The Ancients
The Ancient Amazon
Thu, 07 Nov 2024 03:00:17 GMT
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Today, we often see the Amazon basin as an endless expanse of trees and rainforest. But 2,000 years ago, at the same time that great cities like Rome, Athens and Alexandria were at their height, this massive area of South America was home to a huge range of landscapes, biodiversity and ancient Amazonian civilisations.In this episode of The Ancients, Tristan Hughes is joined by author and journalist Laurence Blair - whose new book Patria: Lost Countries of South America is out today - to explore the extraordinary cultures that lived all across the ancient Amazon basin and unpack stories of agriculture, farming and fish-fuelled cities that go back 8,000 years.Presented by Tristan Hughes. The audio editor is Aidan Lonergan, it was produced by Joseph Knight. The senior producer is Anne-Marie Luff.The Ancients is a History Hit podcast.Enjoy unlimited access to award-winning original TV documentaries that are released weekly and AD-FREE podcasts. Sign up HERE for 50% off your first 3 months using code ‘ANCIENTS’. https://historyhit.com/subscriptionYou can take part in our listener survey here.
Chapter 1: What civilizations existed in the ancient Amazon?
It's polished, it's brightly painted. There are monkeys, there are serpents. I think the key thing to bear in mind, this isn't just crockery. This stuff is really crucial because it shows us that these aren't people who were scratching at living or kind of frozen in time.
These are sedentary cosmopolitan societies that have enough food and enough fuel and material to support this kind of industry of artists and artisans.
I mean, Lawrence, you call it a crucible of civilization, this particular area, and you've highlighted some of the archaeology there with that pottery. And it's interesting that it depicts some of those animals that they would have shared their world with. How far back does that archaeology go?
How far back in ancient history are we talking with people living, sedentary living, farming in that area of the world and creating all this beautiful stuff?
Yeah, that boundary is being pushed back further and further every year. But we're looking at some really dense terra preta deposits from about 6,000 years ago. And actually the oldest ceramics that have ever been found anywhere in the Americas, north or south, actually were found in the Amazon. And they seem to date back to about 7,000 years ago.
And even going even further back, we have plant materials, you know, fossilized seeds, food waste, which goes back 9,000 years ago. And I think this is also the other kind of secret substance, the other kind of key ingredient, which is really perhaps explains the flourishing of these Amazonian civilizations.
It seems as though ancient Amazonians were actually improving and adapting forests around them. Archaeologists have identified at least 80 species. We're talking about cassava, sweet potato, Brazil nuts, peppers, fruits, palms, tobacco.
Oh, different crop types that they were cultivating.
Exactly. So taking a kind of wild variety and then experimenting with it, propagating it, planting it, you know, until you get the best kind of yields. I don't know if, Tristan, have you ever tried a kind of purplish fruit called acai?
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Chapter 2: How was the Amazon shaped by ancient cultures?
We were molded and molded by the woods. To sum up this stuff on the plant domestication, The rainforest today perhaps has an estimated 400 billion trees. The cautious estimate is that around 10% of them, 40 billion, are there because of humans. And some would put that figure a lot higher and say that we're basically looking at a domesticated forest.
Oh, that is extraordinary. I think you've also revealed how there is still so much to explore, as I mentioned at the beginning, about this topic and how we are.
Today, really just scratching the surface, but giving a great overview and insight and more people can explore this further because there are so many stories, so many archaeological stories yet to be discovered or to be brought to the fore from the ancient Amazon, which is extraordinary.
But let's move on because, as you said, we've talked about the plants, the trees, that part, that important part of the Amazon. But there is one big feature that we haven't really covered yet or we've just covered a bit in passing is a transport method, which is, of course... The river Amazon. Now, Lawrence, we talked about, you know, getting food from the land and soil.
What about the fruits of the rivers, the fruits of the river Amazon? Do we know about that with these ancient civilizations in the Amazon?
Absolutely, Tristan. Yeah, I mean, if you go to the Amazon today, I mean, right now there's a really bad drought, unfortunately, which maybe we'll talk about in a bit. But they really bring us home how much people, even today, depend on the rivers of the rainforest, not just the Amazon, the Sol de Moist, the Rio Negro.
This is really a life that's lived on the water or in close contact with the water. Fish is your main kind of protein source. So it's natural, of course, that people would have really depended on that. centuries or millennia ago.
To set the scene for your listeners, if you take the ferry down the Rio Amazon today, you set off from Manaus, you sling your hammock, you find a little spot to squeeze in there amongst the passengers. It takes you about five days to get down to the mouth of the Amazon. a place called Belem, which is actually where the COP conference, the climate conference, is going to be held next year.
And so you have this big city on the one hand. On the left, you have this place called Marechal Island, which is this kind of Switzerland-sized landmass. And it's actually there which one of the rainforest's longest-lasting civilizations emerged. And again, we have the same pattern as with Ecuador. You know, Brazilian scholars noted that, okay, there was some hillocks here.
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