Dialogues in Cuban Archaeology

Subsistence of Cimarrones / 171
9.5. Distribution of bone and fragment sizes by site
burning was 100, or 12 percent of the sample, indicating that burnt elements
were not prevalent. In fact, the great majority of burnt bones are vertebrae,
phalanges, tarsals, and calcaneus, which suggests that they were burned when
thrown near the hearth, where they were found by our team, and not by the
process of food preparation. The small size of the burned bones and their
location in the hearth, together with the fact that the rest of the bones, including
the large ones, did not present any evidence of burning and were
located dispersed within the shelter, suggest that most of the food was not
cooked by direct exposure to the ¤re. The abundant presence of ceramic vessels
in the hearths and in the rest of the area of occupation also supports the
use of containers for cooking. All this suggests that despite the poor subsistence
economy and marginal state of these groups, they retained soup-based
cooking traditions from Africa and the plantations that they escaped. Figure
9.8 shows the distribution of burnt bones by site.