Early prehistoric sedentism and seasonal animal exploitation in the Caribbean lowlands of Colombia

doi:10.1016/j.jaa.2007.02.004

Journal of Anthropological Archaeology

Volume 26, Issue 3, September 2007, Pages 329-349

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jaa.2007.02.004 Get rights and content

Abstract

San Jacinto 1 represents a special-purpose settlement that was used by late Archaic foraging groups who logistically moved from base camps to special-purpose camps in order to collect and process subsistence resources at the onset of the dry season in the Caribbean savannas of northern Colombia. Situated in an optimal location for permanent water and seasonal concentrations of dry season subsistence items, the site’s location was part of a logistic strategy in which specific task groups were moved to resources during a short season of availability. Preserved vertebrate and invertebrate faunas at San Jacinto conform to expectations about assemblage ubiquity, richness, and evenness or equitability within the early occupational strata at the site. Specific animals including turtles and fish were pursued, and may have been processed with C3 plants and grasses in ubiquitous earth ovens. Certain local aquatic invertebrates were also procured along with the collection of specific extra-local gastropods.

Section snippets

Theoretical expectations: sedentism, early pottery, food production, and seasonality

San Jacinto 1 is an important and high resolution archaeological context for investigating the relationship between sedentism, early pottery, the origin of food production, and group territoriality in a markedly seasonal environment. Here, we use a general concept of sedentism which considers reduced mobility and increased territorial control through the constant presence of one group in the same location (Oyuela-Caycedo and Bonzani, 2005:34). We are interested in why these Archaic inhabitants

San Jacinto 1

San Jacinto 1 is the older of two sites found near the modern town of the same name, in the Department of Bolívar approximately 85 km to the southeast of the city of Cartagena (Fig. 1). The site lies at 210 m asl on the edge of the Serranía de San Jacinto, a series of foothills that rise to an elevation of 700 m asl. The surrounding Sabanas de Bolívar experience mean annual temperatures of 27.5 °C and strong annual contrasts between a protracted dry season from December to April/May with another

Faunal exploitation at San Jacinto 1

We are interested in how inferences derived from the preserved archaeofaunal assemblage at San Jacinto 1 conform to hypothetical expectations of early logistic mobility for faunal procurement in a highly seasonal savanna environment. During the recurring dry season occupations of the site, we expect that early foragers focused on the repeated exploitation of a restricted set of specific animal resources. These resources became highly predictable subsistence items through increased seasonal

Discussion

San Jacinto 1 is the first high resolution Archaic archaeological site with fiber-tempered pottery in Latin America that illustrates the complexity of variation in site formation, features, and material culture associated with the complex circuit of mobility and territorial resource use in highly seasonal tropical environments. Contextual and associational data suggest that Archaic foragers of northern Colombia were repeatedly occupying San Jacinto 1 in the fourth millennium before the

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More than half of the dorsal carapace elements show thermal alteration, suggesting that turtles were probably turned upside down and roasted in their shells. Stahl and Oyuela-Caycedo (2007) and Sampson (1998) propose that this specific burning technique is good evidence for human consumption. In Amazonian ethnographic literature, Amazonian ethnographic literature describes this particular roasting technique (Bates, 1979: 237; Werner, 1990; Smith, 1979).
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Zooarchaeological analysis of the role of turtles as a resource for ancient inhabitants has been approached in different regions of the world, within the Broad-Spectrum Revolution and paleodemography frameworks and covering extensive periods of time. In the present work, the role of tortoises (Chelonoidis chilensis) is discussed for the Beltrán Onofre Banegas-Lami Hernández site from Chaco-Santiagueña archaeological region (Santiago del Estero Province, Argentina). This site corresponds to the late agro-pottery stage. The proportion of used resources at the site was estimated and the ethnographic work of the study region and surrounding areas were analyzed to discuss the importance of turtles in the diet of ancient inhabitants. In accord with the results, C. chilensis was used opportunistically or circumstantially, and could be more relevant during summer as an additional resource to lizards, Tupinambis sp.
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Bone surface modification of the M1 sample showed that MSA people were also the main accumulators and modifiers of the tortoises (Thompson and Henshilwood, 2014), with human modification present on all element types (Fig. 3). Burning patterns in this phase also demonstrated that tortoises were processed by being cooked carapace side down in their shells (Fig. 4), which is an efficient mode of processing argued to have occurred in both the Old and New Worlds from the Middle Pleistocene to the present (Flannery and Wheeler, 1986; Schneider and Everson, 1989; Werner, 1990; Sampson, 2000; Speth and Tchernov, 2002; Stahl and Oyuela-Caycedo, 2007; Blasco, 2008; Thompson, 2010a). Skeletal element abundances suggested that humans were also the primary accumulators for the M3 sample, as raptors do not tend to deposit large quantities of carapace and plastron elements (Sampson, 2000).
The site of Blombos Cave (BBC), Western Cape, South Africa has been a strong contributor to establishing the antiquity of important aspects of modern human behaviour, such as early symbolism and technological complexity. However, many linkages between Middle Stone Age (MSA) behaviour and the subsistence record remain to be investigated. Understanding the contribution of small fauna such as tortoises to the human diet is necessary for identifying shifts in overall foraging strategies as well as the collecting and processing behaviour of individuals unable to participate in large-game hunting. This study uses published data to estimate the number of calories present in tortoises as well as ungulates of different body size classes common at South African sites. A single tortoise (Chersina angulata) provides approximately 3332 kJ (796 kcal) of calories in its edible tissues, which is between 20 and 30% of the daily energetic requirements for an active adult (estimated between 9360 kJ [3327 kcal] and 14,580 kJ [3485 kcal] per day). Because they are easy to process, this would have made tortoises a highly-ranked resource, but their slow growth and reproduction makes them susceptible to over-exploitation. Zooarchaeological abundance data show that during the ca. 75 ka (thousands of years) upper Still Bay M1 phase at BBC, tortoises contributed twice as many calories to the diet relative to ungulates than they did during the ca. 100 ka lower M3 phase. However, in spite of the abundance of their fossils, their absolute caloric contribution relative to ungulates remained modest in both phases. At the end of the site's MSA occupation history, human subsistence strategies shifted to emphasise high-return large hunted mammals, which likely precipitated changes in the social roles of hunters and gatherers during the Still Bay.
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Citation Excerpt :
This is mainly documented on carapace (70.1%) and does not coincide with the colouration described by Bennett (1999) for bones burned after burial. The data from double colourations indicate that the tortoise could be placed into the fire upside down, which is the common pattern described ethnographically (Werner, 1990; Sampson, 1998; Speth and Tchernov, 2002; Stahl and Oyuela-Caycedo, 2007). The incidence of carnivore on faunal assemblage from Level IV is very low.
The exploitation strategies of faunal resources have figured prominently in discussions of the timing and nature of the beginning of modern human behaviour. These strategies have focused on ability to make intensive use of seasonal resources, ability to hunt large or dangerous animals and capacity to exploit small prey, specifically fast-running and flying animals. On this basis, the systematic use of small animals for food at the pre-Upper Palaeolithic moments has been an important debate topic in recent decades. Occasional anthropogenic evidences concerning these animals dates back to the Plio-Pleistocene chronologies in Africa. Nevertheless, several authors state that the small animals began to be important in the human diet from at least the early Middle Palaeolithic in the Mediterranean Basin. From this perspective, this paper discusses the human use of small prey (rabbits, birds and tortoises) in the stratigraphical sequence of Bolomor Cave (Valencia, Spain). This site contains a sedimentary deposit composed of seventeen stratigraphical levels ranging from MIS 9 to MIS 5e (c. 350–100 ka). The evidence of anthropogenic processing of small prey is documented from the earliest moments of the site occupation (level XVII) in form of cutmarks, intentional breakage, human toothmarks, and burning patterns, depending on the archaeological level. The use of small animals, attached to the large game identified in the site, indicate generalist human behaviour based on a broad spectrum diet. In general, the aim of this study is to provide data on the subsistence strategies of the Middle Pleistocene hominids from Bolomor Cave and to contribute to the discussion topic related to the human consumption of small prey in early moments.

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Early prehistoric sedentism and seasonal animal exploitation in the Caribbean lowlands of Colombia

Abstract

Section snippets

Theoretical expectations: sedentism, early pottery, food production, and seasonality

San Jacinto 1

Faunal exploitation at San Jacinto 1

Discussion

Journal of Archaeological Science

Quaternary International

Journal of Archaeological Science

Journal of Anthropological Archaeology

Journal of Anthropological Archaeology

Journal of Archaeological Science

Journal of Archaeological Science

Journal of Archaeological Science

Journal of Anthropological Archaeology

Montane Foragers: Asana and the South-Central Andean Archaic

From foraging to farming in the Mediterranean Levant

Hunter-Gatherers: Archaeological and Evolutionary Theory

Nunamiut Ethnoarchaeology

Willow smoke and dogs’ tails: hunter-gatherer settlement systems and archaeological site formation

American Antiquity

Constructing Frames of Reference: An Analytical Method for Archaeological Theory Building Using Ethnographic and Environmental Data Sets

Relative hydrodynamic dispersal potentials of soft-shelled turtle elements: implications for interpreting skeletal sorting in assemblages of non-mammalian terrestrial vertebrates

Polaios

Learning from the present. The constraints of plant seasonality on foragers and collectors

The gift of the variation and dispersion of maize, social and technological context in Amerindian societies

Survey of the land Mollusca of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, Colombia

Territoriality among human foragers: ecological models and an application to four Bushmen groups

Current Anthropology

Spatial organization and habitat use

The Birth of the Gods and the Origins of Agriculture

The symbolic foundations of the Neolithic revolution in the Near East

The Xavánte in Transition. Health, Ecology, and Bioanthropology in Central Brazil

Population characteristics of Agouti paca (Rodentia) in Colombia

Publications of the Museum, Michigan State University Biological Series

Kinship with Monkeys. The Guajá Foragers of Eastern Amazonia

Distributional Archaeology

Turtles of the World

Animal food remains from preceramic Guilá Naquitz

Quantifying biodiversity: procedures and pitfalls in the measurement and comparison of species richness

Ecology Letters

Calcrete

Introduction: cultural responses to risk and uncertainty

The changing approaches to maize research

Cultural implications of crop introductions in Andean prehistory

Domesticated food and society in early coastal Peru

The emergence of prestige technologies and pottery

Fabulous feasts: a prolegomenon to the importance of feasting

Prehistoric seasonal mobility: what are we really achieving?

South African Archaeological Bulletin

The gastropod operculum: a comparative study of the composition of gastropod opercular proteins

Journal of Mollusca Studies