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Monumentality in Western Amazonian formative societies: geometric ditched enclosures in the Brazilian state of Acre
Abstract and Figures
In Amazonia, monumentality has tradition-ally been considered characteristic of the late pre-colonial densely populated complex soci-eties. Recent archaeological fieldwork con-cerning the geometric earthworks in the Brazilian state of Acre has shown that the southwestern Amazonian interfluvial zone was a significant setting for long-term large land-scape modifications. We describe the geomet-ric ditched enclosure sites of Acre as early monumental public spaces reserved for cere-monial purposes, analogous to the central Andean ceremonial-civic centers of the Formative period. The geometric earthwork sites contain contiguous ditches and embank-ment structures of varying forms enclosing areas typically 3-10 hectares in size. Documented cultural features are sparse with-in the enclosed areas. Making use of satellite imagery, aerial photographs, and pedestrian surveys, 360 earthwork enclosures have been recorded in southwestern Amazonia. Our radiocarbon dates suggest that construction and use of geometric earthworks began at the latest around 1000 BC, and prevailed in the region until 1400 AD. The relatively small num-ber of ceramics recovered from the geometric ditched enclosure sites appear to be local sub-styles of the same tradition, sharing certain attributes with contemporary ceramic tradi-tions of the upper Amazonian region. This, and consistency in ceremonial earthwork architec-ture, indicate close cultural interaction between communities that built and used the earthwork sites, and imply probable relation-ships also with the central Andean area.
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... At MC87, five calibrated dates obtained from the pits RH2 (30)(31)(32)(33)(34)(35), C4 (5-10, 10-15) and C5 (10)(11)(12)(13)(14)(15)(35)(36)(37)(38)(39)(40) were spread over a period ranging from 662 to 945 CE. Four dates, obtained from the pits RH1 (0-5, 10-15) and C2 (15- (15)(16)(17)(18)(19)(20)(20)(21)(22)(23)(24)(25) and C17 (10-15) spanned over a period from 430 CE to 976 CE, while dates obtained from C13 (10)(11)(12)(13)(14)(15)(15)(16)(17)(18)(19)(20) and C15 (5-10) spanned over a period from 1296 to 1446 CE At GALB, radiocarbon dating revealed a more complex chronology. One ancient date calibrated at 7739-7588 BCE was obtained from C7 (40)(41)(42)(43)(44)(45). ...
... At MC87, five calibrated dates obtained from the pits RH2 (30)(31)(32)(33)(34)(35), C4 (5-10, 10-15) and C5 (10)(11)(12)(13)(14)(15)(35)(36)(37)(38)(39)(40) were spread over a period ranging from 662 to 945 CE. Four dates, obtained from the pits RH1 (0-5, 10-15) and C2 (15- (15)(16)(17)(18)(19)(20)(20)(21)(22)(23)(24)(25) and C17 (10-15) spanned over a period from 430 CE to 976 CE, while dates obtained from C13 (10)(11)(12)(13)(14)(15)(15)(16)(17)(18)(19)(20) and C15 (5-10) spanned over a period from 1296 to 1446 CE At GALB, radiocarbon dating revealed a more complex chronology. One ancient date calibrated at 7739-7588 BCE was obtained from C7 (40)(41)(42)(43)(44)(45). ...
... One ancient date calibrated at 7739-7588 BCE was obtained from C7 (40)(41)(42)(43)(44)(45). Two other contemporary ancient dates, ranging from 2894 to 2585 BCE, were obtained from RH4 (15)(16)(17)(18)(19)(20) and C11 (20)(21)(22)(23)(24)(25). The seven other dates were post-600 CE. ...
In the past two decades, repeated discoveries of numerous geometric earthworks in interfluvial regions of Amazonia have shed new light onto the territorial extent and the long-term impact of pre-Columbian populations on contemporary landscapes. In particular, the recent development of LiDAR imagery has accelerated the discovery of earthworks in densely forested hinterlands throughout the Amazon basin and the Guiana Shield. This study aimed to evaluate the extent and landscape-scale spatial variations of pre-Columbian disturbances at three ring ditch sites in the French Guiana hinterland. We carried out extensive soil surveys along approximately 1 km-long transects spanning from ring ditches through the surrounding landscapes, and drawn upon multiple indicators, including archaeological artifacts, macro- and micro-charcoals, soil colorimetry, and physicochemical properties to retrace the pre-Columbian history of these sites in terms of occupation periods, anthropogenic soil alteration, and ancient land use. Our results revealed a perennial occupation of these sites over long periods ranging from the 5th and 15th centuries CE, with local enrichments in chemical indicators (Corg, N, Mg, K, Ca) both within the enclosures of ring ditches and in the surrounding landscapes. Physicochemical properties variations were accompanied by variations in soil colorimetry, with darker soils within the enclosure of ring ditches in terra-firme areas. Interestingly however, soil properties did not meet all the characteristics of the so-called Amazonian Dark Earths, thus advocating a paradigm shift towards a better integration of Amazonian Brown Earths into the definition of anthropogenic soils in Amazonia. Soil disturbances were also associated to local enrichments in macro- and micro-charcoals that support in situ fire management that could be attributed to forest clearance and/or slash-and-burn cultivation. Taken together, our results support the idea that pre-Columbian societies made extensive use of their landscapes in the interfluvial regions of the French Guiana hinterlands.
... Literature commonly emphasizes the geometric shapes of earthworks in the southwestern Brazilian Amazon (Pärssinen et al. 2009;Saunaluoma and Schaan 2012;Carson et al. 2014). This generalization has certain basis, given the demonstrated familiarity with basic geometric concepts among presentday isolated indigenous peoples of the Amazon (Dehaene et al. 2006). ...
... Although Amazonian dark earth (McMichael et al. 2014;Kern et al. 2017) is not present in this area, there are reports of brown earth containing ash and charcoal fragments (Montoya et al. 2020;. Such studies suggest a dispersed population surrounding ceremonial sites (Ranzi and Pärssinen 2021;Saunaluoma and Schaan 2012;Virtanen and Saunaluoma 2017). The landscape presumably contained cultural forests enriched with useful plants and occasional clearings with semidomesticated species (Saunaluoma 2012;McMichael et al. 2014;Watling et al. 2015;Pärssinen et al. 2021). ...
Geometric earthworks are evidence of ancient human activity in western Brazilian Amazonia. We used a review of existing and new data to map earthworks across 27,569 km² of deforested areas in southwestern Amazonia using satellite imagery. We developed a conceptual basis for the classification of earthworks based on their structural characteristics using fuzzy sets. We recorded 1,279 structures with a distinctive core density zone. Most of the structures displayed geometric shapes, but they varied in construction accuracy. Geoglyphs accounted for 80% of all objects, with geographically variable shapes and enclosure areas. Other earthwork types included associated embankments, solitary embankments and mound sites. The abundance of earthworks provided evidence of strong pre-European human influence on the study area. A 10-km buffer around each earthwork included 75% of recent deforestation areas and 25.7% of standing forest, suggesting a significant potential for the presence of further earthworks in this ancient anthropogenic landscape and its possible far-reaching ecological legacy. The available radiocarbon data confirm a long-term anthropogenic impact in the study area, with ceremonial geoglyphs indicating activities over a thousand years old and other structures revealing more recent cultural transformations.
KEYWORDS:
Acre; anthropogenic landscape; archaeology; geoglyph; mound village; radiocarbon dating
... Fritz 30 describes a ritual that the Indians did when playing a flute, and when he asked what it was, he was told who called the "Guaricana" that way, which according to them was the devil, who since the time of their ancestors, visibly came and helped them in their villages, and they always made him a house apart from the village, inside the forest, and there they took him drink and the sick that they might be healed. This example illustrates one of the possible ways of using geometric earth structures found in Acre, given that Saunaluoma and Schaan 31 suggest a ceremonial character for such structures. ...
... 7,19,20 There are several examples in the archaeological literature of the Amazon that we could list: the formation of Terra Preta Arqueológica (TPA), an indication of a sedentary lifestyle and an increase in population density; 51 the large circular villages and the construction of defensive ditches and roads in the Upper Xingu; 14,16 artificial mounds or mounds on Marajó Island; roads, canals and raised fields for planting in Llanos de Mojos; 9,4 elevated paths in the Venezuelan Llanos 11 and monumental centers of geometric shapes with roads and paths in the Western Amazon. 31 All these examples suggest a social organization with a high degree of mobilization and organization of labor, and a policy to carry out such enterprises of artificialization of the natural environment. ...
This article prioritized studying the roads and paths that are interconnected to geoglyph-type sites in the Western Brazilian Amazon, not only because of their originality, but also to understand some issues that permeate the universe of geoglyphs, such as how was gave the spatial distribution of these roads in the region, what meaning they had within the sociocultural context of that society. For a more detailed analysis, the Tequinho site was used as the main object of the research, its characteristics and location being what most contributed to its choice, given that it is in the center of the region where the geoglyphs occur, and several roads and paths are linked to the site, and are noticeable in the landscape. The Tequinho site is understood as a public center for cultural and religious events, and its roads and paths are seen as central props in ritualistic ceremonies, as well as markers and boundaries in the landscape. This article also addresses the importance of the Iquiri River, which works, was part of the context of a land-fluvial network in the region of geoglyphs, in the east of the State of Acre, Brazil. During this work, ethno-historical sources were used as a theoretical framework, as well as the perspective of landscape archeology.
... Beyond the Llanos de Mojos, it is worth noting the early dates associated with phenomena such as anthropogenic dark earths and ceremonial monumental architecture (Geoglyphs) (Saunaluoma and Schaan 2012). To conclude, we suggest that the striking archaeological diversity and early chronology observed in southwestern Amazon reinforce the role of this region as a mosaic zone whence domesticated plants and other cultural developments expanded to other parts of the South American lowlands. ...
The Amazon basin is home to an estimated 350 Indigenous languages, divided over more than twenty language families of radically different sizes, geographical extents, and time depths, plus an unusually large number of isolates. Given this rich panorama of linguistic diversity, this chapter focuses on four different socio-historical environments, which together span most of Amazonia and are representative of the intricate history of the area. The chapter first zooms in on the Tupian and Arawakan expansions, which are often contrasted: the former generally being characterized as a demic expansion, the latter as an example of predominantly cultural diffusion. In addition, two genealogical diversity hotspots at the fringes of Amazonia are highlighted, one in the northwest Amazon, the other in northeast Bolivia in the southwest Amazon, both of which are claimed to be regions of intense historical contact and genetic admixture between groups, though probably based on partly different socio-historical dynamics.
Recently, Roberts et al. (2023) defined three socioeconomic thresholds thought to have laid the foundations for the Anthropocene: the first, between 4000 and 1000 BCE, related to the beginnings of agriculture; the second, between 0 and 1500 CE, related to urbanism and the demographic consolidation of human populations; and the third, between 1500 and the present CE, associated with the advance of colonialism and capitalism. In this article, we discuss the results of paleoecological studies carried out in four Amazonian regions known to have high concentrations of archaeological sites (the geoglyphs of Acre, the raised fields of French Guiana, the dark earths of the lower Tapajós region, and the zanja sites of Iténez, Bolivia), and evaluate what they tell us about the nature of the Amazonian Anthropocene. We conclude that the largest and most destructive anthropogenic impacts occurred during the colonial period, especially in the last 50 years, associated with the arrival of capitalist economies. In contrast, Indigenous management practices, which begin to be visible from ca. 2500 BCE, and become highly transformative from ca. 0 CE, managed to maintain vital ecosystem services and increase the agrobiodiversity of the rainforest, building upon - rather than destroying - their relationships with other living beings.
RESUMO Recentemente, Roberts et al. (2023) definiram três thresholds socioeconômicos que teriam sido a base do Antropoceno no mundo: o primeiro, entre 4.000 e 1.000 AEC, relacionado ao início da agricultura; o segundo, entre 0 e 1.500 EC, relacionado ao urbanismo e à consolidação demográfica das populações humanas; e o terceiro, entre 1.500 EC e o presente, associado ao avanço do colonialismo e do capitalismo. Neste artigo, discutimos os resultados de estudos paleoecológicos realizados em quatro regiões da Amazônia conhecidas por apresentarem altas concentrações de sítios arqueológicos (os geoglifos do Acre, os campos elevados da Guiana Francesa, as terras pretas do Baixo Tapajós, e os sítios de zanja em Iténez, Bolívia), e avaliamos o que eles nos dizem sobre a natureza desses thresholds e como eles podem nos informar sobre o Antropoceno amazônico. Concluímos que os maiores e mais destrutivos impactos antropogênicos têm acontecido no período colonial, especialmente nos últimos 50 anos, associados à incursão de economias capitalistas nestes locais. Em contraponto, as práticas de manejo indígenas, que começam a ser visíveis a partir de cerca de 2.500 AEC, e se tornam altamente transformativas a partir de cerca de 0 EC, conseguiram manter serviços ecossistêmicos vitais e aumentar a agrobiodiversidade da sua vegetação, construindo - ao invés de destruindo - relações com os outros seres vivos.
Societal Impact Statement
Global climate models that incorporate carbon sources and sinks usually consider that forest uptake of carbon is in a state of equilibrium. Both historical and paleoecological records suggest that this is commonly not the case for Amazonia. Here, the impacts of colonial practices on Amazonian Indigenous peoples and forests are reviewed. Human activities affect forests' successional stages, trajectories, and species composition. By increasing the spatial coverage of paleoecological records that focus on pre‐ and post‐Columbian periods, the long‐term interactions between humans and Amazonian forests and their role in affecting Earth's climate may be better understood.
Summary
Legacy effects left by the activities of Indigenous people in Amazonia are well known. Although severe, widespread, and recently occurring, the impacts left post‐1492 CE have been less investigated. We review the impact of colonial practices on Indigenous peoples and Amazonian forests. We suggest that forests comprise the sum of their past events, in a mosaic of different cumulative successional trajectories depending on the type, frequency, intensity, and timing of human influence. In regions with a history of minimal human influence, old‐growth species sensitive to fire would be the dominant landscape. In regions with high pre‐Columbian and low colonial influence, old‐growth forests carrying pre‐Columbian ecological legacies would be prevalent. Regions occupied by Indigenous groups post‐1492 CE would also carry similar ecological legacies. In regions influenced by the Jesuits, mid‐successional forests are expected to be enriched with cacao trees. In regions of latex extraction during the rubber boom, mid‐growth forests would present high abundances of early and mid‐successional species and depletion of some species. In deforested areas, we expect early successional forests with influence of exotic useful species. This patchwork of history probably plays a large role in shaping today's forests, and the biodiversity and carbon dynamics documented within them. Paleoecological work focusing on the last millennium, although scarce, has the potential to detect these mosaics of past human influence, and they should be considered when estimating forest ages and successional stages across the basin.
In the past two decades, repeated discoveries of numerous geometric earthworks in interfluvial regions of Amazonia have shed new light onto the territorial extent and the long-term impact of pre-Columbian populations on contemporary landscapes. In particular, the recent development of LiDAR imagery has accelerated the discovery of earthworks in densely forested hinterlands throughout the Amazon basin and the Guiana Shield.
This study aimed to evaluate the extent and landscape-scale spatial variations of pre-Columbian disturbances at three ring ditch sites in the French Guiana hinterland. We carried out extensive soil surveys along approximately 1 km-long transects spanning from ring ditches through the surrounding landscapes, and drawn upon multiple indicators, including archaeological artifacts, macro- and micro-charcoals, soil colorimetry, and physicochemical properties to retrace the pre-Columbian history of these sites in terms of occupation periods, anthropogenic soil alteration, and ancient land use.
Our results revealed a perennial occupation of these sites over long periods ranging from the 5th and 15th centuries CE, with local enrichments in chemical indicators (Corg, N, Mg, K, Ca) both within the enclosures of ring ditches and in the surrounding landscapes. Physicochemical properties variations were accompanied by variations in soil colorimetry, with darker soils within the enclosure of ring ditches in terra-firme areas. Interestingly however, soil properties did not meet all the characteristics of the so-called Amazonian Dark Earths, thus advocating a paradigm shift towards a better integration of Amazonian Brown Earths into the definition of anthropogenic soils in Amazonia. Soil disturbances were also associated to local enrichments in macro- and micro-charcoals that support in situ fire management that could be attributed to forest clearance and/or slash-and-burn cultivation.
Taken together, our results support the idea that pre-Columbian societies made extensive use of their landscapes in the interfluvial regions of the French Guiana hinterlands.
This book is the first modern survey of the economic and social history of Brazil from early man to today. Drawing from a wide range of qualitative and quantitative data, it provides a comprehensive overview of the major developments that defined the evolution of Brazil. Beginning with the original human settlements in pre-Colombian society, it moves on to discuss the Portuguese Empire and colonization, specifically the importance of slave labor, sugar, coffee, and gold in shaping Brazil's economic and societal development. Finally, it analyzes the revolutionary changes that have occurred in the past half century, transforming Brazil from a primarily rural and illiterate society to an overwhelmingly urban, literate, and industrial one. Sweeping and influential, Herbert S. Klein and Francisco Vidal Luna's synthesis is the first of its kind on Brazil.
Esta pesquisa expõe contraposições teóricas e empíricas aos clássicos modelos de ocupação da Amazônia. Através de uma fusão entre base empírica e o corpus de conhecimento atualmente disponível, propõe uma história de ocupação da Amazônia central agenciada por grupos culturais integrados através de um complexo sistema sócio-político, que extrapolou fronteiras étnicas, lingüísticas e ambientais. Este sistema estaria materializado na tradição Borda
Incisa e teria se desenrolado ao longo de muitos séculos, com início em torno do anno domini e se estendendo até os séculos XI e XII d.C. A esta intrincada rede macro-regional, que aqui denomino Esfera de Interações, estão ligados elementos como a padronização de um sistema de comunicação, expresso através da cultura material e das formas de usar e organizar o espaço. A cronologia apresentada neste doutoramento também oferece parâmetros para uma reavaliação do uso de conceitos arqueológicos tradicionais, como as fases e tradições. Logra-se maior flexibilização de tais categorias, uma vez que a fluidez de limites é inerente aos conjuntos artefatuais estudados. Na área de confluência dos rios Negro e Solimões, esta história é contada através do entendimento das relações entre as fases Açutuba, Manacapuru e Paredão.
Esse artigo dedica-se a examinar com detalhes a arquitetura monumental dos geoglifos, gigantescos espaços de sociabilidade que demarcavam lugares e disciplinavam deslocamentos na Amazônia Ocidental pré-colombiana. Esses lugares são examinados sob a perspectiva da ecologia histórica, a partir da qual se entende os fenômenos produzidos pela relação dialética entre sociedades humanas e meio ambiente e que resultam na formação das paisagens como palimpsesto de eventos através de uma linha temporal. São examinados os possíveis usos e signifcados desses sítios, e a importância da arqueologia e geografa histórica para o entendimento da atual confguração paisagística da região. Além disso, esse estudo contribui para a compreensão das transformações socioculturais por que passaram as sociedades amazônicas sub-andinas durante os dois últimos milênios que antecederam a conquista européia.
Interpretations of the Amazonia prehistory have changed significantly in the last few decades, as the complexity and diversity of the Amazonian cultures are beginning to be documented and understood. Earthworking, a long-term conscious anthropogenic landscape alteration, was a widespread phenomenon throughout the South American tropical lowlands. A variety of earthworks has been documented in the Southwest Amazon, including ditches and embankments of different shapes and sizes, roads, extensive raised fields, canals, causeways, and artificial wetlands linked to adjacent mounds and forest island settlement sites. A field survey and test excavations were undertaken in the region of Riberalta, in the Bolivian Amazon. The purpose of these investigations was to study the distribution and characteristics of the pre-Columbian occupation in the region. We found different types of sites, some without visible earthworks, indicating fairly dense occupation on river bluffs and terra firme, but lacking long permanence in the same location. The earthwork tradition prevailed in the Riberalta region from at least 100 B.C. until the period of European contact. The function of the less-complex earthworks may have been to enclose the occupation areas, and in some cases, to serve as canals. Compared to the variable layout of the sites, the ceramic assemblages of the region are relatively homogeneous. A central objective for future research will be to determine if the earthwork sites correlate with a single or multiple cultural traditions.Key-words: Southwest Amazonian archaeology, earthworks, ceramic traditions.
In 1884 a community of Brazilians was "discovered" by the Western world. The Ecology of Power examines these indigenous people from the Upper Xingu region, a group who even today are one of the strongest examples of long-term cultural continuity. Drawing upon written and oral history, ethnography, and archaeology, Heckenberger addresses the difficult issues facing anthropologists today as they "uncover" the muted voices of indigenous peoples and provides a fascinating portrait of a unique community of people who have in a way become living cultural artifacts. © 2005 by Taylor & Francis Group, a Division of T & F Informa. All rights reserved.
How do landscapes-defined in the broadest sense to incorporate the physical contours of the built environment, the aesthetics of form, and the imaginative reflections of spatial representations-contribute to the making of politics? Shifting through the archaeological, epigraphic, and artistic remains of early complex societies, this provocative and far-reaching book is the first systematic attempt to explain the links between spatial organization and politics from an anthropological point of view. The Classic-period Maya, the kingdom of Urartu, and the cities of early southern Mesopotamia provide the focal points for this multidimensional account of human polities. Are the cities and villages in which we live and work, the lands that are woven into our senses of cultural and personal identity, and the national territories we occupy merely stages on which historical processes and political rituals are enacted? Or do the forms of buildings and streets, the evocative sensibilities of architecture and vista, the aesthetics of place conjured in art and media constitute political landscapes-broad sets of spatial practices critical to the formation, operation, and overthrow of polities, regimes, and institutions? Smith brings together contemporary theoretical developments from geography and social theory with anthropological perspectives and archaeological data to pursue these questions.