This article presents results from the excavation and analysis of 11 slab-cist tombs associated with the site of Ayawiri, one of the largest hillforts in the western Lake Titicaca Basin during the Late Intermediate period (LIP; AD 1100–1450). These semi-subterranean tombs typically contain commingled human remains. Variation between and within tombs in the number of individuals, the body parts represented, and the degree of skeletal articulation points to a complex burial practice that likely involved tomb reopening, successive burial, and even the deposition of select body parts. Demographic and mortuary profiles suggest that burial practices were decentralized and flexible, structured by shared attitudes toward “the dead” and the dead body but also subject to the prerogatives and preferences of semi-autonomous corporate groups. This study advances our understanding of a lesser-known mortuary tradition in the Lake Titicaca Basin—one long overshadowed by more prominent burial towers (chullpas)—and sheds new light on the complex interactions that took place between the living and the dead during the LIP.

The Late Intermediate period in the south-central Andes is known for the widespread use of open sepulchres called chullpas by descent-based ayllus to claim rights to resources and express idealized notions of how society should be organized. Chullpas, however, were rarer on the coast, with the dead often buried individually in closed tombs. This article documents conditions under which these closed tombs were used at the site of Quilcapampa on the coastal plain of southern Peru, allowing an exploration into the ways that funerary traditions were employed to both reflect and generate community affiliation, ideals about sociopolitical organization, and land rights. After a long hiatus, the site was reoccupied and quickly expanded through local population aggregation and highland migrations. An ayllu organization that made ancestral claims to specific resources was poorly suited to these conditions, and the site's inhabitants instead seem to have organized themselves around the ruins of Quilcapampa's earlier occupation. In describing what happened in Quilcapampa, we highlight the need for a better understanding of the myriad ways that Andean peoples used mortuary customs to structure the lives of the living during a period of population movements and climate change.

Mimbres painted pottery from the U.S. Southwest is renowned for its spectacular designs. Literature on style and identity suggests three concepts helpful for understanding its social significance: boundaries, multiple dimensions of variation, and historical context. This article investigates these concepts by synthesizing past studies with new analyses. The distribution of Mimbres pottery is strongly bounded, demonstrated with data from the cyberSW project. Variation in designs is multidimensional: (1) individual artists created distinctive styles; (2) specific designs are distributed homogeneously across the region, a conclusion demonstrated in part with new analyses of the geometric designs; and (3) pan-regionally, the designs’ content, regular structure, and appearance on multiple media suggest they were meaning-charged. Considering these findings in their historical context provides insights into the pottery's social significance and elaboration: population growth in the resource-rich Mimbres region engendered land tenure systems, marked in part by burials that included pottery. The pottery came to convey the message “I belong here” from two perspectives. By adopting the pottery, people, including migrants, signaled their acceptance of established ways of life in the region, and their access to the pottery indicated their acceptance in the social milieu.