New Bioarchaeological Evidence and Radiocarbon Dates from the Lambayeque/Sicán Culture Camelids from the El Brujo Complex (Northern Coast of Peru): Implications for Funerary and Herd Management Practices

ABSTRACT

Pastoralism and camelid management have been essential to all aspects of pre-Hispanic Andean societies. Here, we present zooarchaeological and isotopic data on domestic camelid remains from Huaca Cao Viejo (El Brujo archaeological complex) on the northern coast of Peru, and dated to the Lambayeque/Sicán period—to characterise their biological age, diet, life history, possible geographic origin and ritual use. Domestic camelids, representing a wide range of biological ages and a high rate of polydactyly, were found as burial offerings in direct association with human funerary bundles (fardos). Direct AMS dates indicated that camelids were buried over a short period of time (AD 1022–1176) confirming the Lambayeque presence in the Chicama Valley during the first half of the Late Intermediate Period. Stable isotopic analyses were carried out on both bone collagen and hair keratin, including incremental analysis. A considerable variability in δ¹³C values at both the intra-individual and the intra-group level and a large contribution of C₄ resources to diet are shown. This clearly supports local management and camelids originating from various herds. Zooarchaeological and isotopic evidences suggest diversity in herding practices and suggest the importance of the herds in fulfilling the transportation demands for trade in goods.     

Multi-Isotope Investigations for Scientific Characterisation and Provenance Implication of Banded Travertines from Tripolis Antique City (Denizli–Turkey)

The coloured stones used in buildings and monuments were an indicator of power and wealth during the ancient times. In this study, Tripolis city samples have been compared with Tripolis quarry samples in order to recognise the provenance of the banded travertine blocks in the ancient city. The banded travertine samples have similar mineral compositions and mainly consist of calcite with minor amounts of dolomite, aragonite, clay and iron oxide minerals. These results are also supported by CRS studies. Calcite is in the form of needle-shaped crystals ranging between 0.163–1.418?mm (in city) and 0.303–1.270?mm (in quarry). Tripolis banded travertine samples show the similar compositional spread in terms of major oxide, trace elements. δ¹³C_V-PDB values of banded travertines range from 1.93 to 5.25‰ (in city) and 2.99 to 3.99‰ (in quarry), δ¹⁸O_V-PDB values change between (?16.93)–(?10.08) ‰ and (?15.93)–(?13.01)‰, respectively. The U–Th radiometric ages are determined between ～267 and 9?ka in Tripolis city samples and ～350 and 2?ka in Tripolis quarry samples. The minero-petrographic, geochemical, C–O and U–Th isotope results fairly matched with each other. It seems highly probable that the banded travertines in Tripolis city were extracted from the Tripolis quarry, which is located at the northeast of the antique city with a distance of 3?km.     

A Sixteenth-Century Draft Plan of Lisbon’s Western Suburb

The National Library of Brazil has in its cartographic collection a little-known late sixteenth-century ichnographic plan of Lisbon, Portugal, showing the city’s western extramural suburb. In this article the unfinished draft plan is analysed for what it reveals of the mapmakers’ surveying methods. Comparison of the plan with other historical sources suggests that it was produced by Giovanni Vincenzo Casale and Alexandre Massai for military purposes between 1590 and 1597. This makes it the oldest ichnographic plan of Lisbon known to date, replacing the better known ichnographic plan of Lisbon signed by João Nunes Tinoco in 1650.     

Some Insights on the Aterian in the Libyan Sahara: Chronology, Environment, and Archaeology

The Aterian has a huge geographic extension covering all North Africa, although it was not supposed to exist in the mountain ranges of the central Sahara. Its chronological context is not yet definitively determined and it is still difficult to say whether the Aterian tools are technological, typological, functional, or chronological markers. Recent surveys and excavations at Uan Tabu and Uan Afuda, two rock-shelters located in the central Tadrart Acacus, provide the first chronological, environmental and archaeological indications on this Late Pleistocene human occupation in the area. The lack of organic matter led us to perform OSL and TL analyses on sand. L'Atérien a une énorme extension géographique qui couvre tout le Nord de l'Afrique, tandis qu'on ne pensait pas qu'il existait dans les montagnes du Sahara central. Son contexte culturel n'est pas définitivement déterminé et il est encore difficile de dire si les instruments atériens sont des indicateurs téchnologiques, typologiques, fonctionels ou culturels. Reconnaissances et fouilles récentes à Uan Tabu et Uan Afuda, deux abris situés dans l'Acacous central, fournissent les premières indications sur la chronologie, l'environnement et l'archéologie de l'Atérien dans la région. L'absence de la substance organique, nous a porté à faire des déterminations OSL et TL sur les sables.     

Characterisation and blind testing of radiocarbon dating of cremated bone

The success of radiocarbon dating of burned or cremated bones depends on the exposed temperature during burning and the degree of re-crystallisation of the inorganic bone matrix. We present a method for characterisation of likely cremated bones by employing visual inspection, infrared spectrometry and carbon stable isotope analysis on the bio-apatite fraction. The method of radiocarbon dating of cremated bones was tested by dating paired samples of bone and associated context materials such as pitch, charcoal and a dendrochronologically dated oak coffin. The dating of these paired test samples were largely performed as blind tests and showed excellent agreement between pitch and bone. The weighted mean age difference of all test samples is observed to −9 ± 60 ¹⁴C yr. To test the indicators and the effects of the degree of burning, a Late-Neolithic human individual has been studied, as this individual exhibits the full spectrum from low temperature burning (charred) to high temperature (“cremated”) from one end of a single bone to the other. This is reflected as a marked step in numerous parameters as well as in a significant difference in ¹⁴C age between the charred and the cremated bone samples.     

Differentiating between anthropogenic calcite in plaster,ash and natural calcite using infrared spectroscopy: implications in archaeology

Infrared spectroscopy provides information not only on the type of calcium carbonate polymorph, but also on the extent of atomic order. In calcite, three major infrared absorption peaks are identified: ν₃, ν₂, and ν₄. It was shown that the ratio between ν₂ and ν₄ bands reflects the order of the calcite crystal structure. In this paper we analyse this ratio in geologically formed calcites, archaeological plasters, modern plasters and experimentally prepared plasters. For the geological calcite, the values of the ν₂/ν₄ ratio are around 3, whereas for the experimentally prepared plasters, the values are around 6.5. The ν₂/ν₄ ratio for archaeological plasters varies from 3 to 6. This shows that a high ratio is indicative of disorder in the crystal, and implies that the calcite was formed from calcium oxide at high temperatures. It also implies that this disorder can be preserved for at least 14,000 years. The ν₂/ν₄ ratio of calcite from archaeological sites can thus be used to differentiate between anthropogenic calcite, such as in plaster, mortar and wood ash, from geogenic calcite, such as in limestone. The ratio may also be used to identify plaster or ash that still retains its original crystals and therefore carbon-14 content.     

Dating of modified femora of extinct dwarf Hippopotamus from Southern Madagascar: Implications for constraining human colonization and vertebrate extinction events

Two significant events in the late Holocene history of Madagascar were (a) the arrival of people, and (b) the loss of nearly two dozen species of land vertebrates in the socalled “subfossil extinctions”. The consensus is that the faunal losses occurred shortly subsequent to human arrival, but the timing of these events is poorly constrained. The minimum age for initial human presence on the island may now be set at approximately 2000 bp, on the basis of AMS ¹⁴C dates for human-modified femora of extinct dwarf hippos from SW Madagascar. Assuming that this date also marks the beginning of deleterious human interactions with the subfossil fauna, and assuming that this fauna became completely extinct by 900 bp, the width of the anthropogenic “extinction window” may have been as long as c. 1000 a. This estimate, nearly twice the length of previous ones, is close to the unadjusted minimum for the duration of the terminal Pleistocene extinction event in the Americas. Whether or not this length of time comports with theoretical expectations of a “blitzkrieg” pattern of losses is uncertain, but greater refinement in dating the end of the subfossil extinctions is unlikely to produce radically shorter estimates of duration.     

Expanding the utility of Uranium-series dating of speleothems for archaeological and palaeontological applications

Uranium-series (U-series) dating of speleothems is frequently used for palaeoclimate studies but its archaeological and palaeontological applications are limited to stratigraphically significant speleothem formations, such as flowstones, to provide maximum and minimum temporal points. This study targeted soda straw stalactites for U-series dating. In contrast to other speleothem formations, soda straw stalactites are fragile, have typically short life spans (usually only years but rarely up to a few hundred years) and are frequently incorporated into cave deposits. Results of thermal ionisation mass spectrometry (TIMS) U-series dating of soda straw stalactites from palaeontological excavations at Blanche Cave, South Australia, show that small, dense, clean straws tend to yield ages closest to the time of stratigraphic deposition. A correlation between soda straw U-series ages and radiocarbon ages of charcoal from the site is shown. Multiple soda straw age determinations for a single stratigraphic unit are required in order to verify age concordance. In conjunction with other dating methods, U-series dating of soda straw stalactites may help to significantly constrain the age of stratigraphic units and associated archaeological and palaeontological deposits in order to provide more robust chronologies. Here we advocate the collection of soda straw stalactites at future excavations of limestone cave sites.     

Hayonim Cave: a TL-based chronology for this Levantine Mousterian sequence

The thermoluminescence dating method was applied to 77 heated flints from the Mousterian layers of Hayonim Cave in order to provide a precise TL-based chronology for this important Levantine sequence. A detailed dosimetric study was performed by using 76 dosimeter capsules and revealed strong spatial dose-rate variations. In parallel, Fourier transform infrared spectrometry enabled the identification of various mineral assemblages in the sediments of the cave and to localize the boundaries of these assemblages. By comparing these two data sets, it is shown that low dose-rate values (∼500 μGy/a) are systematically recorded in areas where the calcite-dahllite (CD) assemblage is preserved, whereas higher values (up to 1300 μGy/a) are associated with the leucophosphite, montgomeryite, variscite and siliceous aggregates (LMVS) assemblage. The dosimetric and mineralogical information was combined in order to assess, where possible, the dose-rate experienced by each flint during its burial. Some of the flint samples analyzed were too close to mineral assemblage boundaries and were therefore discarded. This rigorous selection led to TL ages ranging from 230 to 140 ka for the lower part of the Mousterian sequence (layers F and Lower E), which contains lithic industries characterized by blade production using the laminar method.