Between Foragers and Farmers: Climate Change and Human Strategies in Northwestern Patagonia

Abstract

In this paper we explore how changes in human strategies are differentially modulated by climate in a border area between hunter-gatherers and farmers. We analyze multiple proxies: radiocarbon summed probability distributions (SPDs), stable C and N isotopes, and zooarchaeological data from northwestern Patagonia. Based on these proxies, we discuss aspects of human population, subsistence, and dietary dynamics in relation to long-term climatic trends marked by variation in the Southern Annular Mode (SAM). Our results indicate that the farming frontier in northwestern Patagonia was dynamic in both time and space. We show how changes in temperature and precipitation over the last 1000 years cal BP have influenced the use of domestic plants and the hunting of highest-ranked wild animals, whereas no significant changes in human population size occurred. During the SAM positive phase between 900 and 550 years cal BP, warmer and drier summers are associated with an increase in C4 resource consumption (maize). After 550 years cal BP, when the SAM changes to the negative phase, wetter and cooler summer conditions are related to a change in diet focused on wild resources, especially meat. Over the past 1000 years, there was a non-significant change in the population based on the SPD.

Multi-isotopic and morphometric evidence for the migration of farmers leading up to the Inka conquest of the southern Andes

“…1). This region represents the southern frontier of the dispersion of Andean agropastoral economies with a southwards latitudinal pattern of decreasing agriculture importance between 32° and 34° S [17][18][19][20] . During the last ca.…”

Disentangling the last 1,000 years of human–environment interactions along the eastern side of the southern Andes (34–52°S lat.)

“…The vegetation and fire history of the last 1,000 y, reconstructed from the four pollen and charcoal records, is interpreted in light of independent paleoclimatic records (e.g., refs. 25 , 30 , and 32 ) and archaeological and ethnohistorical information (e.g., 5 , 41 , and 49 – 52 ). To understand the role of climate and humans in shaping site-specific vegetation histories, we assume that the impact of climate on past vegetation and fire activity varied across this latitudinal moisture gradient, just as it does at present.…”

“…After ∼4000 cal y BP, archaeological assemblages became more diverse and numerous, suggesting a larger population (e.g., refs. 41 – 43 ). During the last ∼2000 cal y BP a wider range of taxa were exploited by hunter-gatherers, supplementing guanaco hunting with plants, small mammals, and birds.…”

“…In the late Holocene, archaeological assemblages were more diverse and numerous, suggesting that a wider range of taxa were exploited by potentially a larger population (e.g., refs. 41 – 44 ). West of the Andes, the Mapuche peoples practiced a combination of hunter-gatherer-forager and intensive agricultural subsistence strategies.…”

Bioavailable Strontium, Human Paleogeography, and Migrations in the Southern Andes: A Machine Learning and GIS Approach

“…AD 1410 (Barberena et al, 2020; Table 4). The economic basis during this period would have been highly variable across space and time with multiple combinations of wild plants, the wild camelid guanaco-Lama guanicoe-, the domestic llama-Lama glama-, and several cultivated plants including maize, squash, chinoa, and beans (Frigolé and Gasco, 2016;Ots et al, 2016;Gil et al, 2020). In this context, the spatial scale of human territories was likely variable through time and remains as an issue of considerable debate.…”