Native Americans of Middle and South America

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Land and Habitat

The Caribbean and Northern Andes culture area is a tropical region that extends over a huge area between the Tropic of Cancer and the equator. In the north lie the Antilles islands, which run in a chain from the larger islands of Cuba and Hispaniola down through the tiny volcanic islands of the Lesser Antilles to Trinidad and Tobago. The western part of the area includes the rugged volcanic uplands of Central America to the south of Mesoamerica, from Honduras through Panama. The southern part of the area lies in South America and includes the northern Andes and adjacent coasts of Ecuador and Colombia, as well as the mountains of northern Venezuela and extensive savanna grasslands north of the Orinoco River.

Although the volcanic soils of the Lesser Antilles and Central America are rich and well watered, the Caribbean and Northern Andes culture area generally lacks extensive areas of land suitable for agriculture. Rainfall is heavy throughout the Antilles and Central America, and increases to even greater amounts along the Pacific coast of Colombia and Ecuador, where extensive mangrove swamps are found. In general, human settlement was sparsest in these swampy areas and in the llanos, a Spanish term for the savannas of Venezuela and Colombia. Throughout the rest of the culture area, the development of agriculture in prehistoric times allowed larger populations. However, compared to Mesoamerican and Central Andean peoples, native groups were confined to relatively smaller and more isolated local habitats.

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People and Languages

At the time of European contact the larger indigenous groups of the Caribbean and Northern Andes culture area included the Ciboney, Taíno (Island Arawak), and Carib, of the Antilles islands; the Jicaque, Kuna, Lenca, Miskito (Mosquito), and Cuna-Cueva, of Central America; the Chibcha (Muisca), San Agustín, Pasto, Esmeralda, Manta, and Colorado, of the Andes and coastal regions of Colombia and Ecuador; and the Tairona, Kogi, Goajiro, Caquetío, Motilones, Paez, and Warrau, of the Caribbean coast and highlands of Colombia and Venezuela. Major language families included Arawakan, Cariban, Chibchan, and Paezan. The last two language groups were confined to smaller regions of the culture area, whereas the Arawakan and Cariban languages extended beyond the culture area to include northern areas of the Amazon Basin.

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Early Peoples

Judging from archaeological excavations at sites in Colombia and Venezuela, hunter-gatherer groups reached the southern part of the Caribbean and Northern Andes culture area by some 12,000 years ago. For example, at Tequendama rock shelter in the Colombian highlands, human occupation dating to this time period includes stone tools and hearths found in association with the remains of deer, rabbit, armadillo, and guinea pig. An even earlier date of 13,000 years ago has been claimed for a mastodon kill at the site of Taima-Taima along the Venezuela coast, but the evidence for this claim is controversial. By 10,000 years ago, it is likely that humans were dispersed throughout most of the mainland area. The Caribbean islands were apparently inhabited much later; the earliest evidence of human settlement there traces to only 5,000 to 6,000 years ago.

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The origin of agriculture in the Caribbean and Northern Andes culture area is uncertain. Current evidence suggests that important food crops such as maize (corn), beans, squash, and potatoes were first domesticated in Mesoamerica and the central Andes, and that people living between these regions probably received these crops through trade, rather than domesticating the wild plants themselves. There is direct evidence for maize cultivation by about 2300 bc at the Real Alto site on the southwest coast of Ecuador. It is possible, however, that people of the northern Andes domesticated manioc, a starchy root. By about 1100 bc people at the Malambo site on the Caribbean coast of Colombia had developed clay griddles called budares, which are associated with the processing of manioc. At the site of Momil in northern Colombia, maize grinding stones replaced budares around 100 bc, suggesting that maize had replaced manioc as a staple by that time. In the Caribbean islands, manioc cultivation probably began around 250 bc, after agricultural peoples in northern Venezuela had begun migrating to the Lesser Antilles.

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Diet and Subsistence

Most of the people throughout the central and northern parts of the Caribbean and Northern Andes culture area practiced small-scale irrigation farming. Crops were watered by canals or by flooding. In the highland areas, the Chibcha and other peoples grew nutritious and productive crops, such as maize, potatoes, and quinoa (a high-protein grain), that supported large numbers of people. In the moist lowlands, the staple crop was manioc. Other foods of the lowlands and middle altitudes included tropical fruits, yams, sweet potatoes, beans, peanuts, and maize. In the Santa Marta mountain range in northern Colombia, the Tairona exploited resources at a variety of altitudes. They fished from the Caribbean Sea, built extensive rock-faced terraces to make steep land suitable for farming, and planted fruit trees in the tropical forest to supplement a diet already rich in proteins and carbohydrates.

Most peoples hunted and fished to supplement farming. The primary hunting weapon was the bow and arrow. To paralyze or kill their prey, hunters tipped their arrows with poison derived from rotted animals rather than with the plant poisons used in other parts of South America. For fishing, men used nets and hooks; they also placed poisons in the water to stun fish, which were then easily collected from the surface.

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Social and Political Organization

By about 1000 ad the Caribbean and Northern Andean peoples had developed a way of life centered around towns and cities, whose populations usually did not exceed several thousand people. Most societies were chiefdoms, or groups in which people were divided into at least two main strata, or classes: a chiefly elite and non-chiefly commoners. A person’s social rank was determined at birth by the class of his or her family. Local chiefs ruled towns and tribes, some of which were grouped into confederations with tens of thousands of subjects. The chief lived a life of idleness and luxury. He lived with several wives in the largest residence in town, was waited on by servants, and was carried around in a litter (a fancy seat or mat carried by teams of men). In some areas the chief had the power of life and death over his subjects, and at his death, some of his wives, concubines, and slaves might be sacrificed. The largest chiefdoms were those of the Chibcha, who formed the largest and most highly developed society between Mexico and Peru. Chibcha culture developed after ad 1200 and flourished until the arrival of the Spaniards in 1537. The largest Chibcha cities were located near the present-day cities of Bogotá and Tunja in Colombia.

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