The established consensus is that the Spaniards reintroduced the domestic horses into North and South America following the discovery by Columbus in 1492. In Southern South America, the first horses on record were those left behind by Pedro de Mendoza's failed first founding of Buenos Aires (1536-1541). A few mares and stallions were left behind (why?) and they roamed free on the Pampas breeding at an astounding rate, wild horses soon populated the vast prairies of Central Argentina. The Indians adopted them and they were taken into Patagonia.
With this in mind, a paper published in 2023 (William Timothy Treal Taylor et al. (2023), Interdisciplinary evidence for early domestic horse exploitation in southern Patagonia. Sci.adv.9,eadk5201(2023).DOI:10.1126/sciadv.adk5201). describes the remains of horses found in Patagonia.
The site is located in the south of Santa Cruz province, between Gallegos and Coig Rivers. The remains were dated and this is what the paper states:
" Two of these horse specimens produced dates from the early 18th to mid-20th centuries. More sensitive radiocarbon discrimination between samples from this period is typically impossible due to a plateau in the calibration curve. However, one specimen, a right tibia fragment, confidently predates 1800 CE (ca. 1645–1808 cal. CE, 2 sigma calibrated range, AA114998), while a second, from the tooth row, appears to likely predate 1700 CE (ca. 1515–1800 cal. CE, AA115001). A guanaco bone shaft fragment was also successfully dated to ca. 1522–1800 cal. CE (2 sigma calibrated range, AA115000), and carbonized food residue from a single ceramic sherd was dated to a similar range (ca. 1645–1800 cal. CE, 2 sigma, UCIAMS-280680). When analyzing horse occupation at the site as a Bayesian uniform phase model in OxCal (https://c14.arch.ox.ac.uk/oxcal/OxCal.html) and assuming the date of 1536 (start of the Mendoza expedition) as the earliest possibility date of horse introduction, the posterior modeled probability distribution for the adoption of horses at Chorrillo Grande 1 has a median modeled start date of ca. 1617 cal. CE, with the most likely date for this adoption falling between 1540 and 1650 cal. CE (1 sigma). When all dates from the site, including guanaco and foodcrust dates, are also included, Bayesian uniform phase modeling produces an even narrower posterior distribution for the onset of site activity, with a median modeled start date of ca. 1627 cal. CE and the most likely boundary falling between 1599 and 1653 cal. CE (1 sigma)."
So the dating is based on the assumption that horses were introduced by Mendoza in 1536! But, what if there had been horses, the native American horses, that had survived the megafaunal extinction in Patagonia? Wouldn't these horses mean that the 1536 AD is not valid?
The genetic analysis found that these were specimens of Domestic horse (Equus caballus), but that is what the Megafaunal American horses were. They were genetically identical to modern horses. So this finding does not clarify the origin of these Patagonian horses.
The script used to date the samples (OxCal Analysis) had a Boundary set at 1536 AD (read more here) which establishes a lower boundary meaning that the samples will be dated to a later date than this lower boundary!!
This is like reconfirming a previously established axiomatic assumption. We decide that horses were brought to America after 1536 so all horse remains found will be dated after that date. Bad science!
Even so, the Confidence Interval includes dates prior to 1536 as possible.
Patagonian Monsters - Cryptozoology, Myths & legends in Patagonia Copyright 2009-2025 by Austin Whittall ©
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