Posted on 08/15/2016 10:22:44 AM PDT by Theoria
Life came to ice-free Canadian corridor too late to sustain migrations of Clovis and pre-Clovis people.
Archaeologists need a new theory for the colonization of the Americas. Plant and animal DNA buried under two Canadian lakes squashes the idea that the first Americans travelled through an ice-free corridor that extended from Alaska to Montana.
The analysis, published online in Nature on 10 August and led by palaeogeneticist Eske Willerslev of the University of Copenhagen, suggests that the passageway became habitable 12,600 years ago1. That’s nearly 1,000 years after the formation of the Clovis culture — once thought to be the first Americans — and even longer after other, pre-Clovis cultures settled the continents (see 'American trail').
Some 14,000 years ago, as North America was emerging from the last Ice Age, twin glaciers that blanketed central Canada receded, creating the ice-free corridor before the appearance of Clovis people across what is now the central United States. “That coincidence seemed too powerful to ignore,” says archaeologist and co-author David Meltzer of Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas. “People who have been cooling their heels in Alaska for thousands of years see this new land open up and they come blasting down this corridor into the new world.”
The ice-free-corridor theory began to crack in the 1990s, when researchers made a case that humans lived at Monte Verde in Chile more than 14,000 years ago. The discovery of other possible pre-Clovis sites in North America further shook the theory that Clovis people were the first Americans.
(Excerpt) Read more at nature.com ...
ping....hope all is well.
Seems to me the most likely place on earth to learn boating is a place like the coast way up north. Nature offers broad hints on how it’s done, what with large chunks of ice floating by and critters riding them.
Do we know what’s up with SunkenCiv?? It’s been what over a month now without seeing him.
Yea, no clue.
Surfers.
The first people in America were surfers searching for the perfect wave.
“Clovis don’t surf!”
I hope Sunken Civ is OK, but...
If those nearest to us don’t know about or participate in FR, if something happens to us they won’t know to, or HOW to inform our fellow FReepers.
I’m going to put my login info and instructions in my “dead” file.
bump
Interesting article, thanks. It remains possible that we’ve been underestimating our ancestors abilities and intelligence for a long time. A coastal route would have taken more resourcefulness than the inland route as boats and changing environments would require inventiveness.
SunkenCiv is alive and well, over the weekend I ran into him on Facebook. He said something about the FR mods not allowing him to post as much as he used to, so he’s experimenting with other forums.
I keep all my login info in a database; maybe I should tell my wife how to access it if I suddenly disappear.
Ten years ago, I proposed that the first Americans came to the New World by boat, and disembarked in California, because that state used to have more tribes than any other part of North America. Go here to see what I wrote about it: http://xenohistorian.faithweb.com/northam/na01a.html#Solutrean
I have a file on Google Docs, which I've shared with my kids, with instructions in case I'm disabled or dead. I haven't added a section on "saying goodbye to online friends", maybe I should.
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