New Archaeological Evidence for an Early Human Presence at Monte Verde, Chile
Questions surrounding the chronology, place, and character of the initial human colonization of the Americas are a long-standing focus of debate. Interdisciplinary debate continues over the timing of entry, the rapidity and direction of dispersion, the variety of human responses to diverse habitats,...
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Published in | PloS one Vol. 10; no. 11; p. e0141923 |
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Main Authors | , , , , , , , , , , , , , |
Format | Journal Article |
Language | English |
Published |
United States
Public Library of Science
18.11.2015
Public Library of Science (PLoS) |
Subjects | |
Online Access | Get full text |
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Summary: | Questions surrounding the chronology, place, and character of the initial human colonization of the Americas are a long-standing focus of debate. Interdisciplinary debate continues over the timing of entry, the rapidity and direction of dispersion, the variety of human responses to diverse habitats, the criteria for evaluating the validity of early sites, and the differences and similarities between colonization in North and South America. Despite recent advances in our understanding of these issues, archaeology still faces challenges in defining interdisciplinary research problems, assessing the reliability of the data, and applying new interpretative models. As the debates and challenges continue, new studies take place and previous research reexamined. Here we discuss recent exploratory excavation at and interdisciplinary data from the Monte Verde area in Chile to further our understanding of the first peopling of the Americas. New evidence of stone artifacts, faunal remains, and burned areas suggests discrete horizons of ephemeral human activity in a sandur plain setting radiocarbon and luminescence dated between at least ~18,500 and 14,500 cal BP. Based on multiple lines of evidence, including sedimentary proxies and artifact analysis, we present the probable anthropogenic origins and wider implications of this evidence. In a non-glacial cold climate environment of the south-central Andes, which is challenging for human occupation and for the preservation of hunter-gatherer sites, these horizons provide insight into an earlier context of late Pleistocene human behavior in northern Patagonia. |
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Bibliography: | ObjectType-Article-1 SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1 ObjectType-Feature-2 content type line 23 Conceived and designed the experiments: TD CO JS RV MP MC LSC AS MM XV GH GD. Performed the experiments: TD CO JS RV MP MC LSC AS MM XV GH GD IA AG. Analyzed the data: TD CO JS RV MP MC LSC AS MM XV GH GD. Contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools: TD RV MP LSC MM XV GH GD. Wrote the paper: TD RV MP MC LSC MM XV GH GD. Competing Interests: The commercial affiliation with the Paleo Research Institute does not alter the authors' adherence to PLOS ONE policies on sharing data and materials. |
ISSN: | 1932-6203 1932-6203 |
DOI: | 10.1371/journal.pone.0141923 |