Todd Surovell - Late Pleistocene Megafaunal Extinction talk at UC Denver, Friday Sept. 24

This Friday, September 24, 2010 (at 4:00PM in AD 200), the UC Denver Department of Anthropology is hosting a colloquium by Todd Surovell on Late Pleistocene megafaunal extinctions in North America. Details below.

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The Associational Critique and the Late Pleistocene Extinction of North American Megafauna

Todd A. Surovell
Associate Professor
Dept. of Anthropology, University of Wyoming

Abrstract

Humans first arrived in North America approximately 14,000 years ago. Over the next two millennia, some 35 genera of Pleistocene megafauna suffered extinction. While it is tempting to see causality in this chronological correlation, after more than 80 years of fieldwork concerning the Pleistocene human occupation of the Americas, we can only demonstrate with confidence that humans hunted at most five species of extinct fauna. Fundamentally then, we must ask if it is possible that humans caused the extinction of some 35 genera of large mammals but left behind very little evidence of that act? This question is at the heart of what I call the "Associational Critique" of the overkill hypothesis. Critics of overkill argue that anthropogenic extinction will remain highly controversial until unambiguous material evidence of human hunting of a large number of taxa is discovered. In contrast, I will argue that a huge amount of circumstantial evidence points to humans as the primary causal agents of extinction, and that the associational critique puts forth unrealistic if not impossible requirements for the overkill hypothesis to fulfill.

Friday, September 24, 2010 – 4:00PM

Room AD 200 (Administration Bldg., 1201 5th St.)

Hosted by the

UC Denver Department of Anthropology

Why flour matters

A couple of days ago, I mentioned how excavations at a Paleoindian site in Utah has revealed that the site's occupants had been milling various seeds to produce different kinds of flours. In that post, I mentioned how this discovery re-emphasized the fact that hunter-gatherers in general hunt as well as gather. In fact, outside of the highest latitudes, plant foods often account for a majority of the caloric intake of ethnographically-documented forager groups, suggesting that this was also very likely the case in prehistory. This is an especially important realization for Paleoindian research, since public (and sometimes even academic) perception is that Clovis and Folsom foragers were essentially big guys with big spears killing big things, i.e., megafauna. Estbalishing that they were not only collecting plants but also processing some of them rather intensively (grinding is a very time-consuming activity, and so is the shaping of grinding implements) reinforces recent research that suggests that Paleoindian diets were as a whole much more diverse than is generally believed (Hill 2008).

Grinding plant matter into flour also has important other implications about the structure of hunter-gatherer subsistence and social life, however. To understand these, it's helpful to look at some of the earliest traces of flour production in the archaeological record, one example of which is provided by the Gravettian site of Bilancino, in Tuscany, Italy, which dates to about 25,000BP uncal. (Aranguren et al. 2007), and which I mentioned briefly earlier. Bilancino is a very interesting site: because of preservation issues, namely the acidic nature of the sediment there, no bone was preserved at all. This has forced the investigators to thoroughly investigate other kinds of archaeological remains that are not usually the focus of such intensive scrutiny in many Paleolithic studies. This includes notably charcoal, pollen and starch grain recovered from the surface of a grindstone. These efforts have paid off in spades by revealing that the occupants of Bilancino had been grinding cattail (Typha latifolia), likely its roots, as well as wild grasses to produce flour.

Aranguren et al. (2007) explicitly discuss the potential impact of flour on Paleolithic lifeways. They specificallyhighlight that it "implies the availability of an elaborate product, a flour, with high energy content, that is rich in carbohydrates, easily storable and transportable, to make a kind of bread (biscuits) or a porridge" (Aranguren 2007: 853). This means that plant material could be preserved and stored for much longer periods of time, which effectively can provide carbs during seasons such as winter during which they are normally difficult if not impossible to obtain. Also, it provides a subsistence items that serves as a buffer against the fluctuating availability of other types of subsitence resources, such as animal tissue. Lastly, because flour is easily ingested and digested, it also provides a foodstuff that both very young and very old members of a group can consume - and maybe even produce while adults are off procuring other things. This means that survival to adulthood and into old age can be facilitated, which has the potential of significantly reorganizing the way labor is divided within a society, and increasing the generational knowledge available to given forager groups.

References

Aranguren,Biancamaria, Becattini, Roberto, Mariotti Lippi, Marta, & Revedin, Anna (2007). Grinding flour in Upper Palaeolithic Europe (25000 years bp) Antiquity, 81 (314), 845-855

HILL JR, M. (2008). Variation in Paleoindian fauna use on the Great Plains and Rocky Mountains of North America Quaternary International, 191 (1), 34-52 DOI: 10.1016/j.quaint.2007.10.004

2010 Loveland Stone Age Fair

The 2010 Stone Age Fair will be held in Loveland, CO, on Sept. 25 and 26. Although I wasn't planning on going, in the end, I was able to make it to last year's 75th edition, and it was a lot of fun and a great way to learn about Paleoindian archaeology and Colorado archaeology generally. I'm definitely planning to attend this year's Fair, which also will include the following two presentations:

Building a Paleoindian Research Program in Southeastern Idaho & Northern Utah
Bonnie Pitblado

For historical reasons, virtually nothing is known about the Paleoindian record of southeastern Idaho and northern Utah. However, in this region, four major physiographic zones converge—the Central Rockies, Great Basin, Columbia Plateau, and Wyoming Basin—creating an exceptionally diverse and inviting environment. Four years of foundational fieldwork has begun to reveal that the Paleoindian record of the region, like its environment, is diverse…and very inviting!

A Folsom winter campsite in the Colorado Rockies
Todd Surovell

Excavations at Barger Gulch Locality B in Middle Park Colorado have produced a rich assemblage of Folsom artifacts occurring within clusters associated with hearth features. Large scale excavations at the site over a 10 year period have allowed us to identify a number of aspects of Folsom spatial and social behavior.

Regular AVRPI readers might remember that some of Surovell's research on the effectiveness of wooden vs. stone projectile point tips was discussed earlier on this blog (and featured on Mythbusters!). In addition to the talks, there will be artifact displays, and the great Bob Patten (who was kind enough to come show Lithic Analysis students how to knap this past srping) will be doing a flintknapping demo, while Bob Heid will be making beads.  Find out all the details about this year's Stone Age Fair, including directions and a schedule of event, by visitng their website.

New Paleoindian site in Keene, NH

It appears that a new Paleoindian site has been uncovered during the construction of a new middle school in Keene, New Hampshire. The report present a good overview in layman's terms of what has been uncovered so far

So far the artifacts have been found in oval clusters. Goodby speculates that these areas were where the people pitched tents or other shelters.

Primarily, the explorers have found a variety of stone tools that would have been used for processing animal hides, such as scraping tools. They've also found tools for making things out of bone and antlers as well as tools for engraving and splitting. But what's even more significant is what the stone tells the archeologists about the people who used them.

"We're learning for one thing that they had connections that extended all over Northern New England," Goodby said. "They were getting their stone from quarries as far away as northern Maine. And from sources in far north New Hampshire." He said there's evidence some of the stone may have come from Berlin and Jefferson.

He said they may have gotten this by following the caribou migratory routes, as that was their main game animal. He also said it may indicate that they were connected to other bands of people at this time so the stone moved from family to family.

Goodby also believes the type of stone they are finding in Keene as compared to the stone found in Swanzey in the 1970s, will ultimately prove the Keene site is even older than the Swanzey site.

Another exciting find was a stone fireplace that still had remnants of burnt fire wood in it. Next to the hearth, the archeologists also discovered what they believe to be burnt caribou bone. Goodby said testing will be done on the bone to determine the animal and the wood to determine what species of trees were in the area when these people lived there.

That's all well and good, and the report provides a nice example of how observation and interpretation can be woven together during archaeological research to develop solid working hypotheses. What struck me most about the report, however, is how the material recovered during excavation will be put to use in the coming years and use the shape part of the school's own curriculum. It appears that the school administrators have very sagely decided to use this material to provide students with an awareness of the deep past.

He said school officials will be building the finds into the curriculum so that students will understand the importance of the history right there in their backyard. He also said replicas of the stone tools will be on permanent display inside the school.

"The curriculum has been a little bit lacking when it comes to the original inhabitants in New England," Gurney said. "Now the students will be able to hold replicas of the actual artifacts in their hands and see exactly what the real tools looked like and touch and hold them…. It's just great."

If you ask me, that's a really fantastic manner of both underscoring the importance of archaeology to a young audience as well as of introducing students to the fundamental principles that allow people to study the human past and, more broadly, an array of 'paleo' disciplines by familiarizing them, for starters, with how dating methods work and the long history of human-environment interactions. Given the recent rise of the worst of obscurantist tendencies in some quarters, this can only be a good thing.

Quote of the day

"I always though that it was a shame that, when they dug the Panama Canal, they didn't screen!"

Bob Kelly in Boulder on 01/29/2010, answering a question about whether a coastal Paleoindian settlement along the western coast of North America might have allowed people to cross into the Caribbean Sea using the isthmus of Panama.

Bob Kelly archaeology lectures at CU Boulder

Robert L. Kelly, a professor of archaeology in the department of anthropology at the University of Wyoming and a leading figure in research on prehistoric hunter-gatherers and the Paleoindian is giving the Distinguished Archaeology Lecture in the CU Boulder department of anthropology at the end of this month. He's also well known for his book "The Foraging Spectrum: Diversity in Hunter-Gatherer Lifeways" which is something of a must for anyone interested in hunter-gatherer adaptations, both in archaeology and as documented ethnographically. He'll be giving two lectures, both of which should be of interest to anyone interested in prehistoric foragers, the settlement of the New World and how archaeology can help understand some dimensions of human nature. Click on the flyer above for details about the lectures and info on how to get to them.

2009 Loveland Stone Age Fair

I unfortunately won't be able to attend this, but I encourage everyone living in the Front Range with an interest in prehistory to attend the 75th (!) edition of the Stone Age Fair, in Loveland, CO this coming weekend, Sept. 26-27. From a short feature in the Denver Post:

Everything on exhibit is from private collections and institutions, including a pre-eminent display of points from the Smithsonian Institution.

"And everything is legally obtained, all these fantastic collections that have come in from all over the country," says Andy Coca, president of the Loveland Archaeological Society, which sponsors the fair.

Coca is keenly sensitive to the problem of black-market artifact sales like the federal investigation that recently sentenced two Utah women for stealing more than 800 Indian relics.

The events will include a flintknapping demonstration by Bob Patten, as well as lectures by several Paleoindian archaeologists: Jason Labelle (From the High Country to the Hogbacks to the High Plains: Prehistoric Lifeways in the Cache la Poudre River Basin, Northern Colorado), Mike Waters (The First Americans: A View from the Gault and Buttermilk Creek Sites, Texas), Pegi Jodry (Sacred Perspectives from Horn Shelter) and Dennis Stanford (Probing the Past: Seeking New Paleolithic Paradigms). If any readers of this blog attend, I'd love to hear some feedback about the whole thing.

More information can be found at the Stone Age Fair website.