From scratch. An essay for an archaeology of hunter-gatherers ways

Abstract

This essay compiles reflections on my practice of the archaeology of hunters and gatherers over fifty years. It brings together concepts that were shaped throughout that experience, related to field archaeology, lithic technology, and rock art; topics to which I specifically devoted myself.

I give particular importance to the role of discovery in shaping data -modifying previous premises and hypotheses- and to the microregional approach, which I defined in 1988 and applied to archaeological research in both the Atacama puna (Antofagasta de la Sierra) and the south-central Andean Patagonia (Río Pinturas).

In both areas, in order to trace the traces of those ancient hunters among nearby microenvironments with different subsistence resources, I used the typology of lithic artifacts and the styles of their expressions in rock art - representations and visual images - as indicators of those traces.