Technological strategies and organization of activities in the 357 uttermost part of South America during Late Holocene: a usewear approach

Abstract

This paper addresses the possible sources of archaeological variability in hunter-gatherer societies focusing on the consumption strategies developed by coastal groups who inhabited the southern part of the Atlantic coast of Tierra del Fuego during the Late Holocene. The aim is to explore the potential of use-wear analysis to solve problems related to landscape organization and activity distribution taking into account the bone and lithic assemblages retrieved from five archaeological sites.The results show that these assemblages form a technological landscape that involved manufacturing procedures, tool uses and designs. Hunter-fisher-gatherer societies transformed different resources, such as hide, bone and wood, with different motions.However, the activities performed with lithic and bone tools exhibit an uneven distribution between settlements. The data suggest that these differences are not related to the length of occupation or dimensions of the site. We also show a lack of correspondence between tool composition and the activities undertaken in the settlements.Consequently, we propose that: a) implements? use-life and b) resource and raw material availability and labour organization in subsistence and technological practices can explain these disparities.