An official website of the United States government
A dense system of pre-Hispanic urban centers has been found in the Upano Valley of Amazonian Ecuador, in the eastern foothills of the Andes. Fieldwork and light detection and ranging (LIDAR) analysis have revealed an anthropized landscape with clusters of monumental platforms, plazas, and streets following a specific pattern intertwined with extensive agricultural drainages and terraces as well as wide straight roads running over great distances. Archaeological excavations date the occupation from around 500 BCE to between 300 and 600 CE. The most notable landscape feature is the complex road system extending over tens of kilometers, connecting the different urban centers, thus creating a regional-scale network. Such extensive early development in the Upper Amazon is comparable to similar Maya urban systems recently highlighted in Mexico and Guatemala.
more »
« less
A monumental stone plaza at 4750 B.P. in the Cajamarca Valley of Peru
We report one of the earliest known circular plazas in Andean South America and one of the earliest examples of monumental, megalithic ceremonial architecture in the Americas. The example presented here is constructed of large free-standing and vertically placed megalithic stones and is located in the Cajamarca basin of the northern Peruvian Andes. This construction method has never before been reported in the Andes and is distinct from other monumental circular plazas in the region. We present three radiocarbon dates associated with the initial construction of the plaza which average to approximately 2750 calibrated years before the common era (cal BCE), corresponding squarely to the Late Preceramic period, which saw the first monumental construction in the Andes. This is one of the earliest examples of monumental, megalithic architecture in the Americas.
more »
« less
- Award ID(s):
- 2114574
- PAR ID:
- 10540016
- Publisher / Repository:
- American Association for the Advancement of Science
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Science Advances
- Volume:
- 10
- Issue:
- 7
- ISSN:
- 2375-2548
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
More Like this
-
-
Studies of late prehispanic architecture in the Andes have generally focused on rectangular and circular structures associated with the Inka Empire. Meanwhile, the architecture of non-Inka populations spans a remarkable diversity of non-orthogonal structures, implicating varied roof designs and construction techniques. This study addresses a gap in knowledge on architectural traditions through collaboration with the community of Huama (Lamay District). Specifically, the replicative construction of a wankar wasi (drum-shaped house) presented herein draws on traditional knowledge developed in Huama over the course of many generations. We also applied Mobile Laser Scanning to visualize and analyze the resultant structure. These data facilitate analogy between contemporary practices and the archaeological record to understand the materials, knowledge, and relationships engaged by prehispanic builders, with the objective of reconstructing local cooperation and resilience of under state occupation. Moreover, this research celebrates local heritage while illuminating the technological choices implicated in construction, past and present.more » « less
-
null (Ed.)Maize is a cultigen of global economic importance, but when it first became a staple grain in the Americas, was unknown and contested. Here, we report direct isotopic dietary evidence from 52 radiocarbon-dated human skeletons from two remarkably well-preserved rock-shelter contexts in the Maya Mountains of Belize spanning the past 10,000 years. Individuals dating before ~4700 calendar years before present (cal B.P.) show no clear evidence for the consumption of maize. Evidence for substantial maize consumption (~30% of total diet) appears in some individuals between 4700 and 4000 cal B.P. Isotopic evidence after 4000 cal B.P. indicates that maize became a persistently used staple grain comparable in dietary significance to later maize agriculturalists in the region (>70% of total diet). These data provide the earliest definitive evidence for maize as a staple grain in the Americas.more » « less
-
Radiocarbon dating of the earliest occupational phases at the Cooper’s Ferry site in western Idaho indicates that people repeatedly occupied the Columbia River basin, starting between 16,560 and 15,280 calibrated years before the present (cal yr B.P.). Artifacts from these early occupations indicate the use of unfluted stemmed projectile point technologies before the appearance of the Clovis Paleoindian tradition and support early cultural connections with northeastern Asian Upper Paleolithic archaeological traditions. The Cooper’s Ferry site was initially occupied during a time that predates the opening of an ice-free corridor (≤14,800 cal yr B.P.), which supports the hypothesis that initial human migration into the Americas occurred via a Pacific coastal route.more » « less
-
Abstract Before the arrival of Europeans, domestic cattle ( Bos taurus ) did not exist in the Americas, and most of our knowledge about how domestic bovines first arrived in the Western Hemisphere is based on historical documents. Sixteenth-century colonial accounts suggest that the first cattle were brought in small numbers from the southern Iberian Peninsula via the Canary archipelago to the Caribbean islands where they were bred locally and imported to other circum-Caribbean regions. Modern American heritage cattle genetics and limited ancient mtDNA data from archaeological colonial cattle suggest a more complex story of mixed ancestries from Europe and Africa. So far little information exists to understand the nature and timing of the arrival of these mixed-ancestry populations. In this study we combine ancient mitochondrial and nuclear DNA from a robust sample of some of the earliest archaeological specimens from Caribbean and Mesoamerican sites to clarify the origins and the dynamics of bovine introduction into the Americas. Our analyses support first arrival of cattle from diverse locales and potentially confirm the early arrival of African-sourced cattle in the Americas, followed by waves of later introductions from various sources over several centuries.more » « less
- Free Publicly Accessible Full Text
-
Accepted Manuscript1.0
- Journal Article:
- https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.adl0572
