Society for American Archaeology

The First South Americans: The Peopling of a Continent from the Earliest Evidence to High
Culture by Danièle Lavallée; Paul G. Bahn
Review by: David Browman
Latin American Antiquity, Vol. 12, No. 3 (Sep., 2001), pp. 338-339
Published by: Society for American Archaeology
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/971640 .
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338 LATINAMERICAN ANTIQUITY
reader with a complex and importantargument, and
with amazing control of detail, such as can and hope-
fully will lead to furtherwork in this difficult field.
The First South Americans: The Peopling of a
Continentfrom the Earliest Evidence to High Culture.
DANIELE LAVALLEE.Translatedby Paul G. Bahn.
University of Utah Press, Salt Lake City, 2000. xii +
260 pp., figures,bibliography,index. $25.0 (paper).
Reviewed by David Browman, Washington
University-St. Louis.
Dr. Lavallee has directed a number of projects in the
Central Andes on Paleoindian and Archaic cultures;
hence she brings a particularexpertiseon those periods
to this volume. The book is somewhatdated;the French
version was published in 1995, and only minimal
updates, none later than 1998, have been made in this
English version. Lavallee states that she excluded sites
where final reports were lacking, or where adequate
radiocarbon determinations were not available. Her
focus upon empirical field data, with little attentionto
theory,is "one of the fundamentaldifferencesthat sep-
arateFrencharchaeologistsfrom our Anglo-Saxon col-
leagues, in whose eyes the developmentof a theoretical
frameworkand of a prior conceptual plan sometimes
seems more importantthan the examination and con-
frontationof observedfacts" (p. viii).
The first chapter "spotlights"individuals she sees
important in providing information about the New
Worldinhabitants,from 1492 up throughthe 1930s (the
beginnings of scientific archaeology).Before the nine-
teenthcentury,she arguesthatmost commentatorsdealt
with "myths,legends, and fantasies."She employs this
chapterto resurrectwhat she believes are the misunder-
stood contributions of the naturalist Wilhelm Peter
Lund, who first recorded"Lagoa Santa man."In addi-
tion to his identificationof these remains as "antedilu-
vian," Lund first recognized that the Brazilian
sambaquiswere of humanorigin.
In the next chapter,Lavallee gets into the archaeol-
ogy. A careful read shows that she divided South
American prehistoryinto periods of 4,000 years dura-
tion each (based on uncalibratedradiocarbondates).
Thus this chapteron the "FirstOccupants"covers sites
that date from 16,000 to 12,000 years ago. She reviews
sites in North, Middle, and South America that have
possible evidence of pre-12,000 B.P. occupation, and
finds support for both land and water immigration
routes. Lavallee believes that the South American sites
of Taima-Taima,Tibito, Los Toldos, Sitio do Meio,
Baixao do Perna,and Monte Verdehave good evidence
for pre-12,000 B.P. occupations,but questions the early
This content downloaded from 195.34.78.191 on Tue, 17 Jun 2014 12:51:07 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
[Vol. 12, No. 3, 20011
claims for Alice Boer, Pedra Furada,and Pikimachay.
She concludes that "Thereno longer appearsto be any
use in clinging to the bufferdate of 12,000 b.p. Todayit
seems difficult to deny that people were in South
America more than 15,000 years ago" (p. 56).
The next chapter,the "Timeof the Hunters,"covers
the periodfrom 12,000 to 8,000 B.P. Duringthis period,
she argues that an extraordinarydiversity of strategies
developed to take advantage of the range of South
American environments. While Lavallee identifies
some regional specialization (such as Pacific Coast
maritime exploitation strategies), she argues that spe-
cialized huntingwas rare,andhunterswere mainly gen-
eralists. She concludes that the disappearance of
megafauna was linked to environmentalfactors, not
Martin's "overkill" hypothesis. While early hunters
were opportunistic,and so would take advantageof tak-
ing such animalsif available,"therenever seem to have
existed any hunterswho specializedin huntingthe great
Pleistocene game, or at least what was left of it" (p.
118). After reviewing the industries from this time
period, she accepts "theidea that, at this time, in South
America, there coexisted two distinct great technologi-
cal traditions:one of these did not know the projectile
point and, generally speaking, the bifacial working of
stone and made up for this with equipmentof wood and
bone" (p. 119). She favors a NorthAmericanorigin for
bifacial flaking and projectile point technology, but
does not rule out a local independentinvention.
The next two chaptersdeal with the periodof 8,000
to 4,000 B.P.;one on the Andes ("TheAndeanBoom"),
and the other on Amazonia ("The Other Side of the
Cordillera").In the Andean chapter she presents her
views on the origins of domesticationof plants and ani-
mals. Unfortunatelythis chapteris marredby two prob-
lems. The first is introduced by the translator,Paul
Bahn. He consistently misidentifies chili peppers as
pimentos, and squashes as gourds. Bahn is a prolix
authorof archaeologicaltexts in England,and has writ-
ten on New World archaeology; hence his errors are
inexcusable.Second, Lavalleedoes not extend the same
critical eye towardinformationfrom these sites as she
does for the earlier hunter-gathereroccupations. She
accepts without question claims of 9,500 B.P. maize,
beans, and "pimentos" (e.g., chili peppers) in
Northwest Argentina and NorthernChile, and 8,000-
year-old maize and beans in Ecuadorand Peru. Partly
based on such dating, she states that for at least 8,000
years, permanent villages existed along the Pacific
coast. In her treatment of "the other side of the
cordillera,"she notes a rapidexpansionof settlementon
the Atlantic and Caribbeancoasts (as there had also
been on the Pacific), due to sea-level stabilization.
Inland, she reviews patternsof generalized hunterson
the open savannas, Elsher-gatherers along the
 REVIEWSANDBOOKNOTES
339

Amazoniandrainages,and specialized guanaco hunters identify the authorsof the remarksto follow and alert
in the Argentinapampa. the reader to particularly important aspects of the
The final two chapters of the book ("Peasants, accounts.These sections contextualizewhat might oth-
Artisans, and Priests" and "Epilogue: Civilization") erwise seem to be disjointed statements,linking them
cover the time from 4,000 B.P. throughthe first "civi- into a coherentnarrative.
lization," Chavin. Lavallee sees this as a time of pro- The book is of great value to ethnohistorianscon-
found cultural upheavals, with the appearance of cerned with the varied ways in which the Maya con-
intensive cultivation, pottery, weaving, hierarchical fronted, and adjusted to, Spanish colonial agents.
society, and the first urbanismand ceremonial centers. Detailed reportson the MancheChol are notablyabsent
These features are identified earliest on the coast of from the literatureon New Worldcolonial encounters.
Colombia and Ecuador,and only later in Peru. When The currentvolume, therefore, addresses a major gap
consideringthe large Peruvianmonumentalcomplexes, by bringing this neglected group into history. Just as
such as Pampade los Llamas, she quibbles with current importantly, the edicts and letters recovered by
interpretations,opining that "Perhapsthey were indeed Feldman in his extensive research convey a sense of
ceremonialcenters . . . but no indisputablearchaeolog- how colonial administration and missionary efforts
ical evidence has as yet provided definitive proof of played out in areas marginal to centers of imperial
this" (p. 201). Lavallee places Chavin and the events power.
after 3,500 B.P. in the "epilogue" because "strictly Archaeologistsinterestedin the Maya lowlands dur-
speaking,this periodlies outside the field of prehistory" ing any period are well advised to consult this source.
(p. 207). She presents two theories for the origins of Thoughfilteredthroughlenses tintedby social and reli-
Chavin-maritimerealms developing into agricultural gious biases, the descriptionsoffered here provide tan-
states that expanded into the sierra, or an Amazonian talizing glimpses of a wide arrayof indigenouscultural
impetus from a jungle homeland,but opts not to chose practices. These range from methods of hunting deer
between them. and collecting valuablefeathersto the context of cacao
The volume's strengthlies in the area of Lavallee's within Maya exchange networks to the manner in
own research, in the discussions of the lithic assem- which the dead were buried.Admittedly,descriptionsof
blages and associated cultures of the Archaic period. cultural patterns are short, dispersed throughout the
Lavallee has provided a nice introductorysummaryof documents,and theirreliability let alone their general
the range of early South Americancomplexes. applicability among the Manche Chol, is difficult to
gauge. Still, archaeologistsshould be gratefulfor even
these abbreviatedinsights into lowland Maya practices
LostShores,ForgottenPeoples:SpanishExplorations and will find them useful in forming hypotheses about
of the SouthEast MayaLowlands.LAWRENCE H. the past.
FELDMAN, editor. Duke University Press, Durham, The broader appeal of the book derives from the
NC, 2001. xxvi + 269 pp., figures, maps, appendices, sense it conveys of how active agents on both sides of
bibliography,index. $18.95 (paper). the colonial divide perceived and dealt with each other.
Given that Chol accounts of their interactions with
ReviewedbyEdwardSchortman,Kenyon College. Spanish interlopershave not survived, the Iberianbias
in reportsdealing with these contacts is inescapable.In
This volume presents a series of documents writtenby addition,since most of the extantrecordswere intended
Spanishclerics and officials who were seeking to pacify as official statementsof events in which their authors
and administerthe Manche Chol of the central Maya participated,they were undoubtedlycomposed with an
lowlands. These elegantly translated accounts are eye to impressing clerical and secular leaders.
arranged in chronological order, beginning with the Nevertheless, the messy reality of colonial encounters
early incursions of proselytizing friars in the sixteenth frequently slips out from behind formal statementsof
century through to the final removal and dispersal of natives converted, Indians conquered, and tributaries
most of the indigenous inhabitantsby Spanish military administered. For example, passing references to a
forces and raidingMosquito Zambos in the early eigh- view, held by at least some Chol, on the therapeutic
teenthcentury.As LawrenceFeldmanpoints out, this is effects of Catholic baptism give a tantalizing hint of
a work of translationand not analysis. The authorpro- how this sacramentwas viewed by the "objects"of mis-
vides a general overview of Spanish colonial adminis- sionary zeal. Similarly,the frequentlyrepeatedlament
trative structuresand conquests along with some very of Spanishclerics and administratorsthatthe Chol only
useful maps in the introductorychapter.He also pref- visited missionarieslong enough to secure metal imple-
aces each set of translationswith helpful commentsthat ments before returningto the forest implies an indige-

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