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Meadowcroft Rockshelter, 1977: An Overview

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

J. M. Adovasio ,
J. D. Gunn ,
J. Donahue  and
R. Stuckenrath
J. M. Adovasio
Affiliation:
Department of Anthropology, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA 15260.
J. D. Gunn
Affiliation:
Division of Social Sciences, University of Texas, San Antonio, TX 78285.
J. Donahue
Affiliation:
Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA 15260.
R. Stuckenrath
Affiliation:
Radiation Biology Laboratory, Smithsonian Institution, 12441 Parklawn Drive, Rockville, MD 20852.
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Abstract

Meadowcroft Rockshelter is a deeply stratified multicomponent site in Washington County, southwestern Pennsylvania. The 11 well-defined stratigraphic units identified at the site span at least 16,000 years and perhaps 19,000 years of intermittent occupation by groups representing all of the major cultural stages/periods now recognized in northeastern North America. Throughout the extant sequence, the site served as a locus for hunting, collecting, and food-processing activities, which involved the seasonal exploitation of the immediately adjacent Cross Creek Valley and contiguous uplands. Presently, Meadowcroft Rockshelter represents one of the earliest well-dated evidences of man in the New World as well as the longest occupational sequence in the Western Hemisphere.

Type
Reports
Information
American Antiquity , Volume 43 , Issue 4 , October 1978 , pp. 632 - 651
Copyright
Copyright © Society for American Archaeology 1978

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References

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