TITICACA BASIN ARCHAEOLINGUISTICS - URU, PUKINA AND AYMARA AD 750-1450

Current linguistic and ethnohistoric models propose that the Aymara et hnic group were late migrants into the Titicaca basin, and favor Uru o r Pukina ethnic groups as the authors of the Tiwanaku civilization, wh ich dominated the Central Andes for roughly half a millennium (AD 500- 1000). A review of linguistic, ethnohistoric and archaeological data s uggests that the Aymara have a substantial time depth in the basin (at least 2,000 years), are the people of Tiwanaku and may have been orga nized in a manner termed 'salpicada', which resulted in the historic p attern of intermingled Uru, Pukina and Aymara communities.