Ceramics styles from Pucara de Tilcara settlement during inca domination

Abstract

This chapter aims to present a synthesis of the wide variety of stylisticmanifestations registered in the ceramic assemblages from Pucara de Tilcara, established as a capital of a wamani on an existing settlement. The pottery of this site allows characterizing styles from other regions of the Andes that circulated during the last late pre-Hispanic Period, as well as recognizing morphological and decorative transformations in pieces manufactured locally. We mainly focus on changes resulting from the Inca conquest that along with the identification of other representations, leads us to consider the pottery of this region?defined for decades as abstract or geometric?as an important visual resource for expressing identity messages and imposing new narratives by the State. In this context we highlight the use of two rhetorical figures: metaphor and metonymy, also detected in other non-ceramic supports, reflecting the existence of religious beliefs related to supernatural and fertility cults.