Crossing the Borders: New Methods and Techniques in the Study of Archaeological Materials from the Caribbean

Table 13.3. Continued
Caribbean Paleoethnobotany / 185
Archaic Age Early Ceramic Age Later Ceramic Age
GA LA BTC SC GA LA BTC SC GA LA BTC SC
x
x
x
[x] x [x]
x
x
x
x x x
x
x
x
x
x
3
Member of the cosmopolitan weed ®ora.
4
Taxon is believed to have been introduced or dispersed
from outside the region. 5 Taxon may be introduced, naturalized, or native (uncertain).
x
x
effects of periodic natural disturbances. At the very least, even simple baseline
information about environmental context is necessary to appreciate the circumstances
with which past inhabitants of the region coped on a daily basis, not to
mention how they may have responded to specific environmental issues and disasters
(see Alley 2000; Diamond 2005) and changed their environments.
A number of circum- Caribbean paleoecological records are now available in
increasingly higher resolution. For example, a significant cyclical and multi scalar
drought history has been documented for Central America (Curtis et al. 1996;
Curtis et al. 2001; Hodell et al. 1995; Hodell et al. 2001; Hodell et al. 2005; Peterson
and Haug 2005; and see Black et al. 1999; Haug et al. 2001, 2003), and this has been
compared with micropaleontological and geochemical records from the Caribbean
itself (Curtis and Hodell 1993; Higuera- Gundy 1991; Kjellmark 1996; Nyberg et al.
2001; Street- Perrott et al. 1993). A recent study by Beets and colleagues (2006) of
oxygen and carbon isotopic variation in the shells of land snails recovered from
Anse à la Gourde, Guadeloupe, is a superb example. The study produced a chronological
record of annual and seasonal moisture fluctuation and proceeded to link
the climate variability with separate episodes of human occupation on the island.
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