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Copyright of Virtual Archaeology Review is the property of Virtual Archaeology Review and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

In this paper we review the growing evidence of anthropogenic landscapespresent in the semi-deciduous neotropical forest biomes of eastern NW Argentina,which have remained relatively neglected in favour of arid to semi-arid western Andean regions. The evidence gathered in de El Alto-Ancasti provides animportant case study where multidisciplinary methodologies have beenapplied to sites that document the emergence and variability in food productionstrategies across the eastern Andean forests and grasslands of NWArgentina. We discuss evidence offarming structures from archaeological surveys, plant management from phy-tolith analysis, and the tempo and nature of settlement from archaeological excavations undertaken at a variety of sites in the El Alto Ancasti mountainrange. We suggest that the communities that inhabited this region during thefirst millennium AD (ca. 1500–1000 BP) established a strategy of 'overlappingpatchworks' of food production that were able to contend with considerableseasonal variability. We argue that, through the use of cross-channelling, low river areas, erosion control techniques and the establishment of mesothermal crops,including maize, legumes, and tubers, throughout the region, these societies adopted flexible strategies to adapt to life in a region prone to climatic change [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Revista del Museo de Antropología is the property of Museo de Antropologia - IDACOR and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This paper presents the first experimental archaeological study to formally compare the physical characteristics of tattoos made on human skin using multiple pre-modern tools and tattooing techniques. Our project used eight tools fashioned from animal bone, obsidian, copper, and boar tusk, along with a modern steel needle, to create tattoos on the leg of co-author Danny Riday. Those tattoos were created through four different traditional, pre-electric techniques consisting of hand poking, hand tapping, incision, and subdermal tattooing. We then documented the tattoos over a six-month period to compare the results. This process revealed clear physical differences between tattoos created using different tools and methods. The resulting data is then used to assess preserved tattoos from archaeological sites in the Andes and Greenland in order to test assumptions about how those marks were created. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Los Viscos, a multicomponent rockshelter in the high-altitude valley of El Bolsón, South-Central Andes, was occupied intermittently over the last 1200 years. One brief occupation dates to the early Hispanic-Indigenous contact period (ca. 1450–1630 cal CE), when European fauna were present but Hispanic political control was unestablished. Zooarchaeological analyses from this occupation are presented (NSP = 233; NISP = 83). Camelids were primarily exploited for meat and few other taxa were consumed, implying continuity with previous late pre-Hispanic occupations. Discontinuities include an apparent lack of camelid secondary product and dried meat exploitation. This is one of few studies documenting early Indigenous-European interactions in the area. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Lambayeque Valley on the north coast of Peru offers a cautionary case study on the relation between climatic and cultural change. Three archaeological site complexes dating from late in the first millennium AD to the middle of the second millennium AD rose and were abandoned in sequence. Each abandonment was associated with a conflagration on the main pyramidal mound(s). In this region, El Niño is the most significant climatic disruption now and for millennia past. By tracking proxy records for El Niño intensity, we found that only the first episode of abandonment and burning was associated with a strong peak in El Niño intensity, while the final episode was the outcome of the Spanish Conquest of the Andes, a distinctly non-climatic driver. These records suggest that equifinality is operative and urge caution in over-interpreting climate as culture-changing catastrophe. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

PHOTO (COLOR): Machu Picchu was built by the Incas, one of several cultures that settled in the Central Andes over thousands of years. In the large cities of both the Inca and the Tiwanaku, the DNA in the new study indicated that people from many different places lived side by side. [Extracted from the article]