Historia
Bato society incorporated cultural elements from the first Ceramic Communities, such as ceramics with nipple-shaped appliqués and iron ore paint, the tembetá, and ceremonial pipes. They shared other ceramic-making characteristics with early communities in North-Central Chile and Northeastern Argentina, such as the use of the bridge handle, tapered bottle necks, and the crafting of plant and animal figures. But the Bato also developed their own stylistic features, which included linear incisions around dotted areas, and relief painting. Unlike the contemporaneous Llolleo culture, the Bato were a society with a strong hunter gatherer tradition, more mobile and less homogenous. Both groups may have used ceramics as a means of ethnic identification that marked differences between groups. This was also achieved through the use of the tembetá and their different funerary practices. In the Andean highlands, both peoples shared their range with hunter-gatherer groups that maintained their lifestyle until very late periods