Pica Oasis Socavones and Geoglyphs
Pica Filtration Gallery Geoglyphs · Oasis de Pica Socavones
Formative to Modern (Alto Ramírez to Colonial)·Tarapacá / Pica-Tarapacá / Hispanic oasis·🇨🇱 Tarapacá Region, Pica commune, Pampa del Tamarugal, Chile
About
About Pica Oasis Socavones and Geoglyphs
Pica (1,350 m, 20°29′21″S 69°19′46″W) is the only living oasis of the Atacama with active filtration galleries (socavones) tapping the Pica Aquifer; study by Lictevout et al. 2 km, feeding Puquio de Pica and Matilla. Surrounding piedmont between Precordillera and Central Depression bears 18 geoglyphs (camelid rows, 30-55 m arrows) on the Pica-Matilla pampa marking gallery intakes and caravan approaches. 1 m). Combined hydraulic-geoglyph landscape illustrates adaptation to one of Earth's driest deserts, with Limoncito and La Concova vineyard terraces (1379 m) and Camarones-style ceramics 900-1300 CE.
Why it mattersOnly Atacama oasis with both qanat-like galleries and associated geoglyphs.
Open questions
Mysteries & theories
Mysteries
- 01Dating of earliest galleries
Theories
- 01Pre-Inca puquio diffusion
Theories are interpretations, not findings. The seal above tells you how much scholarly weight the place carries.
History
How it came to be
- Built
- c.500 CE - present (galleries re-cut 17th-19th c.)
- Period
- Formative to Modern (Alto Ramírez to Colonial)
- Culture
- Tarapacá / Pica-Tarapacá / Hispanic oasis
- Builders
- Pica oasis communities; later Hispanic huas ocios
- Purpose
- Groundwater capture (qanat-like galleries) and caravan route marking
- Rediscovered
- 2020 Lictevout mapping
- Excavation
- Excavation ongoing
900
Pica-8 cemetery and geoglyph floruit
2020
Andean Geology socavones mapping
On the ground
Structures & features
20.4892° S · 69.3294° W · 1350 m · 2 mapped features
Puquio de Pica Intake Geoglyph
geoglyph42-m arrow geoglyph marking main socavón intake
20.4870° S · 69.3310° WLa Concova Main Socavón
hydraulic410-m filtration gallery mouth at 1379 m
20.4860° S · 69.3190° W