The Great Plains contain many of the best-known Paleoindian sites in North America, and a number of these localities were key to determining the chronology of Paleoindian occupations in the years before, during, and since the development of radiocarbon and other chronometric dating methods. Initial attempts at dating were based on correlation with extinct fauna, the “geologic-climatic” dating method, and stratigraphic relationships of artifacts within sites. By the time radiocarbon dating was developed (1950), the basic Paleoindian sequence (oldest to youngest) was: Clovis-Folsom-unfluted lanceolates (such as Plainview, Eden, and Scottsbluff). Initial applications of radiocarbon dating in the 1950s did little to further resolve age relationships. In the 1960s, however, largely through the efforts of C. V. Haynes, a numerical geochronology of Paleoindian occupations on the Great Plains began to emerge On the Southern Great Plains the radiocarbon-dated artifact chronology is: Clovis (11,600–11,000 yr B.P.); Folsom and Midland (10,900–10,100 yr B.P.); Plainview, Milnesand, and Lubbock (10,200–9800 yr B.P.); Firstview (9400–8200 yr B.P.); St. Mary's Hall, Golondrina, and Texas Angostura (9200–8000 yr B.P.). The chronology for the Northern Great Plains is: Clovis (11,200–10,900 yr B.P.); Goshen (ca. 11,000 yr B.P.); Folsom (10,900–10,200 yr B.P.); Agate Basin (10,500–10,000 yr B.P.); Hell Gap (10,500–9500 yr B.P.); Alberta, Alberta-Cody (10,200–9400 yr B.P.); Cody (Eden-Scottsbluff) (9400–8800 yr B.P.); Angostura, Jimmy Allen, Frederick, and other parallel-oblique types (9400–7800 yr B.P.). Fifty years after the development of radiocarbon dating, the basic typological sequence has not changed significantly except for the realization that there probably was significant temporal overlap of some point types, and that the old unilinear sequence does not account for all the known typological variation. The chronology has been continually refined with the determination of hundreds of radiocarbon ages in recent decades. © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/%28SICI%291520-6548%28200003%2915%3A3%3C227%3A%3AAID-GEA2%3E3.0.CO%3B2-A

The Evolution of Paleoindian Geochronology and Typology on the Great Plains

▪ Abstract Historical archaeologists have given relatively scant attention to the study of Native Americans. Despite the potential to contribute to new understandings about Native peoples during and after European contact, the research commitment has been ambivalent at best. In this review, I ground this relationship in early debates about the field's subject matter and concurrent discussions in anthropology about direct-historical and acculturation models. In addition, I highlight currents in research that have refined these approaches as well as those that have charted new directions. The latter are notable for helping comprehend the role of place and tradition in Native peoples' lives, but also for reminding us of the complexities of identity construction in America after European contact. I reason that historical archaeology's use of multiple sources, if linked creatively, can be crucial in producing knowledge about the past that illuminates the rich diversity of experiences among Native Americans. “D...

The Historical Archaeology of Native Americans

This paper deals with the topic of defining a sequence of time units for any specified archaeological area, that is, the topic of constructing temporal models in prehistory. Despite the fundamental necessity for temporal models in modern prehistoric archaeology, no generally agreed-upon, coherent set of principles is currently available to assist archaeologists in the task of temporal model formulation. Accordingly, after a brief historical review of the development of temporal models in prehistory, this paper offers a set of four basic principles to be followed in formulating such models. To illustrate the applicability of these principles, they are applied to a specific archaeological area, the Eastern Woodlands of North America, for which a new temporal model is thus presented. Additional purposes for presenting a new temporal model for Eastern North America prehistory are to stimulate a critical reevaluation of the current status of a number of basic concepts, such as Archaic and Mississippian, and to...

Temporal Models in Prehistory: An Example From Eastern North America [and Comments and Reply]

During the seventeenth century, the Spanish colonists and Indians of northern Florida engaged in a substantial trade for deerskins and other products obtained from interior southeastern tribes, which received brass ornaments, glass beads, iron hoes, guns, and other trade goods in exchange. For eastern Muskogeans, this was a period of cultural reorganization and experimentation following the drastic population losses and sociopolitical devolution of the midto-late sixteenth century.

https://www.jstor.org/stable/info/40712908

Seventeenth-Century Trade in the Colonial Southeast

A good many years ago Nelson and Gifford made a careful and extensive survey of the shellmounds of San Francisco Bay, in the course of which they utilized quantitative methods of analysis to determine the probable age of the cultures represented. In the years since their publications, new deposits have come to light in various parts of the Americas to which their methods might be applied, and a great deal more knowledge is now available which is applicable to the field of primitive dietetics.

A Reconsideration of Shellmounds with Respect to Population and Nutrition

Here They Once Stood: The Tragic End of the Apalachee Missions

THIS PAPER gives the results of test excavations conducted at the Lake Jackson site, Leon County, Florida by the Florida Park Service during the months of April and May, 1947.1 During this time systematic excavations were made in a portion of the village area lying in the vicinity of the large mounds for which the site is well known. These excavations were preliminary in nature, and it is hoped that they will be followed by more definitive study.

Test Excavations at the Lake Jackson Site

Here They Once Stood

Fifty Years of Southeastern Archaeology: Selected Works of John W. Griffin@@@A new Deal for Southeastern Archaeology

In view of the vast number of spurious glass artifacts known, it is of interest to note a genuine example which came to light recently in excavations in Florida. The scraper illustrated with this note (Fig. 27) is made of heavy green glass, and is a perfectly good aboriginal piece in form and workmanship. The length is 57 mm., the width 36 mm. The greatest thickness, 11 mm., lies near the steep nose at a point where original surfaces are present on both bottom and top. Undoubtedly, the material was derived from a heavy green glass bottle. The artifact was found in test excavations at the site of San Luis de Talimali, several miles west of the city of Tallahassee, Florida. San Luis was the major Spanish settlement in the Apalachee area during the seventeenth century, and at the time of its abandonment and destruction in 1704 consisted of a fort and blockhouse, a mission, and a number of dwellings inhabited by both Spaniards and Indians.

John W. Griffin

Papers

Here They Once Stood: The Tragic End of the Apalachee Missions

Test Excavations at the Lake Jackson Site

Here They Once Stood

Fifty Years of Southeastern Archaeology: Selected Works of John W. Griffin@@@A new Deal for Southeastern Archaeology

An Authentic Glass Artifact