Pre-Clovis occupation 14,550 years ago at the Page-Ladson site, Florida, and the peopling of the Americas | Science Advances
▻http://advances.sciencemag.org/content/2/5/e1600375
Abstract
Stone tools and mastodon bones occur in an undisturbed geological context at the Page-Ladson site, Florida. Seventy-one radiocarbon ages show that ~14,550 calendar years ago (cal yr B.P.), people butchered or scavenged a mastodon next to a pond in a bedrock sinkhole within the Aucilla River. This occupation surface was buried by ~4 m of sediment during the late Pleistocene marine transgression, which also left the site submerged. Sporormiella and other proxy evidence from the sediments indicate that hunter-gatherers along the Gulf Coastal Plain coexisted with and utilized megafauna for ~2000 years before these animals became extinct at ~12,600 cal yr B.P. Page-Ladson expands our understanding of the earliest colonizers of the Americas and human-megafauna interaction before extinction.
Fig. 2 Stratigraphy of excavation units at the Page-Ladson site displaying pre-Clovis artifacts and radiocarbon ages.(A) Artifact 12209-a. (B) Artifact 12209-b. (C) Artifact 12242-1. (D) Artifact 12068-2. (E) Artifact 12068-1. (F) Artifact 12080-1. (A) to (E) are flakes; (D) shows evidence of use. (F) is a biface. (G) 2014 wall profiles showing stratigraphy, locations of artifact finds, and location of radiocarbon samples. (H) 2013 wall profiles showing stratigraphy, locations of artifact finds, and location of radiocarbon samples. For (G) and (H), white dots represent locations and ages of radiocarbon samples collected from profiles. Purple dots and text represent radiocarbon ages collected from within units, plotted with correct elevation, and northing or easting. Red triangles show locations of artifacts collected from within units, plotted with correct elevation, and northing or easting. Open red circle shows approximate location of artifacts found in the screen. Trees in the profile are represented by dark brown. Note that although the biface appears as if it were found in the middle of a tree, the tree only occurs in the south wall profile and does not extend into the excavation unit where the biface was found.
