Jordi Armani Rivera Prince

JORDI RIVERA PRINCE, then a graduate student at University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida, was approved funding in April 2022 to aid research on “Power in the Hands of Many: A Bioarchaeological Approach to Study Social Inequality in the Ancient Andes, North Coast of Peru (400-200 cal. B.C.),” supervised by Dr. O. Gabriel Prieto. This project aimed to identify if inequality was expressed in the bioarchaeological and material remains of the late Early Horizon coastal fishing community José Olaya – La Iglesia Colonial de Huanchaco (JO-IG). Funding facilitated four direct enhancements of the dissertation research: 1) analyses of remaining burial objects from the cemetery of JO-IG; 2) a visit to the field to review my skeletal analyses, finalize inventory, and f inalize curation of human remains prior to their return to the Ministerio de Cultura; 3) radiocarbon dating of 8 burials, and 4) dietary (d13C and d18O on enamel) and heavy stable isotope (87Sr/86Sr +Pb-series paired bone and enamel) analyses. All mortuary objects and associated ceramics from Salinar affiliated graves were completed. Radiocarbon dates confirmed the occupational sequence of the Salinar burials. A total of 50 dietary (d13C and d18O on enamel) light stable isotopes, and six heavy stable isotope (87Sr/86Sr +Pb-series paired bone and enamel) analyses were completed and comprise a large dietary study of Salinar individuals. This project is the first to study diet, identity, and inequality in Salinar coastal communities of the North Coast of Perú combining mortuary and bioarchaeological evidence in the same study.