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Long-term cultural stability in hunter-gatherers: A case study using traditional and geometric morphometric analysis of lithic stemmed bifacial points from Southern Brazil
... The study of lithic projectile points is a classic topic in archaeological research due to their high preservation potential in comparison to the organic components of these weapon systems (e.g., Ames et al., 2010;Bettinger and Eerkens, 1999;Charlin and González-José, 2018;Fenenga, 1953;Hughes, 1998;Shott, 1993Shott, , 1997Walde, 2014). Consequently, these lithic heads serve as enduring evidence for inferring processes of cultural adaptation in different paleoecological conditions, economic specialization, hierarchies, identities, and other significant issues in the historical development of humanity (de Azevedo et al., 2014;Dunnell, 1978;Hoggard et al., 2019;Okaumura and Araujo, 2014;Selden et al., 2020;Wang and Marwick, 2020). ...
... In archaeology, the study of standardization in technological designs is crucial for inferring function, economic specialization, style, and temporality within contexts of cultural change. Such change can be associated with factors such as mobility within social hierarchies, the emergence of elites, and shifts in population density (Ames et al., 2010;Hoggard et al., 2019;Okaumura and Araujo, 2014;Selden, 2019;Selden et al., 2020;Wang and Marwick, 2020). Wang and Marwick (2020) distinguish between intentional standardization and mechanical standardization. ...
In Uruguay, Geometric morphometrics (GM) studies in archeology have been exclusively applied to "Fishtail" projectile points. The variability observed in this morphotype is attributed to the modifications due to diverse events such as resharpening or reworked during the history life. In this work, we aim to expand the recognition of the morphological variability of the archaeological lithic projectile point with stem from Uruguay, advance on the functional aspects of these projectiles, and discuss their link with the weapons systems that were used by the indigenous populations of the region. Through optical magnification and non-parametric statistical analysis, we characterize the allometric variation of n = 84 lithic projectile points. To gain independence from the ontoge-netic changes, we selected 36 basic designs and analyzed their morphological variation GM. Based on their weight, we were allowed to assign them to the arrow, dart, and spear categories. The principal components analysis and partial least squares showed that shape changes are associated with the blade-stem relationship, which is proportionality 1:1 and 2:1 in negative values and > 2.5:1 and > 3:1 in the positive values. Arrows and darts share the 1:1 and 2:1 relationship morphospaces of this structure. Darts and spears share the one defined by the ratio > 2,5:1 and, finally, the morphospace defined by the ratio > 3:1 was exclusively integrated for spears. The standardization of proportionalities found in this contribution crosses morphological variability and allows us to discuss the versatility of designs and the complementarity between weapon systems.
... CVs have been used to assess the standardization of bipolar knapping (Duke & Pargeter, 2015;Pargeter & Eren, 2017), Acheulean bifaces (Hoggard et al., 2019;Lycett & Gowlett, 2008;Shipton et al., 2013), Levallois blanks (Dibble, 1989;Eren & Lycett, 2012;Nowell, 2000;Schlanger, 1996), scrapers (Monnier, 2006;Nowell, 2000), burins (Marks et al., 2001), points (Okumura & Araujo, 2014), bladelet cores ; blades (Graf, 2010;Hoggard & Stade, 2018;Hoggard, 2017;Johnson, 2014;Muller et al., 2018;Nakazawa & Akai, 2020;Radinović & Kajtez, 2021), backed artefacts (Eerkens, 1997;Fisher, 2006;Hawkins & Mosig Way, 2020;Wurz, 1999;, ground stone tools (Aimers et al., 2011), and ceramics (Harush et al., 2020;Peelo, 2011;Roux, 2003;Roux & Karasik, 2018). This method has proven useful for quantifying artefact standardization in terms of size. ...
... But for standardization in terms of shape, we require geometric morphometric methods (GM). Recently, 2D and 3D GM methods have been employed to quantify the shape standardization of bifaces (Lycett & Gowlett, 2008), Levallois blanks (Eren & Lycett, 2012;Lycett et al., 2016;Lycett & Von Cramon-Taubadel, 2013), points (Okumura & Araujo, 2014;Way & Hiscock, 2021), and backed artefacts (Delpiano et al., 2021;Hawkins & Mosig Way, 2020). Elliptical Fourier analysis (EFA) has also recently proven useful in shape comparisons of lithic artefacts (Chacón et al., 2016;Hoggard et al., 2019;Radinović & Kajtez, 2021). ...
Standardization can be applied to a lithic assemblage via raw material selection, blank production, blank selection, and/or retouch. Here we explore the baseline level of morphological standardization achievable through blank production alone. By quantifying how little morphological variability is inherently involved in different blank-producing lithic technologies that span much of the Stone Age, we seek to gain a long-term perspective on the evolution of lithic standardization. 728 flakes were knapped from 26 cores of 7 different lithic technologies: bipolar, multiplatform, discoidal, Levallois, direct percussion prismatic blade, indirect percussion prismatic blade, and pressure prismatic blade. Using generalized Procrustes analyses of blank outlines, we observed three noticeable jumps in shape standardization: between bipolar and free-hand flaking, between flake and blade technologies, and between the percussive blade and pressure blade technologies. Technologies that involve more skill and more investment in core preparation appear to create a more standardized set of blanks.
... During the information transmission process copying errors inevitably occur and constitute one of the major sources of variation of material or nonmaterial culture together with intentional innovation such as individual learning/trialand-error experiment. Compared with the study of the technological organization, this line of research has received less attention among archaeologists with the exception of the Accumulated Copying Error (ACE) model proposed by Eerkens and Lipo (2005), which is frequently employed and discussed (Kempe et al., 2012;Okumura and Araujo, 2014;Schillinger et al., 2014). They argued that tiny mistakes will be generated during the process of copying a certain artifact for two reasons. ...
... The greatest strength of this equation lies in its ability to standardize data regardless of the difference between original dimensions, which is extremely beneficial for crossassemblage comparisons (Eerkens and Lipo, 2005;Okumura and Araujo, 2014). ...
... These studies have been especially innovative, taking to heart the critique in Systematics that archaeological typologies are often intuitive, arbitrary and difficult to replicate by other researchers. Motivated by this critique, scholars such as Marcelo Cardillo, Judith Charlin (Cardillo & Charlin, 2018), Mercedes Okumura (Okumura & Araujo, 2014) and others have conducted pioneering work in the application of geometric morphometrics to stone artefact assemblages in an effort to provide a materialist view of technological variation where the focus is on continuous quantitative phenomena. While geometric morphometrics has been applied by archaeologists to a range of regions and artefact types (including ceramic and metal), what makes this South American work remarkable as part of the legacy of Systematics is their exploration of modern phylogenetic comparative methods to model and quantify technological variation and change over space and time (e.g. ...
... Cardillo & Alberti, 2015). While the work by Cardillo and colleagues (Cardillo & Alberti, 2015;Cardillo & Charlin, 2018) focuses on phylogenetic signals and material culture diversity across time and space, Okumura and Araujo (2014) are more concerned with the persistence of attributes over long stretches of time. What these works have in common is the use of an explicitly cultural evolutionary rationale. ...
Systematics in Prehistory. At the height of the debate between Culture History and New Archaeology, Dunnell’s work sought to address a more fundamental issue that was and still is relevant to all branches of prehistoric archaeology, and especially to the study of the Palaeolithic: systematics. Dunnell himself was notorious and controversial, however, but the importance of his work remains underappreciated. Like other precocious works of that tumultuous time Systematics in Prehistory today remains absent from most course reading lists and gathers dust on library shelves. In this contribution we argue for a greater appreciation of its as yet unfulfilled conceptual and analytical promise. In particular, we briefly chart its somewhat delayed impact via evolutionary archaeology, including how it has also influenced non-Anglophone traditions, especially in South America. The obstinate persistence of classification issues in palaeoanthropology and palaeoarchaeology, we argue, warrants a second look at Dunnell’s Systematics.
... This implies a 5500 year occupation span, or at least 270 human generations, and there was a reasonable expectation that we would observe some kind of cultural change through time, which did not happen. All statistical analyses (general Procrustes analysis, principal component analysis, discriminant function analysis, D'AD) showed no significant differences among the morphology of these points through time (Okumura & Araujo, 2014). ...
... This entails two questions for further thought: (1) are modern humans inherently innovative? and (2) what explains the fact that the South American record is so different from the North American? We already addressed these two questions elsewhere (Araujo, 2015;Okumura & Araujo, 2014), and we believe they are of interest for European researchers when discussing the longevity and geographic spread of cultural taxonomic units such as the "Aurignacian," "Gravettian," or "Solutrean." It is also interesting to note that "over-imitation," a concept readily applied to Neanderthals (e.g., Nielsen et al., 2020;Rossano, 2017), can be easily recognized in our case studies. ...
In this article, we will provide a brief history of the appropriation and development of the concepts of “culture,” “tradition,” “technocomplex,” among others, in Eastern South America (Brazil), and present its state of the art. We will discuss some of the convergences and divergences in the nature of the archaeological record of South America, North America, and Europe, as well as their possible theoretical implications, since classification templates or classificatory schemes are strongly dependent on the phenomena they address, whether we acknowledge that or not. Finally, we aim to present some results and the main lines of future action in our current work on this topic.
... In this interpretation, the FPs were manufactured in the adjacent plains of Uruguay and perhaps in Argentina, but not in southern Brazil, which certainly was intriguing since the Uruguayan plain and most of southern Brazil constituted of the same biome during the end of the Pleistocene (and even today in some areas), with the same or similar faunal resources, and without significant topographic distortions (Adams & Faure 1997;Cione et al. 2009: 128;Gallo et al. 2009;Loponte & Carbonera 2017;Vivo & Carmignotto 2004). In fact, the southern states of Brazil, Uruguay and Northeast Argentina present a continuous distribution of other points (early and middle Holocene) from the so-called Umbú Tradition (Nami 2020a;Okumura & Araujo 2014;Prous 1992: 148-149;Rodríguez 2005). On the other hand, even in the presence of environmental differences, the subcontinental coverage of FPs (Nami 2020a) indicates a high degree of adaptive plasticity for the colonization of different environments of these early hunter-gatherers. ...
... The preference of cherts to produce the local FPs follows the same trend observed for other South American assemblages, where microcrystalline and amorphous raw materials are common (Briceño Rosario 2010: 262;Hermo et al. 2015;Miotti & Terranova 2015: 185;Nami 2013) to the detriment of basalts and quarzitic rocks, with the exception of the Argentinean Pampas, where the highest proportion are made of sedimentary quartzites (see Figure 6). Chert is probably the rock with the highest quality in the region to make points (see below), and in fact, cherts of the same qualities and appearance were used to produce other point-types by Holocene local hunter-gatherers grouped in the "Umbú Tradition" (Figure 5), although they also incorporated other rocks in major proportions (Beltrão 1974;Bond et al. 2018;Collet 1987;Costa 2016: 92;Okumura & Araujo 2014). Non-translucent cherts were also recovered in the Carbonera et al. 2016 for other assemblages with local cherts in the region). ...
This study analyses the lithic landscape and the selection of rocks used to manufacture Fishtail points (FP) in southern Brazil, their designs, and some functional aspects. In order to identify the offer of lithic resources, we carried out several surveys throughout 15 months in 47 counties in the Southern Brazil covered by the Botucatú - Serra Geral Vulcano Sedimentary Complex. The lithic composition of numerous hill slopes, fallen rocks, and accumulations of pebbles and boulders in the riversides was evaluated. The results show that basalts (including a small proportion of andesites and rhyodacites-rhyolites), and silicified sandstones, are ubiquitous in the landscape. Conversely, non-translucent cherts are scarce, so their acquisition would have been time-consuming. However, these local cherts were the rocks mostly used to manufacture these points, being another example of the selectivity for high quality rocks by Paleoamerican hunter-gatherers. The same cherts selected in southern Brazil to produce the FP were used to manufacture other point-types by local hunter-gatherers of the early and middle Holocene grouped in the so-called “Umbú Tradition”. Not a single FP of the entire collection analyzed here was made from silicified limestones, which is one of the most common raw materials among the Uruguayan FPs, nor were they made from quartzites as were most of the FPs of the Pampean plains.
Regarding to the designs of these projectiles, some morphotypes appear to have been designed to produce multiple injuries through successive thrusts and withdrawals in the bodies of the prey, while in others, the design seems to have favoured penetration and fixation on the prey, suggesting in this case, a single shot technique for each projectile. As the maintenance process unfolded, especially for points below ~ 80 mm in length, they show features that negatively impacted their efficiency, including distinct asymmetries, somewhat open front angles, a decrease in the cutting perimeter and cross-sectional area, an increase in the bevel angle of the blade edges, and a tendency to a conical cross-section. Behaviours intended to counteract these problems were maximizing the length of the leading edge, maintaining the symmetry and the triangular blade resting on straight shoulders, and maintaining the aerodynamic properties as much as it were possible, in order to improve their lethality and the fixation capacity.
Beyond these rejuvenation processes, three different morphotypes of points appear to be included within the sample. The first includes points over 120 mm and ~ 80 g in weight, with triangular or slightly lanceolate limbs, which mostly present straight shoulders, but there are also examples of rounded shoulders. The second design corresponds to projectiles between 110 and 87 mm and ~30 g in weight, with triangular or slightly lanceolate blades and straight shoulders. The third design presents the classic shape of these projectiles, with a fish silhouette, with maximum lengths below 90 mm, with a more robust and conceptually different design, where the angles of the edges of the blades and of the shoulders are equal, perhaps with the intention to facilitate the spear withdrawal to produce multiple injuries.
... With similar methods, Smith and DeWitt (2016) found standardized bases of fluted points in Alaska and northern Yukon that might indicate a risk management strategy to ensure the ease of replacement during long-distance travel. Other factors, such as low levels of cultural innovation in a small group, could also lead to an increase in standardization of point shapes (Okumura and Araujo, 2014). To test the effectiveness of measuring standardization, Birch and Martinón-Torres (2019) compared landmark-based GMM to traditional metric analysis with CVs using European iron weapons as an example. ...
... To answer the question of whether CV values across our three occupational phases are significantly different or not, we used the modified signed-likelihood ratio (MSLR) test for equality of CVs (Krishnamoorthy and Lee, 2014). While previous work has used the Feltz and Miller (1996)'s asymptotic test for the equality of coefficients of variation from k populations (Eerkens, 2000;Eerkens and Bettinger, 2001;Hoggard, 2017;Lycett and Gowlett, 2008;Okumura and Araujo, 2014), we prefer the MSLR test for shape variables as a more recent development with lower rates of type I error, better performance with uneven sample numbers, and more power across a range of conditions (Krishnamoorthy and Lee, 2014). ...
The emergence of ceramic specialization in past societies is often linked to shifts in the complexity of social structures, because standardized ceramic production can reflect craft specialization and the presence of elite control. Previous work on identifying specialization relies on typological or linear metric analysis. Here we demonstrate how to investigate ceramic standardization by analyzing outlines of ceramic vessels. Outline analysis is useful because, unlike more commonly-used landmark analysis methods, it can effectively quantify shape differences for objects that lack distinctive measurement points needed for landmark analysis. We demonstrate this method using pottery from Kiwulan, a large multi-component Iron Age site (CE 1350–1850) in northeastern Taiwan. To measure ceramic specialization, we quantified pottery standardization by analyzing shape variables with reproducible geometric morphometric methods. We computed coefficients of variation (CVs) for shape coefficients obtained by elliptical Fourier analysis to test for shape standardization. We found significant differences in pottery shape and shape standardization that indicate changes in pottery production resulting from contact with mainland Han Chinese groups in northeastern Taiwan. Our case study, which includes an openly available research compendium of R code, represents an innovative application of outline-based methods in geometric morphometry to answer the anthropological questions of craft specialization.
... A indústria Garivaldinense é definida pela presença de pontas de três tipos: Garivaldinense, Montenegro e Brochier (figuras 23 e 24, e tabelas 7 e 8). As pontas Garivaldinenses são morfologicamente caracterizadas pelo corpo triangular, com gumes retos ou irregulares, e pedúnculo reto ou bifurcado (Okumura & Araujo, 2014). Estas pontas, no entanto, são classificadas em três distintos padrões tecnológicos: [a] façonagem bifacial a partir de retiradas seletivas e transpassantes por percussão, seguida de retoques bifaciais por pressão, [b] façonagem bifacial a partir de retiradas convergentes nãotranspassantes por percussão, seguida de retoques bifaciais por pressão, e [c] apenas retoques bifaciais por pressão (Moreno de Sousa, 2019a e 2019b). ...
... Observamos, ainda, raras variações nos atributos morfológicos e tecnológicos dos distintos tipos de pontas de cada um dos sítios ao se considerar as diferentes profundidades em que foram obtidos em suas respectivas unidades de escavação. Se considerarmos a sobreposição da distribuição de artefatos e idade calibradas obtidas nos diferentes pontos das unidades de escavação dos sítios-base de cada indústria, pode-se sugerir uma persistência cultural de pelo menos 4 mil anos para a indústria Rioclarense, de 3 mil anos para a indústria Tunas e de até 8 mil anos (considerando a idade de 3 mil cal AP como limite máximo para datação relativa das camadas onde há presença de cerâmica Taquara) para a indústria Garivaldinense (Okumura & Araujo, 2014). Pode-se, assim, interpretar uma prolongada persistência cultural ao menos ao longo do Holoceno Inicial para as três industrias, à semelhança do anteriormente documentado por Okumura e Araujo (2014) A semelhança dos atributos tecnológicos das pontas da indústria Garivaldinense ao longo dos perfis das unidades de escavação se mostra como de especial relevância, tanto por envolverem um intervalo temporal potencialmente mais longo de permanência do padrão tecnológico, quanto por se associarem com segmentos dos perfis caracterizados por registros de mudanças paleoambientais mais sólidos do que nos demais sítios abordados, sobretudo pelos referidos cenários de oscilações paleoambientais se basearem em indicadores obtidos nos próprios perfis do sítio Garivaldino, e menos dependentes da extrapolação de estudos realizados em pontos situados nas imediações, como no caso dos sítios da indústria Rioclarense. ...
RESUMO
Com o objetivo de ponderar conexões entre quadros naturais e a ocupação humana pré-colonial, caracterizou-se os artefatos e a contextualização geomorfológica e ambiental de quatro sítios líticos vinculados a antigos registros de grupos caçadores-coletores do sul e sudeste do Brasil, associados a três distintas indústrias líticas. Elencou-se associação dos sítios com terrenos de baixos declives e altimetrias em seus respectivos contextos (terrenos mais estáveis para fixação humana), adjacentes a córregos e próximos de faixas do terreno que registram maiores inclinações e desníveis verticais, mais propensas a apresentarem afloramentos rochosos (fontes potenciais de matérias-primas para a confecção de ferramentas lascadas). Elencou-se fontes de matérias-primas nos entornos de cada sítio e as matérias-primas associadas aos artefatos, e ponderou-se a correlação entre os dois conjuntos de dados. Analisou-se a relação dos padrões tecnológicos de artefatos líticos com a caracterização petrográfica das matérias-primas, verificando-se quais silcretes semelhantes foram usadas para produção de artefatos distintos. Ainda, verificou-se que alguns dos produtos líticos de um dos sítios analisados mostram padrões tecnológicos semelhantes, mesmo quando obtidos a partir de silcretes distintos. Caracterizou-se ausência de variação significativa dos atributos tecnológicos dos artefatos registrados em diferentes posicionamentos verticais nos perfis das unidades de escavação nas quais foram registrados, mesmo quando mostram-se associados a registros paleoambientais distintos (alternâncias entre climas mais secos que os atuais e condições caracterizadas por incrementos de umidade no intervalo de 11 a 7 mil anos atrás). Palavras chave: sítios arqueológicos líticos; Holoceno Inicial, paleoclimas, ameríndios, geoarqueologia
A B S T R A C T
In order to discuss connections between the natural landscapes and pre-colonial human occupation, were characterized the artifacts and the geomorphological and environmental contextualization of four lithic sites linked to ancient records of hunter-gatherer groups from the south and southeast of Brazil, associated with three distinct lithic industries. The association of sites with low slopes and altimetry in their respective contexts (more stable terrains for human settlement), adjacent to rivers and close to terrains that register greater inclinations and vertical unevenness, more likely to present rocky outcrops (potential sources of raw materials for making chipped tools) was listed. Were characterized sources of raw materials in the surroundings of each site, the raw materials associated with the artifacts, and the correlation between the two data sets was considered. The relationship between the technological standards of lithic artifacts and the petrographic characterization of the raw materials was analyzed, verifying which similar raw materials were used to produce different artifacts. Also, it was found that some of the lithic products from one of the analyzed sites show similar technological patterns, even when obtained from different raw materials. There was a lack of significant variation in the technological attributes of the artifacts recorded in different vertical positions in the profiles of the excavation units in which they were recorded, even when they are associated with different paleoenvironmental records (alternations between drier climates than current and others characterized by increments in the moisture between 11 to 7 thousand years ago). Keywords: lithic archaeological sites; Initial Holocene, paleoclimates, amerindians, geoarchaeology
... The fourth proxy, the coefficient of variation (CV) of geometric microliths width, is deeply rooted in the accumulated copying error (ACE) model. This model was proposed by Eerkens and Lipo (2005) and frequently employed and discussed later (Kempe et al., 2012;Okumura and Araujo, 2014;Schillinger et al., 2014). It argues that tiny mistakes will be generated during the process of copying a certain artifact for two reasons. ...
... The greatest strength of this equation lies in its ability to standardize data regardless of the difference between original dimensions, which is extremely beneficial for cross-assemblage comparisons (Eerkens and Lipo, 2005;Okumura and Araujo, 2014). According to the ACE model, larger CVs mean higher diversity of lithic manufacture and thereby indicating more transmission events and a larger pool of learners. ...
The shift from mobile hunting-gathering lifeways to sedentism has been frequently studied, and the Natufian culture is commonly recognized as the earliest sedentary society in the Levant. Historically, the remarkably rich Natufian material remains, combined with certain research biases, turned it into a “scene-stealer” in the Levantine Epipaleolithic sequence. However, data from earlier Epipaleolithic sites suggest a more complex scenario. Accordingly, we hypothesize an increase in occupation intensity even before the Natufian. The new excavations at Neve David (ND), a key site of the Middle Epipaleolithic Geometric Kebaran entity, located in Mount Carmel, enables us to test this by tracing variations in the lithic assemblage from a 185 cm deep section. Drawing upon the models of cultural transmission and technological organization, we employed six proxies: lithic volumetric density, burnt artifacts volumetric density, lithic fragmentation rate, microlith shape variation, relative frequency of bladelet cores, and tool/blank ratio. The first five proxies suggest that the settlement dynamics at ND are characterized by increasing occupation intensity through time. Overall, this case study sheds new light on the tempo and mode of evolution in land use strategies during the Middle Epipaleolithic, which is pivotal to better understanding the Neolithization processes in the Levant.
... Geometric morphometrics (GM) has become a standard approach in analyses of variation in object geometry in data types ranging from skeletal to cultural materials to address evolutionary and behavioral questions in both the biological and anthropological sciences (e.g., Buchanan and Collard 2007;Buchanan and Hamilton 2009;Buchanan et al. 2014;de Azevedo et al. 2015;Hamilton and Buchanan 2010;Hubbe et al. 2020;Klingenberg et al. 2001;Kuzminsky 2013;Kuzminsky et al. 2017Kuzminsky et al. , 2018Parés-Casanova et al. 2020;Seguchi et al. 2010;Shott and Trail 2010;Smith 2010;Smith and Goebel 2018;Smith et al. 2020Smith et al. , 2021Thulman 2012;von Cramon-Taubadel et al. 2017). In archaeology, GM has been used in several studies to examine variation in the shape of stone tools and has become a standard method for morphological analysis (e.g., Charlin 2016, 2018;Cardini et al. 2007;Charlin and González-José 2012;Davis et al. 2017;de Azevedo et al. 2014;Lei et al. 2021;Okumura and Araujo 2014;Shott and Trail 2010;Smith 2010;Smith and Goebel 2018;Smith et al. 2015;Suárez and Cardillo 2019;Thulman 2012). The majority of GM analyses of stone tools have used a 2D landmark approach, which allows the analyst to collect shape data by defining and digitizing landmarks on photographs or scans of artifacts. ...
Only recently has the use of 3D-scanning technology enhanced our ability to consider shape using landmark approaches to geometric morphometrics (GM). Studies examining several types of anthropological datasets have provided mixed reviews of the utility of the third dimension in landmark GM shape analyses. In this paper we present the results of a study examining the methodological utility of three dimensions in landmark GM shape analysis of prehistoric stone points. We used GM to generate principal components (PCs) of shape variation from independent data sets of Clovis and Dalton points in different shape spaces using 2D and 3D versions of the same sample and examined variation in the distribution of shape variables on PCs generated for each data set. Results of uniform multivariate statistical tests performed on each dataset’s PCs were compared to observe whether 2D or 3D data is more effective at determining group membership. We then generated PCs of shape variation in the same shape space using dependent 2D and 3D datasets to observe whether 2D versions of the data cluster with corresponding 3D versions of each point in a PC biplot and multivariate cluster analysis. Results suggest that 2D GM analysis is as capable of discriminating between Clovis and Dalton points as analyses conducted with 3D data. However, those interested in manufacturing technology will benefit from information provided by 3D data sets, which can capture information such as original blank form and thinning strategies.
... Again inspired by palaeobiology, archaeologists have also employed landmark-based geometric morphometrics (GMM) to describe artefact shapes (e.g. [37,38]). While this mitigates the drawbacks of using qualitative or discretized traits, landmark placement on artefacts nonetheless remains difficult [39]. ...
Phylogenetic models are commonly used in palaeobiology to study the patterns and processes of organismal evolution. In the human sciences, phylogenetic methods have been deployed for reconstructing ancestor–descendant relationships using linguistic and material culture data. Within evolutionary archaeology specifically, phylogenetic analyses based on maximum parsimony and discrete traits dominate, which sets limitations for the downstream role cultural phylogenies, once derived, can play in more elaborate analytical pipelines. Recent methodological advances in Bayesian phylogenetics, however, now allow us to infer evolutionary dynamics using continuous characters. Capitalizing on these developments, we here present an exploratory analysis of cultural macroevolution of projectile point shape evolution in the European Final Palaeolithic and earliest Mesolithic (approx. 15 000–11 000 BP) using a Bayesian phylodynamic approach and the fossilized birth–death process model. This model-based approach leaps far beyond the application of parsimony, in that it not only produces a tree, but also divergence times, and diversification rates while incorporating uncertainties. This allows us to compare rates to the pronounced climatic changes that occurred during our time frame. While common in cultural evolutionary analyses of language, the extension of Bayesian phylodynamic models to archaeology arguably represents a major methodological breakthrough.
... Lastly, we have an increasing amount of evidence that shape is an important aspect of formal artifacts, the ones that were produced following some kind of mental template or cultural model (Okumura & Araujo 2014). The single-minded emphasis in technology and consequent disregard of shape is deleterious to the study of lithic industries which show this particular class of artifacts. ...
Brazilian archaeology developed following the same phases that the discipline as a whole went through: an initial emphasis on Historical Culturalism, followed by criticism that culminated in a range of possibilities, from the indiscriminate rejection of everything that had been done before, to a more balanced stance with the incorporation of new concepts. Specifically, we can say that there was a schism between the first professional archaeologists, interested in building historical-cultural knowledge, who sought to understand artefactual variability based on the shapes and possible functions of artifacts, and a younger generation guided by the Processualist approach, who started from the principle that the diversity of stone tools would reflect the relationship between man and environment and could be understood based on the different manufacturing techniques. Over time, criticism of the use of morphological approaches led to technology becoming a supposedly superior and more suitable method of analysis for the characterization of lithic artifacts. In Brazilian archaeological research, this reasoning has been consolidated over time and, consequently, limited not only the use of other perspectives, which could be complementary to the characterization of artifacts, but also the identification of distinct cultural groups. Considering that technological analysis understands that there are several steps involved in the manufacturing process of lithic tools and that the development of these activities occurs in an orderly manner, within a certain time and space, we present in this article some approaches that deal with the notion of Models of Sequence (Bleed 2001). The main objective is to show that even if they consider the development of activities as a process that occurs in an orderly manner, similar concepts are not necessarily substantially identical. To begin the discussion about the different approaches, we first deal with the French method called chaîne opératoire, certainly the most recognized in Brazil. Possibly, its establishment in Brazilian literature is due to successive years of teaching, learning and reproduction of key concepts, without major investment in improving and applying other methods. To this end, we discuss the North American-influenced analysis model called Reduction Sequence, exploring basic concepts capable of differentiating it from the French school. Next, we present the method called Minimum Analytical Nodule Analysis, an approach focused on the macroscopic observation of the raw material, operationalized in a very similar way to the refitting method. Subsequently, we explored the Japanese concept called Gihō, aimed at analysing laminar industries. In conclusion, we draw a parallel between these approaches, showing that some of them require a specific context to be applied or even that their inferences will only be possible in the long term and from dense collections.
... All synthesis on meridional Brazil, including the most significant ones made by Prous (1991;, ignored (or omitted) Miller's classification and considered that sites from the Rio Claro region, including the Alice Boer site, should be associated with the "Umbu Tradition" due the presence of lithic points, regardless of their cultural patterns. New questions on this problematic association were only made again by Okumura and Araujo (2013;2014;2015;, who provided new data on geometric morphometric analysis that suggested that the lithic points from Rio Claro region were, in fact, very different from any others from southern Brazil in morphological terms. ...
In recent years, Paleoamerican sites from central São Paulo state (Brazil) have been associated with a lithic industry known as Rioclarense, but only due the presence of stemmed points and lesmas. Although a few studies on a few sites have been previously presented regarding chronology, formation processes and technology of the lithic points, the complete technological study of the industry was still lacking. This study objective is to present a definition of the Rioclarense Culture. Known (so far) only by its lithic industry, it can be identified by the presence of the Rioclarense-type points and/or lesmas, and/or flakes, preforms and other tools with specific technological features. This article includes a short review on the Rioclarense Culture and 'Umbu Tradition' definitions and the first technological description of all classes of lithic materials of two Rioclarense-associated sites dating to the Early and Middle Holocene: Caetetuba and Alice Boer.
... Remote sensing and geographic information systems (GIS) are highly efficient and effective in developing, managing, and prioritizing the sub-watersheds for many geohazards such as soil erosion (Chatterjee et al. 2014;Malik et al. 2011;Okumura and Araujo 2014;Pandey et al. 2009;Rudraiah et al. 2008). The availability of free access to high-quality resolution topographic data (digital elevation models) has equipped researchers with effective GIS tools to study drainage basins and to quantify with high accuracy different parameters (basic, linear, shape, and relief) of drainage basins. ...
1.Provides the most updated references on water resources management in arid regions
2.Includes climate change, hydrological monitoring, groundwater, and its quality specifically for arid regions
3.Presents case studies dealing with challenges and solutions for arid regions from more than 15 countries
... In terms of methods, this sub-cluster contains articles employing metric and geometric morphometrics for the study of lithic tools and technology (e.g. Eren et al., 2015;Lycett and von Cramon-Taubadel, 2013;Okumura and Araujo, 2014;Schillinger et al., 2015). Within other, much smaller niches of cluster 3, modes of cultural transmission and social learning stand tall, especially in regard to ceramic production (e.g. ...
Bibliometrics offers powerful means of visualising and understanding trends within research domains. We here present a first exploratory bibliometric analysis of cultural evolutionary theory and attendant methods as applied specifically within archaeology across the last four decades (1981–2021). Bibliographic coupling network analysis shows that there exists a broadly successive series of author clusters making up the core of this research domain. A broader vernacular version of cultural evolution is also commonly used in thematic or regional research traditions that fall outside of cultural evolutionary studies in the strict sense. Our bibliometric networks trace the development of evolutionary archaeology over the last four decades and while they demonstrate the centrality of computational models, they also suggest a stagnation in the application of precisely that suite of methods—phylogenetics—that is central to evolutionary archaeology’s biological counterpart palaeontology. Recent methodological innovations in palaeobiology are, however, offering new ways of integrating artefact shape data directly with phylogenetic applications. This development may usher in a renaissance in artefact phylogenetics and appropriately marco-scale applications of cultural evolutionary theory in archaeology.
... Okumura & Araujo, 2014). Un poco más recientemente, tal vez hace unos 8.000 años, comienza a producirse un nuevo tipo de artefacto lítico denominado "clava", cuya relación con las poblaciones que manufacturaban las llamadas puntas "Umbú" no es clara, como así tampoco la finalidad que tenían estos artefactos, que se asemejan a un boomerang lítico por su forma ligeramente curva. ...
Se presentan los lineamientos generales del proyecto de puesta en valor de la Gruta Tres de Mayo (Garuhapé, Misiones) como patrimonio cultural. Este proyecto surge como respuesta a una necesidad detectada en la salida de campo realizada como finalización de curso del seminario y materia optativa “Arqueología de Misiones” realizado en el año 2019 en la Facultad de Humanidades y Ciencias Sociales de la Universidad Nacional de Misiones. Se destacan los valores ambientales, turísticos, históricos y arqueológicos de la Gruta como aspectos del sitio que contribuyen a pensar estrategias para su uso sustentable. Sin embargo, es necesario implementar acciones de conservación y resguardo que permitan que la Gruta Tres de Mayo
como patrimonio cultural, sea un recurso que pueda ser aprovechado por las generaciones actuales y futuras.
... Remote sensing and geographic information systems (GIS) are highly efficient and effective in developing, managing, and prioritizing the sub-watersheds for many geohazards such as soil erosion (Chatterjee et al. 2014;Malik et al. 2011;Okumura and Araujo 2014;Pandey et al. 2009;Rudraiah et al. 2008). The availability of free access to high-quality resolution topographic data (digital elevation models) has equipped researchers with effective GIS tools to study drainage basins and to quantify with high accuracy different parameters (basic, linear, shape, and relief) of drainage basins. ...
Samples of leachate from the Osisioma open dumpsite and water from four boreholes from the surrounding residence were collected using the four cardinal point model. The sampled boreholes were assigned BH 1, BH 2, BH 3, and BH 4 with distances of 80, 251, 348, and 455 (m) respectively from the location of the dumpsite which is at the center as regards to the cardinal point model used. Physicochemical and microbiological parameters were analyzed to determine the quality of the water. pH, Conductivity, Temperature, TDS, Colour, alkalinity, DO, BOD, COD, Nitrate, Nitrate-Nitrogen, Iron, Chlorine, Chromium, Copper, Arsenic, Lead, Zinc, total bacterial count, E. coli and total coliform count were analyzed. pH ranged from 5.2 to 6.3 in borehole water indicating toxic pollution and was neutral (7.1) in the leachate sample. The temperature of borehole water and leachate ranged from 26.70 to 29.70 °C, Colour (Platinum Cobalt Unit) ranged from 13 to 13850PCU in borehole water and leachate. The concentrations of, Lead, Chromium, Copper, Nitrate, Chlorine, Zinc and Iron ranged from; Lead 0.001 in BH 3 to 0.125 in BH 1, Copper 0.00 in BH 3 to 0.08 in BH 4, Chromium 0.014 in BH 3 to 0.037 in BH 2, Nitrate 234.2 in BH 4 to 343.0 in BH 1, Chlorine 0.35 in BH 3 to 1.71 in BH 4, Zinc; 0.09 mg/L in BH 3 to 0.25 in BH 4 and Iron 0.19 in BH 3 to 0.42 in BH 4 respectively. Alkalinity in water sample was below the WHO permissible limit. Arsenic and Iron were above the permissible limits in BH 1 (0.031 and 0.40 mg/L) and BH 4 (0.020 and 0.42 mg/L). Lead also exceeded the limit in BH 1 at 0.125 mg/L. DO, nitrate, nitrate-nitrogen and chlorine exceeded the limits across all the boreholes water sampled. In the microbiological analysis, Total Bacteria Count, E. coli, and Total Coliform Count were analyzed with mean values of 62.00, 6.50 and 23.75 respectively. All the microbial parameters analyzed exceeded WHO permissible limits which make the water unfit for direct consumption. The variations in concentration of microbiological parameters were in respect to distance from the dumpsite and elevation of the sampling points. There is therefore a need for major water treatment to be carried out on the borehole water before human consumption. Dumping of fresh refuse in the study area should be discouraged with the use of sanctions and fines on defaulters. Government should adopt eco-friendly solid waste disposal management systems such as sorting before disposal, incineration, landfill, waste conversion to biogas and compost as well as provision of portable water to reduce indiscriminate borehole construction to preserve the soil structure.KeywordsBoreholeDumpsiteGroundwaterLeachateLandfillPollutionWaste
... Remote sensing and geographic information systems (GIS) are highly efficient and effective in developing, managing, and prioritizing the sub-watersheds for many geohazards such as soil erosion (Chatterjee et al. 2014;Malik et al. 2011;Okumura and Araujo 2014;Pandey et al. 2009;Rudraiah et al. 2008). The availability of free access to high-quality resolution topographic data (digital elevation models) has equipped researchers with effective GIS tools to study drainage basins and to quantify with high accuracy different parameters (basic, linear, shape, and relief) of drainage basins. ...
Typhoon Ulysses (Vamco) brought about more than 300 flooding incidents in the Philippines in November 2020. The Cagayan Valley Region was reported with the highest worth of damage to infrastructure and agriculture. In this study, synthetic aperture radar images were used to analyze the effect of Typhoon Ulysses in the region. The VV and VH bands of Sentinel 1 were used to detect the flooded areas before (November 1) and after (November 13) the typhoon. The VH band was found more effective at detecting flooded and agricultural areas (72,722.30 ha and 37,736.70 ha, respectively) than the VV band (69,501.12 ha and 35,606.59 ha, respectively). The VV polarization was found to be more suited for monitoring vegetation, whereas the VH polarization is more suited for estimating flood extent, as based on the backscatter intensity of the two polarizations before and during flooding on representative places. The significantly high amount of rainfall (200–300 mm) received, low elevation and slope of the affected areas, and the volume of water released from Magat Dam were noted as the contributing factors to the massive flooding event. More than 35,000 ha of rice areas were flooded in Alcala town. Results showed that the standing crops I n Alcala increased after the typhoon (from 660.55 to 923.16 ha) when the flood subsided. This was determined using MODIS, Sentinel 1 and 2, and a 0.3 NDVI threshold. It was also noted that before the typhoon, most of the rice crops were at a stage of maturity and were ready for harvest a few days later.KeywordsGISRemote sensingFlood assessmentTyphoon UlyssesNDVI
... The use of morphometric characteristics has been put to many different uses, such as in obtaining groundwater potential zones in a structurally controlled terrain (Sreedevi et al. 2005), in positioning check dam by prioritisation of micro-watersheds using sediment yield index (SYI) model (Noorka Ratnam et al. 2005), identification of critical erosion-prone areas in the small agricultural watershed (Pandey et al. 2007), prioritisation of mini-watersheds in drought-prone Bargur-Mathur sub-watersheds, Ponnaiyar River basin (Sethupathi et al. 2011), prioritisation of watershed for groundwater potential of Mula Rver basin (Choudhari et al. 2018), prioritisation of Upper Ravi Catchment (Khurana et al. 2020), and prioritisation for flood risk assessment (Syed et al. 2017;Obeidat et al. 2021). Prioritising sub-watersheds has been found to improve watershed management programmes, soil and land conservation, and water management in a number of studies in recent years (Okumura and Araujo 2014;Kadam et al. 2017;Hembram and Saha 2020). In view of the current situation of high soil loss and sediment production, certain sub-watersheds represent potential areas for special conservation implementation and the need to immediately prioritise additional soil and water safeguarding strategies to continue agricultural sector growth (Farhan and Anaba 2016). ...
The objective of the study was to elucidate the hydro-morphological parameters and watershed priority of the Ladhiya basin by applying Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM-30 m) data and topographic sheets of Survey of India with remote sensing and GIS tools. Twenty-five watersheds were delineated for hydrological parameter studies in linear, areal, and relief directions. The overall drainage basin size was calculated to be 754.23 km2 with a dendritic to sub-dendritic drainage pattern, which was impacted by the terrain, underlying geology, and precipitation. The study area was identified as a 5th-order basin with 347 stream segments with a total length of 548.654 km. The physiography and geology of a region have a significant effect on the stream order. The bifurcation ratio ranged between 1.83 and 14 km/km2, indicating moderate to substantial infiltration and structural complexity within the basin. Drainage density ranged from 0.20 to 0.95 km/km2, indicating that the drainage texture of the basin was coarser. The shape index, shape factor, and compactness coefficient indicate that the basin has moderate tectonic activity and moderate basin lag durations, and that it will require more time for peak flow to occur. As a result of its moderate to steep slopes, the soil erosion is low to moderate. The computed parameters were used to determine the watersheds' priority rankings by allocating weights to them using the compound factor (CF) approach in accordance with their erosion potential. The Ladhiya basin has been assigned five priority categories: highest priority, very high priority, high priority, moderate priority, and low priority. WS16, WS5, WS24, WS12, WS25, and WS17 were the most vulnerable watersheds, necessitating stricter soil and water conservation measures. Utilising GIS and remote sensing, we were able to fully comprehend the basin's hydro-morphological features. The findings of the study can also be applied to the development of long-term basin management plans.
... Recentemente, pesquisas mostraram que as técnicas de geoprocessamento, como é o caso dos sistemas de informação geográfica em conjunto com o sensoriamento remoto tem sido fundamentais para a gestão do território e análises de cunho ambiental [13,14] em função da sua rapidez na geração de produtos cartográficos e menor custo atrelado, possibilitando o seu uso para a caracterização morfométrica e mapeamento do uso e cobertura do solo em bacias hidrográficas [15][16][17]. ...
O estudo acerca da morfometria de bacias hidrográficas fornece informações importantes para o entendimento da dinâmica ambiental e dados que corroboram com o monitoramento e gestão territorial. Nesse sentido, esse trabalho teve como objetivo a obtenção e espacialização de cinco parâmetros morfométricos e de conflito de uso do solo visando obter um índice que forneça subsídios que contribuam para o ordenamento territorial. Para tanto, utilizou-se técnicas de geoprocessamento para a elaboração de um índice morfométrico geral para as sub-bacias hidrográficas do Rio Sorocabuçu, por meio da integração de dos parâmetros morfométricos. Como resultados, destaca-se que a área de estudo apresenta características físicas que corroboram para o desencadeamento de processos erosivos e inundação, podendo ser intensificados caso tenham uma ocupação do solo de forma desordenada. De tal modo, a análise morfométrica e do uso e aptidão do solo, mostraram-se fundamentais para o fornecimento de informações para uma melhor gestão ambiental e zoneamento da BHRS por meio de sub-bacias hidrográficas, visando o desenvolvimento sustentável desta região.
... The "Umbú" assemblages are distributed throughout the Holocene, with an enormous variability, which today remains mostly unknown. These contexts are defined by the presence of stemmed points, although lanceolate and triangular stemless points have been recognized (see different points of views in Araujo, 2015;Miller, 1967Miller, , 1974Noelli, 1999Noelli, -2000Okumura & Araujo, 2014;Schmitz, 2006Schmitz, , 2011. Generic bifaces have been found in these assemblages which have been considered technically similar to cleavers. ...
South American lithic cleavers are heavy curved artifacts distributed throughout the tropical Upper Paraná Atlantic Forest in the southeastern lowlands of the subcontinent. The most reliable stratigraphic data and associated radiocarbon dates show that they were produced from the early-middle Holocene to the late-middle Holocene boundary. The cleavers were shaped by bifacial flaking and secondarily by pressure using pebbles, and to a lesser extent, thick flakes. The most used rock for its manufacture was silicified sandstone. The classic design of these tools features a thick, bi-concave neck with expanded shoulder, and a long, triangular and tapered blade with a rounded tip, which has undergone a rejuvenation process throughout its life cycle. Although they have some morphometric variations along their distribution range, they have the same bauplan. Indeed, the geometric morphometry analysis does not show significant differences between the designs of the cleavers from the Upper Paraná River in Argentina, and the Upper Uruguay in Brazil, reflecting the existence of a shared learning lineage in both valleys. Cleavers are recognized at sites that appear to have been residential camps, but quite often they are recovered isolated and distributed in the landscape, suggesting their use in obtaining resources. A fraction of them present a gloss on their tips visible to the naked eye. The microwear analysis of cleavers shows intense modifications in the first two to four cm from the tips of their blades, showing polished areas, and systematically orientated striations which are compatible with the processing of soft and semi-hard plant tissues, especially tubers. These results place these artifacts in the discussion about the systematic exploitation and even manipulation of plants in the Atlantic Forest during the early and middle Holocene.
... These studies 144 have been especially innovative, taking to heart the critique in Systematics that 145 archaeological typologies are often intuitive, arbitrary, and difficult to replicate by other 146 researchers. Motivated by this critique, scholars such as Marcelo Cardillo, Judith Charlin 147 (Cardillo & Charlin, 2018), Mercedes Okumura (Okumura & Araujo, 2014) and others have 148 conducted pioneering work in the application of geometric morphometrics to stone 149 artefact assemblages in an effort to provide a materialist view of technological variation 150 where the focus is on continuous quantitative phenomena. While geometric 151 morphometrics has been applied by archaeologists to a range of regions and artefact types 152 (including ceramic and metal), what makes this South American work remarkable as part 153 of the legacy of Systematics is their exploration of modern phylogenetic comparative 154 methods to model and quantify technological variation and change over space and time 155 (e.g. ...
2021 marked the fiftieth anniversary of the publication of Robert C. Dunnell's (1971) diminutive yet dense Systematics in Prehistory. At the height of the debate between Culture History and New Archaeology, Dunnell's work sought to address a more fundamental issue that was and still is relevant to all branches of prehistoric archaeology, and especially to the study of the Palaeolithic: systematics. Dunnell himself was notorious and controversial, however, but the importance of his work remains underappreciated. Like other precocious works of that tumultuous time Systematics in Prehistory today remains absent from most course reading lists and gathers dust on library shelves. In this contribution we argue for a greater appreciation of its as yet unfulfilled conceptual and analytical promise. In particular, we briefly chart its somewhat delayed impact via evolutionary archaeology, including how it has also influenced non-Anglophone traditions, especially in South America. The obstinate persistence of classification issues in palaeoanthropology and palaeoarchaeology, we argue, warrants a second look at Dunnell's Systematics.
... Therefore, this research of the basin morphometry can provide a very significant database in relation to their hydrological responses (Borga et al. 2008). Of late, remote sensing (RS) and geographical information systems (GIS) have been extensively employed with the objective of watershed management (Chatterjee et al. 2013;Okumura and Araujo 2014;Hasanuzzaman et al 2021). Digital elevation model (DEM) is a very high-resolution RS data and it's freely available for access. ...
The present study investigates sub-watershed prioritization for floodFlood susceptibility mapping of the Silabati River basinSilabati River basin (India) based on morphometric parametersMorphometric parameters. This river basin is a sixth-order drainage system with an adendritic drainage pattern and traverses an area of 4247.99 km2. Almost every year, the lower stretch of the Silabati river basinSilabati River basin experiences floods due to physiographic characteristics and excessive rainfall during a short time. The present work has been conducted with an integrated outlook involving the morphometric parametersMorphometric parameters, geological, and climate data by geospatial techniquesGeospatial technology for determining the probability of spatial flood risk. A ranking method has been employed to prioritize the sub-watersheds for susceptibility to flooding. The results of this study depict that 48.18% area of the basin including 11 out of 26 sub-watersheds has a high to very high floodFlood susceptibility area. Drainage density, basin slope, circulatory ratio, relative relief, relief ratio, stream frequency, and ruggedness number are the most important morphometric parametersMorphometric parameters for flooding in the study area. Since there were no such government or private historical flood records that are required for floodFlood modeling, various morphometric parameters have been accurately used to measure sub-watershed-wise flood susceptibility. The performance and efficiency of this method are validated using ROC and AUC, which ensures a considerable amount of accuracy (89.2%) of the study. Moreover, this research may be used as a guideline for surface runoff harvesting and flood mitigation at the sub-watershed level.
... In the case of the lowlands of southeastern South America, many studies have been devoted to discussing the initial human occupation in the periods of Early Holocene and Late Pleistocene (Miller Jr;1968;Neves and Hubbe, 2005;Buchanan et al. 2007;Araujo 2015;Araujo, 2014 andHadler et al. 2013; Moreno de Sousa, 2019) based on lithics human artifacts (Moreno de Sousa, 2019), bone artifacts (Mingatos and Okumura, 2020), and human skeletons (Hubbe et al. 2014), linked to 14C, OSL and TL ages prior to 8 ka. Such material remains have been interpreted as evidence of early huntergatherer, of a time prior to Tupi and Jê farmers and ceramists. ...
Aiming to contribute to discussions of early (>8 thousand years ago) human-Earth interactions on South America, an integrated analysis was carried out between geological, geomorphological, paleoenvironmental and archaeological data in the Brazilian state of São Paulo. Despite the climatic fluctuations registered in São Paulo during Early Holocene (11.5-8.0 thousand years ago), human occupation (evidenced by flaked rock tools, anthropogenic sedimentary deposits and human skeletons linked to 14C and OSL ages prior to 8 thousand years ago) remained present there throughout the period and without major changes along time in the technological attributes of at least part of their lithic industries, suggesting resilience of such early humans groups in the face of these environmental changes. It was found that around 8,5 thousand years ago, human occupation was present in all the major geomorphological-geological domains of São Paulo State, considered representative of the physical landscape units of the southeastern South America, even though each of them had different availability of attributes valued by the hunter-gatherer ways of life, suggesting significant adaptive capacity to different contexts of the physical environment by these ancient human groups. Also, it was registered that early human settlements are more numerous and older (>10 thousand years ago) in one of the state relief domains: the Cuestas (a transition between two major geomorphological domains of southeastern South America), characterized by the high availability of rocky outcrops of geological units of good capability for manufacturing of stone tools macroscopically similar to the raw materials of many of the artifacts found on such early settlements, highlighting the importance that sources of lithic materials had in the way of life of these ancient populations. Regardless of the different landscape provinces in which they are inserted, most of these ancient human occupations are located in places of relative similar altitudes, inclinations, drainages and proximity (<16 km) of sources of lithic raw materials (e.g, flint, sandstones and quartz found at in situ rocky outcrops and/or gravels fluvial deposits) that strong resembles those of the ancient artifacts, suggesting similar strategies to insert themselves in different geomorphological and geological contexts.
... Chacón et al., 2016;Serwatka, 2014) and elsewhere (Lycett, 2007), Holocene forager tools in South America (e.g. Charlin & González-José, 2012;Okumura & Araujo, 2014;Suárez & Cardillo, 2019) and later prehistoric metal axes (Wilczek et al., 2015), lances (Birch & Martinón-Torres, 2019) and adornments (Vestergaard & Hoggard, 2019) have all been subjected to geometric morphometric assessments, often leading to a substantial critique of established typologies. There is little methodological consistency across these emerging case studies, however, and rarely have such studies re-analysed different datasets comparatively (see Monnier & McNulty, 2010, for an exception), making it difficult to evaluate their conclusions independently of their methodological choices. ...
The identification of material culture variability remains an important goal in archaeology, as such variability is commonly coupled with interpretations of cultural transmission and adaptation. While most archaeological cultures are defined on the basis of typology and research tradition, cultural evolutionary reasoning combined with computer-aided methods such as geometric morphometrics (GMM) can shed new light on the validity of many such entrenched groupings, especially in regard to European Upper Palaeolithic projectile points and their classification. Little methodological consistency, however, makes it difficult to compare the conclusions of such studies. Here, we present an effort towards a benchmarked, case-transferrable toolkit that comparatively explores relevant techniques centred on outline-based GMM. First, we re-analyse two previously conducted landmark-based analyses of stone artefacts using our whole-outline approach, demonstrating that outlines can offer an efficient and reliable alternative. We then show how a careful application of clustering algorithms to GMM outline data is able to successfully discriminate between distinctive tool shapes and suggest that such data can also be used to infer cultural evolutionary histories matching already observed typo-chronological patterns. Building on this baseline work, we apply the same methods to a dataset of large tanged points from the European Final Palaeolithic (ca. 15,000–11,000 cal BP). Exploratively comparing the structure of design space within and between the datasets analysed here, our results indicate that Final Palaeolithic tanged point shapes do not fall into meaningful regional or cultural evolutionary groupings but exhibit an internal outline variance comparable to spatiotemporally much closer confined artefact groups of post-Palaeolithic age. We discuss these contrasting results in relation to the architecture of lithic tool design spaces and technological differences in blank production and tool manufacture.
... Recently, researchers used geospatial techniques like Geographical Information System (GIS) and Remote Sensing (RS) for sustainable watershed analysis and modeling. GIS and RS techniques have high efficiency and effectiveness for extraction of drainage components (Gong & Xie, 2009;Metz et al., 2011), watershed development, and management (Ameri et al., 2018;Chatterjee et al., 2014;Okumura & Araujo, 2014). Nowadays GIS techniques are inexpensive, reliable, and fast way to calculate morphometric analysis (Balasubramanian et al., 2017;Sreedevi et al., 2009) and used for drainage pattern, topography, and subsurface material studies (Balasubramanian et al., 2017;Chandniha & Kansal, 2017;Javed et al., 2011;Withanage et al., 2014). ...
Water is an important resource of the earth’s surface and it is integral for all on this planet. The availability or the scarcity of water depends on the watershed characterizes that consider the basic, linear, and shape parameters of any waterbody. The objective of the study was to delineate 14 morphometric parameters in the Barind region (Dinajpur district, Bangladesh) for sustainable hydrological modeling. An ASTER-DEM of 30-meter resolution data, geographical information system (GIS), and Remote sensing technique were used for extracting drainage components of interest region. The whole study region was covered by the flow of the Purnovoba river, Jamuna river, Atrai river (part-1 and part-2). Research results found that the Purnovoba river had a high bifurcation ratio (0.9982) that defined hydrologically more disturbed than the other three watershed areas and it had a high stream frequency (0.8332) that denoted rocky having low infiltration capacity. Jamuna river had a low drainage density (0.7322) that defined more vegetation having higher permeability. Besides, the Jamuna river had the lowest no. of stream order that was insignificant in the steady runoff process and less prone to cause a flash flood. The research predicted that the availability of groundwater might decrease to Jamuna river in the future as it had the lowest basin area (217.42 sqr. km ) and perimeter (114.90 km) and the basin surface slope would become gentle to Atrai river part-1 for the lowest length of overland flow (0.6072). Purnovoba river experienced the lowest form factor (0.2351) which indicated the most possibility for erosion. The elongated ratio of all basins was greater than 0.5 which considered all the shapes were more elongated. These findings will help for further modeling of an integrated watershed for sustainable hydrological models in the Barind region.
... Our fourth case study is based on the morphology of stemmed bifacial projectile points excavated from the Garivaldino Rodrigues rockshelter in southern Brazil, which revealed that a specific set of bifacial point shapes and sizes was maintained for 3000 years (11,660 to 7540 cal BP) (Okumura and Araujo, 2014). Hunting was characterized by a preference for smaller mammals, although birds and lizards were also hunted (Dias, 2012). ...
Prehistoric archaeology focuses on innovations, transformations, and turnovers. We focus instead on persistency, suggesting that technological persistency in prehistoric hunter-gatherers was triggered by the stability of prey. The technological persistency-faunal stability nexus was not only crucial to human prosperity but also provided safe ground for technological and behavioral innovations, facilitating further adaptation to changing conditions. This can be viewed in the framework of mosaic evolution. We present six cases of morphological stasis enabling trophic adaptations and five archaeological cases of technological persistency following faunal stability. This model could contribute to a better understanding of technological persistency and its evolutionary role.
... Recently, geospatial techniques (RS and GIS) have been applied efficiently with the goal of watershed management (Chatterjee, Krishna, & Sharma, 2013;Okumura & Araujo, 2014). The availability of free access high quality resolution digital elevation (DEM) has further enhanced the strength of the effective GIS tools that enabled many researchers to study drainage basins and to investigate with high accuracy the parameters of drainage basins. ...
Morphometric analysis and sub‐watersheds prioritisation were carried out for the Wadi Easal Basin, Jordan, which is characterised by a high topographic diversity. The total ranking method was applied to prioritise the sub‐watersheds in terms of susceptibility to flash flood. Results of morphometric analysis revealed that the study area is a fifth order drainage system with a dendritic drainage pattern and elongated shape. Prioritisation results showed that about 71% (15 out of 21 sub‐watersheds) of sub‐watersheds have high‐very high susceptibility to flooding, which forms about 64% of the total area of the basin. The main underlying morphometric parameters behind this are the high drainage density, stream frequency, high basin relief, basin slope, ruggedness number, and circulatory ratio, and the low value of basin shape. Overall, the basin has a rugged topography with steep slopes and high relief. Since the basin is ungauged, and no information about its past hydrological behaviour is present, the results of this study can be used as guidance for competent authorities to initialize flood mitigation or artificial groundwater recharge measures.
... El análisis cuantitativo también se ha centrado en el tema evolutivo debido a su potencialidad en identificar patrones culturales en los datos arqueológicos. La mayor parte de los estudios donde se aplica una metodologıá estadıśtica se encuentran relacionados con la observación de variaciones en los artefactos arqueológicos (Neff, 1992;Lyman & O'Brien, 2000;Li et al. 2014;Okumura & Araujo, 2014;Shennan et al., 2015). En el caso de estudios históricos, son pocos los ejemplos de los que se disponen, aunque en los últimos años se ha producido un auge significativo (Isaksen, 2008;Murrieta et al., 2015;Rubio-Campillo et al., 2017;Busto-Zapico, 2018;Coto-Sarmiento et al., 2018;Rubio-Campillo et al., 2018b;Turchin et al., 2018). ...
The loss of cultural complexity and diversity is a common phenomenon throughout human and potentially non-human history, often in relation to major external shocks. Yet, there are few studies that analyse cultural loss as a topic of research. Difficult questions like the study of cultural resilience need to be answered by the use of a diverse set of tools and datasets that goes beyond the level of multidisciplinarity that currently exists on the cultural studies fields, what is needed is deep conversations and collaboration of multiple research fields and non academic actors, providing statistical methods, data extraction and analysis, as well as a global understanding of the topic. CLUB-DECES homes in on the resilience of culture under demographic, climatic and environmental shocks –the occurrence of which is prognosed to become more frequent and severe in the future. By modelling and analysing drastic changes in population or in the environment brought about by shocks CLUB-DECES pursues to measure the cultural resilience of culture by adapting methodologies based on Bayesian inference commonly used in cosmological studies. Thus CLUB-DECES involves multidisciplinary and transdisciplinary studies, combining numerical and analytical modelling from a wide suite of fields, primarily using tools developed to model cosmological datasets, data science, archaeological and anthropological data extraction, together with the most susceptible communities, their representatives and involved the institutions. This ambitious endeavour shall study culture in the human and non-human realm, aiming –on the basis of past datasets– to forecast the requirements to achieve a general measure of the shock-induced tipping-points of culture. This is highly relevant now at a global and European scale. Globally climate change and environmental degradation bring to the tipping-point many vulnerable societies, human and non-human. In Europe, rural areas and whole member states, like Bulgaria, are losing large amounts of population due to migration. CLUB-DECES results will shed new light on our understanding of the past, and thanks to that help our present and have influence on the preservation of cultural diversity for the future generations.
... El análisis cuantitativo también se ha centrado en el tema evolutivo debido a su potencialidad en identificar patrones culturales en los datos arqueológicos. La mayor parte de los estudios donde se aplica una metodologıá estadıśtica se encuentran relacionados con la observación de variaciones en los artefactos arqueológicos (Neff, 1992;Lyman & O'Brien, 2000;Li et al. 2014;Okumura & Araujo, 2014;Shennan et al., 2015). En el caso de estudios históricos, son pocos los ejemplos de los que se disponen, aunque en los últimos años se ha producido un auge significativo (Isaksen, 2008;Murrieta et al., 2015;Rubio-Campillo et al., 2017;Busto-Zapico, 2018;Coto-Sarmiento et al., 2018;Rubio-Campillo et al., 2018b;Turchin et al., 2018). ...
Terra Incognita se ha configurado como un Libro Blanco que pretende identificar tendencias y reflexionar sobre las diferentes concepciones y prácticas de la investigación no disciplinar en nuestro entorno académico (el Sistema Español de Ciencia y Tecnología). Esta es una transición que implica un cierto cambio de paradigma, muy alineado con la investigación dirigida a retos sociales.
Terra Incognita es resultado de la Red de Excelencia SimPastNet – Simular el pasado para entender el comportamiento humano (Redes de Excelencia 2017 I, HAR2017-90883-REDC). Esta red, coordinada por el Grupo de Ingeniería de Organización de la Universidad de Burgos (UBU), está formada por 10 grupos de investigación y 40 investigadores.
Los integrantes de la red pertenecen tanto a grupos de investigación en Ciencias Sociales y Humanidades (Arqueología, Antropología y Sociología), como a grupos de investigación en Ciencias Formales (Matemáticas, Ingeniería e Informática). Todos ellos se caracterizan por su perspectiva transdisciplinar y presentan una larga experiencia de colaboración con especialistas de diferentes dominios.
La Red SimPastNet surgió del proyecto de Investigación Consolider Ingenio SimulPast. Simulating the Past to Understand Human Behavior (MINECO – CSD2010-00034) un proyecto de Humanidades (fundamentalmente arqueológico), dirigido a promover el modelado y la simulación en la investigación histórica y, por tanto, con un marcado carácter innovador y transdisciplinar.
A pesar de que Terra Incognita trate aspectos generales y ofrezca visiones de conjunto, esta genealogía explica el porqué de su perspectiva fundamentalmente anclada en las Ciencias Humanas y Sociales. Además, nos centraremos especialmente en el papel de las Humanidades y las Ciencias Sociales, porque constituyen una parte importante de esos ámbitos desde los que se están generando grandes aportaciones a esa transición que implica posicionarse en nuevos territorios, ajenos a las trayectorias históricas de nuestras disciplinas.
Apresentamos aqui os dados relativos à coleção de pilões líticos acervados no Laboratório de Arqueologia, Etnologia e Etno-História da Universidade Estadual de Maringá (LAEE/UEM). São dados referentes à suas entradas no acervo, morfometrias e espacialização. Expomos também o modo de construção/organização da ficha de acervamento específica para esse tipo de artefato e o processo metodológico, ancorado nos instrumentos legais dos órgãos que tratam do patrimônio histórico-cultural e na bibliografia especializada no assunto. Os resultados alcançados nos permitem oferecer à comunidade científica especializada: subsídios para reflexões sobre esses artefatos; metodologia utilizada para o seu registro patrimonial; revisão da literatura internacional que nos possibilitou observar atributos morfométricos que ainda não tinham sido discutidos na literatura nacional; compreensão da importância desses artefatos no convívio alimentício, medicinal, ritualístico e simbólicos das populações indígenas que os utilizaram; e, com sua espacialização, aumentar nosso entendimento sobre os territórios manejados por essas populações.
In recent years, the mutual impact of land use change and soil erosion has become a major environmental concern. Therefore, this study tried to investigate the changes in different land uses and evaluate the impacts of land use changes on soil erosion in Givi city. To achieve the goals of the research, first, a land use map was prepared using the object-oriented method for the two periods of 2000 and 2021. Then, according to the natural and human conditions of the area, other effective factors for erosion in the area were identified and the information layers of each of the criteria were prepared by the geographic information system. Evaluation and standardization of layers were done using the fuzzy membership function and weighting of the criteria was done using the CRITIC method. The final analysis and modeling were done using the MABAC method as one of the Multi-Criteria Decision-Making (MCDM) methods. The results showed that the largest area in 2000 is related to good and medium pastures, recording 313.172 and 283.144 square kilometers, respectively. In 2021, the biggest areas are related to poor pastures and barren lands, with 335.077 and 329.815 square kilometers, respectively. According to the 2000 erosion zoning map, 16.34% and 20.36% of the city and according to the 2021 erosion zoning, 22.92% and 25.58% of the city’s area are in very high and high erosions, respectively. Decreasing good and average pastures and lands with dense vegetation and turning them into agricultural areas, poor pastures, and man-made and barren lands have had the greatest impact on soil erosion.
This study explores the reworking of projectile point stems by hunter-gatherers in southeastern South America. Techniques employed to rework stems included pressure and percussion flaking and, eventually, light abrasion of fractured sections, methods that were applied opportunistically to resolve various types of stem fractures. Although the local literature has
often overlooked the presence of reworked stems, it appears that point rebasing was a relatively common practice in the region, especially for points made from microcrystalline rocks and other highly silicified rocks. The reworking of points was likely carried out to preserve highquality raw materials and to reduce the cost of manufacturing new points. Although the recognition of reworked stems can be challenging, it is a crucial task for subsequent morphometric and stylistic analysis. This allows for the identification of one of the sources of point variation thus avoiding an artificial increase in the variability of the original designs.
In an area like India, where a large number of people are dependent upon agriculture, soil erosion assumes the role of a silent killer. A comprehensive soil management plan requires systematic development and planning at the scale of the natural boundaries, i.e., the watersheds. These watersheds are now actively encouraged to become the planning unit for a wide range of natural resource management. Sub-basin prioritisation with respect to erosion susceptibility, therefore, has become increasingly popular in the last few decades as this helps in optimal distribution, especially in a country like India, where the availability of resources is scarce. Erosion is a complex problem wherein a large number of factors play an important role in influencing this process. Therefore, multi-criteria decision-making (MCDM) techniques are becoming more popular in this domain. However, there are a myriad of MCDM models in literature, and a proper and systematic comparison between such MCDM models may help in deciding on the best possible model in the given categories. This paper has tried to make such a comparison for morphometry-based sub-basin prioritisation in the rocky terrain of the Chaka River Basin, Eastern India. The MCDM models that have been investigated include technique for order of preference by similarity to ideal solution (TOPSIS), VlseKriterijumsk Optimizacija Kompromismo Resenje (VIKOR), multi-objective optimisation on the basis of ratio analysis (MOORA), compound factor (CF), weighted sum model (WSM), weighted product model (WPM) and weighted aggregated sum product assessment (WASPAS). These results were compared with respect to the RUSLE-based annual soil loss of the Chaka Basin with the help of the ROC curve. Results reveal that the MOORA MCDM method is the most reliable (AUC = 0.711), whereas the TOPSIS is the least authentic (AUC = 0.378). The middle domain of the Chaka Basin appears to be highly prioritised as compared to the lower domain.
The degradation of land and increasing water scarcity are existing challenges for agricultural sustainability, necessitating the implementation of improved soil-conservation practices at the watershed scale. The identification and selection of critical/prone areas based on erosion-governing criteria is essential and helps in the execution of the management process for determining priority. This study prioritizes erosion-prone sub-watersheds (alternatives) based on morphometric parameters (multiple criteria) via five Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis (MCDA) approaches, i.e., AHP: Analytical Hierarchy Process; TOPSIS: Technique for Order of Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution; VIKOR: VIseKriterijumska Optimizacija I Kompromisno Resenje; SAW: Simple Additive Weighting; and CF: Compound Factor. Based on their priority score, 19 sub-watersheds were classified into four priority classes: low priority (0–0.25), moderate priority (0.25–0.50), high priority (0.50–0.75), and very high priority (0.75–1). The results revealed that about 8.34–30.15% area of the Burhanpur watershed is critically prone to erosion, followed by 23.38–52.05% area classed as high priority, 7.47–49.99% area classed as moderate priority, and 10.33–18.28% area classed as low priority. Additionally, four indices—percentage of changes (∆P), intensity of changes (∆I), the Spearman rank correlation coefficient test (SCCT), and the Kendall tau correlation coefficient test (KTCCT)—were employed to compare the models. This study confirms the efficacy of morphometric parameters for prioritizing sub-watersheds to preserve soil and the environment, particularly in areas for which limited information is available.
Using phylogenetic and comparative methods, this paper explores how the interrelations between size and shape defined the evolutionary trajectories of lithic projectile point of the northern coast of Patagonia (Argentina) during Middle and Late Holocene. The results indicate the existence of an allometric relationship between shape and weight of the points that led their diversification process, at least in part. Also, variations in weight appear to have affected the likelihood of generating new morphological variants, suggesting the existence of restrictions on design that acted in different ways along the temporary span studied in this paper.
This Element volume focuses on how archaeologists construct narratives of past people and environments from the complex and fragmented archaeological record. In keeping with its position in a series of historiography, it considers how we make meaning from things and places, with an emphasis on changing practices over time and the questions archaeologists have and can ask of the archaeological record. It aims to provide readers with a reflexive and comprehensive overview of what it is that archaeologists do with the archaeological record, how that translates into specific stories or narratives about the past, and the limitations or advantages of these when trying to understand past worlds. The goal is to shift the reader's perspective of archaeology away from seeing it as a primarily data gathering field, to a clearer understanding of how archaeologists make and use the data they uncover.
Between 13,000 and 7000 BP, the territory of southern Brazil was
occupied in a stable and diverse manner, with the main anthropic
trace being in lithic material. Archaeological research has provided
more consistent evidence of occupation in different environments
and associated with different stratigraphic formation processes
since the Late Pleistocene. Therefore, this paper proposes to analyse
the history of the earliest evidence of pre-colonial occupation in
southern Brazil from a geoarchaeological point of view, focusing on
stratigraphic and chronological data and the process of formation
of archaeological layers. Thirty-three stratigraphic sections were
analysed from 31 archaeological sites distributed along the Parana´,
Uruguay and Atlantic basins. Evidence of archaeological levels was
found in different geomorphological contexts: plateau, slopes,
valley bottom, alluvial plains and rockshelters. The results indicate
that the oldest archaeological levels in the region were formed in
the Late Pleistocene, associated with periods of fluvial incision that
signal important changes in the southern river systems, characte�rized by the formation of alluvial and colluvial-alluvial terraces in
the valley bottoms. This is followed in the Lower Holocene by
widespread colluvial processes in the incised valleys, alluvium in
the middle river courses and anthropogenic deposits in the
rockshelters that formed the main ancient levels. In the early
Middle Holocene, sedimentary deposits containing archaeological
material decrease significantly, marking regional changes in lithic
industries. The data indicate that there appears to be a threshold
between deposition and archaeology in the Early Holocene,
characterized by high stratigraphic resolution, where stratigraphic
sequences show greater thickness and density of archaeological
levels. Finally, the diversity of inter-regional lithic assemblages is
clearly highlighted, marked by the predominance of industries on
pebbles and blocks, the debitage of flakes and blades as a support
for various tools in the interior basins and the shaping of small
projectile points on the Atlantic slope.
Soil erosion is a challenging worldwide environmental issue since it entails many environmental problems such as fertility loss and water pollution. Prioritization of watershed prone to soil erosion is cornerstone in any effective and sustainable management program of natural resources. Morphometry is a powerful tool that has been extensively used for this purpose. This study presents a combination and integration of two different soil erosion prioritization methods that were applied to Yarmouk River Basin (YRB). The methods of morphometric analysis and the Land Use/Land Cover (LULC) analysis were compared for erosion prioritization. The YRB was divided into 44 sub-watersheds. Twenty-one morphometric parameters were extracted and ranked based on their values and relationships to calculate the compound factor (Cf), which was used to prioritize sub-watersheds in terms of sensitivity to soil erosion. It was found that YRB is a fifth-order drainage system, with a dendritic drainage pattern and elongated shape. Morphometric analysis resulted in categorizing about 41% of the YRB in the high and very high soil erosion susceptibility zones while the LULC analysis LULC revealed that 88.6% of the basin was classified as having high-very high susceptibility to soil erosion. The sub-watersheds 1, 3, 4, 7, 9, 10, 11, 14, 20, 27, 28, 30, 32, 33, 35, 36, and 40 were found the most vulnerable to soil erosion based on both methods of analysis.KeywordsGISJordanLULCMorphometryPrioritizationSoil erosion
A região de Lagoa Santa possui um rico contexto geológico, paleontológico e arqueológico. No âmbito da arqueologia, o registro estratigráfico de Lagoa Santa é dominado pelos vestígios associados à Cultura Lagoassantense, que possui uma indústria lítica composta principalmente de microlascas de quartzo hialino e alguns poucos instrumentos polidos. Contudo, a variabilidade desta indústria ao longo do tempo é ainda desconhecida, e alguns poucos sítios da região contam com artefatos que fogem desta composição. É o caso do sítio arqueológico Lund. O sítio Lund é datado do Holoceno Tardio (2332 – 2000 anos cal. A.P.) e possui, um registro arqueológico composto de artefatos cerâmicos e artefatos líticos de diversas classes. Neste trabalho, buscou-se analisar a indústria lítica e cerâmica do sítio arqueológico Lund para entender suas possíveis associações culturais em meio ao contexto de Lagoa Santa. Os artefatos do sítio Lund foram analisados de acordo com métodos da tecnologia lítica, com coletas de atributos quantitativos e qualitativos de cada artefato. Foram executadas análises de tendências e testes de normalidade Shapiro-Wilk. Por fim, testes comparativos entre a indústria lítica do sítio Lund e do sítio arqueológico Lapa do Santo foram realizados, a fim de perceber o nível de similaridade entre as indústrias líticas de ambos os sítios e determinar se a associação cultural do sítio Lund à indústria lítica Lagoassantense era possível. Sob a ótica da teoria evolutiva, o trabalho conclui que diferentes ocupações ocorreram em Lagoa Santa: em um primeiro momento, um grupo Lagoassantense do Holoceno Tardio, com características tecnológicas diferentes à indústria lítica Lagoassantense do Holoceno Inicial, ocupou a região. Essas diferenças se deram pela operação de processos evolutivos-culturais ao longo do tempo, como mutação cultural ou variação guiada. Em um segundo momento, outro grupo cultural, com tecnologia ceramista, upou o sítio. O presente trabalho contribui para o entendimento sobre a evolução cultural Lagoassantense ao longo do Holoceno e sobre a ocupação de Lagoa Santa por outros grupos culturais no Holoceno Inicial.
The Indian sub-continent, midway between Africa and South-east Asia, offers great potential to contribute to the ongoing debates of hominin dispersals and techno-cultural transitions. The Malaprabha Valley sites, in south-western Peninsular India, provides a regional perspective on the transitional processes between Lower and Middle Palaeolithic. Three assemblages, from local Late Acheulean to Middle Palaeolithic were chosen as the key collections and then compared to two of their south-eastern counterparts. These assemblages, excavated or collected from surface, are housed in various museums in India, France and UK. The aim of this PhD was to trace the technological and typological changes of the Large cutting tools (LCTs: handaxes and cleavers) at the transition from Lower to Middle Palaeolithic. A second objective was to discern raw material and blank effects on the shape variabilities of the LCTs. Combining the classical techno-typological analysis and Geometric Morphometric approach (2D and 3D) allow us to get accurate, reversible holistic results. LCTs in Malaprabha Valley always include more handaxes than cleavers. They are constantly made from local quartzite on various types of blanks with gradual increasing use of the flakes. Their shape variability is mostly located on their periphery and is not influenced by the blank types. Whatever variability occurred it seemed to result from varying relative width and thickness. This study highlights that the technological and morphological traits of the LCTs reflect a regional continuity with gradual changes from the Lower to the Middle Palaeolithic, rather than an abrupt external introduction of new technical behaviors. Irrespective of the diverse blank types, the hominin tool makers in this part of Peninsular India were able to achieve similar tool forms, through adaptive shaping strategies, reflecting a mental template that continued through generations apart from the technical progress identifiable in other products.
In the 1980s, feminists drew attention to the fact that when researching elements of material culture, archaeologists worked with a paradigm in which the sources used to deduce their implicit notions of gender arrangements in the past were rarely made explicit. Based on a binary and oppositional epistemology (nature/culture, sex/gender, female/male), public roles and different activities performed by men and women from past populations are often inferred from modern Western narratives and values. This is the case of the man-the-hunter paradigm, where man is presented as the only person responsible for hunting, an activity that would be the engine of human evolution, relegating women to collecting activities. Although these paradigms based on a masculinist view have been criticized, their legacy remains in formulation of archaeological discourses. This research seeks, through a theoretical methodological discussion, to analyze the Brazilian archaeological literature on past hunter-gatherer peoples, calling into question the supposed neutrality of interpretive models that privilege the analysis of projectile points to reconstruct early settlement dynamics in the Brazilian territory. Based on feminist and decolonial theoretical perspectives, it is understood that part of these investigations, of an evolutionist-Darwinist nature and linked to hegemonic currents of knowledge production, reproduce dominant masculinist biases in their research. Other possible ways of formulating archaeological/scientific knowledge about the first peoples to occupy the Americas are also discussed from the perspective of traditional peoples and their relationship with plants. Finally, I hold that by incorporating counter-hegemonic practices, it is possible to build not only other archaeologies, but also other worlds.
Archeological artifacts that exhibit bilateral symmetry represent a large and important proportion of cultural heritage. Symmetry modeling provides a reliable approach of reconstructing the missing geometry by means of deforming the retained surface to the damaged area. However, it remains challenging to improve the quality of restoration when artifacts are heavily corroded and have irregular boundaries. This study presented a hybrid non-rigid deformation method to conserve and restore damaged artifacts. We also used geometric morphometrics (GM) and anthropometric measurements (AM) to capture the main features of the artifact. These methods have wider application to other forms of archeological and anthropological data.
En la decoración parietal de la Tumba Tebana 49, su propietario, Neferhotep, está representado junto con otros actores sociales desempeñando distintas actividades durante su vida terrena y en su proyección póstuma. Puede esperarse que algunas de estas expresiones visuales guarden altos grados de similitud con la realidad, mientras que otras se ajusten a una recreación de potenciales situaciones que ocurrirían a futuro, una vez que hubiese muerto. Al respecto, nos preguntamos si existe alguna clase de diferenciación en la forma de las representaciones que permita individualizar a las personas retratadas, o si sólo interesaba representar a aquellos grupos sociales que debían intervenir en los rituales de enterramiento. Persiguiendo este objetivo, nos proponemos evaluar la existencia de variaciones en la forma de los perfiles de las personas representadas, retomando algunos de los resultados alcanzados en trabajos precedentes. Dichos análisis, efectuados mediante las técnicas de morfometría geométrica, mostraron la existencia de diferencias dependientes del sexo como así también del estatus y/o rango social en los modos de representación de los perfiles de los personajes. Aquí nos interesa evaluar la interrelación de ambas variables y la importancia relativa del sexo (determinado mediante rasgos fisonómicos) en las variaciones morfológicas observadas en los retratos de hombres y mujeres.
En la decoración parietal de la Tumba Tebana 49, su propietario, Neferhotep, está
representado junto con otros actores sociales desempeñando distintas actividades
durante su vida terrena y en su proyección póstuma. Puede esperarse que algunas de estas expresiones visuales guarden altos grados de similitud con la realidad, mientras que otras se ajusten a una recreación de potenciales situaciones que ocurrirían a futuro, una vez que hubiese muerto. Al respecto, nos preguntamos si existe alguna clase de diferenciación en la forma de las representaciones que permita individualizar a las personas retratadas, o si sólo interesaba representar a aquellos grupos sociales que debían intervenir en los rituales
de enterramiento. Persiguiendo este objetivo, nos proponemos evaluar la existencia de
variaciones en la forma de los perfiles de las personas representadas, retomando algunos de
los resultados alcanzados en trabajos precedentes. Dichos análisis, efectuados mediante las técnicas de morfometría geométrica, mostraron la existencia de diferencias dependientes del sexo como así también del estatus y/o rango social en los modos de representación de los perfiles de los personajes. Aquí nos interesa evaluar la interrelación de ambas variables y la importancia relativa del sexo (determinado mediante rasgos fisonómicos) en las variaciones morfológicas observadas en los retratos de hombres y mujeres.
We present in this article the description of a bifacial point found in the municipality of Boa Ventura de São Roque, in the state of Paraná, southern Brazil. Given that it is a piece of exceptional size, made with a complex manufacturing technique, we made a metric description and analysis of the knapping technique of this artifact, in order to compare it with other similar artifacts found in Brazil.
RESUMEN En este trabajo nos proponemos evaluar la existencia de variaciones en el diseño de puntas de proyectil bifaciales pedunculadas entre la cuenca del río Santa Cruz y el estrecho de Magallanes. Con este objetivo se aplicaron análisis morfométricos, métricos y de microdesgaste en los pedúnculos de estos instrumentos. Los mismos señalaron, por un lado, la existencia de semejanzas en su forma y por el otro, variaciones métricas y en el microdesgaste entre los conjuntos procedentes del norte y el sur del río Santa Cruz. Se discute si las causas de estas variaciones pueden relacionarse con características ambientales-como la disponibilidad de recursos líticos, faunísticos y vegetales-o con la existencia de diferentes poblaciones humanas. PALABRAS CLAVES: Patagonia, puntas de proyectil bifaciales pedunculadas, análisis morfomé-tricos, análisis métricos, análisis de microdesgaste. ABSTRACT The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the existence of variations in the design of stemmed bi-facial projectile points recovered between the Santa Cruz basin and the Magellan Strait. Morphometric, metric and microwear analisys were applied on the stem of the proyectil points. While there are similar 1 CONICET – Universidad de Buenos Aries. Saavedra 15, 5to. piso,
As evidências arqueológicas encontradas ao longo do litoral brasileiro atestam que essa área era ocupada, desde, pelo menos, 8.000 anos AP, por grupos pescadores coletores que exploravam os ambientes aquáticos costeiros. Embora a comunidade científica acredite que os sambaquieiros fossem exímios navegadores, evidências a esse respeito ainda são raras. Neste artigo, a partir de uma abordagem focada na Arqueologia Marítima, são apresentados argumentos, hipóteses e evidências que discutem o entendimento de que, além de uma forte relação econômica e simbólica com os ambientes aquáticos, os povos dos sambaquis se apropriaram de ou desenvolveram técnicas de navegação e artefatos náuticos.
This chapter is concerned with war and technological change, concentrating on the aftermath of war, when the causes of technological innovation and its acceptance are less obvious. It proposes that the Salado polychrome was the result of intense female competition created by the influx of thousands of female war refugees and their children into central and southern Arizona and New Mexico. This chapter suggests that the Salado religion was not focused on elites but was instead “a poor woman's religion.” It shows that the Salado case reveals strong selective pressures which led to the formation and spread of a cultural adaptation over an expansive area while greatly limiting variation within the cultural trait.
This chapter addresses the evolutionary advantages of noninnovation. It suggests two evolutionary benefits to traditions and the metatraditions that promote them, one beginning much earlier in human existence than the other. It notes that metatraditions may contribute to the “descent” aspect of the Darwinian principle of descent with modification. This chapter shows that although the emphasis on cultural preservation may seem to be incongruous with much of the current thinking about innovation and cultural evolution, it actually is compatible (if not synonymous) with Darwin's original views on natural selection.
Conhecidas popularmente como “pontas de flecha”, as pontas de projétil associadas à Tradição Umbu no sul e sudeste brasileiros carecem de investigação acerca do modo como foram utilizadas. Há variações importantes de tamanho entre pontas de flecha e pontas de dardo, dadas as diferenças tecnológicas associadas aos meios de propulsão utilizados. Este trabalho visa explorar de maneira preliminar, através da técnica proposta por Shott (1997), a questão sobre o uso de dardos e flechas no sudeste e sul do Brasil durante a pré-história. Foram analisadas pontas de oito sítios do sul e sudeste do Brasil, datados desde o Pleistoceno tardio até o Holoceno final. Pelo menos um conjunto de pontas, datado do início do Holoceno, apresentou uma proporção relativamente alta de pontas classificadas com “flecha”, indicando a presença de pontas que potencialmente poderiam ser usadas nesse sistema.
Since the beginning of systematic archaeological studies in southern Patagonia (Argentina and Chile), projectile points have played an important role as cultural markers. A sequence of projectile point types was established according to their changes in size and shape. These stone tools, along with others cultural evidences, sensed to differentiate a series of "cultural periods," which were, for decades, the frame of reference to understand the cultural evolution in southernmost Patagonia. Although later researches have questioned several of these assumptions, the classical typology of projectile points continued in use until the present day. The goal of this work is to evaluate size and shape variation in two late Holocene projectile point types, known as Fell. Bird, or Magallanes IV and V points or Patagónicas and Ona points, respectively. These two types are compared using geometric morphometries and multivariate statistical analyses. The reliability in the discrimination between types is tested at the light of reduction. The analyses have shown a major incidence of reduction on shape rather than on size, and on blade rather than on stem. However, in average, types IV and V can be distinguished in terms of size, and stem shape despite reduction. Thus, even though successive cycles of use, damage and resharpening have a great influence over size and shape of projectile points, resharpening techniques are specific enough to maintain the differences of size and shape between types, a pattern that is probably related with functional requirements.
Computer simulations were used to investigate whether multivariate analysis of variance and multiple regression analyses based on partial-warp scores yielded the correct type I error levels. Several configurations of landmarks and models for the covariances among and within landmarks were studied. Good agreement was found for all models investigated.
The numerical abundance of artifacts in the archaeological record is in some ways analogous to the occurrence of individuals in many species populations. Methods devised by biometricians for the geometric description of organism form may be applied to artifacts, provided that coordinates of landmarks on individual specimens are available. We have conceptualized two- and three-dimensional geometric models of a bifacial tool, the handaxe, defined landmark locations and from them transformed traditional linear measures into geometric coordinates, illustrated individual variations in handaxe shape, and found statistically significant differences in mean shape between two stratigraphic units in an excavation in northern Israel. The concept of a geometric model for a handaxe may be easily applied to other types of artifacts for which geometric coordinates may be calculated and may prove a useful tool for the archaeologist who desires to illustrate and analyze artifact form.
The study of plant succession provides information on vegetation dynamics of a region and, therefore, improves our understanding of the natural trends of present ecosystems. With this objective, plant succession based on palynology of a sediment profile in a swamp forest was studied on the Lower Northeast Slope of Serra Geral, Rio Grande do Sul. Samples were treated with HCl, HF, KOH and acetolysis; slides were mounted in glycerol-jelly. For each sample a minimum of 500 grains of pollen + pteridophyte and bryophyte spores was counted and other palynomorphs were counted in parallel. Tilia and Tilia Graph software were used to construct percentage and concentration diagrams, with three 14C datings. The results show a local water reservoir in the beginning of the Holocene (± 9800 yrs. BP), creating a herbaceous plant marsh by hydrosere. The initial colonization of the marsh by trees occurred about 8800 yrs. BP, with tropical species from the Coastal Plain migrating in an east-west direction. Afterwards, there was a dry phase between 7000-5000 yrs. BP. The second appearance of regional tree species began at about 5000 yrs. BP, resulting in the present forest and in the west-east migration of tropical species from interior lowlands, like this one, to re-colonize the coast after the last marine regression.
Lagoa Santa, a karstic area in eastern Central Brazil, has been subject to research on human paleontology and archaeology for 175 years. Almost 300 Paleoindian human skeletons have been found since Danish naturalist Peter Lund's pioneering work. Even so, some critical issues such as
the role of rockshelters in settlement systems, and the possible paleoclimatic implications of the peopling of the region have yet to be addressed. We present some results obtained from recent excavations at four rockshelters and two open-air sites, new dates for human Paleoindian skeletons,
and a model to explain the cultural patterns observed so far. It is also argued that the Paleoindian subsistence system at Lagoa Santa was similar to other locations in South America: generalized small-game hunting complemented by fruits, seed, and root gathering.
The new morphometrics, or geometric morphometrics, is a rapidly evolving field. “Morphometrics” has been used to describe a number of fields that study measurements of organisms, and that is why the modifier “new” or “geometric” is necessary to set aside the special subject matter discussed here: the shape of biological organisms as it is studied using as data, point coordinates in two or three dimensions. This includes landmark and outline coordinates. Landmarks are specific points on an organism that correspond in a sensible way over the forms being studied, that is they are homologs; while outline points do not share this notion of homology. The data of morphometrics is now being extended to include tangent directions at coordinates as well (see Bookstein and Green, 1993; Little and Mardia, this volume). Shape is primarily concerned with properties of coordinates that are invariant to scale, location and orientation (see Appendix I, Glossary). The current status of morphometrics together with some future objectives are summarized in a review by Rohlf and Marcus (1993a).
O enfoque especial às pesquisas arqueológicas paleoindígenas, através do Programa Paleoindígena (PROPA), sob os auspícios da Smithsonian Institution (SI), iniciado em 1972, deve-se aos resultados preliminares obtidos em 1968, no oeste do Rio Grande do Sul (Miller 1969), quando do Programa Nacional de Pesquisas Arqueológicas (PRONAPA).
If archaeology is to succeed in explaining culture change, it must view the archaeological record from the perspective of cultural "descent with modification," in so doing returning to many of the issues addressed by the culture-history agenda rejected 30-40 years ago. This involves a consideration of the processes affecting cultural transmission. Many of these are strongly affected by the history of the biological populations in which cultural transmission occurs. It can be shown that prehistoric populations fluctuated much more than used to be thought and that these fluctuations can be hard to detect archaeologically. They can often be associated with cultural changes, and, in fact, the size of populations affects the nature of cultural processes in a variety of ways. These general points are illustrated with reference to a case study from the circum-Alpine Neolithic, where dendrochronology provides high-resolution dating. © 2000 by The Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research. All rights reserved.
In human teratology, the magnitude of exposures cannot be experimentally controlled. But when dose and response are both measured redundantly, a new statistical approach, Partial Least Squares, can powerfully summarize the data while avoiding familiar inferential pitfalls. Procedures of this class have been exploited in a study of the enduring effects of prenatal alcohol exposure upon neurobehavioral development of some 500 children born in 1975-1976. In the context of that study, this article reviews the new methodology under 4 headings: (a) descriptions of dose and outcome measures jointly by way of new composite scores and their saliences (cross-correlations), (b) covariate adjustments for these summaries and scores, (c) methods for inspecting the dose-response relationship between the composites and the original measures, and (d) methods for studying the emergence or amelioration of deficits across developmental age.
Standardized, quantified characterization of artifact shape is still problematic insofar as both intuitive shape typologies and multivariate analyses of shape attributes are limited to narrowly defined classes of artifacts exhibiting homologous morphological landmarks. The Fourier series in closed form is introduced as a mathematical description of irregular, two-dimensional shape, where the relative contributions of 20 standard components of shape, or "harmonics," are given in a series equation which can also regenerate the shape of the artifact as precisely as required. This method permits crossclass inspection of the variance of shapes of artifacts, and lends itself to classifications of shape or to intraclass analyses of variance. The level of descriptive precision may be set by the investigator in accordance with research interests. Applications of the method to archaeological samples, and different analyses of the data generated by the method, are discussed.
Morphometrics is the statistical study of biological shape and shape change. Its richest data are landmarks, points such as 'the bridge of the nose' that have biological names as well as geometric locations. This book is the first systematic survey of morphometric methods for landmark data. The methods presented here combine conventional multivariate statistical analysis with themes from plane and solid geometry and from biomathematics to support biological insights into the features of many different organs and organisms. This book will be of value to applied statisticians and geometers, as well as to all biological and biomedical researchers who need quantitative analyses of information from biomedical images.
Geometric Morphometrics for Biologists is an introductory textbook for a course on geometric morphometrics, written for graduate students and upper division undergraduates, covering both theory of shape analysis and methods of multivariate analysis. It is designed for students with minimal math background; taking them from the process of data collection through basic and more advanced statistical analyses. Many examples are given, beginning with simple although realistic case-studies, through examples of complex analyses requiring several different kinds of methods. The book also includes URLâs for free software and step-by-step instructions for using the software.
In order to understand the relationship between human occupation and paleoenvironmental scenario in Southern Brazil during Holocene, multidisciplinary studies were carried out in two archaeological sites located at Northeast of Rio Grande do Sul State: Sangao rockshelter (RS-S-327) and Garivaldino rockshelter (RS-TQ-58). Both sites have radiocarbon ages from 9400 to 3730 C-14 BP, revealing a continuous occupation of this area by hunter-gatherer populations related to Umbu Tradition. Palynological studies conducted in areas near the archaeological sites demonstrated an increase in humidity and in arboreal taxa starting at 5400 C-14 BP, providing evidence of a mosaic of grasslands and forests. These findings are corroborated by the analysis of small-sized mammals related to non-human predation associated to these archaeological sites, which present contemporary taxa typical of forests and open areas. They also demonstrated that environmental changes were slow and gradual during the Holocene. Although paleoenvironmental data suggest that the landscape of this region evolve gradually from mosaic of forest and open landscapes to diverse and densest forests, zooarchaeological analysis indicates a pattern of adaptive stability that persists throughout the Holocene, characterized by generalist strategies of subsistence focused mainly in forest resources. Therefore, the favorable weather conditions and the presence of forest environments restricted to river valleys and mountain slopes until Mid-Holocene, played a central role for the initial human settlement of this area, related mainly with riverine routes.
Traditional artifact typologies are typically poorly defined. While several attributes usually help define a “type,” shape is invariably the most important. Here I report on a study that uses landmark-based geometric morphometrics to better define three Paleoindian point types from Florida: Suwannees, Simpsons, and Transitional Side Notched. Bilaterally symmetric specimens were created from the original artifacts to capture the presumed ideational forms of the points. The shapes of the bases and the entire points were tested to determine whether the types could be discriminated, and if so which shape was best at discriminating the types. The results show that the base configurations were best at discriminating the groups in two different jackknife allocation tests. The entire point shape was less robust due to the variability in blade shape. The study demonstrates that the three point types can be rigorously defined in ways that are usable in daily archaeological practice, and that base shape, rather than the entire shape, is a better discriminator. Further, the study demonstrates the utility of using several freeware programs for processing and analyzing shape data.