Characterization of pottery fabrics from Cueva de Cristobal (Puna of Jujuy)

Abstract

The results presented here occurred within the framework of research on the transition from hunter-gatherer to agro-pastoralist communities in the Argentine Puna which spawned a need to understand the social processes that caused changes to and the adoption of manufacturing practices such as pottery production. Cueva de Cristóbal is a rock shelter located approximately 10 kilometers from the town of El Aguilar, a high Puna environment in the province of Jujuy. This site offers valuable information on the first agro-pastoral occupation of the Argentina Puna and therefore on the earliest ceramics of northwestern Argentina. Petrographic analysis of ceramic thin sections corresponding to three recurrent types ? corrugated, smooth/smooth, and smooth/rough ? revealed 5 different paste groups (based on mineralogical associations). These results, coupled with the application of scanning electron microscopy (SEM-EDS) to fractions of the clay matrices, allowed some preliminary interpretations of variations recorded in the sample analyzed in terms of local manufacturing technologies.