago de Compostela is thus shifting. A sense of the historical sacredness of the Way persists, however, and this is as an important backdrop for the understanding and experience of the contemporary pilgrim.     

The Sunday morning journey to church considered as a form of ‘micro-pilgrimage’

Using mixed methods data, the social significance and narrative of local journeys to church on a Sunday morning are examined and reframed as a form of pilgrimage. Pilgrimage studies over the last 30 years have criticized the concept proposed by Turner and Turner of pilgrimage as entirely opposite and peripheral to social structures and relation. Recent literature has reinterpreted Turner and Turner’s terminology of ‘liminality’ and ‘communitas’, developing these ideas to identify the continuities that remain between much of everyday life and contemporary pilgrimage. Furthermore, there has been a shift in focus, prompted by interest in mobilities, from pilgrimage centres to recognize the significance of the journey to such centres. This paper advances the discussion further to argue that local scale journeys to church should be considered as a form of micro-pilgrimage: local journeys to church services that can form part of a break from daily social structures to be used to prepare oneself for the act of worship or immersion in the social relations based in the church. The concept of micro-pilgrimages therefore recognizes that these journeys can, like longer pilgrimages, contain qualities of liminality and communitas that combine social and religious significance and meaning for the pilgrim.     

Recent Research on Chaco: Changing Views on Economy, Ritual, and Society

Current research on Chaco Canyon and its surrounding outlier communities is at an important juncture. Rather than trying to argue for the presence or absence of complexity, archaeologists working in the area are asking different questions, especially how Chacoan political, economic, ritual, and social organization were structured. These lines of inquiry do not attempt to pigeonhole Chaco into traditional neoevolutionary types, but instead seek to understand the historical trajectory that led to the construction of monumental architecture in Chaco Canyon and a large part of the northern Southwest in the 10th through 12th centuries. This review discusses the conclusions of current research at Chaco including definitions of the Chaco region, recent fieldwork, histories of Chaco archaeology, chronology, paleoenvironmental reconstruction, demography, political organization, outlier communities, economic organization, social organization, ritual, violence, and the post-Chacoan reorganization. Although many issues are hotly debated, there is a growing concensus that power was not based in a centralized political organization and that ritual organization was a key factor in the replication of Chacoan architecture across a vast regional landscape. Exactly how ritual, social, and political organization intersected is a central question for Chaco scholars. The resolution of this problem will prove to be of interest to all archaeologists working with intermediate societies across the globe.     

‘The Bond of Civility’: Roger Williams on toleration and its limits

In this article, I examine the meaning of the concept of ‘civility’ for Roger Williams and the role it played in his arguments for religious toleration. I place his concern with civility in the broader context of his life and works and show how it differed from the missionary and civilizing efforts of his fellow New English among the American Indians. For Williams, civility represented a standard of inclusion in the civil community that was ‘essentially distinct’ from Christianity, which properly governed membership in the spiritual community of the church. In contrast to recent scholarship that finds in Williams a robust vision of mutual respect and recognition between co-citizens, I argue that civility constituted rather a very low bar of respectful behavior towards others entirely compatible with a lack of respect, disapproval, and even disgust for them and their beliefs. I show further that civility for Williams was consistent with—and partially secured by—a continued commitment on the part of godly citizens to the potential conversion of their neighbors. Williams endorsed this ‘mere’ civility as a necessary and sufficient condition for toleration while also delineating a potentially expansive role for the magistrate in regulating incivility. Contemporary readers of William who conflate civility with other good things, such as mutual respect, recognition, and civic friendship, slide into a position much like that he was trying to refute.     

The Moorehead Phase Occupation at the Emerald Acropolis

The Emerald site, also known as the Emerald Acropolis, was an early Mississippian pilgrimage center key to Cahokia’s development. This paper presents the hitherto unpublished results of two archaeological projects conducted at the site, one led by Howard Winters and Stuart Struever in 1961 and the other by Robert Hall in 1964. These investigations produced the most comprehensive information on Emerald’s Moorehead phase (1200–1300 CE) occupation, during which two of its mounds were capped, a secondary mound was constructed on the central mound, and a mound-top structure was erected on this secondary mound. Similar activities took place throughout the region during the thirteenth century, a time marked by dramatic social, political, and religious change in Greater Cahokia. Based on these data, we argue that people returned to Emerald to memorialize or draw on the powers inherent there and thus reincorporate this place into the newly imagined thirteenth century Cahokian world.     

Agriculture and community in Chaco Canyon: Revisiting Pueblo Alto

The Bonito Phase (ca. AD 860–1140) in Chaco Canyon is widely recognized as one of the primary sources of information about emergent social complexity in prehispanic North America. Large masonry buildings called “great houses,” such as Pueblo Bonito, are iconic symbols of the rapid rise of a powerful society based on the ability to harness labor to prolonged construction projects. It is clear that the political forces at work during the Bonito Phase had an agricultural foundation, presumably in the financing of construction through food surpluses, but the actual nature of farming in Chaco is surprisingly opaque to archaeologists. Indeed, many researchers have concluded that farming in Chaco Canyon was too constrained by poor soils to have supported the dynamic developments associated with the massive stone structures and extensive trade systems of the Bonito Phase. The popular perspective that Chaco was mysterious or enigmatic is largely a response to this view of the canyon as agriculturally marginal. In this study we argue that a predictive model of potential agricultural productivity that includes other portions of the canyon besides the floodplain indicates that Chaco was not marginal for farming. The results of this analysis suggest that great house communities may have been sited to control local production zones and that some great houses may have been linked to others in order to manage multiple agricultural areas.     

Pilgrim routes as contested spaces in Norway

Abstract

Many of today’s pilgrim routes are not only conceived of as religious thoroughfares. They are also seen as historical and cultural routes and are embraced by heritage polices and the tourism industry. It follows from this that contemporary pilgrim routes are endowed with many meanings and expectations, both in the public and private spheres. While much research has focused its attention on the diversity of motives, experiences and symbolic meaning processes among those who embark on journeys along pilgrim routes, less attention has been paid to the varieties of stakeholders involved. By exploring how different types of stakeholders engage with a recently reinvented pilgrim route in Norway, it is shown how this route represents a contested space. Among various stakeholders involved in the development and the management of the pilgrimage, as well as stakeholders who take an interest in the material and symbolic benefits one could possibly draw from it, there are disagreements on what kind of heritage pilgrimage should represent. The differing approaches are basically represented by those who want to promote religious motivations, traditionalist outdoor recreation interests and stakeholders who primarily want to develop and market the pilgrim route in a touristic context. While distinctions between categories such as pilgrims and tourists, or vacationers and religious travellers, are becoming more and more blurred, opposing and partly intersecting discourses among stakeholders tend in this case to result in the upholding of these kinds of distinctions. This implies that travellers along pilgrim route are not left to themselves with their experiences and practices. While some stakeholders take an interest in what pilgrims are doing, in the sense that they want to profit from it, others are concerned about questions of whom a pilgrim is and for whom a pilgrim route is for.     

GEOGRAPHIC EXPRESSION OF BUDDHIST PILGRIM PLACES ON SHIKOKU ISLAND,JAPAN*

A variety of places, functioning diversely in human existence, manifest a certain distinctiveness. The distinctiveness is nowhere as explicit and as clearly expressed, perhaps, as it is in “religious places.’ Of these places, holy places of pilgrimage have been of particular attraction to geographers.¹ There is wide variation in the nature of pilgrimage as defined within the canonical structure of each religion; yet it would seem that all pilgrimages are fundamentally place-bound institutions having specific physical locations. A pilgrimage incorporates certain practices, and requires a specific setting, thus giving rise to distinct geographic and behavioural forms.     

Exploring Geographic Origins at Cahuachi using Stable Isotopic Analysis of Archaeological Human Tissues and Modern Environmental Waters

In this study, we used oxygen‐ and hydrogen‐isotope data from human bone (δ¹⁸O) and modern environmental water samples (δ¹⁸O and δD) to investigate geographic origins of individuals buried at Cahuachi, a ceremonial centre in the Nasca region of Peru (c.AD1‐1000). Our objective was to characterise the natural variation in water stable isotopic composition in the Rio Grande de Nasca drainage, and then to use these data to better infer place of origin for 30 adults interred at Cahuachi. Using the δ¹⁸O and δD values of 63 modern environmental water samples, it was possible to differentiate among the northern and southern river middle valleys, and to infer the isotopic composition of drinking water at higher elevations. Over half of the individuals included in this study had drinking water oxygen‐isotope compositions consistent with places of origin away from Cahuachi during the last 10 to 25 years of life, perhaps in the northern river middle valleys or in the upper valleys/sierra. The environmental water stable isotopic baseline developed in this study enabled a better understanding of the natural variation of waters in the Rio Grande de Nasca drainage. As a result, it was possible to assess the geographic range of place of origin for these individuals with greater certainty. Taken together, these data support the idea of Cahuachi as a place of both local and regional significance, with individuals from distant parts of the Rio Grande de Nasca drainage travelling to and/or transporting the dead to the site for death or burial. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The geographic origins of Nasca trophy heads using strontium,oxygen, and carbon isotope data

Scholars continue to debate the identity of individuals curated as trophy heads in the Nazca Drainage of southern Peru (c. 1–800 AD). What was the role of trophy heads in Nasca society? Were they victims of warfare or venerated ancestors? Strontium, oxygen, and carbon isotope data from archaeological human tooth enamel from Nasca trophy heads from Aja, Cahuachi, Cantayo, Majoro Chico and Paredones, and from individuals buried in Nasca cemeteries at Cahuachi, Cantayo, and Majoro Chico elucidate the geographic origins and paleodiet of trophy heads in the Nazca Drainage. The ⁸⁷Sr/⁸⁶Sr and δ¹⁸O_c(V-PDB) data from both the trophy heads and the Nazca Drainage burials are all quite variable, and do not support the hypothesis that the Nasca trophy heads were obtained from a geographically-distinct population. Similarly, the δ¹³C_c(V-PDB) data demonstrates that the individuals included in this study consumed similar diets. These data suggest that the Nasca trophy heads likely derive from the local Nasca population. Rather than obtain heads from enemy warriors through geographic expansion or warfare as seen in other parts of the world, this complex social practice existed within the Nasca polity throughout space and time.     

Recent Developments in the Academic Study of the Cult of the Virgin Mary

Marian veneration is a vital dimension in Catholic and Orthodox Christianity, growing in significance from its origins in the early Christian centuries. This development has been particularly important in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries; the era termed the "Age of Mary." The four books reviewed in this paper approach the subject of Marian veneration and pilgrimage to Marian shrines from a variety of perspectives. Significant themes covered include the evidence for Marian apparitions, traditional religious pilgrimage, and the changes the Internet has brought to pilgrimage and Marian devotion. Stafford Poole, CM's The Guadalupan Controversies in Mexico (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2006), Robert Maniura's Pilgrimage to Images in the Fifteenth Century: The Origins of the Cult of Our Lady of Czestochowa (Woodbridge: Boyell Press, 2004), and Paolo Apolito's The Internet and the Madonna: Religious Visionary Experience on the Web (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005) all treat specific sites of Marian pilgrimage and are reviewed at length. In contrast, Swanson's edited volume, The Church and Mary: Papers Read at the 2001 Summer Meeting and the 2002 Winter Meeting of the Ecclesiastical History Society (Woodbridge: Boydell Press, 2004), contains a large number of papers on a range of issues relating to the cult of Mary including music, relics, visions, and the spread of Marian veneration. A selection of these papers is referred to throughout this essay, where relevant.