A freshly discover spearhead once used to hunt down mammoths and mastodons some 15,000 years ago is land into question a sight of what we believe about the migration and applied science of former people in America .
Archaeologists from Texas A&M University see the Harlan Stone spearpoint while rooting around a mirky study 64 km ( 40 miles ) northwestward of Austin , Texas . The blade , no longer than 10 centimeters ( 4 inches ) , was unearthed at theDebra L. Friedkin web site , an orbit already rich with archeological treasure from theClovis culture , once believed to the first citizenry in America , and well - sleep together for their “ Clovis I point " spears .
However , this spearhead pre - dates the Clovis cultivation . As documented in the journalScience Advances , the findings suggest the spread head date to between 13,500 and 15,000 years ago , which would make it the oldest known weapon in North America .
" The discovery is significant because almost all pre - Clovis internet site have stone tools , but spear points have yet to be found , " Professor Michael Waters , director of the Center for the Study of the First Americans at Texas A&M , said ina argument . " These point were found under a stratum with Clovis and Folsom missile compass point . Clovis I is dated to 13,000 to 12,700 years ago and Folsom after that . ”
Most curious of all , the spear has a distinguishable staunch point , much like the stemmed spear-point of the Clovis , which were extremely eminent - tech , relatively speaking , of course of study .
The discovery is pretty exciting for water and squad . “ The dream has always been to incur symptomatic artifacts – such as projectile points – that can be recognized as erstwhile than Clovis and this is what we have at the Friedkin land site . "
So , did the fishgig belong to some herald of the Clovis ? Or is it a keepsake from a previous , freestanding migration ? Archaeologists are rightly cautious to jump to any braggy conclusions , but the uncovering is certainly tell us a heap about the lifestyle and culture of pre - Clovis peoples .
Until very recently , it was wide swallow that the Clovis hoi polloi enter the Americas from Asia across the Bering Strait Edwin Herbert Land bridge and down through an frappe - free corridor around 13,500 years ago . Then , mounting archaeological evidence come to light that suggested peoplestepped animal foot in the Americasconsiderably earlier than this . This spearhead isanother brick in the wallof this mount evidence . Nevertheless , even with all of this grounds at their fingertip , archaeologists are still not completely certain who these first people were or how they mother to America .
“ The finding blow up our understanding of the early people to search and locate North America , " add together Waters . " The peopling of the Americas during the end of the last Ice Age was a complex process and this complexity is seen in their transmissible record . Now we are starting to see this complexity mirror in the archaeological record . "
