Paleoethnobotany

The long term Taraco Archaeological Project conducted two excavation field seasons in 2022 and 2023 in the Early Formative period sectors of sites Chiripa, Chiriamaya, and Chiripata, located next to each other along the Taraco Peninsula, Lake Titicaca, Bolivia. The team conducted a range of collection strategies during the excavations, with a focus on contextual recording of artifact and ecofact material, systematically collecting archaeobotanical, zooarchaeological, and bio-archaeological material.

Certain loci within the Lake Titicaca Basin are thought to be significant to plant and animal domestication in the Andes; archaeological work has been conducted at key sites such as Chiripa, Lukurmata, and Wankarani in pursuit of knowledge surrounding the domestication transition by archaeologists of many subdisciplines. A base of knowledge regarding certain aspects of this transition has been established over the decades, particularly through the work of the Taraco Archaeological Project (TAP), yet many questions remain about its timing and context.

This research project involved travel to the community of Chiripa, Bolivia for the 2023 field season of the Taraco Archaeological Project. During the season, excavations were conducted at three sites in the Taraco Peninsula. Around 200 samples were processed via flotation, as well as about 60 which were processed via dry screening, yielding macrobotanical remains that were exported for anaysis at the McCown Archaeobotany Laboratory .