Paleo Speculations

[Ohiofinds]

Fluted points were designed as part of a weapons system including a removable and quickly replacable foreshaft.
This foreshaft system was the cause of the rapid dispersal and universal acceptance of fluted points,
a modern analogy being a repeating rifle vs. a muzzleloader.
The fluting of points began with a single knapper. The knappers group was not alone in the landscape and they were not a colonizing population.
The continent south of the retreating glaciers had been thoroughly explored and its resources were well known.
The new practice of fluting points caused knappers to become (and remain) more bifacially oriented.
Previously stone tools were mainly unifacial, based on cores and blades, with some lanceolate, ovate and stemmed bifaces.
The controlled overshot flaking so common on clovis preforms apparently predates fluted points,
and may have been achieved with isolated platforms and indirect percussion.
The analysis of human DNA will continue to offer new information on the peopling of the Americas but
there will always be unanswered questions and mysteries though, and I believe that is a good thing.
Feel free to add your own ideas and speculations.

[Hal Gorges]

🤔...Necessity is the mommy of all inventions

[Hoss]

Nice write up. Thanks for sharing your thoughts

[clovisoid]

I'll edit and add for my views/comments, but I think you hit a lot of modern thought with your points.

Thin points work better as part of a weapons system including a removable and quickly replaceable foreshaft. (Any knapper can make a point a lot faster than they can find/make/shape a longer dart shaft. Some of the pre-Clovis points from Page-Ladson, Cactus Hill, Coopers Ferry, Buttermilk Creek are thin and haft-able like fluted points.)

Clovis and directly related types like Gainey were the first wide-spread fluted point type (First Generation Fluted points.) Later fluted points like Cumberland & Folsom, and unfluted points like Goshen, Plainview, Midland, Dalton might not be direct descendent technology. Clovis Culture seems to have lasted 200-400 years before people stopped making those points. (Modern context, those non-functional buttons on the sleeves of men's blazers have lasted almost as long as Clovis did.)

This foreshaft system was the cause of the rapid dispersal and near universal acceptance of fluted points. (Great Basin, coastal areas, and further south there are technologies as old as Clovis that lasted longer than fluted points. Some of those points appear to fit best in a socket, which might have been hafted as foreshafts or maybe not.)

A modern analogy being a repeating rifle vs. a muzzleloader.

The fluting of points began with a single group of knappers over time, but likely wasn't perfected. Knapping for many people today is a social activity, and was likely the same with family groups in the past. Much like many other apprenticed skills learned while doing surrounded by older generations. Al Goodyear found a great site that fit well with the model of less experienced knappers working with skilled knappers who could correct mistakes. (If you ever knap with a skilled person, is a great way to learn and conserve material. My high-risk hail-mary shot to get rid of a stack is easy-peasy for a better knapper.) Those pre-Clovis groups were probably related in areas, and maybe circled back to the same resources around the same time of year to meet other known groups. All around the global, small groups of hunter gathers had regular meet ups with other groups where DNA was exchanged. Otherwise dangerous inbreeding occurs over just a few generations. (Definitions of inbreeding changes by culture, but direct lineage inbreeding is universally frowned upon.)

The continent south of the retreating glaciers had been thoroughly explored and its resources were well known. (Yup, I think small groups of people were year much earlier than Clovis.)

The new practice of fluting points caused knappers to become (and remain) more bifacially oriented. (Most older than Clovis tech in North & South America contains both bifacial & unifacial work.)

Previously stone tools were mainly unifacial, based on cores and blades, with some lanceolate, ovate and stemmed bifaces. (Most Clovis tools are unifacial based on cores/blades.)

The controlled overshot flaking so common on Clovis preforms apparently predates fluted points, (Pre-dates & post dates, Clovis used it as a strategy more than most but it was pretty quickly dropped by later fluted points unless it was needed. Many later groups could work an overshot flake when needed.)

and may have been achieved with isolated platforms and indirect percussion. (Agreed.)

The analysis of human DNA will continue to offer new information on the peopling of the Americas but there will always be unanswered questions and mysteries though, and I believe that is a good thing. Indirect answers will likely come from South America where ancient remains are able to be tested and studied for scientific purposes.

[SGT.Digger]

My thoughts on the rapid cause of dispersal. Is not necessarily the technology that allowed wide distribution and easier game gathering like later bow and arrow but rather their longevity/lifespans after the great flood ,was the reason for their footprints to be all over the North /South American continent. Folks still living for several hundred years in those early years after the flood. Longer lifespans would also mean that they were able to reproduce at a rapid rate passing down knowledge and know how . 😀 That’s my 2.5 cents anyway

[Stansbery]

Out of all the fluted points I've seen, very few have impact fractures. I believe they were primarily knives for butchering. I think the bone point was the primary spear or thrusting point. Attached is a photo I took of the Sheriden Cave artifacts. Note the hole in the peccary bone just below the jaw is a perfect match for the cross section of the bone points.

[ApacheNDN]

I read a publication, don't recall the publisher, that had the same hypothesis concerning the Dalton. They believed there to be another point contemporaneous used as a projectile, and the Dalton was primarily a knife. This being due to the fact of the method used for resharpening and that very few Daltons had impact fractures. I myself have found several dozen Dalton's, broken and whole, and have one that has an impact fracture. The rest of the brokes are snap fractures from prying or related activity. Whether true or not, interesting thought.

[LongStride]

puzzling there are no previous models that built up to the fluted Clovis, the mule deer appeared about the same time , again no previous models , the history mystery is intriguing

[clovisoid]

puzzling there are no previous models that built up to the fluted Clovis

Here are a couple of the most well documented pre-Clovis dated relics. I think a couple of them would be considered paleo if found isolated or in a disturbed context like a creek, but some of them look like later points.

Cactus Hill- Looks like a little paleo point to me. I could see a larger version being fluted.



Buttermilk Creek down in Texas, this is significantly older than Clovis.



Gault- The larger point looks paleo, but the the older stemmed pieces look Archaic or later to me.



Cooper's Ferry in Idaho- I'd have guessed Late Paleo to Early Archaic, but solidly pre-Clovis and the cluster of points was around post Clovis as well.

[ApacheNDN]

The Buttermilk piece looks identical, in form, to a Searcy.

[Ohiofinds]

I agree that the stemmed points look more recent. The first published gault preclovis artifacts were criticised as being too similar to clovis for being over two thousand years older. https://www.academia.edu/10646594/Pr...Creek_Complex_
Imagine the excavators surprise when they unearthed the stemmed points.
At least no one would be calling them clovis.
The coopers ferry points age has also been questioned,

https://www.jstor.org/stable/43184940

Any potential preclovis types need similar dates at multiple sites to be accepted.

[Mattern]

Good stuff! Thanks guys for a great discussion. Kim

[sailorjoe]

It is a very good discussion that you started. It has sparked some interesting comments from the outstanding to the far fetched. I have some ideas of my own that I can not back up by any specific documented scientific paper though they may be out there. So some may think these ideas far fetched as well. Here are just a few. (1) The resistance to give up the dogma of the "Clovis first" philosophy, although fading, is still out there. (2) Clovis technology (i.e. fluted points) first originated in what is now the south eastern USA states and spread north and west.(3) There were cultures that co-existed with and pre-dated Clovis that did not make or utilize fluted points and these people did not utilize the large megafauna of the period as much as did Clovis or perhaps not at all. Some of these "ideas" may be baloney. I am not wedded to them except I never ever considered the idea that the makers of the Clovis points as the first folks on this continent. It just went against my idea of what should be common sense and that is now well documented.

[Bullheadtee]

I believe lithics styles have ben repeated and unless found in context. we all may have. A 20,000 year old point or two lol. Their are countless pre paleo sites off the Atlantic Coast based on the megafauna being dredged up and time periods for its being submerged. No telling how long man has Ben here. seams like alot of DNA is linking worldwide populations to places. I was always told. could never be ? I'm pretty shure man has Always traveled by boat .! maybe. destiny manifests itself 😆