O mito da homogeneidade biológica na população paleoíndia de Lagoa Santa: implicações antropológicas
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1590/S0034-77012004000100005Keywords:
within-population variability, Paleoindians, Coeficient of Variation, genetic isolationAbstract
Since their first discovery in 1842-1843, by Peter Lund, the human skeletal remains from Lagoa Santa, Brazil, were destined to influence, substantially, the discussion about the settlement of the Americas, from a biological perspective. Until 1970 several authors have refered to these remains as a homogenous collection, implying that these individuals represented just one biological population or "race". Mello e Alvim (1977; see also Mello e Alvim et al., 1983-1984) was the first to use explicitly the term "homogeneity" as implying a very low intra-population diversity among these late paleoindians. For her, the extremely low diversity among the Lagoa Santa specimens could be explained only by a narrow bottle neck occuring during the occupation of the region, followed by geographic isolation from other contemporary groups. The idea of a extremely low diverse population in ancient Lagoa Santa led some brazilian archeologists to elaborate on the "isolation hypothesis", and to use it to explain local characteristics of material culture and social organization. In this paper we show that even very simple quantification techniques is able to demonstrate that the Lagoa Santa early inhabitants are among the most diverse populations in the planet, as it is normally the case with Late Pleistocene/Early Holocene hunter-gatherers.Downloads
Download data is not yet available.
Downloads
Published
2004-01-01
Issue
Section
Articles
License
Authors who intend to publish in this journal must agree with the following terms:
- a) Authors retain copyright and grant the journal the right of first publication. The work is simultaneously licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which allows the work to be shared as long as the author and the initial publication in this journal are appropriately credited.
- b) Authors are authorized to sign additional contracts for non-exclusive distribution of the version of the work published in this journal (e.g., to publish it as a book chapter), as long as the author and the initial publication in this journal are appropriately credited.
- c) Authors are allowed and encouraged to publish and distribute their work online (e.g. on their personal webpage) after the editorial process, for this can generate productive changes as well as increase the impact and citation of the work. See The Effect of Open Access Publications.
How to Cite
Neves, W. A., & Atui, J. P. V. (2004). O mito da homogeneidade biológica na população paleoíndia de Lagoa Santa: implicações antropológicas . Revista De Antropologia, 47(1), 159-205. https://doi.org/10.1590/S0034-77012004000100005