Continuity and discontinuity in the human use of the north coast of Santa Cruz (Patagonia Argentina) through its radiocarbon record Miguel Angel Zubimendi a, * , Pablo Ambrústolo a , Leandro Zilio b , Alicia Castro b a Paseo del Bosque s/n, La Plata (1900), Prov. Buenos Aires, CONICET & Departamento Científico de Arqueología, Museo de La Plata, UNLP, Argentina b Paseo del Bosque s/n, La Plata (1900), Prov. Buenos Aires, Departamento Científico de Arqueología, Museo de La Plata, UNLP, Argentina article info Article history: Available online xxx In memory of Ver onica Trola Keywords: Patagonia Chronological signal Holocene Shell middens Rock shelters Human burials abstract In this paper, the analysis of a radiocarbon database of the North Coast of Santa Cruz (central Patagonia, Argentina), is presented. Dated archaeological samples were obtained from 56 different types of archaeological sites (open-air -residential sites and burials-, and also rock shelters). The objective of this paper is assessing the continuities and discontinuities in the chronological signal of the area and iden- tifying tendencies along the Holocene. The database currently contains 75 radiocarbon dates falling between ca. 8000 and 300 BP. The radiocarbon data base provides information on the chronological, spatial and contextual variability of the archaeological record of North Coast of Santa Cruz. By means of different analysis of sum of probabilities, we present three different chronological moments of human use of the coast and intermediate zone can be identified. A first moment is represented by early evidence of settlement during Middle Holocene. A second moment corresponds to a hiatus between ca. 5800 and ca. 3900 BP without archaeological evidence. Finally, a third moment is where an increasing of chro- nological signal occurred, related to greater artifactual variability and an increase in the intensity of human settlement in the Patagonian region. The causes that could have influenced in the discontinuity of the chronological signal of the study area, and the characteristics of the different moments identified are discussed. © 2014 Elsevier Ltd and INQUA. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction In this paper, an updated 14 C dataset from the Northern Coast of Santa Cruz (NCSC) is presented. These data was obtained through the research carried out within the last years with the aim of defining the chronological span of the human occupation of the coastal area, and the immediate hinterland. We will discuss this database aiming to identify chronological tendencies in the human use of the NCSC during the Holocene. Changes and continuities in the chronological signal and their relationship with the archaeo- logical record of the NCSC will be presented and analysed. The NCSC is situated in northeast Santa Cruz province (Central Patagonia, Argentina). It includes the intermediate zone, which is characterized by limited archaeological information, between the Atlantic coast and the central Deseado massif. The archaeological surveys in the NCSC were initiated around 1990, and during the last decade much work have been done, reaching more knowledge through intensive stratigraphic excavations and the incorporation of different lines of analysis, such as information from new surficial sites (Zubimendi, 2010), rock shelters (Ambrústolo, 2011), and human burials (Zilio et al., 2013a). 2. Regional setting The Patagonian region is the southernmost continental portion of the world and was the last continental crust colonized by humans, approximately 12 or 13 thousand years ago (Borrero, 2008; Franco et al., 2010; Brook et al., 2014). In a general charac- terization, this region can be differentiated as two main areas: the Andean Cordillera and the vast plateau and steppe-like plains running from the west to the Atlantic sea coast. Nowadays, the Andean Cordillera demarcates the ArgentineeChilean frontier and configures a major divide between the Pacific slope to the west and the Atlantic slope to the east. The peopling of this vast territory was a process of gradual in- tensity. The first evidence of human presence (during Pleistoce- neeHolocene transition) was registered on the river valleys crossing the Santa Cruz plateau, and shortly after that, on the * Corresponding author. E-mail addresses: mikelzubimendi@gmail.com (M.A. Zubimendi), pambrustolo@ hotmail.com (P. Ambrústolo), leandrozilio@yahoo.com.ar (L. Zilio), aliciacastro52@ gmail.com (A. Castro). Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Quaternary International journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/quaint http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.quaint.2014.09.035 1040-6182/© 2014 Elsevier Ltd and INQUA. All rights reserved. Quaternary International xxx (2014) 1e20 Please cite this article in press as: Zubimendi, M.A., et al., Continuity and discontinuity in the human use of the north coast of Santa Cruz (Patagonia Argentina) through its radiocarbon record, Quaternary International (2014), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.quaint.2014.09.035