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As the Inca Empire expanded across the South American Andes during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries AD, Lake Titicaca became its mythical place of origin and the location of a pilgrimage complex on the Island of the Sun. This complex included an underwater reef where stone boxes containing miniature figurines of gold, silver and shell were submerged as ritual offerings. This article reports a newly discovered stone offering box from a reef close to the lake's north-eastern shore. The location, content and broader socio-cultural context of Inca sacrifices are examined to illuminate the religious and social meaning of underwater ritual offerings at Lake Titicaca., SCOPUS: ar.j, info:eu-repo/semantics/published

In vascular plants, larger seeds are generally associated with higher germination potential, healthier seedlings and overall higher rates of survivorship. How this relationship holds or what other physiological tradeoffs evolved in plants adapted to high-altitude environments, such as the tropical and subtropical highland Polylepis tree, remain unclear. In this study, we evaluated the relationship between seed mass and seedling performance by testing the reserve effect, the metabolic effect, and the seedling-size effect hypotheses in Polylepis tomentella Weddell (Rosaceae). Since the relationship between fitness and seed size can often depend on maternal plant size, we additionally investigated the association between germination success, seedling performance (survival, relative growth rate (RGR) and height), and size of bearing-seed trees under controlled greenhouse conditions. Our results showed that heavier seeds are more likely to germinate, but we did not find evidence that could support the reserve effect, metabolic effect or seedling-size effect. As seedlings from larger and medium seeds exhibited comparatively similar RGR, survival percentages and final size, maternal plant size was positively associated with improved seed quality and seedling performance. These results demonstrate that seed mass and maternal size during early seedling establishment are critical for Polylepis persistence, demography and conservation.

En este trabajo se describen las relaciones que las sociedades humanas establecieron con su entorno durante el período Formativo (3000-1000 aP) en la Pampa del Tamarugal, Desierto de Atacama, desde una perspectiva teórico-metodológica que pone el acento en el potencial del registro ecofactual. Éste, al mediar entre lo cultural y lo ambiental, proporciona información vital para una mejor comprensión de la relación entre naturaleza y cultura construida por estas sociedades. Queremos demostrar que este proceso forma parte de una larga historia de racionalización del desierto y de sus recursos silvestres, locales e introducidos, así como de la vivencia particular que tuvieron estas comunidades andinas. Por consiguiente, proponemos que la intervención humana en la Pampa del Tamarugal puede ser entendida como un cambio no sólo ecológico y económico, sino también cosmológico.

The long term response of ancient societies to climate change has been a matter of global debate. Until recently, the lack of integrative studies between archaeological, palaeoecological, and palaeoclimatological data had prevented an evaluation of the relationship between climate change, distinct subsistence strategies, and cultural transformations across the largest rainforest of the world, Amazonia. Here, we review the most relevant cultural changes seen in the archaeological record of six different regions within Greater Amazonia during late pre-Columbian times. We compare the chronology of those cultural transitions with high-resolution regional palaeoclimate proxies, showing that, while some societies faced major reorganisation during periods of climate change, others were unaffected and even flourished. We propose that societies with intensive, specialised land-use systems were vulnerable to transient climate change. In contrast, land-use systems that relied primarily on polyculture agroforestry, resulting in the formation of enriched forests and fertile Amazonian Dark Earths in the long term, were more resilient to climate change.

A key concern regarding current and future climate change is the possibility of sustained droughts that can have profound impacts on societies. As such, multiple paleoclimatic proxies are needed to identify megadroughts, the synoptic climatology responsible for these droughts, and their impacts on past and future societies. In the hyperarid Atacama Desert of northern Chile, many streams are characterized by perennial flow and support dense in-stream wetlands. These streams possess sequences of wetland deposits as fluvial terraces that record past changes in the water table. We mapped and radiocarbon dated a well-preserved sequence of in-stream wetland deposits along a 4.3-km reach of the Río San Salvador in the Calama basin to determine the relationship between regional climate change and the incision of in-stream wetlands. The Río San Salvador supported dense wetlands from 11.1 to 9.8, 6.4 to 3.5, 2.8 to 1.3, and 1.0 to 0.5 ka and incised at the end of each of these intervals. Comparison with other in-stream wetland sequences in the Atacama Desert, and with regional paleoclimatic archives, indicates that in-stream wetlands responded similarly to climatic changes by incising during periods of extended drought at ~9.8, 3.5, 1.3, and 0.5 ka.

South America is well known for its abundance of Quaternary fossiliferous deposits, but well-preserved fossil remains from well-dated sites are scarce in the Atacama Desert and adjacent arid Andes. Here we report on a partially complete skeleton (46%) of a single young (ca. 3–4 years old) extinct horse discovered in the Salar de Surire, a salt flat located on the Andean altiplano of northern Chile (4,250 m asl). Comparative and osteometric morphological analyses identify the specimen as a South American endemic horse Hippidion saldiasi Roth, 1899. A direct AMS radiocarbon date on bone collagen yielded a calibrated age of 13,170 cal yr BP (2σ range: 13,300–13,060 cal yr BP) indicating that it lived near the end of the last glaciation. The body mass of the individual was calculated at approximately 326.4 kg, close to the upper limit of the larger sizes reported for the genus. Stable isotope evidence shows that the Salar de Surire horse relied on an almost 100% C3 diet that is mostly consistent with Hippidion specimens from other environments that also consumed either mixed C3/C4 or fully C3 diets. This finding is now the southernmost high-elevation record for this species and provides further evidence for the broad geographic and ecological distribution of this genus throughout southern South America.

Author(s): Capriles, Jose M.; Tripcevich, Nicholas; Nielsen, Axel E.; Glascock, Michael D.; Albarracin-Jordan, Juan; Santoro, Calogero M.

The Altiplano constitutes the most extensive, high-elevation terrain in South America. Most archaeological research on the earliest human occupation of this region in the Bolivian Andes derives from sites such as Viscachani where the emphasis has been on typological comparisons of projectile points, rather than on complete and radiometrically dated assemblages. In this paper, we present survey and excavation data from the Iroco region in the Central Altiplano of Bolivia to address questions related to the adaptive strategies engaged by Archaic Period highland foragers. Specifically, we focus on the nature of mobility, subsistence, and technological strategies, stemmed from principles in human behavioral ecology. Based on data from radiocarbon dates, lithic, and faunal analyses, we suggest that, similar to other mobile foraging societies in arid environments, highland foragers in Iroco engaged in seasonal residential mobility, consumed a broad range of faunal resources, and developed a curated technological toolkit within the context of ameliorated environmental conditions that prevailed during the early Holocene (11,500–8000 cal BP).

Current scientific evidence shows that humans colonized South America at least 15,000 years ago, but there are still many unknown aspects of this process, including the major and minor migratory routes involved, and the pattern of successive occupation of a diverse continental mosaic of ecosystems. In this context, the role of the Andean highlands (≥3400 meters above sea level) has been neglected, because of the supposedly harsh conditions for humans including hypoxia and cold climate. Nevertheless, the environmental and cultural resources available in the high Andes constitutes an important “megapatch” that should be assessed in terms of human settlement patterns. We review the evidence for late Pleistocene/early Holocene hunter-gatherer occupation of one part of this megapatch, the northern Chilean Dry Puna, in its palaeoecological context. We focus on lithic technology, faunal remains, radiocarbon dates, and other archaeological materials related to different social activities, which allow us to suggest that groups of hunter-gatherers organized and adapted their way of life to highland ecosystems through logistical mobility, and curatorial strategies for lithic tool kits that included projectile points and other formalized tools. The morphology and technological processes involved are recognized over vast territories along the high Andes. We identify this material expression as the high south central Andean Archaic hunter-gatherer tradition, which also featured long distance mobile settlement systems and communication processes over this broad and distinct megapatch. More speculatively, we outline the hypothesis that these highland ecosystems constituted a suitable migratory route that may have been key for the early peopling of the continent, and contrast it with the alternative hypothesis of the initially secondary and seasonally intermittent exploitation of this habitat by hunter-gatherers dispersing along the Pacific coastal corridor.

Premise of research. Anemophily is considered to be a mechanism that evolved to promote pollination success. However, reproductive output can decrease if pollen loads are scarce due to low abundance of compatible mates or floral infections. Here we analyze the effects of breeding system, pollen limitation, and a potential floral fungal infection on the reproductive output of the Andean tree Polylepis tomentella (Rosaceae).Methodology. We performed pollen supplementation experiments in the field to assess the extent of the effect of pollen limitation on fruit and seed set and to identify any pre- or postzygotic self-incompatibility responses within receptive pistils. Supplementary scanning electron microscopy and epifluorescence microscopy were used to observe the possible effects of a potential floral fungal infection on sexual reproduction.Pivotal results. Pollen supplementation did not increase fruit and seed set, suggesting weak evidence of pollen limitation. Most stigmas from self- and cross-pollinate...

Understanding how human societies interacted with environmental changes is a major goal of archaeology and other socio-natural sciences. In this paper, we assess the human-environment interactions in the Pampa del Tamarugal (PDT) basin of the Atacama Desert over the last 13,000 years. By relying on a socio-environmental model that integrates ecosystem services with adaptive strategies, we review past climate changes, shifting environmental conditions, and the continuities and discontinuities in the nature and intensity of the human occupation of the PDT. As a result we highlight the importance of certain key resources such as water, an essential factor in the long-term trajectory of eco-historical change. Without water the outcome of human societies becomes hazardous.

The high Andes of western South America feature extreme ecological conditions that impose important physiological constraints on humans including high-elevation hypoxia and cold stress. This leads to questions regarding how these environments were colonized by the first waves of humans that reached them during the late Pleistocene. Based on previous research, and aided by human behavioral ecology principles, we assess hunter-gatherer behavioral strategies in the Andean highlands during the late Pleistocene and early Holocene. Specifically, we formulate three mobility strategies and their archaeological expectations and test these using technological and subsistence evidence from the six earliest well-dated highland sites in northern Chile. Our results suggest that all of the studied sites were temporarily occupied for hunting, processing animals, and toolkit maintenance. The sites also exhibit shared technological features within a curatorial strategy albeit with different occupation intensities. ...

Archaeological research indicates that hunter-gatherers altered landscapes in southwestern Amazonia as early as 10,000 years ago., The Amazon witnessed the emergence of complex societies after 2500 years ago that altered tropical landscapes through intensive agriculture and managed aquatic systems. However, very little is known about the context and conditions that preceded these social and environmental transformations. Here, we demonstrate that forest islands in the Llanos de Moxos of southwestern Amazonia contain human burials and represent the earliest settlements in the region between 10,600 and 4000 years ago. These archaeological sites and their contents represent the earliest evidence of communities that experienced conditions conducive to engaging with food production such as environmental stability, resource disturbance, and increased territoriality in the Amazonian tropical lowlands.

The high Andes of South America were among the last environments that Homo sapiens colonized during its Pleistocene dispersion out of Africa. The peopling of this high-elevation environment was constrained by atmospheric hypoxia, cold stress, and resource availability. Here we report archaeological and geoarchaeological analyses from Cueva Bautista, a dry rock shelter, located at 3933 m above sea level in southwestern Bolivia. We focus on a well-preserved occupation surface containing hearths and high-quality stone tools AMS dated to 12,700–12,100 cal BP. Geoarchaeological resolution of the site supports its stratigraphic integrity and archaeological analyses indicate that the early human occupation was formed as a temporary camp by mobile foragers relying on a curated technological strategy. Regional paleoenvironmental reconstructions suggest that Cueva Bautista's occupation was synchronous with humid conditions and its abandonment with increased aridity. Our findings suggest that mobile hunter-gatherers explored – albeit not colonized – the high Andes during the late Pleistocene and provides further support that a combination of biological, behavioral, and environmental constraints affected human adaptation to this extreme environment.

In the Lluta Valley, northern Chile, climate is hyperarid and vegetation is restricted to the valley floors and lowermost footslopes. Fossil tree trunks and leaves of predominantly Escallonia angustifolia, however, are abundant up to ∼15 m above the present valley floor, where they are intercalated with slope deposits, reflecting higher water levels in the past. A total of 17 samples have been radiocarbon dated, yielding ages between 38 and 15k cal a BP. The youngest ages of 15.4k cal a BP are interpreted as reflecting the beginning of river incision and lowering of the valley floor, impeding the further growth of trees at higher parts of the slopes. The most plausible scenario for this observation is intensified river incision after 15.4k cal a BP due to increased stream power and runoff from the Rio Lluta headwaters in the Western Cordillera and Altiplano corresponding to the highstand of the Tauca and Central Andean Pluvial Event (CAPE) wet phase.

As with most living organisms, human populations respond to climatic, environmental, and population pressures by transforming their range and subsistence strategies over space and time. An understanding of human ecology can be gained when the archaeological record is placed within the context of dynamic landscape changes and alterations in natural resource availability. We reconstructed the landscape evolution of the Quebrada Mani fan complex, situated along the west-facing slope of the Central Andes in the hyperarid core of the Atacama Desert, an area that contains an archaeological record that spans almost 13,000 years. Surficial geologic mapping and dating of three 2–12 km2 study sites, in conjunction with archaeological records and analysis of remotely sensed data for the ∼400 km2 fan complex, was conducted to reconstruct the landscape evolution and the way of life of Paleoindian (ca. 12.8–11.5 ka) and early/late Formative (ca 2.5 to 0.7 ka) social groups. Just prior to any known human occupation, a large pluvial event in the high Andes, regionally referred to as CAPE I, impacted the Quebrada Mani fan complex from ca.18–16.5 ka. During CAPE I, the Mani fan complex was dominated by perennial stream systems that deposited well-sorted conglomerates in the upper reaches of the fan (Unit T2) and perennial wetlands (Unit B1). This pluvial period was followed by the onset of an extreme drought sometime after 15 ka, but before 13 ka, when wetlands desiccated and the distal reaches of the fan deflated. Sand sheets and sand dunes were deposited across broad reaches of the landscape and Quebrada Mani incised 3–5 m into its floodplain. This drought had profound implications for the distribution of natural resources during the subsequent pluvial event (CAPE II) that ensued from ca. 12.5–9.5 ka. Incision along the upper reaches of the fan caused a more restricted floodplain and allowed the deposition of extensive wetlands along the more distal central reaches of the fan where groundwater emerged. Paleoindian residential open-air camps were placed in these areas. Wetlands were replaced by a tree-covered floodplain during the latter portion of this pluvial event (ca. 10.5–9 ka). We found no archaeological evidence for human occupations between ∼8–2.5 ka, suggesting a lack of natural resources and/or very low hunter-gatherer population densities. During this time, Quebrada Mani incised up to 8 m into the floodplain. Mudflow deposition – typical of the present-day fan complex – initiated around 2.5 ka, likely responding to an increase in precipitation. This triggered a re-population of the fan surface by Formative agricultural groups that irrigated and extensively farmed these floodplains. By the end of the Formative, these socio-cultural groups became increasingly vulnerable to climatic changes as cut-and-fill cycles in the drainage necessitated major infrastructure adjustments, until the technologies and social-cultural convention of the epoch could not cope with environmental change and investments were abandoned by ∼0.8 ka.

Because the 14C calibration curves IntCal and SHCal are based on data from temperate latitudes, it remains unclear which curve is more suitable for archaeological and paleoenvironmental records from tropical South America. A review of climate dynamics reveals a significant influx of Northern Hemisphere air masses and moisture over a substantial part of the continent during the South American Summer Monsoon (SASM). Areas affected by the SASM receive unknown amounts of input from both hemispheres, where an argument could be made for either curve. Until localized tree-ring data can resolve this, we suggest using a mixed calibration curve, which accounts for inputs from both hemispheres, as a third calibration option. We present a calibration example from a crucial period of environmental and cultural change in the southern Lake Titicaca. Given our current lack of data on past14C variation in South America, our calibrations and chronologies will likely change in the future. We hope this paper spurs new research into this topic and encourages researchers to make an informed and explicit choice of which curve to use, which is particularly relevant in research on past human-environmental relationships. Fil: Marsh, Erik Johnson. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Mendoza; Argentina. Universidad Nacional de Cuyo. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales. Laboratorio de Paleoecología Humana; Argentina Fil: Bruno, Maria Cecilia. Dickinson College; Estados Unidos Fil: Fritz, Sherilyn C.. University of Nebraska Lincoln; Estados Unidos. Lund University; Suecia Fil: Baker, Paul. University of Duke; Estados Unidos Fil: Capriles, José M.. Pennsylvania State University; Estados Unidos Fil: Hastorf, Christine A.. University of California; Estados Unidos

Proboscideans are so-called ecosystem engineers and are considered key players in hypotheses about Late Pleistocene megafaunal extinctions. However, knowledge about the autoecology and chronology of the proboscideans in South America is still open to debate and raises controversial views. Here, we used a range of multiproxy approaches and new radiocarbon datings to study the autoecology of Chilean gomphotheres, the only group of proboscideans to reach South America during the Great American Biotic Interchange (∼3.1 to 2.7 million years before present). As part of this study, we analyzed stable isotopes, dental microwear, and dental calculus microfossils on gomphothere molars from 30 Late Pleistocene sites (31° to 42°S). These proxies provided different scales of temporal resolution, which were then combined to assess the dietary and habitat patterns of these proboscideans. The multiproxy study suggests that most foraging took place in relatively closed environments. In Central Chile, there is a positive correlation between lower δ13C values and an increasing consumption of arboreal/scrub elements. Analyses of dental microwear and calculus microfossils have verified these leaf-browsing feeding habits. From a comparative perspective, the dietary pattern of South American gomphotheres appears to be constrained more by resource availability than by the potential dietary range of the individual taxa. This multiproxy study is aimed at increasing knowledge of the life history of gomphotheres and thus follows an issue considered one of the greatest challenges for paleontology in South America, recently pointed out by the need to thoroughly understand the role of ecological engineers before making predictions about the consequences of ecosystem defaunation.

The domestication of llamas and alpacas was fundamental for the cultural and economic development of Andean societies, but the origins of camelid pastoralism as a distinct mode of socioeconomic organization remain little understood. Whereas most archaeological interpretations of prehispanic highland societies emphasize the transition from hunting-gathering to agriculture as a process marked by the establishment of agricultural sedentary villages, other subsistence and mobility strategies have been for the most part overlooked. A case in point is the Wankarani cultural complex from the Central Altiplano of Bolivia, which has been interpreted as an example of an early village-based sedentary society. Here, I argue that a model of mobile pastoralism based on ethnoarchaeological research better explains the Central Altiplano's Formative period archaeological record. Recently collected data support this proposition. Settlement patterns consisted of multiple dispersed camps attached to residential bases occupied recurrently. Horizontal excavations from a residential base revealed structures and features analogous to pastoralist landscapes documented around the world. Faunal identification confirmed the preponderance of domesticated camelids. Based on this evidence, I argue that we need better explanatory frameworks for approaching the origins, organization, and variability associated with early food producing societies such as mobile camelid pastoralists.

The European conquest of the New World produced major socio-environmental reorganization in the Americas, but for many specific regions and ecosystems, we still do not understand how these changes occurred within a broader temporal framework. In this paper, we reconstruct the long-term environmental and vegetation changes experienced by high-altitude wetlands of the southcentral Andes over the last two millennia. Pollen and charcoal analyses of a 5.5-m-long core recovered from the semi-arid puna of northern Chile indicate that while climatic drivers influenced vegetation turnaround, human land use and management strategies significantly affected long-term changes. Our results indicate that the puna vegetation mostly dominated by grasslands and some peatland taxa stabilized during the late Holocene, xerophytic shrubs expanded during extremely dry events, and peatland vegetation persisted in relation to landscape-scale management strategies by Andean pastoralist societies. Environmental changes produced during the post-conquest period included the introduction of exotic taxa, such as clovers, associated with the translocation of exotic herding animals (sheep, cattle, and donkeys) and a deterioration in the management of highland wetlands.

Los cambios producidos en los sistemas de subsistencia de caza-recolección al cultivo de plantas y crianza de camélidos constituyen una de las transiciones más interesantes en la arqueología del altiplano andino. En este reporte se presentan resultados preliminares del análisis de patrones de asentamiento y materiales líticos recuperados en la región de Iroco, el margen noreste del Lago Uru-Uru, en el altiplano central de Bolivia. Los cambios producidos en los sistemas de asentamiento entre el período Arcaico (10.000-3.500 a.p.) y el período Formativo (3.500-1.600 a.p.) están relacionados con cambios en la organización económica y patrones de movilidad. Sin embargo, los cambios tecnológicos se encuentran enmarcados en una posible tradición de utilización de recursos y procesos de manufactura aplicados a los materiales líticos.

Rademaker et al. (2014) present novel archaeological evidence for contending that, during the terminal Pleistocene (TP), humans were occupying the harsh highlands of southern Peru on a permanent basis. The evidence consists of 19 C dates between 11,400 and 12,400 cal before present (BP) associated with stone tools, features, burned plants, and artiodactyl faunal remains recovered from the Cuncaicha rock shelter (∼4,480 m above sea level) in the Pucuncho basin. Near the rock shelter, two open-air workshops evidence obsidian exploitation from the Alca source, previously identified at Quebrada Jaguay, a TP open-air site on the south coast of Peru (Sandweiss et al. 1998). This research is significant and thought provoking but, as discussed below, merits further contextual and theoretical consideration. Although a robust set of radiocarbon dates supports a TP human presence at Cuncaicha, we are concerned that only bone remains were assayed and that there is no adequate description of the taxa, elements, human modification, and taphonomic history of these remains. Was carnivore gnawing present on the bones? High-altitude rock shelters are preferential lairs for predators such as pumas and foxes, implying that not all bones necessarily represent a human presence and chronology. It is also unclear why carbonized plant materials reported from hearths were not directly dated. In our opinion, the few artifacts and informal features reported from Cuncaicha are insufficient to substantiate an intense or year-round occupation. A diverse and complete lithic reduction sequence comes from the surface of the workshops and not from the occupied rock shelter, where only a portion of the sequence traditionally associated with permanent subsistence and related activities is represented.