T213 The History of Humans and the Hydrologic System: Exploring Relationships between Cultures, Climate, and Hydrology through Time II

Tuesday, 11 October 2011
1:30 PM - 5:30 PM
Room 101FG

LAS CARITAS, ENRIQUILLO VALLEY, SOUTHWESTERN DOMINICAN REPUBLIC: IS THERE A LINK BETWEEN THIS TAINO INDIAN PETROGLYPH SITE AND SPRINGS?

Paper number: T213-6
Program: Technical Sessions
Time: 2:45 PM – 3:00 PM

Authors

Abstract

Las Caritas (Little Faces) is a Taino Indian petroglyph site located on a cliff face overlooking Lake Enriquillo in the southwestern Dominican Republic, along steep northern slopes of the Enriquillo Valley. The site is a natural rock shelter made in bioherms built by serpulid worm tubes that formed impressive two-tiered structures with individual mounds >2 m tall and coated with an outer layer of calcareous tufa up to 20 cm thick. Mounds formed along the paleoshoreline of Lake Enriquillo under variable environmental conditions during and subsequent to a Caribbean seaway closure, which produced the lake about 2000 BC. With decreasing lake levels, microbially induced tufa precipitated on these mounds, and as the lake evaporated to ~40 m below present sea level the mounds were exposed and their tufa coating became a unique substrate for carving Taino petroglyphs about 500-1500 AD. At Las Caritas some petroglyphs may have also been made between 1519 and 1533 when Chief Enriquillo led Tainos into this inhospitable desert region during a revolt against Spanish rule.

The Las Caritas site has the greatest concentration and largest variety of petroglyphs in the area. Most petroglyphs represent anthropomorphic motifs and many are simple face-shaped figures carved as single deep grooves in the porous tufa material. The petroglyphs are rare archaeological evidence of Taino inhabitation in this area. The arid climate may have prevented extensive agriculture and establishment of permanent settlements, but Taino probably utilized Lake Enriquillo as a resource (e.g., fish, iguanas, crocodiles, birds), although due to its hypersalinity they likely relied on springs for freshwater.

Interestingly, exposed between Miocene limestone bedrock and serpulid/tufa mounds at Las Caritas are unique circular to elliptical laminated travertine stromatolite structures interpreted as spring precipitates. It is possible that, among other reasons, the Taino chose this site for its proximity to springs that were probably related to the same system of freshwater discharge into the lake that provided favorable conditions for development of large serpulid mounds and thick tufa precipitate several millennia earlier. Future surveys of petroglyph distribution relative to present and past spring location could be used to test this hypothesis.