ENV S 3 Lecture Notes - Lecture 8: Beringia, Mastodon, Pleistocene
26 April 2018
Major IDs-Why is the ID called what it is? Who, what , when , where, why, how &
environmental significance
● Native America
○ How manipulative of their environment were they? How did they interact
with it?
○ Beringia-revolves around the land called Beringia
○ Pleistocene Age-dating back to 2.6 million years ago, period of intense
glaciation; the last big melting of the icesures happened 11 thousand years
ago. (Last Ice Age)
■ So much of the ocean’s water was under ice, that the ocean receded---
land between Siberia and Alaska appeared-Beringia
■ Gamers and the animal targets crossed over past Beringia to a region
of Siberia without ice---stayed there until Wisconsin glaciation melted;
○ Wisconsin glaciation-the last big ice sheet melted
○ -------Theory of how they came to North America------------------------------------------
○ As the animals moved southward, hunters continued to pursue them-
Megafauna: large animals that were of the elephant family; Lived in Siberia
and migrated; i.e. mammoths, mastodons, horses
○ What happened to the Megafauna in North America? Theories:
■ Overkill hypothesis (after 1200 BC): theory developed by a University
of Arizona paleontologist-Paul; hunters came across Siberia
(Eurasian), descendent knew skill of hunting, continued to hunt; as the
animals advanced, no ability to reproduce=extinction; no time to
reproduce
■ Natural die-offs and extinction
■ Extraterrestrials
● Biomass thats dark in color-it is birdwood (ash) that they
theorized that sometime around 12000 years ago, there was a
comet that hit the earth, causing a massive forest fire>climate
change, animals died off rapidly
■ Fell into tar pits
○ Paleo-Indians: “old” indians
■ Three main waves of migration--from Beringia to>down the pacific
coast, middle, to the left all the way down to Nefinland
■ Still hunting new game-american lion, bears
■ Settled to practice agriculture
■ New Mexico area, central mexico
■ They had sophisticated stone tools
● Clovis, New Mexico-found distinctive liths-spear-head called
“clovis points”
○ Archaic Period (7000-1000 BCE)-following Paleo-Indians period; settled in mid
& west regions of what is now United States of America
○ Multiple migrations
■ Corn started with the mesoamerican period
■ Theories of Migration:
● People left East Asia and island hopped all the way to the
pacific to the Americas;
● Paleo-Indians>what were they like? Very diverse;
○ What we do know about Native America is far outweighed by what we don’t
know
○ Nomads-made no imprint on the land
○ Chumash-the most dynamic H-G society in all of Northern America; at the
chiefdom level
Document Summary
Who, what , when , where, why, how & environmental significance. Pleistocene age-dating back to 2. 6 million years ago, period of intense glaciation; the last big melting of the icesures happened 11 thousand years ago. (last ice age) So much of the ocean"s water was under ice, that the ocean receded--- land between siberia and alaska appeared-beringia. Gamers and the animal targets crossed over past beringia to a region of siberia without ice---stayed there until wisconsin glaciation melted; Wisconsin glaciation-the last big ice sheet melted. ------theory of how they came to north america------------------------------------------ As the animals moved southward, hunters continued to pursue them- Megafauna: large animals that were of the elephant family; lived in siberia and migrated; i. e. mammoths, mastodons, horses. Overkill hypothesis (after 1200 bc): theory developed by a university of arizona paleontologist-paul; hunters came across siberia (eurasian), descendent knew skill of hunting, continued to hunt; as the animals advanced, no ability to reproduce=extinction; no time to reproduce.
