Mobility and Exchange among Marine Hunter-Gatherer and Agropastoralist Communities in the Formative Period Atacama Desert

Pestle, William J.; Torres‐Rouff, Christina; Gallardo, Francisco; Ballester, Benjamín; Clarot, Alejandro

doi:10.1086/679594

Cited by 50 publications

(32 citation statements)

References 37 publications

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“…The average collagen yield for the 16 well-preserved samples from Solcor 3 was 17.3 ± 6.0 wt%, with an average atomic C/N ratio of 3.2 ± 0.1, whereas the 26 Tchecar Túmulo Sur samples averaged 15.2 ± 5.2 wt%, with an average C/N ratio of 3.3 ± 0.1. All in all, the samples were exceedingly well preserved (Pestle et al 2015b), as is almost always the case for inhumed materials from the hyperarid Atacama (with some exceptions, see Pestle et al 2016). There were no significant differences in collagen preservation (as judged by collagen yields, elemental yields, and atomic C/N ratios) between the two sites under consideration.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 63%

“…Food web isotope values comprised the edible portions of 119 southern Andean plant and animal samples drawn from previous work in the region (DeNiro and Hastorf 1985;Miller et al 2010;Pestle et al 2015b;Schoeninger and DeNiro 1984;Tieszen and Chapman 1992). Any modern data included in this reference sample had δ 13 C values corrected by +1.5 ‰ to account for the fossil fuel burning effect (Keeling et al 1979).…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Eating out or dining in: modeling diverse dietary strategies in the Middle Period, San Pedro de Atacama, Chile

Pestle

Torres‐Rouff

Hübbe

et al. 2016

Archaeol Anthropol Sci

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The Middle Period of the Atacama oases, North Chile, has been characterized as a time of peace, uniform abundance, and widespread access to exotic materials. In the present work, we test this notion through a comparison of Middle Period human isotopic data (δ 13 C co , δ 15 N co , and δ 13 C ap ) representing two distinct ayllus, Solcor and Tchecar, in the San Pedro de Atacama oases. We employ Bayesian mixture modeling of individual-level isotopic data to quantify and compare dietary composition within and between the cemetery populations of these two contemporary locales. Ultimately, our research shows that dietary diversity, which we take as a proxy for differential levels of participation in long-distance exchange or the access to the products thereof, was unequally distributed, and that the supposedly uniform richness of the Middle Period was similarly discontinuous. While average isotopic values for the two ayllus were similar, variance within each differed significantly, as did variance in dietary composition arrived at through modeling. By all measures, the individuals interred in Solcor 3 had more varied diets, particularly in terms of carbohydrate-rich plants, than their contemporaries interred at Tchecar Túmulo Sur, suggesting that more individuals from Solcor 3 had greater participation in/access to long-distance exchange networks. Besides providing novel insights into the lived experience of the Middle Period residents of far northern Chile, this work also demonstrates the power of Bayesian mixture modeling for the reconstruction of individual paleodiet.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 63%

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Eating out or dining in: modeling diverse dietary strategies in the Middle Period, San Pedro de Atacama, Chile

Pestle

Torres‐Rouff

Hübbe

et al. 2016

Archaeol Anthropol Sci

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“…Esta situación indica probablemente el inicio de las distintas formas de movilidad e intercambio de bienes que se intensifican con claridad en el Período Formativo (Pimentel et al 2011, Nielsen 2013, Labarca et al 2015, Pestle et al 2015, Gallardo et al 2017) y que se concretan con la circulación de estos objetos en la macroescala, incluyendo interacciones con poblaciones del noa (Yacobaccio 2004(Yacobaccio , 2006de Souza et al 2010;Mondini et al 2013).…”

Section: Discussionunclassified

Circulación de objetos perforados de concha: Aportes para la interpretación de su rol en las relaciones sociales del desierto de atacama entre los 6000-3500 ap

Soto¹,

Power²,

Ballester³

2018

Bol. Mus. Chil. Arte Precolomb.

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“…Other crops including tubers such as potato ( Solanum ), ullucu ( Ullucus ), and manioc ( Manihot ) are also likely to have been cultivated alongside squashes ( Curcurbita ), and legumes (e.g., Phaseolus ; Muñoz, ). Isotopic analysis of adults from this time period indicates that, although maize was available, individuals retained a broad‐spectrum resource base with marine resources still a significant component of the diet (Díaz‐Zorita Bonilla et al, ; King et al, ; Pestle, Torres‐Rouff, Gallardo, Ballester, & Clarot, ; Santana‐Sagredo, Hubbe, & Uribe, ). It is possible that agricultural resources comprised a more important portion of the diet for weaning infants and children (King et al, ), as crops such as maize and quinoa are easily reduced to gruels, which are used in weaning even today by the indigenous groups of the Andes (Barton, Castro Williams, Barja, & Murillo, ).…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 96%

A multifaceted approach towards interpreting early life experience and infant feeding practices in the ancient Atacama Desert, Northern Chile

King

Snoddy

Millard

et al. 2018

Intl J of Osteoarchaeology

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Interpreting early life experience in the past is of considerable interest to archaeologists, yet remains fraught with difficulty. Children are sensitive barometers of population health in general. In addition, infant feeding practices, and stresses experienced during infancy and childhood, have important effects on adult health and demographic changes. Understanding how diet and physiological stress interact is therefore of significance, but most bony indicators of stress have non‐specific etiologies that cannot be tied to events during childhood. The recent advent of incremental isotopic techniques means we now have the potential to identify periods of stress and dietary change during childhood through changes to stable carbon and nitrogen isotopic ratios during tissue formation. Being able to establish these individual weaning trajectories allows us to consider individuality in past weaning choices, giving the bioarchaeologist a more nuanced picture of the past. Here, we investigate whether combining paleopathological and isotopic data can give insight into the synergy between infant feeding and stress. We present a case study of a 5‐year‐old child from an early agricultural period archaeological site in the northern Atacama Desert, Chile. We show that, despite physiological stress likely affecting isotopic ratios in this individual, a weaning curve is visible and the interpretation of weaning behaviour is possible. In addition, we suggest that there is isotopic evidence for a micronutrient deficient weaning diet that may be correlated with bony evidence for pathology.

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Mobility and Exchange among Marine Hunter-Gatherer and Agropastoralist Communities in the Formative Period Atacama Desert

Cited by 50 publications

References 37 publications

Eating out or dining in: modeling diverse dietary strategies in the Middle Period, San Pedro de Atacama, Chile

Eating out or dining in: modeling diverse dietary strategies in the Middle Period, San Pedro de Atacama, Chile

Circulación de objetos perforados de concha: Aportes para la interpretación de su rol en las relaciones sociales del desierto de atacama entre los 6000-3500 ap

A multifaceted approach towards interpreting early life experience and infant feeding practices in the ancient Atacama Desert, Northern Chile

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