Holocene landscape changes and wood use in Patagonia: Plant macroremains from Cerro Casa de Piedra 7 (original) (raw)
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The Holocene, 2019
Use of fire has been recognized for a long time as a key innovation in the development of human groups, as a multisource technological improvement. Fuel wastes recovered from archeological sites are the direct evidence of the fire use in society economies of the past. In the process of production and use of fire, diverse parameters exist that intervene and influence in its development. In order to obtain data relative to vegetal composition from early to late Holocene and its exploitation by societies characterized by high residential mobility, we carried on an charcoal and wood analysis in archeological sites Cerro Casa de Piedra 7 (10,690 ± 120-3400 BP) and Cerro Casa de Piedra 5 (6780 ± 110-2805 ± 105 BP) (province of Santa Cruz, Argentina). The results obtained evidence a drastic reduction of taxa used as fuel among occupations corresponding to early Holocene and late Holocene. Throughout all the levels we verified the intense use of tree species for combustion, while bushes were also collected but in much lower overall percentages. Nothofagus pumilio is the species with the highest representation. These results allowed to identify acting modes that refer to acquisition strategies of woody material oriented toward on the collection of great caliber wood
Vegetation History and Archaeobotany, 2018
The present article examines the ways of obtaining firewood and of using it by Patagonian hunter-gatherer groups and the relationship with their high mobility. With these goals, we have selected a range of archaeological sites in varied types of vegetation: forest, forest-steppe ecotone and steppe (according to pollen reconstructions and current records) in several different latitudes of Argentinean Patagonia: Paredón Lanfré (Río Negro province); Cerro Pintado (Chubut province); Cerro Casa de Piedra 7 and Orejas de Burro 1 (Santa Cruz province). The taxa, including Nothofagus pumilio, Austrocedrus chil ensis, Ribes magellanicum, Embothrium coccineum and Fabiana imbricata, found among the scattered charcoal remains in the sediments of the four Patagonian sites, show how firewood was gathered in types of vegetation similar to the ones that nowadays surround the archaeological sites. The archaeobotanical results allow us to detect differences and similarities of the supply of wood and its relationship with human mobility, site functionality and the types of occupation.
Journal of Arid Environments, 2021
In the lower basin of the Colorado River (Buenos Aires province, Argentina) the Zoko Andi 1 archaeological site was occupied by hunter-gatherer groups during the Late Holocene (ca. 1500-400 14 C years BP). The site is the only one in the entire study area that has an important presence of charcoals in a stratigraphic context, particularly related to the Lower Component, dated at ca. 1500-1300 14 C years BP (1430-1296 cal years BP). This contribution presents the first anthracological results for the study area, which contribute to the understanding of the use of woody resources by hunter-gatherers and to the knowledge about the past vegetal communities and climate in the eastern Pampa-Patagonia transition. The charcoals were assigned to Prosopis caldenia, Prosopis sp., Senna sp. (Fabaceae), Jodina rhombifolia (Santalaceae), Condalia sp. (Rhamnaceae) and Larrea sp. (Zygophyllaceae). The archaeological charcoals show the existence of an ecotone between the Monte and Espinal Provinces during the Initial Late Holocene, which indicates the xerophytic open forests with a predominance of Prosopis caldenia and xeric shrub-dominated by Larrea ssp. The vegetation developed under an arid to semi-arid climate. This is consistent with other proxies (geomorphology, sedimentology, phytoliths, and microvertebrates) suggesting a similar environment for this area. Prosopis and Condalia have high caloric power and long fuel duration. These burning xerophytic forest resources were probably used by hunter-gatherers for cooking, heating, and lighting.
Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports
The patterns in the use of wood for fuel by hunter-gatherer societies are shaped by the mobility, duration and function of different occupations. Indeed, many of the fuel properties of wood (flammability, lighting, combustion kinetics, heat), and therefore the functions of fire, depend on the size of its fuel. Consequently, the study and determination of the diameter of archaeological firewood is a possible way to discriminate between the different ways of acquiring wood, from the gathering of wood of small/medium branches to transport-trawling of wood of great caliber (tree trunks), and thus, to provide potential information on the function of the fire. The measurement of wood calibers was applied to the study of both charcoal fragments and wood remains from the site Cerro Casa de Piedra 7 (10,690 ± 120 y 3480 BP), in the Province of Santa Cruz, Argentina, with the objective of highlighting the ways in which firewood was acquired, and how fire was used in the context of high residential mobility of the Patagonian hunter-gatherers. The study evidenced, for the six stratigraphic levels studied, totally dissimilar results in relation to charcoal fragments and non-carbonized wood of the species Nothofagus pumilio (Poepp. et Endl.) Krasser.
The fact that archaebotanical studies performed to date in sites attributed to Patagonian hunter-gatherer societies have been very scarce, has relatively relegated the role played by plant resources within the economy of these societies. This report is a first approach to the study of forest exploitation by the Selknam hunters-gatherers at the archaeological site Ewan, located in the central part of Isla Grande of Tierra del Fuego (Argentina) and dated in historical times (1905). The study is focused is the analysis of charcoal and wood remains of an hypothetical hut in order to characterize which taxa was used for firewood and which for building purposes as well as the way of procurement and the type of wood-processing carried out by this hunter-gatherer group. The data obtained reveal that Nothofagus antarctica (G. Forst) Oerst. -ñire-, was used for all purposes. The record of ring growth shape, size and marks shows that big trunks were cut or uprooted and transported to the settlement.
Archaeological and Anthropological Sciences, 2018
Archaeological finds of uncharred wooden artefacts are particularly rare in Northwestern Argentina. In this respect, the museum collections from the sites of La Paya and El Churcal, in the Calchaquí Valley (Northwestern Argentina), are significant owing to their excellent conservation and diversity of their uncharred wooden artifacts. However, due to necessary current conservation policy in Argentina, researchers may have limited access to artifacts and sampling possibilities. We carried out the identification of woods used to manufacture artifacts from La Paya and El Churcal collections as part of our ongoing studies on the processes of production, circulation, and consumption of raw materials and goods in societies inhabiting the Calchaquí Valley during the late pre-Columbian period (ninth to sixteenth centuries). As a result, we acquired previously unknown information on woods used to manufacture artifacts in the Calchaquí Valley. Despite working with two museum collections that offered different possibilities for intervention and different levels of accuracy of identification, we were able to obtain successful results that show similar trends between the collections.
Quaternary International, 2021
This paper presents the results of a study of firewood use and management by human groups in the Ongamira valley, Córdoba, Argentina (dated between c. 5700-950 BP). In order to understand firewood gathering practices at different periods in the Late Holocene, samples from 63 combustion events recorded in 9 rockshelters were analysed. From the anthracological analysis (14,976 fragments) 19 woody taxa, and 4 botanically indeterminate taxa, were identified belonging to Chaco Serrano forest vegetation. The identification of abundant small flat fireplaces suggests short-lived activities repeated over time. A detailed analysis of the samples (types of fire pits, alterations during combustion and taphonomic processes) permits inferring firewood gathering in the local vegetation around the sites, as well as some taxa belonging to different environmental settings. Archaeological evidence indicates that groups were mobile, with the establishment of a network of places in the landscape where different activities were carried out (tool production, food consumption and pottery manufacture) with fire making as a central activity. People in the past constantly used different places in the valley, focusing many of their activities in rockshelters.
Multiproxy study of plant remains from Cerro Casa de Piedra 7 (Patagonia, Argentina)
Quaternary International, 2017
The objective of this work is to carry out an integral study of macro and microbotanical remains with the aim of providing information to the palaeoenvironmental reconstruction and understanding the different practices employed in the acquisition of woody material used by hunter-gatherer societies from the northwestern region of the Santa Cruz Province, Argentine Patagonia, during the early and middle Holocene. For this purpose, we study macrobotanical remains (carbonized and non-carbonized wood) recovered from different combustion structures and from the sediment of the three stratigraphic levels dated by 14 C and resulting in ages of 9640 ± 190 years BP; 8380 ± 120 years BP and 6150 ± 105 years BP, of the Cerro Casa de Piedra 7 site. Also, pollen and small plant fragments of human and camelid coprolites were studied. The analysis conducted show differences in the taxonomic resolution obtained by each one of the proxies. The marked representation of Nothofagus pumilio among charcoal and wood makes clear that the forest was an environment recurrently used by hunter-gatherers occupying CCP7. The study of pollen and plant fragments coming from coprolites, allowed the identification of grass species typical of the steppe environments and forest-steppe ecotonal areas. In this way, plant fragments provide higher level of taxonomic resolution and a greater diversity for paleoenvironmental reconstruction. The results obtained by means of the multi-proxy analysis allowed us not only to enlarge the reconstruction of the hunter-gatherers livable environment, but also to recognize the availability and use of the plant resources in the Early-Mid-Holocene in the region.