Dialogues in Cuban Archaeology

122 / Ulloa Hung
tance among the early ceramists at the same time that tropical forest environments
were gradually becoming quite important in the economy of these
groups. That is to say, the foraging mode of life was undergoing change, and
the forest began to be alternatively exploited so that the use of wild plants
such as the guáyiga or zamia in some contexts took on an important role in
subsistence of the group. According to Veloz, this transition from the exploitation
of mangroves toward a new productive model reformed millennia-old
traditions of the preceramic groups. Archaeological evidence shows an Archaic
people deliberately reorienting their economic patterns toward terrestrial
gathering, in which they more intensively exploited faunal resources.
It is helpful to consider some differences with regard to the Cuban context.
While in the island of Hispaniola early ceramic sites usually ¤t a well-de¤ned
pattern (especially those linked to the karst areas), in Cuba they tend to demonstrate
a greater variety of patterns, many consistent with those observed for
the traditional foraging communities. Also, analysis of the early pottery from
Santo Domingo exhibits a variety of types, suggesting that when these groups
received or began making ceramics, they had the appropriate socioeconomic
conditions for using them.
In the past few years, questions related to the earliest Dominican pottery
have expanded further as a result of new investigations. The study of Punta
Cana, located in the southeast corner of the island, produced very early dates
for an agricultural-ceramic population from the Greater Antilles, 340 and
240 b.c., providing evidence of an early occupation by these groups in Santo
Domingo. The Punta Cana investigations have been able to isolate three habitational
phases, extending its chronology into the ninth century a.d., demonstrating
that the locations had been used by farmers for centuries and supporting
the argument that they arrived in the Greater Antilles at the same time or
even earlier than in other islands of the Caribbean. Traditional manioc cultivation
is evidenced by the presence of the remains of burén dated to at least
340 b.c. For this reason, this settlement is not only one of the earliest agricultural
occupations in the Antillean arch but has also become a key site in the
explanation of the diffusion of the ¤rst ceramic types in Santo Domingo,
since its chronology coincides with most of the forager-ceramicist contexts in
the area.
However, the pottery patterns from the Punta Cana midden differ from
those traditionally assumed for the Saladoid ceramic series and share features
with the pottery of El Caimito, especially the incised types. This may suggest
a possible transmission of the ceramic technology from the ¤rst farmers of
Punta Cana to the foraging groups, who perhaps incorporated some elements