Isotopic Evidence for Marine Consumption and Mobility in the Atacama Desert (Quillagua,Northern Chile)

Archaeological research in the Atacama Desert has recovered evidence of considerable cultural variability. This variability seems to have increased during the Late Intermediate Period (AD 950–1400). The oasis of Quillagua, located at the margins of the Loa River in northern Chile, between the Andes and the coast (70 km from the Pacific Ocean), has shown important evidence regarding this cultural diversity. The variety in the archaeological evidence found at Quillagua has been interpreted as the result of two different cultural influences at the oasis: the Pica‐Tarapacá who occupied the coastal and inland regions to the north of Quillagua and the Atacama who occupied the oasis and fertile areas southeast of Quillagua. Here, we present the results of stable carbon, nitrogen and oxygen isotope analyses of 23 individuals recovered from the Cementerio Oriente in Quillagua, in order to test whether the observed cultural variability is also reflected in diet and mobility patterns. Results from carbon and nitrogen isotope measurements indicate the importance of marine protein, as well as a contribution of maize in the diet of some individuals. Four individuals show low δ¹⁸O values, suggesting a possible highland or non‐local origin, whereas values for the remaining individuals are consistent with lowland populations. Together, the results support the idea that the Quillagua oasis represented an important site of interaction between the Tarapacá and Atacama cultures, with close contacts with the coast but also with the presence of individuals from the highlands. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Post-Pleistocene Archaeology and Geomorphological Processes on the Namib Desert Coast of South Western Africa

ABSTRACT

The Namib Desert coast is rich in potential food resources, but its extreme aridity imposed severe limits on human settlement in the past. It appears that intensive use of the coast began in the Middle Holocene, although there is evidence of intermittent occupation from the Middle Pleistocene. Coastal sites were closely linked to the desert interior and movement between the two was mainly via the linear oases of ephemeral river systems. Contact was at first sporadic but regular trade with merchant vessels was established in the mid-eighteenth century AD. Coastal geomorphological processes determined the location and accessibility of marine resources used by hunter-gatherer and nomadic pastoral communities. At the same time, marine, fluvial, and aeolian processes have influenced the visibility and survival of archaeological evidence on the coast.     

Prehistoric dental disease and the dietary shift from cactus to cultigens in northwest Mexico

Differences in dental health of prehistoric human groups are commonly attributed to specific subsistence practices, whereby food foragers generally have a lower incidence of dental disease than agriculturalists. Dental health was assessed on a sample of 135 human skeletons from northwest Mexico that date to the Early Agricultural period (1600 BC–AD 200), which coincides with the initial introduction of domesticated cultigens into the region c. 2000 BC. High rates of dental caries (13.5%) and antemortem tooth loss (17.6%) encountered in these prehistoric forager‐farmers from the Sonoran Desert were determined to be the result of the consumption of highly cariogenic local wild resources such as cactus. These patterns mask the degree of reliance on agriculture in the area and highlight the importance of constructing local nutritional histories to better understand the diversity of human diets and their relationships to health and disease. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Terminal Pleistocene–Early Holocene lithic technological organization around Lake Mojave,California

Abstract

The surface lithic scatters at two areas around Soda Lake were intensively surveyed and 3133 artifacts were analyzed in the field using four main variables to infer how Terminal Pleistocene–Early Holocene foragers organized lithic technology around pluvial Lake Mojave, California. Results indicate that early stage bifaces and flake tool blanks were created at a fine-grained volcanic (felsite) quarry/workshop complex in the Soda Mountains survey area and transported elsewhere. In addition, fine-grained volcanic bifaces were reduced and bifaces and flake tools of cryptocrystalline silicates and obsidian were finished, used, and/or discarded at a habitation area on the ancient shorelines near Little Cowhole Mountain. Comparisons with nearby sites of similar ages (at Ft. Irwin and China Lake) reveal many similarities in lithic technological organization. Lake Mojave—an important locus of prior research—can now be integrated into recent Mojave Desert and Great Basin technological organization studies.     

Lower Pecos and Coahuila peyote: new radiocarbon dates

Peyote, a psychoactive cactus native to the Chihuahuan Desert, has been preserved from excavations at only two archaeological sites: Shumla Caves in the Lower Pecos region of southwest Texas and shelter CM-79 near Cuatro Ciénegas in Coahuila, Mexico. We determined three indistinguishable radiocarbon ages of 5160 ± 45, 5200 ± 35, and 5210 ± 35 ¹⁴C years BP, yielding a mean age of 5195 ± 20 ¹⁴C years BP for the three specimens from Shumla Caves. For one of the Cuatro Ciénegas specimens we obtained the first direct radiocarbon date of 835 ± 35 ¹⁴C years BP. This study demonstrates the use of peyote by inhabitants of the Lower Pecos region of the Chihuahuan Desert about 6000 calendar years ago, and confirms its use by inhabitants of the Cuatro Ciénegas region of the Chihuahuan Desert in Late Prehistoric times. The Shumla Caves' specimens are composed of an aggregate of ground peyote mixed with other plant material, i.e., they appear to be manufactured peyote effigies, and are definitely not intact peyote buttons.     

‘From Nitria to Sitria’: the construction of Peter Damian's Vita Beati Romualdi

This article examines the construction of Peter Damian's (c.1007–72) Vita Beati Romualdi (c.1042) as a piece of eleventh-century hagiography. Peter Damian was an erudite hermit, monk and reformer whose ideas on spiritual perfection helped to shape the ideals of the so-called ‘Gregorian Reform’ movement in the eleventh century. This article aims to contribute to recent historiography on the eleventh century through a re-examination of this important piece of hagiography, which has not been more thoroughly considered by medievalists since 1957 in Tabacco's critical edition. This article suggests that, through the biography of St Romuald, Peter Damian sought to promote the example of the Desert Fathers in formulating a more rigorous monastic rule, not only for his hermits at Fonte Avellana, but also for a wide monastic and lay audience. It also argues that there existed a gradual evolution in monastic ideology from the tenth century onwards, sponsored by ascetics like Damian who strove constantly to lead a more austere existence based on the Desert tradition and more particularly the Life of St Antony. In particular, the article pays attention to how Damian, as a hagiographer, was engaged in the construction of Romuald's sanctity.     

The Natures of War

“Nature” is more than a resource bank whose riches can trigger armed conflict and finance its depredations; it is also a medium through which military and paramilitary violence is conducted. The militarisation of nature is part of a dialectic in which earthy, vibrant matter shapes the contours of conflict and leaves its marks on the bodies of soldiers who are both vectors and victims of military violence. Three case studies identify some of the central bio‐physical formations that became entangled with armed conflict in the twentieth century: the mud of the Western Front in the First World War, the deserts of North Africa in the Second World War, and the rainforests of Vietnam. Taken together, these reveal vital connections between the materiality and corporeality of modern war and their continued relevance to its contemporary transformations.     

Near-surface imaging of a buried foundation in the Western Desert,Egypt, using space-borne and ground penetrating radar

ALOS/PALSAR L-band full polarimetric data have been used to detect and characterize a well-defined geometric target hidden under sand deposits in the Western Desert of Egypt. This buried object is rectangular in shape with very straight boundaries and encloses an area of 500 m². Inside the rectangular area there is a perfectly circular feature of approximately 53 m² area. High and medium resolution optical satellite images (WorldView-2, ALOS/AVNIR-2) and field investigation confirm that the topography of the study area is relatively flat and completely covered by dry sand. The electromagnetic wave scattering behavior of the detected buried object was measured by decomposing the scattering matrix of ALOS/PALSAR full polarimetric data into Entropy-Alpha (H/α) and Freeman and Durden decompositions. Furthermore, a combination of unsupervised classification algorithms and Constant False-Alarm Rate (CFAR) edge detection was performed on the polarimetric data which revealed a well-defined geometric shape with straight borders. These borders have high α angles with low entropy, which physically means double bounce scattering mechanism with low randomness and is very similar to that of an urban scatterer, indicating that the detected target might be a buried wall-like foundation of a man-made structure. Moreover, 28 ground penetrating radar (GPR) profiles were acquired using a 270 MHz shielded antenna to validate the satellite radar remote sensing results. The GPR profiles reveal very clear hyperbolic shapes at 1.5 m depth with one of them showing a large hyperbolic shape-like structure, which might indicate the presence of a buried foundation. Thus the site might have significance to archaeological studies of the Western Desert, particularly previous human occupation and the sources of water for such habitation.     

Computed tomography study of snuff trays from San Pedro de Atacama (Northern Chile)

Wooden snuff trays from San Pedro de Atacama (SPA) in northern Chile are objects of particular museological value. Computed tomography (CT), a non-destructive analytical technique useful in the analysis of archaeological objects in which physical tampering is not desirable, was used to study provenience of wood, quality of craftmanship, taphonomic processes and nature of gemstone inlays in a group of snuff trays. While wood used in the manufacture of trays was mostly exogenous to SPA, gemstones used in inlays were likely of local origin. These findings support the active exchange of goods proposed for the south-central Andes region. Several features revealed in the trays support the view that craftsmen producing them were skillful artisans.     

On modeling of chemical stimulation of an enhanced geothermal system using a high pH solution with chelating agent

Dissolution of silica and calcite in the presence of a chelating agent (NTA) at a high pH was successfully demonstrated in laboratory experiments using a high-temperature flow reactor. (Note that the term 'silica' used here includes amorphous silica, quartz, and silicate glass bead.) The mineral dissolution and associated porosity enhancement in the experiments were reproduced by reactive transport modeling using TOUGHREACT. The chemical stimulation method was applied by numerical modeling to a field geothermal injection well system to investigate its effectiveness. Parameters applicable to the quartz monzodiorite unit at the Enhanced Geothermal Systems site at Desert Peak (Nevada) were used. Results indicate that the injection of a high pH chelating solution results in dissolution of both calcite and plagioclase, while avoiding precipitation of calcite at high temperature conditions. Consequently, reservoir porosity and permeability can be enhanced especially near the injection well. Injection at a lower temperature of 120°C (temperature is over 160°C in the base-case) results in a porosity increase that is smaller close to the injection point, but extends to a larger radial distance. A slower kinetic rate results in less aggressive mineral dissolution close to the injection point and larger extent along the flow path, which is favorable for chemical stimulation.