Human adaptation and economic sustainability during the global warming of the Middle Holocene. A multidisciplinary approach for the semi-arid landscapes of central Argentina.

MESSINEO, PABLO GERONIMO

Shanghai

Congreso; 5th Shanghai Archaeology Forum.; 2023

Institute of Archaeology at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences

During the Middle Holocene, there was a global warming cycle, in which humans were not agents of change as they are supposed to be -at least partially- nowadays. This period is known as the Holocene Thermal Maximum and it affected the whole world, although with different characteristics, magnitude, and impact in human populations. This period was a time of cultural, demographic, and environmental changes in the Pampas of Argentina, which were the prelude to the demographic expansion, regional diversification, economic intensification, and social complexity that characterized the following period, the Late Holocene. The main goal is to present the results of a multidisciplinary approach (archaeological, bioarchaeological, geological and paleoecological) in order to understand the variability of adaptations and economic sustainability developed by hunter-gatherer groups and their relationship with the warming period of the Middle Holocene in the Central Pampean Dunefields of Argentina. This area is one of the semi-arid environments located in the center of Pampean plain of Argentina whose main landform is parabolic dunes. The archaeological sites are usually recorded in the border of permanent and temporary shallow lakes and some of them were occupied recurrently. During the Holocene Thermal Maximum, the archaeological record indicates a most recurrent use of this space for inhumations and as residential camps, suggesting that these lakes functioned as persistent places. Zooarchaeological and isotopic analysis indicates that the subsistence strategy was strongly oriented towards artiodactyls (mainly the camelid Lama guanicoe), followed by the Pampas deer, the greater rhea, armadillos, rodents, carnivores, and small birds. In addition, complete eggs of Greater rhea are linked to a shortage of sources of fresh water. The hunter-gatherers were highly mobile, as indicated by the variety of non-local lithic raw materials and the presence of marine mollusks from the Atlantic coast. The designs and reduction techniques allow us to infer practices of maximization of stone tools and the use of standardized bone technology on guanaco bones. To sum up, hunter-gatherer groups modified the adaptability and mobility patterns as a response to the cultural and environmental changes that occurred in a semi-arid landscape in the center of Argentina during the Middle Holocene.