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The Ancient Nasca World pp 279–327Cite as

Puquios: The Nasca Response to Water Shortage

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Abstract

In this chapter, we provide an overview on the state of the art of the investigations conducted up to now on the ancient Nasca filtration galleries, locally known as puquios. They are located in the three valleys of the Nasca, Taruga, and Las Trancas rivers. The technological characteristics of puquios, along with the main archaeological issues still open today such as, for example, the dating and potential relationships between puquios and the Nasca Lines, are briefly summarized. Finally, outputs from satellite-based investigations along with a brief overview on the location of the existing puquios, their current conditions, and management issues are provided.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Results from some geoelectrical investigations performed in 2014 between Gran Piramide and the Nasca River revealed the presence of shallow aquifers at 8–10 m of depth, confirmed by a well which has been excavated. This suggests that in Cahuachi, the Nasca were able to exploit the water tapped by using a water-supply system (including puquios?) and channeling for drinking and rituals. In this respect, small canals have also been found in Piramide Naranja (see Chap. 4 by Orefici).

  2. 2.

    Río Taruga and Río Las Trancas have an average annual flow of 4.4 and 56.1 million m3 of water, respectively.

  3. 3.

    In the case of ASTER data, the selected SWIR channel is band B6 (named also SWIR_band5) at 2.145–2.185  μm wavelength. In the case of Landsat TM data, the selected SWIR channel is band 5 at 1.55–1.75 μm wavelength.

  4. 4.

    Chapter 22 in this volume provides results obtained from recent detailed satellite analyses based on a long time series (1985–2010) of Landsat TM pictures.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. National Research Council (CNR) - Institute of Methodologies for Environmental Analysis (IMAA), C. da S. Loya, 85050 Tito Scalo, Potenza, Italy

    Rosa Lasaponara

  2. CEAP, Calle Callao, 771, Nasca (Ica), Peru

    Josué Lancho Rojas

  3. National Research Council (CNR) - Institute of Archaeological and Monumental Heritage (IBAM), C. da S. Loya, 85050, Tito Scalo, Potenza, Italy

    Nicola Masini

Authors
  1. Rosa Lasaponara
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  2. Josué Lancho Rojas
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  3. Nicola Masini
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Correspondence to Rosa Lasaponara .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. National Research Council (CNR), Institute of Archaeological and Monumental Heritage (IBAM), Potenza, Italy

    Rosa Lasaponara

  2. National Research Council (CNR), Institute of Methodologies for Environmental Analysis (IMAA), Potenza, Italy

    Nicola Masini

  3. Centro Italiano Studi e Ricerche Archeologiche Precolombiane (CISRAP), Brescia, Italy

    Giuseppe Orefici

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Lasaponara, R., Lancho Rojas, J., Masini, N. (2016). Puquios: The Nasca Response to Water Shortage. In: Lasaponara, R., Masini, N., Orefici, G. (eds) The Ancient Nasca World. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-47052-8_13

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-47052-8_13

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