Phytolith and charcoal evidence for prehistoric slash-and-burn agriculture in the Darien rain forest of Panama

Abstract

Darien province, Panama, forming the landbridge between Central and South America, is an expanse of lowland tropical forest over 300 miles long and 100 miles wide about which little is known of its human or environmental history. The first palaeobotanical data from the region indicate a minimum date of 4000BP for the beginning of prolonged human habitation and prehistoric agriculture. Early systems of slash-and-burn cultivation included maize as a primary food plant and appear to have resulted in significant forest modification. An episode of forest regeneration shortly after 350 BP indicates indigenous population decline in the face of European influence, and suggests that the extant forest near the site is recent regrowth after long-term prehistoric occupation and agriculture.