Spatial structure among the geometric earthworks of western Amazonia (Acre, Brazil)

Riris, Philip

doi:10.1016/j.jaa.2020.101177

Cited by 7 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 55 publications

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“…Indeed, southwestern Amazonia contains the earliest plant cultivation and domestication ( 9 , 35 ), the oldest anthropogenic soils ( 35 ), low-density urbanism ( 19 ), and now a much higher density of earthworks. The underlying spatial data distribution may offer valuable information about pre-Columbian practices before European contact ( 36 ).…”

Section: Modeling Basin-wide Distribution Of Earthworkmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…These results confirm previous archaeobotanical and ethnobotanical data that have already shown that some species (e.g., B. excelsa , Astrocaryum spp., and Attalea spp.) are more abundant on and near archaeological sites across Amazonia ( 8 , 14 , 36 ). Species that are less frequent and abundant in areas with a higher probability of earthwork occurrence likely prefer habitats where earthworks are usually not found, such as sandy soils with lower fertility ( 7 ), or were disfavored by past practices that might have had detrimental effects on some species ( 45 ).…”

Section: Relationships With Domesticated Speciesmentioning

confidence: 99%

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More than 10,000 pre-Columbian earthworks are still hidden throughout Amazonia

Peripato,

Levis,

Moreira

et al. 2023

Science

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Indigenous societies are known to have occupied the Amazon basin for more than 12,000 years, but the scale of their influence on Amazonian forests remains uncertain. We report the discovery, using LIDAR (light detection and ranging) information from across the basin, of 24 previously undetected pre-Columbian earthworks beneath the forest canopy. Modeled distribution and abundance of large-scale archaeological sites across Amazonia suggest that between 10,272 and 23,648 sites remain to be discovered and that most will be found in the southwest. We also identified 53 domesticated tree species significantly associated with earthwork occurrence probability, likely suggesting past management practices. Closed-canopy forests across Amazonia are likely to contain thousands of undiscovered archaeological sites around which pre-Columbian societies actively modified forests, a discovery that opens opportunities for better understanding the magnitude of ancient human influence on Amazonia and its current state.

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Section: Modeling Basin-wide Distribution Of Earthworkmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Relationships With Domesticated Speciesmentioning

confidence: 99%

More than 10,000 pre-Columbian earthworks are still hidden throughout Amazonia

Peripato,

Levis,

Moreira

et al. 2023

Science

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“…It demonstrated the analytical possibilities of using spatial statistics for non-systematic regional survey data. As verified in other regions, applying spatial statistical methods in correlation with environmental and cultural variables proved to be a valuable tool to understand regional patterns (Riris, 2020;Bevan et al, 2013), complementing previous site-based research in the region. The performed analysis proves the importance of comparing archaeological data to known environmental variables to explore their correlation on a large scale.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 85%

“…To study the spatial relationships of the Indigenous settlement patterns, we focused on applying Point Pattern Analysis, which is simply defined as the study of the spatial arrangement of points in space (Riris, 2020;Costanzo et al, 2021;Carrero-Pazos, Bevan and Lake, 2019). When the intensity of the point pattern is constant, i.e., corresponding to a stationary and isotropic process within the region, it is called a Homogeneous Poisson Process (HPP).…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The workflow for fitting and testing the models was fully implemented as R code, and it is available in the supplementary information. It was based on the codes of Bevan et al (2013) and Riris (2020), and it draws on functions from several R packages, such as 'sp ', 'rgdal', 'raster', 'MASS', 'maptools', 'dismo', 'DAAG' and 'spatstat' (Pebesma and Bivand, 2005;Maindonald and Braun, 2010;Baddeley and Turner, 2005;Ripley et al, 2022;Hijmans, 2021;Hijmans et al, 2022).…”

Section: Fitting Covariate Spatial Datamentioning

confidence: 99%

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Looking at the Big Picture: Using Spatial Statistical Analyses to Study Indigenous Settlement Patterns in the North-Western Dominican Republic

Malatesta

Hung

Hofman

2023

Journal of Computer Applications in Archaeology

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After several field campaigns between 2007 and 2018 in the northwestern region of the Dominican Republic, more than 300 archaeological sites have been registered and revisited. While several of these sites were identified through the scatter of surface material culture, others show terrain modifications in the form of anthropogenic mounds and levelled areas. Researchers have gathered valuable information regarding these features' functionality and construction processes through large-scale excavations in archaeological sites with anthropogenic mounds, paleoenvironmental studies and remote sensing analyses. These anthropogenic mounds represent a long-term process of formation and were used for a variety of purposes ranging from agricultural to ritual activities. While excavations and small-scale remote sensing can provide a myriad of data to improve our understanding of these archaeological sites, a regional perspective is needed to map the relationship among archaeological sites with and without terrain modifications, to better understand the Indigenous cultural patterns in their regional environment. In this regard, the primary objective of this paper is to explore to what extent these archaeological sites were related to the environment and each other. This was achieved by correlating archaeological data with a set of archaeologically recognized important environmental variables using advanced spatial statistics. The results provide important insights to understand the underlying pattern of archaeological sites in this region and its relationship with the environmental setting.

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