REVIEWS
Authors in Manufactured Light deal with the
composite, assembled surfaces of mosaic mirrors
as singular, shiny surfaces and ignore other salient
properties, namely, geometry and number. In his study
of the large mirror from Las Bocas, Puebla (thought
to date to about 1000 B.C.), Alexander Marshack
(in Aveni, ed., Archaeoastronomy in Pre-Columbian
America, 1975) analyzed the number, shapes, and
arrangement of pyrite pieces of the mirror. He argued
persuasively that the 354 tesserae that once comprised
this rectangular-shaped mirror represented a calendar
count of 12 lunar months. It would be well to analyze
Classic-period mirrors in as much detail. The possi-
bility that mosaic mirrors had calendrical, geometric,
or numerological significance is not considered in this
book. Rather, mirrors provided luminous surfaces for
looking into other realms. Some mirrors even spoke,
and the senses of touch and smell were involved with
others.
In his summation, Taube discusses Postclassic
mosaic mirrors that were clearly laid out as cosmo-
grams. Olivia Kindl documents that Huichol mirrors
continue to be framed as cosmograms. Her study
calls attention to framing devices, most of which
do not preserve archaeologically. Some Maya flint
eccentrics appear to be copies of wooden mirror
frames, so I would not be surprised if some mirrors
had been attached to wooden handles rather than worn
as pectorals. I suspect that the earliest mirrors were
viewed in cosmological terms. As depicted in Olmec
art, mirrors were centering devices that surely marked
their wearers as central persons. These observations
only scratch the surface of Manufactured Light. The
book merits careful perusal by those interested in
Mesoamerican cultures, and some chapters deserve to
be read twice.
Peruvian Archaeology: A Critical History. HENRY
TANTALEN. Translated by Charles Stanish. 2014.
Left Coast Press, Walnut Creek, California. x + 205
pp. 35 figures, notes, bibliography, and index. $70.00
(cloth), ISBN 978-1-61132-991-9.
Reviewed by Richard E. Daggett, University of Mas-
sachusetts, Amherst
There remains much to be written about the history
of Peruvian archaeology, despite the existence of
accounts focused on prominent individuals such as
Max Uhle and Julio C. Tello. Notably lacking to date
has been an overview placing research in the context
of the social, political, and economic changes that
were occurring concurrently both inside and outside
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167
Peru. Tantalen has provided the first such analytical
review.
The book is divided into 10 chapters. Chapter 1
briefly traces the gradual emergence of archaeology
from early postconquest times up until the very
end of the nineteenth century. Chapter 2 introduces
Uhle who, in 1896, conducted the first stratigraphic
excavations in Peru. He continued his work with
American sponsorship, was appointed by an enlight-
ened government to head the archaeological section
at a new National Museum in 1906, and developed a
chronological scheme based on horizon styles. Also
introduced is Tello, who explored the ruins of Chavn
de Huantar and established a museum of archaeology
at the University of San Marcos in 1919. In chapter 3
the reader learns that during the 1920s Peru forged
a strong relationship with the United States while
dealing with the rise of an indigenous movement
in the southern highlands centered at Cuzco. Tello
began teaching anthropology at San Marcos in 1923
and was named director of the National Museum of
Archaeology in 1924. Based on his work at Chavn
he theorized an Andean mother culture with highland
and tropical forest origins that diffused to the coast.
At the start of the 1930s the effects of the Great
Depression resulted in a military coup. Tello was
removed as director of the National Museum and was
replaced by the historian Luis E. Valcrcel. The latter
created a new National Museum, was proactive in
forging a national identity, and focused his attention
on the cleaning and reconstruction of Inca sites in and
around Cuzco. Because of Valcrcels emphasis on
tourism his work was fully funded by the government,
to the detriment of Tellos scientific endeavors; this
caused Tello to travel to the United States in 1936,
resulting in the creation of the Institute of Andean
Research. Chapter 4 focuses on Valcrcel and the
indigenous movement that had intellectual roots in
Cuzco. Valcrcel drew inspiration from the discovery
of the ruins of Machu Picchu and subsequently became
enamored with Marxist ideas. In 1927 he was briefly
imprisoned for publishing a work in which he called
for a revolution to create an idealized Inca state.
Chapter 5 focuses on the amateur archaeologist
Rafael Larco Hoyle, who proposed the idea that rather
than an early highland Chavn culture diffusing west-
ward, an early coastal Cupisnique culture had spread
eastward. The focus of chapter 6 is the 1950s, when the
military government approved research by American
Fulbright students. John Rowe and his students at
Berkeley also conducted research at this time. He
established a temporal scheme of alternating periods
and horizons based on stylistic changes identified
for the Ica Valley. The focus of chapter 7 is the
 168 LATIN AMERICAN ANTIQUITY
ethnohistorian John Murra, who used documents to
identify the locales of specific sites. In particular,
attention is given both to his work at the Inca ruins
of Hunuco Pampa and to his archipelago model. It
was during the 1960s that the National Geographic
Society sponsored multidisciplinary explorations and
excavations in the Moche Valley; another major multi-
disciplinary American project focused on the Mantaro
Valley. The political climate inside and outside Peru
had changed due to the Cold War. Research in the fol-
lowing decade was decidedly focused on social science
as practiced by the Peruvian Luis Lumbreras, who is
the focus of chapter 8. Chapter 9 discusses the highly
disruptive 1980s and the rise of the Shining Path.
During this period yet another major multidisciplinary
project, international in character, was conducted in
the Moquegua region. Opportunities were provided to
faculty and students, especially those affiliated with
San Marcos. But, as discussed in chapter 10, during
the 1990s the government temporarily shut down this
public university and severely reduced its funding. In
concert with increased foreign funding for the private
Catholic University, this served to reduce the prestige
and outreach of San Marcos. Finally, at the start of
the new century the newly elected president linked
his administration to the glorious past of the Inca as
expressed in the ruins of Machu Picchu, thus signaling
a revival of nationalism.
Each of Tantalens chapters could be expanded
into a book, resulting in a series that would cover a
plethora of topics and viewpoints. Tello, for example,
is given insufficient credit for his social activism, as
demonstrated by articles written by and about him
published in the Lima press. Tantalens chapters are
in part character-driven, in part theoretically driven,
and in part institutionally driven, all within the con-
text of the complexities of national and international
interconnections over time. While his presentation at
first glance appears to be primarily chronological,
this is not necessarily so, nor is there consistency of
focus from chapter to chapter. The final chapters, for
example, become increasingly personal and autobio-
graphical.
Despite these criticisms, Tantalen merits praise
for publishing the first analytical general history of
Peruvian archaeology and a debt is owed to Charles
Stanish for his fine translation. Tantalens book
provides an important starting point from which to
begin serious discussions inside and outside the class-
room. Its target audience is primarily professional, but
because of the larger-than-life characters discussed
within, it will appeal to anyone interested in the history
of archaeology in general, and specifically that of
Peru.
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[Vol. 28, No. 1, 2017]
Pointe de Caille: Desarrollo Cultural Postsaladoide
en la Isla de Saint Lucia. MARA ANTONIA
NEGRETE MARTNEZ. 2015. Mitteilungen der
Prhistorischen Kommission, vol. 83. sterreichis-
che Akademie der Wissenschaften, Philosophisch-
historische Klasse, Vienna. 538 pp. 160.00 (paper),
ISBN 978-3-7001-7708-1.
Reviewed by Corinne Hofman, Caribbean Research
Group, Faculty of Archaeology, Leiden University,
The Netherlands
This book by Mara Antonia Negrete Martnez is an
excellent report on several years of excavation (1983
1987) by an Austrian team under the direction of
Prof. Dr. Herwig Friesinger at the precolumbian site
of Pointe de Caille (Saltibus Point) located on the
southeastern coast of the island of Saint Lucia in the
Lesser Antilles. The site is dated between the sixth and
fourteenth centuries, and represents the late Saladoid,
Troumassoid, and Suazoid series. It is one of the most
extensively excavated sites on the island and, with a
timespan of several centuries, very interesting for the
study of long-term processes of human occupation at
the same locality.
St. Lucia played a central role in the earliest
systematic study of Caribbean archaeology, primarily
through the efforts of the St. Lucia Archaeological and
Historical Society. The classification schemes devised
for St. Lucia in the 1960s have had a significant impact
on the archaeology of the entire region. This book
synthesizes the first major archaeological operation
on the island since that time and presents the data
from the excavations at Pointe de Caille in the context
of regional and macro-regional interaction. The data
presented reflect the cultural heterogeneity of the post-
Saladoid archaeological record in the Lesser Antilles.
This diversity can be explained from the perspective of
the extensive networks of human mobility present in
the Lesser Antilles, the exchange of goods and ideas,
shifting sociopolitical organization, fission and fusion
of communities, and changing contact lines over
time.
The meticulous field methods and techniques
adopted by the Austrian team are clearly reflected
in this accessible and well-illustrated volume. The
rigorous laboratory analyses of material culture and
funerary remains, as well as the comparisons made
with assemblages across the region, make this volume
a very comprehensive contribution to the current field
of Caribbean archaeology.
The book is divided into eight chapters written
in Spanish, with summaries in English and German,