LAUSR

The deep social meaning behind food behaviors has significant consequences in diasporic communities and may be one of the hallmarks of the expansion of the Tiwanaku state in the central Andes. The consumption or utilization of corn beer (chicha), coca leaves, and hallucinogenic drugs spread from the altiplano along with several material traditions, but may superficially overlie complex biocultural interactions across the region. This report contextualizes oral pathology from Middle Horizon (AD 500–1100) skeletal samples in the Azapa Valley of northern Chile into the material record to test how diet was constructed and manipulated under influences from the Andean diaspora. Six oral pathology variables were recorded in 295 individuals and compared (age-adjusted) among archaeological traditions (Alto Ramirez, Cabuza, and Maytas-Chiribaya). No significant differences were observed in oral pathology frequencies between traditions, suggesting that material evidence for the influence of Tiwanaku in the Azapa Valley may not have extended to significant changes in local diet, including specialized ritual traditions like the consumption of chicha. These results additionally support models of generalized biological continuity in the lower Azapa Valley and are indicative of consistency in a local dietary base across much of the precontact cultural sequence in the area.