Origin of pre-Columbian guinea pigs from Caribbean archeological sites revealed through genetic analysis

Abstract

Sometime after A.D.500, Ceramic Age populations traveling by canoe introduced domestic guinea pig (Cavia porcellus) from the mainland of South America to the Greater and Lesser Antilles as well as to the southern ABC (Aruba, Bonaire, Curaçao) islands. Pre-Columbian archeological specimens of guinea pig have been found on 18 sites on nine islands where disarticulated remains occur as food refuse. To identify the geographic origin of these animals, we extracted and analyzed ancient mitochondrial DNA of individual archeological guinea pigs (C.porcellus) from three sites. Two individuals each are from the sites of Finca Valencia and Tibes on Puerto Rico and one individual is from the Grand Bay site on Carriacou in the Lesser Antilles. The archeological contexts of the guinea pigs and the chronometric dates of these sites along with the genetic analysis lead us to hypothesize that guinea pigs were introduced initially to Puerto Rico from the modern-day region of Colombia. The genetic data, the first published on a pre-Columbian domestic animal from the Caribbean, allow us to infer direct human movement between the Caribbean Antilles and northwestern South America. These preliminary genetic data are parsimonious with archeological information regarding migration, exchange, and inter-island interaction that took place in the West Indies beginning approximately A.D.600. These interactions contributed to the post-A.D.500 cultural heterogeneity found in the Caribbean.