Recent archaeo-palaeontological findings from Barranca del Muerto site, Santiago Chazumba, Oaxaca, México

Abstract

Abstract This article presents the first results of an archaeo-palaeontological study which began in 2007 at the sites of Chazumba I and II in the Barranca del Muerto, located in the Sierra Madre del Sur (Santiago Chazumba, Oaxaca, Mexico). The excavation work is part of a larger international cooperation project titled “Biodiversity and Quaternary hunter–gatherer societies from Mexico”, led by the Institut de Paleoecologia Humana i Evolucio Social (IPHES, Tarragona, Spain) and the Instituto Nacional de Antropologia e Historia of Mexico. The main objective of the project is to study hunter–gatherer groups and their relationships with Pleistocene fauna and rock art. To date, five excavation campaigns have been carried out (2007, 2008, 2010, 2013, 2014), which have primarily yielded faunal remains from the Late Pleistocene and from within a still undetermined period during the Rancholabrean Age (NALMA). The fauna is represented by megaherbivores (giant sloth, glyptodont and gomphothere, among others) and mesoherbivores (deer, prong-horns, horses and even small mammals, reptiles and amphibians). Some lithic materials have been recovered in association with these remains and several fossils have been examined to determine the presence of cut marks. There is an AMS 14C date of 27,720–27,500 cal BP obtained from a charcoal sample from sediments on top of the bone layers. Further sample assays are warranted in order to confirm the antiquity of the archaeological assemblage.