Spatial patterns in Late Holocene lithic projectile point technology of Tierra del Fuego (southern South America): assessing size and shape changes

Abstract

This paper focuses on the application of geometric morphometrics to the study of the lithic record in southern South America. We review the regional background, discuss methodological issues and summarize research advances. Here a geometric morphometric approach is applied to the case study of Late Holocene stemmed lithic projectile points from Grande Island of Tierra del Fuego (southernmost South America). Our aim is to assess size and shape changes in a broad spatial scale. Projectile point morphometric variations are used to discuss spatial scales of interaction and differentiation among past human populations across the island. Finally, several hypotheses are introduced to explain the patterns observed.

Keywords:

• Geometric morphometrics
• lithic projectile points
• Tierra del Fuego
• Patagonia
• hunter-gatherers
• spatial variation

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank all of those who helped on this research: L. A. Borrero, J. L. Lanata, M. Massone, F. Morello, L. A. Orquera, N. Ratto and A. Zangrando who facilitated access to Fuegian lithic collections. We are grateful to Michael Shott for inviting us to participate in this volume and to the anonymous reviewer whose suggestions contributed to improve our work. Also, we thank to Ivana Ozan and Cecilia Pallo for their help with the figures.

Funding

This work was supported by the CONICET under Grant 112-2011-0100262; ANPCyT under Grant PICT 2317; and Fondo Nacional de las Artes under Grant ‘Morfometría de puntas de proyectil de Fuego-Patagonia’.

Notes

1 Yaghan or Yámana was the name of hunter-gatherer populations inhabiting the Beagle Channel by historic times, whose diet was centered on marine resources (sea mammals, mollusks, etc.) (Gusinde 1982).

2 Twenty-two cases were excluded from this analysis due to a lack of available information (see Table 1).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Judith Charlin

Judith Charlin is a researcher for the Argentine National Research Council (CONICET) and professor at the University of Buenos Aires. Her research focuses on lithic technology from southern Patagonia and statistical methods.

Marcelo Cardillo

Marcelo Cardillo is a researcher for the Argentine National Research Council (CONICET) and professor at the University of Buenos Aires. His research focuses on lithic technology from northern Patagonia and statistical methods.

Karen Borrazzo

Karen Borrazzo is a researcher for the Argentine National Research Council (CONICET) and professor at the University of Buenos Aires. Her research focuses on lithic taphonomy and technology in Tierra del Fuego and Patagonia.