Archaeology of Fueguian Islands: Tierra del Fuego, Dawson and Navarino, Human Settlement and Cultural Interaction (Patagonia, Chile)

Summary

The fueguian archipelago, dominated by three mayor islands named Tierra del Fuego, Dawson and Navarino, is located in the southernmost end of South America. Peopled by hunter-gatherer societies since c. 10.500 BP, the interior sea formations date to Early Holocene. Shoreline environments have evidence of specialized marine adaptation since c. 6.500 BP, after which colonization has been generally interpreted as homogenous, stable and continuous.

Ethnohistoric and ethnographic records account for an overlapping network area of three groups: selk'nam land hunters and alacalufe or kawésqar from central-western Patagonia and yamana or yagan, south of Beagle channel, both maritime nomads.

This subsistence dichotomy -terrestrial/marine and pedestrian/canoe- has restrained research and comprehension of the archaeological record. Therefore a broad and comparative assessment has been overtaken, with a methodological focus on objects or artifacts whose origin can be traced as transport evidence and face to face relations (e.g. lithic and bone raw materials). Also, technological traits related to certain cultural elements that involve more complex teaching-learning processes, sharing and information flows have been studied (e.g. complex core reduction, cranial modification techniques).

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This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 80th Annual Meeting, San Francisco, CA (2015)

Keywords

Spatial Coverage