UMaine Discovery Spices Up Ancient Menus
Contact: Dan Sandweiss (207) 581-1889; David Munson (207) 581-3777
ORONO, Maine — Ancient food remains discovered in Peru by UMaine anthropologist Dan Sandweiss are helping not only to push back the frontiers of agriculture in the Americas, but to further our understanding of how humans ate as much as 8000 years ago. Cutting edge microfossil analysis performed by Smithsonian archeobiologist Linda Perry and her team on samples collected by Sandweiss and his students at a dig site near Wynuna, Peru suggest that ancient cultures were growing chili peppers, in addition to corn and other staples, to spice up their diets thousands of years ago.
A study by Perry, Sandweiss and others, recently published in the journal Science, traces the history of the cultivated pepper through seven archeological sites around the world. Sandweiss’s samples from Peru were the spark that inspired the project, and were the only hot peppers in the study that could be identified to the species level.
“What we are seeing is a consistent association between corn and hot peppers in ancient agriculture, creating what is really a plant complex,” said Sandweiss, who collected the microparticles of starch that that reveled the presence of cultivated peppers at the site. “Analysis of the starch particles gives us the ability to extend the record of pepper cultivation where there are no preserved dry remains.”
Sandweiss has made microfossil collection an important part of his research since the late 1990’s, working closely with Delores Piperno and Linda Perry of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History to unravel the often-complex microscopic record hidden in ancient middens and the pores of grinding tools. His collaborative, multidisciplinary approach has led to several important discoveries related to early agriculture in the Americas, helping scientists and historians better understand the roles played by peppers, gourds and corn in world agriculture.
“A tremendous amount of return has come from an excavation that was only 14 days long. The dig site itself was only 1.5 square meters, but it has been very productive,” said Sandweiss. “I think that the ongoing success of the project really underscores the fruitfulness of an interdisciplinary approach. It can often be the discoveries you don’t expect that can be most important.”