Cultural and social trajectories of human occupation of the Chiloé Archipelago, Patagonia-Chile: change and interaction among marine-hunter-gatherer and agro-ceramic societies

BELMAR, CAROLINA; MORELLO, FLAVIA; SAN ROMÁN, MANUEL; URBINA, XIMENA; REYES, OMAR; TESSONE, AUGUSTO

Congreso; 20th Congress of the International Union for Quaternary Research (INQUA); 2019

The northern Patagonian archipelago is an extended geographical area (600km) that breaks the continuity of the Pacific coast and it projects into an insular system with notable biogeographical discontinuities, such as channels, fiords, mountain chains and icefields that portrays the southern extreme of the western side of South America (Figure 1). This oceanic environment, modeled mainly by important tectonic activity, volcanic and glacial action, registers the first signs of human occupation dated at 5500 years BP by marine hunter-gatherergroups that have navigation technologies. However, the southern zone of Chile and the Chiloé archipelago (41º-43ºS), present an important change in the trajectories towards the last millennium, represented by the emergence of cultural traditions that have ceramic technology, horticulture and -probablydomestic animals. This new social and cultural scenario contrasts with what occurs in the adjacent regions south of the Corcovado gulf (43º S ), where the subsistence systems continuedbased on marine hunting and gathering and fishing until historic epochs (S. XVI-XX), endorsed by the presence of groups historically known as Chonos, Kawésqar and Yámana, in the Patagonian archipelago. This setting is of crucial importance to understand the processes of change and social interaction between societies that produce food and marine hunter-gatherers.The island of Chiloé and its surrounding continental and insular sectors can be conceived as a border territory, a place of contact and interaction between different social and cultural systems. From the archaeological, bioanthropological, isotopic and historical records, weevaluated these cultural trajectories and interactions between human groups with different lifestyles and technological traditions in the northern area of the western Patagonian channels.In our recent studies, we have detected the occasional consumption of domesticated plants - bean, potato, and corn - present in the dental calculus of individuals of these marine huntergatherer societies around 1000 years BP. Microfossil studies will also be applied to ceramic and lithic use residues to evaluate the presence of these domesticated plants that function as amarker of this moment of contact between both groups. Ceramic and lithic studies are oriented to detect continuities and changes in the production of these types of technologies. The faunal assemblage is also integrated to evaluate possible variations in the procurement of this type of resource. Finally, isotopic analysis of human remains from the late Holocene sequence will allowto precise the diet these groups had and the changes occurred through time, all of this evidence is dated as to understand the chronology of the continuities and changes among these marine hunter-gathering groups.FONDECYT Grant 1170726