NO. 1 CULTURAL DEVELOPMENT IN LATIN AMERICA 
81 
ing complex, known as the Chorrera Culture, rapidly spread to the 
Guayas Basin, as well as up the coast into the present province of 
Manabi. The only explanation that can account for this expansion into 
what remains today as some of the most fertile agricultural zones of 
the Ecuadorian coast is the introduction of a staple food crop. Both 
the cultural consequence and the time period at which it occurred 
suggest that this crop must have been maize. 
Among the Mesoamerican elements introduced at this time are pot- 
tery napkin-ring ear plugs, small obsidian blades, types of pottery 
decoration such as iridescent painting, zoned red and black painting, 
and innovations in form such as the annular base, undulating rim, 
and *'cuspidor"-shaped bowl. Carry-overs from the Machalilla Culture 
include the incised and red-banded types of decoration, and the 
carinated bowl form. Other elements of possibly local origin include 
bottles with tall spouts, connected to the body by a strap handle with 
a whistle at the base, zoomorphic whistling jars, and rare but beau- 
tifully modeled masculine pottery figurines. The thin walls and mirror- 
like polished surfaces produced by the Chorrera potters were never 
equaled, much less surpassed, in later cultures. 
Habitation sites were small, and no evidence has survived of house 
construction. No ceremonial structures have been identified, and if 
any existed they were apparently of perishable materials. The only 
implication that social organization was more advanced than in Val- 
divia times is the outstanding ceramic achievement, which seems al- 
most incredible in the absence of specialized craftsmen. The handi- 
cap of a wet tropical climate is particularly severe in this case, where 
so much of the cultural inventory must have been of perishable ma- 
terials, and we are willing to postulate that the sociopolitical and re- 
ligious level of development attained by the Chorrera Culture was 
higher than will ever be directly demonstrable from the archeological 
remains. 
Over the course of centuries, the Chorrera Culture spread not only 
over the coast, where so far it is unreported only in the far northern 
province of Esmeraldas and the southernmost province of El Oro, but 
also into the southern highland provinces of Canar and Azuay. The 
numerous similarities between the pottery of Chorrera and Chavin 
suggest that this diffusion may have continued southward into the 
north Peruvian highlands. In Ecuador this expansion was followed 
by adaptation to local conditions and sufficient isolation to produce a 
series of regional complexes that mark the advent of the next chron- 
ological period (fig. 10). 
Regional Developmental Period. — Even a superficial observer who 
