Introduction
Since the initial publication of the first radiocarbon sequence for Meadowcroft Rockshelter (Adovasio et al. 1975), this site has been among the most controversial localities advanced for early human occupancy of the New World. The reasons for Meadowcroft’s persistently and initially contentious status are ultimately reducible to a single factor – Meadowcroft Rockshelter was the first archaeological locality to seriously challenge the then long-prevailing paradigm that the peopling of the New World was the singular accomplishment of the makers of Clovis fluted projectile points or their immediate precursors.
While Meadowcroft would not be the first site to actually break the Clovis-first barrier (that distinction is almost universally attributed to Monte Verde in Chile), it didset the stage for the collapse of that nearly sacrosanct chronological boundary. Additionally, unlike most of the 500 or so other claimants to pre-Clovis status, Meadowcroft Rockshelter was...
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References
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Adovasio, J.M. (2018). Meadowcroft: Geography and Culture. In: Encyclopedia of Global Archaeology. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-51726-1_1656-2
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