Azul Pampa en etapas productivas

the general research carried out at azul pampa, humahuaca department, jujuy province, is the origin and development of an increasingly sedentary and productive way of life. this specific paper describes a survey made along the sapagua gorge, covering its width through six circular areas on both margins that were covered intensively. this gulch connects the inca cueva gorge with the humahuaca one (within the azul pampa microrregion), and was foreseen as holding possibly complementary sites to those placed at caves and rockshelters along the inca cueva gorge for the initial moments of the formative stage. this model was stated as of local ethnoarchaeological investigations. the foreseen function for these kind of open air sites would have been restricted agriculture in unwatered lands, complementary of the herding carried out preferably at the other locality, but that would have continued also at the alto sapagua gorge during the rest of the year. hunting would have been an activity carried out at both places. the six areas circled were selected for their interest after previous surveys, opinions of other colleagues that investigated at the place and regarding this problem before us, resources available, presence of old people villages ("antigales") that could held several successive occupations, rock art sites, etc. they appeared at different altitudes above sea level as we approached hornaditas, near de humahuaca gulch. we mapped, collected surface materials, made test pits and excavations. we also included mateials collected by landowners and revised official collections. we found several sites considered as "formative" by the north west argentina archaeological tradition, some of which were near heaps of stones possibly made when cleaning the fields for agriculture purposes, with supposedly "diagnostic" artifacts on their surface. the problem is that these kinds of materials were signalled as formative for very distant areas. the sites appeared at both margins of