Lombardo 2010

8/3/2019 Lombardo 2010

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/lombardo-2010 1/11

Pre-Columbian human occupation patterns in the eastern plains of the Llanosde Moxos, Bolivian Amazonia

Umberto Lombardo a,*, Heiko Prümers b

a Geographisches Institut, Universität Bern, Hallerstr. 12, CH-3012 Bern, Switzerlandb Deutsches Archäologisches Institut, Dürenstr. 35-37, D-53173 Bonn, Germany

a r t i c l e i n f o

Article history:

Received 16 November 2009Received in revised form2 February 2010Accepted 6 February 2010

Keywords:

AmazoniaLlanos de MoxosSettlement patternsPre-Columbian archaeology

a b s t r a c t

Despite an increasing number of publications regarding the Pre-Columbian earthworks of the Llanos deMoxos, there have been no serious attempts to undertake a systematic survey of the archaeologicalremains of this lowland region in the Bolivian Amazon. Based on the GIS analysis of data gathered in thefield and retrieved from satellite images, we discuss the spatial distribution of the Pre-Columbiansettlements in a 4500 Km2 area of the Llanos de Moxos to the east of Trinidad, capital of the BeniDepartment, and their relationship with the geographical settings. Our findings shed new light on theprehistory of the region and bear important implications for our understanding of the impact of Pre-Columbian human occupation.

Ó 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction

The investigation of Pre-Columbian remains and culturalevolution in the Amazon is important to understand how humanshave adapted to tropical environments in the past. Traditionally,pre-historic Amazonia was thought to have been sparsely popu-lated by hunters and gatherers because poor soils and harsh envi-ronmental conditions hindered population growth and culturaldevelopment (Gross, 1975; Meggers, 1954, 1971, 1984, 1985, 1991,1992, 1994a,b, 1995a,b, 2001a,b, 2003a). It was suggested thatpermanent settlements were relegated to the proximities of majorrivers, where the soil was more fertile (Denevan, 1996; Lathrap,1970) and the abundance of fish ensured easy access to animalprotein (Carneiro, 1995). However, in the last few decades, newarchaeological findings seem to indicate that, in fact, the Amazonhosted large populations that developed complex forms of socialorganization and chiefdoms. These populations appear to haveoften settled in areas that researchers used to consider ‘unsuitable’

for such developments (Dougherty and Calandra, 1981, 1981e1982,1984; Erickson, 2000a, 2006, 2008; Heckenberger, 1996,1998,1999,2003, 2005, 2006, 2008, 2009; Heckenberger et al., 1999, 2003,2008; Mann, 2008; Neves, 1999; Neves et al., 2001; Pärssinenet al., 2003, 2009; Porras, 1987, 1989; Roosevelt, 1987, 1991, 1993,

1999a,b, 2000, 2002; Salazar, 1998; Schaan, 2004, 2008; Walker,2004, 2008; Wüst, 1992, 1994, 1998; Wüst and Barreto, 1999).Nevertheless, it is still uncertain just how large and how complexPre-Columbian societies were, due to the scarcity of quantitativedata(Meggers, 2001a, 2003b). In this paperwe present new data onPre-Columbian human occupation patterns in the Llanos de Moxos,a vast seasonally inundated savannah region situated in the BeniDepartment of Bolivia. The study is the result of an ongoing jointproject between the German Archaeological Institute (KAAK, DAI,Bonn) and the Bolivian Unidad Nacional de Arqueología. Theproject focuses on Pre-Columbian settlements (Prümers, 2003,2004, 2006, 2008, 2009a,b; Prümers et al., 2006) (Fig. 1). Wewould argue that these settlements have been almost neglected byprevious studies on the Llanos de Moxos' prehistory, which, witha few exceptions (Dougherty and Calandra, 1981e1982; Erickson,2000a; Nordenskiöld, 1913, 1916) have focused on the descriptionand interpretation of earthworks presumably related to productiveactivities and communication infrastructures, such as raised fields,raised pathways, fish weirs, etc. (Denevan, 1963, 1964, 1966, 1970,1980, 1991; Erickson, 1980, 1995, 2000b,c, 2001a,b, 2006, 2008;Michel López, 1993, 1997, 1999; Walker, 2000, 2001, 2004, 2008).These studies provide a comprehensive record of the abovementioned earthworks as well as a variety of hypotheses abouttheir ancient use and possible cultural meaning. However, verylittle is known about the settlements of those who, over thecenturies, created what Erickson (2006) has denominateda “domesticated landscape”. Our settlements analysis also includesforest islands (FI). FI are visible as patches of forest scattered over

* Corresponding author. Tel.: þ41 31 631 8578; fax: þ41 31 631 8511.E-mail addresses: [email protected] (U. Lombardo), pruemers@kaak.

dainst.de (H. Prümers).

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Journal of Archaeological Science

j o u r n a l h o m e p a g e : h t t p : / / w w w . e l s e vi e r . c o m / l o c a t e / j as

0305-4403/$ e see front matter Ó 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.doi:10.1016/j.jas.2010.02.011

Journal of Archaeological Science 37 (2010) 1875e1885

8/3/2019 Lombardo 2010


the savannahs (Fig.1). The forest grows on slightly elevated surfacesthat normally cover less than 1 ha and are usually less than 1 m tall

(Erickson, 2000a). They are often surrounded by a moat-like ditch(Erickson, 2008). Archaeological findings suggest that almost all theFI were used by Pre-Columbian peoples (Erickson, 2000a, 2006;Langstroth, 1996). Some scholars consider that many of theseelevations are remains of levees along abandoned fluvial channels,hence of natural origin (Hanagarth, 1993; Langstroth, 1996), whileothers believe that they are mostly the result of human activity(Erickson, 2006).

Causeways and canals were probably built as elements of a communication network that made travelling possible the wholeyear round (Erickson, 2000c). However, they have been also inter-preted as part of a productive infrastructure (Barba, 2003).

Excavations at settlement sites in the Llanos de Moxos prior tothe GermaneBolivian project were usually limited to test-pits(Bustos Santelices,1976; Dougherty and Calandra, 1981, 1981e1982,1984; Hanke, 1957; Walker, 2004). In the whole area of the Llanosde Moxos, onlyone ceramic chronology has been established, basedon seriation results and a little stratigraphic data from one2 m Â 2 m pit (Dougherty and Calandra, 1981e1982: 25e46).

There is a consensus that the origin of the artificial earthworksin the Llanos de Moxos is Pre-Columbian and that the earthworkswere used and reshaped over centuries. Nevertheless, there is noconsensus on when thefirst of those constructions were built. Mostof them seem to have been in use between AD 400 and AD 1400(Dougherty and Calandra, 1984: 182e184; Prümers, 2004: 58).Within this period, five different ceramic phases have beendistinguished in the ceramic assemblages recovered from two sitesin the Casarabe region: Loma Mendoza and Loma Salvatierra( Jaimes Betancourt, 2004, 2009; Kupferschmidt, 2004). The data

indicates cultural continuity as there are no abrupt changes in theceramic sequence and some ceramic forms and technical featuresare long lasting.

To date, no serious attempt has been made to carry outa systematic archaeological survey in the western part of the Llanosde Moxos, and virtually no information is available regarding thespatial distribution of settlements or their relation to physicalgeography. A solid database for the modelling of the Pre-ColumbianpastoftheLlanosdeMoxosisverymuchneeded.Thispaperprovidesnew quantitative data tofill someof the gaps and shedsomelight onthe level of social complexity and political organization achieved bythe Pre-Columbian inhabitants of the Llanos de Moxos.

2. Study area

The Llanos de Moxos constitute the southwestern part of theAmazon Basin. Most of the flood plains are located in the Beni

Department, NE Bolivia, and they cover approximately130,000 km2. The climate is characterized by two marked seasons:

the rainy season from October to April, when precipitations canreach 500 mm per month, and the dry season with monthlyprecipitation of <50 mm (Hanagarth, 1993). Temperatures are highthroughoutthe year. From June to Septembershort-lived incursionsof cold fronts from the south can occasionally cause sharptemperature drops. Today, the Llanos de Moxos are characterizedby a patchwork of forest and savannah grassland (Mayle et al.,2007). The drainage network consists of a complex pattern of active and inactive rivers, but no data exists with regard to theirpast evolution and long-term variability (Hanagarth, 1993). TheLlanos de Moxos, with an average slope of 20 cm km À1, are amongthe largest inundated savannah landscapes in the world (Hamiltonet al., 2004; Hanagarth, 1993). Inundations are mainly caused byflooding from the major rivers, but they are also the result of theimpeded drainage of local precipitations (Bourrel and Pouilly,2004). In the latter case, the inundation does not provide nutri-ents to the savannah. Because of this peculiar hydrology, thesavannah soils are mainly acid, very clayey and hydromorphic(Boixadera et al., 2003), and forested areas are mainly confined tothe rarely inundated river levees. Given this complex hydrologicaland geomorphological setting, the savannah areas in the Llanos deMoxos are not very suitable for agriculture (Pereira and Salinas,1982), but a large supply of small fishes can be available forhuman consumption (Garson, 1980).

Our study area is east of the city of Trinidad, the capital of Beni(Fig. 2), and covers approximately 4500 km2. An important part of the study area coincides with the territory of the Sirionó, an indig-enous group that has been referred to as a typical example of a terrafirme society whose growth and cultural evolution has been condi-

tioned by harsh environmental conditions (Meggers, 1971). Nowa-days the savannah is mostly used for large scale, extensive cattlegrazing, but most of the indigenous population practice subsistenceslash and burn agriculture on small plots of forested areas (chaco).

3. Spatial analysis

We have used remote sensing and Geographic InformationSystem (GIS) applications to explore the systemic connections thatlinked settlements with other features, such as canals andcauseways.

In the present study, we combine new data from an in depthfield surveyof the region's earthworks with remote sensing images.The earthworks are analyzed at different spatial scales within a GIS.

The research has been carried out in two successive phases: 1)database building and 2) data analysis. The database has beenconstructed with data gathered during six months of fieldwork in

Fig. 1. On the left a pre-Columbian earth mound. On the right, a forest island. The vegetation around the forest island, patucú, indicates wetter conditions due to the ditch

surrounding the FI.

U. Lombardo, H. Prümers / Journal of Archaeological Science 37 (2010) 1875e18851876

8/3/2019 Lombardo 2010


the study area during 2006 and 2007, and satellite imagery fromLANDSAT, CORONA, ASTER and the Google Earth's high-resolutioncoverage (www.googleearth.com). Probable Pre-Columbian earth-works were first indentified on satellite images and theirgeographic coordinates extracted and saved on a portable GPS.Field reconnaissance of previously identified probable Pre-Colum-bian earthworks was performed by a systematic walking surveyand aided by interviews with local cattle ranchers in and aroundTrinidad and people from the Sirionó Territory and other indige-nous communities. Mounds in thewestern and southern part of thestudy area were mapped with the help of the unpublished Lista delomas (written communication from Ricardo Botega). Thegeographic coordinates of the earthworks surveyed were takenwith a handheld GPS (or confirmed in the case of those featuresalready indentified on satellite images). The GPS points were taken

on the highest part of the mounds and a first estimate of the areacovered by the mounds was made in the field and later made moreprecise with the aid of satellite images. Data on Pre-Columbiancanals and causeways were obtained both from surveys carried outduring the field campaigns and the visual interpretation of remotesensing imagery. For the mapping of forest islands only remotesensing images were used, a task aided by the sharp differencebetween the surface reflectance of the forest and that of thesavannah. The presence of ditches surrounding the forest islandsand abandoned river structures in the vicinity of the forest islandswere registered in an associated table. All surveyed data was storedwith the remote sensing imagery and the DEMs in an ArcGis 9.3georeferenced database. Feature classes were created for mounds,forest islands, canals and causeways in ArcGis 9.3.

Settlement patterns, understood as“the way in which peopledisposed themselves over the landscape” (Willey, 1953:1), have

been analyzed on three different scales: large, medium and small.

1) The large scale analysis focuses on the number and types of earthworks present in the study area and their relation tophysical geographic features. The study area was classified in 3coverage classes: forest, savannah and water bodies. Proximityof mounds and forest islands to forests and rivers was analyzed

using buffer operations and Euclidean distance calculations.2) The medium scale analysis focuses on mounds and forestislands, looking at the relation between individual settlementsand neighbouring settlements. The Average Nearest NeighbourDistance Index R was calculated to evaluate the degree of clustering for mounds and forest islands (Clark and Evans,1954). Here, the closer R is to 0 the more the points are clus-tered. R ¼ 1 indicates a random distribution and R > 1a dispersed one (Mitchell, 2005). Density maps formounds andforest islands have been built using the Kernel Density tool(Silverman, 1986).

3) The small scale analysis focuses on mounds and forest islands asstand alone entities. XYZ points were taken with a total stationand then interpolated in ArcGris 9.3 in order to obtain the DEMfor Loma Salvatierra (19847 points), Loma Torrico (4530 points)and Loma Alta de Casarabe (9269 points). These DEM havebeen used to calculate the volume of the 3 mounds and toestimate the average relation between the volume and areacovered by the mounds. This average value has been thenmultiplied by the area covered by each mound and an estimateof each mound's volume has then been obtained. Thiessenpolygons (Hodder and Orton, 1976), whose boundaries definethe area that is closest to each point relative to all other points,have been generated from the mound layer to estimate theterritory belonging to each mound (Hall, 1982). In order toavoid possible biases, the Thiessen polygons sharing one sidewith the limits of the study area have not been included in theanalysis.

4. Results

4.1. Distribution of Pre-Columbian earthworks: large scale patterns

In the study area a total of 113 mounds, 273 forest islands and957 km of canals and causeways have been found and mapped.Drained fields, which are so prominent in other studies of the Pre-Columbian historyof the Llanos de Moxos are not to be foundin ourstudy area. This section presents the results of the mapping of thedifferent earthworks that are present in the study area (Fig. 3) andexplores the large-scale spatial distribution patterns of mounds andforest islands and their relation to physical geographic features.Almost all the mounds are located along strips of forest that grow

over the fluvial deposits of inactive rivers, often on the very edge of the paleo channel. The forest islands are located, by definition, inthe savannah. Only 65 out of 273 forest islands (24%) are in thevicinity (within a 500 m radius) of inactive rivers and could,therefore, be remains of natural levees; and only 44% of the forestislands are within a 2 km radius of the forested areas where themounds are located.

Both mounds and forest islands vary in size: the average moundcovers 5.5 ha, while the average forest island covers 0.34 ha. Fig. 4shows the statistics for (a) the mounds and (b) the forest islands. Atfirst glance, there is no obvious link between the distribution of settlements and present day water bodies (rivers and lakes). Only22% of the mounds and 23% of the forest islands are within a 2 kmradius of present day water bodies. The average distance from

active rivers is 11.5 km for the mounds and 9 for the forest islands.Nevertheless, a pattern does seem to emerge, as can be seen in thescatter plots in Fig. 4 (c and d). The spatial relations of forest islands

Fig. 2. The Llanos de Moxos. Rivers are represented as black lines, grey shading

represents the forested area, white represents the savannah and dark grey lakes. The

rectangle (dashed line) indicates the study area. The continuous line marks the area

where we estimate that large mounds can be found (see text). The dotted line marks

the smaller area of big mounds as proposed by Denevan.

U. Lombardo, H. Prümers / Journal of Archaeological Science 37 (2010) 1875e1885 1877

8/3/2019 Lombardo 2010


and mounds with rivers are clearly different. On the one hand, mostof the forest islands are located between 2 and 6 km from riverswhile the mounds are randomly distributed. On the other hand, allthe largest mounds are closer to the rivers, while this patterncannot be seen in the case of larger forest islands.

A large number of the mounds are located on the eastern side of

the study area, close to the western edge of a small savannah that iscrossed by the River Cocharca (Fig. 2), and a large forested area thatextends eastwards (Monte San Pablo). This area has the highest

density of mounds. Here, the average distance between twoneighbouring mounds is 1800 m and the maximum distance is3970 m. Most of the mounds seem to be situatedon the eastern sideof the Mamoré river (approximately between parallels 14200 0000 Sand 16000 0000 S) where abandoned rivers have left many depositsacross the savannah. The total area where large mounds are present

in the Llanos has still to be confirmed. Fig. 2 shows our estimationbased onthe location of all the mounds known tous. As can beseenin the map, our estimate is much larger than earlier estimates

Fig. 3. Map of the earthworks in the study area. The small triangles represent mounds of less than 8 ha, the medium triangles represent mounds between 8 and 16 ha and the large

triangles represent mounds larger than 16 ha: 1 Loma Salvatierra, 2 Loma Alta de Casarabe, 3 Loma Mendoza, 4 Ibibate and 5 Loma Torrico. The dots represent forest islands and the

black lines causeways and canals. Boxes a and b enclose the areas that we consider to be under the influence of Loma Cotoca and La Loma respectively. The forest area is shaded in

light grey and the lakes are a darker grey.


8/3/2019 Lombardo 2010


(Denevan, 1966: Fig. 4). If we consider that in our study area wehave found a total of 113 mounds and assume that the density of mounds found in the study area is constant throughout the wholearea where we believe mounds to be present, it would appear thatthere are approximately 380 large mounds in the Llanos de Moxos.

This is about 50% more than that suggested by Erickson (Erickson,2000a).

4.2. Distribution of Pre-Columbian earthworks: medium scale

patterns

In the medium scale analysis we have looked at the distributionof mounds and forest islands and the relations between thedifferent settlements.

Mounds and forest islands show different grades of clustering.For the mounds, the Average Nearest Neighbour Distance Index R is0.91 (with Z score ¼ À1.750 and p-value ¼ 0.080), which indicatessome clustering, although there is a 5e10% likelihood that thisclustered pattern is the result of random chance. For the forest

islands, R is 0.57 (with Z score¼ À

13.736 and p-value¼

0.0000),which indicates a clearly clustered distribution. Fig. 5 shows that,with a few exceptions, the biggest mounds seem to be located onthe edge of areas with high densities of smaller mounds.

This pattern can be clearly observed in the case of Loma Cotoca(Fig. 3, a). Loma Cotoca, which is one of the biggest mounds in thewhole study area, offers a good example of this tendency. It islocated on the outer edge of a cluster made by 15 smaller mounds.Its position is not at the centre of the “constellation” of othermounds. However, if we look at the whole picture, which also

includes the cluster of forest islands, lakes, rivers and different landcoverage, Loma Cotoca appears to be in the very centre of a largeand varied territory, right on the very interface between forest andsavannah. The central role of Loma Cotoca is also shown by theimpressive system of canals and causeways that irradiates from the

mound in all directions and that directly connects it with the IbareRiver in the south, the cluster of forest islands in the south east, thelakes on the east and the cluster of small mounds on the west. Twoother medium size mounds are located on the edge of the cluster,one in the north and the other to the south. Loma Cotoca is thecentre of an area of approximately 500 km2, half forest and half savannah, which includes 18 mounds, 25 forest islands, one riverand 3 lakes.

Another interesting case is the mound La Loma (Fig. 3, b). LaLoma covers 19 ha and is located exactly midway between theMocoví River in the north and the Ibare River in the south, 9 kmfrom each.Most of the forest islands that are close to the mound aregrouped into two clusters, located halfway between the mound andthe rivers to the north and south. Like most of the bigger mounds,

La Loma is connected to rivers, forest islands and other moundsthrough canals and causeways. The mound to the south east of LaLoma illustrates the same pattern, as it is also located halfway fromthe two rivers and about4 km from another clusterof forest islands.In the southern part of the study area all the clusters of forestislands are about 4 km from the rivers.

Approximately half the canals and causeways are located alongthe lines that connect mounds to each other or to rivers, lakes andforest islands. However, a lot of the canals don't seem to have beenbuilt as part of a communication network. Almost 450 km of canals

0 4 8 12 16 20 24

Size (hectares)

0

4

8

12

16

C o u n t

Mean = 5.5Standard Deviation = 4.5

0 0.4 0.8 1.2 1.6 2 2.4

Size (hectares)

0

20

40

60

80

C o u n t

Mean = 0.34Standard Deviation = 0.35

0 4 8 12 16 20 24

Distance from rivers (Km)

0

4

8

12

16

20

C o u n t

0

5

10

15

20

25

S i z e

( h e c t ar e s )

0 4 8 12 16 20 24

Distance from rivers (km)

0

20

40

60

C o u n t

0

0. 5

1

1. 5

2

2. 5

S i z e

( h e c t ar e s )

a

c

b

d

Fig. 4. (a and b): Frequency distributions of (a) mounds and (b) forest islands. (c and d): Scatter plots show the frequency distribution of the distance of (c) mounds and (d) forest

islands from rivers versus the size of the sites (right axis).


8/3/2019 Lombardo 2010


are not linked to settlement mounds. Fig. 6 shows an area of savannah where most of the canals crossing it belong to a networkthat is connected to the river. The mounds do not seem to be themain focus of this network because most of the canals are notconnected to them. The river shown in Fig. 6 flows from right to theleft and during the dry season its water level is about6 m belowthesavannah surface. It is worth noting that all the canals that areconnected to the river come from the right hand side. There are

other cases in which these networks are connected to lakes andcases where canals connect different savannahs with each otherwhile cutting through the paleo river deposits.

4.3. Distribution of Pre-Columbian earthworks: small scale patterns

The study of mounds as individual entities reveals them to beplanned, complex buildings that follow a specific architecturaldesign. The TIN (triangular irregular network) of Loma Salvatierra(Fig. 7) shows many characteristics which are shared by numerousother mounds in the study area. The mounds are elevated earthenplatforms which host one or more pyramidal structures on theirtop; they are built on the edge of paleo river channels and are

surrounded by man-made canals. Five sites in the area are made upof two adjacent mounds. One of these is Loma Ibibate, reported byErickson (2000a). Causeways and canals go from the mounds in thedirection of other settlements or geographic elements such asrivers and lakes.

Some mounds are surrounded by one or more concentricpolygonal causeways and evidence of these can be seen at 13mounds in the study area. In the Loma Salvatierra site, the wholemound complex is surrounded by a polygonal causeway thatencloses 21 ha (Fig. 7). In the case of La Loma (Fig. 3, b) there are 2concentric polygonal causeways, the inner one encloses 75 ha andthe outer one encloses 300 ha. To the south of Loma Salvatierrathere is a savannah that is surrounded by forest and has a conicalprofile, with the deepest part almostin its centre. In the verylowest

part of this savannah there is an excavated pond (reservoir) con-nected by a canal to a second pond which is itself connected toLoma Salvatierra by a canal (Fig. 7). Archaeological excavation of

Fig. 5. Density map for mounds (left) and forest islands (right). Dotted areas represent the forest.

Fig. 6. Detail of canal networks in an open savannah space.


8/3/2019 Lombardo 2010


canals and motor coring of the pond showed that their originaldepth was about 1.8 m below the actual surface. The Thiessenpolygons (Figs. 8 and 9, b) show no correlation between the size of the mounds and the territory that belongs to them. However, the

area enclosed by the polygonal causeways correlates well with thesize of the mounds they are built around (Fig. 9, a).

Unlike the mounds, forest islands are not complex structures,although mostof the forestislands in our study area are surroundedby a ditch or depression that is sometimes connected to a canal.

Based on the data extracted from the DEM of the three moundsanalyzed (Loma Salvatierra, Loma Torrico and Loma Alta de Casar-abe), we have estimated that a total of 15 million m3 of earth weremoved to build all the mounds in the study area, which is equiva-lent to almost 3300 m3/km2. In the case of forest islands, if weassume that they are all man-made and that their average elevationis 1 m, then the total volume of earth needed to build them wouldhave been approximately 0.91 million m3. Based on field observa-tion, we have estimated that building one linear meter of causeway

or canal would have required moving 5 m3

of earth. The totalamount of earth moved for the construction of the canals andcauseways that are still visible today is calculated at 4.8 million m3.

5. Interpretation and discussion

The size of the area in which large mounds are found is fargreater than the area estimated by Denevan (1966), whose proposal

is still being used today as a reference by many scholars (Mann,2008; Walker, 2008). The highest density of mounds in areaswhere forests are closely interwoven with savannahs suggests thatthose areas were preferred for permanent settlements. This rein-forces the observation already made by Heckenberger and his teamin the Upper Xingu region, where the large settlements are locatedon the upland/wetland interface (Heckenberger et al., 2008).

With regard to the origins of forest islands, several facts suggestthat most of them are probably man-made: 1) They are organizedin clusters that are strategically situated on the terrain; 2) Onlya very few could be the remains of natural levees; 3) Most of themare surrounded by a circular depression that is very probably man-made. As forest islands rarely represent important nodes in thenetwork of canals and causeways and do not show any associated

complex structures, we think they could have been secondarysettlements. They may have been temporary dwellings to whichpeople commuted for limited periods of time and/or for specific

Fig. 7. Triangular Irregular Network of the Loma Salvatierra.


8/3/2019 Lombardo 2010


reasons, perhaps related to some kind of productive activity thattook place in the savannah. Furthermore, the fact that severalclusters of forest islands are distributed in specific geometricpatterns in relation to mounds also suggests that they were prob-ably part of a bigger planned structure. Some of the clusters of forest islands are connected to the mounds both by canals andcauseways suggesting that they were used both during the dryseason, when canals were used to transport goods on canoes andduring the rainy season, when causeways were used. However, noexcavations have yet been done in any of the forest islands; wehope to confirm our interpretation as possible secondary sites inthe next future.

The great number of canals and causeways allowed the Pre-Columbian inhabitants of the Llanos de Moxos to move easilythroughout the region both during the rainy and the dry seasons.Nevertheless, not all the canals seem to have been built fortransportation. As suggested by the directions of the canals shown

in Fig. 6 and by the hydrologic characteristics of the Mocoví River,we think that many of them are probably the remains of a drainagesystem that could have been built to allow agricultural productionin the savannah. It is worth noting once again, that no drainedfields have been found anywhere in the study area. This is strikingbecause most authors consider drained field agriculture to be theonly possible form of intensive agriculture in the Llanos de Moxos(Denevan, 2001: 247e249). Another kind of intensive agriculturaltechnology has probably existed, but no evidence of this, otherthan these networks of drainage canals, has yet been found. Thelocations of Loma Cotoca and La Loma show that the use of spacewas carefully planned and the settlements were built to maximizeaccess to different resources available in rivers, lakes, forest andthe savannah. The earthworks built in the savannah in the south of

Loma Salvatierra were probably part of a system aimed at assuringa water supply to the mound; the savannah acted like a giantfunnel that carried the rainwater to the central pond (first reser-voir), then the canals brought the water to the mound via a secondreservoir.

Another striking finding is the impressive amount of earthmoved to build the mounds: it is on average 3300 m3/km2 of land,almost one fourth of the earth moved to build the agriculture fieldsin north Santa Ana de Yacuma, which is estimated in 13,000 m 3/km2 (Lombardo, in press). While the effort put into building agri-culture fields was compensated by the food that they provided,there is not any obvious practical or productive reason for makingthe mounds so high. As Nordenskiöld (1916) concluded, it isunlikely that the Pre-Columbian inhabitants of the Llanos de Moxosconstructed mounds to assure dry dwelling places. To build themounds, each cubic meter of earth must have been transporteda considerable distance, sometimes hundreds of meters. It is notwithin the objectives of this study to calculate the exact amount of work needed to build the mounds, but we can easily infer that itwas incomparably more dif ficult to build 1 m3 of mound than tobuild 1 m3 of raised field, causeway or canal. This suggests that themounds probably had a very important political and/or ritual role.Mounds are by far the most labour consuming earthworks thathave been documented in the Llanos de Moxos. The Loma Cotoca,with an estimated volume of almost 0.5 million cubic meter,

Fig. 8. Map of the mounds with their corresponding Thiessen polygons.

0 100 200 300 400

Enclosed area (hectares)

0

5

10

15

20

25

S i z e f o t h e m o u n d ( h e c t a r e s )

0 40 80 120 160 200 240

Thiessen polygon's area (Km)

0

5

10

15

20

25

S i z e o f t h e m o u n d ( h e c t a r e s )

R-squared = 0.844437RMS = 6.30288 R-squared = 0.271774RMS = 8.84238

Fig. 9. (a) Scatter plot of mound size versus the size of the polygonal causeway surrounding the mound. (b) Scatter plot of mound size versus the size of the Thiessen polygon.


8/3/2019 Lombardo 2010


suggests that there must have been a large and well-organizedcommunity for its construction and maintenance.

As mentioned above, several of the mounds are surrounded bypolygonal causeways that probably marked the area of the settle-ment, in a similar way to the circular ditches and earth walls

described in the Rio Branco region (Pärssinen et al., 2003) and inthe Upper Xingu region (Heckenberger et al., 2008). Polygonalcauseways and canals intersect the paleo river channels, implyingthat those rivers were already abandoned at the time in which themounds were built (otherwise the water flow would have erasedthe earthworks and probably also damaged the mounds). Thefindings suggest that the biggest mounds were probably thecentres of a broader political unit: 1) theyare very important nodesin the network made by canals and causeways; 2) while moundsshow a positive relation in size with the area enclosed by thepolygonal causeway, which is probably an indicator of the amountof population they hosted, they do not show the same relation withthe size of the associated Thiessen polygon, indicating the existenceof political unities beyond the local mound community level. The

hierarchy of the settlements is still evident today in the size of thesettlement, its location, the annexed network of canals andcauseways and the number of other settlements in its sphere of influence. Probably each cluster of mounds represents a commu-nity, and these communities were the basic political units. Everycommunity had an internal hierarchical organization but, there donot seem to have been among different communities. Thesecommunities possibly formed a regional peer polity as describedfor the Upper Xingu area (Heckenberger et al., 2008). However, thepresence of important earthworks that connect different commu-nities or drain savannahs that belong to different communities,suggests the existence of a supra-communal political level. Thiscould have been either a centralized and stable political entity ora temporary structure that was established between two or morecommunities for specific, contingent reasons, such as theconstruction of big causeways or canals.

From the above data, we can infer that the construction of a complex infrastructure allowed the Pre-Columbian inhabitants of the Llanos de Moxos to overcome most of the environmentalconstrains of this part of Amazonia. However, it still remainsobscure how that infrastructure worked and how people managedto maintain such large and permanent settlements.

6. Conclusions

The combination of field reconnaissance, remote sensing andGIS analysis is a powerful tool in order to unveil the relationsbetween settlement patterns and ecological settings.

This study has shown that the Pre-Columbian peoples occupied

the eastern part of the Llanos de Moxos, establishing an impressivenumber of settlements and other earthworks that spread from theforest to the savannah. Previous quantitative estimates of thenumber and distribution of earthworks have been revised upwards.The scale of the mounds and their associated structures reveal thatthey were monumental building, that they were densely inhabitedand well interconnected. The magnitude and the spatial distribu-tion of mounds and FIs suggest the existence of political boundariesbeyond the limits of the single settlement. Settlements wereorganized hierarchically into communities; however, there doesn'tappear to be a hierarchical pattern among the different commu-nities, suggesting that, on a regional scale, they formed peer poli-ties. Even though further archaeological research is needed, theintriguing network of canals and causeways, as well as the big

mounds left by the Pre-Columbian inhabitants of the Llanos deMoxos, are proof of their success in overcoming the harsh envi-ronmental conditions of this tropical floodplain. To learn how they

achieved this goal, will be among the most interesting topics of future research on Pre-Columbian human adaptation in theAmazon Basin.

Acknowledgments

Part of the research was funded by the Deutsche For-schungsgemeinschaft (DFG). Jürgen and Barbara Riester deserveour warmest thanks for their support over all these years. Thanksare also due to Ricardo Bottega, who generously shared hisknowledge of settlement mounds in the Trinidad area. A specialthank goes to Allison Beeby, Elisa Canal and Jan-Hendrik May fortheir good advice and revision of the paper.

References

Barba, J., 2003. Terraplenes precolombinos en Moxos. In: CEAM Centros de EstudiosAmazónicos (Ed.), Una limnocultura. Cultura y medio natural en la Amazoníaboliviana, vol. 92. Gràfiques, Barcelona.

Boixadera, J., Poch, R.M., García-González, M.T., Vizcayno, C., 2003. Hydromorphicand clay-related processes in soils from the Llanos de Moxos (northern Bolivia).Catena 54 (3), 403e424.

Bourrel, L., Pouilly, M., 2004. Hidrología y dinámica fluvial del Río Mamoré. In:Pouilly, M., Beck, S.G., Morales, M.R., Ibañez, C. (Eds.), Diversidad biológica en lallanura de inundación del Río Mamoré. Centro de Ecología Simón I. Patiño,Santa Cruz, Bolivia, pp. 95e116.

Bustos Santelices, V., 1976. Excavaciones arqueológicas en Trinidad, Departamentodel Beni. In: Publicación No. 22. Instituto Nacional de Arqueología, La Paz.

Carneiro, R., 1995. The history of ecological interpretations of Amazonia: doesRoosevelt have it right? In: Sponsel, L. (Ed.), Indigenous Peoples and the Futureof Amazonia: an Ecological Anthropology of an Endangered World. Universityof Arizona Press, Tucson, AZ, USA, pp. 45e70.

Clark, P., Evans, F., 1954. Distance to nearest neighbor as a measure of spatialrelationships in populations. Ecology 35, 445e453.

Denevan, W.M., 1963. Additional comments on the earthworks of Mojos in north-eastern Bolivia. American Antiquity 28 (4), 540e545.

Denevan, W.M., 1964. Pre-Spanish earthworks in the Llanos de Mojos of north-eastern Bolivia. Revista Geográfica 34 (60), 17e25.

Denevan, W.M., 1966. The aboriginal cultural geography of the Llanos de Mojos of Bolivia. In: Ibero-Americana 48. University of California Press, Berkeley.Denevan, W.M., 1970. Aboriginal drained-field cultivation in the Americas. Science

169 (3946), 647e654.Denevan, W.M., 1980. La agricultura intensiva prehispánica. América Indígena 40

(4), 613e618.Denevan, W.M., 1991. Prehistoric roads and causeways of lowland tropical America.

In: Trombold, C.D. (Ed.), Ancient Road Networks and Settlement Hierarchies inthe New World. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 230e242.

Denevan, W.M., 1996. A bluff model of riverine settlement in prehistoric Amazonia.Annals of the Association of American Geographers 86 (4), 654e681.

Denevan, W.M., 2001. Cultivated Landscapes of Native Amazonia and the Andes.Oxford University Press, USA, Oxford.

Dougherty, B., Calandra, H.A., 1981. Nota preliminar sobre investigaciones arqueo-logicas en Llanos de Moxos, Departamento del Beni, Republica de Bolivia.Revista do Museo de la Plata 8 87el06.

Dougherty, B., Calandra, H.A., 1981e1982. Excavaciones arqueológicas en la LomaAlta de Casarabe, Llanos de Moxos, Departamento del Beni, Bolivia. Relacionesde la Sociedad Argentina de Antropología 14 (2), 9e48. Buenos Aires.

Dougherty, B., Calandra, H.A., 1984. Prehispanic human settlement in the Llanos deMojos, Bolivia. In: Rabassa, J. (Ed.), Quaternary of South America and AntarcticPeninsula. Balkema, Rotterdam, pp. 163e200. vol 2.

Erickson, C., 1980. Sistemas agrícolas prehispánicos en los Llanos de Mojos. AméricaIndígena 40 (4), 731e755.

Erickson, C., 1995. Archaeological methods for the study of ancient landscapes of the Llanos de Mojos in the Bolivian Amazon. In: Stahl, P.W. (Ed.), Archaeology inthe Lowland American Tropics. Cambridge University press, Cambridge, UK, pp.66e95.

Erickson, C., 2000a. Lomas de Occupación en los Llanos de Moxos. In: Durán, A.,Bracco, R. (Eds.), Arqueologia de las Tierras Bajas. Comisión nacional dearqueologia, Ministerio de educación y Cultura, Montevideo, Uruguay, pp.207e226.

Erickson, C., 2000b. An artificial landscape-scale fishery in the Bolivian Amazon.Nature 408 (6809), 190e193.

Erickson, C., 2000c. Los caminos prehispánicos de la Amazonia boliviana. In:Herrera, L., Cardale de Schrimpff, M. (Eds.), Caminos precolombinos: Las vías,los ingenieros y los viajeros. Instituto Colombiano de Antropología y Historia,

Bogota, Colombia, pp. 15e

42.Erickson, C., 2001a. Pre-Columbian roads of the Amazon. Expedition 43 (2), 21e30.Erickson, C., 2001b. Precolumbian fish farming in the Amazon. Expedition 43 (1),

7e8.


8/3/2019 Lombardo 2010


Erickson, C.,2006. Thedomesticated landscapesof theBolivian Amazon.In: Balée, W.,Erickson, C. (Eds.), Time and Complexity in Historical Ecology: Studies in theNeotropical Lowlands. Columbia University Press, New York, pp. 235e278.

Erickson, C., 2008. Amazonia: the historical ecology of a domesticated landscape.In: Silverman, H., Isbell, W. (Eds.), Handbook of South American Archaeology.Springer, New York, pp. 157e183.

Garson, A.G., 1980. Comment upon the economic potential of fish utilization in

riverine environments and potential archaeological biases. American Antiquity45 (3), 562e567.

Gross, D., 1975. Protein capture and cultural development in the Amazon Basin.American Anthropologist 77 (3), 526e549.

Hall, M., 1982. Quantifying trends in site location with multidimensional scaling.World Archaeology 14 (1), 131e152.

Hamilton, S., Sippel, S., Melack, J., 2004. Seasonal inundation patterns in two largesavannafloodplainsof SouthAmerica:the Llanosde Moxos(Bolivia)andthe LlanosdelOrinoco(VenezuelaandColombia).HydrologicalProcesses18(11),2103e2116.

Hanagarth, W., 1993. Acerca de la geoecología de las sabanas del Beni en el norestede Bolivia. Instituto de Ecología, La Paz, Bolivia.

Hanke, W., 1957. Einige Funde im Beni-Gebiet (Ostbolivien). Archiv für Völkerkunde12, 136e143.

Heckenberger, M.J., 1996. War and peace in the shadow of empire: sociopoliticalchange in the Upper Xingu of south-eastern Amazonia, ca. AD 1400e2000. Ph.Ddissertation, University of Pittsburgh.

Heckenberger, M.J., 1998. Manioc agriculture and sedentism in Amazonia: theUpper Xingu example. Antiquity 72 (277), 633e648.

Heckenberger, M.J., 1999. The enigma of the great cities: body and state in Ama-zonia. In: Novaes, A. (Ed.), A outra margem do ocidente (Brasil 500 anos:experiência e destino). Companhia das letras, São Paulo.

Heckenberger, M.J., 2003. The enigma of the great cities: body and State in Ama-zonia. Tipiti: Journal of Society for the Anthropology of Lowland South America1, 17e48.

Heckenberger, M.J., 2005. The Ecology of Power: Culture, Place, and Personhood inthe Southern Amazon, A.D. 1000e2000. Routledge, New York.

Heckenberger, M.J., 2006. History, ecology, and alterity: visualizing polity in Ama-zonia. In: Balée, W., Erickson, C. (Eds.), Time and Complexity in HistoricalEcology: Studies in the Neotropical Lowlands. Columbia University Press, NewYork, pp. 311e340.

Heckenberger, M.J., 2008. Amazonian mosaics: identity, interaction, and integra-tion. In: Silverman, H., Isbell, W. (Eds.), Handbook of South American Archae-ology. Springer, New York, pp. 941e961.

Heckenberger, M.J., Oct. 2009. Lost garden cities: pre-Columbian life in the Amazon.Scientific American, 64e71.

Heckenberger, M.J., Kuikuro, A., Kuikuro, U.T., Russell, J.C., Schmidt, M., Fausto, C.,Franchetto, B., 2003. Amazonia 1492: pristine forest or cultural parkland?

Science 301 (5640), 1710e1714.Heckenberger, M.J., Petersen, J.B., Neves, E.G., 1999. Village size and permanence inAmazonia: two archaeological examples from Brazil. Latin American Antiquity10 (4), 353e376.

Heckenberger, M.J., Russell, J.C., Fausto, C., Toney, J.R., Schmidt, M.J., Pereira, E.,Franchetto, B., Kuikuro, A., 2008. Pre-Columbian urbanism, anthropogeniclandscapes, and the future of the Amazon. Science 321 (5893), 1214e1217.

Hodder, I., Orton, C., 1976. Spatial Analysis in Archaeology. Cambridge UniversityPress, New York.

Jaimes Betancourt, C., 2004. Secuencia cerámica del corte 1 de la Loma Mendoza.Universidad Mayor de San Andrés, La Paz.

Jaimes Betancourt, C., 2009. La cerámica de la Loma Salvatierra. Doctoral thesis,Universität Bonn.

Kupferschmidt, D., 2004. Analyse der frühen Keramik des präkolumbischen Sied-lungsplatzes Loma Mendoza, Bolivien. Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Uni-versität, Bonn.

Langstroth, R., 1996. Forest islands in an Amazonian savanna of northeasternBolivia, Ph.D dissertation, University of Wisconsin, Madison.

Lathrap, D., 1970. The Upper Amazon. Ancient Peoples and Places. Thames &

Hudson, Southampton.Lombardo, U. Raised fields of northwestern Bolivia: a GIS based analysis. Zeitschrift

für Archäologie Außereuropäischer Kulturen 3, in press.Mann, C.C., 2008. Ancient Earthmovers of the Amazon. Science 321 (5893)

1148e1148.Mayle, F., Langstroth, R., Fisher, R., Meir, P., 2007. Long-term forestesavannah

dynamics in the Bolivian Amazon: implications for conservation. PhilosophicalTransactions of the Royal Society B 362 (1478), 291e307.

Meggers, B.J., 1954. Environmental limitation on the development of culture.American Anthropologist 56 (5), 801e824.

Meggers, B.J., 1971. Amazonia: Man and Culture in Counterfeit Paradise. AldinePubl., Chicago.

Meggers, B.J., 1984. The indigenous peoples of Amazonia, their cultures, land usepatterns and effects on the landscape and biota. In: Sioli, H. (Ed.), The Amazon.Limnology and Landscape Ecology of a Mighy Tropical River and its Basin.Monographiae Biologicae 56, pp. 627e648. Dordrecht.

Meggers, B.J., 1985. Aboriginal cultural adaptation to Amazonia. In: Prance, G.T.,Lovejoy, T.E. (Eds.), Key Environments: Amazonia. Pergamon Press, Oxford, pp.307e327.

Meggers, B.J., 1991. Cultural evolution in Amazonia. Papers from a Conference inHonor of Elman R. Service. Ann Arbor, Michigan. In: Rambo, A.T., Gillogly, K.(Eds.), Profiles in Cultural Evolution, pp. 191e216.

Meggers, B.J., 1992. Amazonia: real or counterfeit paradise? The Review of Archaeology 13 (2), 25e40.

Meggers, B.J., 1994a. Biogeographical approaches to reconstructing the prehistory of Amazonia. Biogeographica 70 (3), 97e110.

Meggers, B.J., 1994b. Prehistoric cultural development in Amazonia: an archaeo-logical perspective. Research and Exploration 10 (4), 398e421.

Meggers, B.J., 1995a. Amazonia on the eve of European contact: ethnohistorical,

ecological, and anthropological perspectives. Revista de Arqueología Americana8, 91e115.

Meggers, B.J., 1995b. Judging the future by the past: the impact of environmentalinstability on prehistoric Amazonian populations. In: Sponsel, L.E. (Ed.), Indig-enous Peoples and the Future of Amazonia. University of Arizona Press, Tucson& London, pp. 15e43.

Meggers, B.J., 2001a. The continuing quest for El Dorado: round two. Latin AmericanAntiquity 12 (3), 304e325.

Meggers, B.J., 2001b. The mystery of the Marajoara: an ecological solution. Ama-zoniana 16 (3e4), 421e440.

Meggers, B.J., 2003a. Natural versus anthropogenic sources of Amazonian biodi-versity: the continuing quest for El Dorado. In: Bradshaw, G.A., Marquet, P.A.(Eds.), How Landscapes Change. Springer Verlag, Berlin, pp. 89e107.

Meggers, B.J., 2003b. Revisiting Amazonia circa 1492. Science 302, 2067.Michel López, M., 1993. Prospección arqueológica de San Ignacio de Moxos. Prov.

Moxos, Departamento de Beni. Universidad Mayor de San Andrés, Bolivia.Michel López, M., 1997. Campos elevados en el altiplano peruano-boliviano y las

llanuras benianas: tecnología del pasado que retorna al presente. Humana 1 (1),51e64.

Michel López, M., 1999. Desarrollo temprano de la agricultura de campos elevadosen los llanos de Moxos, depto. de Beni, Bolivia. In: Ledergerber-Crespo, P. (Ed.),Formativo sudamericano, una revaluación. Ponencias presentadas en el Sim-posio internacional de arqueología sudamericana. Homenaje a Alberto RexGonzález y Betty J. Megger, Cuenca e Ecuador, 13e17 de enero de 1992. Abya-Yala, Quito, pp. 271e281.

Mitchell, A., 2005. The ESRI Guide to GIS Analysis. In: Spatial Measurements andStatistics, vol. 2. ESRI Press, Redlands, California, USA.

Neves, E.G., 1999. Changing perspectives in Amazonian archaeology. In: Politis, G.G.,Alberti, B. (Eds.),Archaeologyin Latin America.Routledge,Londonand NewYork.

Neves, E.G., Barreto, C., McEwan, C., 2001. Unknown Amazon. Culture in Nature inAncient Brazil. British Museum, London.

Nordenskiöld, E., 1913. Urnengräber und Mounds im bolivianischen Flachland.Baessler-Archiv 3 (6), 205e255.

Nordenskiöld, E., 1916. Die Anpassung der Indianer an die Verhältnisse in denÜberschwemmungsgebieten in Südamerika. In: Ymer 1916, Heft 2, pp.138e155. Stockholm.

Pärssinen, M., Ranzi, A., Saunaluoma, S., Siiriäinen, A., 2003. Geometrically

patterned ancient earthworks in the Rio Branco region of Acre, Brasil: newevidence of ancient chiefdom formations in Amazonian interfluvial terra firmeenvironment. In: Pärssinen, M., Korpisaari, A. (Eds.), Western Amazonia eAmazônia Ocidental, vol. 14. Renvall Institute Publications. University of Hel-sinki, Helsinki, pp. 97e133.

Pärssinen,M.,Schaan,D.,Ranzi,A.,2009.Pre-Columbiangeometricearthworksintheupper Purús: a complex society in western Amazonia. Antiquity 83,1084e1095.

Pereira, F., Salinas, J., 1982. General evaluation of the agricultural potential of theBolivian Amazon. In: Hecht, S.B. (Ed.), Amazonia, Agriculture and Land UseResearch. CIAT, Colombia, pp. 17e32.

Porras, P.I., 1987. Investigaciones arqueolocgicas a las faldas del Sangay: tradiciocnupano. Centro de Investigaciones Arqueoclogicas, P.U.C.E, Quito.

Porras, P.I., 1989. Investigations at the Sangay mound complex. National GeographicResearch 5 (3), 374e381.

Prümers, H., 2003. Feldforschung im Bolivianischen Tiefland: Hügelbeete undSiedlungshügel. In: Graichen, G. (Ed.), Schliemanns Erben. Von den Römern imOrient zur Goldstraße der Inka. Hoffmann und Campe, Hamburg, pp. 252e263.

Prümers, H., 2004. Hügel umgeben von “schönen Monstern”: Ausgrabungen in derLoma Mendoza (Bolivien). In: Expeditionen in Vergessene Welten. 25 Jahre

archäologische Forschungen in Amerika, Afrika und Asien, Forschungen zurAllgemeinen und Vergleichenden Archäologie, 10, pp. 47e78.

Prümers, H., 2006. Improntas de esteras en cerámica prehispánica del sitio BellaVista (Depto. Beni, Bolivia). In: Solanilla Demestre, V. (Ed.), Actas III JornadasInternacionales sobre Textiles Precolombinos. Departament d'Art de la Uni-versitat Autònoma de Barcelona e Institut Català Iberoamericana, Barcelona,pp. 207e212.

Prümers, H., 2008. Der Wall führt zum See. Die Ausgrabungen 2005e2006 in derLoma Salvatierra (Bolivien). Zeitschrift für Archäologie AußereuropäischerKulturen 2, 371e379.

Prümers, H., 2009a. Mit Jaguarzähnen ins Jenseits. Archäologie in Deutschland3/2009, 14e19.

Prümers, H., 2009b. (Charlatanocracia[ en Moxos? In: Kaulicke, P., Dillehay, T.D.(Eds.), Procesos y expresiones de poder, identidad y orden tempranos enSudamérica. Segunda parte. Boletín de Arqueología PUCP 11 (2007). Lima, pp.103e116.

Prümers, H., Jaimes Betancourt, C., Plaza Martínez, R., 2006. Algunas tumbas pre-hispánicas de Bella Vista, prov. Iténez, Bolivia. Zeitschrift für Archäologie Aus-sereuropäischer Kulturen 1, 251e284.

Roosevelt, A.C., 1987. Chiefdoms in the Amazon and Orinoco. In: Drennan, R.D.,Uribe, C.A. (Eds.), Chiefdoms in the Americas. University Press of America,Lanham, pp. 153e185.


8/3/2019 Lombardo 2010


Roosevelt, A.C., 1991. Moundbuilders of the Amazon. Geophysical Archaeology onMarajo Island, Brazil. Academic Press, San Diego, CA.

Roosevelt, A.C., 1993. The rise and fall of the Amazon chiefdoms. L ’Homme 33(126e128), 255e283.

Roosevelt, A.C., 1999a. The development of prehistoric complex societies: Ama-zonia, a tropical forest. Archaeological Papers of the American AnthropologicalAssociation 9 (1), 13e33.

Roosevelt, A.C., 1999b. The maritime, highland, forest dynamic and the origins of complex culture. In: Salomon, F., Schwartz, S.B. (Eds.), The Cambridge History of Native Peoples of the Americas. South America: Part 1, vol. 3. CambridgeUniversity Press, Cambridge, pp. 264e349.

Roosevelt, A.C., 2000. The lower Amazon: a dynamic human habitat. In: Lentz, D.L.(Ed.), Imperfect Balance: Landscape Transformations in the PrecolumbianAmericas. Columbia University Press, New York, pp. 455e491.

Roosevelt, A.C., 2002. Late Amazonian. In: Peregrine, P.N., Ember, M. (Eds.), Ency-clopedia of Prehistory. Kluwer Academic/Plenum Publishers and H.R.A.F., NewYork, pp. 289e293.

Salazar, E., 1998. De vuelta al Sangay e investigaciones arqueológicas en el AltoUpano, Amazonía Ecuatoriana. Bulletin de l’Institut Français d’Études Andines27 (2), 213e240.

Schaan, D.P., 2004. The Camutins Chiefdom: Rise and Development of SocialComplexity on Marajó Island, Brazilian Amazon. Ph.D dissertation, University of Pittsburgh.

Schaan, D.P., 2008. The nonagricultural chiefdoms of Marajó Island. In:Silverman, H., Isbell, W. (Eds.), Handbook of South American Archaeology.Springer, New York, pp. 157e183.

Silverman, B., 1986. Density Estimation for Statistics and Data Analysis. Chapman &Hall/CRC.

Walker, J., 2000. Raised field abandonment in the upper Amazon. Culture andAgriculture 22 (2), 27e31.

Walker, J., 2001. Work parties and raised field groups in the Bolivian Amazon.Expedition 43 (3), 9e18.

Walker, J., 20 04. Agricultural Change in the Bolivian Amazone Cambio Agrícola en

la Amazonía Boliviana. In: Memoirs in Latin American Archaeology 13.University of Pittsburgh Latin American Archaeology Publications and Funda-ción Kenneth Lee, Trinidad, Beni.

Walker, J., 2008. The Llanos de Mojos. In: Silverman, H., Isbell, W. (Eds.), Handbookof South American Archaeology. Springer, New York, pp. 927e939.

Willey, G., 1953. Prehistoric Settlement Patterns in the Viru Valley, Peru. Smithso-nian Institution. Bureau of American ethnology, Washington.

Wüst, I., 1992. Precolonial settlement strategies in Bororo territory. In: Ortiz-Troncoso, O.R., Hammen, T.V.D. (Eds.), Archaeology and Environment in LatinAmerica. Institut vor Pre- en Protohistorische Archeologie Albert Egges vanGiffen. Universiteit van Amsterdam, Holland, pp. 253e258.

Wüst, I., 1994. The eastern Bororo from an archaeological perspective. In:Roosevelt, A. (Ed.), Amazonian Indians from Prehistory to the Present.Anthropological Perspectives. University of Arizona Press, Tucson, pp. 315e342.

Wüst, I., 1998. Continuities and discontinuities: archaeology and ethnoarchaeologyin the heart of the Eastern Bororo terrritory, Mato Grosso, Brazil. Antiquity 72,663e675.

Wüst, I., Barreto, C., 1999. The ring villages of central Brazil: a challenge forAmazonian archaeology. Latin American Antiquity 10 (1), 3e23.


Lombardo 2010

Documents

Transcript of Lombardo 2010