The fantastical adventures of Colin and Francesca: Piura & The Vicus Culture

On November 26th we checked out of our hotel in Chiclayo and headed for the city of Piura, the first city the Spanish Pizarro founded in Peru and named after the Quechua word for abundance - “pirhua.” It wasn’t exactly a beautiful place we discovered, nor cheap. We looked at quite a few hostels before we found a new hotel that looked OK, while still being quite overpriced. There isn’t a tourist industry in Piura, and most people who come to the town catch an ongoing bus straight away to Mancora, or are there on business – hence the expensive rooms. However we decided to spend the night as I wanted to see a museum in the city on the following day.

The Museo Municipal Vicus was filled with some paintings by local school children, as well as by professional artists, but the best part was the archeology exhibit and the underground gold room – so I’ll start there.

In the gold room were 2,000 year old artifacts uncovered in December 2001 from the “Lord of Olleros,” a head shaman’s burial site in Ayabaca, an area northeast of Piura which borders Ecuador. Some of the artifacts found with the shaman included a shirt with 500 small decorative gilded copper platelets, golden necklaces, golden mouth ‘cover’ jewelry, golden nose rings and earrings, a copper spear, tumi knives, a crown, and a golden belt with a large golden cat head as the belt buckle.

There were also two small gold figures found with the shaman, male and female, showing rather graphic genitalia.

All of these findings showed a grave very different from typical clay urn graves in the region and more like the grave of the Lord of Sipan. This discovery prompted Dr. Mario Polía Meconio to propose that Ayabaca must have had a highly evolved culture with Mochica influence some 600 to 1000 years before the Guayacundos, the local people of the region.

The archeology exhibit explored the Vicus culture. The Piura region had been occupied with natives who lived without organization or a leader. It is believed that eventually a culture called the Muchik culture took them over, and the two groups combined to evolve into what we know as the Vicus culture. These societies were agriculture-based, and their technological advancement in bronze-working increased their agricultural technology as well. Systems of canals were built brining irrigation to the Chira and Piura Valleys. There seems to be an indication that the Vicus culture had political and commercial ties to the coastal Moche culture, which grew over time. The attractiveness of the more successful coastal societies resulted in many people in the area migrating towards the coast. At the same time the Moche’s control grew towards the inner valleys, and ended up eventually enveloping the at first distinctive Vicus culture.

Later on, the people in this region were known as ‘Guayacundos’ and fought the Incans, until the Incans defeated and pacified them. The Incan ruler Huayna Capac then built a fortress to maintain a hold on the region on the nearby Aypate hill – which now stands in ruins. The Aypate fortress and road also served as an Incan trail between Cuzco and Quito.

Down a side room, I found an interesting exhibit. Ancient peoples in the region believed they needed to prepare a corpse for its journey to another life. They did this by including items that person would need on a journey with them in their burial mound, such as clothing, food, pottery, and other decorative and daily items. One of these cities, which included a cemetery, is called Chusis. Chusis was occupied since 1000 BCE but was primarily used from between 100 BCE and 600 CE.

The city area (located 1.5 hours away from Piura) was constructed using a mix of marine rock, stones, and clay to make medium-sized adobe blocks. The area consisted of three zones, including a defensive area. The cemetery was separated by a dividing wall and contained 11 tombs which included artifacts for the after-life. Petroglyphs showing skeletons interacting were found indicating some beliefs about a life after death. One tomb was that of a warrior, his body has been recovered. Since the site doesn’t get much preservation, it continues to fall apart.

Leaving the Chusis finding, the museum continued on to show more Vicus culture pottery pieces, with numerous examples of their double spout and bridge bottle vessels which make whistling sounds when pouring liquids. The museum noted that many of the pieces were created using negative painting, meaning a wax or film was placed as the ‘design’ on the pottery, then the whole pot was painted in white, black, or various reds. When the wax was removed, there would be two different colors on the piece.

There were two different phases of Vicus pottery, with the first phase being only somewhat influenced by the Moche culture. As time went on the influence of the Moche grew as their control extended to the valley and people from the valley continued to migrate to the coast. Due to this, later Vicus buildings and handicraft creations resemble Moche almost completely. This was because the Moche fully controlled the region of Piura by these phases of Vicus artwork. The two cultures became one.