Dialogues in Cuban Archaeology

166 / La Rosa Corzo
interesting aspects of cimarrón daily life. Until now, however, subsistence
remains have not been analyzed even though the study of faunal remains
has become an important standard of modern archaeological investigations
(Gutiérrez and Iglesias 1996; Jiménez and Cooke 2001).
Convinced that the analysis of these remains recovered from excavations
of cimarrón shelters could provide evidence for the use of faunal resources and
cultural factors linked to this use, the author selected ¤ve sites located in the
westernmost and central areas of the mountain range for study. According to
the artifact analysis, the occupations of these sites have been dated to the ¤rst
half of the nineteenth century. 5
The sites were selected based on the criteria that excavation of most of the
living areas and all stratigraphic levels had been complete, reliable excavation
records were available, and there was little evidence of postdepositional disturbance.
Four sites were selected from the easternmost end of the Alturas del
Norte of La Habana-Matanzas, an area also known as Sierra del Esperón. The
¤rst site, called Cimarrón 1, is a small cave with a single entrance, a living area
of 3 × 4 m, and two hearths. One of the hearths contained abundant food
remains; the other had glass and ceramic vessels, a rustic smoking pipe, and
the remains of a shackle. This site is located on the northern slopes of the
Sierra. The Cimarrón 2 site consists of a rock shelter measuring 14 × 5 m and
has one hearth located near one of the shelter’s three entrances. The hearth
contained food remains, one machete, one knife, and ceramic and glass containers.
The third site, Cimarrón 3, consisted of a rocky overhang on the edge
of the north face. While the occupation area is of only about 1 m 2 , the position
of the site is advantageous as an observation point. In a hearth that covered
most of the site, food remains and fragments of glass and ceramic containers
were unearthed. Cimarrón 5, the fourth site in this part of the survey
area, consists of a cave 13 × 5 m located on the south side of the highest area
of the mountain ranges. The site produced food remains and fragments of a
rustic handmade ceramic that has been the subject of previous studies by the
author (La Rosa 1999). The ¤fth site, La Cachimba, located in the central part
of the mountain range, is a large cavern with several entrances, an interior
space of 4 × 3 m, two hearths and abundant remains of ceramics and glass,
and two rustic smoking pipes (La Rosa 1991a, 1999).
Since the sites are located in extremely inaccessible locations and do not
seem to have suffered measurable postdepositional alterations, detailed attention
was paid to the exact location of the faunal and food remains within the
restricted spaces of the caves and overhangs. This type of information allowed