Glass

In historical times, indigenous groups used industrial products to make everyday items:

  • Glass
  • Stoneware
  • Metal

Alcoholic beverage bottles and jars (toiletries) are containers with a wide variety of shapes, colors and thicknesses.

Glass was used to make endscrapers that were necessary for working with guanaco hides, which were used to make quillangos and awnings.

The analysis of glass artifacts involves the identification of their characteristics:

  • Macroscopic: type of container and sector used; size, shape, thickness and colour; type of tool, type and number of edges. A precision caliber and a colour chart are used. The data obtained are included in specially prepared spreadsheets.
  • Microscopic: functional analysis that allows us to understand aspects related to the use given to the artifact, allowing the identification of specific traces. It involves the use of a magnifying microscope.

Chico river basin 

A set of glass endscrapers has been recovered near a ranch house.

These artifacts are characterized by a wide variety of shapes, sizes and colors. These differences are related to the specific characteristics of the container from which they were made.

The craftsmen chose glass based on its compositional characteristics, which are similar to those of a well-known raw material: obsidian. Being suitable for flintknapping, the glass could be worked using traditional techniques.

Santa Cruz river basin

In the middle basin of the Santa Cruz river, glass endscrapers have been recovered, related to occupations corresponding to historical moments, both on the northern and southern banks of the basin.

On the northern bank, they were recovered in spaces occupied by groups composed by a Spaniard and indigenous people who were dedicated to horse taming, as was their custom after the conquest.

On the southern bank, they were identified in wetland areas as part of rescue works. In addition, Belardi and Carballo Marina indicate their presence near the Tehuelche reserve of Camusu Aike, suggesting the continuity of knapping practices, though substituting lithic material with glass.