Documenting 12,000 Years of Coastal Occupation on the Osmore Littoral, Peru

Abstract

The history of coastal settlement in Peru beginning ca. 12,000 years ago provides insight into maritime adaptations and regional specialization. We document the Late Paleoindian to Archaic occupational history along the Osmore River coastal plain near Ilo with 95 radiocarbon dates from eight sites. Site distribution suggests that settlement shifted linearly along the coast, possibly in relation to the productivity of coastal springs. Marine foods, raw materials, and freshwater were sufficient to sustain coastal foragers for over 12 millennia. Despite climatic changes at the end of the Pleistocene and during the Middle Holocene, we found no evidence for a hiatus in coastal occupation, in contrast to parts of highland northern Chile and areas of coastal Peru for the same time period. Coastal abandonment was a localized phenomenon rather than one that occurred across vast areas of the South Central Andean littoral. Our finds suggest that regional adaptation to specific habitats began with initial colonization and endured through time.