Skip to main content

Advertisement

SpringerLink
Log in

Two millennia of changes in human ecology: archaeobotanical and invertebrate records from the lower Ica valley, south coast Peru

  • Original Article
  • Published:
Vegetation History and Archaeobotany Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

This paper presents archaeobotanical and invertebrate evidence from the flotation and analyses of 46 archaeological contexts from six middens from the Samaca and Ullujaya basins, lower Ica Valley, south coast of Peru. This is part of one of the world’s driest deserts and organic remains can enjoy extraordinary preservation in its hyperarid climate. Each of these contexts represents snapshots with which to piece together a picture of changing human ecology in the lower Ica Valley over nearly two millennia, from Ocucaje Phases 3/4 of the Early Horizon (c. 750 b.c.); through to Early Nasca Phases 2/3 (c. a.d. 100–450); Late Nasca Phases 6/7 (c. a.d. 450–600) and Middle Horizon Epoch 2 (c. a.d. 900). They also offer proxy evidence of wider ecological changes in these basins. Read together with geoarchaeological and pollen data, the archaeobotanical data we present show a gradual intensification of agriculture from small-scale Early Ocucaje societies subsisting mainly on gathered marine and terrestrial resources, through to sophisticated irrigation agriculture by Nasca times, but culminating in a collapse of agricultural production and a return to the gathering of wild marine and plant resources much later, during the Middle Horizon. This trajectory of human ecology is consistent with the model presented elsewhere of a gradual removal of Prosopis dominated riparian woodland for the purpose of increasing agricultural production, which in time exposed the landscape of the lower Ica Valley to high-energy, episodic flood events and of one of the world’s strongest and most persistent wind regimes.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3
Fig. 4
Fig. 5
Fig. 6
Fig. 7
Fig. 8
Fig. 9
Fig. 10
Fig. 11

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Balée W (1998) Historical ecology: premises and postulates. In: Balée W (ed) Advances in historical ecology. Columbia University Press, New York, pp 13–29

    Google Scholar 

  • Beresford-Jones DG (2005) Pre-hispanic prosopis-human relationships on the south coast of Peru: Riparian Forests in the Context of Environmental and Cultural Trajectories of the Lower Ica Valley. PhD thesis, University of Cambridge, http://www.arch.cam.ac.uk/dgb27/

  • Beresford-Jones DG (in press) The Lost Woodlands of Ancient Nasca. A Case-study in Ecological and Cultural Collapse. British Academy Postdoctoral Monograph Series, Oxford University Press

  • Beresford-Jones DG, Arce S (2010) Informe de los Trabajos Realizados Durante la Temporada 2007. Presentada ante la Comisión Técnica de Arqueología. Instituto Nacional de Cultura del Perú. Lima, Peru, http://www.arch.cam.ac.uk/dgb27/

  • Beresford-Jones DG, Arce S, Grimaldo C (2004) Informe de los Trabajos Realizados Durante la Temporada 2002. Presentada ante la Comisión Técnica de Arqueología. Instituto Nacional de Cultura del Perú. Lima, Peru, http://www.arch.cam.ac.uk/dgb27/

  • Beresford-Jones DG, Arce Torres S, Whaley OQ, Chepstow-Lusty AJ (2009a) The Role of Prosopis in ecological and landscape change in the Samaca Basin, lower Ica Valley, south coast Peru from the early horizon to the late intermediate period. Latin Am Antiq 20:303–332

    Google Scholar 

  • Beresford-Jones DG, Lewis HA, Boreham S (2009b) Linking cultural and environmental change in Peruvian prehistory: geomorphological survey of the Samaca Basin, south coast Peru. Catena 78:234–249

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Beresford-Jones DG, Alarcón C, Arce S, Chepstow-Lusty A, Whaley O, Sturt F, Gorriti M, Portocarrero O, Cadwallader L (2011) Ocupación y subsistencia durante el horizonte temprano en el contexto de cambios ecológicos a largo plazo en las cuencas de Samaca y Ullujaya, valle baja de Ica. In: Kaulicke P, Onuki Y (eds) El Periodo Formativo en el Perú. Boletín de Arqueología pucp 13, Fondo Editorial de la Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú

  • Berglund BE, Ralska-Jasiewiczowa M (1986) Pollen analysis and pollen diagrams. In: Berglund B (ed) Handbook of holocene palaeoecology and palaeohydrology. Wiley, Chichester, pp 455–484

    Google Scholar 

  • Bird RM, Browman L, Durbin ME (1984) Quechua and maize: mirrors of Central Andean culture history. Journal of the Steward Anthropological Society 15:187–240

    Google Scholar 

  • Brack AE (1999) Diccionario Enciclopedico de Plantas Utiles del Perú. Cusco: Centro Regionales Andinos ‘Bartolomé de las Casas’

  • Brako L, Zarucchi J (1993) Catalogo de las Angiospermas y Gimnospermas del Perú. Missouri Botanical Garden, St. Louis, Missouri

    Google Scholar 

  • Burger RL (1992) Chavin and the origins of Andean civilisation. Thames and Hudson, London

    Google Scholar 

  • Burghardt AD, Brizuela MM, Mom MP, Albán L, Palacios RA (2010) Análisis numérico de las especies de Prosopis L. (Fabaceae) de las costas de Perú y Ecuador. Revista Peruana de Biología 17:317–323

    Google Scholar 

  • Butzer KW (1982) Archaeology as human ecology. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Castetter EF, Bell WH (1942) Pima and Papago Indian Agriculture. University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque, New Mexico

    Google Scholar 

  • Conklin WJ (2008) The culture of Chavín textiles. In: Conklin WJ, Quilter J (eds) Chavín: art, architecture and culture. Cotsen Institute of Archaeology Monograph 61. Cotsen Institute of Archaeology, Los Angeles, pp 261–278

    Google Scholar 

  • Cook AG (1994) Invesitigaciones de Reconocimiento Arqueologico en la Parte Baja del Valle de Ica. Informe Final (1988–1990) al Instituto Nacional de Cultura

  • Cook AG (1999) Asentamientos Paracas en el Valle Bajo de Ica, Perú. Gaceta Arqueologica Andina 25. INDEA, Lima, Peru

    Google Scholar 

  • Cook AG, Parrish N (2005) Gardens in the desert: archaeobotanical analysis from the lower Ica Valley, Peru. Andean Past 7:135–156

    Google Scholar 

  • Cooke RU, Warren A, Goudie AS (1993) Desert geomorphology. University College London Press, London

    Google Scholar 

  • DeLeonardis L (1997) Paracas settlement in Callango, lower Ica Valley, 1st Millennium BC, Perú. Unpubl. PhD thesis, Catholic University of America, Washington, DC. University Microfilms Inc., Ann Arbor, Michigan

  • DeLeonardis L (2005) Early Paracas cultural contexts: new evidence from Callango. Andean Past 7:27–55

    Google Scholar 

  • Dillehay TD, Rossen J, Andres T, Williams DE (2007) Preceramic adoption of peanut, squash, and cotton in Northern Peru. Science 316:1,890-1,893

  • Donaire Vizarreta J (1998 [1959]) Campiña Iqueña. Aspectos Folklóricos (1941), 4th edn. Ital Perú, Lima

  • Doolittle WE (2000) Cultivated landscapes of Native North America. Oxford University Press, Oxford

    Google Scholar 

  • Gade DW (1966) Achira, the Edible Canna, its cultivation and use in the Peruvian Andes. Econ Bot 20:407–415

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Galan de Mera A (1999) La Clases Fitosociologicas De la Vegetación del Perú. Boletín de Lima 117:84–94

    Google Scholar 

  • Godelier M (1977) The concept of ‘social and economic formation’: the Inca example. In: Perspectives in Marxist Anthropology. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge

    Google Scholar 

  • Grobman A, Salhuana W, Sevilla R, Mangelsdorf P (1961) Races of Maize in Peru. National Research Council Publication 915. National Academy of Sciences, Washington

    Google Scholar 

  • Harris PJC, Pasiecznik NM, Smith SJ, Billington JM, Ramírez L (2003) Differentiation of Prosopis juliflora (Sw.) DC and P. pallida (H. & B. ex. Willd.) H.B.K. using foliar characters and ploidy. For Ecol Manag 180:153–164

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hather JG (1993) An archaeobotanical guide to root and tuber identification. Volume 1 Europe and South West Asia. Oxbow Monograph 28, Oxbow Books, Oxford

  • Hather JG (2000) Archaeological parenchyma. Archetype Publications, London

    Google Scholar 

  • Hecht N (2009) Of layers and shreds: a context-based relative chronology of the Nasca Style Pottery from Palpa. In: Reindel M, Wagner GA (eds) New technologies for archaeology: multidisciplinary investigations in Palpa and Nasca, Peru. Springer, Berlin, pp 207–230

    Google Scholar 

  • Hodgson WC (2001) Food plants of the Sonoran Desert. University of Arizona Press, Tucson

    Google Scholar 

  • Holden TG (1991) Evidence of prehistoric diet from northern Chile: coprolites, gut contents and flotation samples from the Tulán Quebrada. World Archaeol 22:320–331

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hubbard RNLB, Clapham A (1992) Quantifying macroscopic plant remains. Rev Palaeobot Palynol 73:117–132

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Isbell WH (1988) City and state in Middle Horizon Huari. In: Keatinge RW (ed) Peruvian prehistory. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp 164–189

    Google Scholar 

  • Jones MK (2009) Moving North: archaeobotanical evidence for plant diet in middle and upper Palaeolithic Europe. In: Richards MP, Hublin J-J (eds) The evolution of hominid diets: integrating approaches to the study of palaeolithic subsistence. Springer, London, pp 171–180

    Google Scholar 

  • Kellner CM, Schoeninger MJ (2008) Wari’s imperial influence on local Nasca diet: the stable isotope evidence. J Anthropol Archaeol 27:226–243

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kroeber AL (1944) Peruvian Archaeology in 1942. Viking fund publications in anthropology 4, New York

  • Mächtle B, Unkel I, Eitel B, Kromer B, Schiegl S (2010) Molluscs as evidence for a late Pleistocene and early Holocene humid period in the southern coastal desert of Peru (14.5 S). Quat Res 73:39–47

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Martin AC, Barkley WD (1961) Seed identification manual. University of California Press, Berkeley

    Google Scholar 

  • Massey SA (1991) Social and political leadership in the lower Ica Valley: Ocucaje Phases 8 and 9. In: Paul A (ed) Paracas art and architecture. University of Iowa Press, Iowa City, pp 349–416

    Google Scholar 

  • McCauley JF, Breed CS, Grolier MJ (1977) Yardangs. In: Doehring DO (ed) Geomorphology in arid regions. Allen and Unwin, Boston, pp 233–272

    Google Scholar 

  • Molas (1994) Archaeological site manual, III edn. Museum of London Archaeological Service, Museum of London

    Google Scholar 

  • Mom MP, Burghardt AD, Palacios RM, Albán L (2002) Los algarrobos Peruanos: Prosopis pallida y su delimitación. Arnaldoa 9:39–48

    Google Scholar 

  • Moseley ME (1975) The maritime foundations of Andean Civilization. Cummings Archaeological Series, Merlo Perk, Cummings

    Google Scholar 

  • Nabhan GP (1979) The ecology of floodwater farming in arid south-western North America. Agro-Ecosystems 5:245–255

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Nabhan GP (1985) Gathering the desert. University of Arizona Press, Tucson

    Google Scholar 

  • Paran I, van der Knaap E (2007) Genetic and molecular regulation of fruit and pepper domestication traits in tomato and pepper. J Exp Bot 59:3,841–3,852

    Google Scholar 

  • Parker Gay S Jr (1999) Observations regarding the movement of Barchan sand dunes in the Nazca to Tacna Area of southern Peru. Geomorphology 27:279–293

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Pennington TD (1997) The genus Inga: botany. Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew

    Google Scholar 

  • Pennington TD, Fernandes ECM (eds) (1998) The genus Inga: utilization. Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew

    Google Scholar 

  • Piacenza L (2005) Evidencias botánicas en asentamientos Nasca. Boletín del Museo de Arqueología y Antropolgía (UNMSM) 5:3–13

    Google Scholar 

  • Plowman T (1984) The origin, evolution and diffusion of coca, Erythroxylum spp., in South and Central America. In: Stone D (ed) Pre-columbian plant migration. Papers of the peabody museum of archaeology and ethnology 76:125–163

  • Ramírez R, Córdova S, Caro K, Duárez J (2003) Response of a land snail species (Bostryx conspersus) in the Peruvian central coast lomas ecosystem to 1982–1983 and 1997–1998 El Niño Events. In: Haas J, Dillon MO (eds) El Niño in Peru: biology and culture over 10,000 years. Fieldiana Botany 43. Field Museum of Natural History, Chicago, pp 10–23

    Google Scholar 

  • Rea AM (1997) At the desert’s edge: an ethnobotany of the Gila River Pima. University of Arizona Press, Tucson

    Google Scholar 

  • Redman CL (1999) Human impact on ancient environments. University of Arizona Press, Tuscon

    Google Scholar 

  • Roe PG (2008) How to build a raptor: why the Dumbarton Oaks “Scaled Cayman” Callango textile is really a Chavín jaguaroid Harpy Eagle. In: Conklin WJ, Quilter J (eds) Chavín: art, architecture and culture. Cotsen Institute of Archaeology Monograph 61. Cotsen Institute of Archaeology, Los Angeles, pp 181–216

    Google Scholar 

  • Roque J, Cano A, Cook A (2003) Restos vegetales del sitio arqueológico Casa Vieja, Callango (Ica). Revista Peruano de Biología 10:33–43

    Google Scholar 

  • Rossel Castro A (1977) Arqueología Sur del Perú. Editorial Universo S.A, Lima

    Google Scholar 

  • Rostworowski de Diez Canesco M (1989) Costa Peruana Prehispanica. Instituto de Estudios Peruanos, Lima

    Google Scholar 

  • Sagástegui Alva A (1973) Manual de las Malezas de la Costa Norperuana. Universidad Nacional de Trujillo, Trujillo

    Google Scholar 

  • Schreiber KJ (1992) Wari Imperialism in Middle Horizon Peru. Anthropological Papers 87. University of Michigan, Museum of Anthropology, Ann Arbor

    Google Scholar 

  • Schreiber KJ (1999) Regional approaches to the study of prehistoric empires: examples from Ayacucho and Nasca, Peru. In: Billman BR, Feinman GM (eds) Settlement pattern studies in the Americas: fifty years since Virú. Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington, DC, pp 160–171

    Google Scholar 

  • Schreiber KJ (2001) Los wari en su contexto local: Nasca y Sondondo. In: Kaulicke P, Isbell WH (eds) Huari y Tiwanaku: Modelos vs. Evidencias. Boletín de Arqueología PUCP 4, Lima, pp 425–448

  • Schultes RE (1972) Hallucinogens in the Western Hemisphere. In: Furst PT (ed) Flesh of the Gods: the ritual use of Hallucinogens. Waveland Press, Prospect Heights, IL, pp 3–54

    Google Scholar 

  • Silverman H (1993) Cahuachi in the ancient Nasca World. University of Iowa Press, Iowa City

    Google Scholar 

  • Stephens SG (1970) The botanical identification of archaeological cotton. Am Antiq 35:367–373

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Stone-Miller R (1992) To weave for the sun: ancient andean textiles in the museum of fine arts. Boston, Thames and Hudson, London

    Google Scholar 

  • Strong WD, Willey GR, Corbett JM (1943) Archaeological studies in Peru. Columbia University Press, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Ugent D, Pozorski S, Pozorski T (1984) New evidence for ancient cultivation of Canna edulis in Peru. Econ Bot 38:417–432

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Unkel I, Kromer B (2009) The clock in the corn cob. In: Reindel M, Wagner GA (eds) New technologies for archaeology: multidisciplinary investigations in Palpa and Nasca, Peru. Springer, Berlin, pp 231–244

    Google Scholar 

  • Weir GH, Eling HH Jr (1986) Pollen evidence for economic plant utilization in pre-hispanic agricultural fields of Jequetepegue Valley, Northern Peru. In: Matos R, Turpin SA, Eling HH Jr (eds) Andean archaeology, Papers in memory of Clifford Evans. Monograph XXVII, Institute of Archaeology, University of California, Los Angeles

    Google Scholar 

  • Westengen OT, Huamán Z, Heun M (2005) Genetic diversity and geographic pattern in early South American cotton domestication. Theor Appl Gen 110:392–402

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Whaley OQ, Orellana A, Pérez E, Tenorio M, Quinteros F, Mendoza M, Pecho O (2010) Plantas y Vegetación de Ica, Perú–Un recurso para su restauración y conservación. Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew

    Google Scholar 

  • Whaley OQ, Beresford-Jones DG, Milliken W, Orellana A, Smyk A, Leguia J (2011) An ecosystem approach to restoration and sustainable management of dry forest in Southern Peru. Kew Bull 65:1–29

    Google Scholar 

  • Williams PR, Nash DJ (2002) Imperial interaction in the Andes: Huari and Tiwanaku at Cerro Baúl. In: Isbell WH, Silverman H (eds) Andean archaeology I: variations in sociopolitical organization. Plenum, New York, pp 243–266

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgments

We thank all the members of the Proyecto de Investigación Arqueológica Samaca for their fieldwork and many other invaluable contributions, especially Mario Advíncula, Claudia Grimaldo, Kevin Lane, Sandy Pullen, Fraser Sturt and, in particular, its co-director Susana Arce Torres of the Museo Regional de Ica. For the wider interpretations drawn on in this paper we acknowledge with thanks the contributions of Alex Chepstow-Lusty (pollen identifications), Manuel Gorriti (mollusc identifications), Helen Lewis (micromorphological interpretations) and Oscar Portocarrero (plant macrofossil identification). We also thank two anonymous reviewers for their useful suggestion and comments on this paper and Steve Boreham, Warwick Bray, Elizabeth DeMarrais, Charly French, Martin Jones and all members, past and present, of the George Pitt-Rivers Bioarchaeology Laboratory, University of Cambridge, for their help and advice. We thank the Instituto Nacional de Cultura (INC), Perú for granting us research permits. And, above all, we thank the people of the Escuela Libre de Puerto Huamaní and Don Alberto Benavides G. This research was funded by the Natural Environmental Research Council (NERC), the British Academy and the McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research, Cambridge.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research, University of Cambridge, Downing St, Cambridge, CB2 3ER, UK

    David G. Beresford-Jones & Lauren Cadwallader

  2. The Herbarium, Royal Botanical Gardens Kew, Richmond, Surrey, TW9 3AE, UK

    Oliver Whaley

  3. Instituto de Investigaciones Andinas Punku, Calle Los Molles 131 Urbanización Alto de Los Ficus Santa Anita, Lima, Peru

    Carmela Alarcón Ledesma

Authors
  1. David G. Beresford-Jones
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Oliver Whaley
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Carmela Alarcón Ledesma
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. Lauren Cadwallader
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to David G. Beresford-Jones.

Additional information

Communicated by L.A. Newsom.

Electronic supplementary material

Below is the link to the electronic supplementary material.

(PDF 670 kb)

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Beresford-Jones, D.G., Whaley, O., Ledesma, C.A. et al. Two millennia of changes in human ecology: archaeobotanical and invertebrate records from the lower Ica valley, south coast Peru. Veget Hist Archaeobot 20, 273–292 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00334-011-0292-4

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00334-011-0292-4

Keywords

Search

Navigation