The Pastaza and the Upano, two tropical rivers that connect the Andes to the Amazon

Abstract

The Amazon, called Marañón upstream, is born in the Andes and feeds on the waters of the springs of the mountain range and the sediments plucked from the slopes of the mountain. The valleys of Pastaza and Upano are headwaters of rivers feeding the Marañón. They are distant of only 70 km and both drain waters coming down from the Ecuadorian Andes that are not navigable. In spite of these similarities, the social developments between the two valleys show different and common points that deny geographical determinisms. At the same time they reveal the importance of regional trends of evolution in the destiny of the societies that inhabited them. Beyond the remarkable geophysical differences, the two river valleys had different but comparable pre-Columbian developments. In fact, the earliest periods were clearly related to the Amazonian and Andean worlds at the same time (including the Pacific Coast), whereas the most recent periods before the arrival of Europeans mark the formation of an Amazonian cultural universe separated from the Andean world.

Keywords

• ecuador
• andes
• selva
• volcán
• terraza
• montículo
• cerámica