Cultural Chronology of the Gulf of Chiriquí, Panamá

This field work was part of a much larger program lasting three years entitled "Interrelationships of New World Cultures" and organized by the Institute of Andean Research with financement from the National Science Foundation (Ekholm and Evans, 1962). Evidence of interconnection during the Formative period and at other points in time was sought in particular regions of the Intermediate area between Mesoamerica and South America. The PanamÈínian region surveyed is the Pacific coast from the Costa Rican border to the Colombian border. It was covered in two consecutive seasons. The first, in February through May of 1961, included the western coast and principal offshore islands from Punta Burica to Punta Mariato in the southwestern corner of the Azuero Peninsula. The second, in 1962, extended the work to cover coastal Darien. This is a report of the work done in the first season. The participants of the project were Dr. Charles R. McGimsey III of the University of Arkansas, as principal investigator, and two assistants, besides me, who were also graduate students at the time: Mr. William Bishop, geologist, and Mr. Freeman Mobley, ethnologist, both from the University of Arkansas. In four months we visited over 60 sites and tested 12 of these. To each of the sites that we recorded we assigned a letter-number combination. The letters designated the district, and the numbers, the sites in the order found. The site of El Cangrejal was thus given the code number SL-1, with SL standing for the district of San Lorenzo in the province of Chiriquí, and number 1 standing for the first site found in this district. Island sites could not be assigned to districts, so they were simply given a number preceded by the letters IS which stand for "isla." Thus, Isla Villalba became IS-7, Isla Palenque became IS-3, and Islas Las Secas became IS-11. Reported in this study are the four most important sites where the most concentrated work was done. These are the sites mentioned above, all of them located in the Chiriquí Gulf. Three are on islands, the fourth on the mainland. Distances between them vary. The closest to each other are Isla Villalba (IS-7) and El Cangrejal (SL-1), separated by 10 kilometers of water channels. The farthest away is Las Secas (IS-11); it is 37 kilometers from Isla Palenque (IS-3), 53 kilometers from Isla Villalba (IS-7), and 55 kilometers from El Cangrejal (SL-1). The three island sites are located on ridges in back of the beaches, often the highest spot available. The mainland site is on a high bank near the edge of an estuary. All four sites consist of middens formed by the deposition of abundant cultural materials: discarded pottery, stone tools, and the remains of marine and land fauna. These were choice locations and, to judge from the refuse, the occupation of them was continuous. Listed in summary form, the main aims of this report are as follows: (1) To establish a preliminary chronology for the Gulf of Chiriquí, based on local sequences of pottery; (2) to trace, in time and space, the cultural contacts of the inhabitants of these sites with each other and with peoples on the mainland; (3) to reconstruct as much as possible the manner of living and the subsistence patterns of the occupants of these sites; (4) to summarize ethnohistorical accounts of the area in an effort to tie these in with the terminal part of the archeological sequence; (5) to place the ChiriquÈ¡ phases in proper chronological relationship to other Panamanian sequences; and (6) to relate the chronology thus established to those of other lower Central American areas. Two approaches were used in our pottery classification. The first was a subdivision of the decorated sherds into types, differentiated from each other primarily by decorative treatment and secondarily by paste attributes. Their percentage frequencies were plotted by levels. Since the plain pottery does not always appear to show any distinctive differences in temper or paste, it was not divided into the full, conventional pottery type description, but instead was sorted into groups named A-J. Only one plain ware was distinctive enough to be described fully and was labeled Tarrago Bisquit Ware. Perhaps a larger sample from more sites in Chiriquí, or from sites with deeper stratified refuse, will eventually permit the detailed refinement of the plain wares, but for this study they receive secondary treatment even though the percentages were always calculated and actually show some interesting trends in the site seriation charts. There are also some small samples of pottery types that fit into the "Classical" Chiriquí wares known for so many decades from the large museum collections; they are listed under their well-known published names. The pottery type description follows the style established in earlier Smithsonian publications on the archeology of South America, with each type subdivided into the major categories of paste, surface, form, decoration, and chronological position. To these I have added one other category: geographical distribution and comparative materials. For the color identifications of paste or surfaces, words rather than the Munsell Color Chart have been used, for no more precise a code is needed to describe pottery with only simple paints, no polychrome, and variable firing. Hardness is stated in the Mohs scale. It is perhaps interesting to record how the rim profiles were drawn. To facilitate and increase the accuracy of the rim profile drawings, a section from each rim was cut with a blunt-edged carbide geological power saw at right angles to the lip. Unless the rim was badly mutilated, I always cut a section on the right side of the rim exterior so that, when drawn, all rim profiles faced in the same direction. By cutting the rim it was easy to trace the correct profile because it lay flat on the paper. A second method of analysis used in this report, first separately, and then in conjunction with the type approach, is a modal analysis of all appendages (supports and handles) found in each level of the pits. I have chosen to use "mode" to mean "a small group of inseparable attributes" because this is useful in making geographical comparisons. If, for example, a tripod foot shares a cluster of salient attributes with a tripod foot in another area, one can be reasonably certain that some kind of historical relationship, rather than mere chance, accounts for the similarities. In this study, modes have been kept separate from types by using different, though not mutually exclusive, criteria for classification. The main criterion used in the type approach is surface decoration; in the modal approach, the main criterion for distinguishing modes is shape. These criteria could just as well be reversed in another area. The result is that modes and types often crosscut, so that the same mode may appear in more than one type. This may have interesting cultural and chronological implications. The potters, conforming to standardized stylistic patterns (types), were able to isolate features (modes) in this pattern and reproduce them in another context. Chronologically, a mode that crosscuts two types may sometimes indicate contemporaneity as, for example, with Tripod Foot Mode e, which appears in two different but contemporaneous types. A separate modal approach, based on shape elements rather than on painted motifs, is particularly suited to an analysis of the Gulf of Chiriquí collections because this area belongs to a primarily plastic tradition. Paints and slips were used, to be sure, but vessels of the Gulf were not elaborately painted as they were in the CoclȨ-Azuero region. Rather, it is the shape of handles, supports, and rims, and the manner in which these were decorated with plastic motifs, such as applique strips, incisions, and punctations, that make Chiriquí pottery so enormously varied. Using a modal analysis had advantages of a very practical nature. Handles, feet, and supports are so distinctive that they can be recognized easily in any context. Since the surface collections (Ranere, Appendix 2) were made without any regard to randomness, they contain a disproportionate number of such fragments. A modal approach serves to relate these to the excavated collections. The distribution of certain modes beyond the Chiriquí Gulf has also offered important insights into the influences that came there from Costa Rica and from the central provinces of Panamá. In short, modes were used in this study as timemakers and as indices of geographical distribution. From them we could draw inferences concerning wider cultural contacts. I have used several criteria to interdigitate the site sequences and to mark off units of time into phases: (1) the appearance of new types in the stratigraphic columns; (2) marked contrasts in the percentage frequencies of pottery types; (3) the presence or absence of particular modes; (4) the association of types; and (5) the presence of trade wares from known areas. The use of these criteria was facilitated by the deep stratified sequence of Pit No. 3 at Site IS-3. A very distinctive type of pottery was strongly represented in the bottom levels, different types were associated with the intermediate levels, and the most recent levels were marked by the appearance of several new types. In addition, modes were absent from some levels and present in others, and trade pottery from several phases of the Cocle-Azuero area came in at different levels and served to confirm my phase divisions. The other three sites, none of which had the complete sequence represented, were therefore interdigitated with reference to IS-3. The assumption made was that all four sites were close enough geographically to show the same general chronological trends. Contrasts in the percentage frequencies of pottery types proved useful in coordinating pit levels within a site and in differentiating between units of levels in which certain types were heavily represented from units in which they were not. The pottery types are described by phase for easy reference, moving from the oldest to the most recent in the sequence. The modes are described separately. Stone tools and shell ornaments found at these sites were not used in establishing a tentative chronology because they did not show enough changes through time. Along with bones and mollusks, however, they are essential to our cultural reconstructions. A description of surface collections from 26 sites in the adjacent districts of San Felix and Remedios has been appended (Ranere, Appendix 2) to the body of the report, which describes our excavations, to enlarge the scope of this analysis. In this appendix Mr. Ranere has contributed ethnohistorical data and new insights into the archeological material, making his section an important part of this work. I would like to thank first Dr. Charles R. McGimsey III, principal investigator of the project, for inviting me to collaborate in the field work and for asking me to report and interpret the results. The success of the expedition was also due to Mr. William Bishop and Mr. Freeman Mobley, who were indefatigable in their search for sites and acute in their observations of the Panamanian countryside. The authorities of Panamá, as well as Dr. Alejandro Méndez, Director of the Museo Nacional, and Dra. Reina Torres de Araiiz, Professor of Anthropology at the University of PanamÈí, greatly supported the work by their kind cooperation. The entire survey was facilitated by cartographic aids provided by Ing. Amado Araiiz of the Subcomite del Darien and of the Pan American Highway Program. Ample laboratory space to analyze the collections was generously provided by Professor John Otis Brew, Director of the Peabody Museum of Archeology and Ethnology at Harvard University. A grant from the National Science Foundation and a Thaw Fellowship in the Peabody Museum permitted survival during the summer and fall of 1963, when the first, unrevised version of this monograph was being prepared as a doctoral dissertation (Linares, 1964). Drs. George Cowgill, James Gifford, and John Ladd were knowledgeable in their advice on how to handle particular problems in the analysis. Mr. Anthony J. Renere worked with me on the Chiriquí collections and expanded this study in his Appendix No. 2. Mrs. Alexandra W. de García-Bryce advised me on the latest sources for Latin American Archeology. Miss Margaret Currier of the Peabody Museum Library was helpful in the initial research. Mr. Arsen Charles took the photographs on plate 14. From Professor Gordon R. Willey of Harvard University, I have received endless encouragement through the years and most of my knowledge of New World Archeology. My intellectual debt to him is enormous. Expert advice was provided in 1964 by several investigators of the Museum of Comparative Zoology, Harvard University. Dr. W. J. Clench, Curator of Mollusks, guided my identifications of the shellfish material; Dr. E. E. Williams, Curator of Reptiles and Amphibians, sorted out at a glance any reptiles represented on a mass of tiny fragments. All mammal bones were identified by Mr. Charles Mack. Mr. William Bishop, geologist for the expedition, made the rock identifications while in the field, and the material identifications in the descriptions of stone artifacts are all his; his report on the geology of the coast, from which Mr. Ranere and I have quoted extensively, has been of additional value. Mrs. Charles R. McGimsey did the field cataloging of all materials collected and took the photographs of stone artifacts for plates 19 and 20. Dr. Clifford Evans and Dr. Betty J. Meggers of the Smithsonian Institution have spent countless hours over the last years teaching me to classify pottery, making suggestions about plans of research, and helping me in every phase of preparing this manuscript for publication. I cannot thank them enough for their generous help. Dr. Alexander Wetmore, Research Associate of the Smithsonian Institution, provided various maps from his vast collections that were the basis for the final maps produced in this report. To Mrs. Marcia P. Bakry, Scientific Illustrator of the Office of Anthropology, Museum of Natural History, I wish to express my appreciation for preparing the final copies of the maps and seriation charts. I have profited greatly from conversations with Dr. Claude F. Baudez of the Musée de l'Homme, regarding his archeological investigations in nearby Costa Rica. Recently, Dr. Roberto de la Guardia of the Museo Chiricano in David, Panamá, brought me up to date on finds in Chiriquí. In typical Latin American style, my work became a true family enterprise. Sr. Frank Linares Danz, my father, loaned a jeep to the expedition, and Sr. Guillermo Tribaldos, Jr., my grandfather, made his boat available to us. Sra. Olga Tribaldos de Linares, my mother, did the drawings of the artifacts, prepared an original version of the pottery type frequency charts, and typed this report twice, first as a dissertation, then as a manuscript for publication. Their interest in my work is immensely gratifying. I also thank my husband, J. David Sapir, for his patience and continuous encouragement. O. L. de S. Department of Anthropology University of Pennsylvania Philadelphia March 24, 1967