Clovis Technological Complex
The Clovis Technological Complex is an archaeological term that refers to the culture and tool-making practices of a group of early North Americans known as the Clovis peoples, who lived during the late-glacial period around 13,000 years ago. Named after Clovis, New Mexico, where significant artifacts were first discovered, this complex is characterized by distinctive spear points and other tools, including bifaces, scrapers, and knives, often crafted from high-quality stones selected for their aesthetic and functional qualities. Clovis sites have been identified across North America, indicating a broad geographic presence from southern Canada to northern Mexico.
The archaeological evidence suggests that Clovis groups engaged in a mixed foraging strategy, focusing on hunting large game, particularly megamammals, while also utilizing smaller species as supplementary food sources. Settlement patterns reveal that these communities often established themselves near rivers or high-quality stone sources, which were crucial for their tool-making activities. Additionally, there are indications that Clovis peoples imbued their practices with cultural significance, as evidenced by the use of red ochre and the production of decorative artifacts, which may have had ceremonial implications. Overall, the Clovis Technological Complex provides valuable insights into the lifeways of some of North America's earliest inhabitants during a time of significant environmental change.
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Clovis Technological Complex
Related civilization: Paleo-Indian tradition.
Date: 11,500-10,500 b.c.e.
Locale: Clovis, New Mexico, North America
Clovis Technological Complex
The Clovis technological complex was named after a town in New Mexico near Blackwater Draw where James Ridgely Whiteman found distinctive spear points among the bones of a specieis of mammoths, the Columbian mammoths (Mammuthus columbi) in 1929. Edgar Billings Howard later confirmed the association in 1932. Besides New Mexico, Clovis sites have been found across North America, from southern Canada to northern Mexico, and extending west to east from the Pacific to the Atlantic Ocean. People of the Clovis culture lived in North America during the late-glacial period, which marks the last gasp of the last Ice Age, a time of regional cooling and ice-margin fluctuations, extremely rapid and widespread environmental change, and megamammal extinctions.
The Paleo-Indian Clovis peoples made distinctive weapons and tools including percussion-produced bifaces with distinctive flutes removed from the base of one or more sides, scrapers, knives, gravers, and burins, as well as blades struck from prepared cores, red ochre, and ground, incised, cut, and flaked bone and ivory. Settlement patterns include the kill and scavenging sites of big and small game animals, high-quality stone procurement and workshop sites, short-term habitations, base camps, caches, and burials. Clovis sites are not dispersed across the landscape; rather, they typically occur on overviews and riparian settings, especially those associated with small tributary streams, springs, and high-quality stone source areas. Clovis flaked-stone artifacts have been reported from sites located more than 620 miles (1,000 kilometers) from their source area. Clovis peoples selected high-quality stones that were tenacious, with aesthetic characteristics such as exquisite coloring, translucency, and smooth texture. Caches contain bifaces in various stages of manufacture and in early states of their usable life; many are more than 8 inches (200 millimeters) in length.
Although the artifact assemblage suggests that Clovis groups did nothing but hunt and process game, the animal remains suggest that the Clovis economy was actually a mixed foraging strategy, with an emphasis on the hunting of megamammals. Clovis groups had access to a wider range of species than was available to subsequent Paleo-Indian populations. Many of the smaller species provided Clovis groups with a source of backup or second-choice foods.
The use of red ochre and rock crystal quartz may be associated with Clovis belief systems. As in the Old World, Upper Paleolithic period, red ochre may be associated with ideological aspects of hunting, reproduction, birth, and death. The presence of finished weapons, utilitarian tools, and beads in association with red ochre mines suggests that these localities were used for ceremonial functions. Burial caches of exquisitely knapped tools made from exotic materials may be indicative of ceremonial activity. Clovis peoples used bone, ivory, and stone as art media. Decorative motifs were angular, subparallel, zigzagged, and crosshatched. Although art is quite scarce, incising and painting were used.
Bibliography
Bradley, B. A. “Paleo-Indian Flaked Stone Technology in the North American High Plains.” In From Kostenki to Clovis: Upper Paleolithic-Paleo-Indian Adaptations, edited by O. Soffer and N. D. Praslov. Plenum Press: New York, 1993.
Frison, G. C. “Paleoindian Large Mammal Hunters on the Plains of North America.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Science 95 (1998): 14,576-14,583.
Haynes, C. V. “Contributions of Radiocarbon Dating to the Geochronology of the Peopling of the New World.” In Radiocarbon Dating After Four Decades, edited by R. E. Taylor, A. Long, and R. S. Kra. New York: Springer-Verlag, 1992.
Haynes, C. V. “Geoarchaeological and Paleohydrological Evidence for a Clovis-Age Drought in North America and Its Bearing on Extinction.” Quaternary Research 35 (1991): 438-450.
Taylor, R. E., C. V. Haynes, and M. Stuiver. “Clovis and Folsom Age Estimates: Stratigraphic Context and Radiocarbon Calibration.” Antiquity 70 (1996): 515-525.