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| Prehistory of the Americas | |
|---|---|
| Name | Prehistory of the Americas |
| Caption | Clovis point |
| Region | Americas |
| Period | Late Pleistocene–Holocene |
| Major sites | Meadowcroft Rockshelter, Monte Verde, Gault Site, Pedra Furada, Bluefish Caves |
Prehistory of the Americas describes human presence, migration, cultural development, and regional variation in North America, South America, Central America, and the Caribbean prior to European contact. Scholarship draws on fieldwork at sites such as Monte Verde, Meadowcroft Rockshelter, Gault Site, and Cave of Altamira, integrating data from archaeology, paleogenetics, linguistics, and paleoenvironmental reconstruction. Debates over arrival times, routes, and early cultural adaptations involve researchers associated with institutions like the Smithsonian Institution, Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, Museu de Arqueologia e Etnologia da Universidade de São Paulo, and universities including University of Colorado Boulder, Harvard University, and University of Cambridge.
Scholars define the field using chronologies developed by projects at the National Park Service and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration for coastal preservations, and typologies from laboratories such as the Arizona State University Paleoindian Lab and the American Museum of Natural History. Key concepts include the Paleo-Indian period, Archaic period, and regional traditions like the Folsom culture, Clovis culture, Valdivia culture, Norte Chico civilization, and Moche culture. Terminology is debated among authors affiliated with the Society for American Archaeology, the American Anthropological Association, and the Canadian Archaeological Association.
Chronologies synthesize radiocarbon sequences from Bluefish Caves, Paisley Caves, Monte Verde, and Cueva de las Manos. Periodization schemes reference the Late Pleistocene, the Younger Dryas, and the onset of the Holocene with phases such as Paleo-Indian, Archaic, Formative stage, Classic stage, and Postclassic stage in models influenced by works from Lewis Henry Morgan and later by Gordon Willey and Philip Phillips. Regional frameworks invoke the Mississippian culture, Moche, Nazca culture, Tiwanaku, and Chavín de Huántar to mark shifts in social complexity.
Competing models propose coastal migrations along the Pacific Coast via kelp highway hypotheses championed by researchers at University of Oregon and interior routes through the Ice-free corridor between the Cordilleran Ice Sheet and Laurentide Ice Sheet. Alternative scenarios emphasize crossings from Siberia via the Bering Land Bridge () and later movements linking to groups documented in Southeast Asia and Australia. Evidence marshaled includes lithic affinities between Clovis culture and Siberian microblade traditions, ancient genomes sequenced by teams at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Harvard Medical School, and University of Copenhagen, and anomalous sites like Pedra Furada and Monte Verde.
Regional complexes reflect diverse adaptations: in Mesoamerica the Olmec, Maya civilization, Teotihuacan, and Aztec Empire; in the Andes the Caral-Supe civilization, Chavín culture, Wari Empire, Inca Empire, and Nazca culture; in North America the Ancestral Puebloans, Hopewell tradition, Mississippian culture, Haida, Iroquois Confederacy, and Paleo-Indian groups; in the Caribbean the Taíno and Carib; and in Central America the Zapotec civilization and Mixtec. Major archaeological projects at Chavín de Huántar, Sipán, Bonampak, Monte Albán, and Cooper's Ferry have refined cultural chronologies and exchange networks linking obsidian sources like Utah deposits and trade routes reaching Missouri and Colombia.
Reconstruction of past environments uses core samples from Lake Titicaca, Chesapeake Bay, Lake Huron, and Lake Baikal analogs, pollen records from researchers at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, and isotopic analyses from the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology. Subsistence ranged from big-game hunting of Pleistocene megafauna such as mammoth and mastodon associated with Clovis point technologies to foraging, horticulture and agriculture of maize domesticated in Balsas River Valley, manioc in Amazon Basin, squash in Mesoamerica, and potato in the Andes. Coastal adaptations exploited resources around Gulf of California, Bering Sea, and Caribbean Sea with shell middens, fish weirs, and canoe traditions documented ethnographically among Chumash, Tlingit, and Yaghan.
Innovation trajectories include lithic systems like Clovis culture fluted points and Folsom culture technologies, ceramics traditions such as Valdivia pottery and Moche portrait vessels, and architectural achievements at Caral-Supe, Teotihuacan, Machu Picchu, Chichen Itza, and Monte Albán. Agricultural intensification supported complex polities exemplified by the Inca Empire and Mississippian culture with monumental earthworks like Cahokia and iconographic systems preserved in artifacts from Nazca Lines and Maya codices. Maritime technologies and long-distance exchange connected obsidian sources, marine shells, and luxury goods across regions documented by teams at Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute and Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia.
Ancient DNA studies led by groups at the Broad Institute, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, and University of California, Santa Cruz reveal ancestry components related to Ancient North Eurasians, links to Siberian populations, and later gene flow consistent with Na-Dené and Eskimo–Aleut expansions. Linguistic classification debates involve proposals from Joseph Greenberg and critics such as Lyle Campbell, with major families including Algonquian languages, Uto-Aztecan languages, Quechuan languages, Arawakan languages, Tupi–Guarani languages, Mayan languages, and Siouan languages. Contemporary Indigenous organizations like the National Congress of American Indians, Assembly of First Nations, Consejo de Iglesias Evangélicas, and cultural revitalization movements collaborate with museums including the Field Museum and Royal Ontario Museum to repatriate artifacts under policies influenced by the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act and similar laws in Canada and Peru.
Category:Pre-Columbian studies