Ocupaciones humanas a cielo abierto de finales del Holoceno medio y comienzos del Holoceno tardío en el valle de San Antonio de los Cobres, puna de Salta

Abstract

The San Antonio de los Cobres Valley located in the puna region of the Province of Salta, Argentina, has open- air archaeological record in stratigraphic contexts dated since late Mid-Holocene to early Late-Holocene. This paper presents the information obtained from the excavation of these sites and discusses its implications on the knowledge of the hunter-gatherers adaptations occupying this region during the range 5000-3500 years BP. This evidence supports a dynamic of increasing economic niche intensifi cation, accompanied by the increase in population size, with a strategy of low residential mobility a highly heterogeneous space use and a highly habitat selectivity. This process, towards the early Late Holocene increased, favoring the investment in architectural structures and probably the adoption of new technologies such as pottery, in a context of reduced residential mobility and with an economic niche based on hunting, with a greater diversity of hunting technologies and, probably, with herding practices.