Archaeologists don’t know exactly how many Taíno survived the enslavement, massacres, and diseases that marked the following centuries—though genetic sampling reveals significant Indigenous ancestry in contemporary Puerto Rico. But Taíno stories and artifacts stress the importance of conchs: in their fishing and diving traditions; in the infinite piles of conch they harvested, ate, and honed into tools and jewelry; and in their small spirit objects sculpted into three points—originally inspired by the pointed top of a conch shell.
Evidence of conch overharvesting begins in their time, Keegan says. But the export pressure that precipitated collapse dates to the British Empire that gave the queens their English name. A fashionable 18-year-old
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