As Muitas Arqueologias das Minas Gerais

Abstract

This paper presents a critical history of research in archaeology - particularly prehistoric - held in the State of Minas Gerais (central Brazil) since the nineteenth century. After the pioneering phase (P. W. Lund, and some nonprofessional people) some international missions focused the Lagoa Santa region in the third quarter of the twentieth century, while a PRONAPA team made a preliminary survey in the upper valley of the Sao Francisco River. The beginning of more systematic research by the Instituto de Arqueologia Brasileira in the northern part of the State and the creation of the Department of Prehistoric Research at the Federal University of Minas Gerais (UFMG, Belo Horizonte) in the second half of the 1970s, open a phase of more intensive, regionally and thematically diverse research. The beginning of the XXI century is characterized by the proliferation of rescue archaeology, the emergence of new research centers and the creation of training courses for archaeologists at Federal University of Minas Gerais. The caves of the State are notorious by the importance of preservation of perishable materials and of human skeletal remains of great antiquity. The diversity and variety of regional industries, made from very different raw materials, are also important. The archaeology of historical period, very dynamic in the recent years, focuses much more colonial gold mining structures, fazendas and maroon slaves settlements than the archaeology of urbanization and Baroque monuments.