El Cóndor Devorador Tiwanaku (590-1150 D.C.): Convención, divinidad, y alegoría de un carroñerismo ritual

Abstract

The pre-Hispanic iconography of the Andes around violence, death, and fertility has been associated with sacred animals of various types and meanings whose rites persist to the present time. In Tiwanaku (590-1150 AD) the condor assumes these aspects within the theme that we call Tiwanaku Devouring Condor (CDT). The CDT`s images suggest rites associated with death, transformation, and propitiation through the sacralization of his scavenger behavior, and allow us to delve into the definition of a new category of iconographic themes defined as “Devourers”, in which the CDT positioned as the most continuous and ancient during the Middle Horizon. We propose that the CDT was a product of a ritual symbolism in which many cultures of the Andes converge.