3.2.1. Household-level caravans

Adaptationalist explanations for the origins and significance of long distance caravan networks are unsatisfactory, yet the more explicit aggrandizer models for the rise of elite-administered caravans that are documented ethnohistorically, refer to a regional-scale phenomenon that occurred relatively late in the prehispanic past (Stanish 1992: 14;Stanish 2003: 69). As was discussed above, the evidence suggests that household level organization of long distance caravans should be considered as a possible hypothesis for the long distance circulation of goods prior to the Middle or Late Formative when archaeological evidence for ranked society appeared in the Titicaca Basin.

In terms of the two configurations described above as subsistence exchangeand the single-source diffusivegoods (Figure 3-4X), the capacity and incentive for long distance caravan activity appear to be much older than the evidence for elite administration. In other words, on a geographical level and in terms of archaeological distributions one should consider that long distance caravan exchange was possibly organized on the household level thousands of years before elites were clearly organizing labor for the construction of monuments and the hosting of feasts.

What were the contexts in which individuals and households to began to organize long distance caravans in prehistory? Many of the "diffusive" goods with radiating distributions were not required for subsistence, strictly speaking. While small quantities of salt are biologically necessary for humans, salt is available in low densities in many parts of the altiplano and hunters and pastoralists can actually acquire salt from the consumption of meat and blood. In terms of the need for obsidian, it is evident that obsidian has flaking characteristics not available in other stone materials, but high quality cherts are available in many regions where the archaeological evidence shows that obsidian was imported from relatively large distances. Semi-precious stones like lapis lazuli are found in archaeological contexts such as burials after 3300 BCE in the south-central Andes. A variety of perishable goods probably circulated along such exchange networks as well, and as wild plants and agricultural products from particular regions are renowned to this day, such as hot peppers, sweet corn, herbs, and potent coca leaf, there was likely to have been variability in products available from particular valleys over others (especially during the earlier stages of plant domestication). If these products were transferred by caravans, perhaps in dried form, they would have radiated along distributions that were closer to diffusive sources like obsidian.

At risk of creating a rigid dichotomy, these items that were relatively common-place in some regions may have been closer to "prestige goods" because they were transported substantial distances. Following agency models for early leadership, those who mobilized resources to acquire such goods may have been striving to differentiate themselves from their communities and their neighbors. However, it is important to note that many of these goods, such as obsidian, do not appear to have been used exclusively by a small, restricted segment of the population in the archaeological contexts where they are found. Nevertheless these goods were widely transported and the mere presence of these goods indicates that some effort was expended to acquire the product (and, according to Hayden (1998: 44), these are automatically a form of prestige technology). In terms of the importance of "ordinary goods" (Smith 1999, see section 2.2.2), such products may have had important cultural and ethnic associations that lent value to the acquisition of these goods and prestige to those who could acquire them while simultaneously having widespread availability in a community. Archaeologists often define "prestige goods" based on spatially-delimited contexts that imply restricted or elite contexts of consumption, and this sometimes leads to claims that these alleged prestige goods were the impetus for long distance exchange. Rather than inferring that prestige goods defined the exchange networks and then "everyday goods" followed suit, Smith (1999) notes that the cultural information and these non-local yet widely-consumed materials like obsidian are perhaps better considered as "cultural goods", linked to ethnicity signaling and practice among herders (Nielsen 2000: 521-526), and complemented by other markers of ethnicity the most visible of which were probably textiles. As regional links became established, obsidian may have become a means for demonstrating participation and cultural affiliation with the subsistence level networks that exchanged goods including obsidian. Even if archaeologists are not able to detect exclusivity in the access to such goods in intra-site spatial distributions, as the materials were widely consumed in the community, it seems probable that the ability to acquire these goods reflected positively on the individual or household capable of procuring non-local products.

3.2.2. Incentives for early caravan formation

Down-the-line exchange can account for many archaeological distributions of cultural goods such as obsidian, both in volume and in temporal persistence. In terms of efficiency, down-the-line reciprocity networks require lower travel distance and less risk than is incurred traveling through unfamiliar territory (Renfrew 1975: 44). Furthermore, as Nielsen (2000: 24, 514) notes, caravan driving is hard work and it only becomes worthwhile when distances are large and/or loads are heavy or bulky. These bulky items tend to be transported medium distances (40-120 km), but smaller and more valued items might be transported long distances (Nielsen 2000). Traveling peddlers also carry small and light items without the added responsibility of managing many camelids in a caravan, therefore in some ways caravans and peddlers are complementary alternatives for the independent circulation of goods. Nielsen further observes that ancient caravans probably carried a variety of products in their cargo to reduce risk, and they likely carried anythingthat was worth transporting and that could be traded within their social and cultural parameters.

Given the evidence for increased sedentism from the Terminal Archaic and onwards (Aldenderfer 1998;Craig 2005), down-the-line exchange may be considered as the null hypothesis, with direct procurement and household level trade caravans as alternative hypotheses. Consistent but low levels of down-the-line exchange embedded in social relations form the background against which to examine other exchange modes such as caravans and possible non-market mercantilism. What kinds of possible incentives existed for the development of household-level caravans in order to acquire such goods, given the wide variety of potential trade and consumption patterns in prehistory? Incentives for household level caravan organization may include

(1) The maintenance of a social network and a demonstration of extra-local alliances that exceed the level of basic regional interaction implicated in subsistence-related exchange.

(2) Demand for a greater quantity of types, and the number or sizes of products than can be acquired from down the line exchange.

(3) A need or desire to exceed the products available to one's neighbors or to avoid dependency on an entire reciprocity network of neighborly relations.

(4) In a biological adaptationist framework, the risk and potential of caravan driving was a form of costly signaling (Aldenderfer 2006;Craig and Aldenderfer In Press).

Secure evidence of caravan activity, beyond simple evidence of pastoralism from faunal remains and evidence of corrals, may be a challenge for archaeologists and the systematic study of spatial distributions of non-local goods may shed light on the differences between subsistence pastoralism and caravan trade activity. One example of caravan activity from consumption contexts may come in the form of distinctive evidence of pooling of certain goods at particular sites along major transportation corridors, but establishing changes in relative density probably requires representative samples from archaeological collections from contexts that were presumably major caravan networks and those that were more peripheral to principal caravan routes. Sourcing from contemporary household-level assemblages may serve to differentiate such pooling (Figure 2-4), as was attempted with Oaxaca obsidian by Pires-Ferreira (1976). In the south-central Andes, stronger evidence for differentiating caravan trade from down-the-line trade may come from differences in artifact form and context from a variety of non-local products. In short, differentiating caravans from down-the-line exchange will require inference from multiple lines of evidence and from domestic contexts, evidence that is extremely scarce in the south-central Andes.

3.2.3. Exchange between herders and farmers

Ethnographic accounts of the interaction between caravan drivers and agriculturalists may be colored by the comparatively low status of caravan drivers in modern circumstances. Among isolated agricultural valleys in prehispanic Andes caravan drivers likely represented an important link to both information and non-local products. As the owners of the means of transport and the initiators of long distance interaction, caravan drivers were in a strong position to influence trade negotiations with dedicated agriculturalists that did not have their own llama herds or did not have schedules that permitted them to undertake long voyages. Strong links and commitments between herders and particular agriculturalists are, then, in some ways against the interests of herders because in a market context they "held the cards" in terms of negotiating favorable conditions of exchange. From the perspective of regional economic interaction two principal groups that, as per Dillehay (1993: 253), largely complement one another and may result in a relatively stable political and social environment:

(1) Mobile herders with an economic focus on hunting, pastoralism, and who are limited in their scheduling by the needs of the herd and annual cycle caravans.

(2) Relatively sedentary agricultural communities, often with an animal husbandry component as well. These households are largely restricted in their scheduling and long distance travel due to the requirements of agriculture.

In this configuration the mobile herders have greater autonomy, but they depend on articulation with dedicated agriculturalists. The relationship between mobile pastoralists and sedentary agriculturalists in Old World contexts has been the subject of comparative study by Khazanov (1984: 198-227). One common pattern is for trade between nomads and sedentary society to be manipulated for political purposes by administrators and elites in the regional centers. In the fifteenth century, the Chinese state sought to regulate exchange with nomadic tribes occurring at trading posts on the frontier. A recurring pattern occurred where the Chinese government would attempt to control the nomads by restricting trade, and nomads would, in turn, "acquire the right to trade by using arms." (Khazanov 1984: 206). That is, if exchange was curtailed the nomads would resort to violent means as described by Levi-Strauss (1969: 67) and Sahlins (1972: 302) who note the link between exchange and warfare (Section 2.2.5).

In the Near East, nomads were in a more profitable position because often they were the essential link between isolated oases. While administrators may have sought to control nomads trading with their communities, the demand by farmers for the milk and meat products from nomads, and the transportation services offered by nomads, often placed the herders in an advantageous position (Khazanov 1984: 208). In the Andes, a similar pattern linked agricultural valleys like the Colca in the high sierra, the mid-altitudes, and perhaps the littoral, by way of camelid caravans, although by the Late Prehispanic it appears many valley communities had their own large herds pastured in the adjacent puna.

3.2.4. Types of products carried by caravans

Ethnographic and ethnohistoric accounts of the types of goods carried by llama caravans provides a context for discussing the volume of trade and spatial relationships in the prehispanic period. Nielsen (2000: 65-67) observed that caravan drivers transport virtually anything that they think they can transport and will be able to trade, and therefore the argument that certain caravans were transporting purely subsistence goods, while others carried purely prestige goods, is probably unfounded. Nielsen notes that as part of their diversification strategy, caravans in prehistory probably variously transported subsistence goods, cultural items, and prestige goods as they articulated with networks at different levels with a diversity of social associations.

Informative ethnohistoric evidence for caravan transport comes from reports describing the provisioning of the infamous silver mines at Potosí that are reviewed by Browman (1990: 408). These reports state that 40,000 llamas were reserved by Potosí for provisioning and another 60,000 were brought as support for indigenous workers fulfilling their tax obligations through labor. Although with these Potosí data it is difficult to extrapolate from the substantial transportation requirements for mining and ore milling, and the demands of the Spaniards overseeing the mining operations, to a conception of goods that may have circulated during prehispanic times, these data are informative on the variety of items mobilized for the mining effort. Goods included manufacturing items such as cloth, wool, wood and dung as fuel, and building supplies. Subsistence goods included potatoes and ch'uno,meat, maize and chicha, and various fruits and vegetables. Goods that could be classified as cultural / prestige items included herbs, medicines, stimulants including quantities of coca leaf, and hallucinogenics like ayahuasca(1990: 408).

In Mesoamerica, where cargo animals were not available, human bearers carried goods for hundreds of kilometers and canoe transport was used extensively. Drennan (1984: 110) observes that textiles may have represented a significant portion of the goods being transported long distance in the prehispanic period. Similarly, woolen textiles in the Andes were an important trade good for highland pastoralists and probably represented a substantial part of the goods offered for barter between pastoralist caravan drivers and agriculturalists from the beginning of the mutualistic relationship between pastoralists and agriculturalists. This demand for textiles would have been especially strong among agriculturalists living outside of the cotton-producing coastal area. The domestication of camelids for cargo transport sometime in the latter part of the Archaic allowed for more efficient transport of goods throughout the remainder of the prehispanic period. However, this is not to suggest that daily staples were transported, as in modern circumstances where fruits are trucked to the altiplano markets where they are bought for daily consumption.

3.2.5. Caravan travel distances and speeds

Ethnoarchaeological studies provide details on the more immediate decision making practices of caravan drivers including the daily routine, the rate of travel, and the scheduling of rest days. References in the ethnographic and ethnohistoric literature concerning to the velocity and capacity of llama caravans provides benchmarks for estimating the rate of travel in prehispanic times. There is some variability in the reported weights, speeds, and distances in the ethnographic and ethnohistoric literature (Bonavia 1996: 501-515).

Table 3-1. Reported llama caravan loads, distances, and times.

Caravan drivers generally arise at first light and begin preparing for the journey and loading animals for an early departure. Caravans often travel until early afternoon when camp is established and the animals are allowed to graze. As camelids do not pasture at night (whereas Equusdo) ample time must be provided for animals to feed during the afternoon in order to avoid stressing the animals (Nielsen 2000: 446-449). Rest days are taken regularly on caravan routes that exceed six days, with Nielsen (2000: 461) reporting one rest day for every three to five days of travel (Lecoq 1988: 185-186;West 1981: 70). The top priority with respect to nightly campsite selection is the needs of the herd animals. Quality pasture is sought for the animals, the next priority is sufficient water, and additionally the emotional condition of the llamas is considered as reported the llamas can be restless in certain camps. Subsequently the needs of humans are considered including hunting opportunities, trade opportunities, and the comfort of the camp. Thus, while economic and social demands frame the larger scale decisions of caravan routes and products to transport for trade, the needs of the herd animals dominate in short term decision making (Nielsen 2000: 490).

Male llamas are larger and caravan animals are typically castrated males, based on some reports, but "left intact" according to others. Flores Ochoa (1968: 118), reports that castrated llamas produce better meat and wool, but non-castrated llamas make better caravan animals. According to most other reports caravan llamas are castrated because they are stronger and tamer, and this practice allows herders to manage mixed herds (Browman 1990: 398;Nielsen 2001: 168;West 1981: 66).

3.2.6. Circuit mobility and role of the periphery

The circuit mobility model of Nuñez and Dillehay (Dillehay and Nuñez 1988;1995 [1979]) conceives of the development of regional interaction in the south-central Andes in terms of decentralized "circuits" traveled by regular camelid caravans. This articulation between far-flung communities is envisioned as beginning in "Late Archaic" (rather, during the "Terminal Archaic" using the terminology in this dissertation) and Formative times.

Herder-caravan societies moved in fixed spiral-like transhumance paths between two or more axis settlements either along a puna-to-puna vector, a puna-to-coastal vector, or a puna-to-selva vector… Continuity and stability was given to the circuit herder-caravan movement by settlements at both ends of its pathway. For this movement to have maintained equilibrium, its pathway must have been balanced by relatively homogeneous, fixed axis settlements which offered multiple resources and services from their particular ecological zone and by ferias (or fairs) where goods were exchanged (Dillehay and Nuñez 1988: 611).

This historical model is of importance here because it highlights the limitations of a core-periphery focus for addressing certain regionally distributed processes like the emergence of control over regional exchange routes during the Formative in the Lake Titicaca Basin (Nielsen 2000: 88-92;Yacobaccio, et al. 2002: 171-172). In models of Late Formative complexity in the Titicaca Basin presented by Browman (1981) and, to a lesser extent, Kolata (1993: 274), caravans and long distance trade play a prominent role. In Browman's formulation, the core areas of regional centers became increasingly powerful due to craft specialization guilds and other institutions that reached their apex at Tiwanaku, albeit many of these expectations for guilds have not been borne out in more recent research (Isbell 2004: 216;Rivera Casanovas 2003). Kolata holds it was the productivity of raised-field agriculture that formed the principal economic mechanism behind Tiwanaku's florescence, with caravan based articulation being a secondary component. Both scholars emphasize the dominant position of the core areas of regional centers, a position that on a regional scale was ultimately attained by the Tiwanaku state. In contrast to these models that emphasize centralization, the Nunez and Dillehay model holds that it is integration by way of caravan trade routes themselves, and that these routes developed into "leading circuits" when they served to connect important centers. Further, as traditions became established, the relationships between circuits and principal settlements along these routes provided temporal continuity and stability to a system that is otherwise fluid and mobile. Their model gives more autonomy and influence to this integrating, caravan-based element in society such that "the sedentary (or axis) settlements of the population were maintained (and often created) and controlled by the mobile sectors." (Dillehay and Nuñez 1988: 621).

This model also contains weaker points, such as an adaptationalist underpinning for the origins and incentives for participation in these caravan exchange networks, and the model ascribes the emerging dominance of Titicaca Basin centers as resulting from their environmental characteristics. The system is described as "harmonious and cohesive" (Dillehay and Nuñez 1988: 620) as caravans are used to efficiently spread patchy resources over a wider region. The adaptationalist interpretation of harmony is based on a lack of archaeological evidence for warfare in the Formative, with the Andean tradition of reciprocity serving as the cohesive force. Further, the system segregates discrete "highland" and "lowland" communities, while archaeological evidence supports a gradient with no clear demarcation.

A more current theoretical orientation for this model would focus on the motivations of traders, the influence of non-local goods in axis communities, and the status acquired by caravanners based on the importance of their role on a regional scale. The emergence of this distinctive, dispersed economic form that appears simulatenously with beginnings of social inequality during Terminal Archaic and Formative may shed light on the underpinnings of social inequalities that developed during the Formative. Further, a greater exploration of the strategic relationship between aggrandizers in Titicaca Basin regional centers and these long distance traders may provide evidence for how the first elites in early polities were able to coordinate labor and garner resources from the region. Despite the historical and adaptationalist focus, the Nuñez and Dillehay model brought a focus on the role decentralized networks in connected emerging settlements that grew to have regional influence. This emphasis on the mobile sector of society highlights the potential influence in both resources and political support that could come from second-tier communities dispersed across the large expanses of the altiplano in the political strategies of early elites in Titicaca Basin centers.

3.2.7. Compadrazgo relationships and commerce

A trade relationship termed compadrazgo,or simply conocidos,is reported between regular trade partners; typically between those who live in complementary ecological areas (Browman 1990: 404-405;Flores Ochoa 1968; but see ;Nielsen 2000: 437-438;Nielsen 2001: 182-183). For example, if a llama caravan driver from a particular area of the puna and a farmer in a mid-altitude valley with a variety of products have regularly exchanged goods over the years, and then they teach their children of the relationship using fictive-kin terms; a tradition of mutualism is established between herder and farmer that can potentially last for generations. The relationship offers stability and predictability to both sides of the exchange in barter rates, types of goods, and quantities to be exchanged.

The nature of this encounter is critical to understanding Andean reciprocity relationships and the degree of alienability of goods being exchanged (Burchard 1974;Mayer 1971). As mentioned above, the caravan driver has mobility and choices in terms of travel routes and communities where to partake in exchange. The maintenance of long term exchange partners through compadrazgois therefore a constraint on caravan autonomy. Two characteristics of compadrazgo relationships appear to underscore the embeddedness of the interaction:

3.2.8. Discussion

The environmental and cultural context of the south-central Andean highlands framed the circumstances in which emerged the long distance traffic in various products during the prehispanic period. The domestication of camelids sometime in the past 6000 years allowed for more efficient transport of bulky goods. There remain many unknown aspects to the network that articulated dedicated agriculturalists with pastoralists in the prehispanic past, however archaeological and ethnographic evidence allows for inference regarding the following major points:

(1) Network configuration.Products available by ecozone were transported in numerous, segmentary articulations between ecozones while other products, only available in a few locations, were apparently conveyed diffusively and were between transported ecozones and across homogeneous terrain like the altiplano (XFigure 3-4X).

(2) Motivations for change in mode of interaction.The domestication of animals and plants, changes in sedentism, and the development of social inequalities were some of the factors that contributed to development of long distance caravans. It is evident that the original modes of interaction: Direct acquisition and down-the-line exchange, were supplemented by household organized caravan trade, and finally administered caravan trade, but the timing of these changes is difficult to establish with precision.

(3) Means of trade.Features of the Andean barter economy such as enduring trade relationships between households in complementary zones cemented by institutions like over-reciprocation and fictive kinship, are well demonstrated ethnographically in the region. However, seasonal market-like gatherings are also reported in the region and exchange of goods in those contexts may have been more alienable, and transactions may have been more synchronic in nature. Such gatherings may also have had evolutionary significance because they potentially relate to the development of early leadership in regional centers including ceremony, feasting, the use of monumental architecture, and centralized control of trade in certain goods.

The persistent themes in mountain agropastoral settings of non-autarkic economies and risk reduction through mixed subsistence strategies serve as a reminder that variability was probably the rule in exchange relations as well. Absolutes in exchange patterns were probably rare, and a degree of both self-interested trade and elements of embedded, social and symbolic fraternity likely existed between trade partners since early antiquity. While a number of plausible models have been proposed for the later Prehispanic periods where both household-level and elites-administered trade caravans appear to have transported a variety of goods in the region, the initial contexts for caravan trade remain largely unexplained. These initial contexts are particularly important because this mode of organization contributed to the regional context and institutional base in which early leaders in the Titicaca Basin had to operate in order to begin the process of expanding their influence in access to labor, resources, and ideology of their communities.

If enduring regional interaction had persisted since the early days of the pastoral economy during the preceramic, this may be connected to the factors that lead to an increasing consolidation of power in the Titicaca Basin during the Formative Period. These questions are central to understanding the foundations of regional integration that emerged in the Lake Titicaca Basin during the Middle and Late Formative Periods. The above discussion has sought to elaborate upon a possible context for early household-level caravan organization that is principally based on the "circuit mobility" model of Nunez and Dillehay (Dillehay and Nuñez 1988;1995 [1979]) but without following the adaptationalist approach, and with more specific empirical contexts for early caravans. In the ensuing discussion of obsidian procurement and circulation in the south-central Andes existing evidence from obsidian circulation in the region is presented that provides the context for examining obsidian production in more detail.