The Campo Laborde site: New evidence for the Holocene survival of Pleistocene megafauna in the Argentine Pampas
Abstract Investigations have been carried out at the Campo Laborde archaeological site in the Argentine Pampas. Some issues related to Pleistocene extinctions and the survivals of some species of megafauna into the Early Holocene are discussed. At the site of Campo Laborde, abundant bones of giant ground sloth Megatherium americanum some from other Pleistocene fauna Doedicurus sp. and Neosclerocaliyptus sp. and very few from extant fauna (e.g. vizcacha Lagostomus maximus Patagonian hare Dolichotis patagonum and peccary Tayassu sp. were found in association with two quartzite tools, 128 microlithic debris from different raw material and two informal bone tools. Each of the species is represented by only one individual and only one bone of M. americanum and one of D. patagonum show cut marks. Different lines of evidence suggest that Campo Laborde is a giant ground sloth procurement site on the border of an ancient swamp, where the prey was also initially butchered. One of the recovered tools is the stem of a broken bifacial projectile point, which would have been used as a hunting weapon. Based on the stratigraphic position, this site could date to the Early Holocene. Six AMS 14 C ages from M. americanum bone collagen, support this age although there is a wide chronological span between ca. 9700 and 6700 BP. The evidence obtained from Campo Laborde as well as from the La Moderna site indicates that some Pleistocene species such as giant ground sloth and some glyptodon D. clavicaudatus and Neosclerocaliyptus sp. survived in the Pampas until the Early Holocene. Therefore, these megafauna coexisted with early hunter gatherers for several millennia and were exploited.