Two University of Oregon researchers are on a multi-institutional 26-member team proposing a startling new theory: that an extraterrestrial impact, possibly a comet, set off a 1,000-year-long cold spell and wiped out or fragmented the prehistoric Clovis culture and a variety of animal genera across North America almost 13,000 years ago
Read more here and here.
Showing posts with label Clovis. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Clovis. Show all posts
Wednesday, May 23, 2007
Saturday, March 31, 2007
Clovis artifacts do not end debate over first Americans
The antiquity of the peopling of the Americas has been, and continues to be, one of the most controversial issues in American archaeology.
For many years, it was accepted that the Clovis culture represented the earliest appearance of people in this hemisphere.
The hallmark of the Clovis culture is a particular style of grooved spear point that is found from Alaska to northern South America.
Traditionally, the Clovis culture has been said to date from 11,500 to 10,900 years ago, but a comprehensive and critical review of the radiocarbon dates for Clovis in the Feb. 23 issue of the journal Science has narrowed the range to 11,050 to 10,800 years ago.
Michael Waters, director of the Center for the Study of the First Americans, and Thomas Stafford, director of Stafford Research Laboratories, argue that "in as few as 200 calendar years, Clovis technology originated and spread throughout North America."
Read more here.
For many years, it was accepted that the Clovis culture represented the earliest appearance of people in this hemisphere.
The hallmark of the Clovis culture is a particular style of grooved spear point that is found from Alaska to northern South America.
Traditionally, the Clovis culture has been said to date from 11,500 to 10,900 years ago, but a comprehensive and critical review of the radiocarbon dates for Clovis in the Feb. 23 issue of the journal Science has narrowed the range to 11,050 to 10,800 years ago.
Michael Waters, director of the Center for the Study of the First Americans, and Thomas Stafford, director of Stafford Research Laboratories, argue that "in as few as 200 calendar years, Clovis technology originated and spread throughout North America."
Read more here.
Friday, March 16, 2007
Study: Clovis-era humans not first to settle America
For decades, the Blackwater Draw archaeological site near Clovis, N.M., stood out as perhaps the earliest documented evidence of human habitation in North America.
It was here that a band of Clovis-era humans hunted, killed and butchered at least one woolly mammoth. They also left behind distinctive Clovis spear points, lodged inside ancient bones.
Most archaeologists have believed for years that small bands of humans skirted ice sheets across the Bering Straits, made their way to North America and scattered to places like Blackwater Draw.
But a new archeological study suggests the Clovis-era peoples weren't the first in the Americas. The study, "Redefining the Age of Clovis: Implications for the Peopling of the Americas," was published in the Feb. 23 issue of Science.
Read more here. (free reg. req'd - use bugmenot.com)
It was here that a band of Clovis-era humans hunted, killed and butchered at least one woolly mammoth. They also left behind distinctive Clovis spear points, lodged inside ancient bones.
Most archaeologists have believed for years that small bands of humans skirted ice sheets across the Bering Straits, made their way to North America and scattered to places like Blackwater Draw.
But a new archeological study suggests the Clovis-era peoples weren't the first in the Americas. The study, "Redefining the Age of Clovis: Implications for the Peopling of the Americas," was published in the Feb. 23 issue of Science.
Read more here. (free reg. req'd - use bugmenot.com)
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