Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant: Terraces, Warfare, and Climate Change: Late Intermediate Period Agricultural Risk Management Strategies Puno, Peru (A.D. 1100-1450)

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Under the guidance of Dr. David Browman, Ms. BrieAnna Langlie will conduct archaeological excavations and analyze ancient plant remains to measure how farmers in the Peruvian Andes near Lake Titicaca adapted their agricultural strategies to account for a period of prolonged drought and intense warfare during the Peruvian Late Intermediate period (LIP; A.D. 1100-1450). During this unstable time, a warring ethnic group called the Colla occupied nucleated hilltop forts flanked by agricultural terraces. This research will be carried out at one of the largest Colla fortresses called Machu Llaqta, and will examine human agricultural adaptation as a metric to understand the relative importance of climate change and warfare to peoples' daily lives. Methods include excavations of terraces adjacent to Machu Llaqta, utilization of dating methods to determine the age of terraces, and analyses of previously excavated ancient plant remains. Dating methods include optically stimulated luminescence dating and accelerator mass spectrometry dating of radiocarbon. Analyses of ancient plant remains consist of identification of preserved seeds and stems, and starch grain residues recovered from the living quarters of the fort, and pollen analysis of soils recovered from adjacent agricultural terraces. This research will clarify the specific social and environmental factors that motivated LIP food production, agricultural technologies, and plant procurement strategies. Researchers currently contest the severities of ancient Andean climate change and warfare. These new data will provide a metric for understanding the perceived severity of warfare and climate change during the LIP. Identifying when ancient altiplano (high altitude) farmers constructed terraces will be a major advancement in the understanding of Titicaca basin agriculture. While previous research has only generalized about the impact of terrace agriculture in the altiplano, Ms. Langlie's findings will directly correlate terrace technology to the pre-history and environmental chronology of the Peruvian Andes. These data will address wider theoretical discussions in the region such as climate change, political involvement in agriculture, and the motivations behind agricultural intensification. This project aims to study the deep time history of traditional ecological knowledge in a characteristically marginal landscape, especially during a period of climate change and warfare. Locally developed indigenous knowledge provides an appropriate model for environmentally and socially sustainable agriculture. With the impending worldwide increase in annual temperature predicted in the next century, local models of social and environmental sustainability will be essential. This research tests the local deep time political ecological sustainability of terrace agriculture, which remains an enduring and sustainable farming method. Ms. Langlie's investigation builds on the fifteen-year collaboration between U.S. and Peruvian researchers as part of the Collasuyo Archaeological Research Institute located in Puno, Peru. Important results of this project will be graduate student training, and improved resources for future archaeological investigations in the region. International collaboration will be an integral part of this project. The cooperation of the Ministerio de Cultura in Peru, the Collasuyo Archaeological Research Institute, Ms. Langlie, and other researchers in the U.S. foster and promote strong international collaborations.