Plant Diversity in the Archaeological Record: A Means Toward Defining Hunter–Gatherer Mobility Strategies

Bonzani, Renée M.

doi:10.1006/jasc.1997.0192

Cited by 24 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 13 publications

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“…Although fire helped support a robust herbivore population, perhaps more importantly it allowed the maintenance of a diverse and open community of gatherable foods (Bonzani, 1997). For this reason Andean hunter-gatherers are considered primarily broad-spectrum foragers (Bruhns, 1994; Bryan, 1986; Dillehay, 2008).…”

Section: Data Setsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Grass páramo as hunter-gatherer landscape

White

2013

The Holocene

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Tussock grass páramo constitutes the dominant vegetation of the high tropical Andes and cordilleras of Costa Rica. Its distribution, composition and the location of the upper forest line are ascribed, by broad consensus, to climate. The zonal argument finds support in the altitudinal movements of páramo during the Pleistocene, clearly responding to changes in precipitation and temperature. I ask here, however, if the principal ecological variables driving post-Pleistocene páramos are circumscribed solely by climate. The combined pollen, charcoal and archaeological evidence generated in recent decades suggests a distinct Holocene etiology. Five principal conclusions emerge: (1) the sedimentary charcoal record establishes that grass páramo is a fired landscape, (2) natural sources of fire, specifically volcanoes and lightning, are incapable of generating the fire regime apparent in the sedimentary charcoal record, (3) burning at most sites intensified significantly between 13,000 and 11,000 cal. yr BP, and maintained heightened levels during the Holocene, (4) archaeological findings suggest that the original settlement of the Andes coincided with the sedimentary charcoal rise, and (5) the subsistence logic of hunter-gatherers argues strongly for firing the vegetation to increase resource productivity and reliability. From the pioneering mixed vegetation after deglaciation, anthropic fire selected in favor of tussocks and against woody species, generating a novel plant association. I propose, therefore, that Holocene grass páramo is not zonal vegetation, but rather a hunter-gatherer landscape.

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Section: Data Setsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Grass páramo as hunter-gatherer landscape

White

2013

The Holocene

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“…Evidence suggests that San Jacinto 1's inhabitants focused on the availability of starchy seeds and other resources concentrated along a small stream during the driest months of the year from November through January, and possibly into March. Previous analyses of the site have focused on plant and invertebrate exploitation within the context of seasonal mobility (Bonzani, 1995(Bonzani, ,1997Oyuela-Caycedo, 1993Oyuela-Caycedo and Bonzani, 2005), and here we incorporate information from analyses of all associated archaeofaunas. We begin with a brief summary of some important theoretical implications for understanding the early onset of sedentism and its relationship to early pottery and food production in a highly seasonal savanna and active flood plain environment, and identify possible material correlates of logistic mobility.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

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

Stahl¹,

Oyuela-Caycedo²

2007

Journal of Anthropological Archaeology

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“…A variety of other recipes and food preparation methods also took place in ovens and other pits (Thoms 2008(Thoms , 2009. In western North America, these features are often used to investigate topics such as hunter-gatherer mobility (Bonzani 1997;Lepofsky and Lyons 2003), plant food intensification (Elliot 2013; Lepofsky and Peacock 2004;Thoms 1989;Yu 2006), labor and gender (Fulkerson and Tushingham 2021;Wollstonecroft 2002), traditional foodways and seasonality (Lyons et al 2020;Lyons et al 2018;Wollstonecroft and Baptiste 2016), risk reduction strategies (Peacock 1998), and plant food resource management and production strategies (Carney et al 2021;Peacock and Turner 2002;Turner and Peacock 2005).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Bulbs and Biographies, Pine Nuts and Palimpsests: Exploring Plant Diversity and Earth Oven Reuse at a Late Period Plateau Site

Carney¹,

Guedes²,

Wohlgemuth³

et al. 2021

Preprint

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Earth ovens, hearths, and middens are common archaeological features in western North America that contain the residues of everyday activities. Ethnographic and archaeological research indicates these in-ground food preparation features were frequently reused over many months and years. These quotidian features therefore can be productively thought of as having use-lives or biographies. Here we present a framework for interpreting these archaeological food preparation feature biographies and the palimpsest nature of earth oven features. We illustrate the value of this framework through paleoethnobotanical analysis of archived soil samples from a bulk food processing site on the Columbia-Fraser Plateau in northeastern Washington State. While this site and other food preparation sites throughout the Plateau are largely interpreted as remains of intensive geophyte processing, our finds indicate that a wide range of economic plants were processed at this location, indicative of a dynamic and flexible subsistence system. We suggest that residents and visitors to the Pend Oreille Valley from ca. 2700-500 cal BP frequently returned to and reused earth oven features as they processed multiple plant food taxa including nodding onion (Allium cernuum), camas (Camassia quamash) goosefoot chenopod seeds (cf. Chenopodium atrovirens), and pine nuts (Pinus spp.). We see a biographical approach as a potential solution to the common “palimpsest problem” and suggest this framework may be a fruitful way of investigating multiple food preparation recipes, methods, and events, as well as adding paleoenvironmental datasets to biographical or life-history archaeological rhetoric.

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Plant Diversity in the Archaeological Record: A Means Toward Defining Hunter–Gatherer Mobility Strategies

Cited by 24 publications

References 13 publications

Grass páramo as hunter-gatherer landscape

Grass páramo as hunter-gatherer landscape

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

Bulbs and Biographies, Pine Nuts and Palimpsests: Exploring Plant Diversity and Earth Oven Reuse at a Late Period Plateau Site

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