Art & Art History ETDs

Publication Date

Spring 4-14-2025

Abstract

The Moche were semi-autonomous communities who thrived in the ten fertile riverine valleys of Peru’s northern coast between the late fourth and ninth centuries CE. Phase IV (c. 590–700 CE) Southern Moche ceramics feature intricate fine line visual narrative scenes with many multivalent symbols and motifs. This dissertation intends to understand why plants begin to play a more significant role in the Moche iconographic corpus in this period. I explore the interests of elites, the ecological web interweaving image and environment, and species identification.

The images provide us with a glimpse of a time and place in which humans were keenly aware of their environmental impact and also worked to alter, advance, correct, and understand their role in the natural world. I argue that depictions of plants occurred under elite patronage to achieve three main goals:

1. Showing the unseen: They allowed non-participants to see rituals that occur outside the public eye and used plants to locate the areas in which these events occur.

2. As tools of dialogue: Pottery with plant depictions allowed various middle- and high-level elites to send nonverbal messages with goals of acknowledgment and alliance.

3. Legitimizing rule: They deified elites by showing them performing certain tasks in which ritual and ideology played a role in maintaining the ecological balance.

Project Sponsors

Latin American Iberian Institute, UNM

Language

English

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Art History

Level of Degree

Doctoral

Department Name

UNM Department of Art and Art History

First Committee Member (Chair)

Dr. Margaret Jackson

Second Committee Member

Dr. Katherine Chiou

Third Committee Member

Dr. Loa Traxler

Fourth Committee Member

Dr. Douglas Sharon

Keywords

Moche, Mochica, Pre-Hispanic Art, Ethnobotany, Lomas, Humedales

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