Title
Paleoethnobotany of the Early Initial Period of Gramalote in Northern Peru
Date Issued
01 March 2018
Access level
metadata only access
Resource Type
journal article
Author(s)
Universidad de Texas
Publisher(s)
Springer New York LLC
Abstract
The Gramalote site is an early Initial Period (1500–1200 B.C.E.) fishing village located in the Moche valley in northern Peru. Previous research assessed the social dynamics and economic interactions within that fishing settlement. The well-preserved animal and plant record facilitates the archeological study of diet and subsistence strategies through time. The examinations of faunal remains of seabirds, sea mammals, and mollusk shells support the expected marine-oriented subsistence strategy. However, the site also contains a long record of botanical remains suggesting that people had access to plant resources. For this reason, a paleoethnobotanical study was conducted with the focus on reconstructing the pollen record of Gramalote. Previously identified botanical remains were also considered. The analysis of diverse botanical proxies helped to study the relationships between humans and plants in this region of northern Peru during the second millennium B.C.E. Grasses; reeds; food, woody, and wild plants were identified suggesting an environment that allowed small-scale agriculture and a trading network during the Initial Period of Gramalote.
Start page
94
End page
106
Volume
72
Issue
1
Language
English
OCDE Knowledge area
Ciencias de las plantas, Botánica
Scopus EID
2-s2.0-85041538727
Source
Economic Botany
ISSN of the container
00130001
Sources of information: Directorio de Producción Científica Scopus