When the Spanish arrived in the New World, the guinea pig (widely known by its Que-chua name: cuy) was likely distributed throughout the Andean world from northwestern Venezuela to central Chile and northern Argentina. Its status in Central America is uncertain; however, an early 1519 document from the Darien refers to rabbits which entered native houses to breed. In 1547, Oviedo mentions the cori of Santo Domingo, which may be identified as cuy, surely an introduction from mainland Andean South America. The area and circumstances surrounding early cuy domestication are unknown, but the Central Andes have the longest and currently best-documented record of prehistoric association with humans. Cuy may have originally been chosen as a candidate for domestication owing to its commensal scavenging abilities, and its fondness for dark shelter and activity in dimly lit conditions (i. e., kitchens, where it can roam freely to feed on food scraps). Early colonial documents attest to the many non-dietary uses of cuy in Andean culture, including in divination and curing practices that originated in precolumbian times and that continue in the ethnographic present. In ancient times, cuy was regularly employed in sacrifice to placate gods, give thanks, prevent crop damage, and secure favors. Contemporary
Ethnographic treatments about the Andean guinea pig can be found in Morales (1995) and Archetti (1997), with an archaeological summary in Wing (1986), and osteological descriptions in Huckinghaus (1962).
The guinea pig (Cavia porcellus) is a medium sized rodent (order: Rodentia, suborder: Hystricognathi, infraorder: Caviomorpha). It is one of 14 species within five genera of South American cavies (family: Caviidae). Recorded from the Middle Miocene, caviid rodents live in varied habitats throughout South America. Although consensus is lacking, the genus Cavia (from Tupian: sawiya ‘rat’ via Portugese cavia/savia) can include as many as five species distributed over most of the continent except for easternmost Brazil and arid southern Peru and Chile. The domesticated form is today referred to as wanku/wankuchi (Aymara), conejo cui (rabbit cuy), conejillo de las Indias (little Indian rabbit), conejo Peru-ano (Peruvian rabbit), conejo nativo (native rabbit), acuri/curi, huimbo, cobayo or huiro (Colombia), cobaia, porquinho da India (Brazil) acurito (Venezuela), curiel (Cuba), and cuy/quwe (Quechua), which is preferred over the name “guinea pig.” Guinea may alternately refer to Guyana, Africa’s Guinea coast, or to a colonial monetary unit. The cuy’s stout body, short legs, stubby tail, and the manner by which it was prepared for consumption may have reminded early Europeans of suckling pigs.
Authorities do not agree on important aspects of domestication. C. porcellus is the recently approved scientific name for the domestic cuy; however, its direct ancestry is in dispute. Many consider C. aperea as the likely wild ancestor, and include domesticated varieties within this species. C. aperea is described as a less robust version of the domesticated cuy that is widely distributed throughout much of South America, excluding most of Amazonia, southward to central Argentina. Disjunct populations of C. aperea, especially in northern South America, may be feral populations. Whereas certain authorities include C. tschudii as a subspecies of C. aperea, others not only consider the former as a distinct species but also identify it as the more likely wild ancestor. C. tschudii, in contrast to C. aperea, has a restricted distribution from Peru, south to northernmost Chile, and Tucuman and Jujuy in northwestern Argentina.
C. aperea is a crepuscular grazer that can live at high densities within a maze of surface tunnels. Coloration consists of a dark olive upper body with brown and black, and a pale underside. Individuals can reach total lengths of over 350 mm and weights of almost 800 g. Young cuys are fully developed at birth after an average gestation period of 62 days. In some areas, breeding is year round, with females producing up to five litters per year. Individuals are reproductively active after 30 days. C. tschudii also inhabits extensive runways that are constructed in thick grass and preferred moist habitats with scattered rocks between 2,000 and 3,800 masl. Multiple-entranced burrows are reported from Argentina. The coloration of C. tschudii is much more variable than C. aperea, and it is also somewhat smaller but with a comparable reproductive biology. Individuals reach reproductive age after two months.
Domestication has introduced considerable variation, especially through recent global interest in cuy for laboratory research and the pet trade. It is only in South America, particularly the Andes, that cuy continues to be a significant dietary option. Cuy meat is composed of 20.3% protein, which compares favorably with lean cuts of beef, lamb, pork, rabbit, and chicken; whereas its 7.8% fat content is much lower than other meats in general. Domesticated females have been observed to breed as soon as 20 days after birth, bearing litters of up to eight young. Production rates have been doubled under experimental conditions in the Andes, whereas commercial breeding in temperate areas has almost tripled annual production. Improved Andean strains have increased and sometimes doubled birth
Weights, while normal mature weights reach, and often far exceed, 800 g. Changes in head shape and size have been associated with domestication. Osteometric study suggests that domestication has produced a shorter, flatter, and wider skull with a tendency for longer cheek tooth rows when compared to large wild specimens. Increased jaw height, measured at the middle of the diastema between the incisor and first lower molar, has been suggested as an osteological proxy for the increased size correlated with domestication. The conformation of the naso-frontal and fronto-parietal sutures, and the presence/absence of a palatal spine have also been used as criteria for discriminating wild from domesticated specimens.
Actual numbers of reported archaeological specimens is rarely high, possibly owing to its small skeletal size, relatively poor preservation potential, recovery bias, and attendant difficulties in identification. The Bogota plateau of Colombia provides early contexts for cuy in the northern Andes. Specimens have been identified in levels dated 9000 to 5000 BC at Tequendama. Although cuy specimens are identified throughout the El Abra rockshelter sequence, from possibly as early as the eighth millennium BP, domesticated specimens are believed to appear only after 500 BC with the local introduction of pottery. Otherwise, early documentation of prehistoric cuy is restricted to Central Andean sites.
The earliest recorded appearance of cuy in the central Andes is from the Ayacucho area. Puente phase artifacts suggestive of human occupation between 8500 and 8160 BC are found in association with cuy bones at Jaywamachay, a rock shelter located in humid woodland at 3,350 masl. Late Puente phase artifacts dating to 7250 BC are associated with bones of, presumably collected or trapped, cuy at Ayamachay rock shelter at 3,000 masl. Inhabitants of Puente Cave in the thorn forest scrub ecozone at 2,500 masl, are believed to have collected or trapped possibly wild specimens during the early Jaywa phase around 6900 BC. With the exception of Puente Cave, the actual number of recovered cuy specimens is small. Preceramic collecting or trapping of wild specimens is inferred from associations of cuy specimens with bone triangular trap triggers; however, penning may also have been possible. The absence of triggers, and the presence of pits containing cuy specimens, suggests the use of hutches or penning in Piki phase context at Puente around 5470 BC.
A large charcoal filled depression in Chihua phase context from as early as 3600 BC at Ayamachay contained bones of a half dozen cuy. These specimens, and contemporaneous specimens from Rosamachay, just north of Pikimachay at 2,650 masl, are considered to be evidence for early domesticated cuy. Although these inferences are based mainly on the relative abundance of cuy specimens, jaw diastema height at Pikimachay is considered to be clear evidence of domestic varieties by the ceramic Chupas phase as early as 700 BC. In particular, a 400 BC cloth-wrapped Chupas phase cuy mummy from Rosamachay is likely that of a domesticated animal.
Although a few cuy specimens were identified in preceramic deposits at Guitarrero Cave in the Peruvian Callejon de Huaylas, it has been suggested that fully domesticated forms were initially introduced northward from the central Andes only in the first millennium BC. Significant amounts of cuy are recorded throughout the prehistoric sequence of human occupation in the 2,000 m thorn forest of the upper Huallaga Valley. However, despite their appearance since mid third millennium BC Kotosh Mito period context, it is not believed that these cuy specimens were fully domesticated.
Cuy has been reported in preceramic contexts during the third millennium BC at Cul-ebras and Los Gavilanes, and in early ceramic contexts during the second millennium BC at Curayacu. Cuy is identified in Early Horizon context from 900 BC at Chavin, and was recovered in Initial Period contexts from the far northern Cajamarca basin of Peru as early
As the late second millennium BC. Cuy becomes abundant on the Peruvian coast during the millennia before and after Christ.
North of Peru, cuy is identified in Late Formative contexts from the southern highlands of Ecuador possibly as early as 1470 BC. Cuy is found at a number of highland sites in the first millennium BC, which is roughly when it first appears in the western lowlands of Ecuador. Skeletal specimens tend to be relatively rare and are often found in non-utilitarian contexts to or from which Spondylus was exchanged, suggesting trade as a possible mechanism for its northward dispersion. Late prehistoric cuy is documented in extreme southern Colombia, surely an introduction from Ecuador. Cuy has also been identified from Hispanola, where its introduction into the Caribbean must have been via maritime movement.
World History
