The end product of the survey, the program of systematic surface collection and the ceramic analysis is a fine-grained settlement dataset, spanning the period from the first intensive human occupation of the region (around 1500 B.C.) through the first century of Spanish colonial rule (ca. 1600 A.D.). The minimal unit of this particular dataset is the sector, a spatially discrete cluster of archaeological materials pertaining to a single historic or prehistoric phase. For each sector we have recorded its location, size, dimensions, and any information that may be evident on the surface, such as the presence or absence of mound architecture or visible (disturbed) tombs. Sectors of various phases which overlap one another spatially are grouped together into units called `sites,' which are numbered sequentially from T-1 to T-476. A site, as the term is used here, is nothing more than a collection of spatially contiguous sectors. For each site we have recorded information pertaining to its locality, such as the proximity of water sources and arable land and topographical defensibility.
This dataset - a list of sectors and their various properties - is the basis of the analysis that follows. The later chapters of this document discuss what this dataset reveals about the demographic, economic and political dynamics of Taraco Peninsula prehistory. First, though, it will be necessary to discuss in some detail the theoretical and methodological concerns relating to the use of this dataset. Most important will be the question of how the sector database may be used to measure prehistoric population. This is the theme of the next chapter.