[Aztlan] South American pre-Clovis

[Dito Morales]

Dillehay published the first major findings at Monte Verde in 1984 and 
didn't publish the pre-Clovis dates until something like 1997 (I think those 
are the dates). It was his care in how he and his team excavated the site, 
and how they prepared the archaeological community for their finds, that 
helped the team of six (or so) outside specialists who visited the site to 
eventually agree upon his date proposals. This only pushed back the peopling 
model 1400-1500 years, more or less--and this wasn't the oldest stuff found 
there.

It was Niede Guidon who, in 1986, published the first major challenge to the 
11,200 BP Clovis First date with her _Nature_ article on Pedra Furada, in 
Piaui, Brazil. Those 40-50,000 bp dates have yet to be accepted by most 
scholars. There is a selected bibliography of this site at: 
http://www.ditomorales.com/pfbib.htm

More recently (2000), Guidon published the dates for a human tooth found at 
the site of Toca do Garincho (also in Piaui) as 12,210 +/- 40 (Beta 136204). 
This seems a more conservative contribution the pre-Clovis peopling 
argument. Unfortunately(?), the article in which she reports this date ends 
with the following assertion: "...the first migrations to America occurred 
in periods that should be situated between 130,000 and 100,000 years BP...." 
[I did NOT mis-type the numbers!] This become 150,000 BP in a 2005 book that 
accompanied the "Antes" exhibition in Rio.

Niede Guidon, "Arqueologia na Regiao do Parque Nacional Serra da Capivara," 
in _Antes: Historias da Pre-Historia_, edited by Helio Hara, 133-142 (Rio de 
Janeiro: Centro Cultural Banco do Brasil, 2005).

Niede Guidon, Evelyne Peyre, Claude Guerin, Yves Coppens, "Resultados da 
datacao de dentes humanos da Toca do Garrincho, Piaui - Brasil," _Clio_, 
Serie Arqueologica 14 (2000): 75-86.

I left out all accent marks since sometimes they come out garbled in Aztlan 
posts.

Dito Morales
ditomorales at msn.com