Did pre-Columbian populations of the Amazonian biome reach carrying capacity during the Late Holocene?

ABSTRACT: The increasingly better-known archaeological record of the Amazon basin, the Orinoco basin and the Guianas both questions the long-standing premise of a pristine tropical rainforest environment and also provides evidence for major biome-scale cultural and technological transitions prior to European colonization. Associated changes in pre-Columbian human population size and density, however, are poorly known and often estimated on the basis of unreliable assumptions and guesswork. Drawing on recent developments in the aggregate analysis of large radiocarbon databases, here we present and examine different proxies for relative population change between 1050 BC and AD 1500 within this broad region. By using a robust model testing approach, our analyses document that the growth of pre-Columbia

SUBMITTER: Arroyo-Kalin M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7741098 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature