Stable isotope evidence for the adoption of maize agriculture

Over the past three decades, dozens of studies have produced carbon and nitrogen stable isotope data on early human bones and teeth from North America. Because these data record individual diets, they provide one way to test various hypotheses about the uptake and continued dependence on maize agriculture that is complementary to floral, paleopathological, and demographic approaches to the same problem. The delta13C values in the organic fraction of bone (bone collagen) plotted against those in the mineral fraction of bone (bone apatite) from several regions across North America reveal that not all human groups responded in the same way to maize agriculture. Rather there was variation between and within geographic regions. Similarly, the delta15N values in bone collagen from sites from across the southeastern United States show variation in dependence on maize and on marine foods that cannot be fully explained by geography or technical expertise. In combination, the data emphasize the need to consider social forces, both internal and external, to the group under study as well as environmental and technological constraints.