Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-mlc7c Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-10T20:10:04.332Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Late Quaternary of the Western Amazon: climate, vegetation and humans

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2015

J. Stephen Athens  and
Jerome V. Ward
J. Stephen Athens
Affiliation:
International Archaeological Research Institute, Inc., 2081 Young Street, Honolulu HI 96826-2231, USA
Jerome V. Ward
Affiliation:
Pacific Palynology, PO Box 2592, Auburn AL 36831-2592, USA, iarii@aloha.net
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The Amazon rain-forest we know today is quite a recent phenomenon. New research on climate and vegetation changes from a series of cores in Ecuador provide a chronology for early agriculture and forest clearance from early Holocene times.

Keywords

Amazonclimate changeclearancecoresvegetationEcuadoragriculture
Type
Papers
Information
Antiquity , Volume 73 , Issue 280 , June 1999 , pp. 287 - 302
Copyright
Copyright © Antiquity Publications Ltd. 1999

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Absy, M.L. 1979. A palynological study of Holocene sediments in the Amazon basin. Unpublished Ph.D thesis, University of Amsterdam.Google Scholar
Absy, M.L. 1985. Palynology of Amazonia: the history of the forests as revealed by the palynological record, in Prance, G.T. & Lovejoy, T.E. (ed.), Amazonia: key environments: 72–82. New York (NY): Pergamon Press.Google Scholar
Absy, M. L., Cleef, A., Fournier, M. Martin, L. Servant, M. Sifeddine, A. Ferreira Da Silva, M. Soubies, F. Suguio, K. Turcq, B. & Van Der Hammen, T.. 1991. Mise en évidence de quatre phases d’ouverture de la forêt dense dans le sud-est de l’Amazonie au cours des 60,000 dernières années, Comptes Rendus de l’Académie des Sciences Paris (série II) 312: 673–8.Google Scholar
Athens, J.S. 1997. Paleoambiente del oriente Ecuatoriano: resultados preliminares de columnas de sedimentos procedentes de humedales, Fronteras de Investigación 1(1): 15–32. (Quito.)Google Scholar
Athens, J.S., Ward, J.V. & Murakami, G.M.. 1996. Development of an agroforest on a Micronesian high island: prehistoric Kosraean agriculture, Antiquity 70: 834–46.Google Scholar
Bakker, J.G.M. 1990. Tectonic and climatic controls on Late Quaternary sedimentary processes in a neotectonic intramontane basin (the Pitalito Basin, South Colombia), The Quaternary of Colombia 16.Google Scholar
Balée, W. 1989. The culture of Amazonian forests, Advances in Economic Botany 7: 1–21.Google Scholar
Bailey, R.C., Head, G., Jenike, M. Owen, B. Rechtman, R. & Zechenter, E.. 1989. Hunting and gathering in the tropical rain-forest: is it possible? American Anthropologist 91: 59–82.Google Scholar
Bailey, R.C., Jenike, M. & Rechtman, R.. 1991. Reply to Colinvaux & Bush, American Anthropologist 93: 160–62.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Behling, H. 1996. First report on new evidence for the occurrence of Podocarpus and possible human presence at the mouth of the Amazon during the Late-glacial, Vegetation History and Archaeobotany 5: 241–6.Google Scholar
Binford, M.W., Brenner, M., Whitmore, T.J. Higuera-Gundy, A. Deevey, E.S. & Leyden, B.. 1987. Ecosystems, paleoecology and human disturbance in subtropical and tropical America, Quaternary Science Reviews 6: 115–28.Google Scholar
Bradbury, J.P., Leyden, B., Salgado-Labouriau, M. Lewis, W.M. Jr, Schubert, C. Binford, M.W. Frey, D.G. Whitehead, D.R. & Weibezahn, F.H.. 1981. Late Quaternary environmental history of Lake Valencia, Venezuela, Science 214: 1299–1305.Google Scholar
Bray, W., Herrera, L., Cardale, M. Schrimpff Botero, P. & Monsalve, J.G.. 1987. The ancient agricultural landscape of Calima, Colombia, in Denevan, W.M. Mathewson, K. & Knapp, G. (ed.), Pre-Hispanic agricultural fields in the Andean region: 443–81. (Proceedings of the 45th International Congress of Americanists, Bogotá, Colombia, 1985.) Oxford: British Archaeological Reports. International series S359(1).Google Scholar
Broennimann, P. 1981. Auca on the Cononaco: Indians of the Ecuadorian rain-forest. Boston (MA): Birkhauser Publishers.Google Scholar
Burney, D.A., Burney, L.P. & Macphee, R.D.E.. 1994. Holocene charcoal stratigraphy from Laguna Tortuguero, Puerto Rico, and the timing of human arrival on the island, Journal of Archaeological Science 21: 273–81.Google Scholar
Bush, M.B. & Colinvaux, P.A.. 1988. A 7000-year pollen record from the Amazon lowlands, Ecuador, Vegetatio 76:141–54.Google Scholar
Bush, M.B., Colinvaux, P.A., Wiemann, M.C. Piperno, D.R. & Liu, K.-B.. 1990. Late Pleistocene temperature depression and vegetation change in Ecuadorian Amazonia, Quaternary Research 34: 330–45.Google Scholar
Bush, M.B., Piperno, D.R. & Colinvaux, P.A.. 1989. A 6000 year history of Amazonian maize cultivation, Nature 340: 303–5.Google Scholar
Carneiro, R.L. 1995. The history of ecological interpretations of Amazonia: does Roosevelt have it right?, in Sponsel, (ed.): 45–70.Google Scholar
Cavelier, I., Rodriguez, C., Herrera, L.F. Morcóte, G. & Mora, S.. 1995. No solo de caza vive el hombre: ocupación del bosque Amazónico, holoceno temprano, in Cavelier, I. & Mora, S. (ed.), Ambito y ocupaciones tempranas de la América tropical: 27–44. Santa Fé de Bogotá, Colombia: Instituto Colombiano de Antropología, Fundación Erigaie.Google Scholar
Clapperton, C.M. 1987. Glacial geomorphology, Quaternary glacial sequence and palaeoclimatic inferences in the Ecuadorian Andes, in Gardiner, V. (ed.), International geomorphology 1986, Part II: 843–70. London: John Wiley & Sons.Google Scholar
Clapperton, C.M. 1993. Nature of environmental changes in South America at the last glacial maximum, Palaeogeography Palaeo-climatology Palaeoecology 101: 189–208.Google Scholar
Clark, J.S. 1988a. Particle motion and the theory of charcoal analysis: source area, transport, deposition, and sampling, Quaternary Research 30: 67–80.Google Scholar
Clark, J.S. 1988b. Stratigraphic charcoal analysis on pétrographic thin sections: application to fire history in northwestern Minnesota, Quaternary Research 30: 81–91.Google Scholar
Colinvaux, P.A. 1989. The past and future Amazon, Scientific American 260: 102–8.Google Scholar
Colinvaux, P.A. & Bush, M.B.. 1991. The rain-forest ecosystem as a resource for hunting and gathering, American Anthropologist 93: 153–60.Google Scholar
Colinvaux, P.A., Bush, M.B., Steinitz-Kannan, M., & Miller, C.M.. 1997. Glacial and postglacial pollen records from the Ecuadorian Andes and Amazon, Quaternary Research 48: 69–78.Google Scholar
Colinvaux, P.A., De Oliveira, P.E. Moreno, J.E. Miller, M.C. & Bush, M.B.. 1996a. A long pollen record from lowland Amazonia: forest and cooling in glacial times, Science 274: 85–8.Google Scholar
Colinvaux, P.A., Frost, M., Frost, I. Liu, K.-B., & Steinitz-Kannan, M.. 1988. Three pollen diagrams of forest disturbance in the western Amazon basin, Review of Palaeobotany and Palynology 55: 73–81.Google Scholar
Colinvaux, P.A., Liu, K.-B. De Oliveira, P. Bush, M.B. Miller, M.C. & Steinitz-Kannan, M.. 1996b. Temperature depression in the lowland tropics in glacial times, Climatic Change 32: 19–33.Google Scholar
Dawson, A.G. 1992. Ice age earth: Late Quaternary geology and climate. New York (NY): Routledge.Google Scholar
Denevan, W.M. 1992. The pristine myth: the landscape of the Americas in 1492, Annals of the Association of American Geographers 82: 369–85.Google Scholar
Emiliani, C. 1992. Pleistocene paleotemperatures (letter), Science 257: 1462.Google Scholar
Emiliani, C. 1995. Tropical paleotemperatures (letter), Science 268:1264.Google Scholar
Flenley, J.R. 1979. A geological history of tropical rainforest. London: Butterworth.Google Scholar
Gnecco, C. & Mora, S.. 1997. Late Pleistocene/early Holocene tropical forest occupations at San Isidro and Peña Roja, Colombia, Antiquity 71: 683–90.Google Scholar
Grubb, P.J., Lloyd, J.R., Pennington, T.D. & Whitmore, T.C.. 1963. A comparison of montane and lowland rain-forest in Ecuador, Journal of Ecology 53(3): 567–601.Google Scholar
Guilderson, T.P., Fairbanks, R.G. & Rubenston, J.L.. 1994. Tropical temperature variations since 20,000 years ago: modulating interhemispheric climate change, Science 263: 663–5.Google Scholar
Haberle, S. 1994. Anthropogenic indicators in pollen diagrams: problems and prospects for Late Quaternary palynology in New Guinea, in Hather, J.G. (ed.), Tropical archaeobotany: Applications and new developments: 172–201. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Hall, M.L. & Mothes, P.A.. 1994. Tefroestratigrafia Holocénica de los volcanes principales del valle interandino, Ecuador, in Marocco, R. (coordinator), El contexto Geológico del Espacio Físico Ecuatoriano: Neotectónica, Geodinámica, Volcanismo, Cuencas Sedimentarias, Riesgo Seísmico: 47–67. Quito: Corporación Editora Nacional. Estudios de Geografía 6.Google Scholar
Johnsen, S.J., Clausen, H.B., Dansgaard, W. Fuhrer, K. Gundestrup, N. Hammer, C.U. Iversen, P. Jouzel, J. Stauffer, B., & Steffensen, J.P.. 1992. Irregular glacial interstadials recorded in a new Greenland ice core, Nature 359: 311–13.Google Scholar
Kaplan, J.E., Larrick, J.W. & Yost, J.A.. 1984. Workup on the Waorani, Natural History 93(9): 69–75.Google Scholar
Keefer, D.K., Defrance, S.D., Moseley, M.E. Richardson III, J.B. Satterlee, D.R. & Day-Lewis, A.. 1998. Early maritime economy and El Niño events at Quebrada Tacahuay, Peru, Science 281: 1833–5.Google Scholar
Kirch, P.V. & Ellison, J.. 1994. Palaeoenvironmental evidence for human colonization of remote oceanic islands, Antiquity 68: 310–21.Google Scholar
Kuhry, P. 1988. Palaeobotanical-palaeoecological studies of tropical high Andean peatbog sections (Cordillera Oriental, Colombia). Berlin: J. Cramer. Dissertationes Botanicae 116.Google Scholar
Ledru, M.-P. 1993. Late Quaternary environmental and climatic changes in central Brazil, Quaternary Research 39: 90–98.Google Scholar
Ledru, M.-P., Soares Braga, P.I. Soubiès, F. Fournier, M. Martin, L. Suguio, K. & Turcq, B.. 1996. The last 50,000 years in the neotropics (southern Brazil): evolution of vegetation and climate, Palaeogeography, Palaeo-climatology, Palaeoecology 123: 239–57.Google Scholar
Liu, K.-B. & Colinvaux, P.A.. 1988. A 5200-year history of Amazon rain-forest, Journal of Eiogeography 15: 231–48.Google Scholar
Markgraf, V. 1993. Climatic history of Central and South America since 18,000 yr BP: comparison of pollen records and model simulations, in Wright, H.E. Jr, Kutzbach, J. E. Webb III, T. Ruddiman, W.F. Street-Perrott, F.A. & Bartlein, P.J. (ed.). Global climates since the Last Glacial Maximum: 362–90. Minneapolis (MN): University of Minnesota Press.Google Scholar
Martin, L., Fournier, M., Mourguiart, P. Sifeddine, A. Turcq, B. Absy, M.L. & Flexor, J.-M.. 1993. Southern oscillation signal in South American palaeoclimatic data of the last 7000 years, Quaternary Research 39: 338–346.Google Scholar
Martinson, D.G., Pisias, N.G., Hays, J.D. Imbrie, J. Moore, T.C. & Shackleton, N.J.. 1987. Age, dating and orbital theory of the ice ages: development of a high resolution 0 to 300,000-year chronostratigraphy, Quaternary Research 27: 1–29.Google Scholar
Meggers, B.J. 1995. Judging the future by past: the impact of environmental instability on prehistoric Amazonian populations, in Sponsel, (ed.): 15–43.Google Scholar
Mora, C.S., Herrera, L.F., Cavelier, I.F & Rodriguez, C.. 1991. Plantas cultivadas, suelos antrópicos y estabilidad: Informe preliminar sobre la arqueologia de Araracuara, Amazonia Colombiana. Pittsburgh (PA): Department of Anthropology, University of Pittsburgh. University of Pittsburgh Latin American Archaeology Reports 2. (Published with English translation by N. Verniquet).Google Scholar
Netherly, P.J. 1997. Loma y ribera: patrones de asentamiento prehistóricos en la Amazonia Ecuatoriana, Fronteras de Investigación 1(1): 33–54. (Quito.)Google Scholar
O’Brien, S.R., Mayewski, P.A., Meeker, L.D. MéEse, D.A. Twickler, M.S. & Whitlow, S.I.. 1995. Complexity of Holocene climate as reconstructed from a Greenland ice core, Science 270: 1962–4.Google Scholar
Patterson, W.A., Edwards, K.J. & Maguire, D.J.. 1987. Microscopic charcoal as a fossil indicator of fire, Quaternary Science Reviews 6: 3–23.Google Scholar
Pearsall, D.M. & Piperno, D.R.. 1990. Antiquity of maize cultivation in Ecuador: summary and reevaluation of the evidence, American Antiquity 55(2): 324–37.Google Scholar
Perota, C. & Botelho, W.C.. 1990. O sambaqui de Guara-1 e as variaçõs climáticas no Holoceno, Symposium International sur l’Evolution des littoraux des Guyanes et de la zone caraïbe méridionale pendant le Quaternaire, Résumés: 144–6. Cayenne.Google Scholar
Piperno, D.R. 1990. Aboriginal agriculture and land usage in the Amazon basin, Ecuador, Journal of Archaeological Science 17: 665–77.Google Scholar
Piperno, D.R. 1995. Plant microfossils and their application in the New World tropics, in Stahl, P.W. (ed.), Archaeology in the lowland American tropics: 130–53. New York (NY): Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Piperno, D.R. & Becker, P.. 1996. Vegetational history of a site in the central Amazon basin derived from phytolith and charcoal records from natural soils, Quaternary Research 45: 202–9.Google Scholar
Piperno, D.R. & Pearsall, D.M.. 1998. The origins of agriculture in the lowland neotropics. New York (NY): Academic Press.Google Scholar
Powell, J. M. 1970. The impact of man on the vegetation of Mt Hagen, New Guinea. Unpublished Ph.D thesis. Canberra: Australian National University.Google Scholar
Rodbell, D.T., Seltzer, G.O., Anderson, D.M. Abbott, M.B. Enfield, D.B. & Newman, J.H.. 1999. An -15,000-year record of El Niño-driven alluviation in southwestern Ecuador, Science 283: 516–20.Google Scholar
Roosevelt, A.C. (ed.). 1994. Amazonian Indians from prehistory to the present: anthropological perspectives. Tucson (AZ): University of Arizona Press.Google Scholar
Roosevelt, A.C., Lima Da Costa, M. Lopes, C. Machado, M. MicHAB, N. Mercier, H. Valladas, J. Feathers, W. Barnett, M. Imazio Da Silveira, A. Henderson, J. Sliva, B. Chernoff, D.S. Reese, J.A. Holman, N. Toth & Schick, K.. 1996. Paleoindian cave dwellers in the Amazon: the peopling of the Americas, Science 272(5260): 373–84.Google Scholar
Sandweiss, D.H., Richardson, J.B. III Reitz, E.J. Rollins, H.B. & Maasch, K.A.. 1996. Geoarchaeological evidence from Peru for a 5000 years B.P. onset of El Niño, Science 273: 1531–3.Google Scholar
Sauer, CO. 1958. Man in the ecology of tropical America, Proceedings of the Ninth Pacific Science Congress (1957) 20: 104–10.Google Scholar
Sponsel, L.E. (ed.). 1995. Indigenous peoples and the future of Amazonia: an ecological anthropology of an endangered world. Tucson (AZ): University of Arizona Press.Google Scholar
Stager, J.C. & Mayewski, P.A.. 1997. Abrupt early to mid-Holocene climatic transition registered at the Equator and the Poles, Science 276: 1834–6.Google Scholar
Stotiiert, K.E. 1985. The preceramic Las Vegas culture of coastal Ecuador, American Antiquity 50(3): 613–37.Google Scholar
Stuiver, M. & Reimer, P.J.. 1993. Extended 14C data base and revised CALIB 3.0 14C age calibration, Radiocarbon 35: 215–30.Google Scholar
Stute, M., Forster, M., Frischkorn, H. Serejo, A. Clark, J.F. Schlosser, P. Broecker, W.S. & Bonani, G.. 1995. Cooling of tropical Brazil (5°C) during the last glacial maximum, Science 269: 379–83.Google Scholar
Taylor, K.C., Lamorey, G.W., Doyle, G.A. Alley, R.B. Grootes, P.M. Mayewski, P.A.C. White, J.W. & Barlow, L.K.. 1993. The ‘flickering switch’ of Late Pleistocene climate change, Nature 361: 432–6.Google Scholar
Thompson, L.G., Mosley-Thompson, E. Davis, M.E.-N. Lin, P. Henderson, K.A. Cole-Dai, J. Bolzan, J.F. & Liu, K.-B.. 1995. Late glacial stage and Holocene tropical ice core records from Huascarán, Peru, Science 269: 46–50.Google Scholar
Thouret, J.-C Van Der Hammen, T. Salomons, B. & Juvigné, E.. 1996. Paleoenvironmental changes and glacial stades of the last 50,000 years in the Cordillera Central, Colombia, Quaternary Research 46: 1–18.Google Scholar
Todzia, C.A. 1988. Chloranthaceae: Hedyosmum. New York (NY): New York Botanical Garden. Flora Neotropica Monograph 48.Google Scholar
Tolonen, K. 1986. Charred particle analysis, in Berglund, B.E. (ed.), Handbook of Holocene palaeoecology and palaeohydrology: 485–96. Chichester: John Wiley & Sons.Google Scholar
Urrego, G., L.E. 1991. Sucesión holocénica de un bosque de Mauritia flexuosa L.f. en el valle del Río Caquetá (Amazonia Colombiana), Colombia Amazónica 5(2): 99–118.Google Scholar
Van Der Hammen, T. 1986. Fluctuaciones holocénicas del nivel de inundaciones en la Cuenca del Bajo Magdalena-Cauca-San Jorge (Colombia), Geología Norandina 10: 11–18.Google Scholar
Van Der Hammen, T. 1991. Paleoecology of the neotropics: an overview of the state of affairs. Proc. Global Changes in South America During the Quaternary. Boletim IG-USP, Publ. Esp., 8: 35–55.Google Scholar
Van Der Hammen, T. & Absy, M.L.. 1994. Amazonia during the last glacial, Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 109: 247–61.Google Scholar
Van Der Hammen, T., Duivenvoorden, J.F., Lips, J.M. Urrego, L.E. & Espejo, N.. 1992. Late Quaternary of the middle Caquetá River area (Colombian Amazonia), Journal of Quaternary Science 7(1): 45–55.Google Scholar
Walker, D. & Flenley, J.R.. 1979. Late Quaternary vegetational history of the Enga Province of upland Papua New Guinea, Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London B 286: 265–344.Google Scholar