[Terrapreta] The Reason for Pottery Shards in Terra Preta.Re: Char and compost ( was Char made made underpressurized conditions? )

[Kurt Treutlein]

David Hirst .com wrote:
>
> But I know little of what, for example, Australian aborigines do, or 
> some of the people of the Amazon, such as the Yanomami, or New Guinea. 
> Or, indeed in Bangladesh.
>
Don't know for sure about Australian Aboriginals, but it seems they were 
nomadic and traveled in relatively small groups, so relieving themselves 
around the campsite would have been quite simple and regularly moving 
on, as the food supply was used up anywhere would have taken care of any 
build-up. Additionally, the fertility of the area around campsites would 
have been enhanced and this would have been precisely where discarded 
seeds would have ended up.

In New Guinea, where I spent some 19 years, traditionally the area 
around the village was also the toilet. In places with a strong belief 
in marselai (inimical spirits), where people were afraid to leave their 
houses at night, there was a tendency to piss and shit through the floor 
cracks, or perhaps devise urinals, for the men at least from palm frond 
center ribs. If the sickness rate in any village got too high, they 
abandoned it and re-built elsewhere.  Gastric diseases like  dysentery 
were caused by marselai biting people in the belly, according to local 
beliefs.

Not all that different from medieval customs and "garderobes" really.

There was no real knowledge of soil amendment techniques, slash and burn 
was the general method of gardening.

Kurt