La mirada de Ngenechen. Representaciones anfibiomorfas aplicadas al pastillaje en la alfarería de la Patagonia Noroccidental Argentina

Abstract

New findings in pre-hispanic pottery from San Martin de los Andes, Lacar district in Neuquén, allow us to relate the presence of decorative stylized zoomorphic attributes or abstract amphibiomorphs (frog) in fluvial environments. These attributes were historically characterized as “mamelones” in reference to female sexual attributes and symbols of fertility. However, this type of decorating pattern, which is very well known in the territory of South Central Chile in pre and post hispanic pottery, can be seen as the gradual abstraction of amphibiomorphs features emphatizing their distinctive detail, his eyes, which are characterized technically as protúberos. Besides the representation of amphibian as stylistic attribute, it is postulated as evidence of the hunter-gatherer worldview who occupied both slopes of the Andes between third and eighteenth centuries of our era.