Pleistocene-Holocene Transition Era Human Subsistence and Paleoecology at Marmes Rockshelter, Southeastern Washington

在国家科学基金会的支持下，R。李莱曼将评估有关北美最早的人类居民的生存策略的替代假设。一些考古学家认为，这些早期的群体是大型哺乳动物的专业猎人，偶尔也会利用小型猎物;其他人则认为他们是饮食通才，偶尔会利用猛犸或野牛。 不同的研究人员对已发表的数据进行了统计分析，得出了相互矛盾的结果，但所有研究人员都认为，选择正确假设的唯一方法是分析新近从动物群或古动物遗骸中获得的数据。20世纪60年代，在华盛顿州东南部的马梅斯罗克谢尔特（Marmes Rockshelter）发掘出了适当的古动物遗骸。 Marmes网站的地层柱跨越PHT和许多动物群的遗骸收集从1毫米筛孔，使收集独特的美国西部的小样本仍然进行了研究，到目前为止，建议整个集合将包括约4500个可识别的骨骼和牙齿分布在六个地层不同的组合。 最初的古美洲生存实践和转变，在生存追求的人了解他们的新殖民地景观将被记录与细粒度的时间分辨率和显着的大样本。 此外，古生态反应的居民动物的环境动态PHT的变化表型和分类丰度的形式将被揭示。 了解这些反应将有助于回答焦点问题：最初对当地景观生态学一无所知的古美洲殖民者是如何生存的？当他们学习当地生态学时，他们的生存实践是如何改变的？ 相关的问题包括：马梅斯的早期人类利用了哪些可用的动物资源？ 他们被剥削的比例是多少？ 猎物尸体是如何被屠宰的（例如，立即消费或延迟消费）。 物种在一年中的哪些季节被开发（根据出生季节有限的物种死亡时的年龄）？ 正是这些问题支持了关于古美洲生存的其他假说。 此外，学习自然的生态景观（包括气候），古美洲人遇到和适应将有助于确定古美洲人的生存追求的原因。 这项研究的更广泛影响是，两到四名研究生将接受动物考古方法的培训。 其中几个将利用Marmes动物群的收藏品制定自己的研究项目。 此外，这些藏品很可能包含人类遗骸，这些遗骸将被整理并归还给美国陆军工程兵团（管理这些藏品），并可供遣返。 最后，将展示这些收藏品（在这种情况下，40年）的策展价值。

With National Science Foundation support, Dr. R. Lee Lyman will evaluate the alternative hypotheses concerning the subsistence strategies practiced the earliest human inhabitants of North America. Some archaeologists believe that these early groups were specialized hunters of mega-mammals and only occasionally exploited small game; others argue that they were dietary generalists who opportunistically exploited an occasional mammoth or bison. Previous statistical analyses of published data by different researchers have produced conflicting results, but all researchers agree that the only way to choose the correct hypothesis is to analyze data newly derived from faunal or paleozoological remains.Appropriate paleozoological remains were excavated in the 1960s from Marmes Rockshelter in southeastern Washington State. The Marmes site's stratigraphic column spans the PHT and many faunal remains were collected from 1-mm mesh sieves, making the collection unique in the western U.S. The small sample of remains that have been studied to date suggest that the entire collection will consist of about 4500 identifiable bones and teeth distributed across six stratigraphically distinct assemblages. Initial paleoamerican subsistence practices and shifts in subsistence pursuits as people learned about their newly colonized landscape will be documented with fine-grain temporal resolution and notably large samples. Further, paleoecological responses of resident fauna to the environmentally dynamic PHT in the form of shifting phenotypes and taxonomic abundances will be revealed. Knowing these responses will assist with answering the focal questions: How did paleoamerican colonists who were initially ignorant of local landscape ecology survive? And how did their subsistence practices shift as they learned local ecology? Related questions include: Which of the available faunal resources did early humans at Marmes exploit? In what proportions were they exploited? How were prey carcasses butchered (e.g., for immediate consumption or delayed consumption)? At what seasons of the year were species exploited (based on age at death of species with seasonally limited birth seasons)? Precisely these questions underpin the alternative hypotheses about paleoamerican subsistence. Further, learning the nature of the ecological landscape (including climate) that paleoamericans encountered and adapted to will assist with ascertaining the why of paleoamerican subsistence pursuits. Broader impacts of the research are that two to four graduate students will receive training in zooarchaeological methods. Several of them will develop their own research projects using the Marmes faunal collection. Further, the collection very likely contains human remains that will be sorted out and returned to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (that administers the collection) and made available for repatriation. Finally, the value of curation of such collections (in this case, 40 years) will be demonstrated.