48 49 After more than a century of research by hundreds of archaeologists at sites located in Peruvian coastal deserts and valleys, the high- lands, and tropical forests, there is very little doubt that Wari was one of the largest, most complex cultural and political entities that de- veloped in the central Andean region. Ample material evidence supports the claim that it was bigger, wealthier, and more elaborate than any Andean society that had existed before. This evidence comes in the form of monu- mental sites, such as the Wari capital city and regional administrative centers including Pikillacta and Cerro Baúl, as well as in objects of exceptional beauty: textiles of many kinds, polychrome ceramics, sculptures in stone and wood, inlaid ornaments, and metal artifacts crafted by some of the most gifted artists ever to work in the Central Andes. Their creations are the subject of this catalogue. Only the Inca Empire, several centuries along the line, achieved more complexity in terms of organization and influence, or en- compassed a larger territory and incorporated more preexisting societies. Some consider the Wari to be the antecedent to the Inca, not only because the two cultures occupied the same general region but also because the Wari may have laid the economic, administrative, and perhaps linguistic foundations on which the Inca developed an even larger empire in a short period of time (see pp. XX–XX, “Wari’s Andean Legacy”). Furthermore, to most re- searchers Wari is the first empire in ancient South America, and thus the earliest such form of political organization in the southern hemisphere. In the previous essay Katharina Schreiber provides a wonderful summary of this point of view. Thus, Wari was the first Andean society that went through the troubles Looking at the Wari Empire From the Outside In Luis Jaime Castillo Butters involved in creating a polity of a magnitude never seen before, which it accomplished without the advantage of foreign inspiration or influence and with no knowledge that, centu- ries before, the Egyptians, Assyrians, Chinese, and Romans had grown to become empires in their own worlds. Being the first had its advantages: there was little competition, less resistance, ample space for innovation, un- tapped resources, and great opportunities for reorganization of economics and society. But climbing to the top of the ladder carried enor- mous risks and challenges, such as exploring uncharted territories and developmental tra- jectories, interacting with unknown societies, confronting enormously difficult organization- al issues caused by heterogeneity, and testing untested internal strengths and capacities, and these issues are only what had to be tackled in the early stages of building an empire. Nevertheless, when the Wari phenomenon is seen from the outside, from beyond Wari’s borders, its might dims and its image blurs. The ways in which Wari interacted with the societies that existed on its periphery—the Moche, Recuay, Nasca, and Cajamarca, to name a few—are far more diverse, more adapted to local circumstances and opportu- nities, than the ways Wari exercised power within its borders. My task here is to give an alternative point of view, that of someone standing “beyond Wari walls” 1 and looking in, over the centuries it took for this colossal society to emerge, grow, decline, and col- lapse. My particular point of view is that of the Moche of the northern Peruvian coast, a society that for much of Wari’s early history coexisted with it and was influenced by it in more ways that we usually want to accept. The Moche, regarded as one of the first state- Figure 9 [121]. Left, Cup with axe-bearing super- natural being, from San José de Moro; ceramic and slip; H. 15.2 cm, Diam. 10.5 cm. Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú, Lima, M-U1242-C09? Photo: Archive of the Proyecto Arqueológico San José de Moro.