Preceramic maritime foragers of the Atacama Desert coast who created the world's oldest artificial mummies beginning around 7000 BCE, millennia before Egyptian mummification, and who thrived along the hyper-arid Pacific coast sustained by rich ocean resources.
The Chinchorro culture of the Atacama coast declined around 1500–1700 BCE as intensifying El Nino events collapsed the marine resources (particularly mangrove clam beds) that sustained the population, ending a mummification tradition spanning over 5,000 years.
The atlas holds 2 border frames for Chinchorro Culture — the shape you scrub through changes in 5000 BC · 1750 BC.
Continental prehistory covering the Chinchorro coast of the south-central Andes.
Broader Andean context placing Chinchorro within the regional preceramic and Formative sequence of South American coastal cultures.