Solar-Aligned Pictographs at the Paleoindian Site of Painel do Pilão along the Lower Amazon River at Monte Alegre, Brazil

Abstract

The archaeological sites near Monte Alegre, along Brazil's lower Amazon River, provide new information on the little-known activities and symbolism of South American Paleoindians toward the end of the Ice Age. While paleoindian sites like Monte Verde in Chile, or Guitarrero Cave in Peru, are located near the pacific coast, Monte Alegre lies much further inland, 680 km upriver from the mouth of the Amazon River and the Atlantic Coast. With excavated wood charcoal radiocarbon dated as early as 13,200 calibrated years ago, the hill—as a source of sandstone and quartz lithics—supplied early pioneers with adequate tools needed for colonizing the interior of the continent. Once there, they painted rock art on the landscape, which bears a record of the sun's horizon positions throughout the year. At just 2° south of the equator, Monte Alegre shows no overt seasonal changes beyond fluctuating rainfall amounts, unlike at higher latitudes where temperature, amount of daylight, foliage, and forms of precipitation markedly change. Near the equator, solar and stellar horizon sightings most visibly track the passage of time and seasonal cycles. However, horizons are often hidden behind high forest canopy throughout much of the Amazon Rainforest; but in the Monte Alegre hill ridges looming above the river, paleoindians could hike above the canopy to peer at the horizon, more effectively synchronizing their activities to ecological cycles. This research suggests that Monte Alegre paleoindians delimited the azimuthal range of the sun in a solar year with notational pictographs aligned to horizon sightings at Painel do Pilão, and leaving a painted grid of tally marks that might have served as a rudimentary early calendar. The broad-reaching implication for early Americans is that through the strategic placement of rock art, these ancient artists fostered predictive archaeorecording from which resources could be optimally extracted, ceremonial activities could be consistently scheduled, and gatherings for social and economic exchange could be more efficiently coordinated.

Beyond forests in the Amazon: biogeography and floristic relationships of the Amazonian savannas

“…The first reports of these paintings were made by English naturalist Alfred Wallace in 1848, and subsequently Canadian geologist Charles F. Hartt explored the site and published drawings and findings in The American Naturalist in 1871 (Lima & Figueirôa, 2010). Hartt's studies were followed by anthropologist Curt Nimuendajú in 1924, geographer Friedrich Katzer in 1933and ethnographer Manfred Rauschert 1954-1955 to the full excavation of the cave (Caverna da Pedra Pintada) by anthropologist Anne Roosevelt in 1996 (Davis, 2016). In relation to the Monte Alegre pictographs and their astronomical significance, Davis (2016) suggested that the fact that this area is covered in low-growing cerrado vegetation may have facilitated the fascinating sky observations made by the occupants of the site thousands of years ago.…”

The Sequence of Amazon Prehistory: A Methodology for Ethical Science

“…Following our 1990s research at Monte Alegre, my University of Illinois graduate student Christoper Davis (2009Davis ( , 2011Davis ( , 2014 His four wood charcoal accelerator radiocarbon dates were exactly the same age as our four radiocarbon and three Luminescence dates of the earliest Paleoindian levels at the cavern (DAVIS, 2016;DAVIS et al 2017). His dates, which were from the University of Arizona Radiocarbon Laboaratory, were accelerator dates and had errors less than plus or minus 71 years, significantly smaller than most Clovis dates from the same lab.…”

Retraction: Solar-Aligned Pictographs at the Paleoindian Site of Painel do Pilão along the Lower Amazon River at Monte Alegre, Brazil

“…Following publication, the author informed the journal office that there are errors in the data reported in the article [1]. Specifically, the compass measurements used in Figs 9, 11, 12, and 13 are inaccurate due to magnetic distortion in the study area.…”