South America (Geographic Keyword)
301-325 (1,326 Records)
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Daily Life Rhythms: Narrating Milpa Landscapes in Mexican mountains & Sustaining Agroforestry Practices in Brazil (2024)
This is an abstract from the "Weaving Epistemes: Community-Based Research in Latin America" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This paper highlights the importance of agroforestry communities in Latin America as guardians of ancestral knowledge related to plant cultivation and ecological practices that have shaped the region's landscape and cultural heritage. These communities celebrate the interconnectedness between people and the environment,...
Daily Practices and the Creation of Cultural Landscapes in Amazonia (2017)
Short-term, small-scale interactions between humans and the environment may result in profound transformations of that environment over time. Recent archaeological research in Amazonia has revealed the extent that daily practices, such as refuse disposal or cultivation, have modified the soil in the vicinity of ancient and modern settlements. The fertile anthropic soil known as terra preta, formed mainly through the discard of refuse around habitation areas, is an example of how quotidian...
A Database of Neutron Activation Analysis Characterizing Indigenous Ceramics from South America (2016)
The earliest ceramics in South America were made by the indigenous peoples at least 7500 years BP. Ceramics were used for a variety of purposes, including cooking and storage vessels, funerary urns, toys, ceremonial items, sculptures and other art forms. Over the past 25 years, the Archaeometry Laboratory at the University of Missouri Research Reactor has performed neutron activation analysis on more than 7,000 ceramics and clays from locations throughout South America to establish a...
Date and context of early mussel shell fishhooks (Choromytilus chorus) from the southern coast of the Atacama Desert, Taltal, Chile. (2016)
Fishing tools made on marine shells are an important aspect in the economy of prehistoric fishing groups around the world. The oldest shell fishhook along the Pacific Coast of the American Continent dates around 10000 years BP and comes from Baja California, Mexico. On the northern coast of Chile, fishhooks on mussel shell (Choromytilus chorus) have been recovered from the archaeological site of Morro Colorado with dates between 8500 and 6500 cal BP. The appearance of this technology marks the...
De regreso al Valle de los Quijos (Ecuador): aproximaciones gráficas factoriales para interpretar la concentración de basura prehistórica como el momento de compactación sociopolítica de los cacicazgos (2016)
Estudios neo- evolucionistas desarrollados en las últimas décadas, muchos inspirados en las investigaciones arqueológicas desarrolladas en el Valle de la Plata, Colombia, plantean como un elemento fundamental la identificación de unidades políticas cacicales a partir de la dispersión de material cultural en la superficie de las áreas prospectadas. Investigaciones recientes llevadas adelante por nosotros en el Valle de los ríos Cosanga y Quijos, en la Ceja de Montaña Oriental de los Andes...
The decoupling of environment and political change in the prehistoric southern Titicaca Basin (2017)
As the greater project of this symposium attests, we want to become more aware of the constraints of our historical training and try to not separate culture from nature, or politics from the environment in our study of the past. Towards that end, the authors have been working on understanding water and lake level regimes of the southern Titicaca Basin, to better understand the history of this shallow lake and the people that lived around it from the Formative through the Late Horizon. ...
Deep Histories and Persistent Places: Repetitive Mound-Building and Mimesis in the Jama Valley Landscape, Coastal Ecuador (2018)
This paper explores the notions of ‘material memory’ and human agency in deep time as expressed in the repetitive reconstruction of earthen platform mounds over some three millennia in the Jama Valley of coastal Manabí Province, Ecuador. Empirical evidence of repetitive mound-building is presented over a long stratigraphic record extending from approximately 2030 BCE to about 1260 CE, and special emphasis is given to the site of San Isidro, a major civic-ceremonial site and ‘persistent place’...
The Defensive Conformation of the Maritime Space in the Bay of Cartagena de Indias (Colombia) during the Eighteenth Century (2024)
This is an abstract from the "Underwater and Coastal Archaeology in Latin America" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Cartagena de Indias’ geostrategic importance for the European colonial powers in the eighteenth century led to the creation of defense infrastructures and the development of practices to strengthen and protect the coastal territory. All the infrastructures and cultural practices inherent to the “militarization” of this territory...
Defining Identity during Revitalization: Taki Onqoy in the Chicha-Soras Valley (Ayacucho, Peru) (2017)
Investigations into Early Colonial Period status and identity of New World indigenous people have focused on assemblages of Spanish and indigenous goods in domestic and public contexts (Deagan 2003, Rice 2012). These studies have investigated how access to new goods and foodways may have reflected status among indigenous people, or how use of these imports in specific contexts were markers of changing identities. This paper presents excavation results at Iglesiachayoq (Ayacucho, Peru), an Inka...
Demographic Analysis of a Looted Late Intermediate Period Tomb, Chincha Valley, Peru (2015)
Ethnohistorical and archaeological sources establish that the Chincha Valley on Peru’s south coast hosted a populous and economically complex polity during the Late Intermediate Period (1200-1470 CE). A 2013 survey of the middle valley revealed more than 40 cemeteries containing over five hundred highly visible, above-ground collective tombs resembling highland chullpas. To establish a baseline demographic profile for this mortuary tradition, we conducted an osteological analysis of one looted...
Dennis Stanford's Legacy in Latin America (2018)
The influence that Dennis Stanford has had on archaeologists (and others) working in Latin America on the topic of early peopling is discussed, with specific reference to lithic technology, migratory models, and logistical/academic support.
Detecting Pre-Columbian Paleoecological Disturbance in the Lower Amazon (2016)
Amazonia is a major reservoir of biodiversity that has been influenced by anthropogenic activities for millennia. However, the temporal and spatial scale of pre-Columbian land use and its modern legacy on Amazonian landscapes are among the most debated topics in New World archaeology, paleoecology and conservation. This research investigates pre-Columbian (3000-1492 AD) land-use on Amazonian landscapes near the confluence of the Tapajós and Amazon rivers, a region once occupied by the capital of...
Determination of Burial Locations Using Soil Analyses at the Loyola Plantation in French Guiana, 1668-1763 (2017)
Our paper discusses the approach used to determine the location of burials in an equatorial environment where organic preservation is nil. Before using the space of the plantation cemetery to preserve the memory of the enslaved who lived at the plantation we had to demonstrate the extant of the cemetery using soil analyses. Memory of that period is a fleeting souvenir among local residents and we want to use archaeology to address issues with which they are confronted in order for them to...
Developing a "Mound Literacy" for the Late Archaic Norte Chico Region (2016)
During the Late Archaic Period, dramatic cultural transformations took place along the north central coast of Peru in a region known as the Norte Chico. These changes included a transition from hunting-gathering-fishing to farming, more intense social interaction, new kinds of power relationships between leaders and respondent populations, and the construction of monumental ceremonial architecture—all hallmarks of emergent social complexity. This paper moves beyond questions of why people built...
The Development of Andean Textile Dying Technology (2016)
Textiles have always had great social significance in the Andes. They were used to expressed identity and power as well as position and function within society. Intensive investment in textile technologies yielded some of the best such artifacts of the ancient world. While spinning and weaving produced fine garments, it was colors—achieved primarily through the use of brilliant organic dyes—that constituted the major visual qualities of Andean textiles. A limited number of studies exist that...
The Development of Inequality in Middle Horizon Cusco: Entheogens and Ritual Ceremonies to the Rescue (2016)
The Andean and Amazonian regions are home to numerous plants that can be prepared to induce altered states of consciousness. During the pre-Inka period in the Cusco area, evidence from the village of Ak'awillay indicates the consumption of alcohol, coca, and hallucinogens in public ceremonies. Some of the rituals involving entheogens could have corresponded to healing sessions, but the paraphernalia uncovered at the site suggests that most hallucinogens were consumed to communicate with the...
The Development of ‘Peripheral Communities’ in the Eastern Andes (2015)
The Chachapoya have come to be seen as a peripheral cultural entity in relation to the broader pre-Columbian Andes, yet little work has addressed how these ‘peripheral’ communities developed in relation to each other. While it is clear that the material culture that is manifestly associated with the Chachapoya developed prior to AD 1000, it is unclear how uniform this process was on a regional level. In the pre-Columbian Andes the development of centralized and partitioned monumental...
Did Potters Urn? Potential Skeletal Evidence of Ceramic Production from the Ch’iji Jawira Site in Tiwanaku, Bolivia. (2016)
The city of Tiwanaku (AD 500-1100) in the Bolivian altiplano was comprised of multiethnic neighborhoods, with some of these barrios being home to "guild-like" specialists laboring at differing jobs. Ch’iji Jawira, one site within this community, is often described in the archaeological record as containing both a manufacturing center for pottery and a residential area home to these ceramic manufacturers. Prior bioarchaeological research has also shown that the people who were buried at the...
Diet and Adaptations in a High Altitude Rockshelter of Southern Peru, Based on Stable Carbon and Nitrogen Isotopes (2017)
We present the results of stable carbon and nitrogen isotope analyses made on well-preserved collagen of four Early and one Middle Holocene adult humans together with coeval faunal remains of Cuncaicha rockshelter in the Peruvian puna to determine paleodiet. In addition, we reconstruct important aspects of the ecology of the Pucuncho Basin, in which Cuncaicha is located, using new as well as already available and secured values for stable carbon and nitrogen of archaeological and modern fauna...
"Diet and connections among cultural groups in the Atacama Desert during the Late Intermediate Period (AD 950-1450) (2015)
The Pica-Tarapacá and the Atacama cultures appeared in northern Chile during the Late Intermediate Period, after the decline of the Tiwanaku state. Archaeological data suggests that both groups practiced maize agriculture and pastoralism to variable degrees, but their trade and exchange links differed significantly. Interaction with coastal groups, in the form of fish and other marine resources is common in the Pica-Tarapacá sites. The Atacama groups, who occupied the Atacama oases and...
Diet in Coastal Arequipa, Peru, at the Dawn of the Wari Empire (2017)
Excavations at Uraca, a cemetery in the Majes Valley, Arequipa, Peru, uncovered incomplete human skeletons (MNI = 157) and associated grave goods dating to the Early Intermediate Period and the early Middle Horizon. Interpersonal violence was omnipresent at Uraca: 67 of 100 adults suffered cranial wounds (7 were insults received around the time of death), and 20 individuals were violently decapitated and/or defleshed after death. AMS dates show the individuals buried at Uraca lived from...
Diet, Status, and Identity in Colonial Peru: Investigations at Carrizales (Zaña Valley, Peru) (2016)
Late 16th century Peru was a dynamic period associated with emerging Spanish colonial polices - forced resettlement and tribute extraction – coupled with general demographic decline. Spanish officials and indigenous communities alike had to make difficult choices on how they provided for their households and put food on the table. We examine the effects of this tumultuous period on Spanish and indigenous foodways at the reducción site of Carrizales, located in the lower Zaña Valley on the North...
Different and complementary landscapes: A case of study in the Flona-Tapajós (2016)
The goal of this presentation is to contribute to the ongoing debate in Amazonian studies to which human societies impacted and reshaped the landscapes. Landscapes are the results of a human action and environmental changes over time, providing a fundamental dataset for understanding social practices in a historically particular manner (Ingold 1993). Ultimately, this presentation sheds light on the formation and significance of settlement patterns within sites located in the Flona-Tapajós and...
Digital Archaeology and Virtual Reality Models of the Penal Colonies in the Galápagos Islands (1860–1959) (2023)
This is an abstract from the "Unsettling Infrastructure: Theorizing Infrastructure and Bio-Political Ecologies in a More-Than-Human World" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Islands have been used by societies around the world to abandon, exile, or relocate those deemed unworthy. Repressive institutions, as a form of state infrastructure, have been created on the islands during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries to detain political prisoners,...