Economic role played by wild and domestic Camelids in sedentary villages of Northwestern Argentina

GRANT, JENIFER; OLIVERA, DANIEL

Paris

Congreso; 11th ICAZ International Conference; 2010

ICAZ (Internacional Council of Archaeozoology)

29. Advances in Neotropical Zooarchaeology   Economic role played by wild and domestic Camelids in sedentary villages of Northwestern Argentina   GRANT Jennifer1 & OLIVERA Daniel2   1 Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas (CONICET), Instituto Nacional de Antropología y Pensamiento Latinoamericano (INAPL). 3 de Febrero 1378, Argentina. Jennygrant62@yahoo.com.ar 2 Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas (CONICET), Instituto Nacional de Antropología y Pensamiento Latinoamericano (INAPL), Universidad de Buenos Aires (UBA). 3 de Febrero 1378, Argentina. deolivera@gmail.com   South American camelids have occupied a central role in the economic, social and ritual  life of ancient hunter-gathers, herders and also farmers from the Andean region, being the only large herd mammals that where domesticated in all the Americas. Within productive economies it becomes crucial to analyze the incidence of wild vs. domestic camelids in faunal assemblages. This is so because the predominance of certain strategies of resource acquisition or the presence-absence of some of them brings about differences in the logistical organization of the groups. One problem still poorly explored is the question of differences in the management of camelid species by societies of the highlands (Puna) with respect to the ones from the mesothermal valleys. Usually it is accepted that in the economy of the latter, agriculture had a major impact, but it is evident that herding and hunting also played a role still unclear. For that reason, and with the purpose of understanding past relations between humans and camelids, the aim of this work is to compare use tendencies of these animals in   sedentary villages situated at different ecological zones of Northwestern Argentina dating from Formative period onwards (ca. 2300 years AP). This objective will be achieved trough the evaluation of different zooarchaeological indicators such as: size variation observed in camelids (osteometry), their assignment to age categories and different indices of skeletal element abundance.