Fish provisioning on the eastern fringe of Beagle Channel (Tierra del Fuego, Argentina). An assessment of the zooarchaeological record from Bahia Moat

Abstract

Fish exploitation had a significant role for the subsistence of hunter-gatherer-fisher populations that inhabited the southern coast of Tierra del Fuego since middle Holocene times. During the late Holocene, these activities would have intensified through an increase in coastal fish exploitation and the expansion of foraging ranges for fishing offshore areas. This hypothesis is based on the study of many archaeological assemblages from the central Beagle Channel, but prehistoric fishing practices are poorly documented in other sectors of the Tierra del Fuego, in particular the eastern part of the island. Zooarchaeological records recovered from sites in the lo- cality of Heshkaia are presented to assess how fish contributed to the subsistence of hunter-gath- erer-fishers in this sector of the Fuegian archipelago. The area is placed in the bay of Moat, on the eastern sector of the Beagle Channel. Mostly quantitative variations have been documented on Heshkaia sites, for which possible explanations are tested. The data are discussed from a regional perspective and within a longer time frame, tak- ing into account the intensification process recorded on the Beagle Channel towards the late Holocene. Fish exploitation around Hehskaia during the late Holocene features an important representation of coastal fish in coastal sites. Unlike the recorded trend in the central area of Beagle Channel, the exploitation of pelagic resources is never documented on the ichthyoarchaeological assemblages we analyzed.