ROCK HILL, SOUTH CAROLINA – The archaeology field started calling to Winthrop University faculty member Lauren Kohut in the fourth grade to learn about secrets hidden in the past. She channels that fascination today to help understand the ancient effects of climate change in Peru in one of the deepest canyons in the world.
Part of a three-person team recently awarded a $292,000 National Science Foundation grant, the Winthrop assistant professor of geology will travel to Colca Canyon in southern Peru for the next three summers to collect data along the area’s stepped terraces. The landscape measures 14,000 feet from its highest point in the Andes Mountains to its lowest point.
Working with Kohut are Binghamton University Associate Professor BrieAnna Langlie and Cornell University Assistant Professor Matthew Velasco. Each brings a particular set of skills to the project. Langlie is a paleoethnobotanist who focuses on ancient agriculture, particularly plants, while Velasco has expertise studying ancient populations through the analysis of their skeletal remains.
Kohut uses geospatial methodologies—including GIS and spatial analysis, remote sensing, and born-digital data collection (UAV mapping, in-field GIS, photogrammetry)—along with traditional archaeological field techniques to understand the relationships between humans and their environment. Four students will help her this spring semester in Winthrop’s new GIS lab to format what data is already available on the canyon from hand drawn pages from Kohut’s previous trips to Peru.
Group Studying the Late Intermediate Period
Their national grant focuses on a particular time in history: a 350-year period of warfare, climate instability, and political transformation in the South American highland Andes known as the Late Intermediate Period (1100 – 1450 CE). For more than 100 years during this era, South America saw cooler temperatures and increased droughts, as well as violence and warfare between communities.
The purpose of the grant is to find out how the dramatic shift in climate and chaotic period of war contributed to increasing inequality, and whether lessons from that era can be applied to solve today’s challenges. Kohut said communities in the region are already feeling the impacts of a changing climate and extreme weather events.
“Our record of the past is incomplete,” she said.
Terraces Used to Plant Crops
The Indigenous people of the Colca Valley farm their land depending on its elevation. “The changes are very significant,” Kohut said. “They have a lot of elevation in very short distances and have access to lots of growing zones.”
In the lowest valley areas, farmers can grow tropical fruit trees. Going up the canyon, there is fertile ground for maize, then higher up for a wide variety of types of potatoes and quinoa. The domestic animals – llamas and alpacas – are found at the hilltops, where only grasses grow. “There is a long history of raising these animals for food and their fiber,” Kohut said, adding that the animals’ hair is woven into yarn for clothes. The animals are highly susceptible to cold and don’t produce offspring very quickly, so a wipeout of the animals takes significant time to replace them.
Despite decades of archaeological research in the region, there is still a lot that archaeologists don’t know about how farmers reformulated their agricultural systems during this period of climate stress, including how herders and farmers in the region interacted. They also want to gain a better understanding of whether and how hilltop fortifications were used to protect their land.
When the researchers head to Colca Canyon in June and July, the climate will be dry and it will be winter in the Andes. It also is good timing for the community because the team’s excavations won’t jeopardize any crops.
Climate Change Profoundly Affects the Region
One of the driving forces for the grant is that today’s climate change has profoundly impacted the region, Kohut said. “We’re seeing the rainy season, which is normally from November to April, become more unpredictable,” she said. For instance, some farming areas were destroyed by a 2020 landslide that affected the livelihoods of about 10,000 families.
“We see today that communities are dealing with drought and some of the same issues as the Late Intermediate Period where there were growing inequities. How did they navigate those challenges?” Kohut said.
The grant team expects to draw on the expertise of the community and its farmers to understand how lessons from the past can help today’s society prepare for the future. They will also build on an existing partnership with Casa Cultural de Colca, a community organization in that region of Peru. It runs a museum where the research team plans to co-create displays about their findings, with an eye toward highlighting the effects of climate change.
All three team members have research experience in Peru.
Kohut Discovered Love of Mountains
Kohut has been traveling to South America since 2005 when she participated in a college study abroad program in Chile. Once she started graduate school, she conducted her first archaeological trip to Peru and discovered a love for its mountains. “It gives me a different perspective with its landscape,” she said. “There are no trees and you constantly have a huge vista in front of you.”
The group hopes its work can contribute to better understanding of what took place 1,000 years ago. Kohut said it has long been assumed that under trying conditions, farmers adopt more diverse and dispersed farming and herding strategies, resulting in limited wealth and inequality.
“Yet, this traditional account makes simplistic assumptions about the relationship between food production, the environment and sociopolitical complexity,” she said. “Can intensive farming persist despite conditions of drought, warfare and political instability? Conversely, can the adoption of more diverse subsistence strategies actually lead to widening social inequality?”
For more information, contact Kohut at kohutl@winthrop.edu.
