Chantuto Archaeological Site facts for kids

The Chantuto Archaeological Site is a special place located in the Soconusco region, which is on the coast of Chiapas state in Mexico. This site is named after the ancient Chantuto people. They lived along the coast of southwestern Mexico, west of the modern town of Escuintla, Chiapas, a very long time ago – between 5500 and 1500 BC. That's about 7,500 to 3,500 years ago!

The Chantuto people mostly ate clams and fish. We know this because the places where they lived have huge piles of clam shells. These shell piles have been found at five different archaeological sites near lagoons. After the Chantuto culture, the Barra culture developed, followed by the Mokaya people.

Exploring the Chantuto Sites

Archaeologists have found five important sites linked to the Chantuto people. These sites are all located near lagoons, which are connected by a canal. At these spots, archaeologists discovered many shell middens. A shell midden is basically a giant pile of shells left behind by people who ate a lot of shellfish.

One of the main archaeologists, Philip Drucker, dug a test pit at one of these sites. He dug down 2.5 meters (about 8 feet) and found two different layers, or "stratums." One layer had some pottery, but the other, older layer had none. This suggests that the Chantuto people might not have used pottery in their earliest times.

Most of the sites explored had huge amounts of shell deposits. There were very few other items found, but sometimes archaeologists found fish bones and other things related to the sea. Scientists used special methods like "radiocarbon dating" to figure out how old these sites are. This helped them confirm the sites are between 3,500 and 7,500 years old.

Archaeologist Barbara Voorhies calls these places the "five coastal lagoons." The shell mound sites were found on the mainland side of each lagoon in the Acapetahua Estuary area. These shell piles were often round or oval shaped and full of clam shells. The Chantuto people likely stored their clam shells here.

Who Were the Chantuto People?

Archaeologists believe that the Chantuto people eventually became the Barra people, and then the Locona people. However, some experts, like John E. Clark, think these groups were very similar. He suggested calling them all by one name: the Mokaya people. They might have spoken an early language called proto-Mixe-Zoque.

What Did Archaeologists Find?

The main discoveries at these sites are the large shell middens found along the lagoons of the Acapetahua Estuary. These piles are mostly made up of clam shells. Barbara Voorhies thinks these shell mound sites were places where the Chantuto people gathered and prepared large amounts of clams. They probably dried the clams and then took them to their main camps further inland, like the site called Vuelta Limon.

At a site called Tlachuachero, archaeologists took 17 samples from one layer. They found things like bone, pieces of pottery, shells, rock fragments, and clay. The results showed that 99.55% of the total weight of these samples was clam shells! The rest were other items, like fish bones. At the other four sites, a few different objects were found, including grinding stones (called metates), hand stones, and anvils.

Key Archaeologists Who Studied Chantuto

Barbara Voorhies

Barbara Voorhies is considered a very important archaeologist in the study of the Chantuto site and its people. She is an American archaeologist who studied at Tufts and Yale University. Voorhies also taught at the University of Colorado and the University of California in Santa Barbara for almost 30 years. She is well-known for her work on ancient shell mound sites along the coast of Mexico, including the Chantuto sites like Vuelta Limon and Tlachuachero.

Philip Drucker

Philip Drucker also explored one of the shell mounds, called Islona Chantuto. His digs made him believe that this site was from a time before pottery was used. He decided to explore it more deeply. Later, Barbara Voorhies continued this work to understand and study the Chantuto sites and the people who lived there.