Refining the Maritime Foundations of Andean Civilization: How Plant Fiber Technology Drove Social Complexity During the Preceramic Period

Abstract

Moseley's (1975) Maritime Foundations of Andean Civilization hypothesis challenges, in one of humanity's few pristine hearths of civilization, the axiom that agriculture is necessary for the rise of complex societies. We revisit that hypothesis by setting new findings from La Yerba II (7571-6674 Cal bp) and III (6485-5893 Cal bp), Río Ica estuary, alongside the wider archaeological record for the end of the Middle Preceramic Period on the Peruvian coast. The La Yerba record evinces increasing population, sedentism, and "Broad Spectrum Revolution" features, including early horticulture of Phaseolus and Canavalia beans. Yet unlike further north, these changes failed to presage the florescence of monumental civilization during the subsequent Late Preceramic Period. Instead, the south coast saw a profound "archaeological silence." These contrasting trajectories had little to do with any relative differences in marine resources, but rather to restrictions on the terrestrial resources that determined a society's capacity to intensify exploitation of those marine resources. We explain this apparent miscarriage of the Maritime Foundations of Andean Civilization (MFAC) hypothesis on the south coast of Peru by proposing more explicit links than hitherto, between the detailed technological aspects of marine exploitation using plant fibers to make fishing nets and the emergence of social complexity on the coast of Peru. Rather than because of any significant advantages in quality, it was the potential for increased quantities of production, inherent in the shift from gathered wild Asclepias bast fibers to cultivated cotton, that inadvertently precipitated revolutionary social change. Thereby refined, the MFAC hypothesis duly emerges more persuasive than ever.

Keywords: Broad Spectrum Revolution; Complex society; Cotton; Fishing nets; Maritime Foundations of Andean Civilization; Plant bast fibers; Preceramic Period; South coast Peru.

Fig. 1

Preceramic sites on the south coast of Peru discussed herein

Fig. 2

Radiocarbon dates for Preceramic sites discussed herein, all calibrated using the ShCal13 curve (Hogg et al. 2013) in OxCal version 4.2 (Bronk Ramsey 2009)

Fig. 3

Río Ica estuary showing La Yerba II and III Middle Preceramic sites with details of excavations at La Yerba III (Chauca and Beresford-Jones 2016)

Fig. 4

Selected details of excavations at La Yerba III (6485–5893 Cal bp), Río Ica estuary, south coast Peru

Fig. 5

Fish remains at La Yerba II (7571–6674 Cal bp)

Fig. 6

Fish remains at La Yerba III (6485–5893 Cal bp)

Fig. 7

Comparison of fish remains at La Yerba II and III

Fig. 8

Selected finds from La Yerba II

Fig. 9

Selected finds from La Yerba III

Fig. 10

Selected details of yarns and cordage from La Yerba II and III