Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-fscjk Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-23T00:32:50.721Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Manioc agriculture and sedentism in Amazonia: the Upper Xingu example

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2015

Michael J. Heckenberger
Michael J. Heckenberger*
Affiliation:
Departamento de Antropologia — PPGAS, Museu Nacional/Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro, Quinta da Boa Vista, São Cristovão, 20940-040 Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Agricultural productivity and Amazonian settlement

The nature of Pre-Columbian agricultural systems in Amazonia has stimulated considerable debate, specifically: can one or another cultigen — maize or manioc — provide a stable agricultural base for sedentism and population growth (eg. Carneiro 1961; 1986; Gross 1975; Meggers 1996; Roosevelt 1980)? Certain ecological factors are generally seen to limit production and intensification of those subsistence resources that can support sedentary or densely distributed populations. Low agricultural productivity, characteristic of many Amazonian soils, and the generally low density and patchy distribution of terrestrial game are commonly cited as limiting factors (Gross 1975; 1983; Johnson 1982; Meggers 1954; 1996; Ross 1978; Sponsel 1989). It has become accepted that the highly restricted váirzea regions, primarily the floodplain settings of the major ‘white-water’ rivers (the Amazon and its Andean-derived tributaries), did not impose these environmental constraints on demographic or economic growth due to their fertile soils and higher concentrations of rich aquatic resources (e.g. Brochado 1984; 1989; Carneiro 1986; 1995; Denevan 1996; Lathrap 1968; 1970; 1987; Lathrap et al. 1985; Meggers 1996; Moran 1993; Roosevelt 1980; 1989; 1994).

Keywords

AmazoniaAmerindianscontextual archaeologytropical agriculture/subsistencesocietal scale
Type
Special section: Issues in Brazilian archaeology
Information
Antiquity , Volume 72 , Issue 277 , September 1998 , pp. 633 - 648
Copyright
Copyright © Antiquity Publications Ltd. 1998

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Agostinho Da Silva, P. 1993. Testemunhos da ocupação oré-Xinguana na bacia dos formadores do Xingu, in Coelh, V.P. (ed.), Karl von den Steinen: Um Século de Antropologia no Xingu: 223–87. São Paulo: Editora da Universidade de São Paulo.Google Scholar
Balee, W. 1989. The culture of Amazonian forests, in Posey, & Balée, (ed.): 1–21.Google Scholar
Balee, W. 1995. Historical ecology in Amazonia, in Sponsel, (ed.): 97–110.Google Scholar
Basso, E.B. 1973. The Kalapalo Indians of central Brazil. New York (NY): Holt, Rinehart & Winston.Google Scholar
Beckerman, S. 1979. The abundance of protein in Amazonia: a reply to Gross, American Anthropologist 81: 533–60.Google Scholar
Beckerman, S. 1994. Hunting and fishing in Amazonia: hold the answers, what are the questions?, in Roosevelt, (ed.): 177–200.Google Scholar
Brochado, J. 1984. An ecological model of the spread of pottery and agriculture into eastern South America. PhD. dissertation, Department of Anthropology, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.Google Scholar
Brochado, J. 1989. A Expansão dos Tupi e da Ceràmica da Tradição Policrômica Amazônica, Dedalo 27: 65–82.Google Scholar
Brochado, J.P. & Lathrap, D.W. 1982. Amazonia. Unpublished MS. Department of Anthropology, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.Google Scholar
Carneiro, R.L. 1957. Subsistence and social structure: an ecological study of the Kuikuru Indians. Ph.D dissertation, University of Michigan. Ann Arbor (MI): University Microfilms.Google Scholar
Carneiro, R.L. 1961. Slash-and-burn cultivation among the Kuikuru and its implications for cultural development in the Amazon Basin, in Wilber, J. (ed.), The evolution of horticultural systems in native South America: causes and consequences, a symposium: 47–67. Caracas: Sociedad de Ciencias Naturales La Salle. Antropológica, Supplement Publication 2.Google Scholar
Carneiro, R.L. 1978. The knowledge and use of rain forest trees by the Kuikuru Indians of central Brazil, in Ford, 1978: 201–16.Google Scholar
Carneiro, R.L. 1983. The cultivation of manioc among the Kuikuru Indians of the Upper Xingu, in Hames, & Vickers, 1983: 65–111.Google Scholar
Carneiro, R.L. 1986. The ecological basis of Amazonian chiefdoms. Unpublished ms.Google Scholar
Carneiro, R.L. 1994. Kuikuru, in Wilber, J. (ed.), Encyclopedia of world cultures 7: South America, 206–9. Boston (MA): G.K. Hall.Google Scholar
Carneiro, R.L. 1995. The history of ecological interpretations of Amazonia: does Roosevelt have it right?, in Sponsel, (ed.): 45–65.Google Scholar
Carvalho, J.C.M 1951. Relações entre os Indios do Xingu e a fauna regional. Rio de Janeiro: Museu Nacional. Publicações Avulsas.Google Scholar
Deboer, W. 1975. The archaeological evidence for manioc cultivation: a cautionary note, American Antiquity 40(4): 419–33.Google Scholar
Denevan, W. 1984. Ecological heterogeneity and horizontal zonation of agriculture in the Amazon floodplain, in Schmin, M. & Wood, C. Floodplain expansion in Amazonia: 311–36. Gainsville (FL): University of Florida Press.Google Scholar
Denevan, W. 1992. Stone vs metal axes: the ambiguity of shifting cultivation in prehistoric Amazonia, Journal of the Steward Anthropological Society 20(1–2): 153–65.Google Scholar
Denevan, W. 1996. A bluff model of riverine settlement in prehistoric Amazonia, Annals of the Association of American Geographers 86(4): 654–81.Google Scholar
Descola, P. 1994. In the society of nature: a native ecology in Amazonia. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Dole, G.E. 1961–2. A preliminary consideration of the prehistory of the Upper Xingu basin, Revista do Museu Paulista, (NS)13: 399–423.Google Scholar
Dole, G.E. 1978. The use of manioc among the Kuikuru: some interpretations, in Ford, 1978: 217–47.Google Scholar
Dufour, D.L. 1994. Diet and nutritional status of Amazonian peoples, in Roosevel, A. (ed.), Amazonian Indians from Prehistory to the Present: Anthropological Perspectives, 151–76. Tucson (AZ): University of Arizona Press.Google Scholar
Dufour, D.L. 1995. A closer look at the nutritional implictions of bitter cassava use, in Sponse, L.E. (ed.), Indigenous peoples and the future of Amazonia: an ecological anthropology of an endangered world: 149–65. Tucson (AZ): University of Arizona Press.Google Scholar
Fagundes Neto, U., et al. 1981. Observation of the Alto Xingu Indians (central Brazil) with special reference to nutritional evaluation in children, American Journal of Clinical Nutrition 34: 2229–35.Google Scholar
Ford, R.I. (ed.). 1978. The nature and status of ethnobotany. Ann Arbor (MI): Museum of Anthropology, University of Michigan. Anthropological Papers 67.Google Scholar
Galvão, E. 1953. Cultura e sistema de parentesco das tribos do Alto Xingu, Boletim do Museu Nacional (Antropologia) (NS) 14: 1–56.Google Scholar
Garson, A.G. 1980. Comment upon the economic potential of fish utilization in riverine environments and potential archaeological biases, American Antiquity 45(3): 562–7.Google Scholar
Gregor, T. 1977. Mehinaku: the drama of daily life in a Brazilian Indian village. Chicago (IL): University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Gross, D. 1975. Protein capture and cultural development in the Amazon Basin, American Anthropologist 77(3): 526–49.Google Scholar
Gross, D. 1983. Village movement in relation to resources in Amazonia, in Hames, & Vickers, 1983: 429–49.Google Scholar
Hames, R. & Vicker, W. (ed.). 1983. Adaptive responses of native Amazonians. New York (NY): Academic Press.Google Scholar
Heckenberger, M.J. 1996. War and peace in the shadow of empire: sociopolitical change in the Upper Xingu of southeastern Amazonia, ca. AD 1400–2000. Ph.D dissertation, University of Pittsburgh. Ann Arbor (MI): University Microfilms International.Google Scholar
Heckenberger, M.J. 1997. A periferia meridional da Amazônia: cultura e desenvolvimento cultural na fronteira entre Brasil e a bacia amazônica. Paper presented at the 9th annual meeting of the Sociedade de Arqueologia Brasileira, Rio de Janeiro, September 1997.Google Scholar
Heckenberger, M.J. 1998. Revisionism in Amazonian ecological anthropology: the ancient cultural landscapes of the southern Amazon. Unpublished manuscript.Google Scholar
Johnson, A. 1982. Reductionism in cultural ecology: the Amazon case, Current Anthropology 23(4): 413–28.Google Scholar
Kneip, L.M. 1969. Relatório sobre as valetas do Parque Nacional do Xingu. Estado de Mato Grosso. Rio de Janeiro. UFRJ-Museu Nacional.Google Scholar
Lathrap, D.W. 1968. The ‘hunting’ economies of the tropical forest zone of South America: an attempt at historical perspective, in Le, R.B. & Devore, I (ed.). Man the hunter: 23–9. Chicago (IL): Aldine.Google Scholar
Lathrap, D.W. 1970. The Upper Amazon. New York (NY): Praeger.Google Scholar
Lathrap, D.W. 1977. Our father the cayman, our mother the gourd: Spinden revisited, or a unitary model for the emergence of agriculture in the New World, in Ree, C.A. (ed.), Origins of agriculture: 713–51. The Hague: Mouton.Google Scholar
Lathrap, D.W., Gebhart-Sayer, A. & Mester, A.M. 1985. The roots of the Shipibo art style: three waves on Imariacocha or there were ‘Incas’ before the Incas, fournal of Latin American Lore 11(1): 31–119.Google Scholar
Limp, W.F. & Reidhead, V.A. 1979. An economic evaluation of the potential offish utilization in riverine environments, American Antiquity 44(1): 70–8.Google Scholar
Meggers, B.J. 1954. Environmental limitation on the development of culture, American Anthropologist 56: 801–24.Google Scholar
Meggers, B.J. 1996. Amazonia: man and culture in a counterfeit paradise. Revised edition. Washington (DC): Smithsonian Institution Press.Google Scholar
Moran, E.F. 1991. O estudo da adaptação humana em ecossistemas amazônicas, in Neve, W.A. (ed.), Origens, adaptações e diversidade biológica do homen nativo da Amazônia: 161–78. Belém: Museum Paraense Emílio Goeldi.Google Scholar
Moran, E.F. 1993. Through Amazon eyes: the human ecology of Amazonian populations. Iowa City (ID): University of Iowa Press.Google Scholar
Moran, E.F. 1995. Disaggregating Amazonia: a strategy for understanding biological and cultural diversity, in Sponsel, 1995: 72–95.Google Scholar
Posey, D.A. & Balée, W. (ed.). 1989. Resource management in Amazonia; folk and indigenous strategies. New York (NY): New York Botanical Society. Advances in Economic Botany 7.Google Scholar
Roosevelt’, A.C. 1980. Parmana: prehistoric maize and manioc subsistence along the Amazon and Orinoco. New York (NY): Academic Press.Google Scholar
Roosevelt’, A.C. 1989. Resource management in Amazonia before the Conquest: beyond ethnographic projection, in Posey, & Balée, (ed.): 30–62.Google Scholar
Roosevelt’, A.C. 1991. Moundbuilders of the Amazon: geophysical archaeology on Marajo Island, Brazil. New York (NY): Academic Press.Google Scholar
Roosevelt’, A.C. 1994a. Amazonian anthropology: strategy for a new synthesis, in Roosevelt 1994b: 1–29.Google Scholar
Roosevelt’, A.C. 1994b. (Ed.), Amazonian Indians from prehistory to the present: anthropological perspectives. Tucson (AZ): University of Arizona Press.Google Scholar
Ross, E.B. 1978. Food taboos, diet, and hunting strategy: the adaptation to animals in Amazon cultural ecology, Current Anthropology 19(1): 1–36.Google Scholar
Simoes, M.F. 1967. Considerações preliminares sobre a arqueologia do Alto Xingu, in Programa Nacional de Pesquisas Arqueológicas: resultados preliminares do primeiro ano. 1965–1986. Belém, Museu Paraense Emílio Goeldi, vol. 6: 129–144.Google Scholar
Sponsel, L.E. 1989. Farming and foraging: a necessary complementarity in Amazonia?, in Ken, S. (ed.), Farmers as hunters: the implications of sedentism: 37–45. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Sponsel, L.E. (Ed.). 1995. Indigenous peoples and the future of Amazonia: an ecological anthropology of an endangered world. Tucson (AZ): University of Arizona Press.Google Scholar