Modeling Hunter-Gatherer Population Dynamics on the Texas Coastal Plain during the Holocene

Summary

A radiocarbon database is used to model prehistoric population dynamics on the Texas Coastal Plain in the context of Holocene climate change. Hunters and gatherers participated in a multifaceted social and ecological system that appears to have been highly resilient to climatic impacts by utilizing multiple ecological zones and participating in wide-ranging social networks for over 6000 years. Climatic fluctuations include a dry middle Holocene and fluctuating but wetter late Holocene. During the early and middle Holocene the region experienced rising sea-levels followed by stabilization. Expectations from archaeological data indicate populations experienced a number of substantial population fluctuations, peaking during the Late Archaic period (4000-800 BP) and sharply declining during the Late Prehistoric period (800-350 BP). We will compare the patterns in the radiocarbon database to these expectations and Holocene climatic reconstructions.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• PAGES (Past Global Changes) PEOPLE 3000 - PalEOclimate and the PeopLing of the Earth   •
• Society for American Archaeology 83rd Annual Meeting, Washington, DC (2018)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 22399