Agricultural practices in a high-altitude valley of the Southern Andes: new insights from organic residue analysis from La Ciénega valley, Argentina (ca. 200 BCE-900 CE)

Abstract

The consolidation of villager life in the Southern Andes implied profound transformations in human lifeways and groups’ relations with the landscape with the adoption of settled life and food production economies. Contributions from archaeological sciences can cast light into these research questions providing, for example, new information about patterns of susbsistence strategies. In this paper, we present the first organic residue analysis on ceramic containers of early villager societies of Northwestern Argentina (La Cienéga valley, ca. 200 BCE-900 CE) through two simultaneous lipid extraction methods (H2SO4/MeOH and CHCl3/MeOH). We aimed to put to test the existent characterization of the study area as a peripheric herding settlement evaluating the subsistence strategies and food economies of villager groups through the lens of absorbed organic residues in pottery. Preliminary evidence obtained in this article indicated a predominance of biomarkers associable to vegetable products in the vessels (i.e. maize) and a lower contribution of animal fats. Furthermore, a comparison and evaluation of the performance of each extraction method for specific compounds is given.