Monte Verde

Monte Verde II represents a campsite with wooden tent-like structures that was later covered by a bog, sealing the site under a layer of anaerobic peat. The occupants of the site made rope and utilized animal skins, and consumed a variety of plant foods, including seaweed (despite the site being 60 kilometres (37 mi) from the ocean at the time), tubers, seeds, fruits and nuts. Remains at the site suggest that the occupants also butchered now extinct megafauna, including the gomphothere (elephant-relative) Notiomastodon and the llama Palaeolama. Surovell et al. (2026) argued that the campsite itself is middle Holocene (no older than 8,200 years BP), and that Pleistocene elements found within the site had been redeposited. The conclusions of this study have been contested by other scholars. Other sites have been reported elsewhere in the Americas of similar and generally accepted pre-Clovis age to Monte Verde II, including Paisley Caves and Cooper's Ferry.

Paleoecological evidence of the coastal landscape's ability to sustain human life has been used to support a "coastal migration" model for the initial peopling of the Americas. Dating of rock surfaces and animal bones suggests the coastal corridor was deglaciated and became habitable after 17,000 years BP. Although testing coastal migration theories can be difficult due to sea level rise since the Last Glacial Maximum, archaeologists are increasingly willing to accept the possibility that the initial settlement of the Americas occurred via coastlines.

History

Discovery

The site was discovered in late 1975 when a veterinary student visited the area of Monte Verde, where severe erosion was occurring due to logging. Prior to the logging, the site itself had been preserved well due to the favorable conditions created by the Chinchihuapi creek banks. The student was shown a strange "cow bone" collected by nearby farmers who had found it exposed in the eroded Chinchihuapi Creek. The bone later proved to be from Notiomastodon, a gomphothere related to modern elephants. Tom Dillehay, an American anthropologist and professor at the Universidad Austral de Chile at the time, started excavating Monte Verde in 1977.

The site is situated on the banks of Chinchihuapi Creek, a tributary of the Maullín River located 36 miles (58 km) from the Pacific Ocean. One of the rare open-air prehistoric sites found so far in the Americas, Monte Verde was well preserved because it was located in an anaerobic bog environment near the creek. A short time after the site was originally occupied, the waters of the creek rose and a peat-filled bog formed that inhibited the bacterial decay of organic material and preserved many perishable artifacts and other items for millennia.

Radiocarbon dating of bones and charcoal in 1982 gave the site an average age of 14,800 BP, more than 1,000 years earlier than the oldest-known site of human habitation in the Americas at that time.

In the initial excavation, two large hearths and many small ones were found. The remains of local animals were discovered, in addition to wooden posts from approximately twelve huts. Scraps of clothing made of hide were also found. This led archaeologists to estimate the population was around 20–30 inhabitants. A human footprint was also observed in the clay, probably from a 70 kg (150 lb) adult.

Stratigraphy

The area consists of four distinct sites, Monte Verde I, Monte Verde II, Chinchihuapi I, and Chinchihuapi II.

The Monte Verde site has two distinct levels. The date of the upper level, MV-II, has been suggested to be the Late Pleistocene by Dillehay and colleagues, though other researchers suggested that it cannot be older than the middle Holocene.

The lower level, MV-I, is less well understood. It was more ephemeral, having come from ancient river sediments. Dillehay found charcoal scatters which may have been the remains of fireplaces next to stone and wood artifacts. These were dated to at least 33,000BP. He acknowledges MV-I has issues, such as uncertain artifacts, doubtful radiocarbon dates, and unreliable contexts. He hesistates to accept this level without additional evidence, including sites of similar age in the Americas.

Monte Verde I (MV-I)

Monte Verde I is located under an outwash plain, which formed during the last glaciation. It is not directly below MV-II. It was first concluded to be a site of human occupation because of three clay-lined burned areas and 26 stones, 13 of which may have been modified by humans. In 2013, Dillehay and his team returned to perform another excavation at Monte Verde due to the inadequate previous excavations. In 2015, Monte Verde I was re-dated to around 18,500 to 14,500 BP. Charcoal remains, charred animal bone fragments and several lithic artifacts, about 34% of which were derived from non-local sources, were discovered. The older end of this range is controversial, however, as it is based on putative lithic tools which some have suggested are instead naturally occurring objects.

Monte Verde II (MV-II)

The site is suggested to have been occupied by about twenty to thirty people. A twenty-foot-long tent-like structure of wood and animal hides was erected on the banks of the creek and was framed with logs and planks staked in the ground, making walls of poles covered with animal hides. Using ropes made of local reeds, the hides were tied to the poles creating separate living quarters within the main structure. Outside the tent-like structure, two large hearths had been built for community usage, most probably for tool making and craftwork.

Each of the living quarters had a brazier pit lined with clay. Around those hearths, many stone tools and remnants of spilled seeds, nuts, and berries were found. A 13,000-year-old specimen of the wild potato, Solanum maglia, was also found at the site; these remains, the oldest on record for any species of potato, wild or cultivated, suggest that southern Chile was one of the two main centres for the evolution of Solanum tuberosum tuberosum, the common potato. Remains of forty-five different edible plant species were found within the site, over a fifth of them originating from up to 150 miles (240 km) away. This suggested that the people of Monte Verde either had traded on or traveled regularly in this extended network.

Other important finds from this site include human coprolites, a footprint, assumed to have been made by a child, stone tools, and cordage. Dr. Dillehay obtained the date for this site by radiocarbon dating charcoal and bone found within the site.

At Monte Verde II, seven partial carcasses of Notiomastodon, alongside remains of a single individual of the extinct llama Palaeolama show evidence of butchery, with some of these carcasses having preserved meat tissue still adhered to them.

In the May 9, 2008 issue of Science, a team reported that they identified nine species of seaweed and marine algae recovered from hearths and other areas in the ancient settlement. The seaweed samples were directly dated between 14,220 and 13,980 years ago.

However, Surovell et al. (2026) estimated a date of 11,000 years BP for the Lepué Tephra which is stratigraphically below the MV-II, indicating that it should be older than MV-II. The authors noted the erosional contact that represents missing time between layers contrary to Dillehay and colleagues, and they suggested that many Late Pleistocene wood and organic matter from the site are likely representing reworked material. Thus, they argued that the site cannot be dated to be older than the middle Holocene. This hypothesis has later been challenged by Dillehay.

Chinchihuapi I and Chinchihuapi II

These sites, located approximately 500 meters upstream from the Monte Verde sites along the same river, have been dated to about 14,500 BP. Similar materials, including burned areas and fragmentary scorched animal bones, along with small rock flakes, have been recovered. Dillehay and his team conducted excavations between the sites, using test pits and core drillings. They discovered 12 small burned features directly associated with both burned and unburned animal remains, manuport stones, and anthropologically modified flakes, which were dated between 18,500 BP and 14,500 BP. These findings likely indicate seasonal activities in the area. Up until 2019, Dillehay has conducted two additional excavations at the Chinchihuapi site, revealing the presence of lithic tools and flakes, as well as burned features associated with burned animal and plant remains in CH-I.