Special Studies: The Pre-Chavín Stone Sculpture of Casma and Pacopampa

Abstract

In a recent article, “Early Carving From Pampa de las Llamas-Moxeke, Casma Valley, Peru,” Thomas Pozorski and Shelia Pozorski (Journal of Field Archaeology 15 [1988] 114–119) describe an important stone sculpture discovered in their 1987 excavations of Huaca A at Pampa de las Llamas-Moxeke, Casma Valley, Peru. They argued that it was the oldest securely-dated sculpture in Peru based on a radiocarbon date of 1565 b.c. (unrecalibrated), and deemed it unique on the basis of comparisons with the corpus of early stone sculptures from Peru. The dual purpose of this short contribution is to: 1) suggest that on the basis of radiocarbon measurements available it cannot be demonstrated that the Huaca A sculpture is older than the hundreds of stone sculptures from Cerro Sechin in Casma; and 2) draw attention to some intriguing similarities between the Huaca A sculpture and a stone carving from Pacopampa in the Chotano Valley of the Peruvian highlands. These two points highlight the inadequacy of our understanding of the origins of stone sculpture in Peru.