Life in the Atacama Desert 10.000 years ago, as told by a tiny black obsidian tool

Abstract

A fresh obsidian edge can be extremely sharp, as little as one molecule thick. Andean societies were quite familiar with the high quality of this volcanic glass, using it not only in weapons for warfare and hunting but also in surgical and trepanning instruments. Furthermore, its beauty and unusual brightness encouraged the manufacture of ornaments and prestige goods – often exchanged through caravan traffic. Among the archaeological remains of the Atacama Desert, an ancient industry of small obsidian perforators reveals the predilection of early nomadic hunter-gatherers for rocks of this kind. Using an inter-disciplinary approach that combined technological studies with proteomic and compositional analyses, we reconstructed the biography of some of these objects. Barely a few centimetres in size, these fragile but sharp stone tools constitute a true archive of the past that tells us about the way of life in the Atacama Desert 10.000 years ago.