El descubrimiento e invención de los mochicas, una cultura arqueológica de la costa norte del Perú

Abstract

After more than a century of archaeological investigations, today archaeologists have not reached consensus regarding the nature of the political organization of the Moche. In spite of the existence of a diverse array of proposals to explain this phenomenon, there are three different models that prevail: 1) one singular expansionist Moche State; 2) One territorial Moche State in the South and a variety of regional political entities in the North; 3) independent political units or city-states along all the valleys in the North Coast of Peru. If we start reviewing all the empirical evidence available, it is very complicated to decide which one to follow moreover knowing that the archaeological investigations tend to emphasize always a singular regional approach. Due to this unclear panorama these debates have moved not been given the required attention. Nevertheless, there is a concept that all Moche specialists agree upon and it is the acknowledgement that Moche is the first State in South America. This last proposal is not new, it was already expressed in the 40’s and it is considered a product of the conceptualization of Moche as an archaeological culture as well as an ethnic social and political entity...