Advertisement

Abstract

The Clovis complex is considered to be the oldest unequivocal evidence of humans in the Americas, dating between 11,500 and 10,900 radiocarbon years before the present (14C yr B.P.). Adjusted 14C dates and a reevaluation of the existing Clovis date record revise the Clovis time range to 11,050 to 10,800 14C yr B.P. In as few as 200 calendar years, Clovis technology originated and spread throughout North America. The revised age range for Clovis overlaps non-Clovis sites in North and South America. This and other evidence imply that humans already lived in the Americas before Clovis.

Get full access to this article

View all available purchase options and get full access to this article.

Supplementary Material

File (waters_som.pdf)

References and Notes

1
C. V. Haynes Jr., in Paleoamerican Origins: Beyond Clovis, R. Bonnichsen, B. T. Lepper, D. Stanford, M. R. Waters, Eds. (Center for the Study of the First Americans, College Station, TX, 2005), pp. 113–132.
2
M. B. Collins, Clovis Blade Technology (Univ. of Texas Press, Austin, TX, 1999).
3
K. B. Tankersley, in The Settlement of the American Continents: A Multidisciplinary Approach to Human Biogeography, C. M. Barton, G. A. Clark, D. R. Yesner, G. A. Pearson, Eds. (Univ. of Arizona Press, Tucson, AZ, 2004), pp. 49–63.
4
T. W. Stafford Jr., P. E. Hare, L. Currie, A. J. T. Jull, D. J. Donahue, J. Archaeol. Sci.18, 35 (1991).
5
Materials and methods are available as supporting material on Science Online.
6
G. A. Pearson, in The Settlement of the American Continents: A Multidisciplinary Approach to Human Biogeography, C. M. Barton, G. A. Clark, D. R. Yesner, G. A. Pearson, Eds. (Univ. of Arizona Press, Tucson, AZ, 2004), pp. 85–102.
7
A. C. Roosevelt, J. Douglas, L. Brown, in The First Americans: The Pleistocene Colonization of the New World, no. 27 of Memoirs of the California Academy of Sciences, N. G. Jablonski, Ed. (California Academy of Sciences, San Francisco, CA, 2002), pp. 159–235.
8
C. V. Haynes Jr., in Radiocarbon After Four Decades: An Interdisciplinary Perspective, R. E. Taylor, A. Long, R. S. Kra, Eds. (Springer-Verlag, New York, 1992), pp. 355–374.
9
S. J. Fiedel, Am. Antiq.64-1, 95 (1999).
10
S. Bondevik, J. Mangerud, H. H. Birks, S. Gulliksen, P. Reimer, Science312, 1514 (2006).
11
B. Kromer et al., Radiocarbon46-3, 1203 (2004).
12
R. G. Fairbanks et al., Quat. Sci. Rev.24, 1781 (2005).
13
S. J. Fiedel, J. Archaeol. Res.8-1, 39 (2000).
14
C. A. S. Mandryk, H. Josenhans, D. W. Fedje, R. W. Mathewes, Quat. Sci. Rev.20, 301 (2001).
15
B. Bradley, D. Stanford, World Archaeol.36, 459 (2004).
16
T. D. Hamilton, T. Goebel, in Ice Age Peoples of North America: Environments, Origins, and Adaptations of the First Americans, R. Bonnichsen, K. L. Turnmire, Eds. (Oregon State Univ. Press, Corvallis, OR, 1999), pp. 156–199.
17
J. F. Hoffecker, W. R. Powers, T. Goebel, Science259, 46 (1993).
18
R. Bonnichsen, in Clovis: Origins and Adaptations, R. Bonnichsen, K. L. Turnmire, Eds. (Oregon State Univ. Press, Corvallis, OR, 1991), pp. 309–329.
19
G. C. Frison, Ed., The Mill Iron Site (Univ. of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque, NM, 1996).
20
J. R. Johnson, T. W. Stafford Jr., H. O. Ajie, D. P. Morris, in Proceedings of the Fifth California Islands Symposium (U.S. Department of the Interior, Minerals Management Service, Pacific Outer Continental Shelf Region, Washington, DC, 23March to 1April1999), pp. 541–544.
21
T. Goebel, B. Hockett, K. Graf, D. Rhode, paper presented at the 30th Great Basin Anthropological Conference, Las Vegas, NV, 19 to 21October2006.
22
L. Miotti, M. C. Salemme, Quat. Int.109-110, 95 (2003).
23
M. Barbetti et al., Nucl. Instrum. Methods223-224B, 366 (2004).
24
D. G. Anderson, J. C. Gillam, Am. Antiq.65-1, 43 (2000).
25
D. F. Overstreet, in Paleoamerican Origins: Beyond Clovis, R. Bonnichsen, B. T. Lepper, D. Stanford, M. R. Waters, Eds. (Center for the Study of the First Americans, College Station, TX, 2005), pp. 183–195.
26
D. J. Joyce, Quat. Int.142-143, 44 (2006).
27
T. D. Dillehay, Ed., Monte Verde: A Late Pleistocene Settlement in Chile: Volume 2: The Archaeological Context and Interpretation (Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington, DC, 1997).
28
G. K. Ward, S. R. Wilson, Archaeometry20, 19 (1978).
29
We thank A. Hannus, C. V. Haynes, J. Gingerich, G. Frison, and A. Hemmings for providing samples for dating; M. Payn and the North Star Archaeological Research Program established by J. Cramer and R. Cramer for providing funding; P. Reimer and J. Southon for providing advice on 14C calibration; D. Carlson, T. Goebel, J. Southon, S. Forman, and three anonymous reviewers for offering useful comments to improve this paper; and L. Lind, C. Pevny, J. Halligan, and P. Johnson for helping in the preparation of the text and illustrations.

(0)eLetters

eLetters is a forum for ongoing peer review. eLetters are not edited, proofread, or indexed, but they are screened. eLetters should provide substantive and scholarly commentary on the article. Embedded figures cannot be submitted, and we discourage the use of figures within eLetters in general. If a figure is essential, please include a link to the figure within the text of the eLetter. Please read our Terms of Service before submitting an eLetter.

Log In to Submit a Response

No eLetters have been published for this article yet.

Information & Authors

Information

Published In

Science
Volume 315 | Issue 5815
23 February 2007

Submission history

Received: 3 November 2006
Accepted: 12 January 2007
Published in print: 23 February 2007

Permissions

Request permissions for this article.

Notes

Supporting Online Material
www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/315/5815/1122/DC1
Materials and Methods
SOM Text
Table S1
References

Authors

Affiliations

Michael R. Waters* [email protected]
Departments of Anthropology and Geography, Center for the Study of the First Americans, Texas A&M University, 4352 TAMU, College Station, TX 77843-4352, USA.
Thomas W. Stafford, Jr.
Stafford Research Laboratories, 200 Acadia Avenue, Lafayette, CO 80026, USA.

Notes

*
To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: [email protected]

Metrics & Citations

Metrics

Article Usage

Altmetrics

Citations

Cite as

Export citation

Select the format you want to export the citation of this publication.

Cited by

  1. The “Greenberg Controversy” and the Interdisciplinary Study of Global Linguistic Relationships**, Berichte zur Wissenschaftsgeschichte, 46, 1, (114-132), (2023).https://doi.org/10.1002/bewi.202200038
    Crossref
  2. Human Occupation of the North American Colorado Plateau ∼37,000 Years Ago, Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution, 10, (2022).https://doi.org/10.3389/fevo.2022.903795
    Crossref
  3. Fell points from Merín Lagoon, Uruguay: new data and their relevance to the peopling of south-eastern South America, Antiquity, 96, 388, (812-830), (2022).https://doi.org/10.15184/aqy.2022.61
    Crossref
  4. Late date of human arrival to North America: Continental scale differences in stratigraphic integrity of pre-13,000 BP archaeological sites, PLOS ONE, 17, 4, (e0264092), (2022).https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0264092
    Crossref
  5. Late Pleistocene heather vole, Phenacomys , on the North Pacific Coast of North America: environments, local extinctions, and archaeological implications , Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences, 59, 10, (708-721), (2022).https://doi.org/10.1139/cjes-2021-0116
    Crossref
  6. The woolly rhinoceros ( Coelodonta antiquitatis ) from Ondorkhaan, eastern Mongolia , Boreas, 51, 3, (584-605), (2022).https://doi.org/10.1111/bor.12582
    Crossref
  7. Diversity and Paleoecology of the Zone 3 Late Pleistocene Vertebrates at Kincaid Shelter (41UV2), Central Texas, USA, PaleoAmerica, 8, 3, (228-252), (2022).https://doi.org/10.1080/20555563.2022.2075134
    Crossref
  8. Sites in the Americas with Possible or Probable Evidence for the Butchering of Proboscideans, PaleoAmerica, 8, 3, (187-214), (2022).https://doi.org/10.1080/20555563.2022.2057834
    Crossref
  9. Submerged inland landscapes of the Aucilla basin, Northwest Florida, USA: populating the Late Pleistocene and Early Holocene landscape, World Archaeology, 54, 1, (122-141), (2022).https://doi.org/10.1080/00438243.2022.2077826
    Crossref
  10. A critical assessment of claims that human footprints in the Lake Otero basin, New Mexico date to the Last Glacial Maximum, Quaternary Research, 111, (138-147), (2022).https://doi.org/10.1017/qua.2022.38
    Crossref
  11. See more
Loading...

View Options

Check Access

Log in to view the full text

AAAS ID LOGIN

AAAS login provides access to Science for AAAS Members, and access to other journals in the Science family to users who have purchased individual subscriptions.

Log in via OpenAthens.
Log in via Shibboleth.

More options

Register for free to read this article

As a service to the community, this article is available for free. Login or register for free to read this article.

Purchase this issue in print

Buy a single issue of Science for just $15 USD.

View options

PDF format

Download this article as a PDF file

Download PDF

Full Text

FULL TEXT

Media

Figures

Multimedia

Tables

Share

Share

Share article link

Share on social media