Clovis Culture/Technology Spread due to Geographically Widespread Hunter–gatherer Social Network

Neutron activation analysis of 12,900-year-old stone artifacts confirms 450–510+ km Clovis tool-stone acquisition at Paleo Crossing (33ME274), northeast Ohio, U.S.A.

Authors:

Boulanger et al

Abstract:

The archaeologically sudden appearance of Clovis artifacts (13,500–12,500 calibrated years ago) across Pleistocene North America documents one of the broadest and most rapid expansions of any culture known from prehistory. One long-asserted hallmark of the Clovis culture and its rapid expansion is the long-distance acquisition of “exotic” stone used for tool manufacture, given that this behavior would be consistent with geographically widespread social contact and territorial permeability among mobile hunter–gatherer populations. Here we present geochemical evidence acquired from neutron activation analysis (NAA) of stone flaking debris from the Paleo Crossing site, a 12,900-year-old Clovis camp in northeastern Ohio. These data indicate that the majority stone raw material at Paleo Crossing originates from the Wyandotte chert source area in Harrison County, Indiana, a straight-line distance of 450–510 km. Our analyses thus geochemically confirm an extreme stone-source-to-camp-site distance of a Clovis site in eastern North America and thus provide strong inferential material evidence that the fast expansion of the Clovis culture across the continent occurred as a result of a geographically widespread hunter–gatherer social network.