Museo Chileno de Arte Precolombino

Cultures > Center > Hunter Gatherers of Central Chile

Culto y Funebria

Several forms of burial have been identified for these hunter gatherer groups. In the Andes Mountains, the deceased were usually buried in rock shelters, which sometimes held several bodies. Some of these sites were also used as dwelling places and transitory camps. On the coast, individuals were buried in middens, heaps of waste shells left over from the extraction of mollusks. In the inland valleys, especially in the southern part of the territory, a more complex burial pattern has been found that includes large man-made earth mounds containing the remains of several bodies. These sites were occupied for an extended period of time, probably up to the first millennium of the present age. In all these different forms of burial, however, the bodies are placed in a highly flexed position and surrounded by stones.