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Archaeology of the Americas
 
 
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The archaeology of the Americas is the study of the archaeology
Archaeology

Archaeology, archeology, or arch?ology is the science that studies Homo cultures through the recovery, documentation, analysis, and interpretation of material remains and environmental data, including architecture, Artifact , features, Biofact s, and cultural landscape....
 of North America
North America

North America is the northern continent of the Americas, situated in the Earth's northern hemisphere and almost totally in the western hemisphere....
, Central America
Central America

Central America is a central geography region of the Americas. It is the southernmost, isthmus portion of the North American continent, which connects with South America on the southeast....
 (or Mesoamerica
Mesoamerica

Mesoamerica or Meso-America is a region and cultural area in the Americas, extending approximately from central Mexico to Honduras and Nicaragua, within which a number of pre-Columbian society flourished before the Spanish colonization of the Americas in the 15th and 16th centuries....
), South America
South America

South America is the southern continent of the Americas, situated entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere....
 and the Caribbean
Caribbean

The Caribbean is a region consisting of the Caribbean Sea, its islands , and the surrounding coasts. The region is located southeast of the Gulf of Mexico and Northern America, east of Central America, and to the north of South America....
. This includes the study of pre-historic/Pre-Columbian
Pre-Columbian

The pre-Columbian era incorporates all archaeology of the Americas in the history of the Americas before the appearance of significant European influences on the Americas continents....
 and historic indigenous American peoples
Indigenous peoples of the Americas

The indigenous peoples of the Americas are the pre-Columbian inhabitants of the Americas, their descendants, and many ethnic groups who identify with those peoples....
.

of the most enduring classifications of archaeological cultures was established in Gordon Willey
Gordon Willey

Gordon Randolph Willey was an United States archaeologist famous for his fieldwork in South America and Central America as well as the southeastern United States....
 and Philip Phillips
Philip Phillips (archaeologist)

Philip Phillips was an influential archaeology in the United States during the 20th century. Although his first graduate work was in architecture, he later received a doctorate from Harvard University under advisor Alfred Marston Tozzer....
' 1958 book Method and Theory in American Archaeology. They divided the archaeological record
Archaeological record

The archaeological record is a term used in archaeology to denote all archaeological evidence, including the physical remains of past human activities which archaeologists seek out and record in an attempt to analyze and reconstruct the past....
 in the Americas into five phases.






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The archaeology of the Americas is the study of the archaeology
Archaeology

Archaeology, archeology, or arch?ology is the science that studies Homo cultures through the recovery, documentation, analysis, and interpretation of material remains and environmental data, including architecture, Artifact , features, Biofact s, and cultural landscape....
 of North America
North America

North America is the northern continent of the Americas, situated in the Earth's northern hemisphere and almost totally in the western hemisphere....
, Central America
Central America

Central America is a central geography region of the Americas. It is the southernmost, isthmus portion of the North American continent, which connects with South America on the southeast....
 (or Mesoamerica
Mesoamerica

Mesoamerica or Meso-America is a region and cultural area in the Americas, extending approximately from central Mexico to Honduras and Nicaragua, within which a number of pre-Columbian society flourished before the Spanish colonization of the Americas in the 15th and 16th centuries....
), South America
South America

South America is the southern continent of the Americas, situated entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere....
 and the Caribbean
Caribbean

The Caribbean is a region consisting of the Caribbean Sea, its islands , and the surrounding coasts. The region is located southeast of the Gulf of Mexico and Northern America, east of Central America, and to the north of South America....
. This includes the study of pre-historic/Pre-Columbian
Pre-Columbian

The pre-Columbian era incorporates all archaeology of the Americas in the history of the Americas before the appearance of significant European influences on the Americas continents....
 and historic indigenous American peoples
Indigenous peoples of the Americas

The indigenous peoples of the Americas are the pre-Columbian inhabitants of the Americas, their descendants, and many ethnic groups who identify with those peoples....
.

Archaeological time periods

One of the most enduring classifications of archaeological cultures was established in Gordon Willey
Gordon Willey

Gordon Randolph Willey was an United States archaeologist famous for his fieldwork in South America and Central America as well as the southeastern United States....
 and Philip Phillips
Philip Phillips (archaeologist)

Philip Phillips was an influential archaeology in the United States during the 20th century. Although his first graduate work was in architecture, he later received a doctorate from Harvard University under advisor Alfred Marston Tozzer....
' 1958 book Method and Theory in American Archaeology. They divided the archaeological record
Archaeological record

The archaeological record is a term used in archaeology to denote all archaeological evidence, including the physical remains of past human activities which archaeologists seek out and record in an attempt to analyze and reconstruct the past....
 in the Americas into five phases. These are:

  • The Lithic stage
    Lithic stage

    In the sequence of North American prehistoric cultural stages first proposed by Gordon Willey and Philip Phillips in 1958, the Lithic stage was the earliest period of human occupation in the Americas, covering the earliest, Pleistocene period....
    , defined initially as a big-game hunting adaptation. In most places, this can be dated to before 8000 BC. Examples include the Clovis culture
    Clovis culture

    The Clovis culture is a prehistoric indigenous peoples of the Americas culture that first appears in the archaeology record of North America around 11,500 rcbp radiocarbon years ago, at the end of the last glacial period....
    , Folsom tradition
    Folsom tradition

    The Folsom Complex is a name given by archaeologists to a specific Paleo-Indian archaeological culture that occupied much of central North America....
     and Paleo-indian groups.
  • The Archaic stage, defined as cultures relying primarily on increasing intensive collecting of wild resources, after the decline of the big game hunting lifestyle. Typically Archaic cultures can be dated from 8000 BC to 1000 BC. Representative examples include the Arctic small tool tradition
    Arctic small tool tradition

    The Arctic Small Tool tradition is a broad cultural entity that developed along the Alaska Peninsula, round Bristol Bay, and on the eastern shores of the Bering Strait around 2500 BC....
    , the Poverty Point
    Poverty Point

    Poverty Point is a prehistoric archeological site dating between 1650 ? 700 BC in northeastern Louisiana, from the current Mississippi River on the edge of Ma?on Ridge by the village of Epps....
     culture and the Chincharro culture.
  • The Formative stage
    Formative stage

    The Formative Stage is an archaeology term describing a particular developmental level. This stage is the third of five stages defined by Gordon Willey and Philip Phillips ' 1958 book Method and Theory in American Archaeology....
    , defined as "village agriculture" based. Most of these can be dated from 1000 BC to AD 500. Examples include the Dorset culture
    Dorset culture

    The Dorset culture were a Paleo-Eskimo culture that preceded the Inuit culture in Arctic North America. Inuit legends mention the Tuniit or Sivullirmiut , who were driven away by the Inuit....
     , Zapotec
    Zapotec

    The Zapotecs are an Indigenous peoples of Mexico people of Mexico. The population is concentrated in the southern Political divisions of Mexico of Oaxaca, but Zapotec communities exist in neighboring states as well....
     culture, Mimbres
    Mimbres

    Mimbres may refer to:*Mogollon culture#Mimbres culture a subdivision of Mogollon culture;*Mogollon culture#Mimbres pottery style or designs, a particular style of pottery decoration from the Mimbres culture;...
    , Olmec
    Olmec

    The Olmec were an ancient Pre-Columbian people living in the tropical lowlands of south-central Mexico, in what are roughly the modern-day Mexican state of Veracruz and Tabasco....
    , and Mississippian culture
    Mississippian culture

    The Mississippian culture was a Mound builder Native Americans in the United States culture that flourished in what is now the Midwestern United States, Eastern United States, and Southeastern United States United States from approximately 800 Common Era to 1500 Common Era, varying regionally....
    s.
  • The Classic stage
    Classic stage

    The Classic Stage is an archaeology term describing a particular developmental level. This stage is the fourth of five stages defined by Gordon Willey and Philip Phillips ' 1958 book Method and Theory in American Archaeology....
    , defined as "early civilizations," and typically dating from AD 500 to 1200. Willey and Phillips considered only cultures from Mesoamerica and Peru to have achieved this level of complexity. Examples include the early Maya and the Toltec
    Toltec

    The word Toltec in Mesoamerican studies has been used in different ways by different scholars to refer to actual populations and polity of pre-Columbian central Mexico or to the mythical ancestors mentioned in the mythical/historical narratives of the Aztecs....
    .
  • The Post-Classic stage
    Post-Classic stage

    The Post-Classic Stage is an archaeology term describing a particular developmental level. This stage is the fifth of five stages defined by Gordon Willey and Philip Phillips ' 1958 book Method and Theory in American Archaeology....
    , defined as "later prehispanic civilizations" and typically dated from AD 1200 onward. The late Maya and the Aztec
    Aztec

    Aztec is a term used to refer to certain ethnic groups of central Mexico, particularly those groups who spoke the Nahuatl and who achieved political and military dominance over large parts of Mesoamerica in the 14th, 15th and 16th centuries, a period referred to as the Late post-Classic period in Mesoamerican chronology....
     cultures were Post-Classic.


Since these simplistic periods were defined, numerous regional and sub-regional divisions have been created to break up the cultural landscape through time and space. Later archaeologists recognized that these linear stages did not adequately correspond to the cultural variation that existed in different locations in the Americas. Although the Formative/Classic/Post-Classic distinction is still used in the archaeology of Mesoamerica
Mesoamerica

Mesoamerica or Meso-America is a region and cultural area in the Americas, extending approximately from central Mexico to Honduras and Nicaragua, within which a number of pre-Columbian society flourished before the Spanish colonization of the Americas in the 15th and 16th centuries....
 (see Mesoamerican chronology
Mesoamerican chronology

Mesoamerican chronology divides the history of pre-Columbian Mesoamerica into a number of named successive eras or periods, from the earliest evidence of human habitation through to the early Colonial period which followed the Spanish colonization of the Americas....
), this division has been replaced in most of North America by more local classifications. Also see Sociocultural evolution
Sociocultural evolution

Sociocultural evolution is an umbrella term for theories of cultural evolution and social evolution, describing how cultures and society have developed over time....
.
Steinkreis Burnt Hill Massachusetts Gross

Archaeology in the United States


In the United States
United States

The United States of America is a Federal government constitutional republic comprising U.S. state and a federal district. The country is situated mostly in central North America, where its Contiguous United States and Washington, D.C., the Capital districts and territories, lie between the Pacific Ocean and Atlantic Oceans, Borders of the U...
, physical anthropology
Physical anthropology

Biological anthropology, or physical anthropology is a branch of anthropology that studies the mechanisms of biological evolution, genetics inheritance, human Adaptation and variation, primatology, primate Morphology , and the List of human fossils of human evolution....
 and archaeological investigations based on the study of human remains are complicated by the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act
Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act

The Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act , , , is a United States federal law passed on 16 November 1990 requiring federal agencies and institutions that receive federal funding to return Native Americans in the United States cultural items and human remains to their respective peoples....
, (NAGPRA), which provides for the bodies of Native Americans and associated grave goods
Grave goods

Grave goods, in archaeology and anthropology, are the items buried along with the body.They are usually personal possessions, supplies to smooth the deceased's journey into the afterlife or offerings to the gods....
 to be turned over to the recognized tribal body most legally affiliated with the remains. In some cases, notably, that of Kennewick Man
Kennewick Man

Kennewick Man is the name for the skeletal remains of a prehistory man found on a stream bed of the Columbia River near Kennewick, Washington, USA on July 28, 1996....
, these laws have been subject to close judicial scrutiny and great intellectual conflict.

Humans in the Americas

Models of migration to the New World
Models of migration to the New World

There are several popular models of migration to the New World proposed by the Anthropology community. The question of how, when and why humans first entered the Americas is of intense interest to anthropologists and has been a subject of heated debate for centuries....
 addresses the central question of when and how humans reached the Americas. The earliest definite human peoples visible in the archaeological record throughout the Americas are today known as the Paleo Indians
Paleo Indians

Paleoindians or Paleoamericans were the first peoples to enter and inhabit the Western Hemisphere during the final Quaternary glaciation of the late Pleistocene....
.

See also

  • List of pre-Columbian civilizations
    List of pre-Columbian civilizations

    This list of pre-Columbian civilizations includes those civilizations and cultures of the Americas which flourished prior to the European colonization of the Americas....
  • List of archaeological cultures in North America
    List of archaeological periods (North America)

    Many archaeological periods, cultures, complexes, and peoples have been identified in North America....
  • Archaeological culture
    Archaeological culture

    In addition to its usual meaning in social science, in archaeology, the term wikt:culture is also used in reference to several related concepts unique to the discipline....


Further reading

  • Bones, Discovering the First Americans, Elaine Dewar, Carroll & Graf Publishers, New York, 2002, ISBN 0-7867-0979-0