The first peoples of the Atacama Desert lived among the trees: A 11,600- to 11,200-year-old grove and congregation site.

In deserts, water has been singled out as the most important factor for choosing where to settle, but trees were likely an important part of the landscape for hunter-gatherers beyond merely constituting an economic resource. Yet, this critical aspect has not been considered archaeologically. Here, we present the results of mapping and radiocarbon dating of a truly unique archaeological record. Over 150 preserved stumps around five Late Pleistocene/Early Holocene archaeological campsites (12,800 to 11,200 cal BP) show that trees were key features in the creation of everyday habitats for the first inhabitants of the Atacama Desert. At two of these sites, QM12 and QM35, the spatial and chronological correlation between trees and hearths reveals that people located their homes under the tree canopy. At residential site QM35, artifact distribution coincides with a grove dated to ~11,600 to 11,200 cal BP. A third residential area (QM32) occurred along the grove margins ~12,000 to 11,200 cal BP. Based on the distinct cultural material of these two camps, we propose that two different groups intermittently shared this rich wetland-grove environment. The tree taxa suggest a preference for the native Schinus molle, a tree scarcely present on the landscape today, over the endemic, nitrogen-fixing Strombocarpa tamarugo, both for toolmaking and firewood and even though the S. tamarugo was locally more abundant. Together with the spatial and chronological coincidence of campsites, hearths, and trees, we propose that people spared the most abundant and resilient species to create their homes, in turn promoting fertility oases amid the Atacama's hyperaridity.

Response to Comment on "Evidence of humans in North America during the Last Glacial Maximum".

Madsen et al. question the reliability of calibrated radiocarbon ages associated with human footprints discovered recently in White Sands National Park, New Mexico, USA. On the basis of the geologic, hydrologic, stratigraphic, and chronologic evidence, we maintain that the ages are robust and conclude that the footprints date to between ~23,000 and 21,000 years ago.Madsen et al. (1) question the veracity of calibrated radiocarbon ages used to constrain the antiquity of human trackways discovered recently at White Sands National Park (WHSA) Locality 2, New Mexico, USA (2). The ages were derived from seeds of the aquatic plant Ruppia cirrhosa, which they suggest may suffer from hard-water (or reservoir) effects, making them too old, potentially by thousands of years. We were well aware of this possibility, investigated it, and presented several lines of evidence that argued against such a problem. Here we respond to each of their four primary points.

Evidence of humans in North America during the Last Glacial Maximum.

Archaeologists and researchers in allied fields have long sought to understand human colonization of North America. Questions remain about when and how people migrated, where they originated, and how their arrival affected the established fauna and landscape. Here, we present evidence from excavated surfaces in White Sands National Park (New Mexico, United States), where multiple in situ human footprints are stratigraphically constrained and bracketed by seed layers that yield calibrated radiocarbon ages between ~23 and 21 thousand years ago. These findings confirm the presence of humans in North America during the Last Glacial Maximum, adding evidence to the antiquity of human colonization of the Americas and providing a temporal range extension for the coexistence of early inhabitants and Pleistocene megafauna.

Current evidence allows multiple models for the peopling of the Americas.

Some recent academic and popular literature implies that the problem of the colonization of the Americas has been largely resolved in favor of one specific model: a Pacific coastal migration, dependent on high marine productivity, from the Bering Strait to South America, thousands of years before Clovis, the earliest widespread cultural manifestation south of the glacial ice. Speculations on maritime adaptations and typological links (stemmed points) across thousands of kilometers have also been advanced. A review of the current genetic, archeological, and paleoecological evidence indicates that ancestral Native American population expansion occurred after 16,000 years ago, consistent with the archeological record, particularly with the earliest securely dated sites after ~15,000 years ago. These data are largely consistent with either an inland (ice-free corridor) or Pacific coastal routes (or both), but neither can be rejected at present. Systematic archeological and paleoecological investigations, informed by geomorphology, are required to test each hypothesis.

Footprints preserve terminal Pleistocene hunt? Human-sloth interactions in North America.

Predator-prey interactions revealed by vertebrate trace fossils are extremely rare. We present footprint evidence from White Sands National Monument in New Mexico for the association of sloth and human trackways. Geologically, the sloth and human trackways were made contemporaneously, and the sloth trackways show evidence of evasion and defensive behavior when associated with human tracks. Behavioral inferences from these trackways indicate prey selection and suggest that humans were harassing, stalking, and/or hunting the now-extinct giant ground sloth in the terminal Pleistocene.

Human (Clovis)-gomphothere (Cuvieronius sp.) association ∼ 13,390 calibrated yBP in Sonora, Mexico.

The earliest known foragers to populate most of North America south of the glaciers [∼ 11,500 to ≥ ∼ 10,800 (14)C yBP; ∼ 13,300 to ∼ 12,800 calibrated (Cal) years] made distinctive "Clovis" artifacts. They are stereotypically characterized as hunters of Pleistocene megamammals (mostly mammoth) who entered the continent via Beringia and an ice-free corridor in Canada. The origins of Clovis technology are unclear, however, with no obvious evidence of a predecessor to the north. Here we present evidence for Clovis hunting and habitation ∼ 11,550 yBP (∼ 13,390 Cal years) at "El Fin del Mundo," an archaeological site in Sonora, northwestern Mexico. The site also includes the first evidence to our knowledge for gomphothere (Cuvieronius sp.) as Clovis prey, otherwise unknown in the North American archaeological record and terminal Pleistocene paleontological record. These data (i) broaden the age and geographic range for Clovis, establishing El Fin del Mundo as one of the oldest and southernmost in situ Clovis sites, supporting the hypothesis that Clovis had its origins well south of the gateways into the continent, and (ii) expand the make-up of the North American megafauna community just before extinction.

Chronological evidence fails to support claim of an isochronous widespread layer of cosmic impact indicators dated to 12,800 years ago.

According to the Younger Dryas Impact Hypothesis (YDIH), ∼ 12,800 calendar years before present, North America experienced an extraterrestrial impact that triggered the Younger Dryas and devastated human populations and biotic communities on this continent and elsewhere. This supposed event is reportedly marked by multiple impact indicators, but critics have challenged this evidence, and considerable controversy now surrounds the YDIH. Proponents of the YDIH state that a key test of the hypothesis is whether those indicators are isochronous and securely dated to the Younger Dryas onset. They are not. We have examined the age basis of the supposed Younger Dryas boundary layer at the 29 sites and regions in North and South America, Europe, and the Middle East in which proponents report its occurrence. Several of the sites lack any age control, others have radiometric ages that are chronologically irrelevant, nearly a dozen have ages inferred by statistically and chronologically flawed age-depth interpolations, and in several the ages directly on the supposed impact layer are older or younger than ∼ 12,800 calendar years ago. Only 3 of the 29 sites fall within the temporal window of the YD onset as defined by YDIH proponents. The YDIH fails the critical chronological test of an isochronous event at the YD onset, which, coupled with the many published concerns about the extraterrestrial origin of the purported impact markers, renders the YDIH unsupported. There is no reason or compelling evidence to accept the claim that a cosmic impact occurred ∼ 12,800 y ago and caused the Younger Dryas.

A terminal Pleistocene child cremation and residential structure from eastern Beringia.

The dearth of human remains and residential sites has constrained inquiry into Beringian lifeways at the transition of the late Pleistocene-early Holocene. We report on human skeletal remains and a residential structure from central Alaska dated to ~11,500 calendar years ago. The remains are from a ~3-year-old child who was cremated in a pit within a semisubterranean house. The burial-cremation and house have exceptional integrity and preservation and exhibit similarities and differences to both Siberian Upper Paleolithic and North American Paleoindian features.

Absence of geochemical evidence for an impact event at the Bølling-Allerød/Younger Dryas transition.

High concentrations of iridium have been reported in terrestrial sediments dated at 12.9 ka and are interpreted to support an extraterrestrial impact event as the cause of the observed extinction in the Rancholabrean fauna, changes in the Paleoindian cultures, and the onset of the Younger Dryas cooling [Firestone RB, et al. (2007) Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 104:16016-16021]. Here, we report platinum group element (PGE: Os, Ir, Ru, Rh, Pt, Pd), gold (Au) concentrations, and (187)Os/(188)Os ratios in time-equivalent terrestrial, lacustrine, and marine sections to seek robust evidence of an extraterrestrial contribution. First, our results do not reproduce the previously reported elevated Ir concentrations. Second, (187)Os/(188)Os isotopic ratios in the sediment layers investigated are similar to average crustal values, indicating the absence of a significant meteoritic Os contribution to these sediments. Third, no PGE anomalies distinct from crustal signatures are present in the marine record in either the Gulf of California (DSDP 480, Guaymas Basin) or the Cariaco Basin (ODP 1002C). Our data show no evidence of an extraterrestrial (ET)-PGE enrichment anomaly in any of the investigated depositional settings investigated across North America and in one section in Belgium. The lack of a clear ET-PGE signature in this sample suite is inconsistent with the impact of a large chondritic projectile at the Bølling-Allerød/Younger Dryas transition.

An independent evaluation of the Younger Dryas extraterrestrial impact hypothesis.

Based on elevated concentrations of a set of "impact markers" at the onset of the Younger Dryas stadial from sedimentary contexts across North America, Firestone, Kennett, West, and others have argued that 12.9 ka the Earth experienced an impact by an extraterrestrial body, an event that had devastating ecological consequences for humans, plants, and animals in the New World [Firestone RB, et al. (2007) Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 104:16016-16021]. Herein, we report the results of an independent analysis of magnetic minerals and microspherules from seven sites of similar age, including two examined by Firestone et al. We were unable to reproduce any results of the Firestone et al. study and find no support for Younger Dryas extraterrestrial impact.

From the Bay of Naples to the River Don: the Campanian Ignimbrite eruption and the Middle to Upper Paleolithic transition in Eastern Europe.

The Campanian Ignimbrite (CI) eruption, dated by 40Ar/39Ar and various stratigraphic methods to ca. 39,000 cal BP, generated a massive ash plume from its source in southern Italy across Southeastern and Eastern Europe. At the Kostenki-Borshchevo open-air sites on the Middle Don River in Russia, Upper Paleolithic artifact assemblages are buried below, within, and above the CI tephra (which is redeposited by slope action at most sites) on the second terrace. Luminescence and radiocarbon dating, paleomagnetism, and soil and pollen stratigraphy provide further basis for correlation with the Greenland and North Atlantic climate stratigraphy. The oldest Upper Paleolithic occupation layers at Kostenki-Borshchevo may be broadly correlated with warm intervals that preceded the CI event and Heinrich Event 4 (HE4; Greenland Interstadial: GI 12-GI 9) dating to ca. 45,000-41,000 cal BP. These layers contain an industry not currently recognized in other parts of Europe. Early Upper Paleolithic layers above the CI tephra are correlated with HE4 and warm intervals that occurred during 38,000-30,000 cal BP (GI 8-GI 5), and include an assemblage that is assigned to the Aurigancian industry, associated with skeletal remains of modern humans.

Comment on "Redefining the age of Clovis: implications for the peopling of the Americas".

Waters and Stafford (Reports, 23 February 2007, p. 1122) provided useful information about the age of some Clovis sites but have not definitively established the temporal span of this cultural complex in the Americas. Only a continuing program of radiometric dating and careful stratigraphic correlations can address the lingering ambiguity about the emergence and spread of Clovis culture.

Early Upper Paleolithic in Eastern Europe and implications for the dispersal of modern humans.

Radiocarbon and optically stimulated luminescence dating and magnetic stratigraphy indicate Upper Paleolithic occupation-probably representing modern humans-at archaeological sites on the Don River in Russia 45,000 to 42,000 years ago. The oldest levels at Kostenki underlie a volcanic ash horizon identified as the Campanian Ignimbrite Y5 tephra that is dated elsewhere to about 40,000 years ago. The occupation layers contain bone and ivory artifacts, including possible figurative art, and fossil shells imported more than 500 kilometers. Thus, modern humans appeared on the central plain of Eastern Europe as early as anywhere else in northern Eurasia.