November 19, 2015

Earlier Pre-Clovis Dates Found at Monte Verde

Tom Dillehay, the archaeologist who excavated the first proven Pre-Clovis site in the Americas, Monte Verde, Chile has just published results of his latest excavations at the site. He has uncovered artifacts with burned features that are dated to 16,500 BCE. He found burned faunal remains, worked stones, and human knapped flakes that date to 16,500-12-500 BCE. The site is a seasonal site where humans periodically camped. The idea that humans spread rapidly from established sites across the Americas is now in question. Coastal travel for the First Americans was probably easy, but moving inland may have had many difficulties. The earliest human skulls found in the Americas are surprisingly variable, and the earliest populations may have been largely wiped out by later arrivers. The traces of the earliest people may have been found in recent gentic studies in modern South American populations.

The latest research by Tom Dillehay is on PLoS One 10 (see reference below):
http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0141923

John Hawkes has the report here;
http://johnhawks.net/weblog/reviews/archaeology/america/dillehay-monte-verde-2015.html

Mike Ruggeri’s Pre-Clovis and Clovis World
http://bit.ly/11wqze5

Mike Ruggeri’s Pre-Clovis and Clovis World Magazine
http://bit.ly/1uAWdvk

Mike Ruggeri’s Pre-Clovis and Clovis News on Tumblr
http://mikeruggerispreclovisnews.tumblr.com