News in Brief Archaeology

Excavations show hunter-gatherers lived in the Amazon more than 10,000 years ago

Foragers may have laid the groundwork for farming’s ascent thousands of years later

FORAGERS ARISE  Human skeletons such as this one, recovered from graves in the southwestern Amazon, contribute to evidence that hunter-gatherers lived in the area from around 10,600 to 4,000 years ago.

J. Capriles/PSU

By Bruce Bower

- More than 2 years ago

Hunter-gatherers occupied the southwestern Amazon rainforest by around 10,600 years ago — at least several thousand years earlier than previously thought.