Shots Fired in the Battle Over the Cinmar Biface . . . But Does it Actually Matter to the Solutrean Hypothesis?

5/31/2015

The Cinmar biface featured on the cover of Stanford and Bradley's (2013) book. Image source: http://smithsonianscience.si.edu/2012/01/new-book-across-atlantic-ice-the-origin-of-americas-clovis-culture/

This week, Darrin Lowery responded to questions raised about the circumstances of the discovery of the Cinmar biface, a bi-pointed stone tool that resembles, at least superficially, artifacts made and used by the Solutrean peoples of Upper Paleolithic Europe. The point was reportedly dredged up in 1970 by a scallop boat named the Cinmar (hence the name) operating off the Atlantic coast of North America, and associated with mastodon bones that were radiocarbon dated to 22,760 +/- 90 RCYBP (UCIAMS-53545). The Cinmar biface has assumed a prominent place in the debate about the Solutrean hypothesis (the idea that Upper Paleolithic peoples from western Europe colonized eastern North America sometime between about 21,000 to 17,000 years ago), even gracing the cover of the 2013 book about the idea by Dennis Stanford and Bruce Bradley, its two main advocates.

The circumstances of the Cinmar discovery were called into question in a paper by Metin Eren, Matthew Boulanger, and Michael O'Brien titled "The Cinmar Discovery and the Proposed Pre-Late Glacial Maximum Occupation of North America," published in the Journal of Archaeological Science (JAS) in March of this year. Eren et al. questioned the history and details of the find, focusing particularly on inconsistencies and omissions in the various accounts of the discovery. The JAS is a high profile venue, and the paper by Metin et al. generated a significant amount of discussion among archaeologists interested in the peopling of the Americas.

Full disclosure: I consider Metin Eren a friend of mine. We have some overlapping research interests, and have occasionally exchanged emails and papers. I think we've even had beers together at one or two professional conferences.

I should also say that I'm very skeptical of the Solutrean hypothesis. The claim of a trans-Atlantic colonization of North America during the Last Glacial Maximum is an extraordinary one, and I have seen nothing so far that convinces me it is correct. I'm not alone. The Solutrean hypothesis does not enjoy widespread support among North American archaeologists for a number of reasons (see this 2014 exchange for some summary arguments). Unfortunately, it has captured the imaginations of some ugly elements outside of the professional community, serving as the basis for white supremacist and neo-Nazi fantasies about the importance of white people to North American prehistory. That's not the fault of the developers and proponents of the idea, but it's a social dimension to the Solutrean hypothesis that is nonetheless worth being aware of and keeping an eye on.

After reading through both the JAS paper and Lowery's self-published response, I can't say much has changed for me. The discussion about the circumstances of the Cinmar discovery is an interesting one (especially if you like to see an argument), but it's a debate about the details of a single discovery that, in my opinion, doesn't have the power to "prove" anything either way. Despite its appearance on the cover of a book and a charged exchange about the credibility of the artifact and those who are interested in it, the Cinmar biface doesn't really matter.

Let me explain what I mean by that.

On the one hand, what if the case for the Cinmar biface is materially flawed and you just have to throw it out? Eren et al. ask several pointed questions about the discovery, any one of which could potentially sink it as a reliable piece of evidence. Maybe we can't be sure it was in the same dredge load as the mastodon bones, or maybe we can't be sure the artifact was even recovered at sea. So maybe the Cinmar biface means nothing in archaeological terms because we just can't trust it.

But, on the other hand, what if everything about the Cinmar discovery is "best case scenario" for the Solutrean hypothesis? Let's the say we can be sure the point was dredged up in 1970 in the same immediate area as some mastodon remains - what does that actually get us? The "association" between the point and the fauna (on which the age estimate is based) is still incredibly weak, leaving us still with just a single stone point largely without context. Is that the kind of "site" that will change anyone's mind about something as significant as the first colonization of the Americas? I don't think so, and history agrees with me. Think about the sites that have been pivot points in our acceptance of alternative ideas about prehistory in the western hemisphere: L'Anse aux Meadows, Monte Verde, Folsom . . . those were all sites with clear evidence that falsified an existing model. Proponents and skeptics could stand there together and look at the deposits and have a meeting of the minds about what they meant. That's never going to be the case with something like the Cinmar biface. A point that "resembles" a Solutrean artifact with a provenience of "same dredge load as some mastodon bones" is not at the level of a site like Monte Verde - not even close. Under the most charitable reading it doesn't have the power to move the needle on acceptance of the Solutrean hypothesis. By itself it's just not a game changer.

What would be a game changer? Proponents of the Solutrean hypothesis are going to have to find, excavate, and document a real site: good artifacts in good contexts with good dates. Period. If the hypothesis is correct, those sites should be identifiable. The Cinmar biface was made from an inland raw material source, so there should be some sites on dry land with clear evidence of a Solutrean occupation. All you need is one. One good site trumps dozens of finds of purported Solutrean or Solutrean-like artifacts with poor or no context. Think about how many sites with "associations" between stone projectile points and extinct fauna were dismissed in North America prior to the acceptance of the antiquity of humans in the New World demonstrated by careful excavations at the Folsom site. The Solutrean hypothesis will ultimately need something similar.

The burden of proof in this situation pretty clearly has to be on the advocates of the Solutrean hypothesis: it is impossible to use material evidence to prove that Solutrean peoples did not make it to North America (just as we cannot prove they are not currently orbiting the sun in a teapot). The falsifiable hypothesis in this case is that there was no colonization of North America by Upper Paleolithic peoples from Europe. That's what would need to be proved wrong. Does the Cinmar biface, even under the best of circumstances, do that? I would say no. And I would also say that eliminating the Cinmar biface as a piece of evidence doesn't "disprove" the Solutrean hypothesis. Basically, I think that with or without the Cinmar biface the Solutrean hypothesis remains an idea based on an assemblage of circumstantial evidence, none of which at this point appears to be critical to whether the hypothesis is viable or not. I think the Cinmar biface would not change that equation for me even if I had plucked it from the dredge myself. It's just not enough.

Other than it's relevance to archaeology, the Cinmar discussion is interesting because of the speed and openness with which it's taking place. The JAS paper was published open access, so it's available to everyone. Lowery published his response less than two months later on Academia.edu (again, available to everyone). I'm not sure if there's a precedent for this sort of thing - we may be watching something new. It will be interesting to see if the discussion continues and, if so, at what pace and in what format.

Even though I don't think the Cinmar biface is as crtitical to the viability of the Solutrean hypothesis as it has been made out to be, I do welcome the vigorous questioning of evidence. I think it tells you something important about where the debate about the Solutrean hypothesis is at the moment: it's a lot of energy expended over the minutiae of an artifact that greatly diminishes in perceived importance if a single "good" site can be located. That's what I'll be watching for.

Eren, M., Boulanger, M., & O'Brien, M. (2015). The Cinmar discovery and the proposed pre-Late Glacial Maximum occupation of North America Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports DOI: 10.1016/j.jasrep.2015.03.001

43 Comments

Greg Little

5/31/2015 07:28:24 am

You are probably dead on regarding the actual importance--or lack of importance--of this single "point." If Solutreans came to the Americas circa 20,000 BCE it probably would not have taken many of them to spread their lithic technology, which may have evolved to Clovis. A colonization by them would be more identifiable via the mtDNA studies and there is nothing other than the Haplogroup X trace that points to "others." The evidence of such intrusions, even large ones, would most likely be found under water as 20,000 years ago the sea levels were much, much lower. Michael Fought has written a lot about that. But even if Solutreans did arrive, it was a population from 20,000 years ago, probably not "white" as we think about race. And certainly not European.

Darrin Lowery

5/31/2015 10:24:01 am

Hello sir! I read your response and here's my retort! Please be mindful that my self-published article was to address the questions relative to the context, the facts, and the history of the CINMAR discovery. I could care less about any Solutrean affiliation. The significance of the find can be summed up very simply. The CINMAR discovery indicates that there are former nearshore or terrestrial prehistoric archaeological deposits on the Middle Atlantic outer continental shelf.

Let me remind you that there are bi-pointed forms in a gamut of assemblages over many millennia. Bi-pointed biface forms occur in Mississippian through Clovis contexts (i.e., the Beach Cache and even Anzick) across North America. In the Old World, bi-pointed forms occur at Solutrean sites circa 17k to 22k, at Siberian Upper Paleolithic sites (i.e., Ust’-Kova circa ~25 to ~26k), and even within the Still Bay industry at Blombos Cave circa 100k to 70k. The point being (pun intended), the bi-pointed biface form should not be something unexpected in many cultural lithic assemblages. That being said, the biogeochemical alterations to the iron within the meta-rhyolite used to manufacture the CINMAR biface resulted as a byproduct of both sulfidization and sulfuricization. The even degradation to the surface is associated with nearshore drowned-upland tidal marsh landscapes. Since the CINMAR discovery site is located at -74 meters in depth (-242 feet), the question arises as to when was the last time this bathymetric depth or contour was a nearshore tidal marsh setting? The answer is about ~14.5k or at the onset of Meltwater Pulse 1A! The site was situated about 3 miles east of the Clovis coastline and was located beneath about 60 feet of water at ~13k. After years of monitoring the deposition patterns of eroded artifacts along a gamut of shoreline settings, artifacts eroded and displaced from coastal sites move along the shoreline and inshore (via overwash processes); not offshore.

I would agree that the CINMAR biface is not critical to the viability of the Solutrean hypothesis! In reality, I could care less about whose “hypothesis” is at the top of acceptable academic “heap”. Metin Eren, Matthew Boulanger, and Michael O'Brien “muddied” the facts about this discovery and tainted the history of the find to discredit it on their terms. These authors had plenty of opportunities to get the “questions” outlined in their JAS paper answered (via email two months before it was published and via multiple emails a month after it appeared). Most recently, Michael O’Brien basked in his own omnipotent and omniscient glory with the statements outlined in the University of Missouri press release. I have presented all of the available facts (which included a small geography lesson for Dr. O'Brien) relative to the CINMAR discovery at academia.edu. The available facts are out there to clarify the history, address the accusations, and clear up any misrepresentations.

I noticed that you consider Metin Eren a friend. Be mindful that he and his two colleagues criticized a discovery made by a defenseless dead man! I would simply state, “that’s a quality friend you got there”! Thurston Shawn had no academic stake in the proverbial “Peopling of the New World game”. My online response was not to defend Dennis Stanford or Bruce Bradley. These guys can defend themselves! My response was to defend Captain Shawn’s contribution to North America’s prehistory, as well as the misrepresentations of Mrs. Jean Tanner, Mrs. Silvia Cannon, and Mr. Dean Parker!

I could care less about how this find is being interpreted by various scholars with respect to the Solutrean hypothesis! If a fisherman made a similar biface discovery beneath 242 feet of water in the Bering Sea, proponents of the “Land Bridge Hypothesis” would be cheering, dancing in the streets, and screaming we’ve found the “missing” Siberian Paleolithic link. But, the CINMAR biface was found on the wrong side of the continent, situated beneath the wrong ocean, and beneath too much water; therefore it has got to be wrong! In my world, that’s not good science. Maybe, it forces us to look more thoroughly on ~14.5k landscapes across North America. If we were to investigate the Middle Atlantic continental shelf at the -74 meter bathymetric contour line or near where the CINMAR biface was discovered and unearthed a bunch of flakes, cores, and some hammerstones within the associated sediments, the “case” would be closed! By the way, that’s what we hope to do! If we find an old refrigerator, a pile a Navy ordinance, or a pavement of gold ingots, at least we checked it out (I'd prefer the latter)! Not to quote Forrest Gump, but "that’s all I have to say about” the CINMAR issue!

Thanks for the opportunity to comme

Not Darrin Lowery

6/1/2015 09:57:26 am

"I could care less about any Solutrean affiliation...about whose “hypothesis” is at the top of acceptable academic “heap”....about how this find is being interpreted by various scholars with respect to the Solutrean hypothesis!"

Yet, in a 2006 article in the Richmond Times-Dispatch "Archaeologist says Va. bolsters claim on how people got to America," you're quoted as saying:

"The more paleo-Indian points . . . you find, which indirectly suggest that the coastline was the place to be, it sort of fits [Stanford's] model . . . of pre-Clovis folks focused along the coastline and exploiting coastal resources [...] They look very similar to some of the stuff from Cactus Hill, to some of the stuff that they're finding in Florida. And more importantly they look very similar to some of the stuff found at Solutrean sites."

Darrin Lowery

6/1/2015 11:43:22 am

Do you know how many times I've been misquoted and misrepresented by newspaper reporters? Just about every time I've talked to a newspaper reporter! If you're going to hold me to what they say in a newspaper...there aren't enough hours in the day to address reporter mistakes!

We do have a ton of Clovis points in the Middle Atlantic region! I believe Clovis had a coastal adaptation and exploited coastal resources. I can't directly prove it yet! I believe that they (Clovis) were not the first folks in the Middle Atlantic region. Based on what Stanford and Bradley have professed there seem to be some similarities. But as I have said publicly, I put a bunch of flaked on rocks up to my ears and they have never told anything about the gender, language, or ethnicity of their makers!

To illustrate this issue, you can find triangular points in western New York state made by the Iroquois, you can find triangular points in the Chesapeake made by Algonquians, and triangular points in western North Carolina made by Siouan speakers. Technologically all of these points look the same! However, these stone triangular points have radically different cultural histories! Why can't that be the same in Clovis?

Ironically, the lithic utilization patterns expressed in our Delmarva Late Woodland triangular point dataset are exactly the same as our Delmarva Clovis point dataset. As I stated above, I don't think these patterns are expressive of a colonizing population. In summation, we are currently working on addressing many of the aforementioned research issues and concepts!

Steve Timmermans

7/17/2016 08:24:43 am

Clearly and well stated, Darrin.

Salistala

1/22/2018 03:27:07 pm

I wouldn't say that Eren et al are criticizing the discovery of a defenceless dead man.

I'd say they were criticizing your constantly changing account of it. I'd say that they are criticizing a pivotal piece of evidence for a highly controversial hypothesis, that is only supported by non-verifiable testimony and statements from highly biased SH proponents.

Henry Holt

6/1/2015 12:47:07 am

It's sad that there was never a concerted effort to organize the discoveries of offshore fishermen in the Atlantic. For every reported find, I suspect there have been dozens that were not reported for fear of one regulation or another. You see the same thing on land every day...........sites swept under the rug by construction contractors etc. For what it's worth in this case, the account provided by the Cinmar's Captain and Darrin Lowrey sounds entirely credible. The JAS article on the other hand comes off (at best) as poorly researched.

John Grady

6/1/2015 02:41:26 am

Having read whatever that thing is supposed to be, I think Lowery might consider removing it -- for those of us paying attention and reading what's said from both sides, his document confirms everything that Eren, Bolanger, and Obrien (EBO) say in their article:

EBO: Stanford et al. (2014) claim that "It is important to remember that both the mastodon remains and the biface had also been on display since 1976." EBO report that this cannot be possible: museum itself was not founded until 1991, and museum records say the point was donated in 2001/2002

L: Confirms that the museum didn't exist in 1976, and that it received the artifacts in 2001. Stanford was informed of this error on two occasions, and didn't correct it.

EBO: The published description of the Cinmar boat by Stanford and Bradley (2014: 618) is as follows: "the Cinmar was a wooden dredger built in the 1950s...it was smaller than modern dredger...it would not have pulled heavy loads or dredged the distances indicated by O'Brien et al. [1-10 km]" and the caption of the unsourced photograph in their article says that the photo is "illustrating its small size relative to modern scallop vessels." But, EBO point out that the boat was built in the 1960s, and that photographs of the actual boat as well as her specs make her out to be larger than modern boats.

L: Confirms that SB's is an inaccurate description of the boat, that it was "larger than the normal modern scalloping boat," that photographs of it with reference scales demonstrate just how big it was, and that EBO's description of the boat is correct.

EBO: The issue of "hanglogs" is of Stanford's own doing: he claimed publicly at Lindenmeier conference (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9T2XhKtU0hA, scrub to 29:00) that the captain recorded the find and reported it to the harbor master, but EBO point out that no record exists of this.

L: Confirms that there is no reason why the find has to be in a published log, that the find was probably never reported to a harbor master, and that there is no independent record of it--essentially what EBO were saying.

The ad hominem in that document makes L look a bit foolish. Example: The snide comment about a "geography lesson"...except Stanford et al. (pg. 89 of New evidence for a possible Paleolithic occupation..., on which Lowery is a coauthor, in the above YouTube video, and in their 2012 book) themselves refer to the Cinmar biface as coming from the Chesapeake Bay.

Something, something, throwing stones...something, something, glass houses

David Sweet

11/3/2015 09:52:20 am

FYI--You have a great capacity to fall back upon your lack of info to derive false conclusions:

To wit--
the museum was a part of the community center across the street from the museum's current location, until the present building was readied in 1991. I played softball in the community league on the diamond in back of the community center. Exhibits had been accumulating there for some time and continued to do so until the need for a proper museum became imperative. The artifacts mentioned were indeed displayed in the ad-hoc museum as stated.

Further, I've held the Cinmar and its replica cast by Mike Frank, know Dean Parker personally, and hunted artifacts with the late Mark Small, whose collection, including the SIX Solutrean artifacts, I am in possession of SIX Solutrean-like artifacts.

Dr's Stanford and Lowery state:
“Their existence appears consistent with other physical evidence found of very early day man living in the Chesapeake Region and using Solutrean technology to make tools to hunt and butcher mastodons.”

Your confusion about the Cinmar is understandable given your previous misrepresentation of facts--the Cinmar dredged these artifacts up, and there is no question about that. I've been out on a scallop boat before--a modern steel vessel of 80+ feet. The Cinmar is not a modern vessel, nor is it made from steel, so no comparisons with modern steel vessels need be undertaken here for any purpose

Whether a harbormaster recorded the site or not has nothing to do with the fact that the bearings provided nailed the location of the site, as confirmed by sono-bouy, submersible RV and samples from the ancient marsh analyzed along with Mammoth Ivory, which confirms by unique chemical weathering per marsh-bog conditions that the Mammoth was killed at the place the remains and stone blade were recovered...

I do find such to be conclusive enough to brook no if's, but's or maybe's about it

https://www.facebook.com/solutreanforsale

David Cusack

6/1/2015 04:46:10 am

Remind me to never criticize the theories, data, or conclusions of dead persons, lest I be considered a bad, bad man like Meten Erin!

Henry Holt

6/2/2015 05:57:38 am

Just a side note, but it's funny that you should bring up triangle points, since that was lurking in the back of my mind as I read this discussion. I worked on a mid-atlantic site back in the 1980s where we excavated numerous triangles along with beautifully preserved intact post molds and hearths.......6 or 7 feet BELOW SEA LEVEL. Carbon dates were all EARLY ARCHAIC!! Would anyone like to venture a guess as to how many Early Archiac triangles in plow zones have been mis-typed as Late Woodland.............thousands of them!!! and I'm sure the mis-typing continues to this day.

David Sweet

11/3/2015 12:27:44 am

Having been a relic hunter on Va shores for many years (I found my first point at age 11--I'm 56 now), and currently handling the late Mark Small collection, I have discovered 4 more projectile points in the collection after Dr Stanford discovered the two large Solutrean-like knives, at the Gwynn's Island Museum in 2011. Dr Stanford and Dr Lowery gave this statement regards the four additional artifacts: “Their existence appears consistent with other physical evidence found of very early day man living in the Chesapeake Region and using Solutrean technology to make tools to hunt and butcher mastodons.” There are no early archaic triangles from this region--further, the flaking used by woodland peoples is, upon close examination, obviously not the same as used by those who produced Solutrean-like projectile points. Further, beach and shoreline sites in this region are virtually always multi-component assemblages due to wave action and erosion. I've always found old campfire pits, stump hollows and other depressions along the shore to be places where artifacts wash into. Organic material recovered from an underwater setting cannot have provided accurate dating due to inevitable contamination--one cannot date artifacts by C-14, therefore, and as I am intimiately familiar with regional typologies, there is no possible way a woodland triangle could have been confused for the regions' blatantly non-existant early archaic triangles...

Bob Jase

6/2/2015 01:32:13 pm

I find the Solutrean hypothesis intriguing and worth further investigation, it wouldn't surprise me if it were correct. Then again, it wouldn't surprise me if colonization from Asia occurred earlier than presently accepted either.

I suspect that there wasn't nearly as much regional isolation of prehistoric peoples as generally thought - no highly developed civilization for hyperdiffusion, just small groups that wandered & spread new tech & ideas occasionally & probably untracable.

Andy White

6/2/2015 10:41:23 pm

Hi Bob,

As always, it will ultimately come down to evidence. So far I haven't been convinced by anything I've seen that's been put forward. It has been called a "skeletal idea" (or something like that) that lacks positive evidence, and I think that's accurate. And as long as the positive "evidence" remains isolated artifacts with dubious histories and proveniences . . . that's just not enough to convince me that the Solutrean hypothesis is a credible description of something that actually happened in the past, even if it is logically possible. That's where I'm at on it.

Darrin Lowery

7/29/2015 10:31:21 pm

To all! The question comes down to: Are we looking to discover evidence of the first Americans or the first successful Americans? This causes us to confront the question of "Were there multiple failed migration attempts into both North and South America that left no "legacy" genetic signature, but these failed migrations did leave an archaeological record?" Stewart Fiedel and I debate this issue all the time! Let us suppose that 25,000 years ago a boat containing five males got blown off course and ended up along the southern coast of Oregon! These unfortunate souls would leave an archaeological record but leave no legacy genetic record with later successful migrants. Let us also suppose that a population (with both males and females) traverses the North Atlantic ice front circa 22,000 years ago and ends up along the Middle Atlantic. For a while, the population could maintain itself (i.e., reproduce new generations). This frontier population survives for a while (maybe 500 years or more), explores the region, knows the resources, and leaves an archaeological record. However, it ultimately fizzles out (result of bad genetics and a worse environment). Successor populations in the Middle Atlantic region document no evidence of this earlier failed colonization attempt. Is there any precedence for this type of occurrence? Yes (sort of)! As we know the Vikings attempted to settle L'Anse aux Meadows in Canada circa 1000 years ago! The Vikings left an archaeological record (just barely) and they left no genetic signature among the indigenous Native American populations! So how many failed attempts were made to colonize the Americas (either continuously or accidentally) along multiple fronts? I would imagine there were many and each one of them could have left stone tools in good secure geoarchaeological contexts! However, should we discount the discoveries simply on the fact that the evidence does not fit the archaeological record of later successful colonization attempts! Should we discount the evidence from L'Anse aux Meadows....because it's "out of whack" relative to the later successful European Spanish, English, and French colonizations of the New World? I think not! Be mindful the archaeological record of the Vikings in Canada is almost as scanty as the Paleo-American evidence along the eastern sea board! Oh well! Fun stuff to think about! Cheers, Darrin Lowery

Juan Barilli

8/22/2015 03:40:52 am

I have lived on the Eastern Shore over 50 years. I had collected a few stone points in my youth (all 3 were stolen) I really like your position and racial / cultural neutrality on this issue. Recent man was quite capable of long distance dispersion as is shown clearly through artifacts and colonization throughout the world. Australia is a more clearly cut case than the Americas. I have long suspected the American continent was settled by dozens of groups for more than 40,000 yrs as with the entire world. Currents and evidence is unassailable but always very incomplete. The Clovis/ Solutrean connection is very weak at this time. The finding of stone sources and quarries is the utmost of importance. Also the stone source of the discovered "Solutrean" items in the US and especially the East coast must be investigated. The Eastern Shore geology is very misunderstood by non locals. Tilghman Is is similar to all of the lower shore. Flat and sandy. 2 predominant soil types and very little else. I suspect the predominance of points from this area was the difficulty of retrieving them in the coastal muck. Most of the world of archaeology may fail to see the significance of this. Stone can almost not come from this area. The sources could prove European providence. Now that would be a spectacular discovery worthy of proving the point. Otherwise study the nearby lower Delaware, SusQ, Hudson, and Ches bay tributary flats in close proximity of the watercourses.

Juan Barili

8/23/2015 03:03:16 am

I have always had deep interests in early man and am currently in a turning point in life and examining it once again. I have been aware of Clovis since my childhood but had no idea Clovis was so widespread in the southeast until recent internet study so I have decided to study it more. A recent google find of an American "Solutrean" style stone point on the US east coast made from a French stone source is my new target of study. So far I have only seen info in the British news source of the Inquirer. I am doing searches now to study their sources and credibility.

Jaap link

11/3/2015 01:26:23 pm

Hi Darrin. I did what you suggested: imagined five men in a curragh washing up on the Oregon coast. No women, no children, no shaman! Captured in no time by the locals, with time to be accepted into the group. Thus these men could have passed on their techniques without the cultural setting. We're talking small bands here (I think), so it would not be surprising for their genetic imprint to be no longer there (visibly). Your second variation of an entire clan landing and holding out for millennia seems to me to be less likely. Because then I would expect rock-art with plenty of bison, dots, tectiforms and handstencils of young girls and children ... Then again many possibilties have no way of suggesting themselves to our imagination. If only because both in Europe and America so much land was inundated. Doggerland is not a candidate, but think of these vast stretches of land that once connected Ireland, England, France and Spain ... Also it's nice to imagine that Southern Europeans at this time were black and blue-eyed ... Like the Fomorians from Celtic legend?
I'm way out of line, I know ...
Bottom line is that the pressure-flaking need not be Solutrean at all: it's just 'Solutrean-like'! And I don't think the much-hated Solutrean Hypothesis is claiming any more than that ...

boreas

8/28/2015 08:32:28 am

Please note that there are signs of populations existing in the tropical parts of America ( = S-America) during the latter part of ice-time.

This may very well indicate that "the peopling of America" was way older than the few ppl that managed to migrate into N-America from Eurasia.

Then we have to consider that the genetic traits of the NE indians have some clear traits in common with the old Europeans, just as the indigenous populations of the N and NW America have some downstream haplogroups in common to NE Asia.

There is so far NO reason to rule out that an early migration of a limited number of people have happened at various ocassions, and from both fringes of Eurasia. Just as there is no reason to exclude the possibility that archaic humans from the troical part of far-east Asia had made it to S-America well before the end of ice-time.

"It appears from genetic evidence (see link) that the origins of native Americans are extremely complicated."

http://users.on.net/~mkfenn/page5.htm

Serial shoots in the dark?
https://www.academia.edu/8189142/The_Austronesians_in_the_New_World_a_chronostratigraphy

Genetic connections between aboriginees and brazilian indians:
http://geogenetics.ku.dk/publications/si-botocudos/SOM_CurrentBiology.pdf

Relevance:
http://dienekes.blogspot.no/2013/04/polynesian-mtdna-in-extinct-amerindians.html

Common origins confirmed:

"Suruí and Karitiana people of the Amazon had stronger ties to indigenous groups in Australasia—Australians, New Guineans and Andaman Islanders—than to any Eurasians."

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/ist/?next=/science-nature/dna-search-first-americans-links-amazon-indigenous-australians-180955976/

Major reconsideration:
http://www.news.com.au/technology/science/genetic-study-challenges-americas-settlement-theories-by-linking-amazonians-and-australasians/story-fnjwl2dr-1227452095278

"It's incredibly surprising," said David Reich, Harvard Medical School professor of genetics and senior author of the study. "There's a strong working model in archaeology and genetics, of which I have been a proponent, that most Native Americans today extend from a single pulse of expansion south of the ice sheets--and that's wrong. We missed something very important in the original data."

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/07/150721134827.htm

Jaap link

10/26/2015 01:19:46 pm

Been following the debate about the early inhabitants of the Americas, and I'm absolutely flabberghasted ... And it's not just the vitriolic reception of the Solutrean Hypothesis that amazes me. There's also the 20-years-in-limbo the excavator of Monte Verde (and his assistants/students!) had to endure ere his finds were properly examined. Grants not given, jobs on the line, scholarly/scientific careers ruined ... And then to read that archeological sites are buldozed because there is nothing pre-Clovis existing to be found ... Here comes the sheriff?
What sort of idiotic wolf-pack has been terrorising American academia? How come nobody looked below Clovis for donkey's years? Is street-fighting an academic quality in the Americas? The quality of the arguments, and the sneers, and the raggedi-yeah hardly rise above that level.
Oh my America, my new-found land ...

N Kent

4/23/2017 09:59:47 pm

You are a immigrant from Europe, you have no deep ties to America. So quit with the bull!

Henry Holt

10/26/2015 02:00:34 pm

Jalap I couldn't agree more.

Jaap link

10/27/2015 05:10:39 am

Thanx Henry for agreeing. And thanx also for a most intriguing variation of my forename: Jalap. I think I'll hang on to it! But really my post was meant to be a question, and I think it's an important one. For it implies that many results from much painstaking work have been twisted out of recognition.You mentioned an example in your previous post (triangles!). I remember Dillehay had found dates of some 30 kya (charcoal), but hesitated to present it as no doubt it would be attributed to lightning! There is so much evidence that is admittedly not conclusive, but when it is convergent it must stand (albeit tentatively). For converging pointers are vital in the absence of hard evidence.
My main point is this: the research that we are discussing is in dire need of an extensive revision, as too much has quite simply been repressed. One dreads to think how much!

Henry Holt

10/27/2015 06:24:52 am

A few posts ago someone asked the question "Are we looking to discover evidence of the first Americans or the first successful Americans?", almost as if these were in competition with each other, which of course they aren't. The only acceptable answer to that question is "both".

That triangle site was Area D at Abbott Farm that I worked on it with Michael Stewart. It;s the only place where I have ever seen Early Archaic post molds, it was truly remarkable.

David Sweet link

11/3/2015 09:59:52 am

Exactly what typology were these triangles--surely not early archaic! I haven't found an early archaic triangle typology in this region yet. I do know that shoreline sites are subject to erosion of living floors now submerged just off-shore--anything washed from the site's often multiple layers washes ashore, either to find their way into old fire-pits, stump-holes and depressions in the clay under-surface that is most often covered by sand, but which are exposed during winter low-tides--to be filled and covered over each coming spring...so I do not understand HOW there is an early archaic triangle typology in the region that has been discovered in only the one place you've excavated...I'm saying it has got to be a multi-component site that is deeply mixed by the natuiral environment

Henry Holt

11/3/2015 12:03:59 pm

I'm the one who brought up the archaic triangles, simply as an example of a mis-typed artifact when found in a less than perfect context (they are typically typed as late woodland). I didn't mean to suggest any that they were in any way Solutrean-like. if that's what someone thought.

The site I was referring to was in New Jersey at the Abbott Farm national Landmark, Area D. The site was multi-component, well stratified, and these triangles were in fact buried several feet below sea level in the tidal zone of the lower Delaware River. We had to install 50 or so well points and de-water the site just to get at them, and that alone speaks to their archaic age, but also numerous stratified C14 from intact features were run.

The features associated with these triangles suggested the processing of anadromous fish. One noteworthy aspect of these Area D triangles is that they were chert. Other archaic triangle forms in the northeast, Squibnockets for example, are always quartz. Pretty easy to type a Squibnocket, not so with these mid-atlantic triangles.

David Sweet

11/3/2015 01:47:11 pm

I did not believe you meant to assign a Soluterean-era date to common woodland triangles. Nonetheless, there are no known early archaic triangular typologies from the region.

I have a host of triangle points made from both New England lithics and local lithics--Normanskill chert, Onondaga chert, jasper, a variety metavolcanics, quartzite, white/vein quartz and shales are common lithics among the triangles I have handled from the mid-bay region. These are typed from Roanoake and Clarksville to Levanna, Yadkin, Squibnocket, Madison, etc

There are however triangular Solutrean-like points dating to that period--I have a few as identified by Dr's Stanford and Lowery

These and other Solutrean-like examples may be seen here: https://www.facebook.com/solutreanforsale along with other types, including a frame of triangle-types from this area--all artifacts were found along the shores of the middle peninsula/northern neck region--the two largest Solutrean-like blades were dredged from the bay just off Haven Bar Buoy, and traded to Mark Small by the skipper of the vessel, a classmate of his

Henry Holt

11/3/2015 02:13:03 pm

Mid-bay triangles typed as Squibnocket?

David Sweet

11/3/2015 02:45:31 pm

No, not at all, but if you understood the nature of the material, you would understand that a great volume of material came down the Susquehanna River and its tributaries into the bay--probably over-wintering on un-frozen shores..unlike those inland waters which no doubt did freeze for a good part of the winter....Second, to understand the vast richness of the bay environment and to examine the artifact assemblages coming off the bays' shores, one can easily surmise an extensive trading network. Typologies from up and down the Atlantic seaboard show up here--among notables are Jacks Reef Corner Notched and Pentagonal, Pee Dee Pentagonal, Dewart Stemmed, Piscataway, Lamoka, Amos, Bolen, Morrow Mountain, Mansion Inn, Koens-Crispen, Lehigh, Fox Creek, Bare Island, Hoover Island, Poplar Island, Piney Island, Newmanstown, Levanna, Brewerton, Swatara-Long, Genesee, Ashtabula, Pelican, Hinds, Benton, Neville, Hopewell, Wading Creek, Abbey, Atlantic Phase,Six Mile Creek, Susquehanna, Perkiomen, Muncy, Vernon, Hardin, etc.....I even once found an early triangular made from Alabates chert on a bay-beach site.

The volume of trade conducted here also had its supporting lithic industries--just off 14th-16th streets of DC, is a now long buried quarry site wherein quartz and quartzites were quarried by peoples for thousands of years, and was likely done so by peoples from all over the region--especially those who traveled past the area coming from and going to the Chesapeake Bay. There is very little in the way of lithics in Tidewater Virginia--one has to make one's way to the fall line to be able to pick and choose from lesser and greater quality lithics

There is ample evidence to support the claim that at least half of the shell art found in the midwest was made from Atlantic species.

f note--the wide range of typologies found on bay-sites eclipses the numbers found on inland sites. An exercise in comparing for example the late Mark Small collection to the assemblage excavated at Cactus Hill shows how much more cosmopolitan the social nature of the bay's inhabitants and transients were, as opposed to sites where it is clear that inhabitants did not mix much at all with distant peoples (Cactus Hill site records show the furthest identified lithic source was only 175 miles away; the numerous southern and New England typologies found on the bay's sites do not make their presence known whatsoever in the vast majority of inland sites...

This leads inescapably to the significance water travel played in the development of local cultures, the inclusion of a large number of exotic lithics and the the finding distant typologies, some in considerable numbers

David Sweet

11/3/2015 04:42:25 pm

https://www.facebook.com/solutreanforsale/photos/pcb.454681908054261/454681631387622/?type=3&theater

Here are images of woodland triangles and next, a selection of metavolcanics made into points and spears--all from the mid-bay region--represented are andesitem normanskill, onondaga, jasper, PA chalcedony, rhyolites and cherts, quartzite and citrine-quartz, and others.

Note, too, the pair of Solutrean-like blades with very obvious outre' passe flaking--recovered from the bay bottom by scallop dredge.

Both are rhyolite, the smaller most likely from a source in the NC/SC peidmont region where a red/yellow banded rhyolite is known .
It is rather clear that outre' passe flaking-technology existed before Clovis, and apparently no where else in the world except Solutrean

Andy White

11/3/2015 04:56:46 pm

Hi David,

Since you're commenting on my blog, would you care to comment on the issues I raised in this post about the purported Solutrean points you have for sale?

http://www.andywhiteanthropology.com/blog/whats-the-solutrean-hypothesis-worth-about-10k-per-laurel-leaf

David Sweet

11/3/2015 06:22:36 pm

What is at issue is there are no--zero--alternatives to Clovis origins from any other direction. We find outre' passe flaked bifaces consistent with Solutrean flaking technology, found here on Atlantic shores. The presence of these artifacts at such an early age and coinciding with Solutrean--and sharing no links with any other known cultural manifestation's lithics in the world

“Their existence appears consistent with other physical evidence found of very early day man living in the Chesapeake Region and using Solutrean technology to make tools to hunt and butcher mastodons.” sent me via Tom Edwards, quoting Dr's Stanford and Lowery

The problem comes to be this--the artifacts showing consistency with Solutrean had to have been made by people coming from somewhere... There is no other known origin for the collective technological attributes of Solutrean technology except Solutrean Europe.

There is no other known source for Clovis' use of the same (DIFFICULT) technology aside from that it is shared in great detail with Solutrean technology.

There is simply no disputing the significance of the technological attributes of these blades: We cannot pin-point nor even surmise in general any other sourcing for the blades' technical origins than Solutrean Europe.

These artifact's presence defies DNA--they represent a technological continuum that is here, is shared only by Solutrean, and these artifacts date to the ONLY period where Solutrean peoples could have crossed over to this continent; further, they do not occur on the west coast, precluding any influence from that side of the world--so where does that leave one?

As far as the history of the find and subsequent finds--I find too many people are offering what they think they heard in the same manner that 100 people lined up and told to repeat "the quick, sly fox jumped over the lazy brown dog"-- it'll come out as an Indian recipe for black lab on toast or god knows what else. One would ahve thought simply asking me to repeat myself would do...but no, lol

Haven Bar Buoy is where the two I hold came from--tjhe subsequent four additional points came from that length of shoreline to the south of that channel--from Belle Isle to Bethel Beach (Lilly's Neck, Shagtail, new and old haven beaches, Bethel Beach...Belle Isle and Shagtail are eroded away now, so artifacts are now washing to the shores of the mouth of Stutts Creek, Moon, Diggs-area, too

As stated earlier, the Loran nav-data led directly to the site, which was confirmed by the presence of a marsh-bog where the remains had been dredged from. Corroborating evidence demonstrates the chemical weathering of the mammoth tusk was caused by it's deposition in a marsh-bog near the ancient shoreline at this site.

Henry Holt

11/3/2015 09:01:39 pm

Nonsense that Squibnockets are found in Virginia. And don't bother lecturing me on the Midwest. I worked on Grossman, Janey, and Cahokia Mounds, and I own the D. Hitchens site (literally, it's on my farm here in Illinois ). Been there done that, and I have a reasonable grasp of the material.

David Sweet

11/4/2015 03:02:33 am

YOU haven' seen the collection--kinda makes one look foolish to make claims sight unseen of the evidence. Taunton and Susquahanna Bifurcates show up here, too...but as YOU had not seen the collection, I will take your word for what it's worth--and suggest that absolutes such as you propose are one of the reasons why Clovis and mammoth together were doubted for so long. I claim a more than reasonable grasp--not only have I been doing this for more than half my life, I've given demo's and lectures across five states at NA cultural events, several museums, one University and before thouands of adults and kids at the VB Aquarium. I...and you claim a reasonable grasp and pronounce it impossible for a squibnocket to be found carried into VA? I've heard this kind of nonsense before--example: an adena is found outside of its region, so immediately people dedclare there was NO adena in such and such a state...No? The speaker knows that NO adena man ever set foot there? Tjhat trade did not exist and no adena man would have anything to do with producing an out of region find......the very narrowness of such amental exercise amuses me no end

Henry Holt

11/4/2015 07:32:27 am

In fact I have personally carried the Squibnockets I found as a kid (frome SE Mass) into New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Iowa, Illinois.......as far as I know I didn't lose any along the way but you know - shit happens. I did give a really nice one to a girlfriend about 40 years ago, God only knows where that one is today, probably some collection in Virginia from the sounds of it.

David Sweet

11/4/2015 09:14:02 am

Bay cultures exhibit a diversity totally unknown to inland coastal archaeology. The Susquehanna River provided a conduit for cultures to access the bay-region's bounty with greater ease than had such been undertaken by foot travel.

If you are not aware of this great diversity, you should see the range of forms coming into the region--a brief list of but some of the typlogies coming into the region--from north, south and west--among notables are Jacks Reef Corner Notched and Pentagonal, Pee Dee Pentagonal, Dewart Stemmed, Piscataway, Lamoka, Amos, Bolen, Morrow Mountain, Mansion Inn, Koens-Crispen, Lehigh, Fox Creek, Bare Island, Hoover Island, Poplar Island, Piney Island, Newmanstown, Levanna, Brewerton, Swatara-Long, Genesee, Ashtabula, Pelican, Hinds, Benton, Neville, Hopewell, Wading Creek, Abbey, Atlantic Phase,Six Mile Creek, Susquehanna, Perkiomen, Muncy, Vernon, Hardin, etc.....I even once found an early triangular made from Alabates chert on a bay-beach site.

..and you are telling me the Suqibnocket culture's people never once came to the bay region here--you're saying this even without any supporting proofs in-hand re: surveys of regional collections, without personal experience hunting the shores of the region, without any first-hand knowledge of this, merely a claim unsupported by any offering of facts...

Maybe you should gain the needed experience before making claims you cannot support

Bill Wagner

2/9/2016 08:51:34 pm

One matter I never see addressed by the "debunkers" is how an artifact made of South Mountain aoprhyolite from Pennsylvania got that far out into the bay if not by having been left on a much lower shoreline back when the glacier had much of the ocean's water locked up as ice. That scenerio requires a far smaller a stretch of the imagination than that a later coastal people (who relied on more locally-available lithic resources) ventured that far away from land and dropped it out of a canoe.

Jaap

2/10/2016 08:38:45 am

As the artifact shows no wear and tear it must have been well-embedded, and could hardly have been dropped from a canoe. But its vey existance is interesting. To 'debunk' that fact they must show that it was newly-made by a hoaxer.
I have no idea why the very notion that there may have been contact between Europe and the Americas raises such heckles. One could ask the same question with the Maritime Archaic which has interesting parralels in Denmark and France, not just the ochre burials, but also the fishing gear. The only thing is: there is little prospect of this ever being more than a question ...

Bill Wagner

2/11/2016 08:40:12 pm

[quote]It is rather clear that outre' passe flaking-technology existed before Clovis, and apparently no where else in the world except Solutrean.[/quote]

There are collectors in Texas who dispute that vociferously. Not taking sides on it, just a FWIW

Bill Wagner

2/11/2016 08:56:55 pm

And a P.S. Inter-group hostility shouldn't be ruled out in the Pleistocene chapter of "Survivor." This in parallel with Hranicky's long-experience-based observation that sites that produce Clovis don't produce Hardaway points, and vice versa. While apparently contemporary, they seem to have avoided each other, and hostile relations wouldn't be ruled out categorically.

Andy White

2/15/2016 07:51:50 am

What evidence is there for the contemporaneity of Clovis and Hardaway? I've never heard that before - my understanding is that Hardaway is a post-Clovis technology. The two point types are most likely found in different places because they were associated with hunter-gatherer systems that were organized differently (because the environment had changed).

Bill Wagner

2/15/2016 05:33:12 pm

As I recall, it was Hranicky who suggested that. His line of reasoning was that while the excavated Hardaway sites could not be dated, they extended downward so deeply that their lower level(s) would more than likely have been contemporary with Clovis. He can give you a much better account of his ideas than I can :)

I'd note FWIW that Hardaway ways of doing things (specifically making endscrapers and borers on hafted points rather than as separate tools) clearly place it at the beginning of a line of transmission that extended (erratically) to the contact era while fluted point tool inventories (again FWIW) varied pretty widely. Connecting THOSE guys to later folk would be a challenge, I'd think.

Sole bro

10/29/2017 08:53:30 pm

A "scientific" article that goes into Leftist talking points about Nazis is as credible as the Creationist story. I've heard enough variations of history to conclude that we don't know much about our history, and never will. We are here now, we created America, end of story.

Shots Fired in the Battle Over the Cinmar Biface . . . But Does it Actually Matter to the Solutrean Hypothesis?

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