Mysterious Mummies

The Chinchorro purposely took advantage of the mummification conditions of the Atacama desert throughout their reign, but especially towards the beginning and end of their cultural era. Bodies were buried in the desert in reed mats and camelid furs. Some had grave goods including stone knives, shells, fish hooks and fishing nets, perhaps for their use in a mirroring afterlife (Arriaza 1995a). Some mummies were also painted red (Arriaza 1995a) and a few had organs removed (Arriaza 1995b).

 

However, the case of the natural mummy is unclear in the literature. Were natural mummies buried and mummified in the desert and then exhumed for village life before being reburied in the cemeteries with artificial mummies, or were these natural mummies not exhumed and thus not made part of village life? As the length of time this would have taken is undescribed, I would imagine the later is believed. If natural mummies were not moved and cemeteries were perhaps choicely placed in harsher desert conditions, they would not have taken part in village life as other mummies assumably did, which would to suggest social differentiation. Indeed, Arriaza and his colleagues (2005) discuss how the difference in time and effort needed for these mummification processes suggest a possible status differentiation, but note that there were also particular periods where natural mummification is believed to have been simply more popular.