Relationships between Oceanographic and Social Changes on Fishermen Populations during the Middle Holocene. A case study from Taltal (25°C South), Northern Coast of Chile

Summary

The existence of a marked paleoclimatic and paleoceanographic transition during the Middle Holocene on a global scale is well documented. Along the Pacific Coast of South America, temporal trends in the 14C reservoir effect during the Holocene show contrasting patterns between Southern Peru-Northern Chile and central Chile, pointing to significant changes in the structure of ocean currents and the origin of upwelling waters along coastal Northern Chile during the Holocene. The strong latitudinal gradient in upwelling intensity (i.e. higher in Southern Peru-Northern Chile than in central Chile) observed during the mid-Holocene vanished during the late Holocene. What were the consequences of these changes in oceanographic dynamics on the lifestyle of coastal fishermen groups that inhabited the arid coast of South America during the Holocene? Archaeological data from shell midden sites located on the Southern coast of the Atacama Desert (Taltal, 25° parallel South) will be presented to evaluate the relationship between social and oceanographic variations during the Middle Holocene. The implications of the case study will be discussed at local and regional scales.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 82nd Annual Meeting, Vancouver, BC (2017)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 17618