Lagoa Santa, a karstic area in eastern Central Brazil, has been subject to research on human paleontology and archaeology for 175 years. Almost 300 Paleoindian human skeletons have been found since Danish naturalist Peter Lund’s pioneering work. Even so, some critical issues such as the role of rockshelters in settlement systems, and the possible paleoclimatic implications of the peopling of the region have yet to be addressed. We present some results obtained from recent excavations at four rockshelters and two open-air sites, new dates for human Paleoindian skeletons, and a model to explain the cultural patterns observed so far. It is also argued that the Paleoindian subsistence system at Lagoa Santa was similar to other locations in South America: generalized small-game hunting complemented by fruits, seed, and root gathering.
There is a preconception among American archaeologists that the late Pleistocene (c. 12,000-10,000 hap.) and early Holocene human occupation of the Americas would have had highly formalized and diagnostic technologies (Bryan 1986), as seen in bifacial fluted projectiles (Clovis and/or Folsom points) or Palaeoarctic microblades. This bias carries with it two presumptions which have no reason to exist:• Clovis and related industries had to be diffused throughout the Americas; and• there should be a ‘big-game hunting’ horizon in South America.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.