<論説>文明の誕生 : 古代アンデスの事例から (特集 : 文明)

Abstract

古代アンデス文明の始まりは紀元前三〇〇〇年に遡り、その指標は神殿建設とされる。形成期(前三〇〇〇-五〇年)に多くの神殿が建設されたが、各神殿は石や日干しレンガなどの建築材で同じ場所で建て直されることで結果的に大規模化した。また神殿の建設、更新活動の継続に伴い社会が大規模化、複雑化した。神殿の建設は、儀礼に関わる集団の実践の結果であり、当事者が意識、予想しない結果をもたらしたと言える。形成期の神殿を中心とした社会は国家や首長制社会など政体の既存の分類モデルでは十分に説明できないため、リチュアリティーという考えを導入する。また宗教的儀礼と神殿などの物質の関係を整理するためリチュアル・エコノミーという概念を援用し、政治と経済の要素が儀礼に埋め込まれている関係性を記述する。最後に初期の神殿の更新活動のメカニズムを、競合や個人のリーダーシップではなく、協同、集合行為という概念を用いて説明する。

Ancient Andean civilization dates to 3000 B. C. E., and its beginning is defined by the construction of temples (ceremonial centers). When Andean people started constructing temples, they did not cultivate crops such as maize or potato intensively and they did not use ceramics. During the Formative Period (3000-50 B.C.E.), Andean people constructed many temples and their area of distribution spread, but they did not form politically centralized social organizations such as states. The Formative Period is subdivided into 5 phases : Initial Formative Phase (3000-1500 B.C.E.), Early Formative Phase (1500-1200 B.C.E.), Middle Formative Phase (1200-800 B.C.E.), Late Formative Phase (800-250 B. C. E.), and Final Formative Phase (250-50 B. C. E.). Each temple was renovated at the same place using building materials such as stone or adobe and this resulted in gradual aggrandizement. Parallel to the continuous construction and renovation of temples, Andean formative societies were also aggrandized, and their complexity increased. As the dimensions of temples increased, the scale of societies also increased, so we can say that quantitative change brought about qualitative change. But it was impossible to enlarge temples indefinitely ; at some point every temple was abandoned without continued renovations. Thus, Andean temples changed in quality and did not maintain the same conditions. Temples themselves were material objects external to the human body and their size did not indicate the power of the people who led the construction but was related to the amount of manpower accumulated over a long period. Unintended consequences were brought about by the practices of the human ritual groups that constructed the temples. Andean societies of the Formative Period cannot be defined appropriately by models of political organization such as the state or chiefdom, so the concept of "rituality" is introduced in this paper. Rituality applies to societies that emphasized the ritual, communal, and group solidarity on which these entities were founded. The ritual part of Andean formative societies is of primary significance and is not a characteristic incidental to the polity. Rituality and polity are treated as distinct layers of a society and the society's character can be explained by their interrelationship. I introduce the concept "ritual economy" to analyze the relationship between religious ritual and material objects such as temples. Ritual economy is defined as "a theoretical construct that concerns the materialization of socially negotiated values and beliefs through acquisition and consumption aimed at managing meaning and shaping interpretation." By this term we explain a relationship in which political and economic elements are imbedded within ritual. In the case of Andean formative societies, it is constructive to analyze primarily ritual aspects that are not supplemental to political ones. In the case of Andean civilization, the material was tied to the ritual aspect and the complexity of the ritual aspect preceded the political one. Lastly, I try to explain the mechanism of early temples' renovation activities by using the concepts "cooperation" and "collective action, " not "competition" or "leadership of individuals." Cooperation is defined as "actions that require individuals to incur some cost or risk associated with other individuals receiving a benefit" and ritual activities at temples can be seen as a consequence of cooperation, not of competition. Groups of individuals with common interests are expected to act on behalf of their common interests, and collective action treats problems in which the optimal strategy from the perspective of an individual differs from the optimal strategy viewed from the perspective of a group. It is supposed that the population size of an Andean formative society was around 3, 000, and did not exceed it. And the question is how it is possible that social size grows in scale without compulsion or political power. To discuss Andean formative cases, the task at hand is how to connect the increase of the repertory of ritual activities (agriculture, alcohol, ceramics, textiles, metal objects, etc.) to the increase in the size of the population at each temple. Andean civilization was born without state formation, but it resulted in giving birth to states 3, 000 years later. Future research is needed to classify ritualities and analyze how political elements were intensified within these ritualities.