5,000-year-old spear-throwers used to hunt camelids in Chile

Wooden hunting tools discovered in an ancient settlement in northern Chile’s Atacama Desert have been identified as spear-throwers used by the coastal peoples to hunt wild camelids. A recent study has reexamined them and the radiocarbon results date them to around 5,000 years ago. Archaeologists believe they were used to hunt guanacos and vicuñas, wild relatives of llamas who inhabited the area.

A variety of wooden objects were discovered during excavations at Caleta Huelén 42 archaeological site between 1971 and 1973. The settlement was at the mouth of the Loa River, just a half mile from the Pacific coast. The Atacama Desert, one of the world’s driest, meets the ocean there. The arid conditions preserved organize materials, including 12 carved wood objects and other tools employed by the Late Archaic marine hunter-gatherers who lived there between 6000 and 4000 years ago.

Under dwelling floors and in densely-packed middens, archaeologists unearthed collective burials with grave goods including textiles, pipes and hunting tools, plus tools used to catch fish including fishing line, hooks, harpoons and weights.

The most complete example from Caleta Huelén 42 is approximately 28 centimetres long. It retains a carefully shaped handle and part of a bone hook secured with a loop of leather or sinew.

Seven of the nine studied objects share a recognisable design: a defined handle, a flattened central body and a narrower projection that once held or supported the dart. Some contain grooves that may have helped position the projectile, while two have small perforations near their handles, possibly for attaching a cord or improving the hunter’s grip.

They were not simple pieces of carved wood. Their makers combined dense hardwood with bone hooks, leather or sinew bindings and, in some cases, red pigment. The surfaces were scraped or polished until they became smooth and regular. The variety of components visible in the collection shows that these were carefully assembled technical instruments rather than roughly fashioned sticks.

That raised the question of what spear-throwers would have been used for by people who fished hunted marine animals. They already had specialized harpoons. Land animals, camelids specifically, were native to the region and their remains have been found at other coastal sites.

Some of their bones were transformed into tools used in the maritime economy, including components for harpoons and fishhooks. Hunting animals inland may therefore have supported life at the coast in ways that extended far beyond food.

Evidence from the interior Andes strengthens this interpretation. Rock art and archaeological finds show hunters using darts and spear-throwers to capture camelids. Similarities between the Chilean objects and a spear-thrower found roughly 500 kilometres away near the Doncellas River in north-western Argentina may also reflect exchanges of knowledge between coastal and inland communities.

* This article was originally published here