Paleoindian Adaptations in Eastern Beringia: Prelude or Postscript to the Early Settlement of the Americas

考古学家将在阿拉斯加西北部内陆的晚更新世时期的乌鸦断崖遗址进行为期两年的考古调查。该遗址包括美国北极地区最古老、保存最完好的动物遗骸收藏，以及包括凹槽投射点在内的一组石器。凹槽抛射点是一种石头武器尖端，与新大陆大多数地区人类定居的初始阶段有关。然而，它们并没有可靠地在东Beringia(阿拉斯加和育空地区的未冰川部分)被测得年代，这一地区对于思考美洲的殖民至关重要，因为它是北美和南美洲最初的定居者离开亚洲家园扩张时的假定中途站。在缺乏安全年代的情况下，贝林式凹点尚未处于历史或生态背景中，使用这项技术的人的行为或他们与中大陆凹点使用者的关系鲜为人知。该项目将通过乌鸦崖的跨学科研究和对博物馆藏品中发现的现有凹槽点组合的分析来解决这些问题。在乌鸦崖，一个研究小组将：建立考古沉积物的年代学和地层框架；重建晚更新世和早全新世的环境背景；描述动物群开发和资源利用的战略；并描述在该遗址进行的石器生产和维护活动的特点，包括槽点制造和修复方法。基于我们在乌鸦峭壁的详细研究，我们还计划重新检查来自阿拉斯加的现有凹槽点组合，以及来自中大陆的选定凹槽点组合的公布数据，以评估关于贝林贾境内凹槽点技术的传播和发展，以及它在贝林贾和中大陆之间传播的假说。这项工作产生的见解将有助于解决长期存在的问题，即在贝林贾占领凹槽点的时机，以及在极端高纬度环境中制造凹槽点的人的生存和技术适应情况。它还将填补我们在地理和时间上对古印第安人在美洲各地扩散的认识上的一个重大空白。这些问题之所以重要，是因为它们与世界各地人民的首次进入和适应性辐射的一般进程有关，并揭示了小规模社会如何适应各种环境挑战。这项研究的更广泛影响包括对高中生、本科生和研究生的培训和指导。通过PolarTREC计划进行的教育和推广工作将把一个具有重大公共利益和科学重要性的问题--新世界最早的文化发展时期--带入全国各地的课堂。

Archaeologists will undertake a two-year program of archaeological investigations at the late Pleistocene age Raven Bluff site in interior northwestern Alaska. The site contains the oldest and best preserved collection of faunal remains from the American Arctic, and an assemblage of stone tools that includes fluted projectile points. Fluted projectile points are a type of stone weapon tip associated with the initial phase of human settlement in most regions of the New World. They have not, however, been reliably dated in eastern Beringia (Alaska and unglaciated portions of Yukon), a region of critical importance for thinking about the colonization of the Americas since it was a presumed waypoint for the initial settlers of North and South America as they expanded from their Asian homeland. In the absence of secure dating Beringian fluted points have yet to be situated in a historical or ecological context, and there is little known about the behavior of the people who used this technology or their relationship to fluted point users in the midcontinent. This project will address these issues through interdisciplinary studies at Raven Bluff and analyses of existing fluted point assemblages found in museum collections. At Raven Bluff a research team will: establish a chronological and stratigraphic framework for the archaeological deposits; reconstruct the late Pleistocene and early Holocene environmental setting; describe strategies of faunal exploitation and resource use; and characterize the stone tool production and maintenance activities conducted at the site, including methods of fluted point manufacture and repair. Building on insights from our detailed studies at Raven Bluff we also plan to reexamine existing fluted point assemblages from Alaska, as well as published data from selected fluted point assemblages from the midcontinent, in order to evaluate hypotheses about the transmission and development of fluted point technology within Beringia, and its transmission between Beringia and the midcontinent.Insights resulting from this work will help resolve longstanding questions about the timing of the fluted point occupation in Beringia, and the subsistence and technological adaptations of the people who made fluted point in an extreme, high latitude environment. It will also fill a major geographic and temporal gap in our knowledge of Paleoindian dispersals throughout the Americas. These issues are important because they are connected to the general process of first entry and adaptive radiation of people in all parts of the world, and shed light on the means by which small scale societies adapt to diverse environmental challenges. The broader impacts of this study include training and mentoring of high school, undergraduate and graduate students. Education and outreach efforts through the PolarTREC program will bring an issue of great public interest and scientific importance?the earliest period of cultural development in the New World ?into classrooms across the country.