North America - Plains (Geographic Keyword)
176-200 (223 Records)
While numerous ethnographic accounts indicate the use of plants in the creation of ceremonial bison skull altars within many areas of the Great Plains, few examples of this practice has been identified from archaeological contexts. Analysis of phytoliths from soils (n=2) obtained from within and beneath a ceremonial bison skull (AD 1339 and 1397) recovered from the Crepeele site (DiMe-29), southwestern Manitoba, led to the identification of phytolith assemblages dominated by C4 grasses. Samples...
The Red Bluff Dam Project – A 1930s New Deal Construction Project. (2017)
The Red Bluff Project is an earthen dam in Texas on the Pecos River near the New Mexico border. A preliminary geological report of the originally named Angeles Dam Site in Texas by Geologist Kirk Bryan in 1929 found the dam site favorable but he made no conclusion on feasibility. This discussion will talk about the work Dr. Bryan contributed to the later construction of this dam and the later name change to the Red Bluff Project. Emphasis will include the construction of the dam from 1934 to...
Remote Sensing Investigations at Midipadi Butte (32DU2) and Nightwalker’s Butte (32ML39), North Dakota (2015)
As part of a flood assessment effort in collaboration with the US Army Corps of Engineers and the South Dakota State Historical Society, archaeo-geophysicists from the Center for Advanced Spatial Technologies at the University of Arkansas performed remote sensing investigations in 2014 at fifteen sites along the Missouri River in North and South Dakota. Among these are Midipadi and Nightwalker, two related late eighteenth to early nineteenth century Hidatsa sites located on opposite sides of...
Renewed Investigation of Sites within the Black Mesa Region, Oklahoma Panhandle (2016)
Early archaeological investigations in the Black Mesa area of Oklahoma were geared toward the discovery of additional evidence of "Early Man" in North America. The 1926 discovery of the Folsom type site encouraged E.B. Renaud to explore caves along the Dry Cimarron just 50 kilometers downstream. Rather than discovering additional Paleoindian sites, the University of Denver’s surveys documented numerous post-Folsom occupations. Despite the early documentation of these sites, systematic...
Repatriation to Lineal Descendants of Sitting Bull (2016)
Despite numerous books and historical accounts of the 1890 death of Sitting Bull, only one obscure 1893 magazine article mentions that a U.S. Army surgeon cut off a lock of Sitting Bull’s hair and took leggings from his body. These items were loaned to the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History back in 1896 and were recently evaluated for repatriation and were returned to Sitting Bull’s family. This poster reviews the research that determined which descendants had the highest standing...
Revisiting Like-A-Fishhook: Coalescence and Community on the Missouri River, North Dakota (2015)
Critical attention to the concept of "community" in archaeological research over the last decade has recast communities from homogeneous groups of people living at a site to emergent networks of social interaction that both derive from and are reproduced by a sense of common interest and affiliation (Wernke 2007). Coalescent communities are in a constant state of becoming, as residents must continuously negotiate aspects of their identities in ways that mitigate conflict. Historical records...
Rock Art Research and Ethnohistory on the Northwestern Plains and Adjacent Rocky Mountains (2015)
Ethnohistorical sources in our region are mainly used for rock art explanation relative to warfare scenes, but they are equally important for tribal demographics and travel patterns and often more detailed than other sources. Ethnohistory can also provide support for theories about gender and age of rock art production and use when no other information is available. Such references supply details regarding religious practices and beliefs as they actually happened, not as they were later...
Rocks in Our Heads: Recent Investigations in Knife River Flint Quarry Area (2015)
The Knife River flint primary source area was one of, if not the primary source of lithic material in the Northern Plains. Knife River flint was a major trade item from the Paleoindian through the protohistoric. Over the past several years, archaeologists from Metcalf Archaeological Consultants, Inc. have conducted projects within the Knife River flint primary source area located in north-central North Dakota. Many of these projects either directly or indirectly have been in support of oil...
Rockshelters as Late Quaternary Geoarchaeological Records in the Bighorn Mountains, Wyoming (2015)
Rockshelters in Wyoming’s Bighorn Mountains have a long history of archaeological research resulting in a rich dataset of geological and paleoecological information that provides a context for the region’s 12,000 year cultural record. In this study we focus on three deeply stratified and well-dated rockshelters to meet three primary objectives. First, we apply Bayesian statistics to each record to create an age model that contextualizes stratigraphic variability and contrasts autogenic and...
Rockshelters in the Bighorn Basin, Wyoming; Environment, Ecology, and Landuse Patterns (2015)
Archaeologists have investigated many aspects of rockshelters in the Bighorn Basin, Wyoming, but questions remain about the role of these sites within regional settlement patterns. It is clear that the Bighorn Basin is a moisture-controlled ecosystem and that variability in environmental moisture levels produces dramatic changes in both animal and plant populations. Changes in environmental moisture also appear to affect human population levels, and past settlement and subsistence patterns. This...
Seasonal Bison Exploitation in North American Prehistory: A Probabilistic Approach Using Fetal Prey Osteometry (2017)
Bison remains often serve as evidence for seasonal food exploitation in archaeological investigations of the Great Plains and adjacent regions. Interpreting this evidence relies on discrete rutting and calving periods that allow zooarchaeologists to link ontogenetic data to a specific time of year. However, ecological data on modern bison show that the timing of rutting and calving behavior varies between herds and even within the same herd between years. To address this problem, this study...
Settlement Organization of Paleoindian Caribou Hunters: Inferences from the Israel River Complex, Jefferson NH. (2017)
A long-term research project in northern New Hampshire has identified nearly 20 Paleoindian components within a one kilometer by half kilometer space overlooking the Israel River. Consideration of the spatial distribution of tools and debris within the components and the distribution of these components on the landscape suggest a rigorous organization of migrating bands of Paleoindians who focused on caribou hunting. Site specific topography appears to be an essential element in the selection...
Signage Effectiveness as Rock Art Protection (2017)
Site signage has long been used to inform people of the importance and fragile nature of rock art and consequences of damaging the images and related cultural remains. Many styles of signs, with variable content, amount of information, and degrees of threatened legal action, have been used around the world, and their effectiveness may be evaluated by damage to the sign, associated rock art, and surrounding landscape. Other factors, such as fences, walkways, distance from roads, and presence of...
Socialized Landscapes of the Southern Plains: Bedrock Ground Stone Surfaces on the Chaquaqua Plateau, Colorado (2015)
Prehistoric peoples of the Southern Plains created bedrock ground stone surfaces in rockshelters along upper canyon rims on exposed Dakota Sandstone. These bedrock milling features became centers for the reproduction of food and other resources but also developed into anchored places that facilitated the reproduction of socio-cultural values and norms. The socialization of the Southern Plains prehistoric landscape is most visible in the material culture remains of bedrock milling features that...
Soil, Climate, and Culture Records on the Southern Great Plains (2016)
This paper compares radiocarbon chronologies for climatic and cultural changes in Texas and the Southern Plains region utilizing multiple sources. A radiocarbon baseline (>100) from select river basins across Texas helps reconstruct the alluvial histories of these catchments. This baseline establishes a framework for understanding aspects of climate change, as alluviation provides a proxy for general cycles of precipitation and aridity. Next, the alluvial-climatic records are supplemented by a...
Sourcing Interactions: X-Ray Diffraction of Central Plains Tradition Ceramics during the Medieval Climatic Anomaly (2015)
Recent research by Roper (1995 and 2007) questions the long-held perspective that the various phases of the Central Plains tradition (CPt) consisted of small village dwelling populations with distinct borders. New evidence suggests a more fluid distribution of autonomous farmsteads following major stream systems throughout the Central Plains (USA). This debate has led to various questions surrounding the interaction amongst communities and individuals in the CPt populations with an emphasis on...
Sourcing Quartzite Projectile Points from 39FA65, The Ray Long Site, Fall River County, South Dakota (2015)
The purpose of this research was to determine if the tool stone used for two quartzite Angostura projectile points from the Ray Long site (39FA65), Fall River County, South Dakota, could be linked to a specific quarry or geologic formation. The Ray Long site is the type-site for the Paleoindian period Angostura complex which has a regional distribution of Utah, Colorado, southeastern Idaho, Wyoming, southwestern South Dakota, and western Nebraska. The seven quarries selected for the study are...
South Texas Archaic Hunter-Gatherer Mobility Patterns: A Study using Strontium Isotope Analysis (2016)
Strontium isotope ratios from human enamel can be used to estimate the general origin of individuals and are becoming an important tool in archaeology for studying human mobility. This presentation will illustrate the results of a pilot study looking at mobility patterns for south Texas Archaic period hunter-gatherers using strontium isotope analysis. Six human teeth from the south Texas mortuary site of Loma Sandia, dating to about 2850-2550 years ago, were used in this study. Three of the...
Strontium Stable Isotope Ratio Analysis of the Loma Sandia Archaic Period Mortuary Site of South Texas (2017)
Models of hunter-gatherer territoriality are derived from the ethnographic record but have rarely been directly evaluated with archaeological data. Mortuary sites on the Texas Coastal Plain have long been thought of as a product of hunter-gatherer territoriality. Strontium stable isotope ratios from human tooth enamel can be used to estimate the origin of individuals and can evaluate evidence for territoriality. This paper will report the results of strontium stable isotope ratios analyzed from...
Subadult Mortality at McLemore: An Unexpected Culprit (2016)
This study focuses on the subadult skeletal remains excavated in 1960 from the Late Prehistoric-age McLemore site (34WA5) in southwest Oklahoma. Past analyses of this skeletal collection primarily focused on the adults, and what they could contribute to the overall understanding of the health and lifestyle of the individuals who inhabited McLemore. The goal of this study was to reexamine the skeletal collection in light of new methodologies in diagnosing pathology, focusing on the subadult...
Survey Says?!?!: A GIS Based Comparison of Site Locations and Settlement Patterns in the Gunnison Basin, Colorado (2017)
In comparison to the Late Paleoindian period (10,000-8,000 rcybp), the Early Archaic (8,000-6,500 rcybp) in the Gunnison Basin, Colorado is a poorly understood time because of its relatively light archaeological signature. Not only do we have a lighter archaeological record, but we also see a change in technologies, such as projectile point types in this transitional period. Some archaeologists explain these observations as a result of changing environments and shifting settlement processes as...
A Tale of Two Houses: Soil Chemical and Floor Assemblage Evidence of Domestic Activities at the Menoken Site, North Dakota (2015)
Although they are often used by archaeologists to identify activity patterns within domestic spaces, floor assemblages are influenced by a variety of cultural and natural formation processes, especially those related to abandonment. By contrast, soil chemical traces are thought to be less vulnerable to alteration by subsequent activity and, therefore, are treated as primary residue of activities in their original location. Although the formation histories of these two types of evidence differ,...
Technological Variability in Woodland and Plains Village Period Ceramics from Central and Eastern North Dakota (2015)
This paper explores technological variability in Woodland and Plains Village period ceramics from central and eastern North Dakota. Research objectives include 1) assessing compositional variability within Woodland period assemblages, 2) establishing whether or not ceramics could have been produced from local "clays," 3) exploring continuity in pastes from Woodland period to later Plains Village pottery, and 4) comparing Devils Lake "clays" to materials from the Missouri River drainage. This...
Tobacco Related Imagery in Montana and Wyoming (2017)
Pictographs and a few petroglyphs of tobacco plants, tobacco gardens and tobacco headdresses are found at a dozen sites across Montana and Wyoming. Very similar images painted on Crow Indian Tobacco Society pipe bags, moccasins and other clothing strongly suggest the pictographs and petroglyphs were made by the Crow. High concentrations of tobacco pollen at one site suggest it was the location of a tobacco garden
TOOL PRODUCTION, SUBSISTENCE, OR PRACTICE: AN INVESTIGATION OF HUMAN MODIFIED BISON PHALANGES PRESENT AT THE BULL CREEK AND CLARY RANCH SITES (2015)
The Clary Ranch site in Southwestern Nebraska and the Bull Creek site in Northwestern Oklahoma are Late-Paleoindian camps that were used for processing the meat and bones from bison hunts. This is an experimental archaeological investigation involving Clary Ranch and Bull Creek, both of which contain evidence of spiral fracturing on bison phalanges resulting from the butchering and preparation process. This archaeological experiment investigates possible motives Paleoindian hunters would have...