From: derek gatherer (dgatherer2002@yahoo.co.uk)
Date: Mon 08 Dec 2003 - 14:57:37 GMT
> I thought the evidence that the Americas were
> populated by the so-called
> clovis peoples coming from Asia over the bearing
> landbridge and gradually
> down all the way into south america was pretty
> strong?
It is, on the basis of genes, language affinities and
archaeology.
> The only sticking point I think is interesting is on
> the north-east coast of
> north america, where some say that a few europeans
> landed during the last
> ice age (arriving by skirting the edge of the ice
> sheet that would've linked
> north america and europe to some extent), evidenced
> by some very non-clovis
> like tools that look more like ice age tools found
> in southern france.
Yes, this is the 'Solutrean point problem'. It's a
bit like the Jomon pottery hypothesis in that it
relies on a few artefacts rather than a comprehensive
body of archaeology. Another one in this category is
the Bahia de Amphoras in Brazil where there appear to
be Roman wine jars at the bottom of the bay. And of
course the Egyptian mummy with coca leaves in it that
was on the media a lot a few years ago. And of course
also Kennewick Man (he's the best, since he can be
dated and DNA-typed - that one I believe). But all of
these would seem to indicate perhaps a spot of early
intercontinental travel rather than an alternative
origin for Native Americans.
Having said that, Cavalli-Sforza et al do detect that
Native Americans of the US Eastern Seaboard are the
most genetically unusual (although you have to
remember that Native Aeericans are very un-diverse as
a whole, so care is required in interpreting this).
They don't draw any Solutrean-hypothesis conclusions
from that however, merely note it as an anomaly.....
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