Grassland Archaeology in the Americas: from the Southern High Plains to the Plains of Argentina

JOHNSON, E., G. POLITIS, M. A. GUTIERREZ, G. MARTÍNEZ Y L. MIOTTI

Paleoindian Archaeology: A Hemispheric Perspective

University Press of Florida

Lugar: Gainsville; Año: 2006; p. 44 - 65

The vast grasslands ecosystems of the Americas contain long, extensive records of early peoples in the late Pleistocene and transition into the early Holocene. The North American Southern Great Plains region has been a grassland since the Wisconsinan, while the core of the South American Argentinean Pampas has remained a grassland since at least the late Pleistocene (although the character of these grasslands and the faunal communities of both regions changed throughout this period).  The regional, primary depositional units for both areas are aeolian and lacustrine, and thousands of internally-drained lake basins dot the landscape of both regions.  A seemingly analogous cultural development between these two regions appears to be emerging.  Although details differ and the current record appears earlier in the North American region, hunter-gatherers exploited the grasslands herd herbivores of both regions during the late Wisconsinan (18,000-11,000).  In general, these early peoples appear to have had a broad-spectrum, meat-related subsistence base.