Early Holocene Zooarchaeology of Las Vegas Occupations in Coastal Ecuador

在国家科学基金会的支持下，一个考古学家小组，包括彼得斯塔尔，（宾汉姆顿大学，纽约），凯伦Stothert德克萨斯大学圣安东尼奥分校（米尔萨普学院，MS）和菲利普·贝雷斯（Philippe Bearez）（自然历史博物馆，巴黎）将与厄瓜多尔科学家合作，分析与最早和最著名的早至中全新世之一有关的动物骨骼和贝壳标本。（10，800至6600 BP）来自南美洲的考古学文化。这些材料是从厄瓜多尔西部圣埃莱纳半岛的五个被称为拉斯维加斯占领的考古遗址中发现的，应该为这些早期人如何开发当地资源以及这与大约1万年前南美全新世开始时的早期定居生活、仪式主义、植物操纵和区域生态学之间的关系提供重要数据。 相关的项目问题研究如何解决策略在不断变化的沿海环境的背景下发生变化，从早期（10，000 -8000 BP）到全新世中期（8000-6600 BP）职业的资源开发的转变，保存早期丧葬仪式的证据，并提出了过去全新世环境的重建。 研究组合包括至少25,000个脊椎动物，和未知数量的无脊椎动物，标本目前储存在厄瓜多尔和佛罗里达。 在厄瓜多尔，由外国和当地合作者组成的研究小组将识别和分析无脊椎动物标本，并对脊椎动物标本进行分类，准备运往美国。 将在纽约（非鸟类脊椎动物）、密西西比（鸟类）和巴黎（鱼类）的不同实验室对整个采集物（包括目前储存在佛罗里达的标本）进行鉴定和分析。 项目结束后，所有材料将组装成博物馆质量的存储容器，并通过事先协议，将在佛罗里达自然历史博物馆策展。 这项合作研究将提供南美洲全新世早期考古文化中相关动物群材料的最大数据库。由于它们的极端古老，这些考古背景很少以良好的分辨率保存。 因此，重要的是要最大限度地利用可供研究的罕见病例的所有证据。拉斯维加斯的考古学文化与西海岸的其他早全新世占领区截然不同，后者几乎完全集中在海洋资源的开发上。拉斯维加斯的植物栽培记录始于公元前9000年，似乎与北方秘鲁的内陆遗址、安第斯山脉西部森林覆盖的山坡以及中美洲和哥伦比亚的早、中全新世文化有更多的共同点，这些文化将驯化植物的小规模种植沿着树木产品纳入早期新热带生存系统。 该项目是由美国，厄瓜多尔和法国考古学家，动物学家和生态学家在厄瓜多尔拥有丰富经验的多学科和国际合作努力。该团队为Museo Los Amantes de Sumpa做出了贡献，这是一个位于拉斯维加斯类型遗址的社区博物馆和文化中心，今天是一个具有国家和国际科学重要性的考古遗址。 该团队与位于瓜亚基尔的厄瓜多尔国家文化遗产研究所、位于厄瓜多尔圣埃莱纳的Amantes de Sumpa博物馆以及新成立的圣埃莱纳半岛大学（UPSE）的考古部门共享资源。

With National Science Foundation support, a team of archaeologists, including Peter Stahl (Binghamton University, NY), Karen Stothert (University of Texas at San Antonio), Markus Tellkamp (Millsap College, MS), and Philippe Bearez (Natural History Museum, Paris) will collaborate with Ecuadorian scientists in the analysis of animal bone and shell specimens associated with one of the earliest and best known Early to Mid-Holocene (10,800 to 6600 BP) archaeological cultures from South America. The material was recovered from five archaeological sites of what is termed the Las Vegas occupation of Ecuador's western Santa Elena peninsula, and should provide important data for how these early people exploited local resources and how this was related to early sedentary life, ceremonialism, the manipulation of plants, and regional ecology at the onset of the South American Holocene some 10,000 years ago. Interrelated project questions examine how settlement strategies changed in the context of a changing coastal environment, shifts in resource exploitation from the Early (10,000-8000 BP) to Mid-Holocene (8000-6600 BP) occupations, preserved evidence for early mortuary ceremonialism, and proposed reconstructions of past Holocene environments. The study assemblage consists of at least 25,000 vertebrate, and an unknown number of invertebrate, specimens currently stored in Ecuador and Florida. In Ecuador, the research team of foreign and local collaborators will identify and analyze invertebrate specimens, and sort the vertebrate specimens in preparation for shipment to the United States. The entire collection, including specimens currently stored in Florida will be identified and analyzed at different laboratories in New York (non-bird vertebrates), Mississippi (birds), and Paris (fish). Upon conclusion of the project all materials will be assembled into museum quality storage containers, and through prior agreement, will be curated at the Florida Museum of Natural History. The collaborative research will provide the largest data base of associated faunal material from an archaeological culture from the earlier Holocene of South America. Due to their extreme antiquity these archaeological contexts are seldom preserved with good resolution. As a result, it is important to maximize all evidence from those rare cases that are available for study. The Las Vegas archaeological culture is quite distinct from other Early Holocene occupations of the western coast which were focused almost exclusively on the exploitation of marine resources. Las Vegas, with its record of plant cultivation beginning before 9000 B.P., appears to share more in common with inland sites of northern Peru, forested western Andean slopes, and Early and Mid-Holocene cultures of Central America and Colombia that incorporated small-scale cultivation of domesticated plants along with tree products into early neotropical subsistence systems. The project is a multidisciplinary and international collaborative effort by US, Ecuadorian, and French archaeologists, zoologists, and ecologists with considerable experience in Ecuador. The team contributes to the Museo Los Amantes de Sumpa, a community-based museum and cultural center located on the Vegas type site, which is today an archaeological site of national and international scientific importance. The team shares resources with the Ecuadorian Instituto Nacional de Patrimonio Cultural in Guayaquil, the Museum of the Amantes de Sumpa, in Santa Elena, Ecuador, and the archaeology section of the new University of the Peninsula of Santa Elena (UPSE).