Erosion control in Prehispanic agrarian landscapes from Northwestern Argentina: El Alto‐Ancasti Highlands case study (Catamarca, Argentina)

Abstract

Recent research in the El Alto-Ancasti Highlands (Northwestern Argentina) has identified an extensive agricultural system distributed in between residential sites. This agricultural system seems to have been vulnerable to a gullying system that caused erosion and soil surface loss. The existence of check dams along the inside of these gullies places the beginning of this erosion process at least during its Prehispanic occupation, between 600 and 1000 AD when the agricultural system was active. Here, we characterise the Prehispanic construction of the agricultural landscape, its impact on soil formation and the interaction established by Prehispanic farmers in the area with the local erosive dynamics along the eastern frontier of Northwestern Argentina. Our study indicates the need to pursue further research into runoff agriculture in these environments and its potential contribution for the mitigation of long-term erosive processes and risks, as well as elucidating strategies towards sustainable soil management by modern-day local communities.

De la planta a la boca: identificación de restos vegetales en los sitios El Polear 1 y Uturunco 1 a partir del análisis de cálculo dental humano

“…Cabe destacar que dentro de esta familia se encuentran diversas especies que han sido documentadas previamente en la provincia con diferentes usos asociados, a mencionar Canna indica L., cuyas hojas son manipuladas por las actuales poblaciones rurales de la sierra de Ancasti para envolver quesillos y mantenerlos frescos (Martínez 2022) o Canna edulis y Canna sp. identificadas en terrazas arqueológicas localizadas en El Alto-Ancasti, cuyos rizomas pudieron haber sido empleados con fines alimenticios y medicinales (Zuccarelli et al 2021a(Zuccarelli et al , 2021b.…”

Pre-Hispanic anthropogenic wetlands in the upper Ica drainage, south-central Andes: dating and context

“…Check dams of this type were first documented by Regal Matienzo (2005: 72) in the Río Chira Basin in 1970, while other instances were noted by Donkin (1979) in Ecuador, Chile and north-west Argentina. In the latter region, for example, a recent study by Zuccarelli Freire and colleagues (2021) highlights the use of these features across narrow gullies to counteract the effects of land erosion.…”