Domestication of Guinea Pigs from a Southern Peru-northern Chile Wild Species and their Middle Pre-Columbian Mummies

Abstract

To investigate the origins and domestication of guinea pigs, or cuyes (Cavia porcellus), we re-analyzed 12S rRNA (759 bp) and cytochrome b gene (1140 bp) sequence data from relevant species and breeds. Seventeen pre-Columbian mummified cuyes from southern Peru and northern Chile sites are described and compared with both domesticated (living Andean creole and European breeds) and wild species. All molecular analyses point to the western C. tschudii rather than to the eastern C. aperea as the ancestral wild species. Domesticated Andean and European cuyes were different both in biochemical and morphological analysis ; both breeds exhibited a lower neurocranium than that of C. tschudii. Principal component analysis of skeletal measurements showed that most of the mummies anayzed were juveniles, but at least 2 appeared to be adults when compared with wild and Andean cuyes. The degree of domestication in these mummies was evaluated under the criteria of the “domestication syndrome”: their size, hair color and design polymorphisms, and lower skulls demonstrated that they were fully domesticated in southern Perú-northern Chile more than 500 years before the arrival of Spaniards to the Americas; this was the first or major step in the process of cuy domestication. The second stage was the European one, under a different selection regime acting for another 500 years. The third stage is ongoing, with heavy selection for size and meat volume.