Uruguay - Pre-History
Uruguay's rich history spans more than 11,000 years. On the wetlands of Rocha, declared by UNESCO as one of the most diverse environments on Earth, mound-building people thrived 4000 years ago. They built planned villages, made pottery and other tools, grew corn, squash, beans, and tubers, and developed an elaborate belief system. The Late Quaternary palaeo-climate record based on pollen and phytolith analyses indicates that t the mid-Holocene (6,600 to ca. 4,000 bp) was a period of environmental flux and increased aridity.
The area of Chamangá, located in the Province of Flores is characterized for having the greatest concentration of pictographic sites from Uruguay. The potential of this place in relation to these type of archeological areas is confirmed day after day with the constant increase in the number of rupestrian representations findings. More than 40 rock paintings have been registered up until the moment. These artistic sites are found in open areas where granite blocks were used as support for the production of paintings. These round-shaped granite blocks are common in the center and south part of the country, surrounded by a landscape of plains and hilly lands.
In this archeological area that entails 100 km2 approximately, the relationships between the painted blocks and their archeological context have been considered as well as their development within this frame that constitutes a cultural scenery called the rock paintings area of Chamangá. The pictographs are characterized by abstract representations with varied geometrical motives and the monochrome within the nuances of the red. They have been estimated to be more than two thousand years old.
Some particular cases of paintings with miniature style as well as fine engravings are distinguished accurately. Besides the high density of pictographs, the archeological investigations - although still insufficient - have determined the existence of a varied archeological register. The latter includes: polished lithic materials, pottery, as well as quarry sites. The data taken from the archeological investigations indicate that the area was temporary occupied by groups of hunters-collectors-fishermen.
Archaeological monuments in Uruguay are not visually impressive - but their research might change the way we look on the past of South America. Last decade has brought new discoveries and now it seems to be possible that several thousand years ago here developed ancient agricultural societies.
Los Ajos in Rocha is a prehistoric village - complex system of mounds, built around 1000 - 500 BC. This archaeological monument testifies that in the past in this area of South America developed indigenous agricultural society.
The occupational history of the Los Ajos site developed from the creation of a household-based community integrating a centralized communal space during the Preceramic Mound Component (ca. 4,190 - 3,000/2,500 bp) to the Ceramic Mound Component (ca- 3,000/2,500 bp to the Contact Period), where Los Ajos acquired a strong public ritual character through the formatilisation and spatial segregation of its mounded architecture.
During the Ceramic Mound Period, the site exhibited both internal stratification (inner versus outer precincts) and dual asymmetrical architecture in its central sector, which suggest the emergence of incipient social differentiation. This also marked the earliest occurrence of at least two domesticated crops in the region: corn (Zea mays) and squash (Cucurbita spp.), showing that the early Formative societies adopted a mixed economy shortly after 4,200 bp.
Collectively, these results challenge the long-standing view that the La Plata Basin was a marginal area by evidencing an early and idiosyncratic emergence of social complexity never before registered in this region of South America.
El Valle del Hilo de la Vida [The Valley of the Thread of Life] is in the Department of Lavalleja, at kilometer 346 of the Panoramic Route (number 12). It is only three kilometers from the city of Minas and 75 kilometers from Punta del Este. Hikers can observe in the ascent to the Black Mountain something very special. On the northwest slope are distributed (almost ninety) mounds formed with stones, oriented all towards the west. Some are almost three meters high. They are formed by slab stone, flat, small, laid without material, one on top of another, and yet they are part of a structure that remained standing for more than a thousand years.
These unique and mysterious formations can also be found in three other sites of the Department of Lavalleja. In all these places common characteristics are distinguished: all the formations are oriented to the west and are in the proximity of a slope. But what is even more remarkable is that the four zones are arranged in such a way that from the sky they form a cross.
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