Andean landscape conference at the British Museum
Institute for the Study of the Americas
Bill Sillar, ISA Associate Fellow and Lecturer at the Institute of Archaeology, UCL, received KT funding to assist with a conference, Landscape, Site and Symbol in the Andes: Inca ushnus, held at the British Museum, 18-21 November 2010.
The conference, organised collaboratively with colleagues from the BM, Royal Holloway, University of London, and the University of Reading, came at the end of an AHRC-funded research project focused on how the Inca Empire (c. AD 1400-1532) modified the Andean landscape, interacted with the environment, and appropriated new territories and ethnic populations through specific architectural constructions. That project focused on the ushnu, a Quechua term meaning restricted or sanctified space, varying from stone-faced stepped pyramids and platforms located in the central plazas of regional administrative centres, to smaller constructions placed at prominent visible points in the landscape.
The conference provided a public forum to demonstrate how the results of the British project relate to the work of other researchers from Peru, North America, and Europe. It fostered international connections between universities, museums and cultural heritage managers – and holding the conference within the British Museum was central to that aim.
The event was used to develop and extend networks, and continued to build on the success of the South American Archaeology Seminars in fostering public interest in the rich heritage of the Andes. The conference also helped to support the developing profile of the Americas within the museum, highlighting the need for fuller representation of South America within its displays.
