Bone Surface Modifications, Reasonable Certainty, and Human Antiquity in the Americas
The Case of the Arroyo Del Vizcaίno Site
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 2655695 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Richard A Fariña (0000-0003-0898-0333, Centro Uruguayo de Imagenología Molecular, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2015 |
| Volume | 80 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 193-200 |
| Publication date | 2015-01-01 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | American Antiquity (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0002-7316 • E-ISSN: 2325-5064 |
| Publisher | Cambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.7183/0002-7316.79.4.193 |
| OpenAlex | W2314488798 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 10 |
| References cited | 23 |
Modifications on bone surfaces are taphonomic features that allow, among other aspects of environmental reconstruction, the assessment of human presence. The agents that cause such marks are diverse and of both biotic and abiotic origin. Among the former, marks made by human tools are of paramount importance for archaeologists and paleontologists to identify. Although it is possible to erroneously assign trampling marks to cut marks, several criteria have been recently developed so as to avoid such risks. These methods are applied here to the 30,000-year-old site of Arroyo del Vizcaíno (Uruguay), where over one thousand megafaunal remains have been collected. Some of them show marks that have been interpreted to be the result of the action of human tools. Using a database built up from previous studies of experimentally made marks as an actualistic model, it was concluded that the marks in the Arroyo del Vizcaíno site are unlikely to have been made by trampling, hence leaving human agency as the most feasible cause. This has important consequences for the debate on the human peopling of the Americas and on the process of extinction of the Pleistocene megafauna
Archaeology · Biology · Certainty · Geography · Human bone · Megafauna · Pleistocene · Radiocarbon dating · Taphonomy · Trampling · Archaeology and ancient environmental studies · Ecology · Forensic Anthropology and Bioarchaeology Studies · History · Pleistocene-Era Hominins and Archaeology
Co-occurrence of mylodontid sloths and insights on their potential distributions during the late Pleistocene
Ambiguity and Debates on the Early Peopling of South America
To the End of the World
Hard Facts in an Imperfect Site
Some Opinions about Monte Verde
Does the evidence at Arroyo del Vizcaíno (Uruguay) support the claim of human occupation 30,000 years ago
Identifying the accumulator
Differentiating between cutting actions on bone using 3D geometric morphometrics and Bayesian analyses with implications to human evolution
Questioning the Anthropic Nature of Pedra Furada and the Piauí Sites
An Anthropological Conception of the Initial Peopling of the Americas
Taphonomy and Population Dynamics of an Early Pliocene Vertebrate Fauna, Knox County, Nebraska
Applications of Scanning Electron Microscopy to Taphonomic Problems
Cutmarks made by stone tools on bones from Olduvai Gorge, Tanzania
Carbon-14 dates point to man in the Americas 32,000 years ago
Folsom
The use of mortality patterns in archaeological studies of hominid predatory adaptations
A new protocol to differentiate trampling marks from butchery cut marks
A Tale of Two Migrations
Surface modification on bone
A new method for the quantitative analysis of cutmark micromorphology
Evidence of butchery and hominid activities at Torralba and Ambrona; an evaluation using microscopic techniques
Quantitative micromorphological analyses of cut marks produced by ancient and modern handaxes
Identifying Stone Tool Cut Marks and the Pre-Clovis Occupation of the Paisley Caves
Butchering and Stone Tool Function
An Experimental Study of the Morphological Characteristics of Tool Marks
| Citations per year | 1 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 2016 - 2023 (8) |
| Highly cited | No |