A plant microfossil record of Late Quaternary environments and human activity from Rano Aroi and surroundings, Easter Island
Tóm tắt
To investigate past vegetation change and human activity at the highest elevations on Easter Island, this study examines pollen, phytoliths, diatoms, starch and arthropods preserved in sediment/soil profiles from Rano Aroi crater, and another, newly described wetland in the adjacent, much smaller Rano Aroi Iti depression. A Bayesian age–depth model for Rano Aroi provides adequate certainty for the Late Pleistocene and last ~1000 years, but is poorly constrained from 12,000 to 1000 cal BP. The occurrence of cf. Potamogeton and Lycopodium pollen types at this highland site (~425 m altitude), while absent or rare at lowland sites, could well be related to the cooler higher altitude conditions. Smaller quantities of Arecaceae (palm) pollen than at lowland sites indicate that this relatively high-altitude part of the island was near the altitudinal forest limit in the Late Pleistocene, with extensive Asteraceae-dominated shrubland. Arecaceae forest dominated the Holocene, for which there is evidence for a prolonged dry phase. The subsequent disappearance of charcoal and reappearance of diatoms, particularly Eunotia cf. pectinalis, suggest that the dry phase ended prior to human settlement. Polynesian activity is best constrained by abundant microscopic charcoal fragments beginning in a layer at 710 (2σ: 645–797) cal BP, and suggesting a period of forest clearance and burning, culminating at 339 (2σ: 177–428) cal BP. Thinner soils compared with lowland horticultural sites and 14C dates of macroscopic Sophora charcoal suggest that the site was occupied after 1670 CE. Newly described terraces, and pollen, phytoliths and starch of cf. Broussonetia
papyrifera (paper mulberry), cf. Colocasia
esculenta (taro) and Musa (banana) sp. identified in this study show the value of a combined microfossil approach and provide evidence for extension of cultivation of these Polynesian-introduced cultigens to this least accessible part of the island. Rano Aroi Iti yielded a Bayesian 14C age–depth chronology to a basal age of 1530–1314 cal BP, giving an unexpectedly old age for presumably introduced New World pollen of Sisyrinchium, which occurs throughout the core.
Tài liệu tham khảo
Azizi G, Flenley JR (2008) The last glacial maximum climatic conditions on Easter Island. Quat Int 184:166–176
Baer A, Ladefoged TN, Stevenson CM, Haoa S (2008) The surface rock gardens of prehistoric Rapa Nui. Rapa Nui J 22:102–109
Baisden WT, Prior CA, Chambers D, Canessa S, Phillips A, Bertrand C, Zondervan A, Turnbull JC, Kaiser J, Bruhn F (2013) Rafter radiocarbon sample preparation and data flow: accommodating enhanced throughput and precision. Nucl Instrum Meth B 294:194–198
Blaauw M, Christen JA (2011) Flexible paleoclimate age–depth models using an autoregressive gamma process. Bayesian Anal 6:457–474
Brown FBH (1935) Flora of southeastern Polynesia. III. Dicotyledons. Bernice P. Bishop Museum. Bulletin 130:1–386
Butler KR, Flenley JR (2010) The Rano Kau 2 pollen diagram: palaeoecology revealed. Rapa Nui J 24:5–10
Cañellas-Boltà N, Rull V, Sáez A, Margalef O, Giralt S, Pueyo JJ, Birks HH, Birks HJB, Pla-Rabes S (2012) Macrofossils in Raraku Lake (Easter Island) integrated with sedimentary and geochemical records: towards a palaeoecological synthesis for the last 34,000 years. Quat Sci Rev 34:113–126
Cañellas-Boltà N, Rull V, Sáez A, Margalef O, Bao R (2013) Vegetation changes and human settlement of Easter Island during the last millennia: a multiproxy study of the Lake Raraku sediments. Quat Sci Rev 72:36–48
Cummings LS (1998) A review of recent pollen and phytolith studies from various contexts on Easter Island. In: Stevenson CM, Lee G, Morin FJ (eds) Easter Island in Pacific context. Easter Island Foundation, Los Osos, pp 100–106
Diamond JM (2005) Collapse: how societies choose to fail or succeed. Viking Press, New York
Diamond JM (2007) Easter Island revisited. Nature 317:1692–1694
Dumont HJ, Cocquyt C, Fontugne M, Arnold M, Reyss J-L, Bloemendal J, Oldfield F, Steenbergen CLM, Korthals HJ, Zeeb BA (1998) The end of moai quarrying and its effect on Lake Rano Raraku, Easter Island. J Paleolimnol 20:409–422
Ehrlich PR, Ehrlich AH (2013) Can a collapse of global civilization be avoided? Proc R Soc B 280:20122845
Etienne M, Michea G, Diaz E (1982) Flora, vegetacion y potential pastoral de Isla de Pascua. Boletin Tecnico No. 47. Universidad de Chile, Santiago
Flenley JR, King ASM, Teller JT, Prentice ME, Jackson J, Chew C (1991) Late Quaternary vegetational and climatic history of Easter Island. J Quat Sci 6:85–115
Gonzàlez C, Dupont LM, Behling H, Wefer G (2008) Neotropical response to rapid climate change during the last glacial: palynological evidence from the Cariaco Basin. Quat Res 69:217–230
Gonzalez-Ferran O, Mazzuoli R, Lahsen A (2004) Geología del complejo volcánico Isla de Pascua, Rapa Nui, Chile: V Región Valparaiso. Carta Geológica- Volcánica Isla de Pascua. Centro de Estudios Volcanologicos, Santiago
Goodwin ID, Browning SA, Anderson AJ (2014) Climate windows for Polynesian voyaging to New Zealand and Easter Island. Proc Natl Acad Sci 111:14716–14721
Grimm EC (1987) CONISS: a FORTRAN 77 program for stratigraphically constrained cluster analysis by the method of incremental sum of squares. Comput Geosci 13:13–35
Grolle R (2002) The Hepaticae of the Easter Island (Chile). The Bryologist 105:126–127
Heyerdahl T (1961) An introduction to Easter Island. In: Heyerdahl T, Ferdon E (eds) Reports of the Norwegian archaeological expedition to Easter Island and the East Pacific, vol 1. Allen and Unwin, London, pp 21–90
Hobbs WO, Lalonde SV, Vinebrooke RD, Konhauser KO, Weidmann RP, Graham MD, Wolfe AP (2010) Algal-silica cycling and pigment diagenesis in recent lake sediments: mechanisms and paleoecological implications. J Paleolimnol 44:613–628
Hogg AG, Hua Q, Blackwell PG, Niu M, Buck CE, Guilderson TP, Heaton TJ, Palmer JG, Reimer PJ, Reimer RW, Turney CSM, Zimmerman SRH (2013) SHCal13 Southern Hemisphere calibration, 0–50,000 years cal BP. Radiocarbon 55:1889–1903
Horrocks M (2005) A combined procedure for recovering phytoliths and starch residues from soils, sedimentary deposits and similar materials. J Archaeol Sci 32:1169–1175
Horrocks M, Wozniak JA (2008) Plant microfossil analysis reveals disturbed forest and a mixed-crop, dryland production system at Te Niu, Easter Island. J Archaeol Sci 35:126–142
Horrocks M, Baisden WT, Flenley J, Feek D, Nualart LG, Haoa-Cardinali S, Gorman TE (2012a) Fossil plant remains at Rano Raraku, Easter Island’s statue quarry: direct evidence of a former elevated lake level and ancient Polynesian horticulture. J Paleolimnol 48:767–783
Horrocks M, Baisden WT, Nieuwoudt MK, Flenley J, Feek D, Nualart LG, Haoa-Cardinali S, Gorman TE (2012b) Microfossils of Polynesian cultigens in lake sediment cores from Rano Kau, Easter Island. J Paleolimnol 47:185–204
Horrocks M, Marra M, Baisden WT, Flenley J, Feek D, Nualart LG, Haoa-Cardinali S, Gorman TE (2013) Pollen, phytoliths, arthropods and high-resolution 14C sampling from Rano Kau, Easter Island: evidence for late Quaternary environments, ant (Formicidae) distributions and human activity. J Paleolimnol 50:417–432
Hunt TL, Lipo CP (2006) Late colonization of Easter Island. Science 31:1603–1606
Kahn JG, Horrocks M, Nieuwoudt MK (2014) Agriculture, domestic production, and site function: micro-fossil analyses and late prehistoric landscapes of the Society Islands. Econ Bot 68:246–263
King ASM (1987) The Late Quaternary Vegetation of Easter Island. Unpubl. MSc Thesis, University of Hull
Ladefoged TN, Stevenson CM, Haoa S, Mulrooney M, Puleston C, Vitousek PM, Chadwick OA (2010) Soil nutrient analysis of Rapa Nui gardening. Archaeol Oceania 45:80–85
Ladefoged TN, Flaws A, Stevenson CM (2013) The distribution of rock gardens on Rapa Nui (Easter Island) as determined from satellite imagery. J Archaeol Sci 40:1203–1212
Louwagie G, Stevenson CM, Langohr R (2006) The impact of moderate to marginal land suitability on prehistoric agricultural production and models of adaptive strategies for Easter Island (Rapa Nui, Chile). J Anthropol Archaeol 25:290–317
Loy TH, Spriggs M, Wickler S (1992) Direct evidence for human use of plants 28,000 years ago: starch residues on stone artefacts from the northern Solomon Islands. Antiquity 66:898–912
Mann D, Edwards J, Chase J, Beck W, Reanier R, Mass M, Finney B, Loret J (2008) Drought, vegetation change, and human history on Rapa Nui (Isla de Pascua, Easter Island). Quat Res 69:16–28
Margalef O, Cañellas-Boltà N, Pla-Rabes S, Giralt S, Pueyo JJ, Joosten H, Rull V, Buchaca T, Hernández A, Valero-Garcés BL, Moreno A, Sáez A (2013) A 70,000 year multiproxy record of climatic and environmental change from Rano Aroi peatland (Easter Island). Glob Plant Change 108:72–84
Margalef O, Martínez Cortizas A, Kylander M, Pla-Rabes S, Cañellas-Boltà N, Pueyo JJ, Sáez A, Valero-Garcés BL, Giralt S (2014) Environmental processes in Rano Aroi (Easter Island) peat geochemistry forced by climate variability during the last 70 kyr. Palaeogeogr Palaeoclimatol Palaeoecol 414:438–450
Marra MJ (2013) Pleistocene beetles in New Zealand. In: Elias SA (ed) Encyclopaedia of Quaternary science, 2nd edn. Elsevier, London, pp 244–254
Mieth A, Bork H-R (2005) History, origin and extent of soil erosion on Easter Island (Rapa Nui). Catena 63:244–260
Moore PD, Webb JA, Collinson ME (1991) Pollen analysis, 2nd edn. Blackwell Scientific, London
Mulrooney MA (2013) An island-wide assessment of the chronology of settlement and land use on Rapa Nui (Easter Island) based on radiocarbon data. J Archaeol Sci 40:4377–4399
Niemann H, Behling H (2008) Late Quaternary vegetation, climate, and fire dynamics inferred from the El Tiro record in the southeastern Ecuadorian Andes. J Quat Sci 23:203–212
Orliac C (2000) The woody vegetation of Easter Island between the early 14th and the mid-17th centuries AD. In: Stevenson CM, Ayres WS (eds) Easter Island archaeology: research on early Rapa Nui culture. Easter Island Foundation, Los Osos, pp 211–220
Orliac C, Orliac M (1998) The disappearance of Easter Island’s forest: over-exploitation or climatic catastrophe. In: Stevenson CM, Lee G, Morin FJ (eds) Easter Island in Pacific context. Easter Island Foundation, Los Osos, pp 129–134
Overland A, Hjelle KL (2009) From forest to open pastures and fields—cultural landscape development in western Norway inferred from two pollen records representing different spatial scales of vegetation. Veg Hist Archaeobot 18:459–476
Peteet D, Beck W, Ortiz J, O’Connell S, Kurdyla D, Mann D (2003) Rapid vegetational and sediment change from Rano Aroi Crater, Easter Island. In: Loret J, Tanacredi JT (eds) Easter Island: Scientific exploration into the World’s environmental problems in microcosm. Kluwer, New York, pp 81–92
Piperno DR (2006) Phytoliths: a comprehensive guide for archaeologists and paleoecologists. Altamira Press, Lanham
Rull V, Caňellas-Boltá N, Sáez A, Giralt S, Pla S, Margalef O (2010) Paleoecology of Easter Island: evidence and uncertainties. Earth-Sci Rev 99:50–60
Rull V, Caňellas-Boltá N, Sáez A, Margalef O, Bao R, Pla-Rabes S, Valero-Carcés B, Giralt S (2013) Challenging Easter Island’s collapse: the need for interdisciplinary synergies. Front Ecol Evol. doi:10.3389/fevo.2013.00003
Seidemann J (1966) Stärke-atlas. Paul Parey, Berlin
Skottsberg C (1956) Derivation of the flora and fauna of Juan Fernandez and Easter Islands, vol 1. Almqvist and Wiksells, Uppsala
Stevenson CM (1997) Archaeological investigations on Easter Island. Maunga Tari: an upland agricultural complex. The Easter Island Foundation, Bearsville and Cloud Mountain Presses, Los Osos
Stevenson CM, Haoa S (1998) Prehistoric gardening systems and agricultural intensification in the La Perouse area of Easter Island. In: Stevenson MC, Lee G, Morin FJ (eds) Easter Island in Pacific context. Easter Island Foundation, Los Osos, pp 205–213
Stevenson CM, Ladefoged TN, Haoa S, Guerra A (2005) Managed agricultural production in the Vaitea Region of Rapa Nui, Chile. In: Stevenson CM, Ramírez Aliaga JM, Morin FJ, Barbacci N (eds) Papers. VI International Conference on Easter Island/VI Congreso internacional sobre Rapa Nui y el Pacifico. Easter Island Foundation, Los Osos, pp 125–136
Stevenson CM, Jackson TL, Mieth A, Bork H-R, Ladefoged TN (2006) Prehistoric and early historic agriculture at Maunga Orito, Easter Island (Rapa Nui), Chile. Antiquity 80:919–936
Stevenson CM, Puleston CO, Vitousek PM, Chadwick OA, Haoa S, Ladefoged TN (2015) Variation in Rapa Nui (Easter Island) land use indicates production and population peaks prior to European contact. P Natl Acad Sci USA 112:1025–1030
Stockmarr J (1972) Tablets with spores used in absolute pollen analysis. Pollen Spores 13:615–621
Thornton PE, Running SW, White MA (1997) Generating surfaces of daily meteorological variables over large regions of complex terrain. J Hydrol 190:214–251
Torrence R, Barton H (eds) (2006) Ancient starch research. Left Coast Press, Walnut Creek
van Balgooy MMJ (1971) Plant geography of the Pacific. Blumea Suppl 6:1–222
van Dam H, Mertens A, Sinkeldam J (1994) A coded checklist and ecological indicator values of freshwater diatoms from the Netherlands. Neth J Aquat Ecol 28:117–133
van Steenis CGGJ, van Balgooy MMJ (1966) Pacific plant areas, vol. 2. Blumea Suppl 5:1–312
Van’t Veer R, Hooghiemstra H (2000) Montane forest evolution during the last 650,000 years in Colombia: a multivariate approach based on pollen record Funza-I. J Quat Sci 15:329–346
Van’t Veer R, Islebe G, Hooghiemstra H (2000) Climatic change during the Younger Dryas chron in northern South America: a test of the evidence. Quat Sci Rev 19:1821–1835
Wilmshurst JM, Eden DE, Froggatt PC (1999) Late Holocene forest disturbance in Gisborne, New Zealand: a comparison of terrestrial and marine pollen records. N Z J Bot 37:523–540
Wozniak JA (1999) Prehistoric horticultural practices on Easter Island: lithic mulched gardens and field systems. Rapa Nui J 13:95–99