[meteorite-list] RCYBP

From: Thaddeus Besedin <endophasy_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Wed, 22 Aug 2007 00:55:49 -0700 (PDT)
Message-ID: <441109.72727.qm_at_web62505.mail.re1.yahoo.com>

Jesus Christ, list. This is the last time.
--- Thaddeus Besedin <endophasy at yahoo.com> wrote:

> List,
> I was abrupt by sending an unsolicited monologic
> argument toward perpetual public access while I was
between classes.
> This is corrected for typographical (and other)
> errors.
>
>
> Well-dated fluted point sites (Clovis) seem to,
> according to recent work in Clovis site chronology
> bracketing (Waters and Stafford 1997
> http://dmc-news.tamu.edu/templates/?a=4202&z=0 )
> date
> from a ~200-400 year period terminating abruptly at
> the end of the last interstadial period preceding
the Younger
> Dryas Stadial (~12,900 - 11,500 calBP), or the
Bolling-Allerod interstadial, preceded by the Older
Dryas stadial extending, from pollen/spore records,
14,600 - 13,700 calBP in Hokkaido (~14,000 calBP -
13,500 calBP in Canada). The popular press does not
usually catch
> naive conflation of radiocarbon and calibrated
> years,
> even when
> scientists are explicit about the distinction.
> Archaeologists seem to make the same mistake on
> occasion,
> but often RCYBP is not indicated in source documents
> that
> may contain quoted/excerpted material. There
> are no true, well-dated Clovis sites (with full
> classic Clovis prismatic blade toolkit) dating from
> after ~12,700 calBP, but Fluted point technology
> persists. Clovis points were probably curated by
> later
> people, since their size made them visible to late
> Pleistocene people, which then allowed them
> continued
> utility as functional biface knives.
> Fluted point sites are numerous in the Eastern
> United
> States because of
> environmental factors, not necessarily because of
> a greater frequency of occupied sites, although
> resource
> abundance may have also permitted
> population growth, or Clovis technology was more
> frequently adopted by an original founding human
> populations
> in the East. Sedimentary
> preservation of sites is more common on depositional
> surfaces that have relatively
> little relief. In Alaska, Younger Dryas Erosional
> unconformity would be expected,
> since this was a period of general valley floor
> incision, followed by
> rapid sedimentation beginning ~ 11,600 - 11,500
> calBP,
> or at the initial Preboreal Holocene. Thus, the
> differential preservation
> between expansive depositional Eastern landscapes
> and
> proportionally less common
> occupiable flat space in Western Valleys, subject to
> greater
> surface material loss due to greater mean slope
> angle
> (gravitational effect on unconsolidated
> sediments)and
> fire frequency (i.e. ground cover destruction) with
> erosive flooding. Valley downcutting has obliterated
> Bolling interstadial period
> depositional surfaces on broad floodplains. The
> record is skewed.
>
> Recently, Radiocarbon dates at the non-fluted-point,
> non-microlithic Mesa site in Alaska
>
(http://www.blm.gov/heritage/adventures/research/StatePages/PDFs/lo_res_%20kunz%2014ap03.sep.pdf)
> have returned dates both earlier and
> contemporaneous
> with Clovis (e.g. Beta-55236 [intact hearth]: 11,660
> +/- 80 14C YBP
> returns the calibrated date of 13,431 +/- 141, or
> [68% range 13?C290 - 13572], and GX-26461: 12,240
> +/-
> 610
> 14C YBP calibrates to 14718 +/- 1084
> for [68% calibrated range of 13634 - 15802 BP]
> [CalPal2004_SFCP
> QuickCal Ver. 1.3.1])
>
>
> Evidence of fluting has only been identified in the
> Old World at the Uptar site in NE Siberia
>
(http://www.archaeology.org/9611/newsbriefs/uptar.html),
> which may represent a late migration of North
> American
> toolmakers into Siberia, but may be also be evidence
> of in situ convergent
> development. The Uptar point has a contracting
> stem-like base, and thus possibly shares a hafting
> configuration with
> Windust/Lake Mojave style late Pleistocene-early
> Holocene forms, although Ushki (Eastern siberia)
> points from Layer 7 (Ushki 1 initial occupational
> 14C
> date constraint: 11,820 ?} 100 BP,
> 13736 ?} 159 calBP [68% calBP range: 13,577 -
> 13,895]
> CalPal_2007_HULU) include side-notched,
> expanding base forms which are found in post-Windust
> (after 9,000 BP)
> assemblages in the Northwestern United states. A
> late
> influx of North American people
> into Siberia may have curated representative
> technologies of
> both stemmed and fluted traditions, contemporaneous
> in
> North America, where terminal Pleistocene stemmed
> point technology survived into the Holocene.
> Basal thinning modification of hafted objects is
> common in East Asia and the Old World at large
> during
> the Upper Paleolithic, appearing in Mousterian
> Levallois assemblages as well as later blade/core
> industries (e.g. Gravettian, etc.). The preference
> by
> fluted point
> makers for a geographically widespread and ordinary
> bifacial thinning style that produces outrepasse
> flake
> terminations to define
> biface edges opposing the striking platforms of
> removed surface material does not link Clovis
> technology
> to any Western European technological tradition,
> such
> as the
> Solutrean tradition. Clovis is late, brief, and
> often
> invisible, since projectile point forms can hardly
> define a "culture." Clovis fluted Projectile forms
> disappeared concomitantly with the extinction of
> megafauna at the onset of the Younger Dryas stadial.
> At this time, until more evidence of rapid
> extinction
> characteristic of cataclysmic events becomes
> available, any answer to the question of whether a
> bolide was significant enough to be responsible for
> either cultural or biological extinction is at best
> based on a post hoc fallacy.
> -Thaddeus
>
> --- Thaddeus Besedin <endophasy at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> > Well-dated fluted point sites (Clovis) seem to,
> > according to recent work in clovis site chronology
> > bracketing (Waters and Stafford 1997
> > http://dmc-news.tamu.edu/templates/?a=4202&z=0 )
> > date
> > from an ~200-400 year period terminting abruptly
> by
> > the end of the last interglacial period, the
> Younger
> > Dryas Stadial, which is dated to ~12,900 - 11,500
> > years ago. Popular press does not usually catch
> > their
> > naive confuaion of radiocarbon and calibrated
> years.
> > Archaeologists seem to make the same mistake.
> There
> > are no true, well-dated Clovis sites (with full
> > classis Clovis prismatic blade toolkit) dating
> from
> > after ~12,900 cal BP, but Fluted point technology
> > persists. Clovis points were probably curated by
> > later
> > people, since their size made them visible to late
> > Pleistocene people, which then allowed the
> continued
> > use of functional bifaces (ofetn of great size).
> > Fluted point sites proliferate in the east because
> > of
> > environmental factors, not necessarily because a
> > greater frequency of sites occurs. Sedimentary
> > preservation of sites is more common in places of
> > lower relief, like Florida. The record is skewed.
> >
> > Recently, Radiocarbon dates at the
> non-fluted-point,
> > non-microlithic Mesa site in Alska
> >
>
(http://www.blm.gov/heritage/adventures/research/StatePages/PDFs/lo_res_%20kunz%2014ap03.sep.pdf)
> > have returned dates both earlier and
> > contemporaneous
> > with Clovis (e.g. Beta-55236 (intact hearth):
> 11,660
> > +/- 80 14C YBP
> > returns the calibrated date of 13,431 +/- 141, or
> > 2-sigma 13290 - 13572, and GX-26461: 12,240 +/-
> 610
> > 14C YBP calibrates to 14718 +/- 1084
> > for a 2-sigma calibrated range of 13634 - 15802 BP
> > [CalCurve: CalPal2004_SFCP
>
=== message truncated ===



      ____________________________________________________________________________________
Park yourself in front of a world of choices in alternative vehicles. Visit the Yahoo! Auto Green Center.
http://autos.yahoo.com/green_center/
Received on Wed 22 Aug 2007 03:55:49 AM PDT