Chankillo: A 2300-Year-Old Solar Observatory in Coastal Peru

Ghezzi, I; Ruggles, Clive

doi:10.1126/science.1136415

Cited by 66 publications

(42 citation statements)

References 9 publications

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“…6A). This result lends important support to our previous argument (Ghezzi & Ruggles 2007) that this natural hill may have been perceived as the leftmost 'tower' in this profile, and that besides the evident symmetry with the rest of the tower alignments, it may have been symbolically important that midwinter was the one time of year when the sun emerged between a natural hill and a human construction (Tower 1). In the same vein, an Inca 'fertility' offering of a female figurine inside a marine shell (Ghezzi 2008), carefully deposited in the centre of the first step of the northern staircase of Tower 1, highlights the relationship between this tower and June solstice harvest festivals, a relationship that was apparently recognized and honoured by the Inca almost two millennia later.…”

Section: The Social and Ritual Context Of Horizon Astronomical Observsupporting

confidence: 71%

“…A Total Station survey was undertaken in 2010 both to check our earlier results (Ghezzi & Ruggles 2007), obtained by differential GPS, and to explore issues about what could be observed from points other than the 'observing points' (for example, by crowds gathered on critical dates in the plazas). The main conclusions were as follows:…”

Section: The Social and Ritual Context Of Horizon Astronomical Observmentioning

confidence: 99%

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The social and ritual context of horizon astronomical observations at Chankillo

Ghezzi

Ruggles

2011

Proc. IAU

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Abstract.The authors have shown previously that, as viewed from an evident observing point to the west, and a plausible observing point to the east, the Thirteen Towers of Chankillo formed an artificial 'toothed' horizon that spanned the annual rising and setting arcs of the sun and provided a means to identify each day in the seasonal year by observing the position of sunrise or sunset against them. The Thirteen Towers thus constitute a unique solar observation device that is still functioning, and a remarkable example of a native form of landscape timekeeping that preceded similar facilities in imperial Cusco by almost two millennia. Yet the social, political, and ritual contexts in which Chankillo's astronomical alignments operated deserve further exploration. In this paper, we present new archaeoastronomical evidence that not only clarifies some aspects of the solar observation device but suggests a wider range of alignments visible from more publicly accessible parts of the ceremonial complex, and also suggests a possible interest in marking lunar alignments as well as solar ones. We also bring together archaeological evidence to suggest that the society that built Chankillo was differentiated. The Thirteen Towers may have served to regulate the calendar, solar and ritual, while the solar cult centred on them may have lent legitimacy and authority to a rising warrior elite through ceremony in an impressive sacred setting that brought society together while reproducing its growing inequality.

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Section: The Social and Ritual Context Of Horizon Astronomical Observsupporting

confidence: 71%

Section: The Social and Ritual Context Of Horizon Astronomical Observmentioning

confidence: 99%

The social and ritual context of horizon astronomical observations at Chankillo

Ghezzi

Ruggles

2011

Proc. IAU

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“…Elsewhere in the Andes, research demonstrates that pre-Hispanic peoples actively marked solstices and other cyclical astronomical occurrences. Recent work at the fortified site of Chankillo on the northern Peruvian coast uncovered a series of 13 carefully placed stone towers, some of which correspond to annual solstice and equinox events (22,23). Chankillo is roughly contemporary with the Paracas phases we report on here for Chincha.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A 2,300-year-old architectural and astronomical complex in the Chincha Valley, Peru

Stanish

Tantaleán

Nigra

et al. 2014

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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Recent archaeological research on the south coast of Peru discovered a Late Paracas (ca. 400-100 BCE) mound and geoglyph complex in the middle Chincha Valley. This complex consists of linear geoglyphs, circular rock features, ceremonial mounds, and settlements spread over a 40-km 2 area. A striking feature of this culturally modified landscape is that the geoglyph lines converge on mounds and habitation sites to form discrete clusters. Likewise, these clusters contain a number of paired line segments and at least two U-shaped structures that marked the setting sun of the June solstice in antiquity. Excavations in three mounds confirm that they were built in Late Paracas times. The Chincha complex therefore predates the better-known Nasca lines to the south by several centuries and provides insight into the development and use of geoglyphs and platform mounds in Paracas society. The data presented here indicate that Paracas peoples engineered a carefully structured, ritualized landscape to demarcate areas and times for key ritual and social activities.chiefdoms | Andean

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“…There is no shortage of new 'discoveries' and even spectacular new types of discovery, such as the all-year-round solar observation devices at Taosi in China (Xu & He 2010) and Chankillo in Peru (Ghezzi & Ruggles 2007), the latter of which is still in a 'functioning state' even today. Such 'discoveries' still have the power to excite widespread public interest, as do some less tangible factors, the most prominent one at the moment being the run-up to the 2012 Mayan era-completion date.…”

Section: Thirty Years Onmentioning

confidence: 99%

Pushing back the frontiers or still running around the same circles? ‘Interpretative archaeoastronomy’ thirty years on

Ruggles

2011

Proc. IAU

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Abstract. This personal perspective on the development of archaeoastronomy over the last thirty years focuses on interpretative and methodological issues, picking up for example from the debate between Schaefer and Aveni at Oxford VII. How far we have actually progressed in the last three decades? Are we at last starting to achieve the correct fusion between the social science questions that our discipline addresses and the 'hard science' methods that are often involved in tackling them? In this paper I argue that the need for our hypotheses to be solidly grounded in social theory, which has rightly been recognised by most archaeoastronomers in recent years, is not an excuse for avoiding the need to be scientifically rigorous in assessing them against the actual evidence. I conclude that identifying robust methodologies for weighing together the different types of data with which the cultural astronomer is faced in different sitations, so as to infer the 'best' interpretation, remains at once the most challenging and the most pressing issue facing our 'interdiscipline' in the future.

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Chankillo: A 2300-Year-Old Solar Observatory in Coastal Peru

Cited by 66 publications

References 9 publications

The social and ritual context of horizon astronomical observations at Chankillo

The social and ritual context of horizon astronomical observations at Chankillo

A 2,300-year-old architectural and astronomical complex in the Chincha Valley, Peru

Pushing back the frontiers or still running around the same circles? ‘Interpretative archaeoastronomy’ thirty years on

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