54. Possible Relatives in the Americas

Meadowcroft site (Pennsylvania, USA)

by George Weber

Location of the Meadowcroft rock shelter, 4 km from the town of Avella.  Acknowledgment for most illustrations to Mark McConaughy

The Meadowcroft Site

The Meadowcroft site is important because it has an enormously long record ofhuman occupation. although that occupation was not continuous. The site was first occupied at a very early date indeed: just under more than 16,000 years ago is the latest estimate for the oldest level found and the site was not finally abandoned until the American War for Independence.

The site was discovered in 1909 by a black foreman who recognised strange bones as too big teven to be buffalo (in fact they turned out later to be of the extinct Bison antiquus). Some bones and artefacts were collected and then sat, forgotten, in a warehouse until the site was re-discovered by Albert Miller in 1955. Scientific excavation with the most modern technologies was finally carried out 1973-1978 by a team led by Dr.James M. Adovasio of the University of Pittsburgh. His discoveries were spectacular and made the site one of the most important in the Americas. It upset the powerful "pre-Clovis does not exist" faction among prehistorians and so it took decades for the message from Meadowcroft to sink in, that there was indeed a pre-Clovis.

The scientific excavation of the rock shelter was so well-organised and documented and the evidence found so clearly layered in undisturbed strata (unlike most other possible pre-Clovis sites) that there was much less room for doubt and controversy than there had been with earlier pre-Clovis claims.

Entrance to the rock shelter

Meadowcroft has become a tourist attraction

Meadowcroft seen from the air

The bottom of "deep hole" at Meadowcroft shows the depth of the oldest finds.

 

The Strata, the finds and their dating

Eleven strata (layers) were found with number 1 the lowest and the oldest. The 2nd stratum (and especially 2a) is of major importance to American prehistory, the "pre-Cloviss, does it exist or not" controversy - and to us.

STRATUM 1
- Older than 30,000 years
- Weathered blue-gray shale
- No artefacts found

Interface between Strata 1 and 2
- C14 dates between 31,000 and 21,000 years
- Thin veneer, fine blue silty clay sediments (from bedrock shale combined with rooftop fragments)
- No artefacts found

STRATUM 2
- Sand and silt from rock shelter walls and some larger roof spalls, 30-130 cm thick (with Stratum 2b the upper 46-50 cm), continuous across the site

- A major rooftop fall around 13,000 years ago separated the stratum into a lower/older (2a) and an upper/younger (2b) substratum

- Sub-Stratum 2a - Palaeoindian and early Archaic

--C14 dates between 16,200 and 13,200 years from material of undoubted cultural origin; going back to 21,000 years from material of uncertain but possibly cultural origin; a date of 19,600 was derived from a piece of bark that appeared to have been cut and that might have been part of a bark basket (but may also have been charred bark from an ancient forest fire blown into the cave)

-- Contains all the pre-Clovis materials found at Meadocroft rock shelter

-- 26 firepits and hearths, 5 refuse and storage pits, 1 roasting pit, 1 fire floor, 1 ash/coral lens and 4 specialized activity areas were identified, 123 chipped stone artefacts, including one unfluted lanceolate point (named the "Miller lanceolate"), several unhafted bifaces, unifaces (including 2 "Mungai knives"), prismatic blades and fragments of prismatic blade cores as well as used and debitage flakes were found

-- Almost 32% of the stone assemblage twere made from a locally available chert, 17% were made from exotic Flint Ridge Chalcedony/Vanport Chert and a further 16% from Kanawha Chert. The nearest sources of the former is 112 km and the latter 183 km from Meadowcroft. This indicates that the earliest known inhabitants of the rock shelter either had been in the area long enough to have (a) found remote sources of exotic material, or (b) built up a wide-ranging trade network with other groups if such existed at the time

-- A bi-pointed wooden tool resembling a foreshaft for a compound dart of spear shaft was found in the lower (older) part

-- Faunal and floral remains are sparse but are generally indicative of temperate climatic conditions

-- The earliest human remains found at Meadowcroft, a fragment from a middle hand phalanx of a young person, is C14 dated to 13,300 years ago, and a second human bone is a weathered fragment (probably a section of occipital bone) of similar antiquity.

-- The oldest bone tool (from the lower part of the stratum) is a cut and charred fragment from a white-tailed deer antler base. The piece was recovered from a fire place that yielded a C14 date of around 16,000 years ago

-- Artefacts from the (youngest) uppermost part of 2a represent the Early Archaic occupation of the shelter based on C14 dates. Only non-diagnostic stone points were found in this uppermost level of 2a but an early Kanawha stemmed point of early Archaic type was found in a level just above these features. It seems that the roof fell in on the cave's occupants not long after the change from Palaeoindian to Early Archaic

Lamellar stone blades from Stratum 2a

Bifaces from Stratum 2a, the "Miller Knife" is in the centre

The "Miller lanceolate point"

Heat-treated flakes made from Flint-Ridge Chacedony that had to be imported from more than 100 km away from quarries between Newark and New Concord, Ohio

- Sub-Stratum 2b - middle and late Archaic

-- Materials of certain cultural origins range in C14 ages between 9,100 to 8,000 years

-- 6 firepits and hearths, 3 refuse and storage pits, 6 fire floors, 1 ash/coral lens, 8 ash/charcoal lenses and 2 specialized activity areas were identified

-- Diagnostic stone point types recovered from this level include 1 Kanawha stemmed, 1 Kirk serrated-like, 1 Morrow Mountain-like, 1 Hansford Notched-like, 1 Brewerton Corner Notched-like, 2 Buffalo-stemmed, 1 Steubenville Stemmed-like, and 1 Merom-like points

-- Perishable artefacts include 3 pieces of simple plaited basketry, 1 pointed wooden twig, 1 complete and 1 tip of bone awls, and 1 bone weaving implement.

-- Food items recovered were Hhickory, walnut/buuternut, oak nutshells as well as a variety of seeds.

-- All animal species identified were from species still found it or only recently extirpated from the area

 

STRATUM 3 - terminal Archaic or transitional/early Woodland

- C14 dates between 3,200 and 2,900 years
- Silt and clay dominant, 30-110 cm thick, continuous across the site
- Artefacts including the earliest ceramics found
- First domesticated plant remains (Cucurbita sp.) found

STRATUM 4 - early Woodland

- C14 dates between 3,050 and 2,300 years
- Sandy loam, 30-70 cm thick, continuous across the site
- Artefacts and first corn (maize) found

STRATUM 5 - early and middle Woodland

- C14 dates between 2,160 and 1,670 years
- Sandy loam, 20-40 cm thick, continuous across the site
- Artefacts including ceramics found

STRATUM 6 - middle to early late Woodland

- No C14 dates, estimated between 1670 to 1290 years
- Large particles (bigger than 4 mm) make up most of stratum, silts and clays make up the rest, 60-140 cm thick, not continuous across the site
- The stratum ends with a massive roof fall on eastern side of shelter
- Artefacts occur but are rather sparse and there are no ceramics

STRATUM 7 - late Woodland

- C14 dates between 1,290 to 925 years
- Sandy loam, 20-40 cm thick, continuous across the site
- Artefacts including ceramics found
- A fragmentary human burial found

STRATUM 8 - late Woodland

- Only one C14 date, 685 +/- 80 years (ca. AD 1320)
- Larger particles with some sand, thin stratum, 0.5 to 5 cm thick, not continous across the site
- Artefacts occur but are rather sparse and there are no ceramics

STRATUM 9 - late Woodland

- Only one C14 date, 630 +/-100 years (ca. AD 1370)
- Larger particles with some sand, thin stratum, 0.5 to 5 cm thick, not continous across the site
- Artefacts including ceramics occur but are rather sparse

STRATUM 10 - late Woodland

- No C14 dates, should be younger than AD 1200 and terminated after the first arrival of Europeans
- Larger particles with some sand, thin stratum, between 1 to 5 cm thick, not continous across the site
- Some stone artefacts and some historic Euro-American artefacts found

STRATUM 11 - historic Euro-American period

- Only one C14 date, AD1775
- Silty clay with some larger prticles, between 12 to 15 cm thick, continous across the site
- Some stone artefacts and ceramics as well as some historic Euro-American artefacts and large amounts of nutshells found

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Last change 12 January 2007