Process-making the compound

by Di Hu

First, I tried to find the most complete site plan of a Tiwanaku compound that I could. I found it in Janusek's "Identity and Power in the Ancient Andes." It is called "Mistion 2" and is located at Lurkurmata, a Tiwanaku city. The Late Tiwanaku IV compound was very close to a canalized quebrada. Camelids, lake fowl, fish, lithic production and weaving were found.

I started my modeling process by looking at all the available information, including Michele Koons’ GPR data. I then sketched out the layout of the compound using Janusek’s plan of Mistion 2 at Lukurmata. Using ethnographic data and Michele’s GPR, I decided on the full dimensions of the compound. I traced it and raised it. Then I added the conjecture walls. I found that the North wall’s length was easy to conjecture because the “super” compound wall that enclosed the Mistion 2 compound did not run parallel to the north wall of the Mistion 2 compound. Thus, the Mistion 2 compound wall could only go so far before it would intersect the enclosing compound wall (Figures 2, 4). The other sides took much more conjecture. I interpreted the entrance to be on the lower, east side because the entrance to the super compound is parallel to the east wall.

I then added the houses I modeled before to the compound. This was pretty time consuming because I had to decide which ones were suitable. To decide, I reread three articles from the domestic architecture book and Janusek’s article from Silverman’s book. Also, placement was much harder than expected in Sketchup because of the jerky movements. To find the right dimensions of houses, I used Goldstein’s site plans from Lukurmata Structure 14, a Tiwanaku III house, and modeled the walls and the posts. Then I used the rough dimensions and the post holes to evaluate where the doors would be.

I then added more features to the compound including outer walls to the storage facilities, a pen, and a craft area.

For textures, I found Dr. Erickson’s textures pretty helpful. However, some did not have the right tints when they were scanned. Also, a lot of the pictures were at an angle, which made taking a good sample difficult. Furthermore, a lot were somewhat blurry. I went online and found some more textures for the adobe. I cut and modified a lot of the textures using Photoshop.

I then started to put the textures onto the compound. This proved quite difficult because there were so many details. The biggest problem was due to Sketchup. Sketchup does not allow one to stretch the texture over a surface. It automatically tiles it. I had to constantly go to Photoshop to make necessary changes. I also had to add other features like the canal, roof of the storage facility and the roof of the entrance. I noticed something very interesting with my model of the storage facilities. Some of the rooms have entrances only a little over a feet wide. How did they get their produce out? A possibility could be that at the bottom, it is narrow, but at the top, it is wider, possibly shaped like a trapezoid or an upright key. However, I just kept the door slim. This can be changed later if there is evidence for such doors.

This is how the compound was modeled step by step:
1) Scanned the site plan.
2) Imported plan into sketchup.
3) Traced the site plan
4) Raised the traced parts.
5) Researched single family compound sizes, thanks to Michele Koons and Dr. Erickson's Putuco book, and decided on the size and shape of the rest of the compound.
6) Raised the conjecture walls.
7) modified the Tiwanaku prototype houses made beforehand to fit the plans of real Tiwanaku houses.
8) Pasted the houses onto the compound floor in the right position.
9) Finished the details, put roofs over the kitchen/dwelling and storage facilities.
10) Added entrance.
11) Gathered textures and edited them.
12) Constantly modified textures both in sketchup and photoshop to get the right effect.
13) Sketch out details and made sure everything was textured.
14) Made the floor and textured it.
15) Revised roof on kitchen.
16) Cleaned up compound.

Just making this compound using Sketchup from start to finish took about 39 hrs.

After step 14, I picked up “State and Local Power in a Prehispanic Andean polity: Changing patterns of urban residence in Tiwanaku and Lukurmata, Bolivia” by John Janusek from the library. This was his dissertation from 1994. I found out through his more extensive notes on Mistion 2, which was what we modeled, that the round structure had a thatched roof (p. 219). I changed the model in light of the new information (Figure 10). The round building, which I interpreted to be part of a kitchen area, was consistent with the new information I found in Janusek’s dissertation. He aid that an early surface yielded cooking vessel sherds, camelid bones, and a complete mandible tool. Each floor of accumulated domestic refuse demonstrated typical domestic activities of grinding, cooking, serving, storage, weaving, and the consumption of camelids and fish (p. 219). It is also clear that they ate a lot of camelids. The later layers dated to 818+/- 110. The circular building is interesting because Janusek noted that the shape of it was simply not functional and it was different from the other rectangular buildings. He suggests that it may be a way for the group to identify itself from other social groups, possibly ethnically (p. 223). This was coincidentally consistent with our fictitious character family being from a different area.

Figure 11: X-ray view of the compound.

Figure 12: X-ray oblique view of the compound with people for scale.