Several prehistoric societies did not develop robust hierarchical systems even after centuries of population clustering and advancements in constructing structural earthworks and crafting materials like ceramics and alloys. What social dynamics characterized these non-state complex societies and how did they influence technological production? Here we analyze population clustering and hierarchical structures through two regional settlement studies in the northeastern Andes of Colombia. Employing both a traditional Inverse Distance Weighting interpolation (IDW) approach and an unsupervised machine learning method, Density-Based Spatial Clustering of Applications with Noise (DBSCAN), we identify settlement clusters within the pre-Columbian sedentary settlement sequence. Analyzing rank-size distribution and A-coefficients based on identified clusters, we discern differences in hierarchical systems between the two regions. Results reveal that these early sedentary communities did not establish strong settlement hierarchies over centuries of clustering. Our findings suggest that the lack of robust hierarchical systems in Muisca societies may be attributed to slow and non-linear settlement clustering and limited site specialization. We compare this with evidence for technologies in the Muisca area, arguing that the emergence of strong and permanent settlement clustering is a threshold for early communities before developing information-storage technologies, such as standardized representations for counting or writing.

中文翻译：

---

哥伦比亚安第斯山脉东北部早期定居社区的社会政治演变、人口聚集和技术


几个史前社会即使在几个世纪的人口聚集和建造结构土方工程和制作陶瓷和合金等材料方面的进步之后，也没有发展出强大的等级制度。这些非国家复杂社会的特征是什么，它们如何影响技术生产？在这里，我们通过哥伦比亚安第斯山脉东北部的两项区域定居点研究来分析人口聚集和等级结构。采用传统的反距离加权插值 （IDW） 方法和无监督机器学习方法，即基于密度的噪声应用程序空间聚类 （DBSCAN），我们确定了前哥伦布时期定居定居序列中的定居集群。根据已识别的集群分析秩大小分布和 A 系数，我们辨别了两个地区之间分层系统的差异。结果显示，这些早期的定居社区在几个世纪的集群中并没有建立强大的定居等级制度。我们的研究结果表明，Muisca 社会缺乏稳健的等级系统可能是由于缓慢且非线性的定居点聚集和有限的场地专业化。我们将其与 Muisca 地区的技术证据进行了比较，认为强大而永久的定居点集群的出现是早期社区在发展信息存储技术（例如用于计数或写入的标准化表示）之前的门槛。