Cactus Hill (USA) - Possible Preclovis Site in Virginia

Cactus Hill (USA) - Possible Preclovis Site in Virginia Cactus Hill (Smithsonian designation 44SX202) is the name of a buried multi-component archaeological site on the coastal plain of the Nottaway River in Sussex County, Virginia. The site has both Archaic and Clovis occupations, but most importantly and once quite controversially, below the Clovis and separated by what appears to be a variably thick (7–20 centimeters or about 3–8 inches) level of sterile sand, is what excavators argue is a Pre-Clovis occupation. Data from the Site Excavators report that the Pre-Clovis level has a stone tool assemblage with heavy percentages of quartzite blades, and pentangular (five-sided) projectile points. Data on the artifacts has yet to be published in detailed peer-reviewed contexts, but even skeptics agree the assemblage includes small polyhedral cores, blade-like flakes, and basally thinned bifacial points.   Numerous projectile points were recovered from the various levels of Cactus Hill, including Middle Archaic Morrow Mountain Points and two classic fluted Clovis points. Two projectile points from what are thought to be Pre-Clovis levels are named Cactus Hill points. Based on the photographs published in Johnson, Cactus Hill points are small point, made from a blade or flake, and pressure flaked. They have slightly concave bases, and parallel to slightly curved side margins. Radiocarbon dates on wood from the Pre-Clovis level range between 15,070 ±70 and 18,250 ±80 RCYBP, calibrated to approximately  18,200–22,000 years ago. Luminescence dates taken on feldspar and quartzite grains in the various levels of the site agree, with some exceptions, with the radiocarbon assays. The luminescence dates suggest that the site stratigraphy is primarily intact and has been little affected by the movement of artifacts down through the sterile sand. Seeking the Perfect Pre-Clovis Site Cactus Hill is still somewhat controversial, in part no doubt because the site was among the earliest to be considered Preclovis in date. The Pre-Clovis occupation was not stratigraphically sealed and artifacts were assigned to Pre-Clovis levels based on their relative elevation in an environment of sand, where bioturbation by animals and insects can easily move artifacts up and down in a profile (see Bocek 1992 for a discussion). Further, some of the luminescence dates on the Pre-Clovis level ranged as young as 10,600 to 10,200 years ago. No features were identified: and, it must be said that the site is just not a perfect context. However, other, completely credible Pre-Clovis sites have been and continue to be identified, and Cactus Hills shortcomings may today be of less significance. Multiple instances of fairly secure preclovis sites in North and South America, particularly in the Pacific Northwest and along the Pacific coast, have made these issues seem less compelling. Further, the Blueberry Hill site in the Nottoway River valley (see Johnson 2012) also reportedly contains cultural levels stratigraphically below Clovis-period occupations. Cactus Hill and Politics Cactus Hill isnt a perfect example of a Pre-Clovis site. While the west coast presence of Pre-Clovis in North America is accepted, the dates are pretty early for an east-coast site. However, the context for the Clovis and Archaic sites also in the sand sheet would be similarly imperfect, except that Clovis and American Archaic occupations are firmly accepted in the region and so no one questions their reality. The arguments concerning when and how people arrived in the Americas are slowly being revised, but the debate will likely continue for some time to come. Cactus Hills status as a credible evidence of preclovis occupation in Virginia remains one of those questions yet to be fully resolved. Sources Feathers JK, Rhodes EJ, Huot S, and MJM. 2006. Luminescence dating of sand deposits related to late Pleistocene human occupation at the Cactus Hill Site, Virginia, USA. Quaternary Geochronology 1(3):167-187.Goebel T. 2013. Archaeological Records: Global expansion 300,000–8000 years ago, Americas. In: Mock SAEJ, editor. Encyclopedia of Quaternary Science (Second Edition). Amsterdam: Elsevier. p 119-134.Goebel T, Waters MR, and O’Rourke DH. 2008. The Late Pleistocene Dispersal of Modern Humans in the Americas. Science 319:1497-1502.Johnson MF. 2012. Cactus Hill, Rubis-Pearsall and Blueberry Hill: one is an accident; two is a coincidence; three is a pattern – predicting old dirt in the Nottoway river valley of Southeastern Virginia, U.S.A. Exeter: University of Exeter.Wagner DP, and McAvoy JM. 2004. Pedoarchaeology of Cactus Hill, a sandy Paleoindian site in southeastern Virginia, U.S.A. Geoarchaeology 19(4):297-322.Wagner DP. 2017. Cactus Hill, Virginia. In: Gilber t AS, editor. Encyclopedia of Geoarchaeology. Dordrecht: Springer Netherlands. p 95-95.

The Devil, Part Two

The Devil, Part Two The Devil, Part Two The Devil, Part Two By Maeve Maddox A note from Stephen Thom has recalled me to a post that I wrote in May: Speak of the Devil! Maeve, I might suggest double-checking the printers devil expression. Â  It was my understanding that the term referred to the compartmentalized wooden tray that holds all the little metal letter stamps used in a printing press. Â  If that tray got tipped over and the letters spilled the printer would need hours and hours reorganizing the tray (having a devil of a time in the process). Â   This was told to me when my grade-school class trip visited a recreated colonial American village; the man working the old-time printing press told us that was where the term printers devil came from. I know from experience what a devil of a job it is to sort out pied type, i.e., moveable type that has been mixed up. I had the happy fortune to work in a letterpress print shop as an undergraduate. I wasnt allowed near the huge rotary press or the hot linotype machine, but I set type for headlines using a composing stick, and printed my own stationery on the little platen press. I was also called a devil by the elderly shop manager. It was a sad day when we got our first offset machine and saw the beginning of the end. The compartmentalized wooden tray is called a type case. Theres an upper case that holds the capital letters, and a lower case that holds the small letters. Yep, thats where we get the terms uppercase and lowercase. The small letters are placed in the lower case because theyre the ones most used and the lower case is easier to reach. One of my least favorite jobs was going through the compartments looking for pied type. The etymology for printers devil offered by the man in the colonial village is one Ive not been able to find in any printed reference Ive consulted. Heres the entry in Brewers Dictionary of Phrase Fable: A printers devil. A printers message boy; formerly, the boy who took the printed sheets from the tympan of the press. Moxon says (1683): They do commonly so black and bedaub themselves that the workmen do jocosely call them devils. One of my favorite reference books is an 1898 edition of Brewers The Readers Handbook that I acquired years ago in England. This fat little red book is now broken in two from the use its had from me. I learned only recently that the erudite old gentleman also produced a Dictionary of Phrase Fable that first appeared in 1870. The 80 or so devil references in my library copy of the Dictionarys eighth edition cover four closely-printed two-column pages. The devil only knows how many more devil expressions are in the seventeenth edition that I just ordered for myself. Want to improve your English in five minutes a day? Get a subscription and start receiving our writing tips and exercises daily! Keep learning! Browse the Expressions category, check our popular posts, or choose a related post below:English Grammar 101: All You Need to KnowAnyone vs. EveryoneAffect vs. Effect