La serpiente en el arte rupestre de Nocui, norte semiárido de Chile

rock art research recently conducted at the pastures of nocui (region of coquimbo, chile) reveals the remarkable technical and iconographic development archieved in engravings during early ceramics period (ca. 2000 bp) and until the blossoming of diaguita culture (1000-1536 ad). this suggest that rupestrian expressions played a primary rol in the process of appropriation of the local territory, as carried out through a seasonal hunting and grazing economic strategies. we propose that the high symbolic value attributed in this way to specific locations became sacralized through time, making certaim places essential to the construction of local identity and the promotion of its cosmovision.