Ice friction for moving the heavy stones at the ancient Pumapunku complex. A first technological approach to the age problem

Abstract

In this work, ice-lubrication for moving the lithic material at the Tiwanaku complex and particulary at the ancient Pumapunku site is discussed. Ice friction (sliding stones on a sheet of ice) is identified as the most feasible technology for the transport of heavy stones at Pumapunku which is much in line with the inventiveness and technological approach used by this civilization not only because the propitious climatological conditions of the Titicaca basin but also because their most than proved technical inventions and knowledge in crops frost protection technology (raised-field systems also called suka kollo in Aymara), which is believed modified drastically the entire microclimate of the basin. Indeed, it is very justified to think that if ancient Tiwanaku people were able to develop a completely efficient technology to face the negative effects of frost in the entire basin region, on the contrary, it becomes very difficult to believe that the same people either inadvertent or deliberately don’t took advantage of frost to move the heavy stones from the quarries. Because ice friction provides the maximum reduction in the number of men required to pull the heaviest stone and because Andean civilizations lacked draft animals before the arrival of Europeans, then by utilizing an available population growth model -derived from plausible crop-yield estimates, it is possible to asses a technologic upper limit for the age of the Tiwanaku civilization. Finally, for the specific case of andesite blocks which are believed to be quarried at the foot of the Mount Ccapia (90 km away from the Tiwanaku site) and sailed on large rafts or totora reed boats across lake Titicaca, the alternative possibility of an ancient ice-corridor in the Gulf of Taraco is analyzed

Postprint (author's final draft)