Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Don’t Fall Asleep by a Boulder: Time, Communication, and Consciousness in relation to Andean Stone

  • Research
  • Published:
Archaeologies Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

My paper addresses perspectives on powerful stones among rural farmers and pastoralists in the contemporary Andes. Stones are considered sites of transformation that transcend temporal dimensions. Some boulders are considered to have been people in previous ages; their petrification is an ongoing process that affects human beings in their vicinity, suggesting an ontological orientation in which time, place, materiality, and consciousness are intimately interrelated. Significant stones, ranging from miniature livestock to huge monoliths, are connected with powerful mountains through a play of fractal relations that animates the cosmos.

Résumé

Mon article traite des perspectives relatives à des roches puissantes se trouvant parmi des fermiers ruraux et des gardiens de troupeaux dans les Andes contemporaines. Les roches sont considérées comme des sites de transformation qui transcendent les dimensions temporelles. Certains blocs de roche sont considérés comme ayant été des personnes au cours d'époques antérieures. Leur pétrification est un processus continu affectant les êtres humains dans leur voisinage, ce qui suggère une orientation ontologique au sein de laquelle le temps, le lieu, la matérialité et la conscience sont imbriqués de manière intime. Les roches de grande signification, allant des troupeaux miniatures aux gigantesques monolithes, sont reliées aux montagnes puissantes par le biais d'un jeu de relations fractales animant le cosmos.

Resumen

Mi artículo aborda las perspectivas sobre las piedras poderosas entre los agricultores y pastores rurales de los Andes contemporáneos. Las piedras son consideradas lugares de transformación que trascienden las dimensiones temporales. Se considera que algunos cantos rodados han sido habitados por personas en épocas anteriores; su petrificación es un proceso continuo que afecta a los seres humanos de su entorno, lo que sugiere una orientación ontológica en la que el tiempo, el lugar, la materialidad y la conciencia están íntimamente interrelacionados. Piedras importantes, que van desde ganado en miniatura hasta enormes monolitos, están conectadas con poderosas montañas a través de un juego de relaciones fractales que animan el cosmos.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Alberti, B. (2016). Archaeologies of ontology. Annual Review of Anthropology, 45, 163–179. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-anthro-102215-095858.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Allen, C. J. (1984). Patterned time: The mythic history of a Peruvian community. Journal of Latin American Lore, 10(2), 151–173.

    Google Scholar 

  • Allen, C. J. (1997). When pebbles move mountains: Iconicity and symbolism in Quechua ritual. In R. Howard-Malverde (Ed.), Creating context in Andean cultures (pp. 73–84). Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Allen, C. J. (1998). When utensils revolt: Mind, matter, and modes of being in the pre-Columbian Andes. RES Anthropology and Aesthetics, 33, 18–27.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Allen, C. J. (2002). The hold life has: Coca and cultural identity in an Andean community (2nd Edn). Washington DC: Smithsonian Institution Press (second edition, first edition 1988).

  • Allen, C. J. (2011). Foxboy: Intimacy and aesthetics in Andean stories. Austin TX: University of Texas Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Allen, C. J. (2015). The whole world is watching: New perspectives on Andean animism. In T. Bray (Ed.), The archaeology of Wak’as: Explorations of the sacred in the pre-Columbian Andes (pp. 23–46). Boulder: University Press of Colorado.

    Google Scholar 

  • Allen, C. J. (2016). Stones who love me: Dimensionality, enclosure and petrification in Andean culture. Archives de Sciences Socials des Religions, 174, 327–346.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Allen, C. J. (2016). The living ones: Miniatures and animism in the Andes. Journal of Anthropological Research, 72(4), 416–444.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Arguedas, J. M. (1981). Deep rivers. Austin: University of Texas Press. Translated by F. H. Barraclough from Los ríos profundos, Editorial Losada, S.A., Buenos Aires. 1958.

  • Arnold, D. Y. (2020). Envolturas generativas: procesos vitales en los andes meridionales. In O. Muñoz (Ed.), Ensayos de Etnografía Teórica. Andes (pp. 163–192). Madrid: Nola Editores.

    Google Scholar 

  • Barad, K. (2007). Meeting the universe halfway: Quantum physics and the entanglement of matter and meaning. Durham, NC: Duke University Press Durham.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Bastien, J. (1985). Mountain of the condor: Metaphor and ritual in an Andean Ayllu. Long Grove, IL: Waveland Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bolin, I. (1998). Rituals of respect: The secret of survival in the Peruvian Highlands. Austin: University of Texas Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bray, T. (2009). An archaeological perspective on the Andean concept of camaquen: Thinking through late pre-Columbian ofrendas and huacas. Cambridge Archaeological Journal, 19, 357–366.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bugallo, L., & Tomasi, J. (2012). Crianzas mutuas: El trato a los animales desde las concepciones de los pastores puneños (Jujuy, Argentina). Revista Española de Antropología Americana, 42, 205–224.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Cummins, T., & Mannheim, B. (2011). The river around us, the stream within us: The traces of the sun and Inka kinetics. RES: Anthropology and Aesthetics, 59/60, 5–21.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dean, C. (2010). A culture of stone: Inka perspectives on rock. Durham: Duke University Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • De la Cadena, M. (2015). Earth beings: Ecologies of practice across Andean worlds. Durham: Duke University Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Délétroz-Favre, A. (1993). Huk kutis kaq kasqa: relatos del distrito del Coaza (Carabaya-Puno). Cuzco: Instituto de Pastoral Andina.

    Google Scholar 

  • Di Salvia, D. (2020). Con los pies en tierra andina: reflexiones teóricas sobre la ontología animista quechua. In O. Muñoz (Ed.), Ensayos de Etnografía Teórica. Andes (pp. 227–261). Madrid: Nola Editores.

    Google Scholar 

  • Escalante, C., & Valderrama, R. (1992). Nosotros los humanos / Ñuqanchik runakuna: Testimonios de los quechuas del siglo XX. Cuzco: CBC.

    Google Scholar 

  • Estermann, J. (1998). Filosofía Andina: Estudio Intercultural de la Sabiduría Autóctona Andina. Quito: Ediciones Abya-Yala.

    Google Scholar 

  • Fabiano, E., & Bat-Ami, A. (2023). Epistemología del cuerpo: la orina en el mundo andino y amazónico. In B. Quintanilla, F. Cepek, & Machery (Eds.), Epistemologías andinas y amazónicas. Conceptos indígenas de conocimiento, sabiduría y comprensión (pp. 391–438). Lima: Fondo Editorial PUCP.

    Google Scholar 

  • Flores Ochoa, J. (1977). Aspectos mágicos del pastoreo: Enqa, enqaychu, illa y khuya rumi. In J. Flores (Ed.), Pastores de Puna (pp. 11–138). Lima: Instituto de Estudios Peruanos.

    Google Scholar 

  • Gose, P. (1994). Deathly waters and hungry mountains: Agrarian ritual and class formation in an Andean Town. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Howard, R. (2006). Rumi: An ethnolinguistic approach to the symbolism of stone(s) in the Andes. In P. Dransert (Ed.), Kay Pacha: Cultivating earth and water in the Andes (pp. 233–243). BAR International Series 1478, London.

  • Howard, R. (2012). Shifting voices, shifting worlds: Evidentiality, epistemic modality and speaker perspective in Quechua oral narrative. Pragmatics and Society, 3(2), 243–269.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Howard, R. (2020). Articulando perspectivas: el papel de la narración oral quechua en la construcción de la cosmovisión andina. In O. Muñoz Morán (Ed.), Andes. Ensayos de etnografía teórica (pp. 263–304). Madrid: NOLA Editores.

    Google Scholar 

  • Itier, C. (1999). Karu Ñankunapi: 40 Cuentos en Quechua y Castellano de la Comunidad de Usi (Quispicanchi-Cuzco). Lima: CBC, Cuzco and Institut Français d’Etudes Andines.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lira, J. A. (1990). Cuentos del Alto Urubamba. Cuzco: CBC.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mannheim, B. (2021). The social (and cultural, and syntactic, and semantic) life of generics. Language in Society, 50, 605–618.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Mannheim, B., & Van Vleet, K. (1998). Dialogics of Southern Quechua narrative. American Anthropologist, 100(2), 309–325.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Mendoza, Z. (2021). Qoyllur Rit’i. Crónica de una peregrinación cusqueña. Lima: La Siniestra Ensayos.

    Google Scholar 

  • Momaday, N. S. (1976). Native American attitudes to the environment. In W. H. Capps (Ed.), Seeing with a native eye: essays on native American religion (pp. 79–85). New York: Harper and Row.

    Google Scholar 

  • Morote Best, E. (1988). Aldeas sumergidas: Cultura popular y sociedad en los Andes. Cuzco: Centro de Estudios Regionales Andino.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ossio, J. (1973). Ideología Mesiánica del Mundo Andino. Lima: Ignacio Prado Pastor.

    Google Scholar 

  • Paternoster, C. (1996). The stone and the thread: Andean roots of abstract art. Austin: University of Texas Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Platt, T. (1997). The sound of light: Emergent communication through Quechua shamanic dialogue. In R. Howard-Malverde (Ed.), Creating context in Andean cultures (pp. 196–226). Oxford: University of Oxford Press.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Puetz, M. (2002). The University of Chicago :: Theories of Media :: Keywords Glossary :: mimesis. Retrieved from https://csmt.uchicago.edu/glossary2004/mimesis.htm#_ftnref5.

  • Ramírez, J. A. (1969). La novena al Señor de Qoyllur Rit’i. Allpanchis, 1, 61–88.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Randall, R. (1982). Qoyllur Rit’i, an Inca Fiesta of the Pleiades. Bulletin de l’Institut Français d’Etudes Andines (Lima), 11(1–2), 37–81.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ricard Lanata, X. (2007). Ladrones de Sombra: El Universo Religioso de los Pastores del Ausangate. Cuzco: Centro Bartolomé de las Casas.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Robin Azevedo, V. (2008). Miroirs de l’Autre Vie: Pratiques Rituelles et Discours sur les Morts dans les Andes de Cuzco (Pérou). Nanterre: Société D’ethnologie.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sahlins, M. (2014). On the ontological scheme of Beyond Nature and Culture. HAU: Journal of Ethnographic Theory, 4(1), 281–290.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Salas Carreño, G. (2010). Acerca de la antigua importancia de las comparsas de wayri chu’nchu y su contemporánea marginalidad en la peregrinación de Quyllurit’i. Anthropologica, 28(28), 65–90.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Sallnow, M. (1987). Pilgrims of the Andes: Regional cults in Cuzco. Smithsonian Institution Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Salomon, F. (1991). Introductory essay. In Salomon, F., & Urioste, G. L. (Eds. and Trans.), The Huarochirí manuscript: A testament of ancient and colonial Andean religion (pp. 1–38). Austin: University of Texas Press.

  • Salomon, F. (2018). At the Mountains’ Altar: Anthropology of religion in an Andean community. New York: Routledge.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Salomon, F., & Urioste, G. L. (Eds. and Trans.). (1991). The Huarochirí manuscript: A testament of ancient and colonial Andean religion. Austin: University of Texas Press.

  • Sillar, B. (2004). Acts of God and active material culture: Agency and commitment in the Andes. In A. Gardner (Ed.), Agency uncovered: Archaeological perspectives on social agency, power, and being human (pp. 153–190). London: UCL Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sillar, B. (2012). Patrimoine vivant: Les illas et conopas des foyers Andins. Techniques & Culture, 58(1), 66–81.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Sillar, B. (2016). Miniatures and animism: The communicative role of Inka Carved Stone Conopa. Journal of Anthropological Research, 72(4), 442–464.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Skar, S. L. (1987). The role of urine in Andean Notions of Health and the Cosmos. In Skar, H. O., & Salomon, F. (Eds.), Natives and neighbors in South America, anthropological essays (pp. 267–294). Etnologiska Studier 38, Göteborgs: Göteborgs Etnografiska Museum.

  • Spotswood, D. (2022). Fractals of a mountain: Human-environment relations in the Peruvian Andes. PhD thesis in Social Anthropology, University of Edinburgh. Retrieved from https://era.ed.ac.uk/bitstream/handle/1842/39655/Spotswood2022.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y.

  • Stensrud, A. (2010). Los peregrinos urbanos en Qoyllurit’i y el juego mimético de miniaturas. Anthropologica, 28, 39–65.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Stensrud, A. (2011). ‘Todo en la vida se paga’: Negotiating Life in Cusco, Peru. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Oslo, Norway.

  • Taussig, M. (1993). Mimesis and alterity. New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Taylor, G. (1974). Camay, Camac et Camasca dans le manuscrit Quechua de Huarochirí. Journal de la Société des Américanistes, 63, 231–243.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Valderrama, R., & Escalante, C. (1980). Apu Qorpuna: Visión del mundo de los muertos en la comunidad de Awkimarka. Debates en Antropología, 5, 233–264.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Viveiros de Castro, E. B. (1998). Cosmological deixis and Amerindian perspectivism. Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, 4, 469–488.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Viveiros de Castro, E. B. (2004). Exchanging perspectives: The transformation of objects into subjects in Amerindian ontologies. Common Knowledge, 10(3), 463–484.

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

Over almost five decades, I have received kind assistance and encouragement from more individuals and institutions than I can enumerate here. I am immensely grateful to the people of Sonqo, Peru, who opened their homes and shared their lives with me. Heartfelt thanks go as well to my many helpful colleagues and friends in Cuzco and Lima, as well as North America and Europe. I received travel support from the George Washington University and fellowship support from several institutions, including the Sainsbury Research Unit for the Arts of Africa, Oceania & the Americas (2015), the Fulbright Specialist Program (2011), the Center for the Advanced Study of the Visual Arts at the National Gallery of Art (2001), the Guggenheim Foundation (2001-02), and the Dumbarton Oaks Center for Pre-Columbian Studies (1994). I especially want to express my appreciation to Ran Barkai and Kathryn Weedman Arthur for conceiving and organizing the conference on “Ancestral Stones” that gave rise to this special issue. My thanks, as well, to Tel Aviv University for hosting this unique and memorable event. Finally, any errors of fact or interpretation in this paper are completely my responsibility.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Anthropology, George Washington University, Washington, DC, 20052, USA

    Catherine J. Allen

Authors
  1. Catherine J. Allen
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Catherine J. Allen.

Additional information

Publisher's Note

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Rights and permissions

Springer Nature or its licensor (e.g. a society or other partner) holds exclusive rights to this article under a publishing agreement with the author(s) or other rightsholder(s); author self-archiving of the accepted manuscript version of this article is solely governed by the terms of such publishing agreement and applicable law.

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Allen, C.J. Don’t Fall Asleep by a Boulder: Time, Communication, and Consciousness in relation to Andean Stone. Arch 20, 277–300 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11759-024-09499-4

Download citation

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11759-024-09499-4

Key Words

Search

Navigation