As it says on the tin. When people think of alt domestication centers in America they think the pacific Northwest, eastern seaboard, Mississsipi, Southwest ETC. But I don't see people thinking about the Rio De La Plata basin in South America. The region has Pineapple, Guanaco, Peccary, Cabybara and Potatoes can be imported from Peru. So, how would a society in the river basin develop?
WI: Rio De La Plata/Parana agricultural cradle?
- Thread starter Light Jammings
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You are right that the Rio de la Plata region has potential. Cassava or manioc would work as a founder crop, the guanaco and peccary could be domesticated and there's tons of hystricomorphs that could be domesticated. You also have paca, pacarana, agouti and potentially copyu/nutria. and spiny rats. Mashua, oca , ulluco and yacon seem indigenous to that region. You could have a decent civilization spring up and with the river system they might develop as traders of sorts.
The trouble I always have with these "agricultural cradle" topics is if various plants and animals can be domesticated to produce a civilization, why weren't they? What was stopping them?
Not trying to shoot it down or anything, I'm just trying to understand what the lines of thought are in terms of how a civilization can be born. My understanding was that ancient tribal societies were often near starvation and would eat just about anything they could get their hands on, so no plant or animal was beyond their attempts to domesticate for more efficient food sources.
Not trying to shoot it down or anything, I'm just trying to understand what the lines of thought are in terms of how a civilization can be born. My understanding was that ancient tribal societies were often near starvation and would eat just about anything they could get their hands on, so no plant or animal was beyond their attempts to domesticate for more efficient food sources.
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You're about right.
The main problem with civilization in the American continents is lack of draft animals, even the most poor peasant in the old world would borrow a plough and an animal to cultivate the lands, the Chinese plough together with seed drill could cultivate upto 5 hectares of land per day, by 1200 AD almost all the major civilization in the old world had technology to plough large amount of land in a short period of time.
For any civilization in the Americas to have a robust agricultural system you need some draft animals, although inca, mayans etc had robust population just think about the possibility with draft animals.
Theres still Hunter Gather peoples today they often live next to farmers and pastoralits in Africa. In fact Hunter Gathers were often healthier than there Early Farming counter parts.
The old Jared Diamond polemic If it could be farmed it would have been. Ignore that is not much different than Early crops and has about the same potential.
It's not so much "what was stopping them" as "what was causing it in other places". A theory I've read is that large scale agriculture was adopted in the old world out of crisis, when overhunting and changing climate made hunting and gathering impossible to sustain the population. Then it turned out that agriculture produced a larger surplus, causing population growth and making it impossible to return to the old form of sustenance. "What was stopping them" was probably that there was no need to, and humans for the longest time have preferred for things to remain as they are.
Interesting, good point. Does anyone familiar with the area know if there are any well-known pre-Columbian settlements in the Pampas on the level of the Mississippian burial mounds, ie. Cahokia?
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None that I've been able to find; Cahokia was fueled by maize agriculture, but the temperate pampas at least did not have agriculture at all, though agriculture did exist further north on the Parana.
If potatoes are introduced, there is a possibility for a very dense, even China-like level of population to develop on the humid pampas since this region is so fertile it allows twice-yearly harvests. With additional crops like chenopodium and llamas providing labor and wool, there will be masses of people crowding what's now Argentina.
The trick is getting these agricultural systems introduced. Between the humid pampas and the Andes are deserts and tropical savanna/forest environments where potato agriculture just isn't going to work, blocking gradual diffusion, and with the mild climate of the region there's just not much incentive for hunter-gatherers to change their lifestyle. Perhaps an ancient Andean civilization collapsing at a different time could send agriculturalist refugees into the lowlands, in search of a land of milk and honey?
What about semi-nomadic and sedentary agriculturalists like much of North America?
Or maybe could we see something like the Mississippi?
Or maybe could we see something like the Mississippi?
For a Mississippi-style civilization, the right mutation of maize could see the crop spread into the temperate south. This is not something that happens often, though; it took almost 2,000 years for the North Americans to create strains of maize that could grow in temperate climates well enough to provide the calories for the Mississippian culture. And once again, there's the problem of adoption; Native Americans living in a similar environment in California did not abandon their traditional lifestyles for maize agriculture, because there was no reason for them to. So Natives living along the lower Parana may not adopt maize agriculture even if they do have the opportunity.
Semi-nomadic llama herders and agriculturalists could be fun. I think that sort of lifestyle could develop in the drier parts of the pampas.
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Well, there are concrete evidences of the existence of a native culture with similar characteristics to the Mississippi, burial mounds (in a broad sense) which seems to be developed by thousands of years along the territories of today's Uruguay and south of the Río Grande (Brazil) according to still ongoing Archaeological/Anthropological investigations.
From the Wiki:
Also, perhaps this Paper (in Spanish) could be useful and/or to give more and better info.
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I imagine a palm focused agro-forestry complex based on a series of Butia-Syagrus hybrids and mutants.
Butia sp. and syagrus romanzoffiana naturally hybridize, it’s been observed in the wild of Uruguay with Butia lallemantii a non-trunking subterranean Butia species.
Thus it’s likely natural and artificial hybrids could exist as well with indigenous communities.
The seeds of all Butia and Syagrus as edible, basically miniature coconuts, there are edible fruits that can be made into alcohol, immature leaves eaten as vegetables, sap that can be made into alcohol and according to one sourcw Syagrus Romanzoffiana trunks can be harvested for a “sago”
I can see it being much like Bactris gasipaes which was a major staple up in southern Central America and northern South America where it was such an important foodstuff that the Spanish destroyed 30,000 to starve the indigenous population.
So hybrids or mutants could retain its non-trunking characteristics to provide greens, some could be tall and have golf ball or orange fruit sized seeds with thin fruit like a coconut, others can be seedless midsized/dwarf and eaten as a starchy fruit before it fully ripens and sweetens.
I can see it being a very reliant food source able to handle the flooding so common in the region.
it could be replicate the many uses of the coconut which was basically one of the most important plants in Southeast Asia and Oceania leading to a plethora of opportunities like boat making and coastal travel.
Butia sp. and syagrus romanzoffiana naturally hybridize, it’s been observed in the wild of Uruguay with Butia lallemantii a non-trunking subterranean Butia species.
Thus it’s likely natural and artificial hybrids could exist as well with indigenous communities.
The seeds of all Butia and Syagrus as edible, basically miniature coconuts, there are edible fruits that can be made into alcohol, immature leaves eaten as vegetables, sap that can be made into alcohol and according to one sourcw Syagrus Romanzoffiana trunks can be harvested for a “sago”
I can see it being much like Bactris gasipaes which was a major staple up in southern Central America and northern South America where it was such an important foodstuff that the Spanish destroyed 30,000 to starve the indigenous population.
So hybrids or mutants could retain its non-trunking characteristics to provide greens, some could be tall and have golf ball or orange fruit sized seeds with thin fruit like a coconut, others can be seedless midsized/dwarf and eaten as a starchy fruit before it fully ripens and sweetens.
I can see it being a very reliant food source able to handle the flooding so common in the region.
it could be replicate the many uses of the coconut which was basically one of the most important plants in Southeast Asia and Oceania leading to a plethora of opportunities like boat making and coastal travel.
How far south could this palm agriculture spread? According to the wiki article northern Uruguay seems to be the southern fringe of their distribution, but there are species of palm trees that have adapted to California IIRC, so could the farmers establish arbocultures of edible palms into the Buenos Aires region?
Most def.
Butia is the second cold hardiest cocoid/fan palm after Jubaea the Chilean wine palm.
8a is the upper limits, but by the time it reaches Chile and mixes with Jubaea it can get to 7b easy.
But recognize that it would take about 10-15 years in cool/warmish summer (rather than warm/hot summers), cool winter environments such as the Valdivian forests to fruit, but once it did you’d have a 100+ year crop if it’s a mixed.
The Pampa does have a very strong herder and horse-rider culture in our world, so something similar is possible.
It's sad that llamas are too small compared to horses though. The mental image of gaúchos riding llamas is hilarious to me.
That's actually good for developing the package-a palm arborist culture moving south and finding that getting food security is taking longer and longer to establish are likely to innovate, either domesticating local wild plants or accepting 'foreign' crops from neighboring peoples in the Andes.
As a Jared Diamond fanboy I am guilty of overstating the importance of domestic animals, but a surviving horse scenario would be great for what OP wants-if domesticated, it can provide meat, milk*, and labor, and eventually become the basis of a horseback-based civilization on the pampas. For just llamas, I was imagining a culture that looks like the Maasai, driving their herds on foot from grazing ground to grazing ground, following a set pattern.
*more limited use tho since horses aren't great milk producers and their milk is SUPER lactose intensive
This thread has generated a lot of discussion! and I am greatful for that 
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.The Pampas is a pretty good place for a horseback civilisation, yes, but tbh the whole "native American wank cuz they got horses" is a bit cliche at this point, although I am a fan of alternate domestications and all that. Domesticated Pecciaries, anyone?