Publications

In the central Argentine Andes, the earliest evidence of domestic crops, pottery, cemeteries, domestic camelids, and the bow and arrow dates from approximately two thousand years ago. In contrast to traditional expectations, these Neolithic changes did not occur together. To evaluate the synchronic or diachronic nature of these changes in northern Mendoza (Argentina), we parsed six phases with 92 published dates, five of which are unpublished, and four paleoclimatic proxies for the time span of 3790–1010 cal BP. We refined the phases with archaeological data from the Uspallata Valley around Cerro Tunduqueral, which is known for its rock art. The lithic analysis of the Alero Tunduqueral site provides evidence of mainly expeditious strategies, direct provisioning of local resources, and embedded mobility to acquire more distant raw materials. We estimate the cost of acquiring raw material with a friction surface of walking hours using a GIS. These data allow us to propose a phase without Neolithic elements (phase 1), followed by an early presence of domestic crops during a neoglacial advance (phase 2). The latter led to a population displacement to the lower areas associated with the first ceramics and houses (phase 3), before there was a return to the higher areas (phases 4-6), coinciding with increased regional precipitation.

This contribution focuses on a 1928 multiauthor paper reporting the discovery of a child's skull at Devil's Tower cave on the Rock of Gibraltar. It was ground-breaking. Two of the lead authors, Dorothy Garrod and Dorothea Bate, were women, and it was one of the earliest reports of a fossil hominin to incorporate and integrate detailed information about its stratigraphic and environmental context.